Kevin's Watch

Lord Mhoram wrote:exnihilio,

whom identify political grievances as the cause and justification for terrorism (disingenuously in my opinion)

If political grievances, socioeconomic disparity, and cultural discontentment and disillusionment - all of which are closely related - are not responsible for terrorism, what is?

Saying that political grievances have no role in terrorism is like saying the match has no role in the bonfire. Yet I believe the resulting conflagration exceeds all proportion in the Islamic world -- unless one is prepared to assert that Muslims are singularly aggrieved. I am not prepared to make that argument, but I would entertain it if it was persuasively advanced by another, and supported by the evidence.

I must agree with Lord Mhoram and say that political grievances are a large determiner in the cause thereof, and are certainly justification as far as the terrorists are concerned.

It's not that Muslims are singularly agrieved, it's that terrorists feel that they are.

Just like Basque separtists feel singularly agrieved, just like the IRA feels it.

--A

Avatar wrote:I must agree with Lord Mhoram and say that political grievances are a large determiner in the cause thereof, and are certainly justification as far as the terrorists are concerned.

It's not that Muslims are singularly agrieved, it's that terrorists feel that they are.

Just like Basque separtists feel singularly agrieved, just like the IRA feels it.

--A

Avatar, are you trying to say that there is a uniform distribution of terrorism worldwide directly correlated with political grievances and quality of life?

Not at all. I am saying that terrorists uniformly feel that they are justified by opression and political grievances to commit acts of terrorism.

--A

Avatar wrote:Not at all. I am saying that terrorists uniformly feel that they are justified by opression and political grievances to commit acts of terrorism.

--A

I do not agree with that statement.

Let us take Al Quaeda as a single example. In their press releases they often talk about political grievances and rehash the usual litany of Western *crimes*, but when talking about their rationale for action and their objectives, they have consistently cited a desire to forcibly purify and unify Islam (as by killing those Muslims that are less than supportive for militant Islam) and to propogate the true religion worldwide in the form of Shari'ah via a new imperial Caliphate.

exnihilio,

So the question is, using your example, is al Qaeda's motivation the true and actual spread of Islam? Or is it the strengthening of their sociopolitical power, motivated by their economic depravity and what they perceive to be Western aggression as well as their own ambition, using Islam as a means to achieve these goals? Not like political entities have ever used religion to achieve their ends before...

Lord Mhoram wrote:exnihilio,

So the question is, using your example, is al Qaeda's motivation the true and actual spread of Islam? Or is it the strengthening of their sociopolitical power, motivated by their economic depravity and what they perceive to be Western aggression as well as their own ambition, using Islam as a means to achieve these goals? Not like political entities have ever used religion to achieve their ends before...

LM,

In discussing Al Qaeda I have suggested that they be taken at their word, and I have not tried to morph them into power politicians caught up in an ego-driven calculus of self-aggrandizement such as would make them readily comprehensible to a western mind. To do so would assume that our banal lusts for power, sex, and mammon are the only true aspirations of mankind. On the contrary, I suggest that Al Qaeda (thanks for the spelling correction, btw) are sincere and earnest men who believe they are doing the will of God (Allah). That is what makes them so dangerous.

I believe their motivations are spiritual, although spiritual matters are public province in Islam. In fact it is this incompatibility between the secular, heterogenous societies of the West and the traditional Islamic practice of Shari'ah which seems to be the biggest problem. To say that Islam has historically been a state religion is to understate the matter. It has been the state (or empire) that was founded on Islam, not vice versa. Islam has always been a spiritual, social, and political system -- and Mohammed envisioned and propounded it that way.

To ask Islamic countries to *modernize* or *Westernize* is to ask them to secularize, which is to ask them to abandon Islam as the foundation of their society. And Al Qaeda are the reactionaries to the process begun by Kemal Attaturk when he abolished the Turkish Caliphate, shed his fez, and put on a western suit. Al Qaeda believes (and many share this belief in the Islamic world) that to shift the basis of society away from Islam is to destroy -- Qutb used the word exterminate -- Islam.

So no, I do not agree with you about the nature of their motivations. I think they are motivated to defend Islam itself (as they see it), not to simply accumulate power or to protest (violently) against whatever injustice happens to occur. And I think their actions, as evidenced by their campaign to facilitate the wholesale slaughter of Shi'ites in Iraq, proves that they are indifferent to all forms of injustice when it suits their purpose.

[edited for spelling]

Hmmm. So you think that the fundamentalist leaders are sincere? That they actually seek to spread Islam this way (not just defend it), and that this is not simply a power-play to maintain relevance and...standing? in the eyes of the people?

If we posit that, then what chance do you actually believe the fundamentalists have of creating an imperial caliphate?

