that's a perfect example of instinct. you don't see dogs patrolling the street looking for burning buildings, that would require conscience dogs are more loyal than humans, dogs have detected sadness in owners and brought comfort, dogs show affection, they even got Michael Vick arrested. instinct is not conscience a conscience has to do with a moral compass- determination of right and wrong dogs instictively can be extremely loyal and protective but dogs do not have the responsibility of conscience, in other words it is foolish to expect them to make moral decisions that's why it's not rape when a dog has his way with the dog in heat
I opposed the second Gulf War from the beginning, extremely ill advised. I have serious questions about the American intelligence system. Are we that stupid or did our political leaders simply not listen. Probably some of both. Now that we are in there is no easy exit. Like I intimated, I don't always agree with Hitchens, but I find him the most fascinating commentator in the public media.
I don't know any God's that are totalitarian authoritarian dictators (of course I only know one God ) I talk to God, I never have heard an audible word from God. What is wrong with desert people and fishermen? It's all the word of God I am positive slavery wasn't God's idea. The idea probably started with the most intelligent men at the time. There is no slavery in God's Kingdom and He is not going to change His mind about that. Point is you can't love God and I can. And love is ethical in every respect. Even loving Santa Claus is ethical. No I did not say that. I said you cannot repent of your sins to God. Sin is a motivation of the heart; you cannot possibly change the motivation of your own heart, only God could do that. It would be easier for a leapard to change his spots to stripes than for you to change the motivation of your heart. The Holy Spirit prompts me often to do what is right. Has that ever happened to you or another unbeliever? Where did innate conscience come from? Well I have to say he is certainly dishonest about his challenge. He certainly cannot believe in God like I do. The ethics of believing in God are found in the message and life of Jesus. Since he doesn't know God he assumes God cannot be known. So to base his challenge on an assumption is dishonest- it must leave him in the position of discrediting anyone who knows something he doesn't.
i posted this earlier..it's not mine. "In that moment, the story of Jesus was not about who is right and wrong, what God’s name is and who his prophet is, but what exactly God’s motivation toward humanity is. If the message that God wants to get across to us is just about getting our beliefs right, then he didn’t need to come himself. If God’s entire intent was to clarify right from wrong, no personal visitation was necessary. If the ultimate end was simply to overwhelm us with the miraculous so that we would finally believe, then even God taking on flesh and blood and walking among us was far from necessary. There is only one reason for God to come himself, because in issues of love, you just can’t have someone else stand in for you.” i'm not trying to convince you of anything...just sharing perspective. i dont for one minute pretend that something I will write/post here will change anyone's heart. no illusions of that at all.
Great posts.... it's definitely a matter of faith. Reality as we know it would be different if God made Himself absolutely known and without a doubt. For Christians, God did it when He substantiated into Jesus. It's a very profound thought, but two thousand years later, it's a still a matter of faith. In many respects, God is an idea, like liberty. It's a pursuit, and it can't be proven, only seen through our works. We live in a nation that lives and breathes liberty. It's much harder to believe in the concept living in a nation without it. How could liberty be put into words to nations without it? How could it be proven that liberty exists? Even if God were somehow empirically proven false by some means, what comes of it? It still wouldn't answer why we're here.
I could roll my eyes too, yet I think I'll refrain. I'm sure your God and Jesus would be proud of you, however, and perhaps even high five you for the ritual rolling of the eyes. Heaven makes no sense in my own personal (note how I said, "for me") world view. I understand the need of some people for such a place. That's fine. It works for them. Go them. Go you.
sorry I hit the wrong smiley icon. The rolleyes is right above the wink. It obviously really bothered you. I apologize.
Science as we understand it and practice it today is almost exclusively materialistic and objective which is why things like String Theory have a such a hard time being accepted because they can't be tested and many of their predictions cannot be observed. I'm not saying that the scientific mind isn't interested in the deeper meaning as many scientists consider the pursuit of science to also be spiritual. The problem is whether the methodology of science is one that can provide a greater meaning than just beyond the material. For example according to cosmic inflation the latest theory is that the Universe will continue to expand forever until eventually matter and energy will be so diffuse as to be practically indistinguishable from the vacuum. Is there any deeper meaning to that? For a purely objective view of the Universe there isn't and it matters not whether the Universe stays constant, expands into infinity or compacts in a big crunch as thinking beings though with a limited lifespan we are curious about what our role is in the Universe and is there more than just saying we live for a brief period of time in an Universe expanding into nothingness. So science, at least as we currently understand it, is great at understand the hows of our perceived Universe but any sense of meaning is something that we ourselves will seek to imbue. So you are correct that religion can't absolutely answer the why of the Universe but that isn't a question that requires an absolute answer as the search for meaning is inherently subjective.
