February 12, 2011

Bill Maher about Barack Obama: "I think he's a centrist the way he's a Christian... not really."

Via Instapundit:



And Cornel West says "being a Christian is not a political orientation for the President." Oh, thanks for putting it that way. An apt turn of words, Cornel. Because that's exactly what I think Obama's Christianity is: a political orientation.

My source? I said it before:
My source is "Dreams from My Father," chapter 14. While working as a community organizer, Obama was told that it would "help [his] mission if [he] had a church home" and that Jeremiah Wright "might be worth talking to" because "his message seemed to appeal to young people like [him]." Obama wrote that "not all of what these people [who went to Trinity] sought was strictly religious... it wasn't just Jesus they were coming home to." He was told that "if you joined the church you could help us start a community program," and he didn't want to "confess that [he] could no longer distinguish between faith and mere folly." He was, he writes, "a reluctant skeptic." Thereafter, he attends a church service and hears Wright give a sermon titled "The Audacity of Hope" (which would, of course, be the title of Obama's second book). He describes how moved he was by the service, but what moves him is the others around him as they respond to a sermon about black culture and history. He never says he felt the presence of God or accepted Jesus as his savior or anything that suggests he let go of his skepticism. Obama's own book makes him look like an agnostic (or an atheist). He respects religion because he responds to the people who believe, and he seems oriented toward leveraging the religious beliefs of the people for worldly, political ends.

229 comments:

«Oldest   ‹Older   201 – 229 of 229
jr565 said...

If morality required inefficiency, better to be poor than corrupted, would you call it moral? Take Afghanistan. The "moral" code required women not be educated and women not see male doctors. The result was an infant (and mother) mortality rate that wasn't just bad but utterly appalling. Don't you think it's an *indication* that a system is immoral if it doesn't just allow, but practically *demands* that babies die?

Our society demands that babies die. Look at all the babies killed through abortion.and while I certainly deplore the treatment of women in Afghanistan and the muslim world, I am appealing to absolute values of right and wrong, so of course mistreatment of women is wrong. However, if there is no such underpinning then when I critiqued Afghanistan I might say they were inneficient but I wouldn't say they were immoral since that would be irrelevant.


Do you really think it's a coincidence that the wealthiest societies protect property rights and individual sovereignty, don't keep slaves and do treat women equally?


All of those are recent phenomenons. However you could easily find rich and wealthy societies throughout histiory that gave property rights to the wealthy and which kept slaves and treated women equally. Look at the British Empire. In fact it could be argued that as they gave up their empire, gave up their slaves and democratized they in fact lost status and influence.

Gabriel Hanna said...

@jr565:

You're still dodging my question:

How do we know what god to follow in order to establish our morality without resorting to opinion?

Again, got nuthin. More and more verbiage about how ATHEISTS can't answer that question. But theists ALSO must resort to opinion, because different Gods say different things to different people.

But my challenge to you is, once AGAIN, how can a theistic morality be established since every theist has his own opinion on which god is legitimate.

What's the difference between "I say north is this way" vs "I say my invisible captain says north is this way"?

All you've done is push the moral relativism back on what religion we adopt that has the morality we want.

My morality actually is absolute. it's based on what I think is moral. Morality is what I say it is. If you disagree with me, then you're wrong. Why should you believe me? Not my problem. If I invent a God and say he provides my morality, you still have to decide for yourself, using fallible human opinion, whether my source of morality is to be trusted. If you don't beleive in my God, not my problem.

You have a double standard for theists and nontheists. Theists are allowed to point to their invisible captain and you take their word for it, but a nontheist nontheist speaking for himself all of a sudden has to deduce everything from first principles.

Revenant said...

I think I have.

Yes, but nobody else appears to share that opinion. So far two people have given up on trying to communicate with you, and the two who remain -- one atheist, one not -- aren't having much luck getting through to you either.

But you can help us out.

I'll pass; I've seen you play this game before. :)

Gabriel Hanna said...

@jr565:

Hans Reichenbach wrote, if I'm getting it right (it's subtle), that morality is not something you know or don't know, it's your expression of the behavior that you demand from other people. Because moral principles are, in this view, statements about what people desire the world to be, they can't be true or false. Every person is free, whether we want them to be or not, to reject others' principles and demand that every one follows his own. Everyone is already doing this, whether they pass the buck to religion or not, because we all have to decide what religion we're going to listen to.