--A

Avatar wrote:Hmmm. So you think that the fundamentalist leaders are sincere? That they actually seek to spread Islam this way (not just defend it), and that this is not simply a power-play to maintain relevance and...standing? in the eyes of the people?

If we posit that, then what chance do you actually believe the fundamentalists have of creating an imperial caliphate?

--A

Avatar,

That is a very difficult question to answer, which is why I have been reticent for this long. Since I am leaving for work today I decided to go ahead and take a stab at it.

I really don't have the detailed knowledge of Islamic society to be able to answer the question with any degree of confidence, but I do have some opinions about it.

I would say that their chances are good if they are not opposed over the long term. There is a lot of temptation in the West to throw up our hands and quit. One of the best ways to let yourself off the hook is to believe that you are powerless to change the situation. A dispassionate appraisal of the situation would not yield that conclusion. That conclusion is a self-fulfilling prophecy that is not very different than an ostrich putting its head in the sand.

Western society, as I have implied above, has no claim to absolute moral supremacy. Neither does any other civilization. But that is not to say that we have nothing to offer. In fact, we have a great deal to offer. But we need to offer ourselves carefully and without preconceptions or dualistic formulas -- and with the idea that this can be an exchange of ideas where we learn things of real value from the Islamic world, and even from our enemies in Al Qaeda (I believe that we can).

Offering this exchange in a realistic way means changing our goals around. And I'm not necessarily talking about the administration, although I think they could have done a much better job of it. I mean that the public needs to be led into a different conception of what the goals are here. The central goal cannot be gratitude or friendship from the Islamic world. As anybody with any social experience knows, true friendship and gratitude are not obtainable in any direct way; therefore it is not realistic that we should desire friendship and gratitude as the central object of our actions. Indeed, we should anticipate significant resistance and resentment to the prospect of cultural exchange. It is also well to remember that those with the most cause to feel gratitude often choose resentment in its place -- because gratitude must first overcome vanity.

It also needs to be explained with more clarity that the goal we seek is a structural change in the strategic and political situation in the Middle East. I think these goals are being pursued, albeit somewhat incompetently and without a viable public relations campaign to accompany it -- which is perhaps the most vital element for success. The effort cannot long endure without long term public support, and the prospects for this have to be considered dubious at the present time.

In order to create the proper expectations, it needs to be clear that structural change does not mean a western system imposed on Iraq or other nations. Structural change means empowering the masses to participate politically without resorting to terrorism against a demonized other. This change will (I believe) over the long term lead to a more liberal and secular basis for Arab society, and ought to gradually redirect the energies of most of Al Qaeda's grassroots support. A change of this magnitude is also going to take generations, and it begins with the education of children -- by reversing the trend of radicalization of the youngest and most vulnerable in Wahabbi-funded madrassas.

This is likely to be a lengthy process as already stated. This process, moreover, is not one that will be uniformly encouraging or full of positive signs. This process is going to require patience and steadfast determination, including the willingness to accept the reality of casualties and setbacks. This process will try men's souls.

I also think that it is going to be necessary to allow Islamism to run its course -- to an extent. What I am saying is that Islamism -- as a kind of paranoid, nativist, xenophobic Utopianism -- cannot be discredited from without. It must be discredited from within, which means that it must show itself to be bankrupt in the marketplace of ideas. Containment from without is going to have to be balanced against intervention with no easy calculus to rely upon.

I draw a small degree of encouragement from Iran. The Iranian public is much less impressed with Islamism (and, as a corollary, more pro-Western) than virtually any other society in the Middle East. That is because they have lived Islamism, and like those in the old Soviet bloc, have come to learn that it is unable to deliver on its promises. All it can do is create a perpetual state of xenophobic alarm and crisis to hold itself together (like the three states in Orwell's 1984).

Perhaps I should back up a bit now. In my prior post I talked about how Al Qaeda sees itself, and whether I think their beliefs are sincere. That is a separate question from their actual nature.

I think their nature is that of religious reaction (against the intrusion of Western liberal values) that has assumed the characteristics of a Western revolutionary movement (or what we would consider a secular religion in the West). Like any other Utopian revolutionary "-ism," Islamism identifies itself with an unjustly oppressed group, wants to purify or remake society so that the injustice to this group is redressed, and thinks its methods will yield a Utopian result so perfect and lasting that any amount of violence is justified to achieve this end. A new golden age (or the return to a prior golden age) is the end point of their efforts.

There are a lot of reasons to posit this western influence, but of particular note should be the virtual monopoly of ideological leadership in Islamism that was educated in the West. A large number of the vanguard has a similar background: being from upper class families that sent their children to the West to be educated. Sayyid Qutb, the ideological father of Al Qaeda, received a Master's degree in the United States in 1950, and even published the book Social Justice And Islam while in the United States. This book was the starting point of a religious social critique that led to the creation of the ideology of Islamism.

