Original Sin?

Quote: Dalex64

What confused me is your statement or response to Bob's statement that an uncaring or neutral universe would be the end of us, or wouldn't be worth living in. I'm portable again, as usual, so I'm sorry I can't easily go check your exact words.

One more thing you just said is morality dwells within us, and we are special because we know right from wrong.

The universe, and nothing else in the universe (probably or almost), except for us, knows right from wrong.

I'm saying the same thing several different ways - the universe does not care, doesn't know right from wrong, and doesn't have the capacity for any of thise things.

None of that is in conflict either with the idea that God made us a happy or favorable little corner of the universe to live in.

I'm think you'll have to forgive me, the idea that there is no true or objective right or wrong, good or evil, is so repulsive to me in every way that I might have written my thoughts down quickly and inaccurately.

Quote: FrGamble

The universe isn't run by moral laws, but WE ARE!

Of our own making, that evolved over time.

Quote:

You almost, and I know you can't really be saying this, sound like you don't think their is anything wrong with the actions of the clans back in this time period.

In retrospect, of course it's wrong to eat a
passing stranger for lunch. But being in
those times and those circumstances, I
probably would have thought nothing
of it. That was what we did and it would
have seemed correct.

We have something much more recent.
Well within the living memory of many
people, me included, there was a time
when Blacks were treated as subhuman
in this country. Right up to the 1960's
you could buy all kinds of things that
degraded Blacks as a race. Mammy and
Mose salt and peppers, watermelon eating
Black kids figures that you hung pot holders
from. Hundreds and hundreds of items
like these. Fine Christian upstanding citizens
with love in their hearts had this awful stuff
in their homes all across America.

Was it morally wrong? It is now, but in the
40's and 50's, not really. It was accepted
practice, everybody did it, just like eating
strangers for dinner. Morality can be a moving
target.

Quote: Evenbob

Of our own making, that evolved over time.



In retrospect, of course it's wrong to eat a
passing stranger for lunch. But being in
those times and those circumstances, I
probably would have thought nothing
of it. That was what we did and it would
have seemed correct.

We have something much more recent.
Well within the living memory of many
people, me included, there was a time
when Blacks were treated as subhuman
in this country. Right up to the 1960's
you could buy all kinds of things that
degraded Blacks as a race. Mammy and
Mose salt and peppers, watermelon eating
Black kids figures that you hung pot holders
from. Hundreds and hundreds of items
like these. Fine Christian upstanding citizens
with love in their hearts had this awful stuff
in their homes all across America.

Was it morally wrong? It is now, but in the
40's and 50's, not really. It was accepted
practice, everybody did it, just like eating
strangers for dinner. Morality can be a moving
target.

I sort of bowed out, as post-migraine issues weren't allowing me to express myself as completely as I had wanted. Leave it to EB to take my thoughts and put them into words.

This is what I've said a hundred times. Morality shifts. Just like EB said, used to be you could look down on colored folks. God fearing Christians looked down on colored folks. Not because they were evil, but because that was the order of the day. Use to be you could tease dandies, and faeries, and other effeminate chaps. Now you can't. We can still pick on short people, and fat people, a people who don't spell too good, and poor people, but could come a day when even saying "poor" (it's financially challenged now) could have you excommunicated from society. Because morality shifts.

Millions, "not tens of thousands" that EB offered, but millions of my people were slaughtered out of hand for no other reason that they lived somewhere that a more advanced culture wanted. Slaughtered by folks escaping religious persecution. Slaughtered by folks that held the Lord your God as their own personal savior. By stone and by axe, they were cut down. Manifest Destiny, their destiny under God to do this work. Work, which involved a genocide that makes the Holocaust look like a two day apartment fire. Your people did that In the Name of God.

It's not opinion. It's history, written down in common English and held in our museums. It's not prehistory or trapped in ancient texts made of confusing lost languages. It's there, it happened, it is the way the world was. What part of this is open for debate?

None of this should be up for debate at all, the fact that it is makes me deeply upset. It is thoughts like you and Bob bring up that raise the question - was the killing and eating of strangers really wrong, was the killing of millions of people in a genocide really wrong? OF COURSE IT WAS! It was back then when they were doing it, it was wrong before they did it, and it will always be wrong. By you putting morality on some type of sliding scale where it just happens to depend on where and what time you lived to determine if racism is acceptable or not is absurd. You are legitimizing evil and calling something bad a good. Morality shifts, come on man!?! Maybe our practice of morality shifts but genocide doesn't all the sudden become a bad thing once it stops, racism isn't acceptable and good until they change a law. These things are objectively bad and you trying to deny that is as offensive as Bob's pictures.

