FFT: Gender as a social construct — what is the vid below telling us on where our intellectual culture has now reached?

_{kairosfocus
June 10, 2017

Academic Freedom, Evolutionary Incoherence, Logic and Reason, rhetoric, worldview

1}_{Categories
Academic Freedom
Evolutionary Incoherence
Logic and Reason
rhetoric
worldview}

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Someone gave the link, I think we need to watch a comparison of real vs fake papers on gender:

I ask us to ponder:

Where have we now reached, why? END

Comments

to kmp: Good comment about natural moral law.jdk_{June 19, 2017
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KF:
where has anyone equated bestiality with sodomy?
When the discussions are about homosexuality, SSM and transgendered, and someone asks me if I think that bestiality is wrong, it is either because the person equates them in some bizarre way, or it is an attempt to distract and deviate from the actual discussion. I guessed at the former. Perhaps I was wrong and that he was only attempting to distract and deviate from the subject being discussed. In either case, responding only rewards bad behaviour.
indeed, I suggest this is a case that is even more perverse than child sexual molestation.
That's interesting. You think that the abuse of an animal is more perverse than the abuse of a child? I think the opposite.
We note, too, that at no point have you been able to provide warrant as to why bestiality is an evi,...
Evil is a religious invention. It doesn't exist. As such, it would be pointless for me to get in a discussion about it. But if you were to ask be if beastiality is wrong from a societal perspective, I would say that it is. As is child abuse, rape, murder, stealing, etc. Any rational person can provide logical arguments as to why these things are counter to a stable and health society. Thankfully, the bulk of society agrees with me and we have passed laws against them. Nobody here has provided a coherent argument as to why homosexuality, SSM or transgender is in any way harmful to a stable and healthy society. I have heard warnings of dire consequences, none of which have been supported on the ground with real evidence. Yes, we have seen consequences that have been detrimental to specific individuals, but these have been the result of these individuals wrongly thinking that religious freedom covers for their open discrimination against others by denying publicly provided services based on sexual orientation. Just as we saw negative consequences to individuals who used the same arguments to discriminate against others based on the colour of their skin. People here have talked about "natural moral law" thinking that it supports their position with regard to these issues. But it does no such thing.
Natural Moral Law: A pillar of the Catholic set of laws is its understanding of natural moral law, which addresses laws that aren’t written but nevertheless known by all men and women who have the use of reason. It uses basic common sense, prudence, and justice.
By definition, if you claim that something follows the "natural moral law" you are claiming that anyone who disagrees with you does not have the sense of reason. Thus ending any debate because, after all, what is the point in debating anyone who does not have the sense of reason? In short, making this claim is a cop-out.kmidpuddle_{June 19, 2017
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KF @ 272: Excellent comment. Thank you for sharing.Truth Will Set You Free_{June 19, 2017
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KF @ 268: Question to KMP - "where has anyone equated bestiality with sodomy?" Sodomy is not bestiality because it is not interspecies. I personally find it to be as equally revolting as bestiality, but I understand that others do not.Truth Will Set You Free_{June 19, 2017
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F/N: John C Wright's discussion is relevant. I clip:
I, resting only on my human reason and with no particle of loyalty to or faith in any theological speculations (which, at the time, I frankly dismissed as egregious and base superstition), was drawn step by step against my will and very much against my inclinations away from the comfortable libertine and libertarian opinions of my youth to the conclusion that the sex act is licit only within marriage, that unchastity is illicit, and that unnatural sexual acts are illicit as well as unnatural. There are perfectly natural and worldly reasons for a rational atheist to support the Christian position on sexual morality. The following argument shows that the Christian position is the only logical position to hold, given the realities of human nature [--> he includes, later the sexually predatory nature of many men, and the issue of what it means for a woman to open the gates of her womb (and with this, the gates of her soul), to a lover . . . I add, especially as a trusting virgin]. One a personal level, I did not change my conclusions about sexual morality because I became a Christian. The cause and effect was the other way. After cold logic lead me to the conclusions that the only logical position