When you say "it's wrong to kill people and take their stuff" you are demanding that other people not kill people and take their stuff, and you are refusing to obey those who say that it's not wrong. We all choose which moral principles to follow, in practice.

Now you seem to think that if there's no unambiguous way to decide who's right, then everybody gets to say whatever they want. But that's how it is ALREADY, that's how it will always be. If God appears to everyone simultaneously tomorrow and tells us all what to do, we will still be free to think he's wrong, unless he reaches into our brains and stops the neurons from firing.

Throwing the responsibility for your actions on what God told you is just a way for you to avoid responsibility for the demands you make on other people.

Gabriel Hanna said...

@jr565:

Explain why murder is wrong, and not simply stating that murder deprives people of their life. Why is THAT wrong?
A materialistic universe is morally indifferent. Where then are you getting an objective morality.


I think the main problem is that you don't really know what "absolute" means.

Murder is wrong because I say it is wrong. I don't murder people, I don't participate in murder, I don't condone murder. When people say that they murder is okay I call them sick bastards and refuse to associate with them. I don't allow murders that are in my power to prevent. I support laws that prevent murder and I support the enforcement of those laws and I will assist in the prevention and punishment of any murder that goes on in whatever way I am needed. I'm going to teach my kids the same even if murder gets legalized.

Now of course you can say "Why", but "murder is wrong" is my premise and I refuse to enertain others. (Why not? Because.) You can choose a different premise if you want, but your premise is morally wrong in my absolute morality and I won't listen to arguments that you make suggesting otherwise. I may not be able to persuade you of that, but I don't care if you're persuaded or not, you don't get to committ murder if I can prevent it. This is what Reichenbach calls "social friction".

Social friction may not satisfy you, you may say it comes down to "might makes right". But it doesn't. Society can and does come to the wrong moral answers. (Who says what's moral? I do. You can say what you want about it, I listen to me.) Society may be right or may be wrong, but in practice it DOES control the outcome, whether that outcome be morally right or morally wrong (by my morality, the only one I care about.) Society can't make me agree that its moral dictates are correct, but it can force them on me.

It's an absolute morality. But according to you it's only absolute if I preface "God told me" to each sentence of my rant and that doesn't make any sense. Where my morality came from, from my own brain or from golden plates or a burning bush, doesn't matter, it's still absolute.

Gabriel Hanna said...

Incidentally, any of the other commenters wishing the benefit of absolute answers to moral questions are encouraged to get in touch with me. There will be a nominal fee.

jr565 said...

Gabriel Hana wrote:
Social friction may not satisfy you, you may say it comes down to "might makes right". But it doesn't. Society can and does come to the wrong moral answers. (Who says what's moral? I do. You can say what you want about it, I listen to me.)

Of course it's might makes right. You're establishing that there is in fact no real moral choices. If I eat babies it's not objectively wrong, it's only wrong if 3 out of 5 people agree that it is and then coerce me to agree to their morality through force of will.
So as I said there is nothing really more moral between Hitler or Ghandi except for your personal preference, and the need to force others coercively to believe what you want them to believe. The only appeal you have is your logic and then the power to coerce others to bend to your will. Morality doesn't actually exist.
A serial killer is as right (and wrong) as the most virtuous man who never commits any sin.You're acknowledging that there is no real morality. As for theists, they may want to murder, but there are rules against such things so he can't do such things without damning his soul. If a serial wants to murder and there is no god, the only real wrong he can commit is getting caught. If he's stronger then his victims he's right.

jr565 said...

Gabriel Hana wrote:
t's an absolute morality. But according to you it's only absolute if I preface "God told me" to each sentence of my rant and that doesn't make any sense. Where my morality came from, from my own brain or from golden plates or a burning bush, doesn't matter, it's still absolute.


And of course it's only "absolute" insofar as society has a rule against it. Though since societies and ethos constantly evolve, what is immoral today may be moral tomorrow and vice versa. How is that absolute? If tomorrow the rules change to allow murder (like say legalizing euthenasia) most theists would still have a problem with it because it would meet their definition of murder and violate their sense that human life has intrinsice worth despite what the states and law may say. For theists there is human law and then there is a higher law. The higher law doesn't change. Rend unto caesar what belongs to Caesar and unto God what belongs to God. For you there is only Caesar's law.

Why are liberals always suggesting you can't legislate morality? Isn't that exactly what you are suggesting society should do all the time? And aren't you acknowledging that the law is itself arbitrary. It's not based on any REAL morality, so it's justice is unjust. And yet it compels the state to take away freedom of individuals for purely arbitrary reasons.

jr565 said...

