Fairness and reasonableness are procedural rules, not rules for deciding what will and won't be sanctioned. Fairness means whatever rules there are are applied to everyone the same. When I said "reasonable" I meant that they are not applied or interpreted rigidly and there is no cruel and unusual punishment. I probably wasn't clear enough about that. — T Clark

Okay, but "cruel and unusual" is a non-procedural constraint. I mean, if there is a cruel and unusual rule that is applied equally to all, would you have a complaint? Would there be something wrong or irrational about the rule?

My reference to the forum was a specific instance of a general rule and was not intended as a comment on the forum itself. It is the institution of this sort with which I am most familiar. As such it is a reasonable example. — T Clark

That's fair. I just want to try to avoid the scenario where this becomes a referendum on TPF or something weird like that.

The reasoning for dismissal / banning should be to prevent harm to be done to others. — ssu

Okay, thanks for answering.

The idea here is apparently that we should ban, imprison, or deport someone whose ideas and views will cause a sufficient level of harm, such as a terrorist or someone who aids and abets terrorists. This is similar to this option:

I dismiss KK because entertaining them and their viewpoint will lead to harm. — Leontiskos

Now, do you see this as a moral or non-moral move? Presumably you see it as non-moral, and might view it as I described here:

Another observation is that “being at cross purposes” seems to play a fairly significant role in dismissal. Some kind of communal short-circuit occurs. For example, if someone tries to exterminate Jews and another tries to stop them, they are not at cross-purposes in the deeper sense, because they are engaged in a common pursuit of practical execution. Similarly, when two football teams face off, they are not at cross-purposes given that they are both engaged in the same genus of activity, even though they are opposed within that genus. — Leontiskos

Or in other words, we are going to deport the terrorist, and we need to undertake no moral evaluation of their intentions before doing so. Maybe the terrorist was acting in good faith or was a victim of poor education - it makes no difference to the decision. The police and the terrorist are not at cross purposes in that deeper sense. They are playing the same game, in different directions. If this is right then they are deported but not excluded in the deeper sense, and I will say more about this below.

I think some people do view terrorists that way. Others attribute moral blame to them. In any event, this is a case that I agree to be more or less non-moral. We move terrorists out of our country, or perhaps even kill them, in the same way we move or kill rodents that have infested our home.

If we want to look at this thread in light of international issues, then perhaps a traitor is a better example than a terrorist. I wouldn't quite say that a terrorist is dismissed or excluded, given the fact that they never sought incorporation in the first place. We are not denying the terrorist anything that they intrinsically desire; only something they desire instrumentally. The traitor, on the other hand, is someone who is dismissed or excluded and who is also judged morally. I recently watched the film Breach, which is about a traitor in the FBI, and in that film those qualities are on display to a remarkable degree.

Do you think treason differs from terrorism in this moral sense? Do you think a country is rationally justified in imputing moral blame to a traitor?

Rationality absent an end is a different matter... one that I am much less sure about. — BitconnectCarlos

On my view racism (thinking that one race is generally superior or inferior to another) is false, and therefore irrational. The OP was taking this for granted, but maybe that was a mistake.

But the kicker comes in the fact that we shun/exclude/dismiss racists, and yet we don't shun/exclude/dismiss everyone who is irrational. So why do we shun racists in particular? At a societal level, it is almost certainly because we fear they will reenact a societal mistake of the past. And that's fine - it's a bit like telling your kid not to play near the fire to decrease the probability that they will be burned. Yet even that account is insufficient given that deterrence does not require shaming/shunning/excluding. In any case, there is nothing particularly moral about what I have said thus far. Culpability has not yet entered into the conversation.

But we do view racists as immoral. Are we wrong to do so? Should we just treat them like innocuous children who have wandered too close to the fire? On my view the moral attribution has to do with some form of obstinacy, malice, or negligence, which layer atop the foundational irrationality. But on this view some racists will be immoral and some will not be immoral. This moral judgment also accounts for the shift from deterrence to shaming/shunning/excluding.

I don't know where your view would take this. Maybe you would say that racists are immoral but not irrational? I don't really understand accounts of morality that distance themselves from rationality.

There is no rational basis.

...

Our hope is that they will be reasonable and fair. — T Clark

So you think that there is no rational basis to any rule regarding dismissal/exclusion, and yet you also hope that the rules of an internet forum will be reasonable and fair? It sounds like you are contradicting yourself.

Also, I would prefer speaking about "internet forums" in the generic sense, as I don't want this thread to become a thread about TPF.

We need to distinguish between different types of rationality. Regarding instrumental rationality, certain decisions are definitely favored over others. Once we agree that Western civilization or our religion is worth preserving, we can talk about rationality towards that end. Rationality absent an end is a different matter... one that I am much less sure about. — BitconnectCarlos

Okay, that's fair enough as far as it goes.

