Do Athiests have morals?

[Monk Of Reason]

You have been using the word "irrelevant" like a crutch lately. There cannot possible be anything more relevant than the very people who founded this country saying the exact opposite of what you claimed. If you claim their faith had no role in the government they produced what could possibly be more relevant that they themselves claiming the opposite? Your basically saying if I don't just accept whatever you declare is true then any effort to resolve a thing even using the very men's words themselves impossible .

Where in our constitution does it say we are in any way part of the Christian faith? I don't care what the personal opinions of religion were of some of the founders no more than you do of the ones that don't agree with you.
quote]
How in the world secularists get these volumes of declarations out of one sentence that says:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;[/quote]
Because this means that the government will not respect an establishment of religion. I don't think you fully understand the implications of that.

Those two simplistic and short sentences reflect two facts, neither of which you grant.
1. They were trying to prevent the government from taking over the church and making it some mandatory, singular, uniform, one size fits institution.
2. They were setting up a government not a church. I do not see how they could have incorporated one additional theological foundation without it becoming a church. For pity's sake they grounded all rights exclusively in God. How much more theological grounding can politics be and still be called politics?

1. Agreed in many respects.
2. They set up a government. A government not run by god or any religion. In fact it does not take any establishments of religion into consideration. If the people running it have religious ideologies then that will reflect in the laws as it has. But it will never be ruled by Christianity. It is not a "Christian" nation.

Even the bible does not say wine, but only fruit of the vine. Most prohibitionists were not motivated to stop drinking entirely but viewed getting rid of alcohol altogether the only way to stop the effects of over indulgence. In fact the only people to protest the use of wine in communion were Christian's.

How many outspoken atheists, Jews or Muslims where there not protesting? The biggest issue I have with your claims usually center with you claiming that a christian or Christians did something equates it to Christianity doing it.

Hardly zero.

I still say zero. Not that everyone that opposed alcohol was non-christian but that the status of "christian" had little to do with it.

It is not mine, it is a famous work by Alexander Fraser Tytler, Lord Woodhouselee FRSE (15 October 1747 – 5 January 1813) was a Scottish advocate, judge, writer and historian who served as Professor of Universal History, and Greek and Roman Antiquities, in the University of Edinburgh.[1
Alexander Fraser Tytler - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

And what was his arguments and evidence? The link didn't seem to have anything in it that was obviously supporting your argument. If there was please point it out.

Your expected a-priori rejection was why I did not bother explaining it beyond what the theory is.

If you have evidence then I am likely to change my mind. I doubt you have the evidence is the problem.

I can present a far better argument than you ever can about the foundation of any actual objective moral duties and values but that is not what you were talking about. You said that morality was derived from secularism. That is not what history says. History shows that almost all morality was prescribed to God's and a huge proportion of it conflicts with even the idea of evolutionarily derived values or what would far later be called humanism. Again your going to have to adopt a position you prescribe to certain societies and individuals specifically denied by those exact individuals. Now you welcome to think whatever you want in spite of what those you think it of specifically claim but you cannot expect me to find it compelling.

This is simply wrong. On all accounts. I don't even really know what to say other than that. Because the evidence and the history are both against you. Its as if you live in a totally different world with a different history.

 

[1robin]

Then I guess you and I will simply disagree. The brittish had every access to god as the rebels. It was not in the name of god that they rebelled but it was a commonly held phrase to talk about their "god given right to freedom" but really it was propaganda against taxation of our nations wealth and natural resources. That was the reason for the revolution. And as far as I am concerned wealth and buisiness are secular aspects not religious ones.

