Source: (consider it)
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Thread: The next person I hear...
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IngoB
 Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Brenda Clough: But we already do that. This very moment, we have selected certain rules in both OT and NT and utterly ignored them, without any fuss.
My point exactly! It's the Christian thing to do, it always has been - from the apostolic origins to today. So why now pretend that I must allow polygamy just because some of the people in scripture practised it? It's risible.
Of course, Protestants might find it somewhat difficult to argue just how they arrive at their precise selection of what scripture is to be informative and what scripture is binding them, and how. Catholics like me however have no problem with that whatsoever. It gets decided by the apostles and their successors, our bishops and in particular the pope, and the compilation of their binding decisions is what we call the "magisterium". The end. OK?
-------------------- They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
So God was just fucking around with those Old Testament dudes?
ETA: Natural moral law? Nature is full of homosexuality. Necrophilia. Rape. Incest. [ 30. June 2015, 17:53: Message edited by: lilBuddha ]
-------------------- I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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The Phantom Flan Flinger
Shipmate
# 8891
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: quote: Originally posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger: And you don't see a problem with that?
Depends on what you mean by "problem". Do I see doctrinal incoherence, contradiction to scripture, breach with tradition, etc.? No. Do I see potential personal problems, perhaps even massive ones, for a couple so afflicted? Sure. But then I find the RC strictures against masturbation ... problematic, personally speaking.
The real question for me is whether I accept that 1) Christian religion can impose crosses on me that I would would not have without it, and 2) whether the RCC is the proper Christian authority to do so in this world. For me the answer is "yes" and "yes".
In which case, I give up.
-------------------- http://www.faith-hope-and-confusion.com/
Posts: 1020 | From: Leicester, England | Registered: Dec 2004
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IngoB
 Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by JonahMan: And what is 'natural moral law'? Given that morality has been defined differently at different times and in different places throughout history, it's difficult to perceive any universality there. Just saying that it's a) obvious and b) difficult isn't really convincing. This is unlike the laws of physics, say, which have (as far as we know, anyway) remained the same and stay the same whether humans are aware of them or not.
Natural moral law is the moral law that one discern simply from observing the nature of human beings themselves (in contrast to say moral law specially revealed by God). Just like natural physical law studied by physics, it is indeed both "obvious" and "difficult" at the same time. The diligent student of General Relativity or Quantum Mechanics will find many things obvious that the unstudied person will find "difficult", to say the least. Annoyingly, unlike for physics everybody thinks that their own specific take on morality has the same standing and that their gut can make moral decisions at least as well as someone who has spent decades studying natural moral law. The reason for this is simple: it is convenient to justify what one wants to do as moral, and in the social realm, might makes right. Whereas it tends to be inconvenient to have false ideas about physics, and no amount of social might will make the unphysical come true.
Anyway, it is true that moral law unlike physical law, is not automatically obeyed, but rather ought to be obeyed. That's pretty much the definition of "moral", that it is under our free-willed behavioural control. That we can do other makes the study of these laws harder. This does however not establish that there is no such law. It just means we cannot count on establishing morality from just observing one individual, because they could be acting immorally. That there is such a law to be found is philosophically based on the idea that all things have some kind of "end". One can of course attack this philosophical idea, but perhaps morality is not the easiest place for such an attack (because human beings clearly are pretty purpose-driven in their behaviour).
The natural moral law assumed by such philosophy is as universal and constant as human nature, by definition, and it is hence a fair bet that it has not noticeably changed anywhere on earth in about the last 30,000 years. Whereas it is of course true that the extent to which the natural moral law has been followed in practice is highly variable. This is hardly surprising, people make a bit of a sport out of fudging moral laws, really. However, just like noise around a mean can be suppressed by averaging, so one can indeed look at global history and discern underlying trends as signal of the inescapable natural moral law people are deviating from. For example, there generally is some concept of innocence and the idea that innocent people should not be tortured or killed. Obviously, people will do things like declaring that to be innocent you have to belong to their group, but that is not a sign against but a sign for such underlying trends. Truly random torture and murder is not really palatable in the long run, systematic excuses have to be found. Etc.
-------------------- They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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IngoB
 Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by lilBuddha: So God was just fucking around with those Old Testament dudes?
The OT dudes were fucking around with God. It's an old habit, which humanity has found near impossible to kick...
quote: Originally posted by lilBuddha: ETA: Natural moral law? Nature is full of homosexuality. Necrophilia. Rape. Incest.
Yes, but natural moral law is established neither by the range nor by the mean of observed behaviour. It is established by an analysis what sort of behaviour is appropriate to the nature of a being. Data about actual behaviour certainly feeds into such an an analysis, but it cannot be reduced to simplistic statistics. To give a non-moral but behavioural analogy: most dogs will eat chocolate, but they ought not to, because it is rather unhealthy for them. That some dogs have been observed to eat chocolate and that giving chocolate to dogs may even result in most of them eating it does not establish that they ought to eat chocolate. Rather, we have to analyse this in terms of canine physiology and behaviour, and then find that dogs are misled by the taste of chocolate to eat something that is actually dangerous to their health. One cannot short-cut such systemic analysis with simplistic statistics.
-------------------- They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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ThunderBunk
 Stone cold idiot
# 15579
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Posted
Pompous, irrelevant, unimpressive.
Please find a new crowd.
-------------------- Currently mostly furious, and occasionally foolish. Normal service may resume eventually. Or it may not. And remember children, "feiern ist wichtig".