The point of this digression was to illustrate that Islamism seems to represent the latest entry into the tradition of Western radicalism. Thus Islamism's insistence on purifying the culture of Islam is not without irony. In a negative sense, Islamism is perhaps the first real evidence that Islamic culture has been penetrated by the West in a fundamental way.

By seeing Islamism in context, we can make some assumptions about its future. First, its nature is fundamentally reactionary. That means that its ideology cannot stand without the prop of an adversarial outsider, and that it is not truly capable of generating realistic solutions to real-world problems -- which will ultimately lead to its being discredited. Second, its nature requires that it be discredited from within as described above, which will take a significant amount of time. Third, containment is going to require long-term confrontation. Fourth, it will fall when the time is right. Fifth, the time will be right when most of its constituents recognize that it is a lie and a catalyzing event enables a change.

These are my thoughts, and I submit that they are neither definitive nor above question. Feel free to cut loose on them, as you have a month to do your worst!

This is indeed the worst. That I can't really find any substaantive point on which to disagree with you.

I think that it must run its course, that the only way of "discrediting" it is from within, that current attempts to "control" it are imcompetent at best, and that dialogue is essential.

I certainly agree that the only way that things will change in the long term is through education social advancement. Address the factors that make radicalism so attractive to the young, the poor, the dispossessed, and you will already be making a dent in the foothold of fundamentalism.

Good post Exnihilo. If I manage to think of something I disagree with you about, I'll add it. safe journeys.

--A

Fist and Faith wrote:Well, I mentioned that I was disappointed by C.S. Lewis' book, and Lord Mhoram asked why. May as well start a thread about it. I found the book online here:
www.lib.ru/LEWISCL/mere_engl.txt

My problem is right away; Book I. Lewis posits a law that he calls variously the Law of Human Nature, or Moral Law, or Rule of Decent Behavior. The idea is that there is a Law that all people feel. It tells us what is right, and what is wrong. This is why we know that, for example, we should not steal, and that we should keep our promises. He says this law is a fact, just as the law of gravity is a fact. But, while the law of gravity cannot be disregarded, the Moral Law can.

So far, I was impressed with how he explained what he had in mind. With one exception, I thought he was making very good points, and doing so logically and convincingly. He had good arguments against some things that I would have thrown at him. I was looking forward to hearing him do away with what I consider this Moral Law's true nature. I was getting upset that he seemed to be ignoring it entirely. But finally, in chapter 3, he says it:

Some people say that though decent conduct does not mean what pays each particular person at a particular moment, still, it means what pays the human race as a whole; and that consequently there is no mystery about it. Human beings, after all, have some sense; they see that you cannot have real safety or happiness except in a society where every one plays fair, and it is because they see this that they try to behave decently. Now, of course, it is perfectly true that safety and happiness can only come from individuals, classes, and nations being honest and fair and kind to each other. It is one of the most important truths in the world.

So far, so good. Now I wanted to hear him explain why this was not the actual explanation for the Moral Law. He continues the same paragraph:

But as an explanation of why we feel as we do about Right and Wrong it just misses the point. If we ask: "Why ought I to be unselfish?" and you reply "Because it is good for society," we may then ask, "Why should I care what's good for society except when it happens to pay me personally?" and then you will have to say, "Because you ought to be unselfish" - which simply brings us back to where we started. You are saying what is true, but you are not getting any further. If a man asked what was the point of playing football, it would not be much good saying "in order to score goals," for trying to score goals is the game itself, not the reason for the game, and you would really only be saying that football was football - which is true, but not worth saying. In the same way, if a man asks what is the point of behaving decently, it is no good replying, "in order to benefit society," for trying to benefit society, in other words being unselfish (for "society" after all only means "other people"), is one of the things decent behaviour consists in; all you are really saying is that decent behaviour is decent behaviour. You would have said just as much if you had stopped at the statement, "Men ought to be unselfish."

The key is in the first sentences of each quote:

...it means what pays the human race as a whole...

But as an explanation of why we feel as we do about Right and Wrong...

Many people do not "feel as we do about Right and Wrong," and do not care about the human race as a whole.

The thing is, he's been trying to establish that there's this Law that all people feel, despite the fact that we don't always follow it. He wrote this in the 1940's, so the Nazis were big on his mind. He says that even they felt this Moral Law, but chose to ignore it, for whatever reasons. But I see no reason to believe that. I believe the Nazis - as well as many, many, many other societies and individuals - felt and feel otherwise. I do not say that nobody feels that cheating is bad, and keeping your word is good. I feel that way, and I know that many of you do, too. But that is not proof that everybody else does.

Many individuals do what benefits them individually, without any regard for the principles of Lewis' Moral Law. The question is, why would they lie about it when caught? Some lie about it because they want to be trusted in the future. After all, it's much easier to cheat people who trust you. Some lie to keep out of jail. Still others see that it would be difficult to live safely and happily if society was in anarchy, and they lie so everybody else stays on the straight and narrow. (And yes, some do believe they did something wrong. But they tried the easy/quick way this time. And some of them lie about it because they don't want to be embarrassed.)