I don't know what this is. I did not say anything about who had access to what. I said:

1. The British government slowly monopolized the Christian Church.
2. It became a one size fits all and sole authority on everything institution.
3. It became the same yoke that people keep throwing off at great expense.
4. The Romans began this horrific idea of force fitting everyone into one cookie cutter called Christianity by force.
5. Over and over, either from within or without this kind of do it my way or suffer produces those who rebel.
6. The migration to the US was just one of these episodes, the same as dozens of reformations had already occurred.
7. They did not want to be forced to worship their God the way a Kind, Pope, or any other said they had to especially when those that are dictating how are point blank violating the faith.

What your talking about is only one aspect in a later event where those that escaped England finally had so much they stood up to fight them at the risk to everything. It is not why they came here to begin with and not what I was talking about. I was talking about why we left, your talking about why we went to war. However lets take the evolution. You might think the founding document that declared to the world why we rebelled "irrelevant" since it does not support your view but has no impact on it actually being the most relevant evidence possible.

“We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions … ” —Declaration of Independence (This was taken from Judges 11:27.)

John Locke referred to a biblical account (Judg. 11) to support the proposition that only God could judge man when in the state of war. An appeal to God as judge could not have been made had America’s founders subscribed to deism.

“With a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives…” —Declaration of Independence

“Divine Providence” was one of the oldest cornerstones of Christian teaching—it represented the heart of their belief in God, namely, that God was the ever-active, moment-by-moment governor of the universe.

God is Jehovah Jireh, meaning "the Lord shall provide" (Gen. 22:14).

The Four Principles That Anchor the Declaration of Independence

1. Rights come from God.

2. The purpose of civil government is to secure those rights.

3. The power of civil government is given by the consent of the governed, each of whom is fully entitled to rule.

4. The right to govern is forfeited by a tyrant to lower civil magistrates in order to restore the rule of law.

All four of these principles are Christian.

Jefferson’s early draft of the Declaration had the word derived. Benjamin Franklin and John Adams replaced that with the phrase endowed by their creator. By replacing derived with endowed by their Creator, the Declaration rested upon rights as God had given them, not as man understood them to be. Thus, America’s founders chose to establish the new nation upon the laws of nature and of nature’s God, not upon natural law.

Later, Congress inserted the adjective certain in the place of Jefferson’s inherent. The word inherent means “existing in something else, so as to be inseparable from it.” The word was appropriate if man was certain about the existence of the rights being relied upon but uncertain of their exact content. Once God was identified as the giver of those rights, however, then the word certain became appropriate, because whatever God had given to mankind was “sure, true, undoubted, unquestionable, existing in fact and truth” (the definition of certain).

When the words endowed and certain are coupled with unalienable, then the Declaration makes a most remarkable claim: What God has given for the benefit of all mankind cannot be given away by the recipient or taken away by the donor (Numb. 23:19; 2 Chron. 19:7).

“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” —Declaration of Independence

It is most instructive that the Declaration’s authors did not make the same claim about governments as they had about unalienable rights. God endowed mankind with rights, but governments are “instituted” among men. The Bible is the source of this distinction: Biblically, a king was under the law of God, not above it. (See Deuteronomy 17:14-19, Exodus 18, 1 Samuel 8, and Romans 13:1, 4.)

Biblically, a change of leadership was not fully implemented until ratified by the people (1 Sam. 10:17, 24).

Exactly how much Christian doctrine has to be in the most relevant document from the most central figures about the most relevant issue before you agree it is not secular, it would only require one appeal to the divine?

And it still stands that countries that are poor and distraught are far more religious than countries that are not. Then after that the moral fabric of that society is inversely proportional when mapped out.

What does that have to do with me or anything we have discussed. I am not defending the all faith position but the Christian position. I believe a wrong faith worse than no faith and would expect it to produce misery. Christian nations (or ones that have strong Christian traditions of roots) make up the most successful nations on earth, atheist countries have made up the most diabolical on earth, and false faiths make up the poorest and most backwards. There are exceptions but this is the trend and I do not know what this has to do with what I said. I gave you the life cycle of democracies, you replied with a generalization about all faiths.

