dsayers

Define your terms. Morality refers to the consistency of behaviors that are binding upon others. You say "if you are immoral" and "if you are moral," but people don't have moral components, behaviors do. Racism is holding the belief that ethnicity A is inferior/superior to ethnicity B. Such a belief is not binding upon others and therefore has no moral component. The author put forth morality as a standard. Keeping this in mind, immoral is not better than immoral. He also put forth generosity as a standard. That which is taken by force is not a generous donation. Besides, who are you to decide for others which is better? In a secular democracy, the initiation of the use of force is largely invisible. I say better the devil you know than the one you regard as a savior.

Same, but for different reasons. It claims being racist is immoral and that being generous is being moral. So it suffers from the lack of integrity of not defining terms. The quote "your laws... based on rational thought" is irrational, implying the religion of Statism. All in all, some of the things seem antagonistic, which suggests bias during data analysis and personal gratification from the results.

And who in turn pays for that extra effort and capital? All of us! They're protecting us already.

Non-denominational Christianity was inflicted upon me as if it were factual. It was used as a way of threatening me by proxy to alter my behavior to the point of stunting natural curiosity, exploration, and rational thought. I was made to attend Sunday school and church every week. I was given books to read, all in lieu of an actual nurturing relationship with my actual parents. Most memorable to me was the way I had a crisis of conscience regarding my biological drive to masturbate and being told it was a sin to engage in lustful thoughts and behaviors. I often cried, feeling utter despair, promising God I would never do it again, yet couldn't seem to stop. I felt that I was dooming myself to an eternity of hellfire for something that is in fact both natural and healthy. This actually led to sexually deviant behavior, with victims :*( Credit actually goes to George Carlin for sparking the beginning of my road to acceptance that there is no God. Sorry, I don't like the word atheist because it implies that theism is the norm and non-theism is a deviation. Even though George Carlin planted the seed of doubt, I was again terrified that the very thought that God doesn't exist would be tantamount to an eternity of hellfire. That's some seriously fucked up programming there! Even my father present day uses the logical fallacy of you should believe just because there's "no harm" if you're wrong. Which isn't believing, but I digress. It was fun watching Penn & Teller's Bullshit with him because we both watched the show, but he always felt the need to offset anything they said against religion. I don't remember how or when I finally accepted that there is no God without any reservations or fear. Kind of like how if you're jarred from sleep, you cannot actually identify the specific moment you became lucid. It wasn't until I watched Stef's Introduction to Philosophy series years later that I was finally able to articulate thoughts on the subject. I'm being very literal here because this infliction of irrationality is as far reaching as reducing a person's vocabulary to make them less capable of resistance and escape. It is psychological imprisonment and torture, used in my case as a form of prior restraint of a creature forming, learning the world they're living in as is necessary for survival.

Also, I keep forgetting to share one of my favorite FDR video. One where .

I think the first half of this video covers addiction pretty well:

By this, do you mean that both watching porn and eating food from McDonald's are behaviors that are not binding upon others and therefore have no moral component (amoral)? Because "has moral significance" doesn't seem like an accurate way to describe having no moral significance. @BaylorPRSer: It's none of my business obviously, so of course there's no pressure to answer. But are you having sex in the meantime with a partner? Because there's health benefits to regular ejaculation. So while I obviously accept that you are free to do what you want for whatever reason you want, and I appreciate your honesty regarding the lack of a moral component, I would still hope your decision was an educated one. Either way, thanks for sharing.

Welcome, Mprobison! I would argue that the behavior of verifying is the result of belief or doubt as a motivator. I've argued before that "belief" is a temporary state; Only valuable if used as motivation to test the theory in order to upgrade it to truth, or discard it as not accurately describing the real world. In this way, I think verifying demonstrates the uncertainty that "believe" and "doubt" refer to. You don't present day verify that 2+2=4 because you experience no uncertainty with regards to that proposition. The term philosophy denotes a love of wisdom or pursuit of the truth. I would ask those who are making the assertion to define their terms before bothering to respond to it. Philosophy refers to a method, not the goal the method is used to achieve. So opening the Bible to test if something is true would be bad philosophy. Testing an objective claim to see how accurately it describes the real world is good philosophy. To this end, neither belief nor doubt are good philosophy alone, but verifying isn't necessarily good philosophy if the method used to verify is problematic. Does this help at all? What do you think about it? Nitpicky side note: Philosophy is objective. Even though it's relatively common parlance, the phrase "my/personal philosophy" is about as absurd as referring to math as "my/personal math." Thought I'd point that out since you seem as if you'd appreciate precision.