Foolish, potentially deranged witterings
Posts: 2208 | From: Norwich | Registered: Apr 2010
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Autenrieth Road
 Shipmate
# 10509
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: I bet we won't, because once people have strutted their ideology sufficiently to keep up with the Jones, everybody still knows that a marriage between a man and a woman is a different sort of thing than a "marriage" between a man and a man, or a woman and a woman.
My ideology is not so lightly adopted as your dismissive "keeping up with the Jones" tries to imply.
And, this is not true: quote: everybody still knows that a marriage between a man and a woman is a different sort of thing than a marriage between a man and a man, or a woman and a woman.
(FTFY). Not me. I neither know nor believe that for what qualifies something as a marriage, that a marriage between two people of the opposite sex is any different than a marriage between two people of the same sex. They are both true marriages, no quotes.
Differences? Sure. There are differences between people who believe marriage is a sacrament vs. people who believe marriage is purely a civil matter. There are differences between people who get married after buying a house and having a child, vs. between people who get married before doing those things. There are differences between people who sleep together before marriage and people who wait until after marriage. There are differences between marriages where both people are about the same height, vs. where there's a wide disparity in heights. There are differences in marriages where both people are from the same culture vs. where they're from different cultures.
Some of those might be important, some might not be, some might be widely or narrowly approved of, some might seem to be a problem, some might not. But they're all marriages, not some marriages and others "marriages".
Regarding your larger point about language, sure, language will roll along and change to accommodate what people want to talk about, sometimes in ways that annoy me, sometimes in ways I welcome.
I would note that we still have the phrase interracial marriage. But we also have no problem saying that an interracial couple have a marriage (not a "marriage").
For example:
"What was the relationship between your college senior tutors?" "They were married."
"Was there anything distinctive about them?" "They were the first interracial married couple I had met."
-------------------- Truth
Posts: 9559 | From: starlight | Registered: Oct 2005
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Organ Builder
Shipmate
# 12478
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Posted
Part of the problem with "Natural Moral Law" when it moves from a concept to a "system" is that as a "system" it is not particularly natural, does not always have much to do with morals, and isn't even particularly good as a basis for law.
It is so flexible as to be unsuited for the purposes to which it is usually put; it's like using a kite string for a sword. While St. Thomas Aquinas could no doubt easily agree with Ingo's explanation of it, there is certainly no guarantee that his 13th-century mind would come to the same conclusions upon the examination thereof as Ingo's fin de siècle mind. They are both willing to agree that the Catholic Church is capable of using it, but those of us who don't buy the Catholic Church's self-proclamations are not so hamstrung the minute the Church says something is so--especially when it goes against our observed experience
So I will simply hope that Ingo dies before the Catholic Church decides "Natural Moral Law" indicates something is so with which he can't agree. I'm not certain what that would be, but I'll bet sometime in the next thousand years they will decide something which would make him froth at the mouth were he still alive.
-------------------- How desperately difficult it is to be honest with oneself. It is much easier to be honest with other people.--E.F. Benson
Posts: 3337 | From: ...somewhere in between 40 and death... | Registered: Mar 2007
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JonahMan
Shipmate
# 12126
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Posted
Which human beings am I supposed to look at to discern this natural moral law? There seem to be some great big whopping differences between how different people act and think. How should I tell which ones are really natural (and doing things they 'ought' to), and which aren't? Particularly when there are many different examples of people who are acting - in my opinion - morally. Yet if I lived 500 years ago I would have quite a different opinion, I'm sure.
A law which only 'ought' to be obeyed is not intrinsic in the same way that a law of physics is intrinsic. It's pure nonsense to say otherwise. It's more like the traffic laws. Some people somewhere put together some rules and, in general, people obey them because they make sense and allow the traffic to flow smoothly. But some people go faster than the law allows (and might be punished if caught). And occasionally the traffic authorities say, "You know what? We could really increase the speed limit on that road, it's perfectly safe." But the people who went too fast on it before hand were still guilty of speeding and the people going over the previous limit but below the new one aren't.
Now the Roman Catholic traffic authority is perfectly at liberty to tell all their members that they should still drive below the original limit. But it doesn't mean that 'speeding' has been redefined, just that the understanding by society in general has decided that a new rule is more appropriate.
-------------------- Thank God for the aged And old age itself, and illness and the grave For when you're old, or ill and particularly in the coffin It's no trouble to behave
Posts: 914 | From: Planet Zog | Registered: Dec 2006
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IngoB
 Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Autenrieth Road: My ideology is not so lightly adopted as your dismissive "keeping up with the Jones" tries to imply.
But of course you would think so. That's because you are Mrs Jones. Running ahead is always a bit more strenuous than following after, but so much more satisfying once the followers start streaming in, isn't it?
quote: Originally posted by Autenrieth Road: I neither know nor believe that for what qualifies something as a marriage, that a marriage between two people of the opposite sex is any different than a marriage between two people of the same sex. They are both true marriages, no quotes.
Aha. Humans are such wonderfully flexible animals, they behaviourally re-program at the drop of a hat. Still, if I showed you pictures of couples and asked you to press a button if you think that they could be married - I think I might be able to see a statistical difference in your reaction times between seeing a heterosexual and homosexual couple. And if I put you in an MR scanner and played some nice heterosexual and homosexual porn to you, who knows what differences I might spot in the fMRI BOLD contrast? It would so disappointing if your insula lit up in disgust.
Science has this nasty tendency to be cruelly objective... Kind of ruins you for life, really.
quote: Originally posted by Autenrieth Road: "Was there anything distinctive about them?" "They were the first interracial married couple I had met."
