I also prefer science and reason to faith and religion. With that said, I take full responsibility for driving this particular thread of the discussion in this direction.
I hope our discussion has been cordial, and hasn’t muddied the overall post. I didn’t mean to drag you or anyone else into this, and I’m sorry if this discussion caused any harm or triggered any negativity. I’ve experienced religious trauma in the past and I know how debilitating it can be.
This is an area where I disagree. I personally think that the “golden rule,” treat others how you want to be treated, is the only foundation of morality that is needed. That can mean different things to different people, so perhaps a more accurate statement would be: “treat others how they want to be treated, because you want the same.”
If someone’s foundation of morality depends on an all powerful authority that can exclusively define what should and should not be punished, I worry about what they might do if they interpret the message of that authority to be harmful to otherwise innocent people.
Regarding the teachings of Paul, that’s another area where we both agree. I’ve never understood why Christians put so much weight behind the words of a man, even when they contradicted the words of Jesus.
How do you feel about polytheists and atheists that follow the same moral compass, but do not share the same religious beliefs?
Very true! But the same could also be said of many, if not most religious people. I was born to parents who followed this religion, grew up following this religion, and therefore this is my religion.
What does it mean to believe in different Abrahamic religions if they all believe in the same God? What about polytheists or atheists who follow an identical moral compass without the belief in the same God?
Wow that definition is garbage, you weren’t kidding. I would define the concept of “nuance” as the idea that not everything is black and white, and that there are often shades of gray in between.
For example, the question “is paper valuable?” depends a lot on the paper. Paper money, absolutely. Blank printer paper, yes but very much less so. Scrap paper that is rotting, almost certainly not.
As a result, the answer to the question “is paper valuable?” is much more nuanced than a simple “yes” or “no” answer can provide.
My understanding is that these experiences with sports are very similar to the equivalent of religious experiences. Both have songs, chants, and rituals. Both provide a sense of belonging and community. Both have an in group and an out group. Both highly revere influential figures, both past and present. Both have clearly defined enemies. Both follow a regular yearly schedule, with important dates throughout the year.
Most of those attributes can also be applied to a wide variety of human interests. I would be very surprised if those who didn’t share any particular interest weren’t also confounded by the intensity of some of those engaged in that interest.
On an unrelated note, it’s good to see you again friend. It’s been a “long” time eh?
I feel like I have been expressing the other perspective in great detail, but I also don’t feel like you have meaningfully engaged with that perspective and have instead focused on my personal beliefs. Perhaps that’s an effort to protect your own beliefs, for fear that such engagement might cause you to question things that you consider fundamental to your understanding of the world and your self identity. I can’t say for sure, but I can say that I have personally been in that position and felt that way.
Even if we assume that there is an objectively moral decision in this scenario, we can never know with absolute certainty without asking God directly. Even the wisest scholars of what we do have of God’s word disagree on its interpretation, which leaves humanity with a lot of ambiguity.
I always enjoy discussing philosophy, and agree that this has been an enjoyable discussion. I wish you well, I hope you have a wonderful day, and I hope to engage in similarly enjoyable conversations with you again in the future.
Based on that response, it seems to me that you are claiming that your knowledge and understanding of the Qur’an is in fact infallible and prophetic.
I am in no way saying “the thing cannot be said,” I am saying that I agree with both perspectives equally. I believe that murder is wrong and that saving people’s lives is just, but when those two options are in conflict there is no objectively correct answer. The fact that who is on either side of the track results in potentially different answers proves that no choice is always morally correct, in my opinion.
Stress testing the framework is where philosophy is the most interesting in my opinion. There are many parables in God’s word, and these stories also make us consider morality and truth, and in many ways stress test the framework.
Please try to remove any personal connections from the scenario. Remember, all participants are strangers.
I’m giving a counter argument to your own without taking any stance of my own, because I personally don’t believe that either answer is more or less moral or correct.
Would you say that murder of an individual is always more moral if multiple lives are saved as a result? Would you murder an innocent person in cold blood so that their organs could be used to save multiple lives?
I don’t currently personally believe in God, but if a God does exist, I think it would be foolishness and hubris to assume that any human could ever predict how that God would judge any situation.
“Nearly everything” seems a bit hyperbolic, but I absolutely agree that it’s a major problem that has caused, and will likely continue to cause massive unnecessary suffering worldwide.
We should all imagine imaginary numbers together.
Nuanced in the sense that there is no absolute, objective correct answer.