At the risk of derailing my own thread, are you comfortable with the inference that anger or moral indignation is never rationally justified if there is nothing beyond instrumental rationality?

If someone is a flat earther, don't engage with them. What's the point? Same with neonazi's, Qanon, electiondeniers, etc. They're not immoral, but they're not fun to talk to. — RogueAI

Okay, good. You've answered the OP:

1. I don't engage those who are not fun to talk to
2. Flat Earthers are not fun to talk to
3. Therefore I do not engage flat Earthers

That's a good example of a non-moral answer to the OP. :up:

What if the innocents are factory workers making bombers to be used against you? What if they're a bunch of scientists working feverishly on enriching uranium for a nuclear bomb to be used against you? What if they're a bunch of chemists at a mustard gas plant? — RogueAI

If the innocents aren't innocent then (1) would of course not apply to them. As far as I understand, someone working in an arms factory is not considered an innocent or a simple civilian.

Getting back to the OP, do you think it is ever rationally justifiable to dismiss or exclude someone, particularly because of some action or set of actions they have chosen? If so, when and why is this rationally justifiable?

Make up your mind. — ssu

When I said:

I think it is well-accepted that when someone overtly tries to harm us we attack them... — Leontiskos

...I was saying, "Yes, obviously we oppose terrorists." Again, the question of the OP is, "Why?"

My point is that for Q1 and Q2 you can get definitive answer — ssu

Then give a definitive answer. Answer the OP. That's what it's there for. I gave my answer in post #2.

I think that's right. Fighting terrorism is instrumentally rational in that it preserves Western civilization and our religious heritage. — BitconnectCarlos

Okay, but how far does this extend? Are you comfortable with the inference that no course of action is more or less rational than any other course of action? For example, that killing your own daughter is no more or less rational than killing the intruder who is wielding lethal force? Or that excluding racists from the town hall meeting is no more or less rational than excluding 41 year-old women with 6-inch hair from the town hall meeting? Or that killing the innocent is no more or less rational than killing the guilty? Is it only priests who would make these distinctions, not philosophers?

I want to be careful about going too far out on this tangent, but we can explore it tentatively.

- Thanks for the background. I wanted to look that up but the internet was down when I drafted the OP.

You become like a priest to them, trying to get them to see the light. It's no longer philosophy so much as moral reformation. — BitconnectCarlos

Are you saying we need to provide moral facts in support of our stances such that we believe we can justifiably dismiss terrorists? If that is the case, then I'm not sure anyone can dismiss anyone on any grounds. — ToothyMaw

It sounds like you guys don't believe that opposing murder or terrorism is a rational act. That in opposing murder or excluding a murderer we are acting like "priests," not "philosophers," and that there is no rational justification for opposing murder or terrorism, or dismissing/excluding those who engage in these acts.

Is that right? If so, Aquinas would find this quite amazing.

You can continue; it just turns into a different type of discussion. How do you start explaining to someone that a 3-year-old is not a valid target just because they belong to a certain nationality or race? — BitconnectCarlos

Well let's keep these two distinct:

1. You should not (deliberately) harm the innocent
2. Those who (deliberately) harm the innocent should be dismissed/excluded/shunned/etc.

The thread is primarily about (2), but it may well be that (1) must be considered in the analysis.

So if I were to take a stab at your example, I would say that the one who deliberately harms the innocent is unfit for society, given the liability they pose to societal peace and wellbeing. Therefore, for the sake of the society's health, they are to be excluded from society at least until they have accepted (1).

That is an attempt to replace your "wicked" with a reasoned explanation. I think that explanation is sufficient to justify their exclusion, even if it is not a complete explanation of (2). It may not be complete given that it makes no mention of culpability.

When one side condones or mitigates the deliberate murder of innocents, I tune out and ignore them. — BitconnectCarlos

Okay, but why? The OP is asking, "Why?"

If someone is downplaying or supporting the intentional targeting of civilians, that person is wicked. — BitconnectCarlos

Okay, but why should wicked people be tuned out and ignored? Is it supposed to be self-evident, such that no real explanation is possible?

I think @ssu must be reading the OP as tendentious, but I gave my own earnest answer in the second post. I am sincerely interested in the rational grounding for the various varieties of dismissal or exclusion, and I am in no way claiming that dismissal/exclusion is never appropriate.

Yes. Leontiskos, you and I go to jail if we gather funds to terrorists. — ssu

"It's illegal, therefore you can't do it. Don't ask any more questions."

I don't find that to be a reasonable stance. We know of all sorts of things that were illegal and yet should have been done, such as freeing slaves.

