Alright, so for all here who have settled upon relativistic morality, explain the basis of your moral outrage against the rapist and why I should find your reasons compelling.

Are not some cultures insane by the standards of others? Can we demonstrate that we have access to virtues that transcend human perspectives? — Tom Storm

I suspect whatever reservation you have in condemning rape in other nations exists only in your inability to articulate a reason why your cultural values should predominate, but your conscience leaves you no doubt as to the immorality of it.

So who will do this for you? Something else for you to decide.

The directionality of ethical considerations will not relieve you of such responsibilities. — Banno

I'm not sure the reason for this clarification, as if I abandoned my free will to God. As an aside, and a debate for another time, but relying upon the incoherence of an ability to decide for myself, as if freedom of the will is meaningful within a secular context, is an irony.

At any rate, if the power to choose what shall be right and what shall be wrong is truly a power I possess, my divine command cannot be objected to and I'd have no reason to choose one rule over the other.

Unless I do have a reason..

If I do, then I'm not deciding from scratch, but something mysterious is guiding me.

And was he right? What do you think? — Banno

I think whether he is right or wrong isn't dependent upon what I think. If I ok rape, that makes me wrong.

There will doubtless be folk too enamoured with external authority to see that the decision is theirs. — Banno

The decision is mine to decide whether to do right or wrong, but I'm not empowered to make wrong right.

The reason for being good is for no other reason than that we regard it as good.
— Fooloso4

Yep. — Banno

Which is precisely why Putin is invading Ukraine: for no reason other than he thinks it good.

The notion that it makes sense to ask why one ought be virtuous, to require a reason for being virtuous, is muddled, since being virtuous is exactly doing what one ought to do. — Banno

The question isn't why we ought be virtuous. It's why we ought do X, where X is any particular act. Once we've concluded that a particular act ought be done, we can can then call that act virtuous.

So then this construct begs the question then of "what makes an act virtuous." And you respond:

Like it or not, we decide what is virtuous. — Banno

Who is "we"? Me and you, the modern Western world, the man with the biggest guns, a wise philosopher? Who?

In any event, is this not a nod to subjectivism? If the world goes mad and finds virtue in rape, is not rape virtuous? Don't you wish to say. "I don't care what anyone says, THAT is wrong!" That is, we can say whatever we want, but wrong is wrong. Do you not agree?

Ethics changes the world to fit our ideas; hence ethics is not found, nor could we find something that underwrites ethics. ( — Banno

A contradiction. Your last statement asserted "we" underwrite our own ethics, but now there is no underwriter at all. Is this not a nod to nihilism? An argument could be made that it's better to say there is no ethics than to say we can decree the profane holy, right?

I know you take my views as improper extrapolating from yours, drawing conclusions you deny should arise from your statements, but it is a serious problem with atheistic morality to try and claim how there can be eternal truths.

each joke has a tragic element: some person gets a real bad treatment — god must be atheist

Consider this doozy:

How do you make a handkerchief dance?
Put a little boogie in it.

A kid joke. Maybe even edgy for an 8 year old. A joke nonetheless.

No bad treatment here, so your joke formula doesn't work. Or maybe you suggest this isn't a joke. If that is your argument, I'll beat your mother to death.

A joke obviously because someone got real bad treatment.

Boogie! Kills me every time.

practicing a religious ritual shows that you are religious? — Harry Hindu

This imposes a modern sensibility on some ancient belief systems. What you call "ritual" for some encompasses their every act, from opening their eyes in the morning to going to sleep at night. They behave in a way consistent with God's will because they believe that's the correct way to behave. By the same token, you behave as you do based upon empirical evidence, believing certain behaviors lead to certain consequences.

Your ritual of hand washing is not just for clean hands, but for safe food, avoidance of illness, long life, etc. That is, to achieve your good. That's precisely why the religious wash their hands. I just want to point out here that the religious are not superstitious, simply trying to quell their OCD, but they believe as firmly as you in the legitimacy of their behavior.

Then all Jews should be following the rituals as laid out originally in the Bible, yet many of them don't, yet still call themselves "Jews". — Harry Hindu

Actually, the ancient Hebrews were descents of the Jews, and typically the word "Jew" wouldn't have been used pre 6th century bce. In any event, Judaism changed dramatically over the years, bringing up again the problem of their not being an essence to the term.

I describe myself as a non-ritualstic Jew. That doesn't mean my family won't gather for Passover Seder, but that has nothing to do with me thinking God will bless me for the event anymore than when your family might gather for your birthday. In truth, along with our matzoh, we color eggs on Passover, which isn't exact textbook haggadah. Is that ritual?