to hold just so happened to be the one held by my (at that time) hated enemies the Christians, I began to look at their egregious and base superstition with a less hostile gaze . . . . The Stoics reason as follows: of things, some are within our control, and others are not. Things within our control include the reason, which is the seat of logic and judgment, the passions, which is the seat of honor and virtue (good habits or bad), and the appetites, which is the seat of desire. Things not within our control include externals: your flesh, your money, your rank in society, your reputation in the eyes of others, the fortunes of war, whether you are healthy or sick, whether you live or die. You can influence these things only indirectly; you can try, but you cannot be assured of success. Even a cursory inspection of the human condition provides us with ample experience that the passion and appetites cannot be controlled unless habituated. One cannot, merely by a momentary effort of will, create or put aside a passion or an appetite, until and unless those passions and appetites are by long habit of self discipline subject to the sovereignty of the reason. The power to put aside unreasonable passions and appetites is called “virtue” (indeed, originally, the word “virtue” simply meant “power.”) Because it is unusual to make a distinction between passions and appetites, let me emphasize the difference. The word “appetite” here is being used to mean a self-centered desire for a specific physical pleasure: lust is the appetite for copulation, thirst is the appetite for drink, hunger the appetite for food, and so on. “Passion” by contrast is not necessarily self-centered, and is not necessarily satisfied by any physical pleasure: the desire of a bold soldier for glory in combat, for example, or the desire for a mother to protect her children, or the desire of a friend to come to the aid of his friend, or the desire of a patriot to see his home and nation honored. Many, if not most, passions are connected to imponderables: love and loneliness, shame and honor, glory and humility are matters that concern the passions. Unlike the brute beasts, a man can train and domesticate his passions to serve his reason rather than his appetite. I do not see the need to dwell further on this point: the literature and philosophy of all mankind through all history dwells primarily on the human condition, of which the tension between these three parts of the mind is the primary reality. A skeptic unconvinced of this point is directed toward those writings. That man has a duty to so domesticate his passions to serve his reason [--> I add, through the disciplined, growing exercise of responsible, rational freedom] we can deduce from the raw fact that the appetites are a multitude of contradictory desires, easily able to be inconsistent with surrounding facts of reality. If I desire to keep my cake and eat it too, the reason must arbitrate which desire shall prevail, since both cannot . . . . Even a cursory inspection of the human condition provides us ample evidence that there is a moral component to virtue and vice. Aside from the merely practical arrangement of the passions and appetites needed in order to sate one’s hungers efficiently, the reason makes a judgment on the fitness, wholesomeness, goodness or righteousness of the passion or appetite. The seat of moral judgment is called the conscience. There are those who claim these judgments are relative, or arbitrary, or are the by-product of Darwinian social evolution, or are the product of a programming imposed by economic class-interests. Their claim is that the judgments of the conscience either have no jurisdiction outside a narrow sphere, or have no jurisdiction at all. Their claim, simply put, is that all moral judgments are subjective, therefore illegitimate. To prefer virtue to vice (so the argument goes) is as arbitrary and personal a judgment as to prefer pie to cake. We can dismiss the claim that moral judgments are all subjective merely by inquiring whether or not we ought to inquire into the claim. Ought we to inquire whether or not all moral judgments are subjective? If the answer is no, the question is closed. [--> And, I suggest, such a closed-minded foreclosing of an issue is a warning flag that we are dealing with irresponsibility and/or irrationality.] If the answer is yes, then ought we to make this inquiry honestly, or dishonestly? If the answer is that we ought to make this inquiry dishonestly, then (a fortiori) we are not bound the results. For a dishonest thinker is under no moral obligation to accept a conclusion to which his logic drives him; even if he loses the argument, a dishonest thinker is not under a duty to change his mind or mend his ways. For what will impose the moral duty upon the dishonest thinker to conform his thoughts to the conclusions dictated by reason? Why must he be truthful even to himself? Why listen to his conscience? If the answer is that we ought to make this inquiry honestly, we necessarily thereby acknowledge at least one universal moral duty: the duty to think honestly. This duty is universal because the only other