Christian Black Metal!

[James Murphy]

what Apsu is saying is actually pretty simple, and could have been expressed much less obliquely, thus:

"The ends do not always justify the means."

 

[mr.L.]

Wow lots of pretentious formulation here .

I'm not fully awake yet, but if I have understood you correctly there seem to several issues with the actual content.

I have to take issue with the philosophical position you're implying and supporting, here. For one thing, it's ultimately antithetical to science in particular and empirical reasoning in general.

First there's the implicit premise presented as a package deal that "of course" you respect all beliefs as long as the bearer(s) of such beliefs respect yours. The major problem with this position is that it's completely untenable in general and probably only applies vaguely to a few specific people you had in mind when you wrote/thought it such as, perhaps, your grandmother. For example, your caveat of "if they respect mine" assumes that respect is a form of tolerance; of acceptance. A "so long as it doesn't harm me" approach. But would you say that you respect the beliefs that lead your neighbor to abduct and slaughter innocent people unrelated to you in their home, so long as their activity didn't interfere with your life? Or would you (as I assume the case to be) find the very idea abhorrent and disturbing, and by no means worthy of tolerance, acceptance or any level of respect?

Although I think respect holds (or at least should hold) more meaning than mere acceptance or even tolerance, I don't want to derail this thread by a philosophical discussion about the meaning of respect. I do agree with you that acceptance or tolerance of one's views and beliefs is for most of us not a reason to defer from judgement for or against the views, beliefs and resulting actions of the persons who tolerates our views and beliefs (and nor should it).

Although what you're saying (and feeling, obviously) here seems reasonable and positive on the surface, there's honestly a subtly insidious premise involved which plays out in some fairly major ways; I'll see if I can elucidate it concisely.

The viewpoint you're espousing here is known as pragmatism -- ethical pragmatism, to be specific -- which is the idea that if something "works" then it is morally "good". The problem is in the definition of what it means for something to "work". Ultimately, pragmatism reduces to an "ends justify the means" approach because pragmatism offers no other guidance to reasoning or action besides succeeding at one's intended narrow, short-term goal, without regards to potential consequences or long-term drawbacks.

This of course is largely dependent on your (narrow) definition of “working” that as far as my experience goes is not accepted by all pragmatist, thus making this seem to be a bit of an easy setup to make pragmatism look bad and thus making your own position look superior .

Which invariably leads the rationally-minded person to realize long-term reasoning and planning is vastly superior, based on their knowledge of how reality actually works and that it cannot, in fact, be cheated (science). Given *this* premise, it readily follows that the act of lying poses a particular problem for the rational person who has as their goal maximizing their long-term happiness: namely that if "what works" -- where 'works' is a short emotional response -- isn't based on reality, then at *best* it will provide small doses of hollow comfort, paling in comparison to a truly rational integration of knowledge and experience with the facts of reality.

Again dependent on your narrow definition of “works”. In addition your view of our knowledge of reality and human decision making in general seems overly optimistic and unrealistic to me. For one: one's view of reality is far from complete or coherent and singular in form and in most cases based on specific experiences, superstition, culture, prejudice, etc. In fact even if one would be able to keep up with all the developments in all fields of science (which you'll hopefully agree with me is absurd) at most you will have is a set of models (some of which do not integrate all that well either) that will help explain and in some cases predict phenomena we experience in the world around us (with differing accuracy and likeliness), which is something different than exact knowledge of how the reality actually works. In addition I think you underestimate how much of our responses and behaviour is based on other processes than deep rational thinking. As much as you may dislike it humans are generally rather different from say a computer system that runs through all its most up to date models and data to come to a decision (our brains are too slow for this in most cases anyway, which would make our survival rate drop rapidly).

I agree with you that as far as making a life plan or making big decisions where we have plenty of time to consider which way to go, it is very prudent to take the scientific insights we have about the world we live in into account. What these scientific insights however do not or do very little to provide, opposite to what you implicitly seem to argue, is a source of moral judgement or a way of giving intense feelings (such as fear of death as Jevil mentioned) a meaningful place in our lives. As much as I am a fan of modern science and as much as it has done too expose some of the metaphysical nonsense present in different cultural and religious traditions, it is in these areas that I think art, philosophy and even insights from different religious traditions often have more to offer.


BTW: I like black metal, whether the band worships Christ, Satan, aliens from the planet Ungl'Unl'Rrlh'Chchch or whatever

 

[James Murphy]

^ no, it's what i said:

what Apsu is saying is actually pretty simple, and could have been expressed much less obliquely, thus:

"The ends do not always justify the means."

 

[mr.L.]

^ no, it's what i said.

Ok, in that case I just agree

 

[James Murphy]

what was that about "pretentious formulations"? if true, your responses didn't raise that bar at all... nor will snarky, sarcastic use of "smileys" ingratiate you much around here.

to cut through the rhetoric, Apsu was basically just saying that achieving a specific desirable end for oneself doesn't intrinsically justify any particular means employed to achieve it, especially if those means are not employed responsibly so as to to avoid any potential harm said means might cause others ... IOW, "your rights end where those of others begin".

ftr, i have no problem with you rebutting Absu's post... just, you know... tone down the sarcasm, we're not even in a "fight", lol.

 

[mr.L.]

That smiley was just there to indicate my disappointment after trying to unravel Apsu argument and you making things look so simple . No offense intended at all.

I do think however that what Apsu tried to state was a bit more than your simplification though or I'm just reading too much into it because some of the formulation was a bit too much for me. Too bad that my response seems not to faired much better

 

[JBroll]

To: Christianity
From: Every other religious view, or lack thereof, that has been trying to survive you since you gained enough power to be the dominant religion in a large part of the world
RE: Persecution

Welcome to what we've been putting up with for the better part of two millennia. Enjoy your stay.

Jeff

 

[drew_drummer]

To: Christianity
From: Every other religious view, or lack thereof, that has been trying to survive you since you gained enough power to be the dominant religion in a large part of the world
RE: Persecution

Welcome to what we've been putting up with for the better part of two millennia. Enjoy your stay.

Jeff

 

[James Murphy]

ha ha ha.. beautiful Jeff

 

[slashvanyoung]

Just saw an interview with Dave Mustaine and he was talking about "hypochristians". And yeah, of course he takes credit for that term...

 

[Felix Neumann]

Just saw an interview with Dave Mustaine and he was talking about "hypochristians". And yeah, of course he takes credit for that term...

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