Leaving aside empathy, morality seems to be created by humans to facilitate social cooperation in order to achieve their preferred forms of order. Murder fucks up order. — Tom Storm

If there is a reason, then it must apply for the act to be immoral. That is, if the slaughter of an innocent is necessary for the maintenance of order, then it is moral, correct?

As if one needed a reason to do what one ought do... — Banno

So one needs no reason not to murder, which means murder is just plain wrong in an absolute, objective, non-relative, non-subjective way?

What does that even mean? As if there is a reality composed of morality that exists regardless of the consensus opinion.

A truly bizarre position.

Surely there must be a reason not to murder, else what makes it wrong?

As I said, for some word to have meaning it needs to refer to something. So if the user of the word, "religion" isn't referring to anything then it would just be a string of meaningless scribbles or sounds from their mouths.

What one person means by "religion" someone else could mean something different, then how do we know that they are even talking about the same thing? To say that the word has meaning in that any person can use it however they want renders the word meaningless in that it is now to vague for anyone to understand how it is being used and that it would be more efficient to just say what you are referring to rather than use the word, "religion" at all. It becomes useless. — Harry Hindu

What you say of the word "religion" is not unique to the word "religion," but is a universal limitation of word definition. The term "religion" includes a number of examples, all of which are clearly designated among speakers for what they are, for example: Christianity, Buddhism, Judaism, Hare Krishna, Janism, Hinduism, Islam, and then there are thousands of others in every corner of the world, many of which have come and gone over the millennia. We can try to find the element common to all that defines "religion," but, try as we might, we will continue to find that there is no essential element that must exist in order for the belief system to be a religion. The reason for this is because essentialism is not a sustainable argument as it relates to definitions of terms.

This problem with the term "religion" is no different from the term "cup," yet we use the term cup in a meaningful way. That is, I can give thousands of examples of cups (just like I can with religions), but there will always be some cup example that falls outside the definition that we keep trying to refine. There is no essential element of a cup for it to be a cup, but that hardly means we can't speak of cups.

It seems to me that if you want to posit gods on the natural level then you would be practicing science, not religion - which leads me to think of another definition for religion: The act of favoring one unprovable concept over all other unprovable concepts. — Harry Hindu

I just see this comment as positing a false dichotomy between (1) the scientific method and (2) religion. Most people use neither, but accept as proof just their instinct or general observations. We don't engage in rigorous experimentation for most of our beliefs. Someone who insists upon herbal remedies, for example, isn't practicing religion or science.

It's an error to also deny an overlap between the two also, as most religious people accept science (to greater and lesser degrees) and plenty of scientists allow for the unknown variable, which they to greater and lesser extent attribute to God.

In any event, nothing I've said is inconsistent with atheism or suggests, hints, or intimates there may be a god. My point is simply that your argument of the incoherency of the term "religion" effectively proves its non-existence is incorrect.

Whenever you rely on somebody else that person has authority over you. — HardWorker

In most organizations, management has the authority and power, and that is the power over subordinates. The manager who died not rely on others is the worst manager of all because he can't figure out that his role is to oversee the operation and not to work the assembly line.

Observations: I haven't been able to determine the sex of individuals on this forum based on their intellectual activities. Suggestive words, phrases, accounts of experiences, admissions as to being a man/woman, outbursts of any kind and the like don't count as they're obvious indicators of one's sex.

Conclusion: The mind has no sex. It's neuter/asexual. — Agent Smith

It would be an interesting question whether there is an accurate AI algorithm that could distinguish men from women with a high degree of statistical probability. I found this one, but I doubt it's very reliable: http://www.hackerfactor.com/GenderGuesser.php#Analyze

I typed posts from this board of those I knew to be male and those I knew to be female, and it wasn't terribly accurate.

I cut and pasted my short story entry and it came back:

Genre: Informal
Female = 3709
Male = 4288
Difference = 579; 53.62%
Verdict: Weak MALE

Weak emphasis could indicate European.

Genre: Formal
Female = 2637
Male = 2104
Difference = -533; 44.37%
Verdict: Weak FEMALE

Weak emphasis could indicate European.

I'm a strong American male, so they need to rework some things, but the idea is interesting.

Meaning is using terms to refer to things that are not words. If the word does not refer to anything that exists outside of one's own mind yet it is used to refer to things outside of one's mind (confusing the map with the territory) then it is a meaningless word - just like the term, "god".

Now, if it is correctly being used to refer to a concept (those things that only exist in minds) then it has meaning. The difference is do those concepts then refer to things in the world.

