Portrait of an American Hero

[Immanuel Can]

...democracy came from polytheism not Christianity

Did I list "democracy"? I don't recall having done so. In fact, I didn't.

But let's roll with that anyway. The Greek democracy was exclusive of women, slaves and other "lower" types, such as non-Athenians. It was a limited, aristocratic democracy, and lacked any unity with a basic idea of universal human rights. Those awaited Locke, who first articulated the rationale from Christian principles -- principles still quoted by all the major Human Rights codes of the world, including the American and the UN.

[surreptitious57]

So Mohammed was only a prophet to Arabic speakers

This is completely false because by that logic the majority of Muslims today who are non Arabs would not qualify as Muslims
But there is no compulsion upon them to learn Arabic if it is not their mother tongue beyond certain terms specific to Islam

The Koran can be understood better in Arabic as nothing gets lost in translation but it is not compulsory for non Arabic Muslims to learn it though
I have two copies of the Koran in English given to me by a Muslim - but they would not exist if Arabic was the only language it could be printed in

Most Korans will be non Arabic translations simply because most Muslims are non Arabic speakers and so need to study Islam in their own language
And actually the country with the largest Muslim population is not Saudi Arabia birthplace of Islam but Indonesia whose first language is not Arabic

[surreptitious57]

Mohammed came for everyone with a sword

Can you explain how this was possible when the Koran absolutely forbids the taking of all innocent life including non Muslim
Also do you know Matthew I0 : 34 : Think not that I am come to send peace on earth : I came not to send peace but a sword

I therefore have actual scripture to demonstrate that Jesus came with the sword
While you have an assertion without any evidence that Mohammad did the same

[Sculptor]

Jesus justified feudalism...

Heh.

You know nothing. Not only don't you know what Jesus said, or what feudalism etc. mean, but most remarkably, not even anything about Karl Marx.

I see I'm speaking into a hollow vessel. I shall desist.

Take your ignorance of Marx with you.

[RCSaunders]

Is there no right or wrong way to wash clothes, build a building, cook a meal, design an airplane, etc.

Nope. There are ways that work faster or slower, but they imply no judgment at all on what you're doing. ...

If your objective is to work faster and method A will accomplish the objective faster than method B and those two methods are the only ones avaialble to you, which is the right method for working faster? If you want to go to Rightville and there are two roads, highway W, which goes to Wrongville and highway R, which goes to Rightville, which road is the right road to take to go to Rightville. Which is the wrong road to take to go to Rightville.

Any other meaning attributed to right and wrong is superstitious belief in intrinsic values, the belief that something that is right for nothing is just right.

Morally right or wrong. ...

Only you are talking about something called, "moral right and wrong." I am only referring to what is right or wrong relative to some objective, purpose, end, or goal.

You say people have a right to free speech.

Never said that.

Then you don't believe it? Then you can't complain if there's a prohibition on particular kinds of speech.

I do not have a, "right," to free speech, but it is wrong for anyone to be prevented by force or the threat of it, from saying or writing whatever they choose. There is no guarantee that no one will ever try to prevent me from saying or writing what I choose, and I do not want anyone else to provide such a guarantee. I'll pay to ensure my own freedom to say and write whatever I choose.

You say it's wrong for children to be compelled to take public education, and wrong for educators to indoctrinate them...

I definitely said that.

Why?

Because the children do not belong to the educators.

Parents have no right, you say, to guide their children, and children have no right not to be indoctrinated, and educators aren't actually wrong for indoctrinating them, because none of the above have rights...because rights don't exist?

You use the word rights to mean something guaranteed and there is no guarantee parents will be allowed to guide their children, or that children will not be indoctrinated, etc. If there were such a guaranteed right, those wrong things could never happen?

It is wrong (not morally or politically, but practically) for anyone but childrens' parents to determine what their children are taught, and who will teach them.

You're objecting to the violation of certain...what shall we call them? "necessary freedoms"? that you say people have, such as the freedom to say what they want to.

That's exactly what I do not say. The freedoms are necessary, but people do not just have them. Just as food is necessary but people do not just have it, and every individual most work to grow or buy their own food, if they choose to eat and live and not be a sub-human predator or parasite, every individual must provide their own means of verbally communicating with others, and there own protection of it, if they choose too.