For example in Germany the accusation of being a Nazi can be pretty serious: denying that the Holocaust happened can get you five years in prison. Germans, who do have this painful history, do take it quite seriously. — ssu

Right, as I said:

What’s interesting about this is that it’s not altogether wrong. For example, the taboo against anti-Semitism has a rational undergirding, particularly in places like Germany. The cultural consensus balks at non-conformity, and this is rooted in both harm and a form of reparations. — Leontiskos

-

My point here is that moral judgments start from things that universally are considered not only being unmoral, but even criminal. Us not tolerating them doesn't mean that we are against free speech. Even if we put here "question about the breadth of the moral sphere aside" as you said, we shouldn't forget them. It's similar to talking about the Overton window. We understand that when there is a window, there's also part which isn't in the window, but perhaps "the Overton Wall". — ssu

It sounds like you have no answer to the OP, or that you want to discuss a different OP. Do you have answers to Q1 or Q2 of the OP? Or are you saying that cultural taboos and laws are unquestionable and rationally opaque, and cannot be inquired into?

But what about outside of doctrine; could cultural Christianity (the default setting of the West, we might say) still be useful? — Tom Storm

Yes - I don't think proponents of cultural Christianity ("Christianists," on one rendering), claim to be expounding Christian doctrine per se. There has been a pretty interesting discussion of this topic since Paul Kingsnorth's lecture, "Against Christian Civilization" (paper version).

Far later come things where would have a discussion about if the issue is morally right or wrong. — ssu

Questions about the breadth of the moral sphere aside, it seems clear to me that when someone wishes to dismiss or exclude someone with a charge like, "Racist!," they are almost always involved in a moral judgment. The implication is that the racist has done something (morally) wrong, and as a consequence of that wrongness they are being dismissed, excluded, etc.

This thread is meant to tease out exactly what is going on in that sort of phenomenon. If we had to break it down rationally, what is it about a racist, or a Nazi, or a bigot, or a liar, or a betrayer, or a troll (etc.) that rationally justifies some form of dismissal or exclusion?

From the OP:

Very often we are invoking moral blame when we assess someone’s beliefs in this way, and this is a curious phenomenon. Is it rationally justifiable? Do we have to downgrade our moral dismissals to non-moral dismissals? At what point is a moral dismissal justifiable? — Leontiskos

Think not first about "moral disapproval", think first about something that would be clearly illegal by current legislation. How about a site that gathers funds to Al Qaeda and Isis? — ssu

Okay, so you think we should dismiss (or act negatively towards) a site or person that gathers funds to Al Qaeda and Isis? And you think we should do so on the basis of "public security and safety"?

I think it is well-accepted that when someone overtly tries to harm us we attack them (and I don't see how this would be unrelated to morality). Perhaps in the OP I am more interested in forms of exclusion which do not involve overt violence. Shunning, excluding, dismissing, etc. But you could also take the thread in the direction of self-defense if you wish. Principles of self-defense are probably somewhat related to principles of exclusion or dismissal.

(I don't want to step on the toes of moderators, but a paradigm example of the question of the OP would be to ask about criteria for banning a member from an internet forum. It is not the motivation behind this OP, but it is the example of "dismissal" that TPFers would be most commonly familiar with.)

A worthy guide is Dante's inferno. The last circle, the ninth, for those who betray, who lie, engage in treachery. — tim wood

Okay, good. But we could still pare down that word "liar" in the way I pared down "racist" or "Nazi." What is a lie and why is it bad? We could do the same thing with "treachery" or betrayal.

For "dismissal," the punishment ought to fit the crime. — tim wood

So what punishments fit the crimes that Dante depicts in the last circle of Hell? What punishments fit a liar? Or a betrayer?

It's not clear whether you're interested in "types" of people or what they do. — tim wood

Speak to whichever one you prefer. I used the word because the two things you distinguish need not be separate. For example, "Betrayer" is a type rooted in actions.

For me the most interesting question asks from whence the moral disapproval arises. One person thinks black people are inferior to white people; another thinks black cats are inferior to white cats; another thinks black pens are inferior to white pens. Supposing that all three are irrational, why does moral disapproval attach to the first but not to the second or third? All of our various pejoratives seem to signal irrationality, but we do not deem all forms of irrationality to be immoral. Is there some added ingredient beyond irrationality that makes racism or bigotry immoral. Malice? Obstinacy? Harm?

The key is probably negligence, the idea that they should know better. We have a tendency to prejudge negligence even in a complete stranger, given assumptions about their cultural education.

But the strange thing about our current culture is that strong tribalism has mixed with an environment in which everyone’s content consumption is unique in an unprecedented way. Or in other words: we are assuming that we are all on the same page precisely when we are least on the same page. For this reason we tend to impute fault without sufficient justification.