And at the point where this is not something so distinctive that sticks in memory as significant, real racial equality will have been realised. That by the way is something that I think has a chance in hell to happen, if a very small one.
-------------------- They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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Boogie
 Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: The real question for me is whether I accept that 1) Christian religion can impose crosses on me that I would would not have without it, and 2) whether the RCC is the proper Christian authority to do so in this world. For me the answer is "yes" and "yes".
Which is fine.
The key words here being "for me". If it's the proper Christian authority for you then, fine, go with it.
It simply is not so for the rest of us.
Get over it.
-------------------- Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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JonahMan
Shipmate
# 12126
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: Still, if I showed you pictures of couples and asked you to press a button if you think that they could be married - I think I might be able to see a statistical difference in your reaction times between seeing a heterosexual and homosexual couple.
And I daresay if I were to show you pictures of people of difference races, ages and genders and ask which ones you should love there would be an equally statistically variation in your reaction times. I don't suppose this would cause you to argue that you shouldn't love them all equally though, would it?
quote: Originally posted by IngoB:
Science has this nasty tendency to be cruelly objective... Kind of ruins you for life, really.
If science means making up an experiment and then imagining the results (like we've both done above), then yes.
Let me know how scientific this 'natural moral law' theory of yours is, how we can test it and make predictions from it, even write some equations to encapsulate it.
-------------------- Thank God for the aged And old age itself, and illness and the grave For when you're old, or ill and particularly in the coffin It's no trouble to behave
Posts: 914 | From: Planet Zog | Registered: Dec 2006
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Twilight
 Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
So IngoB's not supposed to have freedom of speech here, because he doesn't agree with the rest of "us?"
I never understand why people get mad at him for stating what he believes. I find his input very interesting, particularly on this board which leans toward the liberal side.
My own religious "authority" is the Bible and my Episcopalian, lesbian I think, priest. She interprets the Bible for us every week with an extremely broad, socially influenced slant. In contrast, I really enjoy it when IngoB reminds us what is being said at the other end of the Christian scale. He's one extreme end of the bell curve. I think what he says serves as sort of a grounding touch stone from which we can jump as far off as we see fit.
Posts: 6817 | Registered: May 2002
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: And if I put you in an MR scanner and played some nice heterosexual and homosexual porn to you, who knows what differences I might spot in the fMRI BOLD contrast? It would so disappointing if your insula lit up in disgust.
What a shame all he sees when he looks at a human body is this machine that can do no more than stimulus-response. It's almost science, but with such a massive category error, it's not even wrong.
-------------------- Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Twilight: He's one extreme end of the bell curve.
Ingo? A bell end? I couldn't possibly comment.
-------------------- Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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LeRoc
 Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
quote: Twilight: So IngoB's not supposed to have freedom of speech here, because he doesn't agree with the rest of "us?"
Who is taking away IngoB's freedom of speech?
-------------------- I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
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Anglo Catholic Relict
Shipmate
# 17213
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: Still, if I showed you pictures of couples and asked you to press a button if you think that they could be married - I think I might be able to see a statistical difference in your reaction times between seeing a heterosexual and homosexual couple. And if I put you in an MR scanner and played some nice heterosexual and homosexual porn to you, who knows what differences I might spot in the fMRI BOLD contrast? It would so disappointing if your insula lit up in disgust.
Far more information than anyone ever wanted about Ingo's fantasy world.
Posts: 585 | Registered: Jul 2012
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Organ Builder
Shipmate
# 12478
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Twilight: So IngoB's not supposed to have freedom of speech here, because he doesn't agree with the rest of "us?"
I never understand why people get mad at him for stating what he believes. I find his input very interesting, particularly on this board which leans toward the liberal side.
Well, I suppose having hoped Ingo dies before the Catholic Church does something which destroys his faith might be interpreted as being mad at him, but I DID give a time period of a thousand years...
Ingo doesn't make me mad, and I've never participated in one of his Hell calls that I can recall. It is the nature of the internet bulletin board that he has as much freedom of speech as anyone unless an Admin pulls the plug. I don't recall if he has ever had shore leave, but it's pretty obvious he has come back if he did.
I deal with him the same way I deal with everyone on the Ship; I engage if I have time to engage, and go away if I don't. Sometimes that makes people think they've "won" an argument but I've noticed arguments are never won on the ship--they always come back with a vengeance, like too much garlic in a sauce.
-------------------- How desperately difficult it is to be honest with oneself. It is much easier to be honest with other people.--E.F. Benson
Posts: 3337 | From: ...somewhere in between 40 and death... | Registered: Mar 2007
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ThunderBunk
 Stone cold idiot
# 15579
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by LeRoc: quote: Twilight: So IngoB's not supposed to have freedom of speech here, because he doesn't agree with the rest of "us?"
Who is taking away IngoB's freedom of speech?
Maybe me. I keep trying to provoke something which sounds like a human utterance and less something created by random Vatican statement generator. I also want something which sounds like a contribution to a debate rather than a statement of an immoveable position. The basis of my challenge is that "normal service" is pointless and totally out of context as a "contribution" to a discussion board.
This makes me challenge the constant screed under his name, and his right to effectively rehash his single point in slightly different guises.
-------------------- Currently mostly furious, and occasionally foolish. Normal service may resume eventually. Or it may not. And remember children, "feiern ist wichtig".
Foolish, potentially deranged witterings
Posts: 2208 | From: Norwich | Registered: Apr 2010
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Autenrieth Road
 Shipmate
# 10509
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: quote: Originally posted by Autenrieth Road: My ideology is not so lightly adopted as your dismissive "keeping up with the Jones" tries to imply.