Its because we have deemed teens to be too young to marry. In a way it is actually a progression of society. Girls are not having children younger but getting married later. Also it was blasphemous to have a child out of wedlock in the 50's. Now it is not so important. Neither are signs of degradation of morality but rather progress in the society with inadequate sexual education.

So your taking the fact that far more children are born without two parents these days and calling it progress? Teen marriage is not a moral issue. There is no reason to say 18 is morally worse than 20. The reason teen pregnancy has gone out of fashion is because we have become materialistic, which demands higher education, which demands personal freedom, which is facilitated by not having a family. Your taking a shift from family values to selfish commercialism and calling it progress which is exactly what I was talking about. Secularism changes priorities, and no matter how much damage they cause or how selfish their roots this is called progress. Who cares if we have more babies without two parent homes that is not important today, who cares if we are killing lives in the womb on an industrial scale we now have cell phones, who cares if families never eat together anymore we have two cars in the driveway.

I disagree.

With what? I take it for granted you disagree as you have an opposing viewpoint.

I will grant that there was some crazyness in the 50's but that was breaking the shackles of the previous social lines added to people. In almost every aspect it has resulted in far more good than bad.

Reminds me of a poem about secularism.
“Creed” on the World By Steve Turner
We believe in Marxfreudanddarwin, We believe everything is OK, as long as you don’t hurt anyone to the best of your definition of hurt, and to the best of your knowledge. We believe in sex before, during, and after marriage. We believe in the therapy of sin. We believe that adultery is fun. We believe that sodomy’s OK. We believe that taboos are taboo. We believe that everything’s getting better despite evidence to the contrary. The evidence must be investigated And you can prove anything with evidence. We believe there’s something in horoscopes UFO’s and bent spoons. Jesus was a good man just like Buddha, Mohammed, and ourselves. He was a good moral teacher though we think His good morals were bad. We believe that all religions are basically the same-at least the one that we read was. They all believe in love and goodness.They only differ on matters of creation, sin, heaven, hell, God, and salvation. We believe that after death comes the Nothing Because when you ask the dead what happens they say nothing. If death is not the end, if the dead have lied, then its compulsory heaven for all excepting perhaps Hitler, Stalin, and Genghis Kahn We believe in Masters and Johnson What’s selected is average. What’s average is normal. What’s normal is good. We believe in total disarmament. We believe there are direct links between warfare and bloodshed. Americans should beat their guns into tractors . And the Russians would be sure to follow. We believe that man is essentially good. It’s only his behavior that lets him down.This is the fault of society. Society is the fault of conditions. Conditions are the fault of society.We believe that each man must find the truth that is right for him. Reality will adapt accordingly. The universe will readjust. History will alter. We believe that there is no absolute truth excepting the truth
that there is no absolute truth. We believe in the rejection of creeds, and the flowering of individual thought. If chance be the Father of all flesh, disaster is his rainbow in the sky and when you hear State of Emergency! Sniper Kills Ten! Troops on Rampage! Whites go Looting! Bomb Blasts School! It is but the sound of man worshipping his maker.

Steve Turner, (English journalist), “Creed,” his satirical poem on the modern mind. Taken from Ravi Zacharias’ book Can Man live Without God? Pages 42-44

Divorce rates 1950 - 25%, 1985 - 50%.
Between 1950 and 2001 there was over a 400% increase in child pornography.
Since 1960 there has been an 800% increase in unmarried couples living together.
From 1967 - 1990 child abuse cases went from 65,000 to 3 million.
Between 1960 and 1990, there was a 41% decline in marriage
Between 1960 and 1990, the percentage of children living apart from their biological fathers more than doubled, from 17 percent to 36 percent
From 1970 to 1996 the number of "never married" persons increased from 21 million to 46 million in 1996
Since 1960 there has been over a 400% increase in illegitimate births
1960 there were 2 known Sexually Transmitted Diseases (syphilis and gonorrhea); today there are more than 25
43 percent of white male homosexuals estimate they have had sex with 500 or more different partners, and 28 percent report more than 1,000 partners.
Since abortion was legalized by our Supreme Court in Roe vs. Wade, more than 30 million babies have been killed. This now amounts to one eighth the population of the entire United States
Less than 1% of all Americans had used illegal drugs before 1960.
In 2002, 10% of 12th grade students reported using illicit drugs other than marijuana in the past month, 2005 saw a 212% increase in prescription drug abuse by US teens.
In 2003, more than 20% of students in the 12th grade reported using marijuana in the past 30 days.
Youth suicide rates skyrocketed 400 percent since 1950