There are effecient ways to run the world besides the one where everybody benefits by everyone playing fair. As long as I (or a select group of friends) benefit, what do I care about the rest? When people who think like that get together, all Hell breaks loose. The Nazis are a good example. I can get what I want if I kill anyone who tells me I can't have it. In the early days of my country, the US government killed most of the Native Americans, and stole the land from those left alive. They got what they wanted NOT by following any Moral Law, but by eliminating those they would have had to share with. History is filled with groups that have lived by this law. I do not suspect many of them had any trouble sleeping at night.

Lewis never addresses this possibility. He says everyone feels this Moral Law.

Well gosh, somebody has got to defend this poor dead guy who can’t stand up and clarify himself for us! (Sorry about the delay, but this requires a serious response.)

Generalizing a group of people can go too far in assuming the same motive or lack thereof (this is what your concern is, n’est-ce-pas?). But the same thing could be said of the Nazis. I would hardly think it reasonable, by the same token, to assume that they universally did NOT feel this Moral Law when doing the awful things they did. All evidence indicates that most DID feel this Law, and disobeyed it out of fear of personal consequences, etc. Well and good, but we are still left with a minority of ultimate decision makers who did not seem to feel this.

I would suggest (and Christianity actually states) that it is possible to kill (for practical purposes) our natural reactions, including a sense of Moral Law. That would not negate the existence of this Law, but indicate that it can be smothered again and again, until eventually it is no longer felt. Taking children is a reasonable way to measure this. You simply won’t find the hardened reactions of the Nazis in young children. It takes a good deal of time and awful experience to reach a state where you can do what such people do. It is not reached in a day, and certainly our natural impulses are not born in such a depraved state. The same thing applies to any other class or group of people you would describe. The strength of this internal objection necessarily varies. Some wouldn’t be able to sleep at night, others might just hear a nagging voice, or it might finally have been killed off. That is what being damned literally is. You are essentially describing such people. This leaves what you say about depraved people true without negating the general truth Lewis describes. (Lewis, in general, was speaking of ordinary people in ordinary societies.)

As to what we can say about what other people feel, Lewis discusses this, in the same book, I believe – how we can know man from the inside. It is unreasonable to assume that people would feel exactly the opposite of what we do about right and wrong ultimately. If they don’t care they would probably cheerfully acknowledge that something is actually wrong. In terms of our physical bodies, there are things that are undeniably good, or beneficial, or whatever you want to call it, for them – rest, food, drink, oxygen, exercise. To find a person who got healthier through eating only junk food, drinking only beer and laying on the couch is about as likely as (pick your simile here) finding a trillion dollars in your pocket.

The same thing undoubtedly goes for our emotional reactions. If we were to watch the person we cared about most in the world being slowly tortured to death, we would not feel great joy, and anyone who actually did would probably be in need of care and special confinement. A norm can be identified, and deviations from that norm can be identified as wrong, or harmful, or whatever.

Lewis never said you couldn’t defy the Moral Law and not get what you want. Perhaps the one thing he should have added, for your sake and others who wonder about this, is that you can kill your sense of the Moral Law. But that doesn’t negate his general point.

One fun aside is how people avoid the word ‘moral’ and replace it with the word ‘ethical’ these days.

Oh, and I quite agree with avatar that it would be easier to raise a child to be selfish. But then, anyone with kids’ll tell you that. That is our nature, and that is precisely what this moral law is struggling with. If it didn’t (if all of our impulses were all in harmony, we would have either a goody-goody utopia now or else all delight in giving and receiving what we call evil to each other – an anti-utopia, if you will, and the two would be indistinguishable. But it is clear that that is not the case.

rusmeister wrote:Well gosh, somebody has got to defend this poor dead guy who can’t stand up and clarify himself for us! (Sorry about the delay, but this requires a serious response.)

Sorry for my delay. Being a god has taken up most of my time here lately. Since the game moved to Gravin Threndor, I've seldom visited other forums. With the game is on hold, I figured I'd look around again.

rusmeister wrote:Generalizing a group of people can go too far in assuming the same motive or lack thereof (this is what your concern is, n’est-ce-pas?).

Oui. That's why I offered different reasons for why people would pretend to feel this moral law when they really don't, as well as stating that I'm sure many people do feel it, even though they sometimes ignore it There's just no way to put all who break what Lewis considers to be a Law into one group.

rusmeister wrote:But the same thing could be said of the Nazis. I would hardly think it reasonable, by the same token, to assume that they universally did NOT feel this Moral Law when doing the awful things they did. All evidence indicates that most DID feel this Law, and disobeyed it out of fear of personal consequences, etc. Well and good, but we are still left with a minority of ultimate decision makers who did not seem to feel this.