Just like before E=MC2 was discovered did anyone know relationship between mass and energy? Maybe the meterial world we know is linked in a certain fixed manner to the spiritual world, that is for future generations to discover maybe.
Except that is ignoring human nature that we are self aware thinking beings that are aware of our own mortality. Religion may very well be a delusion but it is one that is for a purpose because as thinking beings it is difficult to accept the alternative of a completely meaningless existence with no after, or before, to that existence. There very well might not be anything more to that but its in our nature to search for answers, or provide them, if we can't find them. If we didn't then we wouldn't fear death as it would be the meaningless end to a meaningless existence. Animals may or may not have morals but to me the deeper question is are animals aware of their mortality or even the passage of time? A bunch of cows grazing in a field from their standpoint they always have and they always will be sitting their grazing. To them its always an endless present and they can't grasp beyond that. The difference with us is that we do go beyond the moment and realize that time passes and eventually existence as we know it will end. Its that knowledge that drives us to ask for something more than what we perceive as objective reality as we know objective reality, at least for us, will end.
Well said. I don't think many people remember what a moral choice is. Moral means that judgments of behavior are made based upon whether they are inherently right or wrong. Webster's dictionary says it is a choice distinquished by what is noble, virtuous, right and honorable in behavior. Moral implies a distinction in what man wills by his choices. No animal reasons a choice according to morals. Animals choose behavior that is instintive to species. I gun is not moral. The choice a man makes using a gun is moral. A knife is not good or evil, it is how a man uses a knife that is moral. My dog had a litter of 12 puppies and killed them all. We were sad but there was no investigation or arrest made.
BTW- an animal may appear moral, but that is because we humans are moral beings and when an animal does something instinctively or through training that appears moral it is because we know in our conscience that the animal behaved in harmony with human conscience. That is why we applaud Shamu for doing tricks without eating the girl riding on Shamu. We say , "Gee, that's a nice Killer Whale!" (but don't be surprised if you go swimming off a Northern California beach and a Killer Whale objects to you taking a ride- it's all instinct and training)
Hmm. Which is it? Instinct or training? Are we humans not trained by society to overcome some of our more base instincts? Lacking that, do things devolve to the state of affairs of Ralph, Piggy, and the rest of the boys in Lord of the Flies? What makes our morals superior when they are simply instinct being overcome by training as well? Is it a matter of degree? [/devil's advocate]
Morality is different than instinct. Training is applicable to both. Moral means right or wrong. The only way to 'remove' morals is to violate the conscience until it cannot work properly. This is what happens to the person who repeatedly does evil. Over time they deaden any sensitivity in their conscience. The first time you peak at something you shouldn't your conscience, if sensitive will let you know- no. But keep doing it and sooner or later your conscience is abused and you cannot experience it anymore in that situation. What you are calling a basic instinct is simply a selfish inclination. We can be trained to crush our conscience and behave just like an animal. But that isn't how God intended for us to live. Animals don't have lesser morals, they have none. Morals only apply to humans. You must understand humans do not commit cold blooded murder because it is instinctive. Humans do not eat other humans because it is instinctive. That kind of behavior requires a perversion of conscience. Animals are all instinctive, that is how God designed them to live. Big fish eat little fishes, that is not fish cannibalism, that is animal instinct. But destroy the human conscience and you are left with animal like inclinations- cannibalism, murder, genocide, human sacrifices etc. Morals cannot fall if the conscience is properly followed. When animals do what a human judges as good and right. The animal did not do it because it was good and right; the human who has moral judgment saw it that way. The animal was being instinctive. The only thing we do instinctively are those things that do not require a choice of action. All of this is in the bible. If you email me I will give you alot of bible to read up on this subject.
