How is it consistent to criticize the left for hating America AND not having an objective morality ?

Bradskii

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That says more about your disinterest in other ways of knowing the world, other than the propositional, than the value of Jesus of Nazareth as a human being and religious figure.
Describing God as a 'religious figure' has me scratching my head. But if you want to accept Him just as human, then I'll be as generous as I can be and say that his proclamations were worthwhile repeating. But if your best is to suggest that you should treat others as you'd like to be treated, then I am suitably unimpressed by anyone claiming that this is something explosively new in moral thought.
 
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Tinker Grey

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I do try and force my myself to have some more empathy for others because I don't like becoming bitter and twisted.
Would you say that this is a waste of time?
Well, define enemy. What does it mean to say that one has an enemy? What did Jesus mean by love? Neither the Gospel writers nor Jesus bothered to define their terms (with the sole exception in my memory being neighbor.)

If I am fighting a war, should I jump on a grenade to save the Nazi that was jut now shooting at my comrades-in-arms? Should I love the one that just committed a mass shooting on my family? No. And, again, what would it mean to love that one?

If you merely mean forgive, what do you mean by the term forgive? Sure, the healthy mind eventually figures out how to move on. But why should I call up the murderer and express forgiveness? To what end?

As such, IRL, I don't think I have any actual enemies, just people I find somewhat unpleasant. So for any real use of the word enemy, the maxim is at best useless and at worst wrong.

Most of Jesus' meanings are undefined (anybody want to argue about meekness?). As such, followers make of them what they will.

They are by-and-large just platitudes.
 
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Bradskii

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I do try and force my myself to have some more empathy for others because I don't like becoming bitter and twisted.
Would you say that this is a waste of time?
Being bitter and twisted? Yes.
 
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perplexed

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Can people answer the question below after reading the background to the question , My smarty pants sarcastic response to your answer might help you understand my mindset.

Background to the question:
In the photo below the girl is doing the famous will power experiment, If you wait one minute
before eating the marshmallow you get another one.
1676936878413.png

The girl is using a simple strategy to help her resist temptation
she is not looking at the marshmallow she is looking at the ceiling.

Question:
What would you write on the ceiling to help the girl resist temptation?
 
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Hans Blaster

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Question:
What would you write on the ceiling to help the girl resist temptation?

Just eat the marshmellow, kid. These people are conducting an experiment on you and don't deserve your cooperation.
 
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FireDragon76

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Can people answer the question below after reading the background to the question , My smarty pants sarcastic response to your answer might help you understand my mindset.

Background to the question:
In the photo below the girl is doing the famous will power experiment, If you wait one minute
before eating the marshmallow you get another one.
View attachment 328313
The girl is using a simple strategy to help her resist temptation
she is not looking at the marshmallow she is looking at the ceiling.

Question:
What would you write on the ceiling to help the girl resist temptation?

Even cuttlefish do the same sorts of things in a similar experiment, which implies the cuttlefish is conscious and employs the exact same strategies as a human child, even though a cuttlefish's brain is very dissimilar to a human brain.
 
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gaara4158

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May I interject here for one moment and provide two clarifications about my own perspective on ethics and morality?

One point I need for us to be clear on is that I'm not one who has claimed that "only Christians" have the ability to be moral. What I have claimed is that different persons, if they're not sociopathic, will often hold to different Ethical outlooks and express different [SETS] of moral practice. They can all commonly hold to some general notion about human flourishing as part of the moral impetus, but their use of the same term doesn't necessarily denote the same referents or the same social goals or outcomes.

Secondly, as I've said elsewhere, I am not a Divine Command Ethicist and I never have been.
I’m aware that you’re not a Divine Command Ethicist and you’re not someone who claims a monopoly on valid moral proclamations via your relationship with the Divine Commander. But you did seem to object to my argument stating that claiming objectivity based on the belief in a transcendent code doesn’t necessarily make your moral proclamations any stronger or more compelling. As far as I can tell, everything comes down to outcomes or goals which are ultimately subjective, regardless of the referents or specifics, so I view the validity of morality as a guide to behavior to be basically the same between theistic and atheistic paradigms. There are others in this thread who seem to think they have an objective morality which is more valid in some way than one that isn’t objective. If you don’t agree with them, we’re on the same page, but if there’s a nuanced position between mine and theirs I’d like to hear about it.
 