possibility, that we have no duty to think honestly, is not something we honestly can think. So we can at the minimum conclude that there is at least one moral duty to which the conscience prompts us, and this duty is a universal, which means it is an absolute, which means that the statement that all moral duties are relative is false . . . . Prudence is the general term for the common sense, sound judgment and sense of proportion needed before any man can arrange the passions to be fit, proper, and proportionate to the situation, as in, not to react with excessive fear to minor threats nor to react with understated fear to dire threats, nor to react with excessive and undue longing for minor pleasures, nor to treat with neglect major and lifelong joys, and so on. An absence of prudence is folly. Justice is the virtue restricting the appetite of self-interest of the passion of factional loyalty to its proper sphere, so that neither self-love nor love of one’s own will interfere with the rational judgment concerning strangers and rivals and enemies. Justice is rendering reward, penalty, courtesy, and dignity each according to his merit, rather than to the interests or personal loyalties of the judge. An absence of justice is injustice, or partiality Chastity is nothing more nor less than justice, moderation, prudence, or fortitude in reference to the sexual passions and appetites . . . . Romanticists say that Love Conquers All: the sexual impulse is too strong to be checked, or is determined by genetics, or that it is unjust for some other reason to demand virtue or self-control in sexual matters. Usually, the Romanticist argument is used to excuse only the form of sexual deviance being defended in the particular argument, since there can be found to be some sexual desires beyond the pale even of those most tolerant of sexual deviation. This is a rhetorical tactic, not a reasoned position, and we need not pause except to dismiss it. A partisan of the Sexual Revolution who, if any exist, sincerely maintaining that sex acts with children, dogs, corpses, other men’s wives and the children, or, for that matter, the corpses of dogs of other men’s wive’s children, in violation both of common prudence and simple justice, must have their argument fail merely on the terms of the absence of consent and the presence of harm . . . . marriage is not a contract. A contract is a meeting of the minds on such terms as the parties shall mutually agree for the exchange of goods and services or other consideration of value. Contracts have no moral or legal force outside their terms. One example should suffice to show the difference. Suppose Mr. A makes a deal with Mr. B that, starting noon on Monday, Mr. A will buy lumber from and only from the lumberyard of Mr. B, forsaking all others. Mr. A buys a load of lumber from yard C that same Monday, but at eleven o’clock. Is he in violation of any provision of the contract, or by the word or the spirit? Has he betrayed or wounded Mr. B in any way? Can Mr. B make any claim for which relief at law can be granted? The answer is no. By coincidence, this same Mr. A was planning to marry Miss D that same day, also at noon. Five minutes before the wedding is scheduled to take place, Miss D walks in on her promised bridegroom. He is standing with his trousers around his ankles vigorously coupling with one of the bridesmaids, Miss E, whose skirts are about her ears and her ankles about his ears. If the marriage were a contract, Miss D would have no more right to criticize or condemn his behavior than does Mr. B the lumberman. And yet no one of ordinary prudence would suggest she continue with the wedding at this point: we might even think her emotions insincere or unrelated to reality if her reaction were calm and understated. No sober argument can be raised that Mr. A is not betraying Miss D in this case . . .
There is much more food for thought there (such are excerpts from preliminary remarks), which will help us to begin to understand the fire we are playing with as a civilisation. I suggest a sober reading. KFkairosfocus_{June 19, 2017
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Pindi, purpose here indicates proper and primary end, which can be evident from the case. There may be secondary ones but such must be compatible with the primary one. Where sexuality is concerned, the tendency to put pleasure first -- a crude form of hedonism -- leads to incoherence and chaos. KFkairosfocus_{June 19, 2017
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StephenB, on the topic of purpose, why must there be only one purpose for sex? Or anything else?Pindi_{June 19, 2017
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JDK: SB has summarised:
You can’t discern the same thing you assume. If I discern that a man is dishonest, I am going by the evidence. If I assume he is dishonest, I have made my decision before the evidence has had a chance to speak. Aristotle didn’t assume the natural moral law; he apprehended it. Cicero didn’t assume the natural moral law, he apprehended it. By definition, natural moral law is discerned. Belief or faith is for revealed truths, not natural truths.