The means of speaking and writing is not automatic or just there. One must learn a language and find others who speak the same language before they can communicate with others, and that is just the beginning. Whether speech or writing, if no one else is interested in hearing or reading what you have to say, you'll have no audience. If you cannot find a way to have what you have written published no one else is going to read it. For the same reason you must be free to speak and write whatever you choose, you must be free to not listen to or read what anyone else says or writes. [That is my objection to pubic school.] Those are freedoms you need, but like food, water, protection from the elements and everything else you need, you do not have them just because you need them. You must provide them yourself.

[Impenitent]

the standardized test writers have the most influence of what your children are taught in public schools... this varies by state, but not much

-Imp

[Immanuel Can]

So Mohammed was only a prophet to Arabic speakers

This is completely false because by that logic the majority of Muslims today who are non Arabs would not qualify as Muslims...

Well, they could continue to profess Islam illogically, but they couldn't do anything about what Islam says about that. It says that Mohammed did no miracle except the Koran itself.

But if the Koran is a "miracle," we are told by Muslims that it is a miracle that can only be seen by those who read Arabic. So for the rest of the world, Mohammed did no miracle at all, and is not a prophet to the world, therefore. They can't know he's genuine.

That's an unresolvable contradiction inherent to Islam: it's non-Arabic-reading proponents can never see the "miracle" Mohammed is alleged to have done, and which attests to his genuineness. But the fault is with those Muslims that make the two claims, not with me.

[Immanuel Can]

Mohammed came for everyone with a sword

Can you explain how this was possible when the Koran absolutely forbids the taking of all innocent life including non Muslim

Yes. All Muslims have to do is define a life as "non-innocent," and then they can take it.

But they have a second tool, called "abrogation," or the vacating and replacing of old texts with new ones. Muhammed's "pacifistic" pre-Media phase is abrogated in favour of his post-Median militant phase, according to Muslim orthodoxy. So the older "commands" are replaced with the newer commands, which advocate violence. And you see the same thing in the life of Mohammed...before Medina, he was largely pacifistic; afterwards, a bloodthirsty warlord.

Also do you know Matthew I0 : 34 : Think not that I am come to send peace on earth : I came not to send peace but a sword

Of course. But you read it out of context, so you've completely misunderstood the allusion.

“Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn “‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law—a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’ “Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it."

I other words, the only literal "sword" there is not in the hands of a Christian but in the hands of those who are going to persecute him/her. Christians will "lose their life for my sake," as Christ said, and they are to "take up their cross and follow," meaning, be willing to go to the death faithful...there is no command for a Christian to use a sword there. And metaphorically, the "sword" speaks of that division between family members that is spoken of...not peace between them but strife, in other words, because evil people will hate those who are faithful to Christ, and even their own family members will turn against them.

Reading the whole thing, as above, makes that very clear.

[Immanuel Can]

Is there no right or wrong way to wash clothes, build a building, cook a meal, design an airplane, etc.

Nope. There are ways that work faster or slower, but they imply no judgment at all on what you're doing. ...

If your objective is to work faster and method A will accomplish the objective faster than method B and those two methods are the only ones avaialble to you, which is the right method for working faster? If you want to go to Rightville and there are two roads, highway W, which goes to Wrongville and highway R, which goes to Rightville, which road is the right road to take to go to Rightville. Which is the wrong road to take to go to Rightville.

You're missing the point, RC. It doesn't matter how fast or how efficiently you do something, if the thing you choose to do is evil. Nobody should advocate for fast, efficient death camps.

But your method leaves no basis for judging whether the end-in-view, toward which we are trying to accelerate, is a good or a bad one.

nothing is just right.

Really? So feeding orphans isn't just right, and molesting them isn't just wrong? Just checking.

Morally right or wrong. ...

Only you are talking about something called, "moral right and wrong." I am only referring to what is right or wrong relative to some objective, purpose, end, or goal.

Then you're speaking only of trivialities. "I can do X faster" is trivial, if we don't know if X is good or bad.