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gaara4158

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Can people answer the question below after reading the background to the question , My smarty pants sarcastic response to your answer might help you understand my mindset.

Background to the question:
In the photo below the girl is doing the famous will power experiment, If you wait one minute
before eating the marshmallow you get another one.
View attachment 328313
The girl is using a simple strategy to help her resist temptation
she is not looking at the marshmallow she is looking at the ceiling.

Question:
What would you write on the ceiling to help the girl resist temptation?
“Do you even want two marshmallows? They’re not even that good. Eat the one to pass the time and let the lab coats know you won’t be needing the second one.”
 
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2PhiloVoid

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I’m aware that you’re not a Divine Command Ethicist and you’re not someone who claims a monopoly on valid moral proclamations via your relationship with the Divine Commander. But you did seem to object to my argument stating that claiming objectivity based on the belief in a transcendent code doesn’t necessarily make your moral proclamations any stronger or more compelling.
No, your interpretation of what I was intending to say is backwards. I was intending to imply that your morality is no better and no more qualified or objective than is mine. And if we can start with that premise as a beginning point for discussion, then we can proceed with asserting our respective modalities, hueristics, methoda and/or other rational criteris for why we think our own perspective on Ethcis and Morality is "the right one."
As far as I can tell, everything comes down to outcomes or goals which are ultimately subjective, regardless of the referents or specifics, so I view the validity of morality as a guide to behavior to be basically the same between theistic and atheistic paradigms. There are others in this thread who seem to think they have an objective morality which is more valid in some way than one that isn’t objective. If you don’t agree with them, we’re on the same page, but if there’s a nuanced position between mine and theirs I’d like to hear about it.

For me, the first thing to do is to create a surveyed taxonomy of the various positions that exist and break each one down in turn.
 
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gaara4158

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No, your interpretation of what I was intending to say is backwards. I was intending to imply that your morality is no better and no more qualified or objective than is mine. And if we can start with that premise as a beginning point for discussion, then we can proceed with asserting our respective modalities, hueristics, methoda and/or other rational criteris for why we think our own perspective on Ethcis and Morality is "the right one."
Actually, I agree. I have engaged with others in this thread who claimed that theirs was more qualified than mine due to being based objectively in something divine by simply mirroring their rhetoric from a secular perspective, but ultimately I believe there can be no moral discussion without reference to the end goal of morality, which requires subjective input. My basis for morality is no more rational than anyone else’s.

For me, the first thing to do is to create a surveyed taxonomy of the various positions that exist and break each one down in turn.
This sounds time and labor intensive for this medium.
 
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2PhiloVoid

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Actually, I agree. I have engaged with others in this thread who claimed that theirs was more qualified than mine due to being based objectively in something divine by simply mirroring their rhetoric from a secular perspective, but ultimately I believe there can be no moral discussion without reference to the end goal of morality, which requires subjective input. My basis for morality is no more rational than anyone else’s.
Agreed. But we still want to get to a point where we can discern, in a robust manner rather than a loose one that befits solipsism, that we're being morally reasonable in our assertions. However imperfectly may do so, we still have to achieve some level of mutually recognizable justification for our reasoning. Otherwise, we're just slinging mud at each other in the name of "morality."

It'd be really odd if we each insists that we're "going to do our own thing, regardless, and other people can simply kiss our butts" where Ethics and morality are concerned. It'd be particularly obnoxious if we were to do so, all the while remaining not only clueless but also haphazard in our personal insistence about the morality we actually choose to undertake, wouldn't it?
This sounds time and labor intensive for this medium.