But then again, since our rights are not in fact inaliable since we aren't endowed by our creator with them, we don't really have those rights to begin with. Those rights themselves are as arbitrary as the laws on which theyre based.

jr565 said...

Gabriel Hanna wrote:
You have a double standard for theists and nontheists. Theists are allowed to point to their invisible captain and you take their word for it, but a nontheist nontheist speaking for himself all of a sudden has to deduce everything from first principles.

Sure there's a double standard because the two are different. A theist who points to their invisible captain is referring to rule and laws that he must abide by or face consequences not because he necessarily wants to follow those rules but because those things are either right or wrong, and will be right or wrong if he's on the world or buried underneath it. It's bigger than him. For a nontheist he only speaks for himself. His rules dictate that he's right if he thinks he's right and that there are no actual rules except for those he wants. He could base his morality on how he wants others to treat him, or he could base his morality on how he wants to treat others. There's no reason that self interest has to be selfless. He's his own god and dictator. And like any dictator he feels he can force others to abide by his edicts simply because that is how the world should run according to him even though there is no actual proof that that which he says is right or wrong is in fact right or wrong.
I don't see why we actually have problems with the Sadaam Husseins of the world, considering he is simply making the rules according to his whim and then using his power of govt to coerce others to satisfy his most base instincts, just as you think you have the right to do simply because that is how the world should run to YOU. You think that you can control peoples actions based on your whim and take away their freedoms because you have a problem with X, the Taliban feel they can chop peoples heads off because they aren't wearing beards or play music. Under your morality I can't really find a problem with what the Taliban are doing, other than that I disagree with it. But my disagreements are not really based on objective facts,only personal opinion. Since they have the power to compel others to not play music they are in fact right nor to heed our opinions they are in fact right.

Gabriel Hanna said...

@jr565:

If I eat babies it's not objectively wrong,

It is objectively wrong. I just may not be able to do anything about it.

Moral statements are not facts, they are expressions of will.

Morality doesn't actually exist.

Yes it does, we're talking about it. People live by it. It exists, but it doesn't work the way you think it does.

You're acknowledging that there is no real morality.

No. There is a real morality. Mine.

As for theists, they may want to murder, but there are rules against such things so he can't do such things without damning his soul.

Of course he can, he just chooses a religion without damnation or a religion where murder is okay. In all your verbiage you have never addressed this point.

Under your morality I can't really find a problem with what the Taliban are doing, other than that I disagree with it.

I just told you that my morality forbids murder absolutely, but if you have a problem in this specific case, yes, the Taliban's practices are immoral.

It's very simple.

But they are acting as they do under threat of damnation, which according to you is the guarantee that their morality is correct. And now you are going to tl; dr all over it, but you will never, ever address that point: that people choose what religion to believe to get the morality they desire.

Gabriel Hanna said...

@jr565:

Explain how you reject Taliban morality without appealing to human opinion. They have a God and holy books and everything who tells them what to do on pain of damnation.

No more tl; dr from you. Just explain how you can reject the clear word of God expressed by the Taliban, if God gives us objective morality.

Well, maybe you accept it, I guess you can give that answer too.

jr565 said...

Gabriel hanna wrote:
No. There is a real morality. Mine.

And mine. And I guess whoever can coerce through law or otherwise the other to submit to their will is in the right.Is that correct? So, if we're on a desert island there really isn't a common shared morality greater than the both of us. It's simply a contest of wills and who can get the other to submit. Right?

jr565 said...

Gabriel Hanna wrote:
But they are acting as they do under threat of damnation, which according to you is the guarantee that their morality is correct. And now you are going to tl; dr all over it, but you will never, ever address that point: that people choose what religion to believe to get the morality they desire.