I suspect, the pivot is the issue of self evident, plumbline moral truth, and beyond it self evident truth in general. Where, self-evidence is not equal to obviousness or to imposed axiomatic claims. The Kantian gulch between the inner world and the outer one rears its head again. So, let me first pause and cite F H Bradley's apt response:
We may agree, perhaps, to understand by metaphysics an attempt to know reality as against mere appearance, or the study of first principles or ultimate truths, or again the effort to comprehend the universe, not simply piecemeal or by fragments, but somehow as a whole [--> i.e. the focus of Metaphysics is critical studies of worldviews] . . . . The man who is ready to prove that metaphysical knowledge is wholly impossible . . . himself has, perhaps unknowingly, entered the arena . . . To say the reality is such that our knowledge cannot reach it, is a claim to know reality ; to urge that our knowledge is of a kind which must fail to transcend appearance, itself implies that transcendence. For, if we had no idea of a beyond, we should assuredly not know how to talk about failure or success. And the test, by which we distinguish them, must obviously be some acquaintance with the nature of the goal. Nay, the would-be sceptic, who presses on us the contradictions of our thoughts, himself asserts dogmatically. For these contradictions might be ultimate and absolute truth, if the nature of the reality were not known to be otherwise . . . [such] objections . . . are themselves, however unwillingly, metaphysical views, and . . . a little acquaintance with the subject commonly serves to dispel [them]. [Appearance and Reality, 2nd Edn, 1897 (1916 printing), pp. 1 - 2; INTRODUCTION. At Web Archive.]
In short, the Kantians have erred and we can properly address self-evident truth. Such truths, we approach in light of our experience of ourselves in our world. For one with appropriate experience that s/he may properly understand, one sees that a SET is so; further, that it is so based on understanding what it claims; lastly, that it must necessarily be so on pain of PATENT absurdity on the attempt to deny it. For example, one cannot be deceived that s/he is conscious. Likewise, it is undeniable that error exists. Similarly, for something to be coloured, it must be extended in space. No world is possible without distinct identity, A vs ~A (thus as direct corollaries the first principles of right reason and the world of numbers). And the like. Such truths also apply to a world of responsibly and rationally, significantly free, morally governed creatures. Indeed, if we are not of this class, we have no duties of care in truth, reasoning and behaviour and so the whole project of responsible, reasoned discussion collapses. With it, knowledge of any sort dependent on rational sense. Worse, as conscience is an integral part of our consciousness, the assignment of conscience to the status of delusion that we are under moral government taints and undercuts all of our inner life, sawing off the branch on which we all are sitting. In short, it is absurd. So, though we may err in particular matters of reasoning and duty, we can safely start from accepting that on the whole our rational and moral senses respond appropriately in material degree to reality. In short, logical and moral government of our conscious lives is a start-point for reason and responsibility. The issue, then, is what does such an immediate awareness of our inner life and its connection to the world we inhabit tell us about the roots of reality? Obviously, that IS and OUGHT must be fused in those roots. For, that is the only level where it is possible to unite is and ought. (And, this has been argued out many times, I am summarising.) This brings us to the only serious candidate, after centuries of debate. If you doubt that, simply put up a coherent alternative. (And a recent attempt collapsed, starting with the self-undermining assertion that we can know nothing on the nature of ultimate reality.) Namely: the inherently good creator God, a necessary and maximally great being, worthy of loyalty and the reasonable, responsible service of doing the good in accord with our evident nature. But long before we get to that, we have a case: it is self-evidently evil to kidnap, bind, sexually assault and murder a young child for sick pleasure. Probe the case, it has much to teach, as was outlined above. KFkairosfocus_{June 18, 2017
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KMP, where has anyone equated bestiality with sodomy? J-Mac asked about being able to discern and warrant why this is an evil, SB spoke to it in response to rhetoric of evasion, and I cited him. I agree with him that it is a further degree of warping human sexuality out of its readily discerned purpose and sound context; indeed, I suggest this is a case that is even more perverse than child sexual molestation. We note, too, that at no point have you been able to provide warrant as to why bestiality is an evil, a severe perversion of our sexual nature. You still face a dilemma:
a: acknowledge the actuality of the evil of perversion (here, in an even more extreme degree than child molestation) and then face the challenge of warranting moral government on evolutionary materialist scientism or its fellow travellers, or b: lose credibility as the patent perversity of the act confronts the want of ability of worldviews that have no adequate foundation for moral government to ground moral judgements is starkly exposed.