But of course you would think so. That's because you are Mrs Jones. Running ahead is always a bit more strenuous than following after, but so much more satisfying once the followers start streaming in, isn't it?
One loses every which way with you, doesn't one? Not following the Pope and the Magisterium, therefore one is to be denigrated as being either too far behind or too far ahead, in either way bad.
Since having followers streaming in is so much to be sneered at, then here's to the Pope and the Magisterium becoming ever more marginalized.
quote: quote: Originally posted by Autenrieth Road: I neither know nor believe that for what qualifies something as a marriage, that a marriage between two people of the opposite sex is any different than a marriage between two people of the same sex. They are both true marriages, no quotes.
Aha. Humans are such wonderfully flexible animals, they behaviourally re-program at the drop of a hat.
This is relevant, except as a sneer? It would be better if humans did not re-program, or re-programmed only slowly? Or do you only sneer at human flexibility when it's in a direction that you don't approve of?
quote: Still, if I showed you pictures of couples and asked you to press a button if you think that they could be married - I think I might be able to see a statistical difference in your reaction times between seeing a heterosexual and homosexual couple. And if I put you in an MR scanner and played some nice heterosexual and homosexual porn to you, who knows what differences I might spot in the fMRI BOLD contrast? It would so disappointing if your insula lit up in disgust.
Sure, that might be true for me. And it might not. But if you're saying it's true for the majority of people, then sure, I'll accept that it may well be true for me. So what?
There's a test one can take that shows that in general white people in the US associate black with bad things and white with good things. There are all sorts of studies that show the ways things we don't agree with intellectually are nevertheless wound into our brains and bodies. That doesn't make me think there's a natural moral law that white people are better than black people.
Or for your porn example: my fantasy sex life includes things that I would not want to happen that way in real life. The fact that looking at porn might well show that I find rape porn to be a turn-on does not mean that I want rape to be legal, or that I think that in real life rape sex is better (and certainly not more moral) than non-rape sex.
quote: Science has this nasty tendency to be cruelly objective... Kind of ruins you for life, really.
The experimental results of science do not dictate how we interpret the significance of those results, nor what we choose to try to do in response to those results.
quote: quote: Originally posted by Autenrieth Road: "Was there anything distinctive about them?" "They were the first interracial married couple I had met."
And at the point where this is not something so distinctive that sticks in memory as significant, real racial equality will have been realised. That by the way is something that I think has a chance in hell to happen, if a very small one.
Agreed. I realized after I posted that there was an underlying painful racist bite in that having been my true reaction to my house's senior tutors, and that I remember it. (And obviously another racist bite in that I only realized after I posted it, and not before I posted it so as to think up a different example. I acknowledge my own racism, and I try to move beyond it. I've improved in some ways, in other ways I still suck.) A better example would probably have been something along the lines of "I'm studying married couples. In particular, I'm studying the pressures on interracial marriages compared to intraracial marriages." I wanted to illustrate that we can simultaneously have language to indicate that they're all marriages, and also have language to indicate that there are differences that in our (non-post-racial) society, there is still a potential difference there.
Whether or not we may ever escape racism to the degree that that's not the first thing I notice or that sticks in my mind, and similarly whether or not people (whether other people or me) ever cease to notice as a primary characteristic that a married couple are of the same sex or opposite sexes, in either case for me the couples are married, and I want to work towards responding to and treating them with the same respect as any other couple. I certainly acknowledge that I'm not all the way there yet. Yet even while being flawed like this, I celebrate Loving and I celebrate Obergefell.
-------------------- Truth
Posts: 9559 | From: starlight | Registered: Oct 2005
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Autenrieth Road
 Shipmate
# 10509
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Anglo Catholic Relict: Far more information than anyone ever wanted about Ingo's fantasy world.
Ah, I cross-posted with you and now there's also TMI about my own fantasy world. ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
-------------------- Truth
Posts: 9559 | From: starlight | Registered: Oct 2005
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no prophet's flag is set so...
 Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Doc Tor: He's just cross because he's just found out he's not a proper scientist.
Who's got a hammer and some nails?
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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RooK
 1 of 6
# 1852
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Twilight: I never understand why people get mad at him for stating what he believes.
My dear over-projectionist: I suspect that very few people are mad at IngoB for the act of being honest. I think you'll find that they're reacting to the fact that the things he's saying are repugnant and horrible, and constructed with circular arguments liberally lubricated with an amazing lack of empathy or insight.
Posts: 15274 | From: Portland, Oregon, USA, Earth | Registered: Nov 2001
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
IngoB,
Dog's and chocolate, really? Because all those wild dogs are eating chocolate on their own, aren't they? What sort of nature is appropriate for the being? You mean like the swans that have a higher rate of chick rearing when the couple raising the chicks are both male? All that is necessary for a species to thrive is that enough males fuck enough females. "Natural moral law" is a synonym for "I've got nothing, but I'm gonna defend it anyway" . [ 30. June 2015, 21:40: Message edited by: lilBuddha ]
-------------------- I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Twilight
 Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by LeRoc: quote: Twilight: So IngoB's not supposed to have freedom of speech here, because he doesn't agree with the rest of "us?"
Who is taking away IngoB's freedom of speech?
I thought "It simply is not so for the rest of us.Get over it." I thought that sounded like someone thought he shouldn't express himself here anymore, since she was speaking for "the rest of us," I didn't want to be included.
