Upright Biped Schools Ed George

_{Barry Arrington

November 25, 2019

Intelligent Design}

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Everything below is from a comment posted by UB:

Ed at 34,

[re: Ed on telling the truth]
It is just one of the rules we have to follow if we want to be welcome in society. If I chose to live by myself in a cabin in the hills I would have no obligation to be honest to the rare person that stumbled upon me.

Yes, you’ve been very concise on this feature of your belief system, and we understand you. If you live in a society then you have to tell the truth as a moral obligation to the consensus of that society (who collectively believe that people should tell the truth). But if you live out on your own, then you are your own consensus, and as you clearly say, you ”have no obligation” to tell the truth to some poor sap who might happen upon you.

You’ve made yourself perfectly clear on this.

And if that poor sap who happens to come upon you on your hill also happens to be of the fairer variety, with breasts and a vagina … well tough shit, eh Ed?

I’ve asked you repeatedly if a woman being raped needed the consensus of a group in order to know for certain that the brutalization she feels is actually valid. That is certainly the belief you seem to espouse here. You promote this as the advanced and enlightened view of human life, and judging by your insistence, you apparently think others should follow your lead on the matter, particularly those god-fearers around you who still mistakenly believe that raping a woman is an immoral act whether or not there is even one other ‘effing human being on the entire surface of planet who thinks so.

You’ve understandably refused to answer my question, of course, but you’ve certainly shed some light on the matter now. Whatever happens to that curvy sap who happens upon your hill, she can’t really say that what’s happening to her is “wrong”, per se, she’ll just have to keep in mind that what’s happening to her literally goes with the territory, and in this instance, she was merely on the “wrong” territory. As you say, there is no moral dilemma on your part, having acted on your decision. It’s just a geographic misfortune on her part. Hell, it could even be sheer dumb luck.

But you view this whole thing as a trick question, a “loaded question” as you called it. We all know that you aren’t the type of man so hardened of heart that you would actually ever rape a woman (regardless of when and where she happens upon you). It’s just that you are the type who is hardened enough to think that you decide if it is wrong for her to be raped. It’s a deformity of reason, but I see you come here daily to sell it in public — and you seem to really enjoy it, with that special kind of superior arrogance: Does a woman being raped need the consensus of society in order to know for certain that the brutalization she feels is valid. Yes she does, but a man living by himself on a hill outside society can rape her without any moral obligation whatsoever.