I can do this all day. It is too depressing. Your looking at moral insanity on parade and calling it progress.

The bible did nothing to stop slavery. It was stopped eventually when people's minds were changed enough. I think it is highly irrelevant that you think the bible doesn't support slavery. The bible was used to support slavery and to denounce it. If it can be used on both sides it can't claim any sort of credit as the source of its removal.

1. The bible is exactly what inspired our founders to declare all men equal. You cannot find justification for all men being equal in nature. Evolution never created two equal things in history.
2. A Christian said it was the bible that inspired him to fire the first shots against slavery.
3. The man more responsible for stopping slavery than any other said it was the bible that motivated him and justified his belief that all men are equal.
4. It was hundreds of thousands of Christians who died to free them. I would say about 90% of their personal correspondence that I could find listed biblical morality as among the primary reasons for their actions.
5. It was almost exclusively the bible that led the slaves to cry out for freedom and look for deliverance.

With the except of a pile of bibles falling on every slaveholders head I do not see how anything can be more involved. And it was the same bible that was primarily looked to when demanding equal rights later on. The leaders were Christian, their foundations were Christian, their principles Christian, their places of meeting Christian.

Where was the atheist John Brown, the humanist Martin Luther King, the Darwinian Lincoln? Where were the great secular battalions dying in the trenches of Petersburg to set other men free?

Alright. God never came down to free slaves. God sat by for tens of thousands of years and let slavery happen. It was only when we started to see people as people in a well understood sociological aspect of cultural change in history. It had absolutely nothing to do with god and in fact I personally believe that had religion not been involved from the start it would have been eradicated earlier.

How do you know that? God primarily acts through human agency, the majority of those agents claimed God motivated them, and the rest quoted principles only the bible properly grounds. We were talking about 19th century slavery. It is beyond the capacity of a post to comment on slavery as a whole and most of them did not look to God for deliverance. The ones we are discussing did and were freed. I have already shown it was a Christian effort almost entirely that ended slavery and speculation about what did not happen carry no weight.

Explain how it is relevant to proving the case that religion was the only source of morality that set up the end of slavery.

I did not say it was, I said it was the primary motivation by a huge margin.

Then respond to the rest of what I stated

I did.

I don't logically see how you can defend the assumption that Christianity freed slavery because Christianity was used to JUSTIFY slavery. You can take up your biblical argument with the Sourthern Christians of the days of old. But you cannot simply say it was the bible and be done with it.

If the bible says do not murder then they guy who murders in the name of God is full of crap, but the guy who stops a murder and claims to have done so based on his biblical faith is. It can't get any simpler.

New International Version
"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free.

If I said that it was the English language that freed the slaves even though both sides spoke the English language wouldn't that simply not make any sense?

Of course not, language is not a moral entity or doctrine. God and the bible are.

I do hope you aren't talking about the puritans. Please please PLEASE make the ignorant claim that they came here for religious freedom.

No not them specifically but lets see about them.

In the early 17th century, thousands of English Puritans settled in North America, mainly in New England. Puritans were generally members of the Church of England who believed the Church of England was insufficiently Reformed and who therefore opposed royal ecclesiastical policy under Elizabeth I of England, James I of England, and Charles I of England.
History of the Puritans in North America - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sounds word for word exactly what I said.