It is therefore noteworthy that you have tried to dress yourself up in the lab coat while evading the issue. Where, advanced technical training in the sciences generally does not provide exposure to relevant issues, contexts, foundational knowledge and analytical skills. In some cases, sciences or scientific professions may provide an ethics course as a part of qualification, but they will not generally give the broad background required to claim a degree of expertise. Indeed, in this sort of context, putting on the lab coat is a sign of appeal to scientism, the ill-founded notion that "Science" has an effective monopoly on serious knowledge. As an illustration of how fallacious this is, such a claim or implication is a claim in epistemology, not science so it undercuts itself. KFkairosfocus_{June 18, 2017
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jdk
Well, that settles that, doesn’t it: declaring that what you believe is true is true “by definition.” More circular assertions, all pointing to each other as if that made them true.
I didn't declare that what I believe is true by definition. I said that the natural moral law is, by definition, something that is known and not believed. That is why its history precedes all the major religions. Do you not understand that something that precedes religion cannot also depend on religion? I am sure that kairosfocus has explained this to you more than once. So, one again, back to my question : Do you know that bestiality and murder are wrong?StephenB_{June 18, 2017
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Seversky, no one has a RIGHT to marry. That pivotal term is inadvertently revealing, as it implies a binding expectation of duties on the part of others to accord one what the right is tied to. No-one inherently owes any other person a duty to marry, indeed there have been cases where men and women have balked at the altar itself, and in many jurisdictions, there is still a formal pause that an objector may speak. It is by imagining that one has a RIGHT to "marry" as an expression of in effect an emotional "romantic" bond and then demand entitlements from the community that were established because of its interest in the proper nurture of posterity that come from the natural result of the act of union in the context of stable covenant, that we see how the imposition of an inherently disordered and incoherent entity has been imposed under false colour of law. And, this warping is further exposed when we notice that for example there is a readily discerned reason why laws of incest forbid people of close degree of relation from marriage. KFkairosfocus_{June 18, 2017
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LT, you are precisely correct. There are many acts of a sexual nature that are not properly sexual intercourse. Not so many years ago they were recognised as such and for cause were generally termed unnatural acts. KF PS: There is a reason why sexual intercourse is called the act of marital union, and such reason is closely connected to why novelties pivoting on unnatural acts and imposed by lawfare and/or manipulation influenced by the tactics and aims of cultural marxism -- again, cf. Lindh (a significant author on 4th generation war, which BTW includes lawfare as a component) and as has been outlined and cited above -- are not properly marital or conjugal. Same Sex Marriage and the like are forms of words, imposed now under false colour of law, but such lack sound foundation in our morally governed rational nature and the associated complementarity of the two sexes which comes to a crucial expression in the act of marital union and its natural consequences. Let me put part of it this way, there is something transcendent going on when a woman -- especially a virgin woman on her wedding night -- opens the gates of her womb and with that the gates of her soul, to her lover. Something, that we too often seem utterly determined not to acknowledge, to sobering cost on many levels.kairosfocus_{June 18, 2017
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stephen writes,
By definition, natural moral law is discerned.
Well, that settles that, doesn't it: declaring that what you believe is true is true "by definition." More circular assertions, all pointing to each other as if that made them true.jdk_{June 18, 2017
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jdk
I know you say you discern it, but I’m saying that you are just discerning your religious assumptions,
Bad logic. You can't discern the same thing you assume. If I discern that a man is dishonest, I am going by the evidence. If I assume he is dishonest, I have made my decision before the evidence has had a chance to speak. Aristotle didn't assume the natural moral law; he apprehended it. Cicero didn't assume the natural moral law, he apprehended it. By definition, natural moral law is discerned. Belief or faith is for revealed truths, not natural truths.StephenB_{June 18, 2017
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Stephen writes,
I didn’t say that I assumed purpose. I said that I can discern purpose from the fact of the complementarity of the sexes.
I know you say you discern it, but I'm saying that you are just discerning your religious assumptions, which includes the assumption that there is a God who made sex for the purposes you claim are the "naturally moral" ones.. Sure, sex is for reproduction. But that doesn't mean it's the only thing it's for.jdk_{June 18, 2017
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kwimmuddle
But, then again, I am not the one stupid enough to equate homosexuality with beastiality.