Posts: 6817 | Registered: May 2002
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: And if I put you in an MR scanner and played some nice heterosexual and homosexual porn to you, who knows what differences I might spot in the fMRI BOLD contrast? It would so disappointing if your insula lit up in disgust.
I don't think this is terribly relevant.
If you put me in an MR scanner and showed me pictures of Brussels sprouts, I expect you could notice my disgust. I don't want to eat the things, and I'd rather not watch you eat them, but I don't want to prevent you from eating them.
I don't know whether AR enjoys porn, and if so, what her tastes in porn are. I don't particularly want to know, either. But I'm pretty sure that whether she is personally attracted by homosexual sex, repulsed by it, or anything in between has little influence on her opinions on same-sex marriage.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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LeRoc
 Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
quote: Twilight: I thought "It simply is not so for the rest of us.Get over it." I thought that sounded like someone thought he shouldn't express himself here anymore, since she was speaking for "the rest of us," I didn't want to be included.
Thinking he shouldn't express himself here anymore doesn't take away his freedom of speech. Even saying STFU to him doesn't take away his freedom of speech. He's still speaking, isn't he?
-------------------- I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
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Twilight
 Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by LeRoc: quote: Twilight: I thought "It simply is not so for the rest of us.Get over it." I thought that sounded like someone thought he shouldn't express himself here anymore, since she was speaking for "the rest of us," I didn't want to be included.
Thinking he shouldn't express himself here anymore doesn't take away his freedom of speech. Even saying STFU to him doesn't take away his freedom of speech. He's still speaking, isn't he?
I was talking to Boogie and Boogie alone and I said freedom of speech here, because it seemed to me she was telling him that his opinion was not welcome here because he didn't agree with the rest of us. Of course telling someone to shut up doesn't legally remove their freedom of speech, but it is asking that they not talk anymore which seems rather closely related to me. Is that simple and literal enough for you?
Posts: 6817 | Registered: May 2002
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LeRoc
 Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
quote: Twilight: I was talking to Boogie and Boogie alone and I said freedom of speech here, because it seemed to me she was telling him that his opinion was not welcome here because he didn't agree with the rest of us. Of course telling someone to shut up doesn't legally remove their freedom of speech, but it is asking that they not talk anymore which seems rather closely related to me. Is that simple and literal enough for you?
To me, the difference is rather substantial. Removing someone's freedom of speech is a bad thing, and a lot of people in the world are suffering from that. Asking someone not to talk anymore is just that.
-------------------- I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
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orfeo
 Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by JonahMan: Which human beings am I supposed to look at to discern this natural moral law?
The ones that aren't gay, of course.
The ones that get married in front of an altar and say "I do", just like giraffes.
The ones that behave just like all the species that pair-bond for life, instead of like all the species that don't pair-bond for life.
EDIT: It's actually quite amusing to see marriage linked to "natural" law, because in fact the arguments in the USA in support of "traditional" marriage have explicitly been on the grounds that it isn't natural. They've been arguing that marriage is needed to encourage men to stick around and rear their children, because the natural, unconstrained behaviour of males includes getting a woman pregnant and then moving on. [ 30. June 2015, 22:51: Message edited by: orfeo ]
-------------------- Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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St Deird
Shipmate
# 7631
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Posted
Natural moral law is simply Bingo's way of saying "what I, personally, feel to be morally correct".
"But I feel differently!" you cry? Ah, but reader, you only feel differently because you're trying to keep up with the Joneses. Eventually, you too will wake up and realise that, deep down, you've always agreed with Bingo.
-------------------- They're not hobbies; they're a robust post-apocalyptic skill-set.
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IngoB
 Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
Thanks for the concern, those of you who were concerned. But I don't feel that my freedom of speech is under particular threat here. It was after all almost entirely predictable what would happen if I posted here on this thread; and if I hadn't intended to write a few pages of posts in order to provide the experience of "disagreement with someone who has thought their position through" (to quote the OP), then I wouldn't have posted. Of course, it is getting just a tad repetitive now. But we always have ThunderBunk's future contribution to look forward to, which will be humane, deep and plain genius. Any day now...
quote: Originally posted by Organ Builder: Part of the problem with "Natural Moral Law" when it moves from a concept to a "system" is that as a "system" it is not particularly natural, does not always have much to do with morals, and isn't even particularly good as a basis for law. It is so flexible as to be unsuited for the purposes to which it is usually put; it's like using a kite string for a sword.
All of these are unsubstantiated assertions. As for all human inquiries, there are various approaches and disagreements within the study of natural moral law. But hardly at a level that would justify such sweeping comments.
quote: Originally posted by Organ Builder: So I will simply hope that Ingo dies before the Catholic Church decides "Natural Moral Law" indicates something is so with which he can't agree. I'm not certain what that would be, but I'll bet sometime in the next thousand years they will decide something which would make him froth at the mouth were he still alive.
The RCC is not basing its moral pronouncements on natural moral law. After all, it possess revealed moral law, a much stronger source if one believes in Christian revelation, as the RCC most assuredly does. Natural moral law is largely a failed endeavour as far as sexual morality goes. Those who would believe it don't need it, because they have a better source in their Catholic faith. Those who might be compelled by its arguments, in the absence of such faith, won't listen to it. Its technical sophistications are no match for the sexual drives clouding judgement. For the most part natural moral law concerning sex is a playground for philosophers who can demonstrate that everybody could know better. That's undoubtedly true, but of remarkably little help in a practical sense.
quote: Originally posted by JonahMan: Which human beings am I supposed to look at to discern this natural moral law? There seem to be some great big whopping differences between how different people act and think. How should I tell which ones are really natural (and doing things they 'ought' to), and which aren't? Particularly when there are many different examples of people who are acting - in my opinion - morally. Yet if I lived 500 years ago I would have quite a different opinion, I'm sure.
