Meleagar wrote:Belinda wrote:
Actually there is no life form that is independent of any other life form, even to viruses(if they are life forms at all).
An odd statement from a darwinian evolutionist; was the first form of life not independent of any other forms of life?
Also, rock bacteria seems to be independent of any other form of life, existing on minerals found in rock at 3000 feet.
Could we perhaps not get off topic, we are with this statement in danger of turning this topic away from an investigation of meta-ethics, to a debate about darwinian evolution vs intelligeant design, hence I will not voice any objections because its a totally different subject. Suffice to say though that the proponent of intelligeant design has just as many, if not more gaps in its theory to account for than darwinian evolution, and what's more is says that nature, isn't actually nature, because if nature does not work naturally but intelligeantly how can it be nature at all?
On the subject of ethics and theism/deism though, well, I have a theory about it. I reckon that, there are really four positions one can be, four attitudes to any one particular religion:
1.
Total Denial - This being the view that the religion in question is a total waste of time and that there is absolutely nothing remotely contructive or useful about it. (I do not hold this view, some of my friends do but I think they are being a little presuptuous).
2.
The aesthetic attitude - This being the view that the supernatual claims that the religion is making are not false as such (they are false if taken literally), but rather are metaphorical and/or symbolic allusions. It is akin to when someone says something like "she will be in my heart forever", if taken literaly the statement is frankly retarded, but, there is a difference between what a sentence means semantically, and what one actually does with the statement. Now the origional authors of books like the bible and quran, did not understand the increadible events happening around them (such as the physics behind an earthquake for example), they would have appeared miraculous, ergo, they would have recorded them in the only way they new how,
poetically, as an
artistic representation of what happened. Most historians believe the trojan war did take place, but few with any ounce of sense think that it happened in the way homer described, and such would be the case with all religions. This is the view I hold because it allows me to deny idealism, deism and intelligeant design (because there are significant problems that its proponents simply cannot begin to account for) whilst allowing for religion to be useful.
I certainly don't think religion is necessary but I certainly think that its useful.
3. The moralistic attitude - This being the view that does take the supernatual elements of the religion seriously, literally, but, limits it to a large extent. Most religious people with an ounce of sense take this view, here is how it works. Religious texts, may well convey messages from supernatural entities, but, they are translated through the veil of mortal minds, imperfect minds, ergo, the texts in question are always imperfect. Jesus did not write the bible, his followers did, ergo there is bound to be some mistakes. Not all the authors even knew Jesus at all, and had only other humans to learn from! Such is the case with all religions. But there is a way we can cope with this, it is based on the following assumptions. That god/gods/spiritual energy (or whatever it is you believe in) exists, that it is rational, and that it is ethical through that rationality. So for example if your a christian, your concerned with atoning for sins through self sacrifice and belief etc etc, the point being, how are we to know what our sins are? Through the bible? Well, partly, but unfortunately the bible cannot be the B all and end all because it was written by humans who are imperfect, ontop of that there are numerous inconsistencies. Certainly
some of it is true, (says the believer anyway) so how are we to sort out the truth from the falsity, well, its simple, which parts of the book are logical, and which are ethical? How do we tell ethical? Simply, what is actually contructive. So for example when god told abraham to kill his son, its all very well "trusting god" i.e. showing faith, the virtue of trust etc, but unfortunately that is abusing trust, because the end is clearly unethical. How is killing your son contructive in any way! Ergo, what abraham should have said was, "no! explain why first!", or even "no, f**k off!". Most sensible religious people I know hold this view, in that they do NOT think that by dint of being an atheist I will go strait to hell, how is that contructive in any way? It does not allow me to learn from my mistakes, which is what justice is all about, and if its unjust its clearly not what god would want, or even allow! They do NOT think that if god tells them to rape and murder and steal they ought to do it, because god would NOT tell them that, ergo whatever IS telling them to do that, clearly ISN'T god! (So when the jews killed the amalokites, it clearly wasn't god who told them to do that because god WOULDN'T tell them to do that!)
4. The extremist - This being the view that both logical and morality are somehow subject to god's whim, meaning that, no matter what it is that god tells you to do, that is what you ought to do. So if god does tell you to commit genocide, that is ethical. The problem with that, is that many people think that god IS saying that, (global jihad etc) where he clearly isn't, but more importantly its fundamentally absurd, because, if all morality means is to be subject to god's unjustified whims, then how is morality useful or desired? If being moral means committing genocide, then how is morality useful or contructive? It would render morality totally devoid of any value! If god is ethical, he must be subject to ethics, god is not a dictator!