True enough. Actually, I've always agreed with this, even though I didn't try to say so. I was just making the point that there are some people for whom we don't have the slightest reason to believe feel this moral law, whether it's all Nazis or merely some.

rusmeister wrote:I would suggest (and Christianity actually states) that it is possible to kill (for practical purposes) our natural reactions, including a sense of Moral Law. That would not negate the existence of this Law, but indicate that it can be smothered again and again, until eventually it is no longer felt. Taking children is a reasonable way to measure this. You simply won’t find the hardened reactions of the Nazis in young children. It takes a good deal of time and awful experience to reach a state where you can do what such people do. It is not reached in a day, and certainly our natural impulses are not born in such a depraved state. The same thing applies to any other class or group of people you would describe. The strength of this internal objection necessarily varies. Some wouldn’t be able to sleep at night, others might just hear a nagging voice, or it might finally have been killed off. That is what being damned literally is. You are essentially describing such people. This leaves what you say about depraved people true without negating the general truth Lewis describes. (Lewis, in general, was speaking of ordinary people in ordinary societies.)

As to what we can say about what other people feel, Lewis discusses this, in the same book, I believe – how we can know man from the inside. It is unreasonable to assume that people would feel exactly the opposite of what we do about right and wrong ultimately. If they don’t care they would probably cheerfully acknowledge that something is actually wrong. In terms of our physical bodies, there are things that are undeniably good, or beneficial, or whatever you want to call it, for them – rest, food, drink, oxygen, exercise. To find a person who got healthier through eating only junk food, drinking only beer and laying on the couch is about as likely as (pick your simile here) finding a trillion dollars in your pocket.

The same thing undoubtedly goes for our emotional reactions. If we were to watch the person we cared about most in the world being slowly tortured to death, we would not feel great joy, and anyone who actually did would probably be in need of care and special confinement. A norm can be identified, and deviations from that norm can be identified as wrong, or harmful, or whatever.

Lewis never said you couldn’t defy the Moral Law and not get what you want. Perhaps the one thing he should have added, for your sake and others who wonder about this, is that you can kill your sense of the Moral Law. But that doesn’t negate his general point.

These four paragraphs express your point of view very nicely. You offer a theory that is different than the one I believe in, and I don't see anything in yours that invalidates it. The thing is, nothing in your view invalidates mine, either. Although your idea is internally consistent, mine is too. Without any evidence from outside either theory, I'm sticking with mine. Put simply, and unscientifically, I feel the correctness of mine.

And I quite agree with the idea that, just as we have physical similarities, we have psychological ones. I've often said the same thing. However:

rusmeister wrote:If we were to watch the person we cared about most in the world being slowly tortured to death, we would not feel great joy, and anyone who actually did would probably be in need of care and special confinement. A norm can be identified, and deviations from that norm can be identified as wrong, or harmful, or whatever.

The norm is that nobody would feel great joy in watching the person we cared about most in the world being slowly tortured to death. But plenty of people who wouldn't take joy in that don't have a problem slowly torturing somebody else to death. Human behavior tells me that our psychological similarities don't take us as far as any kind of moral law.

rusmeister wrote:Oh, and I quite agree with avatar that it would be easier to raise a child to be selfish. But then, anyone with kids’ll tell you that. That is our nature, and that is precisely what this moral law is struggling with.

Aren't you arguing my side here? People are born selfish. I'm saying Lewis' moral law is the result of the fact that people are also gregarious (another psychological similarity), and it is obvious that we cannot live together in anarchy. Alas, many do not feel Lewis' moral law, which would help us live together in societies. Even in societies where most of the individual aspects of this moral law are the rule, they only go through the motions when they think they cannot get away with doing otherwise. But, every single day, the news is filled with examples of people violating every aspect of the moral law. Very often in horrific ways.

And, as I've said, some societies are not run by this moral law, whether traditionally, or because of a recent change in the ruling body. People can live together efficiently with some abusing others.

I either believe something that is so opposed to actual human behavior is inside all of us and so very often ignored, or that there isn't something that is so opposed actual human behavior inside all of us.

rusmeister wrote:One fun aside is how people avoid the word ‘moral’ and replace it with the word ‘ethical’ these days.

I'm not nearly clear on the difference myself, so please point out when I use the wrong one.

Good responses!

The only part of your post that I could offer additional response to:

rusmeister wrote:
Oh, and I quite agree with avatar that it would be easier to raise a child to be selfish. But then, anyone with kids’ll tell you that. That is our nature, and that is precisely what this moral law is struggling with.