Religion is the belief in things outside of, or beyond, the natural. — Harry Hindu

If we're using the term "religion" within a community, it has meaning, even if the meaning amounts to delusional, confused, and inconsistent beliefs about the origins of the universe. To declare that the term is meaningless is to claim it's gibberish, just sounds conveying no thought whatsoever. "God" means something different from "cat" and different from "jldjlk." To say otherwise is just to impose an opinion on the validity of the concept that underlies the word "God."

My belief in bigfoot is different from my belief in gorillas, but my belief in bigfoot doesn't dissolve into meaninglessness because there is no such thing as bigfoot.

Your definition of religion is wanting and does not universally describe all religions. It's entirely possible to have a religion with gods that interact only on the "natural" level, which isn't entirely inconsistent with primitive religions, especially considering in primitive societies they don't have a real distinction between the miraculous and ordinary earthly events.

For your definition to be workable, you would be admitting to essentialism.

This only points to the problem. — Fooloso4

It resolves the problem because it declares an authority for a prescriptive language system for a utilitarian purpose. If you want to dispense with the philosophical questions of "what is a cup," you provide someone the power to decree what a cup is and then that's what it is. You can argue as much as you want after the gavel falls, but it won't do you any good.

It can very much be a problem when it comes to religious exemptions. — Fooloso4

Legal definitions are easy to come by. It's whatever the legislature and judges say it is.

You don't know how to define a game but you know how to use the word. Why this special pleading over 'concept' - a word you also know how to use? — ZzzoneiroCosm

This is a good point, pointing out that it's not just the metaphysical existence of an underlying concept that is being denied, but "concept" is being denied having meaning even through usage, which is the gold standard under this analysis.

The problem I have in addition to this is that the "meaning is use" position does not require the outright denial of internal ineffable concepts; it just denies such can be discussed. It's one thing to declare that my public behavior is all you can know of me, but another to say that my public behavior is all there is of me.

To the extent @Banno is trying to define "concept" in a metaphysical way (as opposed to a usage way), he's correct in that you cannot tell him anything about your concept expect to the extent you can communicate it in words (your public behavior), but that hardly equates to a conclusion there can be no concept in your head that you are simply unable to communicate.

Actually it's from Austin rather than Wittgenstein. — Banno

Wherever it's from, it seems an illogical jump from treating behavior as an objective means of assessing meaning to declaring behavior as the speaker's subjective meaning.

Ah, I see, you expect malice on my part. Well, all that does is shut down the promise of a conversation. — Banno

Not malice, just motive, but in any event irrelevant. We can substitute cups for religion in this debate is my point, which would be an easy way to avoid the loaded topic of religion.

Yes, prostheses – like verbal or psychological crutches – useful for the disabled but crippling from premature / over-use by the (once) abled. — 180 Proof

Assuming even worse, that religion is that which only the stupidest morons believe in, the OP's concern is resolved: The word has meaning.

Think I mentioned that before. I don't; understand what sort of thing a concept is, apart from just the way we use a word... — Banno

This is an unnecessarily excessive extrapolation of the meaning is use concept. The concept is a self contained linguistic theory offering a description of how communication occurs, leaving in silence that which is unreducible to words, but not denying its existence.

This is to say, you don't understand my concept of a tree except to the extent you understand how I use the term "tree," but you need not deny my concept of the tree may contain attributes unidentified in my speech.

An open polythetic approach does capture much of what is implicit in the notion of a family resemblance. But as the article points out, just providing a polythetic definition does not remove ethnocentric or other biases. The next step is take to be an anchored polythetic approach, the example being that a religion has at least the characteristic of "a belief in superempirical beings or powers", together with some combination of other criteria. This is taken as answering the question as to why Buddhism is a religion but not Capitalism. — Banno

I thought it an odd post by you because the riddle of "what is a religion" is no more a curiosity than "what is X," meaning religion doesn’t pose a special case anymore than any other word, and the riddle (as the article points out) was solved by Wittgenstein. Words simply don't have essences, and their meaning is based upon usage and context. That's that.

For some reason though, you don't accept that and instead try to assert an essence (i.e religion at its essence is "a belief in superempirical beings or powers"). Surely we are all creative enough to design a "religion" without that attribute. If we could not, then we'd have defeated Wittgenstein and proved essentialism.

The covert point of the OP I suspect is to prove that the religious believe in a meaningless concept, striking a fatal blow against religion. My reply to that is it may be that religious beliefs are false, but that they might have no referent and that they may be defintionaly elusive doesn't make them meaningless. Meaning is use. We use the term, to be sure. It must therefore have meaning.