Puritanism was a religious reform movement that arose within the Church of England in the late sixteenth century. Under siege from church and crown, it sent an offshoot in the third and fourth decades of the seventeenth century to the northern English colonies in the New World–a migration that laid the foundation for the religious, intellectual, and social order of New England.
Puritanism - Facts & Summary - HISTORY.com
Again sounds exactly like what I said

Back in England, the Puritans had been people of means and political influence, but King Charles would not tolerate their attempts to reform the Church of England. Persecution mounted. To many there seemed no hope but to leave England. Perhaps in America they could establish a colony whose government, society, and church were all based upon the Bible. "New England" could become a light Old England could follow out of the darkness of corruption.
Timeline by 1601-1700Who Were The Puritans? – Church History

The Puritans who, in the 1560s, first began to be (contemptuously) referred to as such, were ardent reformers, seeking to bring the Church to a state of purity that would match Christianity as it had been in the time of Christ. This reform was to involve, depending upon which Puritan one asked, varying degrees of stripping away practices seen as residual "popery"--vestments, ceremony, and the like.
Pilgrims and Puritans: Background

 

[leibowde84]

Quick definitions for the unlearned:

Amoral: lacking a moral sense; unconcerned with the rightness or wrongness of something.

Immoral: not conforming to accepted standards of morality.

Moral: concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character.

When someone claims that he/she is irreligious, does it give them justifications to negate teachings of religious communities. For example, thou not steal. Does it give someone who claims to be irreligious the right to steal?

Also, which of the above words excellently describes the life of an Athiest?

This is an extremely easy question to answer. Stealing being "wrong" or against societal interests is not reliant on religion. Whether or not it even origninated with religion (which I think is debateable) wouldn't effect how they are used by Atheists. These moral codes have alredy become part of secular society and the law.

 

[Monk Of Reason]

What your talking about is only one aspect in a later event where those that escaped England finally had so much they stood up to fight them at the risk to everything. It is not why they came here to begin with and not what I was talking about. I was talking about why we left, your talking about why we went to war. However lets take the evolution. You might think the founding document that declared to the world why we rebelled "irrelevant" since it does not support your view but has no impact on it actually being the most relevant evidence possible.

I disagree that the founding document involves any christian authority. Not that it was irrelevent. I think it is just as relevant as you. I do not agree with your interpretation of it.

The Four Principles That Anchor the Declaration of Independence

1. Rights come from God.

2. The purpose of civil government is to secure those rights.

3. The power of civil government is given by the consent of the governed, each of whom is fully entitled to rule.

4. The right to govern is forfeited by a tyrant to lower civil magistrates in order to restore the rule of law.

I agree with points 2 through 3. I don't agree with number 1. I think it was poetic way of saying that rights are inborn. We are not born without rights but we are born with rights that are then taken away. This is a sentiment I agree with. I do not bleieve in god and nor do I think that god is required.

All four of these principles are Christian.

Nothing about two, three or four is Christian. At least not any more christian than Monarchies.

Jefferson’s early draft of the Declaration had the word derived. Benjamin Franklin and John Adams replaced that with the phrase endowed by their creator. By replacing derived with endowed by their Creator, the Declaration rested upon rights as God had given them, not as man understood them to be. Thus, America’s founders chose to establish the new nation upon the laws of nature and of nature’s God, not upon natural law.

I do not agree that this indicates god as any authority. I think it indicates that they wanted to establish that they had endowed rights. Not that god specifically came down to them and granted them those rights.

Exactly how much Christian doctrine has to be in the most relevant document from the most central figures about the most relevant issue before you agree it is not secular, it would only require one appeal to the divine?

If the basis of our countrie's laws ever required god or Christianity then I would agree. I don't agree because nothing in our government requires or is based upon Christianity. If we could simply shift to a totally secular government (which for all intents and purposes we have) it did not collapse. You don't agree. And I will never make you agree.