It just a part of becoming more educated and informed (and responsible) about the nature of Ethics and the human acts of morality we need to effect. Becoming better educated in the realm of Ethics also helps us see that 'subjectivity' is, itself, open to interpretation and that what is one person's relative conception of 'subjectivity' isn't necessarily equal to another person's concept of subjectivity. They're not all the same nor of equal quality. In the process of more educated inquiry, we may even find other, better terms which apply to our daily perceptions and cognitions about Ethics. Perhaps a term like Inter-subjectivity or Sobjectivity, or other similarly minted terms might have more conceptual relevance than do either subjectivit or objectiviity. Moreover, it's not too much to say that loose, flimsy ideas of "subjectivity" may lead to the accumulation of too many unjustified beliefs about what is 'right' and what is 'wrong.'

In the process of academically surveying and analyzing the field of a topic, we then can discern more clearly where our own previous inclinations and assumptions may have been faulty, especially where the moral quality of actual human interaction is of prime importance.

But, I get it. Studying is time consuming, and sometimes difficult to come by. When I was in college, it was not uncommon for me to hear a number of fellow students who sat with me in various Ethics, Philosophy and Sociology classes complain about the amount of convoluted study they had to endure every semester. To some extent, that's just the way it is, even if we're on a public forum.
 
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Ken-1122

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It'd be really odd if we each insists that we're "going to do our own thing, regardless, and other people can simply kiss our butts" where Ethics and morality are concerned. It'd be particularly obnoxious if we were to do so, all the while remaining not only clueless but also haphazard in our personal insistence about the morality we actually choose to undertake, wouldn't it?
I don’t find that odd at all, as a matter of fact that is how things work in the real world; so long as your “thing” remains within the of the law. The minute doing your moral thing goes against the law, law enforcement will get involved in your moral activities and they will do a whole lot more than “kiss your butt”. That’s the difference between moral laws; vs laws of the land. Everybody can have their own moral laws that they follow, but there can only be one law of the land that everybody is required to follow.
 
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2PhiloVoid

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I don’t find that odd at all, as a matter of fact that is how things work in the real world; so long as your “thing” remains within the of the law. The minute doing your moral thing goes against the law, law enforcement will get involved in your moral activities and they will do a whole lot more than “kiss your butt”. That’s the difference between moral laws; vs laws of the land. Everybody can have their own moral laws that they follow, but there can only be one law of the land that everybody is required to follow.

Yes, I know you don't find it odd, Ken. But my discussion with Gaara is about a different nuance than what you're bringing up here. Mine is about surveying the Ethical landscape, engaging the resulting taxonomy of Ethical perspectives we may find in that landscape, and analyzing each one of the perspectives for strengths and weaknesses...........and to then press other persons to recognize the weaknesses within their supposedly chosen moral perspective.

And if we find along the way that someone has a moral perspective befitting only a sociopath or psychopath, then too bad for him.
 
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Ken-1122

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Yes, I know you don't find it odd, Ken. But my discussion with Gaara is about a different nuance than what you're bringing up here. Mine is about surveying the Ethical landscape, engaging the resulting taxonomy of Ethical perspectives we may find in that landscape, and analyzing each one of the perspectives for strengths and weaknesses...........and to then press other persons to recognize the weaknesses within their supposedly chosen moral perspective.

And if we find along the way that someone has a moral perspective befitting only a sociopath or psychopath, then too bad for him.
It sound like we’re talking about the exact same thing. Ya see; when 2 people survey the ethical landscape the way you described, eventually they are going to approach a moral situation that they will disagree on, and this disagreement does not mean one of them are a sociopath, it’s just when it comes to morality, nobody is going to agree on every issue.
 
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2PhiloVoid

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It sound like we’re talking about the exact same thing. Ya see; when 2 people survey the ethical landscape the way you described, eventually they are going to approach a moral situation that they will disagree on, and this disagreement does not mean one of them are a sociopath, it’s just when it comes to morality, nobody is going to agree on every issue.

I'm not one who, even as a Christian, expects everyone to agree on every issue. But whatever the actual level of agreement may or may not be between us, the point here is that what I'd like to see is everyone coming to grips with the weaknesses existing within their own chosen moral view points.

What I notice is that some people think their moral perspectives are impervious to critique. I don't believe any are.
 
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