Events we call causes may not lead to events we call results 100% of the time. Being bitten by an infected deer tick causes Lyme disease, but not everyone who is bitten by an infected deer tick gets Lyme disease. — T Clark

Causes always lead to events if we accept that every event has a cause, which is a basic metaphysical assumption. What you have identified isn't a metaphysical problem, but an epistemological one, meaning every cause doesn't have a predictable event, and by "predictable," I mean knowable. That we don't know whether you will contract Lyme's disease by the bite of an infected deer tick doesn't mean that there will not be an event that is caused by the bite of the infected deer tick, it just means you don't know what it will be.

As you increase the number of variables that can affect outcome, predictability decreases and is arguably eliminated, which is the foundation of chaos theory, but chaos theory doesn't suggest some events don't have causes.

Again - For this thread I’d like to focus just on the meaning of the words “cause” or “causalty,” not on any other philosophical issues. Also, as I noted, I’d like the focus to be on physical causes. — T Clark

This seems more of a focus on the physics question of what causation is as opposed to the philosophical issues related to causation. The philosophical debate related to causation is: https://iep.utm.edu/causation/

For example, take Hume's comment "We have no other notion of cause and effect, but that of certain objects, which have always conjoin'd together, and which in all past instances have been found inseparable." This denies direct knowledge of causation and claims it's based upon an assumption that A causes B as opposed to A always seems correlated to B. Statistically speaking, the best you can say is that A is 100% correlated to B after n number of trials, but you can't ever say that A causes B.

So, you've spoken of causation, but you can't see the property of causation, as in your example, the bounce off one ball to the other. You can see the movement, but not the actual causation.

The rooster came first, as males often do, which fertilized the egg, which was then laid, which was then sat upon by the hen, which resulted in a hot little chick, who was eventually noticed by another rooster, and the laying cycle began again.

On the contrary, gamblers, like lovers, play to lose – to keep the games going. The action is everything, that's the jones! :broken: — 180 Proof

Ain't no fun in a truly broken heart.

Either you're unaware how the expansion happened or you're playing a semantic game. Which is it? Are you just taking issue with the word expand? — Benkei

The latter. I'm drawing a distinction as to what happened. It's not as if western Europe and eastern Europe are both invaders into Ukraine fighting over the same prize. Western Europe has allowed countries to voluntarily apply for membership into NATO and decide how they wish to align. Russia has engaged in a hostile military takeover.

Whatever pressures the West has exerted to encourage NATO alignment doesn't equate to military force. My point being that if Russia wishes to justify their "expansion" into Ukraine as responsive to the West's "expansion" into Ukraine, that sounds like spin control, trying to assert an unjustified moral and logical equivalency.

For this to work, you have to show it's reasonably possible for Russia to effectively occupy Ukraine. I don't think this is the case. Maybe Eastern Ukraine but then if Mearsheimer and Kissinger are to be believed only true neutrality would've seen them survive as independent countries. — Benkei

I don't know why occupation or displacement is necessary for full control. The USSR controlled its member states.

And what exactly are Russians to believe when the US overthrew the Ukrainian government in 2014 and has an outsized influence on NATO and a proxy war between Russia and NATO/USA may have been going on since then? — Benkei

This is a very one sided view. Can I say the US played no role in the overthrow, no, but I can't say the overthrow didn't represent the will of the Ukraine people either.. Ukraine was a pawn for both sides in 2014. They seemed to be moving toward the EU but then their President swung back to siding with Russia, in opposition to the will of the people, thus resulting in the uprising. Do you suspect Russian meddling caused the change of heart away from the EU? Seems the best explanation.

At any rate, do you think an uninfluenced Ukranian vote would side with Russia or the West? You can argue either will result in some form of subjugation, but the economic subjugation of the West is infinitely more palatable than the totalitarian subjugation of Russia.

This isn't some democracy vs. autocracy battle. But nice example of US propaganda I suppose, let's pretend it's about ideals when we all know another game is being played. There's a reason NATO chose the expansion in certain countries and that reason isn't benign. — Benkei

NATO doesn't expand. Nations voluntarily join or they don't, and there are requirements for joining that must be met. I'd consider the Crimea event or the current invasion an expansion.

Does anyone live under the illusion that Russia was not going to eventually invade Ukraine regardless of NATO expansion into other nations? Are we to believe that Russia really thought a NATO protected Ukraine might one day invade Russia despite the Russian nuclear arsenal and so this defensive move became necessary now?

If the driver for the war is the reestablishment of a Russian empire of the likes of the former USSR (which i think it is), then the war had to be fought not just prior to Ukraine entering NATO, but prior to Ukraine breaking all ideological ties to Russia.

The window to seize Ukraine was closing through a potential NATO alliance, an EU entry, or just through continued liberalized democratization of Ukraine. If Russia wished to reestablish its past glory, it had to act before it lost all its potential prey to the protection of the West.