You're not judging the objective, purpose, end or goal itself, so we don't even know whether or not going at it more efficiently or faster would be a good thing. It might well be desperately evil...in which case, we should hope that our progress toward it would be a slow, inefficient and complicated as possible...and ideally, no progress at all.

You say people have a right to free speech.

Never said that.

Then you don't believe it? Then you can't complain if there's a prohibition on particular kinds of speech.

I do not have a, "right," to free speech, but it is wrong for anyone to be prevented by force or the threat of it, from saying or writing whatever they choose.

Oh. So you're just dodging the word "right," while still trying to assert one. Sorry, RC, nobody's going to buy that. If it's not a "right" for you to speak, then denying you the chance to speak isn't "wrong." You don't have any "right" to speak, then.

I'll pay to ensure my own freedom to say and write whatever I choose.

That will work so long as you are by far the strongest person in a given area. But if your personal ability to "pay" falters, then your freedom is gone. And at some point, it's absolutely guaranteed to falter...if it hasn't already.

You use the word rights to mean something guaranteed...

I do not. I never said any such thing at all. In fact, if the thing were "guaranteed," you would not need to appeal with the claim "I have a right to X" at all. Rather, what its being asserted is not a guarantee of receiving such a thing, but only that those who violate it are doing something illegitimate.

It is wrong (not morally or politically, but practically) for anyone but childrens' parents to determine what their children are taught, and who will teach them.

Why?

I know why I think that's true, but I'm certain my reasons are not your reasons. So what are your reasons for saying that, RC?

[gaffo]

I don't have a comment about George Floyd as a man, RC. I mean, is it worse if he was a saint than if he was a drugged-out thug? Either way, I don't see that being a criminal warrants one in being killed on the street

Exactly, i thank you for your humanity Sir.

- BTW not heard from you, how are you doing? well i hope.

Yes, thank you. Very well. And how about you?

I'm well, thanks for asking Sir.

[RCSaunders]

Nope. There are ways that work faster or slower, but they imply no judgment at all on what you're doing. ...

If your objective is to work faster and method A will accomplish the objective faster than method B and those two methods are the only ones avaialble to you, which is the right method for working faster? If you want to go to Rightville and there are two roads, highway W, which goes to Wrongville and highway R, which goes to Rightville, which road is the right road to take to go to Rightville. Which is the wrong road to take to go to Rightville.

You're missing the point, RC. It doesn't matter how fast or how efficiently you do something, if the thing you choose to do is evil. Nobody should advocate for fast, efficient death camps.

But your method leaves no basis for judging whether the end-in-view, toward which we are trying to accelerate, is a good or a bad one.

Only someone with a twisted view of values could turn a rational point about right and wrong into advocating death camps. I have not mentioned any specific end, goal, or purpose, but if I had, nothing that would harm anyone else would have come into my mind or my explanation. Can't you think about anything else? Is it because your God is purported to have set up the granddaddy of all death camps--so efficient it will last forever?

nothing is just right.

Really? So feeding orphans isn't just right ...

If I have to steal your children's food to feed someone else's orphans, it is wrong.

... and molesting them isn't just wrong? Just checking.

You really have to have a perverted mind to suggest molesting children could possibly not be wrong with regard to any human objective or purpose.

Morally right or wrong. ...

Only you are talking about something called, "moral right and wrong." I am only referring to what is right or wrong relative to some objective, purpose, end, or goal.

Then you're speaking only of trivialities. "I can do X faster" is trivial, if we don't know if X is good or bad.

When a doctor is about to amputate your leg, whether he gets the right one or not is only trivial? Whether the medicine that is prescribed is the right one (that will cure you) or the wrong one (that will kill you) is only trivial? Whether you leave your child at the right corner to be picked up by the school bus or the wrong corner to be picked by a predator is only trivial? Whether the white stuff you put in the baby's bottle is the right stuff (milk) or the wrong stuff (ipecac) is only trivial? Whether the EMT's take the (faster) right turn to reach a victim in time to save their life, or (slower) wrong turn thus losing the patient is only trivial?