Are you referring to me? I have not equated the two. The natural moral law recognizes *degrees of evil,* and so do I. Beastiality is worse than homosexuality. However, you appear to equate bestiality with homosexuality. Since you don't know that bestiality is wrong, and since you don't recognize the natural moral law, it follows that you have no grounds for saying beatiality is worse than homosexuality.StephenB_{June 18, 2017
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Lar Tanner
In other words, shouldn’t the morality of SSS be different than the morality of heterosexual sex, since SSS has a different purpose?
The purpose of sex does not change from one group to another just as the purpose of breathing does not change from one group to another.StephenB_{June 18, 2017
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seversky, I have already indicated that the gay movement was a top-down phenomenon.StephenB_{June 18, 2017
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jdk
Stephen, the purpose you are assuming is that of your religion. Your arguments are circular.
It is unfortunate that you continue to respond to my posts without reading them. I didn't say that I assumed purpose. I said that I can discern purpose from the fact of the complementarity of the sexes. Meanwhile, you have not told us if you know that bestiality and murder are wrong. Do you? StephenB_{June 18, 2017
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KF:
KMP, In addressing SB, you are dealing with someone with advanced formal education in both philosophy and communication [as well as being a very well catechised Catholic],...
I apologize. I only have advanced formal education in science. I obviously am not worthy of participating in a discussion with such an exalted personage. But, then again, I am not the one stupid enough to equate homosexuality with beastiality.kmidpuddle_{June 18, 2017
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StephenB @ 250
As I have argued throughout the thread, the morality of sex is based on the purpose of sex.
This is an interesting statement. If same-sex marriage (SSM) is not actually marriage (as many SSM opponents claim), shouldn't same-sex sex not be considered 'sex'? And if same-sex sex (SSS) is not really sex -- as SSM is not really marriage -- shouldn't SSS have a different purpose than heterosexual sex? In other words, shouldn't the morality of SSS be different than the morality of heterosexual sex, since SSS has a different purpose?LarTanner_{June 18, 2017
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Seversky at least jdk and puddle are wrong, you are not even wrongEugen_{June 18, 2017
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And one of the main reasons is that millions of heterosexuals, many of whom are are in faithful, monogamous marriages (me, for instance) came to understand (easily, once the issue was sufficiently raised) that supporting same-sex marriage was the right thing to do for those same-sex couples who, it was seen, deserve all the same benefits of marriage, legal and otherwise, that heterosexual couples do, as well as (to continue his long sentence) who, in doing so, do no harm to anyone else. This has happened democratically, by a change in the general attitude of the public, which then became reflected in the law.jdk_{June 18, 2017
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StephenB @ 220
Why would you doubt that gay marriage weakens marriage the family when it was designed to do that very thing? The gay movement did not “emerge” from the bottom up; it was introduced and forced fed from the top down. Books have been written about this subject and no one who is acquainted with the facts will deny it. Either the institution marriage gets to define itself and the way children should be raised or else the government will make that call. By definition, they cannot co-exist as the primary influence for family values, life issues, cultural norms, and sexual morality. As one grows, the other diminishes.
It sounds to me like you are promoting a conspiracy theory which demonizes the gay community to an alarming extent. Same sex marriage became accepted because there was a groundswell of popular support which provided the impetus and the authority for legal and political decisions. It is both absurd and a purblind denial of what happened to believe that a small minority could impose its will on the majority in light of the history of oppression of homosexuals at the hands of the Christian majority over thousands of years. You have not shown how same sex marriage abridges the right of heterosexual couples to marry in any way. You have not shown how same sex marriage has any influence on heterosexual families and how they raise and educate their children. The notion that "the institution marriage gets to define itself and the way children should be raised" is rhetorical nonsense. The institution of marriage is not an intelligent, moral agent capable of making such determinations. It is people who decide these matters. Heterosexual individuals are free to choose whether or not they want to marry and raise a family. All that has changed is that homosexuals have finally been granted the same freedom by society as whole. All that has been diminished is the power of evangelical Christianity to impose its will on the rest of us in these matters.Seversky_{June 18, 2017
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Stephen, the purpose you are assuming is that of your religion. Your arguments are circular.jdk_{June 18, 2017
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SB, evidently KMP does not realise the historical precedent for so-called same sex marriage -- a misnomer and frankly a cynically mocking counterfeit imposed by ruthless lawfare and highly deceitful manipulation [cf Lindh on this pattern] -- is Nero Caesar, as Suetonius testifies in his nightmarish, nauseating discussion that I would advise not to read at any time within three hours of a meal time on either side. KFkairosfocus_{June 18, 2017
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jdk
Yes I noticed: his “natural moral law” is basically conservative Catholic dogma.