The problem is that Putin is learning is that the window was more shut that he thought it was. The fierce Ukraine resistance is based upon its belief that it is truly autonomous and not, as Putin would suggest, a group a Russians stranded in a Westernized state. Ukrainians stand with the full belief Russia is an invader and the West is a protector, indicating Russia is in a weaker position than maybe Putin appreciated.

This is just to say that whether NATO signaled it was expanding, or even if it signaled it was contacting (as Trump would have had it in his America first protectionism), Putin had to act now or forever lose Ukraine to the West.

Putin is fighting the infectious disease of Democracy, making this war inevitable as long as self rule is what the Ukrainians want. The only way for Ukraine to have avoided this war was to abandon democracy and submit to Putin. What backed Putin into a corner is that his country sucks and no one wants to be a part of it.

Words are clearly dependent on meaning based on the language that instantiates it for him. The 'use' is the application of the language. — Shwah

Again, I've not argued words have no meaning. I've argued words need no referent for meaning, and I've not conflated reference for usage.

The bottom line is that Yahweh's existence is not logically required simply because that word has been used. Usage provides meaning, but it doesn't create the referent. That is, you can talk about God and the term can be impregnated with all sorts of meaning from that use, but that does not create the God you're talking about.

The same holds true for the person who believes that Tom Sawyer is non-fiction. They can talk about him, understand him, and be fully wrong about his existence. I'm an A-TomSawyerist in that I disbelieve in his existence.

He makes no claim to word meanings being dependent upon reference. He's talking about words lacking meaning outside of usage or context. That is, "Moses did not exist" only obtains meaning within particularized contextualized use, being devoid of meaning just as a stark statement.

Incorrect. Atheists say god does not exist. Which is different than saying god is fictional. I just said that about bigfoot and company. — L'éléphant

An atheist would claim that God is a fictional character in the Bible. They wouldn't deny he existed as that fictional character. If they did, I think someone would just open the Bible and show them where he was being talked about.

The same holds for Tom Sawyer, Tiny Tim, and Harry Potter. They don't exist as anything other than fictional characters.

So it's a reference to an existential construct (subjective fact). — Shwah

Saying its only referent is its subjective meaning is denying it has a referent.

The referent to "Donald Trump" is Donald Trump. See how you have a word, its meaning, and the actual referent? You're missing the actual referent with the term "King of America."

Okay but there are times the king of america does exist and even times you are the king of america. There are certainly references which make that true such as choosing monarch in civilization as america. — Shwah

By America, I mean the USA, and the USA never had a king.

was replying to him. I don't know what that refers to. I said term which includes adverbs. — Shwah

You've just argued that a referent must exist for there to be meaning. What does "intelligently" refer to?

How can you parse the phrase "king of america" without a referent at all? I feel it's necessary to emphasize that the referent does not need to be material but if you don't know what a king is or what america is or what they are when conjoined (a linguistic conception, a monarch of america game simulator) then you can't meaningfully decide whether it's true or not. — Shwah

I've not argued words have no meaning. I've argued they need not point to anything to have that meaning. The word "the" means something, but there is no "the" in a material or non-material way.

said term which includes any part of speech or phrase. — Shwah

Every part of speech has a referent? What about articles, prepositions, verbs, gerunds, etc? Where is the "the", the "about", the "cooking"?

it has no reference then how can you predicate anything about it? It needs something to build off of. For instance the queen of england has a material reference where the queen of france has one as well but in the past etc. In any case the queen is the object which is more accurately understood through predications. — Shwah

"I am the king of America" is a meaningful proposition. It has a truth value, and it is false. "King of America" has no referent. "I am the king of Canada" is similarly a false proposition, but it is distinct in meaning from the first proposition, meaning "king of America" and "king of Canada" have different meanings, despite neither having a referent.

That's the whole point. You don't need an *empirical* reference but you do need some reference otherwise it's a meaningless non-proposition. — Shwah

No, it' is a proposition and it has meaning and it has no referent whatsoever.

No your objection doesn't work because you still have to speak of them all as existing. — Shwah

Nouns, even proper nouns, needn't have referents to have meaning. "The king of France doesn't exist" is a meaningful proposition despite the non-existence of a king of France.

Your argument that the very declaration that God doesn't exist somehow bootstraps him into existence because logic dictates every speakable noun have an empirical referent is absurd. I can't speak aberjobbies into existence.

I'm a theist, by the way. There are atheists too. I can't deny their existence because I've actually seen them. I'd be hard pressed to claim I know there is a god more than I know there are atheists.