Aren't you arguing my side here? People are born selfish. I'm saying Lewis' moral law is the result of the fact that people are also gregarious (another psychological similarity), and it is obvious that we cannot live together in anarchy. Alas, many do not feel Lewis' moral law, which would help us live together in societies. Even in societies where most of the individual aspects of this moral law are the rule, they only go through the motions when they think they cannot get away with doing otherwise. But, every single day, the news is filled with examples of people violating every aspect of the moral law. Very often in horrific ways.

It's essential to understand that the 'moral law' to which Lewis is referring is emphatically NOT (is that emphatic enough? ) referring to positive desires that we simply ignore, but rather to a desire that OPPOSES what we (in general) want to do. Christianity posits that our nature, which we a re born with, is fallen and therefore selfish, turned away from God and towards self. Thus, the moral law is the voice of God in us telling us what we should do, not what we want to do. So violating the moral law is actually quite natural to us.

Also, a focus on the social effects of this leave out the effects of moral law on 2 other relationships - with God and with self (I recognize that you dispute the former). For example, issues like drug abuse and suicide affect not only others, but self as well. (It is easiest, of course, to see the effects of this law in relations with others).

Also, a minor point, but it is not a great leap from enjoying watching a loved one being tortured to enjoying watching anyone be tortured. A sane person would agree that there is something abnormal in either case.

But on the other points I would agree to a draw (or perhaps a stalemate).

rusmeister wrote:It's essential to understand that the 'moral law' to which Lewis is referring is emphatically NOT (is that emphatic enough? )

So then, what... Maybe?

rusmeister wrote:It's essential to understand that the 'moral law' to which Lewis is referring is emphatically NOT (is that emphatic enough? ) referring to positive desires that we simply ignore, but rather to a desire that OPPOSES what we (in general) want to do. Christianity posits that our nature, which we a re born with, is fallen and therefore selfish, turned away from God and towards self. Thus, the moral law is the voice of God in us telling us what we should do, not what we want to do. So violating the moral law is actually quite natural to us.

I'm glad you gave this additional response. I didn't know this is what you meant. I thought the moral law was supposed to be positive desires that we simply ignore. Of course, we're still at the stalemate, because I don't find it any more convincing, but it's definitely good to understand your belief.

rusmeister wrote:Also, a minor point, but it is not a great leap from enjoying watching a loved one being tortured to enjoying watching anyone be tortured. A sane person would agree that there is something abnormal in either case.

I agree. I just meant that, afaik, many of the people who torture others do object to the torture of their own loved ones. So, while we agree that there is this bit of psychological common-ground, akin to common physical characteristics of the species, I do not believe it goes far enough to base much of a moral law on. (Not that I think you're saying it does. I'm just saying...)

rusmeister wrote:But on the other points I would agree to a draw (or perhaps a stalemate).

It was always going to come to this anyway. I started this thread merely because LM asked me why I was disappointed with Mere Christianity. I'm not particularly interested in changing anybody's beliefs; I'm simply interested in learning what everyone's beliefs are.

And my beliefs aren't likely to change. I've put years of thought, reading, and interaction into all this stuff. Many certainly feel that my logic, or my first assumptions, are flawed, but they are what they are, and all I believe is based on them.

However, I fully admit that I'm not opposed the having various kinds of religious beliefs, and, in some way, think it would be kinda neat. Heh. Besides, I could be wrong about my beliefs. If I am, I'd certainly like to know about it. That's why I picked up Mere Christianity in the first place (which I had been referred to by The Language of God, by Francis S. Collins), and why I almost always participate in these kinds of discussions.

Iwould ask why you are interested in learning what everyone's beliefs are. There is such a cacaphony of contradiction and so many that are based on fallacies or misunderstandings that you could go nuts trying to take them all in. As for me, I'm interested in Truth, not merely opinions and beliefs. There are perhaps an infinite number of false answers to a mathematical question, but only one correct answer (I'm speaking in simple terms - don't want to engage in sophistry).

Understood (on being in no hurry to change your beliefs). Many of us are thinking adults who have spent years putting serious thought into these questions. My assertion is merely that some are wrong; that not everybody can be right (and that there must be a right and wrong).

I would suggest one more for serious reading: "The Everlasting Man" by G.K. Chesterton. Chesterton is pretty deep. I am deeply impressed by the fact that his friend and contemporary, George Bernard Shaw, got his ideological passport into public schools, while Chesterton has been censored out and is unknown, due certainly to the fact that Shaw was atheist and Chesterton Christian. In their time they were both equally known, they debated (and Chesterton generally won, imo) and C. was even more prolific than Shaw. It was that book by Chesterton that got Lewis to reconsider his own (at the time) atheist position (you have been warned).

www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/%7Emward/gkc/books/ev ... ng_man.pdf

You might want to peruse his quotations first, tho':

www.chesterton.org/acs/quotes.htm

rusmeister wrote:I would ask why you are interested in learning what everyone's beliefs are. There is such a cacaphony of contradiction and so many that are based on fallacies or misunderstandings that you could go nuts trying to take them all in.