Natural moral law is not about people "acting natural". It is about looking at the nature of human beings, analysing what kind of beings they are, and from this deriving what sort of activities would be good for them, would lead them towards their proper ends. This kind of analysis is not overly concerned with the details of a particular culture, nor indeed with the accidents of any individual. For example, what sort of relationship would it be good to have to one's parents? The answer one would give here for a human being would be different to that one would give for a spider, because the nature of a human being is different from a spider. One would for example not advise a human being to eat its parents as soon as possible after birth, even though this may be appropriate to a spider flourishing.
quote: Originally posted by JonahMan: A law which only 'ought' to be obeyed is not intrinsic in the same way that a law of physics is intrinsic. It's pure nonsense to say otherwise.
No, it is not "pure nonsense". It is thinking about the world in terms of a paradigm that you are not used to. Specifically, it is thinking about the world in terms of its "final causes", its "ends", its "goals" and "aims". The purposes of a thing or person can be thwarted. The purposes of a person can be thwarted by that person himself. This does not mean that such purposes are not "intrinsic" to that thing or person. It just means that the thing or person was prevented from reaching them, possibly by the exercise of its own free will.
quote: Originally posted by JonahMan: Let me know how scientific this 'natural moral law' theory of yours is, how we can test it and make predictions from it, even write some equations to encapsulate it.
It's hardly "my" natural law theory, it's not mathematical in nature and it makes predictions like that all people are born free, as stated already by natural law theorists in ancient Rome who proclaimed that in the face of ubiquitous slavery. A point made here in passing by a juridical natural law theorists who will give you an earful about how you derive that a river should be common property etc. So it's really a big, ancient and by now very varied philosophical tradition which really is not just about what people do with their genitalia.
quote: Originally posted by Boogie: Which is fine. The key words here being "for me". If it's the proper Christian authority for you then, fine, go with it. It simply is not so for the rest of us. Get over it.
Why would I want to get over that? Furthermore, we are not talking about some "purely religious" dogma, like say the Trinity. To me, this issue lives at an interesting intersection between biology, sociology, politics, religion, ...
-------------------- They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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St Deird
Shipmate
# 7631
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: Natural moral law is largely a failed endeavour as far as sexual morality goes. Those who would believe it don't need it, because they have a better source in their Catholic faith. Those who might be compelled by its arguments, in the absence of such faith, won't listen to it. Its technical sophistications are no match for the sexual drives clouding judgement.
Well, that's bullshit.
You are saying that people would agree with natural moral law, except that their sex drives want them to do all sorts of things against NML, and their sex drives are stronger than their listening-to-NML drives, so they listen to their sex drives instead, and hence disagree with NML.
My sex drive is fairly happy driving me to do two things: a) sleep with my husband b) make lots of babies My sex life would, in fact, be entirely compatible with what "natural moral law" apparently thinks I should be doing. ie: I do not have any sex-drive-related reason why I should fool myself into not listening to NML, because it won't really place any further restrictions on my behaviour.
I still utterly DISAGREE with it.
-------------------- They're not hobbies; they're a robust post-apocalyptic skill-set.
Posts: 319 | From: the other side of nowhere | Registered: Jun 2004
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orfeo
 Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
...how the hell does anyone decide which sex drives are "naturally moral" and which aren't?
I'm sure you can work out which ones are productive, in the sense of generating children (hint: women are only fertile a few days of the month), but there are some truly profound leaps of logic involved in suggesting either:
1. Only productive sex is natural (not just a leap of logic, but demonstrably false by spending some time actually observing nature, including human nature, including those lovely monogamous heterosexual couples we've all heard about).
2. Only productive sex is moral. There are any number of things I do with my body and mind which aren't goal-directed, and yet no-one seems to object. Is chewing gum immoral because it isn't food? Is wordless singing immoral because it fails to praise God? Is punching the air immoral because I've failed to strike an evildoer? Is using an exercise bike immoral because I haven't travelled anywhere?
It's ironic. Atheist are sometimes accused of treating human beings as a meaningless collection of chemicals. A conception of natural moral law that reduces human beings to functional parts that must only fulfil their designated functions does exactly the same thing.
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Boogie
 Boogie on down!
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: quote: Originally posted by Boogie: Which is fine. The key words here being "for me". If it's the proper Christian authority for you then, fine, go with it. It simply is not so for the rest of us. Get over it.
Why would I want to get over that?
Not just you, all people who want to tell folks what to do in their private sex lives. All people who want to discriminate against gay sex.
It really, really is high time they all got over it and exercised their minds in useful ways.
-------------------- Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
I think we should just leave Ingo to the fruitcake zone of his own imagining. There is no point in trying to reason with someone who insists on 7 impossible things before breakfast and denies the basic principles of logic and justice.
Fine. Go back to your tiny little world where everyone agrees with you and await the apocalypse, Ingo. Just don't expect anyone to take you seriously ever again.
-------------------- arse
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JonahMan
Shipmate
# 12126
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Posted
I don't think that anyone here could possibly imagine that there would be any chance of stopping IngoB talking, so his freedom of speech is not really an issue.
His ability to reason in great big circles means that he is entirely happy talking to himself.
Some of my favourites: "All of these are unsubstantiated assertions." Unlike, er, everything that he has said himself.