So your taking the fact that far more children are born without two parents these days and calling it progress? Teen marriage is not a moral issue. There is no reason to say 18 is morally worse than 20. The reason teen pregnancy has gone out of fashion is because we have become materialistic, which demands higher education, which demands personal freedom, which is facilitated by not having a family. Your taking a shift from family values to selfish commercialism and calling it progress which is exactly what I was talking about. Secularism changes priorities, and no matter how much damage they cause or how selfish their roots this is called progress. Who cares if we have more babies without two parent homes that is not important today, who cares if we are killing lives in the womb on an industrial scale we now have cell phones, who cares if families never eat together anymore we have two cars in the driveway.
.

Yes. Having less forced marriages is morally progressive. I think that with better sexual education we can have fewer young girls having babies before their time. And I don't see abortion as morally wrong. I don't personally like it but I don't think there is an objective moral truth against it. By modern standards it is ethically progressive.

Divorce rates 1950 - 25%, 1985 - 50%.
Between 1950 and 2001 there was over a 400% increase in child pornography.
Since 1960 there has been an 800% increase in unmarried couples living together.
From 1967 - 1990 child abuse cases went from 65,000 to 3 million.
Between 1960 and 1990, there was a 41% decline in marriage
Between 1960 and 1990, the percentage of children living apart from their biological fathers more than doubled, from 17 percent to 36 percent
From 1970 to 1996 the number of "never married" persons increased from 21 million to 46 million in 1996
Since 1960 there has been over a 400% increase in illegitimate births
1960 there were 2 known Sexually Transmitted Diseases (syphilis and gonorrhea); today there are more than 25
43 percent of white male homosexuals estimate they have had sex with 500 or more different partners, and 28 percent report more than 1,000 partners.
Since abortion was legalized by our Supreme Court in Roe vs. Wade, more than 30 million babies have been killed. This now amounts to one eighth the population of the entire United States
Less than 1% of all Americans had used illegal drugs before 1960.
In 2002, 10% of 12th grade students reported using illicit drugs other than marijuana in the past month, 2005 saw a 212% increase in prescription drug abuse by US teens.
In 2003, more than 20% of students in the 12th grade reported using marijuana in the past 30 days.
Youth suicide rates skyrocketed 400 percent since 1950

I can do this all day. It is too depressing. Your looking at moral insanity on parade and calling it progress.

And yet overall crime is still down. Death and disease is down. Murder rates are down. Rape rates are down.
Divorce isn't immoral and it isn't because of a degregation of morality its because of increased financial independence of women.
Marriage itself isn't moral. Fewer people getting married isn't negative.
Children living away from biological fathers is in many cases are not a negative thing in terms of the morality of the people.
Again never married isn't a bad thing.
Illigitimate births is an archaic standard.
A lot of that has to do with medical advances. No one ever paid attention. Hell they didn't even know what cancer was back then,.
I will need to see the source for the homosexual male having more than 1k partners. I don't even see how that is physically possible and I doubt its authenticity.
Abortion is a thing.
This is doubtful. Though to be fair most of the illegal drugs were not illegal back then. Geroge Washington grew pot, cocaine was a great pick me up for getting through the day in the roaring 20s. Heroin was a cough medicine originally.
Good. The weed will chill them out. Its harmless for the most part and its far better than drinking.

I don't see the problem.

1. The bible is exactly what inspired our founders to declare all men equal. You cannot find justification for all men being equal in nature. Evolution never created two equal things in history.[/quote
I won't even go farther than this because they didn't declare all men equal. They declared themselves equal and above rule of Brittish people. But women and minorities? Nah. Hell even non-land owners and the wrong kind of "white" people weren't considered equal for many many years to come.

Where was the atheist John Brown, the humanist Martin Luther King, the Darwinian Lincoln? Where were the great secular battalions dying in the trenches of Petersburg to set other men free?