You're not judging the objective, purpose, end or goal itself, so we don't even know whether or not going at it more efficiently or faster would be a good thing. It might well be desperately evil...in which case, we should hope that our progress toward it would be a slow, inefficient and complicated as possible...and ideally, no progress at all.

No, we haven't gotten that far. You keep dwelling on non-essentials. When you are through denying there must be some objective, purpose, or goal for there to be any right or wrong, then we can discuss what objectives are appropriate for human beings.

I'll pay to ensure my own freedom to say and write whatever I choose.

That will work so long as you are by far the strongest person in a given area. But if your personal ability to "pay" falters, then your freedom is gone. And at some point, it's absolutely guaranteed to falter...if it hasn't already.

Ex-jocks, thugs, cops, and brutes in general think like that. It's why they are surprised when a little eighty-year-old lady shoots them. There are many ways to protect one's own person, property, and personal liberty without the use of force, and there are professionals who specialize in the use of force for protection in the rare cases when it's necessary. You really have to get out of that narrow way of thinking, "if the government doesn't do it for me, it can't be done."

I don't know if you remember how we got on this subject, but it started with our disagreement about ideas and the personalities associated with them. Seems pretty far from the purpose of this thread.

Still I'm willing to entertain any additional thoughts you feel necessary to express.

[Immanuel Can]

If your objective is to work faster and method A will accomplish the objective faster than method B and those two methods are the only ones avaialble to you, which is the right method for working faster? If you want to go to Rightville and there are two roads, highway W, which goes to Wrongville and highway R, which goes to Rightville, which road is the right road to take to go to Rightville. Which is the wrong road to take to go to Rightville.

You're missing the point, RC. It doesn't matter how fast or how efficiently you do something, if the thing you choose to do is evil. Nobody should advocate for fast, efficient death camps.

But your method leaves no basis for judging whether the end-in-view, toward which we are trying to accelerate, is a good or a bad one.

Only someone with a twisted view of values could turn a rational point about right and wrong into advocating death camps.

Red herring. Respond to the problem: if the "end" in view is evil, what value does finding a faster, more efficient or more direct way of doing it add to the equation?

nothing is just right.

Really? So feeding orphans isn't just right ...

If I have to steal your children's food to feed someone else's orphans, it is wrong.

... and molesting them isn't just wrong? Just checking.

You really have to have a perverted mind to suggest molesting children could possibly not be wrong with regard to any human objective or purpose.

Red herring. And ad hominem. Is the "end" of molesting children an objectively evil end? Yes or no.

You're not judging the objective, purpose, end or goal itself, so we don't even know whether or not going at it more efficiently or faster would be a good thing. It might well be desperately evil...in which case, we should hope that our progress toward it would be a slow, inefficient and complicated as possible...and ideally, no progress at all.

No, we haven't gotten that far. You keep dwelling on non-essentials. When you are through denying there must be some objective, purpose, or goal for there to be any right or wrong, then we can discuss what objectives are appropriate for human beings.

The time to discuss it is now. Are some "ends" objectively immoral?

I'll pay to ensure my own freedom to say and write whatever I choose.

That will work so long as you are by far the strongest person in a given area. But if your personal ability to "pay" falters, then your freedom is gone. And at some point, it's absolutely guaranteed to falter...if it hasn't already.

Ex-jocks, thugs, cops, and brutes in general think like that.

No, realists do.

If you're past middle age, then the reality is that you know that. You're in no shape to "pay" to defend your rights against younger, stronger people, if your personal resources are all you have. In fact, if you are lone person, of any age, you cannot afford to "pay" for your own freedoms; they can be taken from you by the next group or mob that happens along.

Witness Minneapolis.

[RCSaunders]

No, we haven't gotten that far. You keep dwelling on non-essentials. When you are through denying there must be some objective, purpose, or goal for there to be any right or wrong, then we can discuss what objectives are appropriate for human beings.

The time to discuss it is now. Are some "ends" objectively immoral?

No it is not, because you are framing the question in a way that can only be addressed from your own premise. What you mean by, "objectively moral," is not what I mean by, "objectively appropriate for human beings." So long as you insist that what you call moral values are determined by something external to and independent of individual human life and purposes, we are not talking about the same thing at all, and what you are talking about as moral values I regard as both anti-human and malevolent. The whole problem is your view that values are some kind of transcendent intrinsic things determined by some supernatural agent, which divorces values from any relationship to actual human choice.