Collectivizing while telling others not to collectivize is hypocritical. Saying that Statists do X, Y, and Z but religious folks don't when in fact they do is bias. Saying I'm not "respecting your arguments" (whatever that means) won't change this. Saying 2+2=4 is absolutist is not an argument. Saying we can't be certain of history/history is slanted with regards to religious atrocities, but not when it comes to State atrocities is hypocritical. And a performative contradiction since if you really adhered to "it is certain that nothing can be certain," you wouldn't respond to me at all since you'd be mindful that it might not be me if somebody hacked my PC, or the server, or a roommate used my PC, or a mod edited my post, etc. And irrelevant since we have all the present day info we need to understand that seriously fucked up shit is done in the name of religion (looks at own penis). I apologize for the off-topicness.

In the ruler/ruled relationship, rules are for the benefit of the rulers. They're not meant to apply to the rulers. Logic never enters into it. That's the problem when people say things like, "You can't do that because that piece of paper says so." They'll just change what the piece of paper says. If they can get you to ask the wrong questions, they don't care what your answers are. For as long as people are focusing on HOW land acquisition by nations should take place, they're not focusing on whether nations are valid concepts.

I think you have a blind spot for all the murder and destruction that has been carried out in human history due to religious beliefs. I think you downplay how harmful teaching children to not think rationally, to seek approval of external sources, and threatening with an eternity of suffering is. Again, this does nothing to prove that religion exists. The clarification I've already offered stands that you are referring to the effects of the actions people take, not the concepts themselves. In fact, when you say the concepts are responsible, you're protecting the people who have voluntarily done these heinous acts. You don't have to prove that god doesn't exist. You can point out that claiming god does exist would require extraordinary proof. You can point out that claiming god exists is claiming consciousness exists without matter an energy, in uniquity, happens to be the one they were taught about, and intervenes, and all the problems introduced by those claims. This is rationality in response to religion. How am I able to do this if, as you claim, it cannot be done? There's only one way to meaningfully divide people: those willing to initiate the use of force to achieve their goals and those who will not. The motivation for their aggression is irrelevant. How much aggression has come from religion vs Statism is irrelevant. I maintain that your adherence to a distinction is your bias and nothing more.

If religion means a system of beliefs, then I don't think agreeing is an option. You can accept or reject my claim, but don't mistake it for opinion. Concepts don't exist. Did you mean to say that the effects of the behaviors of people who believe Statism is a valid concept are real? Because this is true of non-secular religions also. As is your accurate claim that it is possible to reply with reason and rationality. So again, I don't see the differentiation your bias seems to require. Though I thank you for sharing where it comes from. I don't understand. You had said: All I did was express the contrapositive. Any issue you rightly have with the collectivization in my expression of the contrapositive also applies to what you expressed, which was my point.

It's not an assumption, it's the implication. You cannot decide how things that are greater than you will play out. You cannot make decisions for other people without their consent. A baseball game is a bad analogy because everybody at a baseball game is there voluntarily. You are part of society just from being born, so you cannot ethically organize society. If you HAVE to eat to survive, then is employment really a free choice? Yes, because you could do everything for yourself and not interact with anybody else. This too is not as grandiose as you're making it sound. Would you let somebody drive your car if they weren't insured? Exact same thing.

Statism is a religion. By your own plea to not collectivize, there are also atheists who are far more mild than your average non-secular religious type. They all hold irrationality over reality, so what's the benefit of differentiating them?

A fantastic video that I think will shed some light on this is I think Stef makes a very convincing argument. To answer your question, it is intentionally inflicted by parents, not accidental or genetic. It is not something that one arrives upon by way of logic, reason, or evidence. Which is the first thing to look at when answering the titular question. Would I marry a Christian? No. The reason to get married is to publicly commit for the sake of your future children. I don't think it's safe for your future children to choose for them (since they cannot choose for themselves) a co-parent that lacks the capability of differentiating fact from fiction. So what about dating? No. The reason to date is to find a suitable mate. So if I wouldn't marry a Christian, I'd be wasting both of our time dating one. What about friendship? Most likely no. If I live in the real world, I have little to talk about with somebody who lives in Candy Land for example. How would we resolve potential conflicts if I think reality is the universal arbiter and they think a book is? I would be depriving my time and friendship from somebody who accepts their capacity for error. That wouldn't be fair to anybody involved. I will gladly have conversations with Christians. Mostly to talk about the method by which they've arrived to their conclusion. As a "Christianity survivor," I choose to be responsible for trying to help others escape programming that was meant to groom them for subjugation by abusers. Bottom line is I simply enjoy the time I spend with rational thinkers and find time spent on those who reject rationality to be tedious and not at all enjoyable.

