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In my example, lying to my great grandmother on her deathbed didn’t encourage either my mother or myself to live dishonest lives. It taught me that I should reduce pain in some situations where a simple minded “categorical imperative” would be violated.A "little white lie" of that type doesn't hurt anybody, does it? Of course it does. It encourages people to live dishonest lives in general.
In my example, lying to my great grandmother on her deathbed didn’t encourage either my mother or myself to live dishonest lives. It taught me that I should reduce pain in some situations where a simple minded “categorical imperative” would be violated.
So turn Anne Frank over to the Nazis. Got it.
But we aren't talking about lying to avoid standing by one's convictions. We are talking about lying so the last we ever did for someone is comfort them.If people have no right to the truth (as a Gestapo agent would not), that is a different situation than merely lying to get out of having to stand by ones religious convictions.
I don't see how lessening pain is more important than respect for truth.
And at any rate, that is a somewhat different situation than what is being discussed.
But we aren't talking about lying to avoid standing by one's convictions. We are talking about lying so the last we ever did for someone is comfort them.
Usually we hear about a person confessing belief on their deathbed. But, imagine a non-believer at the bed of their mother who is a believer. She emotionally suffers because her son is not saved. He could make a false confession of faith before she dies and limit her emotional suffering by thinking he is now saved.
Is it moral or immoral for him to lie to her about his confession of faith in order to give her comfort before she dies?
That's a slander and untrue.Un-Christianly speaking: not really. Just do whatever the hell you feel like since there are no Absolute moral realities
That's a slander and untrue.
Against the other 5.6 billion people in the world who don't get their morality from Christianity. These people do not do whatever the "hell" they feel like, as you say.A slander? Against whom?
Against the other 5.6 billion people in the world who don't get their morality from Christianity. These people do not do whatever the "hell" they feel like, as you say.
If so, it surely didn't come across that way. The charged language seems to undermine the point you wanted to make? What was that point anyway?You've misread my post, Caliban. I was attempting to be prescriptive in my utterance rather than merely descriptive. When I said, "Just do...", it's not exactly a simple statement about some observation.
If so, it surely didn't come across that way. The charged language seems to undermine the point you wanted to make? What was that point anyway?
If so, it surely didn't come across that way. The charged language seems to undermine the point you wanted to make? What was that point anyway?
Against the other 5.6 billion people in the world who don't get their morality from Christianity. These people do not do whatever the "hell" they feel like, as you say.
I agree that many in the U.S., like myself, have Christian vestigial moral instincts. This is simply explained by cultural transmission. I disagree that things like protecting for the weak are exclusively Christian. There is be no way to support that claim.Their is a lot of stuff like protecting the weak, including the handicapped that we do as a society, and even atheists agree with. This stuff does not make sense from a purely evolutionary stand point. Like behavior of social animals etc.
"This stuff does not make sense from a purely evolutionary stand point."
I am unaware of any reputable person advocating for Social Darwinism or anything resembling it. To me it is a non-issue. If you find a public figure advocating such a bad idea--we should discuss it.Well I sort of was meaning that. I actually was going to quote Penn Gillete it hard to find that old column or blog that he use to write and explain it in his own words. Now the notion that atheists would not be in favor of that anymore isn't news, when "selfish gene" Richard Dawkins, has the sense to completely back away from that when confronted with those kinds of implications in a few interviews, debates etc. basically nobody will.
I am unaware of any reputable person advocating for Social Darwinism or anything resembling it. To me it is a non-issue. If you find a public figure advocating such a bad idea--we should discuss it.
I don't know the Gillete reference, but non believers often discuss growing up in the West where Christian norms affect their thinking. This is not an admission of any superiority of Christian morality, it is simply a feature of growing up here. If I had not grown up in a Christian household, I might not have had to overcome intolerance for homosexuals in my youth. I was taught that sexual purity was an important moral issue and it caused me a lot of unnecessary guild as an adolescent and young adult. I was told I was a sinner from birth--these are Christian moral claims. If you want to claim that Christianity is responsible for good moral instruction; you also have to own the negative.
Yes maybe, but that does not make it true. And besides, proper sex education would have done the same thing without the needed shame and guilt of thinking my girlfriend and I were storing up wrath every time we touched each other.your Christian sexual ethics may have saved you from getting a venereal disease or maybe even a teenage pregnancy.
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