-

Another observation is that “being at cross purposes” seems to play a fairly significant role in dismissal. Some kind of communal short-circuit occurs. For example, if someone tries to exterminate Jews and another tries to stop them, they are not at cross-purposes in the deeper sense, because they are engaged in a common pursuit of practical execution. Similarly, when two football teams face off, they are not at cross-purposes given that they are both engaged in the same genus of activity, even though they are opposed within that genus.

“Writing off” or dismissal seems to occur when the actual genus of activity differs between two people. For example, if someone comes to TPF to advertise their newest invention, they will literally be dismissed by the moderators because they are not engaged in the requisite kind of activity. Or if a musician aims only to make money rather than art, then her fellow musicians will dismiss and ostracize her in a way that they wouldn’t dismiss or ostracize a technically inferior musician who possessed the proper aim. Or if one person is engaged in a practical activity such as anti-racism, and another is engaged in a speculative activity such as studying racial characteristics, they will tend to dismiss and oppose one another. Other examples include the philosopher and the sophist, or the pious and the charlatan. It would seem that in order for moral indignation to fully flower the genus of activity must differ subtly, and in such a way that the second genus could be reasonably mistaken for the first. It may be that moral outrage occurs because someone is seen as an impostor, pretending to be what they are not and in danger of fooling and misleading onlookers. The more intentional, subversive, and potent the imitation or likeness, the stronger the moral outrage.

If this is right, then much of the trigger-happy moral outrage probably has to do with the “impostor!” reaction. At the most fundamental level is probably the idea that someone is selling the irrational or the harmful under the guise of the rational or beneficial. Even a material position, when proposed, is liable to raise the ire of someone who opposes it, for it is only the impostor who would propose what ought to be opposed.

What’s interesting about this is that it’s not altogether wrong. For example, the taboo against anti-Semitism has a rational undergirding, particularly in places like Germany. The cultural consensus balks at non-conformity, and this is rooted in both harm and a form of reparations. On the other hand, our cultural moment is one of false assumptions of unity, of faux-taboos, without foundation in reason or consensus. To label everything one dislikes “Nazism” is to mistake the cultural consensus regarding [insert political fad here] for the cultural consensus regarding anti-Semitism, and that is a facile equivocation.

Yet even if the trigger-happy moral outrage has to do with the “impostor!” phenomenon, it nevertheless holds that well-founded moral outrage is also often rooted in the identification of an impostor, both because the impostor is dangerous and because the duplicity or incongruence is inherently ugly and disagreeable. Maybe this goes at least partway towards answering the OP.

If by 'Hell', you mean the traditional 'eternal Hell', yes, I agree that universalism is also based in considering eternal torment as unjust as a punishment. But also annihilationists raise the same concern. And, if we go outside Christianity, for instance many Indian religions (both theistic and non-theistic) would raise the same concern, without however endorsing a form of universal salvation. — boundless

Sure, and the claim has never been that the only people who hold Hell to be unjust are universalists of type 1.

IMHO the greatest problem of infernalism is the claim that the fate is irrevocably fixed at death — boundless

You keep assuming that premise, but I see no reason why one would have to hold to the fixity of the will at death in order to believe in Hell.

Universalism is clearly also based on the view that sin is more like an illness, a terrifying illness-like corruption that causes damage to both the sinners and others. — boundless

This will ultimately run up against objections to Manichaeism if the illness has no proper cause. In Christianity even when sin is conceived as an illness the proper cause of that illness is a volitional act, whether Adam's or Satan's.

To be fair, in his book 'That All Shall be Saved' (p. 51-52) Hart seems to explicitly deny this construal of this thought — boundless

Then Hart would seem to be logically committed to a Limbo of some kind, at least theoretically. He thinks God cannot damn the sinner and he also thinks the sinner does not deserve salvation. The deserts of the (existing) sinner are therefore something in between those two options.

E.g., a 10-minute sin of adultery cannot be proportionate to an eternally repetitive punishment of being cheated on. That violates proportionality: don’t you think? — Bob Ross

Yes, and I also think that a 100 minute punishment would violate proportionality in the exact same way. That was my point. I am not saying that it must be exactly 10 minutes to be proportionate, but equality and proportion are related, after all.

Okay, but if you want to argue for a disproportion of punishment, then you must specify what is supposed to be infinite and finite. Is it duration? Is it that the punishment has infinite duration whereas the transgression did not have an infinite duration? — Leontiskos

I am saying any combination of a sin that itself contains no form of infinitude with any punishment that contains at least one form of infinitude. — Bob Ross

Yes, and I have been asking you what form of infinitude is at stake. Is your answer to that question, "There is some form of infinitude at stake, but I am not able to say what that form is"? I mean, if you don't know what is infinite, then how do you know that something is infinite? Specifically, you seem unwilling to commit to the position that the duration is what is infinite, but I only want you to commit to some object of infinitude.