Comments

My point at #1 is really very simple: if a moral subjectivist has no basis for moral obligations how am I obligated to trust anything he asserts about morality?
You don't. But then you're not obligated to trust anything anyone says, even a moral objectivist (after all, they might also be a liar or a hypocrite). Of course, you are obligated to trust anything I assert, because I'm a paragon of virtue. :-)Bob O'H_{November 26, 2019
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My point at #1 is really very simple: if a moral subjectivist has no basis for moral obligations how am I obligated to trust anything he asserts about morality? On the other hand, if he wants to believe in nonsense that’s his personal prerogative. What he doesn’t have the right to do is cram his nonsense down anyone else’s throat. Doubling down on your unwarranted opinions and beliefs over and over again (being argumentative) is an attempt to cram your beliefs down someone else's throat. This is something I have said on this site several different times before that’s worth repeating again:
I try to avoid getting involved in discussions or debates with any of our regular interlocutors because I don’t believe they are being intellectually or ethically honest. The logic here is really very basic and straightforward: If there are no true interpersonal moral standards or obligations how can we trust anything anyone says or asserts? I don’t think that we can. To have an honest discussion or debate you need some kind of interpersonal, or “transcendent,” standard of truth and honesty-- even if it’s a traditional or some kind of “conventional” standard. Why would I trust somebody else’s subjective standard for honesty and truth when he starts out by arguing there is no standard of truth or honesty?
In other words, telling the truth and being honest only makes sense if there is an objective standard of truth and honesty. That’s a self-evident truth, therefore, any viable system of morality must be based on the fact that there really is moral truth and moral truth obligates us to be truthful and honest.john_a_designer_{November 26, 2019
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I have a problem with all moral subjectivists in that they are in obvious error. If they were serious thinkers, they wouldn't be moral subjectivists to begin with. Andrewasauber_{November 26, 2019
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I don’t have a problem with Ed being a moral subjectivist, either. Ed's problem is that he is a pathological liar, cowardly equivocator, bluffing lose and a willfully ignorant, insipid troll.ET_{November 26, 2019
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Judicial activism, i.e. legislating from the bench by the radical left, is indeed a looming threat to our republican democracy of representative government, but it need not be fatal. Whilst Congress should be the one to most directly challenge the judicial branch's overreach into it's legislative territory, historically it has been the executive branch that has curtailed judicial overreach.
Reining In Judicial Supremacists Excerpt: Presidents and members of Congress are not constitutional eunuchs who are impotent to resist judicial activism. The Constitution equips them with a system of checks and balances that can be applied to reign in those who engage in judicial overreach. Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln are examples of two Chief Executives who understood the dangers of judicial activism and who resisted it in their time. Where would America be today if Mr. Lincoln had rolled over in response to the Dred Scott decision?,,, In his first inaugural address Mr. Lincoln declared, "The candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the government upon questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, …the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their government into the hands of that eminent tribunal." https://townhall.com/columnists/kenconnor/2015/07/15/reigning-in-judicial-supremacists-n2025295
And while the executive branch can curtail the judicial branch's overreach into legislative territory for a time, a more permanent solution needs to originate from Congress itself in that Congress itself has the power within itself to amend the constitution in such a way so as to severely restrict the judicial branch to its original intended role of 'merely judgement',
"the judiciary has neither "force nor will, but merely judgment?" Alexander Hamilton - Federalist No. 78
bornagain77_{November 26, 2019
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I don’t have a problem with Ed being a moral subjectivist. The problem is when he tries to push his subjectivism on everyone else. If there are no moral obligations there is no obligation on my or anyone else part to even consider what he is asserting (baseless assertions are not arguments.) In other words, whatever he is trying to argue is blatantly self-refuting. I made the following comment some time ago on another thread. It is worth repeating here: Without a transcendent standard for interpersonal moral obligations there is no basis for universal human rights. Nevertheless, the secular progressive left, which has no transcendent basis for morality, ethics or human rights because it is rooted in a mindless naturalistic metaphysic, has illegitimately co-opted the idea of human rights to push its perverted political agenda of so-called social justice. But how can someone’s (or anyone’s) subjective opinion of right and wrong become the basis of universal human rights? Many of our regular interlocutors, like Ed, have tried to argue that moral values are in fact subjective. But again, subjective values do not carry any kind of interpersonal moral obligation. They are your values not mine. They are simply arbitrary personal preferences. Why should I be obligated to even respect your personal opinion? How can one have something like universal human rights based on arbitrary subjective personal preferences? And what good is any kind of moral system if moral obligations are not real and binding? The U.S. founding fathers appear to have understood that ideologically motivated groups like the social justice warrior left (so-called factions) would try to subvert the political process. This is one reason why they made it difficult to amend the U.S. Constitution. For example, the first 10 amendments to the constitution, which were passed very quickly, (the so-called Bill of Rights) required a 2/3 vote in each house of congress as well as approval of ¾ of state legislatures. It appears the founders thought this would prevent a small vocal faction from subverting the will of the people. However, apparently they didn’t notice the loophole in article III that allowed Supreme Court judges to appropriate more power than was constitutionally granted to them. That’s the loophole that the SJW left has been able to exploit and is why they have used the courts to push their agenda. You don’t need to convince an overwhelming majority of people you are right-- you don’t even need to convince a majority. All you need is to convince are a few sympathetic judges who share your “enlightened” group think. The problem is that is not representative or small-r republican government. That’s an oligarchy. An oligarchy is one of the types of government that takes away rights. Moral subjectivism provides no basis to create a broad based consensus which is necessary to protect fundamental human rights.john_a_designer_{November 26, 2019
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