Thanks for the offer, but I think I'll pass. I've read the bible more than a few times (for college classes on both the Old and New Testament and personal curiosity) and don't need any proselytizing today. I've just never found an ancient tome composed of the Septuagint (A Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible compiled and canonized around 90AD) and the books sanctioned by Irenaeus of Lyon as canon (as a way to counter the Gnostic movement) a couple of hundred years after Christ's death to be more than a fascinating historical and literary document. I've always been curious as to what did not make it in, other than the Apocrypha (which is an interesting story in and of itself). There are certainly quite a few good ideas in it, especially in the New Testament, but it's riddled with contradictions and barbarism as well. Exactly who pays for the sins of the father? Is it according to Isiah 14:21 or Deuteronomy 24:16? Did Matthew or Luke get it right as to where Jesus gave his first sermon? Matthew (5:1) claims it was on a mountain, but Luke (6:17) says it was on the plain. Both contain essentially the same text, adapted to the audience of the author, so where was it? Was it John ("When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, "It is finished:" and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost."), Luke ("And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, "Father, unto thy hands I commend my spirit:" and having said thus, he gave up the ghost."), or Matthew ("And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, "Eli, eli, lama sabachthani?" that is to say, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" ...Jesus, when he cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost.") who got Jesus' last words (something I would think significant) correct? These may seem like insignificant quibbles, but they matter on some level. Leviticus 20:13 says to kill homosexuals. Leviticus 20:27 says to stone fortune tellers to death. Isaiah 13:15-18 says to kill children in front of their parents and to rape the wives and have no compassion for the children. Kill them all. Deuteronomy 20:10-14 says to to enslave everyone in town if they surrender, but kill them all (except the women, you can have them) if they don't surrender. Exodus 21:7-11 spells out the rules for sex slaves. I can't say that I agree with any of that. Cooking with human dung ("And thou shalt eat it as barley cakes, and thou shalt bake it with dung that cometh out of man, in their sight." - Ezekiel 4:12) and calling for my death by fire (Deuteronomy 13:13-19) seem odd to me as well. Granted, many of these are from the Old Testament, but it's still The Bible. I know the New Testament is the New Covenant, but the fact that God went from being so wrathful and angry to being the loving Christian God worshiped today eats at me a bit too since it contradicts Numbers 23:19 and James 1:17, as well as other verses speaking to the unchanging nature of God. The typical rhetoric I've heard in reply is that God had always planned to sacrifice His Son for humanity, etc. so it wasn't a "true" change, but actions speak louder than words. He went from being a consuming fire - a jealous God (Deuteronomy 4:24) to the God of Light with no darkness in him at all (1 John 1:5). I'm happy that it works for you, but it doesn't for me. I don't see how it can all be held as canon, yet people pick and choose the parts that work for them, taking some things as parables and some as literal with it all open to individual interpretation. I suppose that's what makes it so powerful though. Even with all that said, I admire those who live a Christ-like life. He truly is a role model that everyone can admire and strive to emulate. For what it's worth, I'm a practicing Buddhist.
I've concluded that no matter what science is able to answer - or religion for that matter - it still won't answer the question of why are we here. Because you can always dig a layer deeper. If someone created us, who created them, and so on. If time has a beginning, then what made time have a beginning? Where did all this matter and energy come from. If time went backwards to infinity - then how does that make sense? When did it all begin? No matter how you look at it, no matter what answer we come up with or try to give - it still will not answer the question of why or the purpose or answer this question of meaning. If there is some deeper order and forces - why must that be the end? There might be infinite levels of complexity. Just as we went from matter to atom to protons/electrons to quarks to vibrating 10 dimensional strings - who's to say that it stops there? If you define our purpose via some all powerful being or cosmic force - then what's the purpose of that all powerful being or cosmic force? You can drive yourself nuts. The fact is we live in a ridiculous universe with very limited knowledge on why this thing exists. Some people have the need to find meaning in it all - personally, I'm content not to know the meaning and focus on figuring out how to do better jumps kitesurfing. Life's too short to figure out it's "purpose". You don't need god, science, or faith to be a righteous fellow, be happy, and live a great life.
You know, for someone who claims to have been well versed in evolutionary theory and biology (IIRC, apologies if I've got the wrong guy), but later "saw the light," the amount of ignorance on display here regarding aspects of animal behavior directly related to evolution leads me to believe that your backstory is a calculated farce, a weak attempt to make yourself seem more credible than you actually are (again, apologies if I've got the wrong guy). Morals are a question of degree, tied directly to the amout of intelligence possessed. Animals have lesser intelligence, thus they have lower forms of morality. To say they have absolutely none, to outright dismiss mountains of zoological and ethological research, frankly I don't see how anyone, besides other fervent Christians of course, can take anything you say on this subject seriously.