From your earlier argument on this subject:

nothing is just right.

Really? So feeding orphans isn't just right, and molesting them isn't just wrong? Just checking.

The problem with your view of values being dictated by God as primary, and not determined by any human objective, purpose, or goal, is they justify just anything. "Feed the orphans," becomes an absolute, which justifies anything one does so long as the orphans get fed. Dictated values also make it impossible to know why something is wrong, because there is no why beyond, "God said so." It is why you can say sarcastically, "so molesting children isn't just wrong?" because you have no reason to think molesting children is wrong because there is no human end or purpose that would make such an act wrong, so it would not be wrong if God had not said it was wrong.

The reason we cannot agree on values is because you have no explanation for why anything is right or wrong beyond, "God said so," and I know exactly why what is wrong is wrong, and why what is right is right, and that what is right would be right even if God said is wasn't.

[Immanuel Can]

No, we haven't gotten that far. You keep dwelling on non-essentials. When you are through denying there must be some objective, purpose, or goal for there to be any right or wrong, then we can discuss what objectives are appropriate for human beings.

The time to discuss it is now. Are some "ends" objectively immoral?

No it is not, because you are framing the question in a way that can only be addressed from your own premise.

No, I am not. I am simply asking if you can justify your claim to the reasonable satisfaction of a rational, skeptical observer.

From your earlier argument on this subject:

nothing is just right.

Really? So feeding orphans isn't just right, and molesting them isn't just wrong? Just checking.

The problem with your view of values being dictated by God as primary, and not determined by any human objective, purpose, or goal, is they justify just anything.

Incorrect. They can never justify anything outside of what God says is right.

"It is why you can say sarcastically, "so molesting children isn't just wrong?"

No, the reason I can ask that is because of what you yourself said...namely, that "right" means only efficient as a means for... , without any reference to, or further information on the end-in-view.

So it's fair game for me to suggest a kind of "end" that most people would find odious, and see if you're still content to say that so long as X is an efficient means for performing that odious action, then "right" it is.

The reason we cannot agree on values is because you have no explanation for why anything is right or wrong beyond, "God said so," and I know exactly why what is wrong is wrong, and why what is right is right, and that what is right would be right even if God said is wasn't.

Then say why that is. Why, in your secular world, is an efficient means for molesting orphans (or pick any other odious deed you prefer) not "right" anymore, since it would certainly seem that it satisfies your previously stipulated definition of "right"?

[Immanuel Can]

No, we haven't gotten that far. You keep dwelling on non-essentials. When you are through denying there must be some objective, purpose, or goal for there to be any right or wrong, then we can discuss what objectives are appropriate for human beings.

The time to discuss it is now. Are some "ends" objectively immoral?

No it is not, because you are framing the question in a way that can only be addressed from your own premise.

No, I am not. I am simply asking if you can justify your claim to the reasonable satisfaction of a rational, skeptical observer.

From your earlier argument on this subject:

nothing is just right.

Really? So feeding orphans isn't just right, and molesting them isn't just wrong? Just checking.

The problem with your view of values being dictated by God as primary, and not determined by any human objective, purpose, or goal, is they justify just anything.

Incorrect. They can never justify anything outside of what God says is right.

"It is why you can say sarcastically, "so molesting children isn't just wrong?"

No, the reason I can ask that is because of what you yourself said...namely, that "right" means only efficient as a means for... , without any reference to, or further information on the end-in-view.

So it's fair game for me to suggest a kind of "end" that most people would find odious, and see if you're still content to say that so long as X is an efficient means for performing that odious action, then "right" it is.

The reason we cannot agree on values is because you have no explanation for why anything is right or wrong beyond, "God said so," and I know exactly why what is wrong is wrong, and why what is right is right, and that what is right would be right even if God said is wasn't.

Then say why that is. Why, in your secular world, is an efficient means for molesting orphans (or pick any other odious deed you prefer) not "right" anymore, since it would certainly seem that it satisfies your previously stipulated definition of "right"?