This is interesting; because one could make the argument that some disruptions (viz., sins) could cause an infinite causal chain of disturbances of the proper; and I would say if this were to happen, which is very unlikely, then it would have some sort of infinite demerit and may be punished (potentially) by eternal punishment. — Bob Ross

It's not really related to causal chains. Suppose there is a pipe that helps control water levels in the Great Lakes. Water flows through that pipe at 10 gallons per minute. Now suppose you break the pipe and it is never repaired. If the Earth is destroyed four billion years from now then 2.1024e+16 gallons of water would have flowed through that pipe.* And you might say, "Ah, I merely broke a pipe. I didn't cause 2.1024e+16 gallons of spillage." But in fact you did cause 2.1024e+16 gallons of spillage, by breaking the pipe. The counterargument that breaking a pipe is disproportionate to 2.1024e+16 gallons of spillage simply does not hold water.

The likely objection is that someone could not possibly be expected to know that by breaking the pipe they would cause 2.1024e+16 gallons of spillage. To this the traditional Christian would say, first, that our acts involve more culpability and knowledge than we wish to admit, and second, that there are those who break the pipe and fix their end in sin, the mysterium iniquitatis. Hitler is often taken as an unobjectionable example of this. If we reach the point where this is taken to be rare but possible, then I will be satisfied.

- :up:

* Assuming, of course, a cuendillar pipe, which raises questions about how you managed to break it. :wink:

It seems to me that there is a plausible trade-off between duration and intensity in terms of punishment. One might justly meet out a short, but intense punishment for a sin that occured over a long duration or vice versa.

The problem I see for St. Thomas here is that the claim that breeches in the order of man's conformity to the will of God continue forever itself has to presuppose that universalism is false. If universalism is true, then God is eventually "all in all," and all such breeches are repaired "at the end of the ages" (perhaps after "the age to come").

If universalism is true, there are no human, or even demonic crimes that have infinite effects. By the same logic, if annihilationism or infernalism are true, there are indeed such crimes. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I agree with all of that, technically speaking.

The difficulty for both sides is that appealing to this seems to require begging the question and assuming that one of the positions is the case in order to make a claim about the duration and effects of any creatures' transgressions. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Appealing to what, though? Aquinas has independent reasons to believe that a breach that has not been repaired by the time of death will never be repaired, and therefore he is not begging the question. I'm not convinced that universalism is really on his radar at all, which is why I wouldn't say that he has presupposed something about it.

I think there are good arguments for the fixity of the will at death even though it’s not a hill I would die on. But I don’t find it plausible, within the Judeo-Christian tradition, to say that the will can never be fixed in anything other than God.

I would prefer to postpone a properly theological discussion at least until the Roman Easter Octave has concluded, even though in my opinion the most secure and relevant premises to this debate are theological. With that said, I am not opposed to exegeting Aquinas, as I am the one who inserted him into this thread.

Philosophically, there is some merit to an argument that <Only a very substantial act is able to incur an eternal consequence; humans are not capable of such substantial acts; therefore humans cannot incur eternal consequences>. That second premise fits within our cultural milieu. I don't see how I would make much headway against that premise without outside help. In our secular culture, the stakes are all thought to be quite low, at least in relation to eternity.

Not sure if this helps. — boundless

It does, thanks. That is very similar to my own story. Raised Catholic, fell away in adolescence, became interested in Buddhism and Eastern traditions, and then reverted back to theism and finally Catholicism in college.

Note that I wrote what follows before I had read this post of yours. I will try to return to the remainder of this last post of yours later on.

---

So, the 'fixation' in sin must come after death. But why? — boundless

It would be hard to quickly introduce you to a very old and deep tradition. Edward Feser has a recent article on the topic, although it is now behind a paywall, "Aquinas on the Fixity of the Will After Death."

But the quote you take from Aquinas says nothing about death. The claim is that humans can fix their end, which strikes me as uncontroversial.

Not sure how these objections are just 'cultural' and not 'rational'. — boundless

Is there one in particular you want to pursue? I'm not sure I have time to try to speak to them all.

Aquinas doesn't say anything in the text I quoted about the fixity of the will at death, so your points are not properly responding to what he is saying. If you don't think the human will is ever fixed, are you therefore of the opinion that someone can leave Heaven and go down to Hell?