That very well may be true. In many cases you are born with your religion, but in other cases you come to your religion through your morality. Most religions, on the most fundamental questions have it as a given that the big things are either right or wrong (there are very few religions for example that say murder is ok forexample (and not killing murder). So if you're a deist you might reject all the outward trappings of religion and find common ground amongst all religions and say those are the greater truths that all have come to agree upon. But you're right you're not going to come to a religion that you fundamentally don't agree with. So you would seek out a religion that meets your morals. Different religions would speak to you differently. Some religions might profoundly even change your mind to either conform to that religion or to reject that religion and change your views accordingly. That's ultimately irrelevant though.
The atheistic worldview in fact makes any such discussion of morality as moot. There is no morality based on a principle above any humans thought, so there is really no such a thing as a just law or an unjust law only laws that people make and then force others to adhere to through coercion. There are then no fundamental rights or truths that are true whether we agree or not. And no real freedom. Even the most free system is simply a system set up to deny people the right to do as they would, and jail them if they don't abide by the rules. Rules that are not in place because of any great truth, but only because a collected group of people wrote it that way, and then said if people didn't follow they'd be jailed. And there's no real reason to "do right" or "do wrong" since the very concept would be immaterial. Doing right would be doing what's in my best interest. If that means that I rape women or eat babies or murder you and your family then that is right. You may say I'm violating your rights to not be molested, but you'd similarly be violating my rights to molest. There are no real rights anyway. Since neither can establish that molesting is either right or wrong outside of the context of our own actions then what is right is whatever the victor decides.
how can you ever be wrong if you never think you're wrong? And how is that different than being a sociopath? Sociopaths don't care what other people think.Do you? You've already established that the only morality is yours. What's the difference? A psychopath has no remorse if he kills people. And what's wrong with that? That would suggest that one should have such remorse, but you've already established that yours is the only morality so on what basis are we establishing that? If you don't think that you need empathy for other human beings then you're right.
All you are is a tyrant just like the psycopathic killer. That you don't kill is immaterial, since killing or not killing and whether its good or bad is in the eye of the beholder.
Can you come up with any reason why killing or murder is wrong, other than "Because I said so!"? If someone said they thought murder was right because They said so, then why even have a debate about it. Do what you will.
It would be like someone saying 2+2=4 and someone else saying 2+2=5. If 2 doesn't actually mean anything then why have an argument about it. Either side would have to adamantly believe that they are right and then coerce the other into submission, not because 2 actually meant something but because they seeked to hold power over their neighbor.

jr565 said...

Gabriel Hanna wrote:
If I eat babies it's not objectively wrong,

"It is objectively wrong. I just may not be able to do anything about it.

Moral statements are not facts, they are expressions of will."

You've just proven that my eating babies is not objectively wrong because you thin that moral statements are not facts. You could never prove that eating babies is wrong, all you could say is you don't like it. Well who cares? As to whether you can do something about it, sure you could. You could similarly express your will. Just as the baby eater coerced the baby to his will through action you could coerce the baby killer to be killed through force of your will. But that wouldn't solve the problem of whether eating babies was right or wrong, nor whether you responding by jailing a baby killer is right or wrong either. If you did act or didn't act to deal with a baby it would matter in neither case. You can't establish anything moral at all.

"Yes it does, we're talking about it. People live by it. It exists, but it doesn't work the way you think it does.
No, what exists is your ability to say what's right, along with everyone else's ability to also say what's right and then the will to coerce others to bend to their will. You are simply describing a process not making a moral value judgement and you can't. You can never be wrong. I can never be wrong, so if being wrong or right can mean everything it means nothing.

"Of course he can, he just chooses a religion without damnation or a religion where murder is okay. In all your verbiage you have never addressed this point.

How about people who do things wrong yet who choose a religion that says doing such things are in fact wrong? Like say a person who is told that theft is wrong yet who in a dark hour breaks the rules and steals and then feels bad about it. He doesn't change his morality or religion simply because he has pangs in his conscience. Isn't the person with a conscience the biggest sap in the world? Like you with your refusal to kill under any circumstances. Absent a higher moral rule that precludes kiling it sounds like a form of insanity. Why cling to something that works against your self interest so thoroughly when there is no basis for you to actually believe what you believe and no benefit to your believing it anyway?

jr565 said...

Also,
you think that the only morality that matters is your own, and that you can coerce others and take away their freedoms, not because what you believe is right or wrong based on any criteria but simply because you believe it. And is every other person not similarly entitled to coerce you to their will if they expend the actions to do so? So then the only real question is who can coerce the other one more efficiently, right?

Gabriel Hanna said...

@jr565:

That very well may be true. In many cases you are born with your religion, but in other cases you come to your religion through your morality.

THANK YOU. Game, set, match. Bye.

Religion-based morality is just as "relative"--it depends on your opinions on morals, or those of your parents.

jr565 said...

Gabriel Hana wrote:
THANK YOU. Game, set, match. Bye.

Religion-based morality is just as "relative"--it depends on your opinions on morals, or those of your parents.