That person may argue that actively causing the death of a human is murder, which is always objectively and morally wrong. Doing nothing is the morally correct option from that perspective. To be clear, I’m not personally arguing in favor or against either choice, because I personally believe that there is no objectively best option.
There have actually been studies that involve this exact scenario, but of course without anyone being in actual danger (unbeknownst to the subject).
Let me ask the question in another way. Do you think that God would judge a person who acted one way or the other?
I never made the connection until reading your comment, but I now wonder if they heard about the incompleteness theorems and came to their conclusions about math based on a misunderstanding.
I’m sorry to hear that concept disappointed you, but I personally don’t think it ultimately matters or effects the usefulness of math. I see it as similar to the difference between science and engineering. An engineer can create something useful by knowing what works, without knowing precisely why it works. A scientist tries to uncover why things work the way they do, regardless of the utility of that understanding. Often the output of those two fields overlap, but they don’t have to.
So if I’m understanding your answer correctly, and assuming everyone involved were strangers, you believe that saving many lives at the cost of one is the more moral choice.
What would you say to someone who disagreed because they could not bring themselves to be actively responsible for the death of someone, and considered inaction the more moral choice because the group would have died anyway if they weren’t there and able to intervene?
The point I’m trying to get at is that I don’t believe there is a correct answer as to which choice is more moral. There are valid reasons to conclude that either option is both moral and amoral in equal measure. You could argue for either choice in circles, and both parties would be correct while never convincing the other.
In my opinion some questions of morality are clear and easy to answer, but some are much more nuanced, and that is where there is room for subjectivity.
Emotion is not necessary for the different scenarios to have potentially different moral considerations. For example, does your moral responsibility as a parent to nurture and protect your children change the equation?
Even if you assume everyone involved are strangers, what is the better, more noble, more humane option or direction of action?
I feel like this argument falls apart when considering things like the trolley problem. To wit:
A trolley has lost control and is traveling down its track towards a group of people. Nearby there is a switch that will divert the trolley onto a different track where there is only one person. Do you
A) Activate the switch, thereby being actively responsible for a person’s death. B) Do nothing and allow multiple people to die due to your passive inaction.
How might your answer change if that one person were your child? Or if they were a notorious criminal? What if the group were all children? What if they were prisoners? Different people will reasonably disagree on which choice is more moral.
Yours is a fascinating perspective that I haven’t considered before.
My “shooting from the hip” response is to consider the life of an animal in a 2x2 grid. The first column is pets, the second column is non-pets (i.e. Animals living in the wild). The first row is animals with sufficient access to food, shelter, and overall wellbeing. The second row is animals without those needs being met (i.e. Suffering under the hands of either humans or nature).
In my opinion, based on my personal life experience, and only if you consider the animals that are not typically used for food (that’s an entirely different, but also important discussion), the number of animals in the top left quadrant are second only to the number of animals in the bottom right. Because of this, I believe that the concept of pet ownership is an overall net positive.
That still absolutely does rob the pet of the free will to decide their own destiny, and that is still absolutely a moral quandary.
Edit: Another way to frame my opinion that pets are a net positive is that we humans have done a great deal to improve our general quality of life (for better or worse to the world at large), and have mostly brought our pets up to a similar quality with us. Food, water, and shelter are usually provided to pets at a minimum, but those are anything but guaranteed in the wild. Pets lives also greatly improve compared to wild animals if you consider modern heating and cooling, pet friendly dietary considerations, veterinary care, and an overall pet friendly society.
I now consider it one of many examples of the idea that you can’t use reason and evidence to change someone’s beliefs, if they never used reason or evidence to conclude those beliefs in the first place.
I feel sorry for those who have never felt the excitement of changing their beliefs based on new evidence or understanding, especially when due to their own hubris. Being wrong is an opportunity to learn and discover. Everyone who has ever lived, and will ever live, is sometimes wrong.
In a way, that’s the general theme of this thread. We stood our ground when we knew we were right and could prove it with reason and evidence, while facing opposition that was based on stubbornness, hubris, and refusal to admit to being wrong.
Email is absolutely still used massively, especially in the business world. Even if someone is accessing their emails in a browser, they are still being sent with SMTP behind the scenes.
There’s also SSH, NTP, VOIP, FTP, BitTorrent, and probably more that I’m forgetting, that all have varying degrees of usage today.
Don’t get me wrong, HTTP is certainly by far the most used protocol, but it is in no way the only important one that would be difficult to replace.