How did you arrive at the conclusion that society needs to be "organized"? It's literally saying we have to decide how others will live, which is false. It suggests that people will just lay around, waiting for other people to provide solutions when empirical evidence tells us that it is our nature to adapt. If people want to be able to travel at superhuman speeds, we'll have roads (or better). If people want to be able to sit on a bench, breathe fresh air, watch some deer, and listen to the birds, there will be parks. Division of labor comes about by way of specializing to fill a demand for others so that we can choose which of our desires we'd rather farm out to others than handle ourselves. In this way, I think it's bizarre to suggest that there would be a "way to organize society" that didn't involve insurance companies and such.

You can't fix a problem you cannot identify. This is why self-knowledge is literally foundational. It seems she understands there's A problem, but not what the problem actually is. As such, she's going to try this, that, and the other, only to be disappointed when it doesn't work. There was a time in my life where, having engaged in this type of aimlessness, I was convinced that "the world" was trying to tell me I didn't belong here. It's going to be even worse if she happens upon an arrangement that appears to work, because then she'll stop looking for the actual solution. Worst of all is that so many of these people artificially supporting others with "likes" and "friend requests" lack self-knowledge also. Meaning they're going to echo untruths and cause others to go astray. Let it never be said that the reason rationality isn't instantly adopted is not the effect of momentum of the past.

This accurately describes the real world. As for the coloration, I like it a lot. I wish it were used for rational rebuttals instead of nuh uh! Then again, I use a browser extension that makes everything light text on dark background. If the default here is white background, I could see how non-dark texts would be easier to read.

lol @ when ASKED to.

This is like saying that I'm a hypocrite for holding rape as immoral and love making as moral simultaneously, as if rape and love making have no distinguishing characteristics. When in fact they have the most distinguishing characteristic on the planet: consent. If I say you're only welcome in my house if you don't smoke and you choose to enter, you have consented to not smoking in my house. If you strum a guitar, this isn't me consenting to not strumming my guitar in the same way. The two are not comparable. You won't even address how an idea is property in the thread that is about it, so I see nothing productive in pretending to engage in that conversation in a second place at the same time.

Thank you for the kind feedback! I'm paying it forward. Stef's Introduction to Philosophy series help explained first principles to me. I agree with you that starting from self-ownership, seemingly most things become clearer and more simple. I think that's why the State does everything it can to destroy the idea of individual and always refer to the collective (despite the fact that you cannot have a collective without individuals).

I was just watching FDR's recent release "Criticism: Why I Was Wrong About Socialism" and Stef put what I was trying to say a bit more succinctly, so I thought I'd share it here: "If you're good at disproving someone's argument, you don't need to insult their argument ahead of time.The moment you start insulting someone's argument ahead of time, most likely and most often it's because you don't have a good rebuttal."

"agree to losing a right" is a convoluted if not weighted way of describing something that isn't as grandiose. If I invite you over to my house and say I don't allow smoking, when you enter my house, you're not "agreeing to lose a right." You're respecting my property rights. You could go outside and have a smoke and I won't have anything to say because I respect your property rights. "Rights" aren't up to us. The real world is the arbiter. In the above example, if you own yourself, then you confess that I own my house. If you say "I have a right to smoke in your house," you are claiming that property rights are valid and invalid at the same time. The real world tells us that something cannot be valid and invalid simultaneously.

I think this is one of the problems with addressing "watching porn" with no other qualifiers. If all that you accomplished in this journey was "only possible" because you freed up time from watching porn, then it sounds as if you were doing so in extreme excess, which would be the problem, not the porn itself. I'm confused. By making an objective claim, you're acknowledging that there's such a thing as truth and it's preferable to falsehood. But "I won't argue the case where I make the claim" says to me that you're not interested in whether your claim is true of false. I think this is a performative contradiction.

Thanks for sharing! That was incredible to watch. And I can honestly say, I'm reflecting on my eating habits like never before. I also agree with what he said about teaching people their limits. Last winter was the first time my car got irrevocably stuck in snow. Irrevocable in that a quick rocking back and forth didn't break me free. Prior to that, I was safe in terms of how I drove in snow, but never considered saying "No, I'm not going to drive in this." Primarily BECAUSE I had never been stuck. Now that I've seen a limitation first hand, I will not be making that mistake again. We're pattern-identifying machines. As we experience more of life, we file various things away as not requiring additional scrutiny. It's effective to remind people of their limits.