Furls Fire isn't around as much as she used to be, so you aren't likely familiar with her and her faith. But if you read a bit in here, you'll eventually learn about it, and what I think of it and her. People like her are the reason I am interested in learning about others' beliefs.

rusmeister wrote:My assertion is merely that some are wrong; that not everybody can be right (and that there must be a right and wrong).

I, as you already know, don't have any religious beliefs, so I don't have an opinion on whether any one is True or False, or if any number of different beliefs can be True at the same time. But I very much like that idea, which runs through the various quotes I gathered for this post from, holy cow, four years ago!
kevinswatch.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=6968#6968

rusmeister wrote:I would suggest one more for serious reading: "The Everlasting Man" by G.K. Chesterton. Chesterton is pretty deep. I am deeply impressed by the fact that his friend and contemporary, George Bernard Shaw, got his ideological passport into public schools, while Chesterton has been censored out and is unknown, due certainly to the fact that Shaw was atheist and Chesterton Christian. In their time they were both equally known, they debated (and Chesterton generally won, imo) and C. was even more prolific than Shaw. It was that book by Chesterton that got Lewis to reconsider his own (at the time) atheist position (you have been warned).

Thanks! I'll look at it soon. With that many quotes in the quote link, I may just as well start with the book, eh?

Fist and Faith wrote: Thanks! I'll look at it soon. With that many quotes in the quote link, I may just as well start with the book, eh?

Actually, I would read a couple of dozen of the quotes, a few from each section to get a sense of the intelligence of this man before you tackle a big tamale. It gives reasons to not write the man off quickly.

I really do believe he was excluded from public curriculum precisely due to his faith, while Shaw, who had an equally powerful faith, was (and is) welcome because it lined (lines) up with the ideology driving public schools.

Fist and Faith wrote: I, as you already know, don't have any religious beliefs, so I don't have an opinion on whether any one is True or False, or if any number of different beliefs can be True at the same time. But I very much like that idea, which runs through the various quotes I gathered for this post from, holy cow, four years ago!
kevinswatch.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=6968#6968

Having read the post, I can say that while I disagree with Aliantha's statement*, an idea almost approximating it was believed by Lewis, and I believe it as well, that I call, "The Dartboard". It is basically that there IS Truth (The bullseye), but that people can be closer to or further from that Truth - put another way, that many beliefs contain varying degrees of the Truth (and similarly, varying degrees of error). The idea that all beliefs are ultimately the same is nonsense, however. Buddhism, with its ultimate annihilation of individuality into a pantheistic 'whole' (hole is more the word I would use), is light-years away from Christianity, which while condemning individualism, ultimately assures that our individuality will remain intact and become better than ever.

Obviously, the goal is to find the best expression of actual Truth that we can find.

*or almost agree, depending on the place the religion 'gets' you to.

Of course, I can't speak for aliantha, but what I have in mind is best seen in the last of those quotes - from Ramakrishna's entry in The Encyclopedia of Eastern Philosophy and Religion:

For twelve years, under the guidance of various gurus, he submitted himself to spiritual practices of assorted religious systems, including Christianity and Islam. Each direction led him to illumination, so that he could declare on the basis of personal experience that the followers of all religions alike could realize the ultimate reality if their surrender to God was sufficiently intense.

Even this doesn't say exactly what I'm thinking. I can envision a God who is not concerned with how anyone worships, but with how sincerely. Of course, there might be limits to what this God would consider worship. Being sincerely devoted to infanticide might not be acceptable. (Of course, this hypothetical God might have a different attitude toward even that.) SRD said it very well, both as Mhoram:

"And if there is no Creator? Or if the creation is untended?"

"Then who is there to reproach us? We provide the meaning of our own lives. If we serve the Land purely to the furthest limit of our abilities, what more can we ask ourselves?"

and as himself:

We are not required to save the world. We are required to stand up as truly as we can for what we love.

Of course, since I'm not convinced there's any God/god/creator, I'm not saying this is the way God views things, nor even that this is likely the way God views things. I'm just saying I like this idea.

While talking with rus, Mere Christianity came up. Maybe I wasn't remembering it correctly. It's been a few years, and, since I didn't agree with it, I didn't return to it. Figured I'd check it out again, in case rus is right about my misunderstanding Lewis' premise. Only read the first two chapters so far. I'll read more after this post, then go back and see what I said when I started the thread. Thought it might be fun!

Yeah, I disagree so far. Let me give my theory of the Moral Code.

People are naturally selfish. If not taught that different things belong to different people, that everything is not his, a child will assume everything is his. Why wouldn't he? At that age, what reason is there to imagine that my desires are not more important than anything else in the world? So the child sees no problem with snatching "his" things out of another child's hands.