I refuted that claim long ago. You had no response. Would you care to try again. I wrote this @170
Your only “point” is to make the false claim that my arguments are faith based. At their core they are natural law arguments, though I can use religion to add a little icing on the cake. Still, I don’t need the icing to make the point. If I told you that a can opener has a certain nature and that using it as a shovel would violate its purpose, would you say that I was making a religious argument? If I said that a crankshaft has a certain nature and using it as a gas tank would violate its purpose, would you say that I was pushing a religions argument? And so I make the same common sense argument for sex. If human beings have a certain nature, then they should not approach sex as if they had the nature of an animal. The substance of that argument is independent of religion, but since you cannot address it, indeed, since you completely ignore it, your only recourse is to bring religion back into the discussion.
As I have argued throughout the thread, the morality of sex is based on the purpose of sex. That purpose can be established by an observation of the complementarity of the sexes. Don't you realize that these things are on the record? Wouldn't you like to try something new?StephenB_{June 18, 2017
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JDK, No, the natural moral law -- as Cicero demonstrates -- antedates the Christian faith, it is testified to by our consciences reflecting rationally and responsibly on the human condition. The Christian faith, in its main traditions agrees with and appeals to the law of our evident nature, it does not impose it as dogma. Notice, again, Cicero:
"“Law (say they) is the highest reason, implanted in nature, which prescribes those things which ought to be done, and forbids the contrary.” This, they think, is apparent from the converse of the proposition; because this same reason, when it [37]is confirmed and established in men’s minds, is the law of all their actions. They therefore conceive that the voice of conscience is a law, that moral prudence is a law, whose operation is to urge us to good actions, and restrain us from evil ones . . . . the origin of justice is to be sought in the divine law of eternal and immutable morality. This indeed is the true energy of nature, the very soul and essence of wisdom, the test of virtue and vice."
For starters . . . how can we know that it is evil to kidnap, bind, sexually assault and murder a young child for one's sick pleasure? (How is this warranted, apart from the self-defeating nihilism of might and manipulation make 'truth,' 'right,' 'rights,' etc?) Like unto this, are we or are we not responsibly and rationally free morally governed creatures, where we have an evident nature that then leads to the issue that there is a naturally evident purpose such that to rob a human being of life is to frustrate that end, and to distort sexuality from its proper context of the complementarity of the sexes and the requisites of sound child nurture leads to a wrenching of our nature that undermines human thriving in community across time. That is, sexual licence and perversions of the various sorts that now increasingly rear their heads and demand to be treated as "rights" -- but to properly claim a right one must first be in the right, to try to compel others to uphold one in wrong is itself a compounding of evil, as we can plainly see -- are in the end suicidal for human community. And yes, I am saying that our civilisation is patently suicidal at this point, something that is for instance strongly support5ed by demographics. The sort of uncontrolled release and twisted expressions of sexual energies that are mounting up as a tidal wave across our civilisation are ruinous. But then, we are seeing ideologies that imply that there is no truth in the testimony of our consciences that we are under moral government, we are victims of grand delusion. Such fail to realise that this instantly includes the sense of duty to truth and reason itself, making shipwreck. KFkairosfocus_{June 18, 2017
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kf writes,
as well as being a very well catechised Catholic
Yes I noticed: his "natural moral law" is basically conservative Catholic dogma.jdk_{June 18, 2017
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kwimpuddle
Now, if you want to actually address the issues of homosexuality, SSM, the existance of traditional marriage, whether the government has the authority to define what a marriage is, and transgender in an evidence based fashion, I am sure that JDK and I would we be willing to discuss the issues with you.
I am fine with using historical evidence to confirm morally based principles, so long as we draw from the 2000+ year record of cultural trends--and the attendant rise and fall of nations--. We learn much less from the 10-year blips.StephenB_{June 18, 2017
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