You're confusing why you would join a religion with the relative nature of morality. And there's a difference. Morality would be constant and not relative because of religion believing in an ordered universe.
I also believe in the laws of gravity. One could argue that gravity doesn't conform to any law, and it's just as relative to believe in the law of gravity as to not believe in the law of gravity. Only the law of gravity is not relative at all. It's constant. Religious morality is what it is and you can certainly reject it, but it doesn't mean that it changes to suit the believer, because the believer believes that it is beyond them, not from them.
Atheists believe that morality is of their own making. So every person who ever set foot on the earth had their own unique ideas about what was good. If someone believes in raping and someone believes in non violence, then the morality of the equation would have to be settled through action. If the rapist was able to rape his victim he was in the right. How is he possibly wrong? he thinks he's right, therefore he's right. Others may think that he's wrong, but you've already established that the individual is hte one who creates their morality and they can never be wrong with it. Further they then coerce others into following their belief through force, sort of like you saying you would stop a murderer. If there are no objective truths, then a rapist trying to rape someone and someone trying to stop a rape are morally indistinguishable. All it ends up being is one side tries to force his views on the other side through coercion and the stronger wins out. That's the only morality that an atheist should expect.That's the morality of nature and a random universe. There is no right or wrong, there is just "is".

jr565 said...

So now, explain how you forcing your will on those who seek to murder and prevent them from killing is somehow better than those who seek to kill people and force their will onto them. You'd have to first establish that murder is (absolutely) wrong. Since you can't argue that it's absolutley wrong due to a law higher than ourselves, the only way you could argue that murder was wrong was through logic. So what's your logic? Saying "because I said so" is not sufficient, because you are not a god, and anyone can similarly say that. You seem to think that your morality of "I said so" should compel others to bend to your will, yet the same principle would apply to them, unless you think you should be granted some specific considerations.
In order for there to be morality there have to be benchmarks that are constant. Your view would not allow for such things.
So determining any question morally is ridiculous. There would be no vocabulary for determinining a moral truth, and you've already stated as your baseline that such a truth could never be established, or that alternatively there are 6 billions forms of truth as to whether murder is right or wrong since every person living could come up with their own calculus, and then 6 billion people could similarly compel the other 5.99 billion to follow their whims if the right amount of pressure is applied. What kind of pressure? Who cares? That is as irrelevant as what the argument was about in the first place. Whether they coerced their brethren through laws or through a firing squad would be immaterial, because there is no basis for saying that a law or a bullet is more or less moral.It would be like trying to spell things when noone came up with an alphabet.
I could argue that you spell a word with a specific way because there is an overarching alphabet that dictates proper and improper spelling, but you could always counter that there is a cyrillic alphabet and a chinese alphabet so who is to really say how you spell a word.Then your worldview would ultimatley deconstruct language just as your world view deconstructs morality. But I would counter that if you have no alphabet then spelling words is a useless endeavor and words really have no meaning. That's your morality.

jr565 said...

isn't an atheists view that there is an objective morality as much based on faith as a religious persons belief in religion?
THere is no proof for your view that absent a god or an ordered universe there is some way to measure goodness or badness or good or evil. That would be the only thing that would allow for such black and white terms, and atheists are all about the shades of gray. Black is a shade of gray as is white and it ultimately doesn't matter if the gray is darker or lighter since it's all gray anyway.

jr565 said...

Here's Ted Bundy:
"Then I learned that all moral judgments are “value judgments,” that all value judgments are subjective, and that none can be proved to be either “right” or “wrong”….I discovered that to become truly free, truly unfettered, I had to become truly uninhibited. And I quickly discovered that the greatest obstacle to my freedom, the greatest block and limitation to it, consists in the insupportable “value judgment” that I was bound to respect the rights of others. I asked myself, who were these “others”? Other human beings, with human rights? Why is it more wrong to kill a human animal than any other animal, a pig or a sheep or a steer? Is your life more to you than a hog’s life to a hog? Why should I be willing to sacrifice my pleasure more for the one than for the other? Surely, you would not, in this age of scientific enlightenment, declare that God or nature has marked some pleasures as “moral” or “good” and others as “immoral” or “bad”? In any case, let me assure you, my dear young lady, that there is absolutely no comparison between the pleasure I might take in eating ham and the pleasure I anticipate in raping and murdering you. That is the honest conclusion to which my education has led me—after the most conscientious examination of my spontaneous and uninhibited self."