"natural moral law = about looking at the nature of human beings.... deriving what sort of activities would be good for them, would lead them towards their proper ends." And how do we decide what is 'good for them' or what is a 'proper end'? Why, by seeing what natural moral law tells us! And of course, these purposes, ends, goals and aims are the same for everyone, everywhere, at all times.... it's just that somehow they don't realise it. A good relationship with your parents is not just different between a spider and a human being, but between different human beings in different situations and cultures.
If my purposes are being thwarted by my own self, how do I tell whether this purpose is the 'real' me, or if it's the thwarting that is the moral bit? So, I would like to produce great art and inspire people, but my laziness thwarts me. How do I tell which is natural or moral? Of course, I can look at more general view of things rather than a particular individual or culture, from which I conclude that hardly anyone produces great works of art, so clearly it is unnatural. So the laziness bit must be the proper order of things, and great artists should be prevented from doing their thing.
-------------------- Thank God for the aged And old age itself, and illness and the grave For when you're old, or ill and particularly in the coffin It's no trouble to behave
Posts: 914 | From: Planet Zog | Registered: Dec 2006
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IngoB
 Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Autenrieth Road: Sure, that might be true for me. And it might not. But if you're saying it's true for the majority of people, then sure, I'll accept that it may well be true for me. So what?
The point of all this was a refutation of your assertion that you "neither know nor believe ... that a marriage between two people of the opposite sex is any different than a marriage between two people of the same sex." A statement that you made in response to my claim that "everybody still knows that a marriage between a man and a woman is a different sort of thing than a marriage between a man and a man, or a woman and a woman."
I'm pretty sure that I can objectively show with psychological experiments and neuroimaging that you, personally, do still "know" this difference. Now, you can indeed argue that this kind of "instinctive knowledge" is mistaken, and that it is rather the "idealistic knowledge" which you have consciously adopted that is the true. And perhaps you can argue that the latter represents the true "you", whereas the former does not, though that gets us into all sorts of philosophical difficulties.
However, this does not really touch the point I was making, namely that everybody - including you - still "knows" this at some level. And while this is admittedly entirely speculative at this point in time, I will make the following prediction: we will (perhaps: eventually) be able to find adults who do not have such instinctive "race" knowledge (and we will likely find them in the most "cosmopolitan" places, i.e., this is learned, if at an early stage). Whereas we will never find adults who do not have such instinctive "sex" knowledge (indicating either that this is "hardwired" into the brain, or that no stable society can exist that does not sufficiently maintain and teach this differentiation, or likely both).
I should perhaps add that I do think that some kind of "us vs. them" group thinking is also hardwired into human brains, just like appropriate sexual differentiation, but I do speculate that triggering it by "race" is a learned response. We do not need to learn that there are others apart from us, but we do need to learn that skin colour is an indicator for that. And these days we need to unlearn that... Whereas to deny all the "us vs. them" within us is yet another liberal project doomed to failure by human reality (and yet another ideology falsely claimed to be somehow derived from scripture and/or Christ, whereas actual Christianity makes ingenious use of group thinking).
-------------------- They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Boogie: quote: Originally posted by IngoB: quote: Originally posted by Boogie: Which is fine. The key words here being "for me". If it's the proper Christian authority for you then, fine, go with it. It simply is not so for the rest of us. Get over it.
Why would I want to get over that?
Not just you, all people who want to tell folks what to do in their private sex lives.
But surely the point of marriage (as opposed to simple cohabitation) is that it is a public matter, giving recognition to a relationship that has, in principle, a sexual elemnt (however defined). If it wasn't a public matter people wouldn't be arguing so fiercely for or against SSM.
-------------------- My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
Sorry, the public statement is that one a) is free to legally marry b) that one will forsake all others.
The exact sexual status of the couple ongoing is not mentioned in the public statement. Historically, it is assumed that the couple are having sexual intercourse, to the extent that the marriage can be annulled without it. However nobody in their right mind (and I am very strongly suggesting that IngoB is not of right mind) is suggesting that a marriage without sex is legally invalid to the extent that a third party can say "oi, that's not a "real marriage", they're not having sex!" [ 01. July 2015, 10:20: Message edited by: mr cheesy ]
-------------------- arse
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orfeo
 Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by mr cheesy: The exact sexual status of the couple ongoing is not mentioned in the public statement.
Nope. Because predicting the future is a damn tricky business, as I have to explain to my clients constantly.
Perhaps we should avail ourselves of modern technology and require a couple to produce a bedroom video diary?
Or just a sex tape.
-------------------- Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
Or just bedsheets.
Because we really do want to be a society that does this to young women, don't we?
-------------------- arse
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
Natural law sounds like a design argument to me. Acorns becomes oaks, yes, but is a good acorn one that becomes an oak, and a bad one that gets eaten?
Well, not really, since acorns/oaks are not moral agents, but when we turn to humans, and their 'natural ends', we still seem to have an overlap between ends and morals. How does this arise?
Of course, you can say that it's granted by God, but then secular government and secular law will ignore this generally. The Treaty of Tripoli, isn't it, that has the much cited sentence, 'The Govt of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion'.
-------------------- I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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LeRoc
 Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
After having talked with Ingo a couple of times, I finally understood that the term 'natural moral law' actually means 'whatever the hierarchy says it means'. It is of no use looking at examples of acorns, spiders ...
-------------------- I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by mr cheesy: Sorry, the public statement is that one a) is free to legally marry b) that one will forsake all others.