Let me address your culpability point:

can a human being reach a level of culpability that deserves a punishment of unending pain (of some sort)?
Personally, I lean to answer 'no' to this question even if the 'sin' is 'objectively infinitely bad'. — boundless

There is a general—and in my opinion, unfortunate—trend in Catholic theology towards this argument:

1. Humans are not capable of the level of freedom and consent necessary for mortal sin
2. Therefore, no humans commit mortal sins
3. Therefore, no humans go to Hell

It should be simple enough to note that (1) is strongly contrary to Catholicism, and that this argument therefore does not derive from Catholic tradition in any substantial sense. If historical Catholicism believes anything at all, it is that humans are capable of mortal sins. :lol:

More generally and philosophically, this goes to the point I made above about C. S. Lewis', "The Weight of Glory." If one has a low anthropology where humans are not capable of much and therefore cannot be held responsible for much, then the conclusion that one cannot incur eternal consequences is ready to hand. A world where the denial of free will is somewhat common is a world where this low anthropology is in the air. I realize you claim that humans are capable of a great deal, just not Hell, but the general point stands.

Yet from a Christian perspective it is not at all clear that the low anthropology supports the capax Dei. That is, if humans don't have the power to sin mortally, then they probably also don't have the power to accept a gift of salvation, or to be deified. The "eternal consequences" that humans cannot effect are bidirectional. Created freedom always has a dual potency, and this is precisely why "Corruptio optimi pessima" (the corruption of the highest is the lowest). It's no coincidence that the same world which holds to a low anthropology has also lost its grasp on human dignity and nobility. The reprobate and the saint disappear simultaneously.

I don't really find these questions to be resolvable in terms of philosophy. The case in Scripture seems more concrete though. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Curiously, I agree entirely with this statement but I think the Scriptures strongly support Hell on balance. For example, Hart's move with aion is extremely old, and writers since at least Augustine have been pointing out that it is pretty wild for someone to take something like Matthew 25:46 and interpret aionion differently in the two instances within a single verse. That is a good example of my difficulty with universalist Biblical interpretation. If we handed Mt 25:46 to someone who has no horse in the race, they would easily come to the conclusion that aionion means the same thing in both instances, and that "aionion zoen" ("eternal life") is not meant to be temporary.

Or from John Henry Newman:

“Of course we must not press the words of Scripture; we do not know the exact meaning of the word ‘chosen’; we do not know what is meant by being saved ‘so as by fire’; we do not know what is meant by ‘few.’ But still the few can never mean the many; and to be called without being chosen cannot but be a misery.” — Newman, Plain and Parochial Sermons

Other famous difficulties for the universalist are the eternal damnation of the demons and Matthew 26:24. Augustine covers most of this in City of God XXI, which is as fresh today as it was then. A very tight and charitable analytic critique of Balthasar's position can be found in Kevin Flannery's, "How to Think about Hell." Regarding the Pauline passages, many of the best Pauline scholars such as N. T. Wright find the universalist's interpretation highly puzzling. In general I would say that it's not a coincidence that the tradition leans so heavily against universalism, and universalism has always struck me as a conclusion in search of an argument. On my view the philosophical case fares better than the theological case.

But I'm going to try to stick closer to the philosophy in this thread, both because the OP focuses on it and because it is Holy Week in Rome.

I don’t see how eternal punishment can be theologically sound if it is unjust: God is perfectly just, so God cannot eternal punish if it is unjust to do so. — Bob Ross

What was saying is that eternal punishment might not take place even if it is not unjust. One does not need to claim that it is unjust in order to argue against it.

Perhaps I am misreading Acquinas, but it seems as though, even in your excerpt, he is arguing that sin is the disruption of God's order and, as such, incurs a debt of eternal punishment. — Bob Ross

I missed this. To use an analogy, imagine that a pipe breaks and the water that was flowing through it is now flowing out onto the ground. This is an order being disturbed, and as long as the pipe remains broken, the water will continue flowing out onto the ground. It will flow out onto the ground for all eternity if the cause/pipe is never repaired. Put crudely, Aquinas is saying that we are able to break our own pipes in ways that we cannot repair, and that Hell flows out of this.

Pope Benedict's quote is from his encyclical Spe Salvi. — boundless

Thanks, that was my guess.

Rejecting the infinite duration of punishment doesn't necessarily imply the acceptance of the doctrine of universal salvation. — boundless

That's true, but universalism in the first sense I noted and rejection of Hell really do go hand in hand. They are logically distinct positions, but that sense of universalism logically entails the rejection of Hell on the grounds of justice. What threads like this are concerned with is precisely the thesis that Hell is unjust.

I don't think that universalists claim that eternal bliss is 'just' since nobody actually deserves it. — boundless

Hart has recently further popularized the thesis that Hell is unjust, and if a Christian views Hell as unjust then salvation is not undeserved. That is, if it is unjust for someone to not be saved, then salvation is not gratuitous.

(I assume it goes without saying that the traditional doctrine of Hell is a doctrine of eternal Hell.)

Edit: Can you give me a snapshot of your religious affiliation and background? It will help me respond on point. I myself am a Catholic with an affinity for Orthodoxy.