Ted Bundy sounds a lot like Gabriel Hanna.
What is the atheistic response to Ted Bundy? Is he evil? Or has he simply applied his own morality to the world and said it ok for him to rape and murder women? The worst thing that Gabriel Hana could say is "I disagree with how you treat women" but he could never say Ted Bundy is evil. And who cares what Gabriel thinks about how Ted Bundy treated his women. Certainly not Ted Bundy.

Terry said...

Indeed, many of us believe that the lack of a "clock-winder" makes the universe a more rational and objective place than it would otherwise be.

"Believe"?

jr565 said...

Coulnd't one argue that in fact, under Gabriels rules that Ted Bundy is a virtous man? Compare Ted Bundy to Gabriels edict that he is against all murder simply because he is.If we had to make a moral argument that one is better than the other, how does Gabriel propose to do it.
Seems to me Bundy's argument is pretty impeccable. If all moral judgements are simply value judgements and they can't be right or wrong then why follow them. The "value judgment" that he needed to respect the rights of others was insupportable and in fact interfered with his true freedom. I would certainly say that Gabriels stance to not kill is a moral one, but then again I'd be arguing an absolute. To Ted and Gabriel such absolutes would simply be value judgements neither right or wrong.

jr565 said...

In fact Gabriels' social friction argument sounds an awful lot like Ted Bundy's rationalizatoin for why he rapes and kills.
He is right simply because he is. He doesn't care what others think. Morality as defned by others is simply value judgments none of which have to be adhered to and which are not real anyway. He is disgusted by murder just as Ted is aroused by murder.
The idea that murder is good or bad though is simply a value judgment. Who's to say absent objective truth that Gabriels impulse is more moral than Ted's. Can Gabriel answer that?

Revenant said...

Indeed, many of us believe that the lack of a "clock-winder" makes the universe a more rational and objective place than it would otherwise be.

"Believe"?

Believe, v., "to have confidence in the truth of".

Revenant said...

In fact Gabriels' social friction argument sounds an awful lot like Ted Bundy's rationalizatoin for why he rapes and kills.

Not really, but I'm sure you'll be happy to spend 5000 unread words "explaining" that assertion.

jr565 said...

Revenant isn't this what you essentially have to believe if you don't believe in a god or a rational universe:

"Then I learned that all moral judgments are “value judgments,” that all value judgments are subjective, and that none can be proved to be either “right” or “wrong”…

How could moral judgements be anything other than value judgements based solely on the individual making them. And since 6 billion people each would make value judgments and since there would be no overlying truth (since there, again is no rationaly universe) there is no way to objectively judge said judgments as either positive or negative (except in your personal opinion, which would be as special as any one of the other billions of people who share the same planet).
Hence, there is no way for you to have an objective morality. Nor is there any real way to determine that that which you say is right or proper or moral can in any way objectively be so.
So is a humanistic value system cannot be better or worse than that of a genocidal madmans. You may like it better, but a genocidal madman may like his better.
I know you don't want to admit it, but that's what atheism naturally leads to. There can be no morality. That doesn't mean an atheist can't be a moral person to others (if they feel his value sytem matches theirs) or to himself, since whatever he does can be construed as right since he thinks it is. But then look at Ted Bundy. How are you proving his way of thinking is wrong.
Care to respond? You got nuthin'.

jr565 said...

If the idea of doing good is only a value judgment then why should you do good (according to other peoples value systems which are not real moral truths) if it doesn't benefit you? If you have an appetite to kill and rape women, and if the idea that you shouldn't rape and kill is simply a value judgement, then why shouldn't you rape women if that is what makes you happy?
Or if you simply want to be the richest person ever and don't care if you hurt others, and the idea that you should be an honest businessman is simply a value judgment (according to other peoples value systems) then what is wrong with Bernie Madoff's actions, other than that he got caught?
Are we responsible to adhere to the value systems of others? Isn't that simply a value judgment?
Even the idea that everything is permissable so long as it's consensual and as no one is hurt (ie Locke) would be another value judgment ultimately rendered meaningless. First off, who is determining who is consenting, and who is determining the harm? But more importantly, why is that any more valid than saying everything is permissible even if there is no consent and even if people get hurt. Since either is simply a neutral value judgement no better or worse, then the only thing you could really say is you disagree that you shouldnt be allowed to hurt people.
But that is no different than saying you don't like vanilla ice cream.
Right Revenant?

Revenant said...

Word count: 530.

«Oldest ‹Older   201 – 229 of 229   Newer› Newest»