The exact sexual status of the couple ongoing is not mentioned in the public statement. Historically, it is assumed that the couple are having sexual intercourse, to the extent that the marriage can be annulled without it. However nobody in their right mind (and I am very strongly suggesting that IngoB is not of right mind) is suggesting that a marriage without sex is legally invalid to the extent that a third party can say "oi, that's not a "real marriage", they're not having sex!"
Marriage is a public statement of commitment and being seen as a single unit, but the sexual relationship, or at least the possibility of it, is implicit in marriage. You don't actually have to be having much sex, but it's in the range of things that might happen. Are you married? If you are, and your other half suggested that from now on there should be no sexual element to your marriage although you'd carry on living together in love and mutual support, would you not think that a fundamental change was being suggested? Arguments about who can or can't marry are absolutely not about saying what people can or can't do in private- quite the opposite. That's why it's worth fighting for. [ 01. July 2015, 13:11: Message edited by: Albertus ]
-------------------- My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Albertus: You don't actually have to be having much sex, but it's in the range of things that might happen. So arguments about who can or can't marry are absolutely not about saying what people can or can't do in private- quite the opposite. That's why it's worth fighting for.
Wrong - you don't actually have to be having any sex at all. Very clearly the law does not discriminate against people who are unable to have sex for physical reasons, for reasons of prior abuse or such - providing the other partner does not complain. Hence such things very clearly are in the private space and between the individuals concerned.
If you are saying marriage is about sex, then sorry, you are saying what can't be done in private (ie you can't not have sex).
-------------------- arse
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
There are certainly married couples who live without sex, for many varied reasons, inability, lack of enthusiasm, renunciation, are some that spring to mind.
These discussions always seem to get back to some kind of essentialism or oughtism. Marriage is essentially X - well, I don't think the state should be getting involved in that, and as far as I can see, the state tends to agree, well in many European states, and presumably the US.
Of course, I'm aware that I'm teetering on the brink of the old libertarian argument, that the state need not, or should not, be ratifying people's relationships in any case. But then of course, there are questions of inheritance, child custody, pensions, visiting rights, and so on.
-------------------- I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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RooK
 1 of 6
# 1852
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: "everybody still knows that a marriage between a man and a woman is a different sort of thing than a marriage between a man and a man, or a woman and a woman."
I'm pretty sure that I can objectively show with psychological experiments and neuroimaging that you, personally, do still "know" this difference.
This is not just bullshit, it's bullshit based on a deeply flawed premise.
Deeply flawed premise: you seem to be implying that some sort of relevant truth can be derived from a posited "ick factor". Denying somebody a set of legal safeguards just because we don't like them or because they're different from us in some irrelevant way is stupid and petty. Insert broccoli meme here.
Bullshit: because it would be then logical to extrapolate that the exact same so-called objective psychological and neuroimaging results would probably suggest that all of our parents shouldn't be married. Because - ew.
Posts: 15274 | From: Portland, Oregon, USA, Earth | Registered: Nov 2001
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Autenrieth Road
 Shipmate
# 10509
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Posted
I had FTFY'ed and edited out IngoB's scare quotes. What he actually said was:
quote: Originally posted by IngoB: everybody still knows that a marriage between a man and a woman is a different sort of thing than a "marriage" between a man and a man, or a woman and a woman.
This is a statement not just that one's brain chemistry reacts differently to same-sex vs. opposite-sex couples, but also, via the scare quotes, that legally and morally we are not justified in treating them as the same.
When I see couples where one partner is a lot taller than the other, I always wonder "how do they have sex?" (Yes, yes, I know how they have sex, but the difference in where their faces would presumably be relative to each other always seems strange to me... OK, fine, I'm just digging in deeper.)
Anyway, as long as we're doing armchair fMRI experiments, I would suspect that my brain has a different reaction when shown a couple close to the same height vs. when shown a couple of very different heights and asked about them being married.
But nobody wastes their time asserting that quote: everybody still knows that a marriage between two people of similar heights is a different sort of thing than a "marriage" between two people of very different heights.
And if someone says that both types of couples are married and their marriages are the same, no-one thinks it's very important to say "aha, gotcha, your brain reacts differently to them, therefore they're really different, so different in fact that one is a marriage and the other is only a "marriage"."
-------------------- Truth
Posts: 9559 | From: starlight | Registered: Oct 2005
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by mr cheesy: quote: Originally posted by Albertus: You don't actually have to be having much sex, but it's in the range of things that might happen. So arguments about who can or can't marry are absolutely not about saying what people can or can't do in private- quite the opposite. That's why it's worth fighting for.
Wrong - you don't actually have to be having any sex at all. Very clearly the law does not discriminate against people who are unable to have sex for physical reasons, for reasons of prior abuse or such - providing the other partner does not complain. Hence such things very clearly are in the private space and between the individuals concerned.
If you are saying marriage is about sex, then sorry, you are saying what can't be done in private (ie you can't not have sex).
no no no. There are exceptions- people who can't have sex can be legally married (although they cna also apply for their marriage to be annulled, in certain circumstances), but in principle a sexual relationship is part of marraige- hence the provision for annulment on grounds of non-consummation. Note however that an unconsummated marriage is not in itself void, but can be voided if the parties (or one of them) wish. So a sexual relationship is presumed to be a requirement of marriage but- by declining to seek annulment for non-consummation- it is a requirement that the parties can waive in a particular case. That's my last word on this topic because I suspect that you are either (i) unable to understand fairly straightforward legal reasoning or (ii) wilfully choosing not to understand my point so that you can have the last word.
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