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Politics : Should God be replaced? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Greg or e who wrote (17449)	5/12/2004 12:39:12 AM
From: Solon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 28931

"I am saying that your opinion does not stand up to rational scrutiny so it is not logically compelling." What you said (over and over and over again) is: just opinions...nothing but opinions...blah, blah, blah." You are now stealing my line, because I have finally hammered it into your head that your opinions are based on superstitious thinking which are therefore no more compelling than opinions based on any other mythology. Of course, my opinions may be rationally scrutinized because they are derived from a belief in natural facts and are presented as commentary on same. You admit that your beliefs are based on supernatural "events" which is a claim for beliefs based on something outside of what can be reasoned. Any feeble attempts at reasoning you have made always begin with supernatural premises which then becomes "reasoning" about whatever supernatural paradigm you have imagined in your mind. Sound reasoning begins with what most competent people know as objective premises. The "reasoning" of your religious agenda always gets to an entirely different universe than the "reasoning" of any other religious agenda. That sort of "reasoning" is just the shouting of children. Nobody wins because all imagination of supernatural beings and places is equally credible and equally incredible. "I have been saying that morals (actually ethics) are not universally possible without a transcendent basis." I know you keep "saying" it! It is your way of "proving" it! But it doesn't cut any ice in the real world! Nor did you say that. You said that there WAS a transcendent basis for moral behaviour--regardless of the fact that morality was everywhere relative and depending on the colour of your uniform, etc. I would certainly agree that Absolute morals are impossible without an Absolute Being. I do not say, however, that just because there are NO Absolute morals, it must follow that there is NO Absolute Being. I have never said that the fact that morality is relative disqualifies all possible ideas of "God". Some people may still seek God without buying into the brutality, cruelty, misogyny, tribalism, and defective character which passes for morality in most religious traditions. "You keep conveniently forgetting that humans have always pointed to a transcendent basis for the the things we all know are right and wrong" Don't be silly. Forget the Inquisition? Forget what happens on a daily basis 365 x 24? No, Greg. I have not forgotten that some people have always disrupted society with their "transcendent basis". But that hardly evidences a transcendent basis. Indeed, since the "transcendent bases" are all at logger-heads with one another and have spoken against the others "transcendent bases" over centuries using both pen and sword...it would appear that (far from suggesting the validity of any one supernatural source)--it simply implies the ignorance and the imaginary bases of all. You seem unaware that these transcendent bases were (IN FACT) thousands in number and based on imagination and fear. How it helps your argument that Yahweh is Jesus and that They placed inerrant truth in YOUR bible, quite fails me. Perhaps you can explain to me how the fact that some people have always believed in the supernatural and have always believed that THEIR supernatural people and places were TRUE supernatural people and places versus the illusionary (and Devil-inspired) people and places of myriad other people, is supposed to argue that YOUR particular God is the author of some supposed Absolute morality? I am thinking of your continued puzzlement as to what would compel people to act civilized and decent (relative to their cultural group, etc) without one of the many Gods who flutter about. And it is so sad to think that Greg M. would not act civilized and decent if he did not believe in God because Greg M. seems to believe that people cannot be good to one another without being "compelled". So do we believe in ONE Holy Land belonging to ONE Holy group of people. Or do we simply recognize that people can be either fair or unfair, kind or unkind about things. And that rational self-interest requires both justice and kindness...and much else. There are one Hell of a lot of BELIEFS (Hooray, Hooray!) being shouted about by one Hell of a lot of people with guns and bombs...but where in the Hell is the kindness?? "In the social creatures referred to as Homo sapiens there are certain behaviours which rationally lead to profit. These include social organization for mutual protection and emotional alliances for sexual and social power. And they include treating friends and associates with honesty and fair value. And they include a tolerance of differences which do not threaten the essential harmony and survival of the group."