Quote: FrGamble

Morality shifts, come on man!?! Maybe our practice of morality shifts

What's the difference? Morality is what we practice,
it's not something written in a book. Jesus never
spoke out about slavery because it was in vogue
when he was alive, we understand that and don't
hold it against him. Slavery was a foundation of
society then, it would never occur to him to be
against it.

Why don't you rail against his morality, it's right up
there with eating strangers for Sunday brunch.

You know who adores and collects all that Black
memorabilia? Black people! They love it, I bought
it whenever I could find it in the 80's Blacks bought
most of it. Go figure..

To clarify, what I meant by 'our practice of morality' was that we are not always good at doing what we know we should. I define this as sin. In fact maybe a fringe benefit of this discussion may be that it helps you recognize that there is always a gap between what we know we should do and what we do. This is plain as the nose on your face.

By the way did you know Jesus said, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." He also said, "Whatever you do to these least brothers and sister of mine, you do unto me." And there are many more instances where Jesus and the Apostles spoke against slavery as we understand it today. Let me ask you a question, in the US when modern Slavery was a foundation for society, especially in the south, was it at that time a moral good?

Quote: FrGamble

To clarify, what I meant by 'our practice of morality' was that we are not always good at doing what we know we should. I define this as sin. In fact maybe a fringe benefit of this discussion may be that it helps you recognize that there is always a gap between what we know we should do and what we do. This is plain as the nose on your face.

By the way did you know Jesus said, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." He also said, "Whatever you do to these least brothers and sister of mine, you do unto me." And there are many more instances where Jesus and the Apostles spoke against slavery as we understand it today. Let me ask you a question, in the US when modern Slavery was a foundation for society, especially in the south, was it at that time a moral good?

You are interpreting "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." in a modern context and applying its modern meaning to slavery in an ancient context.

I think it is pretty clear that neither Jesus nor the Bible spoke out against slavery, and "do unto others..." did not apply to slaves.

http://www.religioustolerance.org/sla_bibl2.htm

Quote: Face

This is what I've said a hundred times. Morality shifts.

I have to stand with the good Father on this one, though his moral code is largely wrong.

While there are changes in ethics and morality, as there are changes in science, what changes most is really perception, for lack of a better term, and social norms.

Quote: Nareed

I have to stand with the good Father on this one, though his moral code is largely wrong.

While there are changes in ethics and morality, as there are changes in science, what changes most is really perception, for lack of a better term, and social norms.

Moral: adj - concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character:

Morality: n - principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong or good and bad behavior.

Principle: n - a fundamental truth or proposition that serves as the foundation for a system of belief or behavior or for a chain of reasoning

Fundamental: adj - forming a necessary base or core; of central importance:

Semantics? Yes, that is what I am arguing. I get what you and the Good Father are saying. Just because it was accepted to enslave blacks in the 1800's doesn't mean it was righteous and just. But it was "right" according to the majority of white America, to do just that. It was "right" to deny them rights given to land owning white men. It was "right" to deny women the right to vote. Not by my standards, not yours, and likely not any modern American. But then, it absolutely was. It cannot have been wrong or things wouldn't have been the way they were.

The "necessary base" and "foundation for a system of belief", the fundamentals and principles, were that blacks and women were second class (or worse) citizens. These principles were used to create a morality that treating them as such was "right".

Where is my error? I fancy myself rather good at English and reading comprehension. The dictionary definition of these things match what I've been saying. Further, looking back into history, I see the evidence that I am speaking truth. Men, in accordance with the law and their God, behaved in this manner with no repercussions whatsoever. Many were quite successful, many are men whose statues adorn our places of importance and fill our texts today. They are remembered and revered as Great Men.

Now I'm not arguing, but I'm asking. How in the world is this not proof that morality shifts? By definition and by example, it has done just that. Where is there room to argue? Help me understand.

Quote: Dalex64

I think it is pretty clear that neither Jesus nor the Bible spoke out against slavery, and "do unto others..." did not apply to slaves.

Of course it doesn't. Jesus wasn't sending
some cryptic message about slavery, he
accepted it as did everybody in his time.

Christians love to do this, find some passage
that speaks to the point they're making, even
though it has nothing to do with it.