But humans are gregarious. Dang it, we like being around other people! And a society cannot function under the natural morality we see in children. Anarchy is not a workable system for societies. If left alone, a group of infants would (assuming they managed to survive) either become a society with rules, or disband. It would not grow into a society with no rules. There's no such thing. Of course, now, children are born into societies. They come to learn rules very soon after birth. They are taught society's rules. They are taught "proper behavior." A society's rules are proper behavior - within that society.

And, of course, there are similarities in the rules of societies. As I just said, anarchy will not work. Some issues must be addressed if a society is to survive. Any society. Killing is an example. You can't have a society without rules about killing. If it was up to each individual, there would be some who would do their best to kill everyone else. With no rules against it, and no consequences for breaking those rules, the society would end when the last victim died. So, all societies have rules about who can and who cannot kill whom, and under what circumstances.

Ownership is another. Everything in a society can be owned by the king, who does with everything whatever he pleases. Or everyone can have the right to own things. Or there can be no ownership of anything, and everybody can use what they need when they need it. (The Gods Must Be Crazy comes to mind.) But there must be rules of some sort about it. If some people in a society believed that ownership was achieved in certain ways, and other people believed everything is community property, there's gonna be conflict. The society would tear itself apart.

Regardless of the specifics of a society's laws regarding killing and ownership, there must be laws regarding them if the society is to exist. Societies that attempted to exist without them no longer exist. They either fell apart entirely (many probably dying, and maybe most going elsewhere), or quickly made rules. Either way, they are no longer societies of anarchy.

Other issues range widely from society to society. Sexual issues, for sure. When is it ok to be naked? In front of whom? For what reasons? How old should you be before having sex the first time? How many sex partners is it acceptable to have in one lifetime? At the same time?? Is prostitution ok? Every answer imaginable for these questions is good in one society or another, and every answer is bad in another.


Now, we still have that selfish issue. Before they are taught otherwise, two year olds take from each other, sometimes forcefully, sometimes smacking each other. They are taught to behave differently. And no, it's not an absolute. There are no absolutes. There is variety in all things, and there are exceptions to every rule. Left entirely to themselves, some people would grow up to be giving and helping. Not every child would grow up to be selfish in every regard in every instance. But some would. Others would be selfish in certain ways, under certain circumstances, but not in others. Some would think anything they need to do to get their way would be justified; others would only think stealing is ok, but not killing. Some would think it's ok to falsely accuse others of things if it gets them what they want; others would only lie to get out of trouble. There's a wide range of behaviors we'd see if we weren't brought up with the teachings of parents and society that certain behaviors are good, and others bad. But, selfishness is the natural inclination, and, if we have to be forced to not be selfish when we're children, what would it be like if we weren't forced to?

And, of course, there is selfishness everywhere. Despite being brought up with the teachings of parents and society that certain behaviors are good, and others bad. Because we can't change human nature, or the nature of a particular person. So we have jails filled with people who kill and steal and rape and on and on... The selfishness and laziness cannot be eradicated from everyone. Certainly not from me. Most people break the rules now and then. Many people seem to break them more often than not.

Lewis has a couple problems with all this. For one, why do we make up excuses when we're caught acting "badly"? That is, against society's rules.

Lewis wrote:If we do not believe in decent behavior, why should we be so anxious to make excuses for not having behaved decently? The truth is, we believe in decency so much - we feel the Rule of Law pressing on us so - that we cannot bear to face the fact that we are breaking it, and consequently we try to shift the responsibility.

Fair enough. I'm sure that does apply to some people. Some people do believe in the rules of their society. Hey, most societies have at least a few good rules, imho. And it makes sense for someone raised on certain morals to embrace them. But, please, not nearly all people do it for this reason. Not even close. Many people have chosen to get through life by cheating and stealing, instead of working. They certainly can't do that if they are caught. So they try to make us believe they don't behave those ways. How many people are giving us excuses, and thinking, "I hope he buys this! If he doesn't, he's gonna start locking his door!"

But what about those who aren't gung-ho on their society's rules, but don't break them too often, and never the biggies. Why would they feel the need to come up with excuses when they do break the rules? Probably your average person. Remember - we're gregarious creatures. We want to be around other people, and we want to be liked.

He also says this:

Lewis wrote:If no set of moral ideas were truer or better than any other, there would be no sense in preferring civilised morality to savage morality, or Christian morality to Nazi morality. In fact, of course, we all do believe that some moralities are better than others.

This is just a little disingenuous. Everybody listening to the broadcast was, what, living in 20th Century England? Any chance they had the same morals taught by their parents and society?? Any chance any of them did think the Nazis had a better way of life? And did he broadcast it to Nazis, the Stalinists, the Serbs, or the Hutus? Think they agree with Lewis on which moralities are better than others?


OK, enough for now. Back to reading. Heh