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[Pacifist Patriot]

This message was self-deleted by its author (Pacifist Patriot) on Mon Feb 5, 2018, 02:16 PM. When the original post in a discussion thread is self-deleted, the entire discussion thread is automatically locked so new replies cannot be posted.

[Tobin S.]

1. Your boy is all grown up now, momma.

Let the young man think for himself.

[mountain grammy]

2. He'll do fine, mom!

[onager]

3. Ha! I read that as "FSM Orientation."

And thought: "Damn, they're REALLY serious about that new Flying Spaghetti Monster group."

You already figured out that you just need to "butt out and keep it zipped." So I guess all we can do is reinforce the smart decision you already made. Which I see people are doing already.

Maybe you could at least visit the class wearing a Hitchens T-shirt or something.

[AlbertCat]

4. This course examines three main questions:

(1) Yes
(2) Yes
(3) Huh?













But of course school is there to make you think...not to really answer a bunch of questions.

[Yorktown]

5. This course examines three main questions:

(1) Yes
(2) No (*), there is no 'objective' morality
(3) Huh? Agreed: the word 'spirituality' is a sock puppet

2- No, there can't be an 'objective' morality (OM) because there is no standard, no law-giver.
There only are distribution curves of decreasing degrees of agreement to any moral statement.

Let's take an extreme example; moral statement 1 (**): is it OK to murder an innocent child?

I hope absolutely 100% here would say it's wrong. So we would call it objective morality.
Except that it's not 100% and I can think of one bad and one good example.
Bad example: the deranged psychopath. He just won't see the objectivity of that morality.
But the much better -and classic- example: you are part of a small group of twenty persons of a hunted minority (let's say, Jews trying to cross to safety during WWII) and a small party of the hunters is walking near your group, not yet seeing you (here, a patrol of Waffen SS with machine guns). In the group, a baby starts crying as the hunters party approaches hearing distance and the baby can't be stopped from making sounds. What is the objective morality? Kill the baby to save the group? Will the baby's mother agree to that morality? The objectivity of even an apparently unassailable (**) proposition crumbles.

But (*), it's a bit like 'Free Will', it's a play on words because we must act as if there was an objective morality. In general terms, save extraordinary circumstances, we should all consider not murdering an innocent child 'objective' morality.

PS: theist apologists are very big on trying to establish there IS an objective morality. Then they proceed to say such objective morality couldn't be established by humans who differ on so many things, and conclude there has to be an objective law giver, whish -tadaa- is God.

[AlbertCat]

6. No, there can't be an 'objective' morality (OM) because there is no standard, no law-giver.

Whoa..... way too nuanced for school!

[Lordquinton]

7. The extreme example you give

Could be argued that even if it were not morally right, it was still the correct thing to do.

[Yorktown]

8. Then 'your' (hypothetically yours) morals self-destruct

Could be argued that even if it were not morally right, it was still the correct thing to do.

If 'morality' is opposed to 'the correct thing' to do, you just killed morality.

qed.

[Lordquinton]

9. Just goes to show how crappy morality is as a yardstick

It's a very fuzzy, poorly defined term. Reminds me of playing a paladin in D&D, with the stupid moral situations you get put into.

[Yorktown]

10. Agreed. Another proof religions are sandcastles.

One of the precious few tangible religions claim to bring is moral codes.

If, as you write, there is no moral yardstick defined as of today, it proves another failure of religions.

And I would agree it's fuzzy. Morality is just a lot of distribution curves.

[onager]

11. Bring the moral codes!

Soupy Sales brings the Ten Commandments down from the Vasquez Rocks...er, Mt. Sinai. Note nifty product placement. From the hilarious movie "...And God Spoke." Also starring Lou Ferrigno as Cain, Andy Dick as Abel, and Eve Plumb as Mrs. Noah.

[Yorktown]

12. Eve Plumb as Mrs. Noah

Who's Eve Plumb?

[onager]

13. TV sitcom star many years ago.

Here, I'll give you a hint. Though it might not mean much, unless you are of A Certain Age...

Then this lady
Met a man named Charlie
And they knew that it was much more than a hunch.
So they put them all together
And that's how they all became the Manson Bunch...

That's pretty close, anyway.

[Yorktown]

14. Praised be the Flying Spaghetti Monster which invented Google