Ok. So you're going Greek -> Latin -> English. Why not just do Greek -> English like most translations? The Greek is there. — BitconnectCarlos

The point you are making is true, and also elementary. :up:

(I highlight this only because the error continues to persist.)

, , -

I will try to come back to these thoughtful posts. Time is short today.

Punishment delivered as a means of deterring other would-be transgressors is punishment oriented towards an end that is distinct from retribution. But clearly it will not deter anyone from sinning to continue to punish sinners after the Judgement, assuming that those who have been beatified are incapable of sin. One only needs a continuous deterence policy when the people one is hoping to deter are capable of transgressing. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yes, that is a good argument. :up:

There is quite a bit of literature on that objection, most of which I have forgotten. In any case, Aquinas does not say that deterrence is the only object of punishment. He would surely agree with you that the medicinal aspect of deterring others ceases to exist in the eschaton. If the objector had claimed that all punishment is merely medicinal/deterring, then I believe Aquinas would have attacked that premise. That is a premise that is present in our culture but was not present in Aquinas'.

But the larger issue is that, if one takes infants to be born under the rupture in the order St. Thomas refers to, this could be read as saying:

"All men are subject to damnation from conception, since they cannot repair the order that is ruptured in Adam. And they can do nothing to repair this order themselves." — Count Timothy von Icarus

In my opinion Limbo plays a more central role in Thomas' thought than is usually recognized, and there is nothing truly punitive about the natural beatitude of Limbo.

But can the dead not repent? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Catholic doctrine is firm that the dead cannot repent.

The tricky thing about this thread is that it is philosophical, not theological. Theologically speaking, Christian tradition accepts that the demons are damned and will never repent, and therefore you already have a precedent for the sort of conclusion that a universalist wants to reject. The purely philosophical spectacles perhaps have no need to take such a theological datum into account.

Dante pointedly dodges this question by not having a single sinner in the Inferno take any responsibility for their sins or show any repentance. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Rather than a dodge, I see that as highly consistent with Christian tradition.

And I would agree with this, the idea of God as some sort of disengaged "third party" to sin does not make a lot of theological sense. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Right, and that is worth pointing out in relation to the OP.

The question of whether eternal punishment is justified seems to me to be different from the question as to whether eternal punishment is theologically sound. The two need not go hand in hand, and indeed they usually don't go together, with the claim that God would be justified in punishing repetent sinners, but shows mercy instead, being a common one. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Okay, that's a fair point.

Theologically, the focus on "extrinsic punishment" and "extrinsic reward," seems less helpful — Count Timothy von Icarus

Right. I think that's fairly easy to avoid, but it is inevitably woven into this thread.

Yet aside from being an "opinion of recent theologians," this is also a conception right at home with many of the earlier Church Fathers. — Count Timothy von Icarus

We can say that many early Fathers understood the gaze of God to fall on the saved and the damned alike (with a different effect), but this does not mean that those "many" were universalists. Only a very small number of them were. ...I should probably just state outright that I disagree with Hart (and even Balthasar), and I think they distort the tradition.

But as you say, we can understand a universalist conclusion in different senses. It could be necessary according to justice, or it could be gratuitous according to mercy. I think the latter possibility is much more credible than the former qua Christianity. Yet for someone coming from a purely philosophical perspective in the 21st century, the idea that (eternal) Hell is unjust is at least understandable. Indeed, a very quick way to get at the infinitude question is to note that 21st century philosophers generally do not believe in angels, demons, the higher nous, and the eternal stakes that accompany such a paradigm. In a similar way, a new convert who reads Lewis' essay, "The Weight of Glory," would probably be blown away by the elevated anthropology.

(P.S. What source were you quoting Benedict XVI from?)

1. A punishment which incorporates any form of infinitude must have as its corresponding offense one which has in that same form an infinitude. (principle of proportionality in justice) — Bob Ross

Okay, but what is the basis of this? Is it something like this?

1a. A punishment which incorporates any form must have as its corresponding offence one which has that same form.
2a. Infinitude is a possible form (or meta-form)
3a. Therefore, a punishment which incorporates any form of infinitude must have as its corresponding offence one which has that same form of infinitude

More precisely, you seem to be saying that a punishment of infinite duration can only be meted out for a transgression of infinite duration. And according to 1a this carries with it the claim that a punishment of a 10 minute duration can only be meted out for a transgression of a 10 minute duration, etc. The Aquinas quote from above addresses this:

In no judgment, however, as Augustine says (De Civ. Dei xxi, 11) is it requisite for punishment to equal fault in point of duration. For the fact that adultery or murder is committed in a moment does not call for a momentary punishment: in fact they are punished sometimes by imprisonment or banishment for life—sometimes even by death; wherein account is not taken of the time occupied in killing... — Aquinas, ST I-II.87.3

-

For all intents and purposes, I don’t think it matters if the infinitude is in terms of duration of the crime, repetition of the crime, the dignity of the offended party, etc. — Bob Ross

Okay, but if you want to argue for a disproportion of punishment, then you must specify what is supposed to be infinite and finite. Is it duration? Is it that the punishment has infinite duration whereas the transgression did not have an infinite duration?

Within mainstream Abrahamic religions, it is a common belief that God will punish unrepentant sins committed against finite beings with eternal punishments and this is prima facie objectionable. — Bob Ross

It would be interesting to see someone try to flesh out this argument. Certainly an eternal punishment is temporally infinite. But what is it about sin that is supposed to be finite? We have something like this:

1. To repay a finite transgression with an infinite punishment is unjust
2. All sin is finite
3. Therefore, Hell is unjust

We could say a lot about this, but the most pressing matter is to focus on the term "finite" from premise (1) and what is meant by it. Aquinas' interlocutor is thinking of a transgression with finite duration or malice. You yourself are thinking of a transgression against a finite being (and this sets up Anselm's argument). But to take an easy and recent example, the Vatican recently released a document claiming that human beings have infinite dignity. Although it was a sloppy document, it is echoing a cultural presupposition (and, ironically, a presupposition that is often wielded against the doctrine of Hell). If we follow that cultural lead and say that humans have infinite dignity, then Anselm's argument in fact holds vis-a-vis humans; and what is sinned against is not therefore finite.

In any case, the claim that it is "prima facie objectionable" won't hold unless we understand what is supposed to be finite about a particular transgression.

This is not what you originally posted and what I replied. — javra

Of course it is. The mods are free to check edit history or whatnot to confirm that no edit was performed.

I don't deal well with dishonest people - for I don't in any way respect them. — javra

Then as Aristotle pointed out, it must be terrible for you to be alone with yourself.

• Leontiskos: "Does Aristotle or Aquinas somewhere claim that 'ultimate' (whatever that means) ends are not able to be frustrated?"
• Javra: "Whom else but Aristotle originated to concept of an 'unmoved mover'?"

(Yet another red herring that altogether avoids the question posed. Yet more avoidance of any semblance of philosophical dialogue.)

You have a penchant for ignoring the parts of a post that are more crucial. For example, you said:

I would ask you to express which part(s) of it you, in fact, find to be invalid. — javra

But you had already ignored the answer given, namely:

There are different problems, but I think the primary one is the idea that if something does not fulfill some end then it doesn't have that end as a final cause. For example, on that reasoning if an acorn does not grow into an oak tree then it does not have the final cause of an oak tree. But I don't see how that could be right. A teleological ordering does not depend on each individual reaching the end in question. — Leontiskos

-

And similarly, in this case you chose to ignore this:

And who cares whether or not it is "ultimate"? Does Aristotle or Aquinas somewhere claim that "ultimate" (whatever that means) ends are not able to be frustrated? — Leontiskos

- Come back when you're serious, and have real arguments to hand.

acorns becoming trees is NOT an ultimate telos/end — javra

That's a pretty standard ad hoc response. If an oak tree is not an acorn's ultimate end, then what is? And who cares whether or not it is "ultimate"? Does Aristotle or Aquinas somewhere claim that "ultimate" (whatever that means) ends are not able to be frustrated?

- This is a good example of the basic irrationality involved in so many arguments against classical religion, as well as the intransigence which accompanies that irrationality. You gave a very bad argument; I pointed out why; and rather than facing the problem you decided to ignore it.

"If some acorn does not become an oak tree, then the oak tree cannot logically be the ultimate telos/end of all acorns - for that acorn cannot ever, for all eternity, approach oakness teleologically as its end."

So again, logically, if eternal punishment does in fact occur, is God to then be understood as not being the ultimate telos/end of all that exists? — javra

Okay. It just seems like a separate question from my post, unless you think something from the post elicits or naturally causes that question.

Here is how I would phrase one of your arguments:

1. If someone is damned, then their teleological end is not fulfilled
2. If Hell is not empty, then someone is damned
3. Therefore, if Hell is not empty, then God cannot be the teleological end of all that exists/occurs

See, I don't find this argument to be valid. Therefore I would ask you to spell it out further, rather than me guessing at what might get us to the conclusion.

There are different problems, but I think the primary one is the idea that if something does not fulfill some end then it doesn't have that end as a final cause. For example, on that reasoning if an acorn does not grow into an oak tree then it does not have the final cause of an oak tree. But I don't see how that could be right. A teleological ordering does not depend on each individual reaching the end in question.

Am I reading this right? — javra

Is there a particular part of my post that your interpretation is seizing upon? I am trying to understand the connection.