I already gave you a link earlier. You disregarded it. I see no reason to fetch another one.

How do you know that? God primarily acts through human agency, the majority of those agents claimed God motivated them, and the rest quoted principles only the bible properly grounds. We were talking about 19th century slavery. It is beyond the capacity of a post to comment on slavery as a whole and most of them did not look to God for deliverance. The ones we are discussing did and were freed. I have already shown it was a Christian effort almost entirely that ended slavery and speculation about what did not happen carry no weight.

Isn't it funny that an omnipotent being only ever acts through human agency? Humans who are supposed to have free will and not simply agents of his will? If I said that god was going to punish you but I stabbed you would you assume it was god or me? I see no argument that is convincing that god did anything.

I did not say it was, I said it was the primary motivation by a huge margin.

And I stated that doesn't logically follow if we were to think about it objectively.

If the bible says do not murder then they guy who murders in the name of God is full of crap, but the guy who stops a murder and claims to have done so based on his biblical faith is. It can't get any simpler.

New International Version
"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free.

Yeah. Too bad that slavery wasn't ended soon as Christianity became the dominant religion of Europe. Since it only ever escalated it makes me wonder if it had any power to stop it in the first place.

Of course not, language is not a moral entity or doctrine. God and the bible are.

I argue that they aren't. But lets take ideology instead. It is the closest thing I can think of. How can two groups both conservative fight on opposite sides of an issue and then whichever side wins conservatism claims it was conservatism that made the day? Even though its main opponent claims it was the true conservative ideology? Or we could use liberal or any other ideology in its place if you like.

No not them specifically but lets see about them.

In the early 17th century, thousands of English Puritans settled in North America, mainly in New England. Puritans were generally members of the Church of England who believed the Church of England was insufficiently Reformed and who therefore opposed royal ecclesiastical policy under Elizabeth I of England, James I of England, and Charles I of England.
History of the Puritans in North America - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sounds word for word exactly what I said.

Actually puritans were forced to flee England because a pluralistic minded individual was appointed. Puritans were persecuted but mainly because they were the westboro baptist church of their day. I mean when they got here they decided they were going to make a purely puritin country and make it heaven on earth. It wasn't so that people could be free it was because they wanted to impose their own religious ideology. They did so by slaughtering natives and telling ghost stories till it got all to real and ended in witch trials. If you think them to have come over for religious freedom rather than freedom to impose their religious beliefs then look into their interactions with Quakers.
Truth is they bucked heads with other factions in England and lost because it was not popular enough.

 

[Pudding]

Well what you say it partially right but not exactly. Yes the governing institution was to be run by the people. I don't think there is any other choice. A metaphor might help clarify this. It you imagine a nation is a dualistic institution having a body and soul. Our body was to be man made law, our soul was to be Judeo-Christian. The people who founded this nation were religious and our laws do reflect that. Our founders were 95% Christians and 4.9% theists and deists.

So if majority founders of a nation is a specific religion X believer, it then justified the nations law must be preserve to religion X law, if the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the religion law then they must immigrate to other country?

However your last statement is where the shipwreck occurred. You cannot possibly know nor can I possible prove whether there is a God which can provided or grounded the foundation of this nation and it's laws. The only thing we can do is conclude whether the founders claimed there was and so acted on that belief. I can submit evidence until this keyboard breaks but let me just a give a few examples.

So we know that we can't possible prove whether there is a God which can provided or grounded the foundation of this nation and it's laws. Then it justified that if the founders(human) claimed there was a God exist as fact for themself, then all non-believer must force to acted on that belief? If the non-believer don't want to force to acted on that belief, then they must immigrate to other country?

1. "It is impossible to rightly govern a nation without God and the Bible." George Washington
2. John Adams - The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity.
3. John Quincy Adams - The Declaration of Independence laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity.
4. Thomas Jefferson - God who gave us life gave us liberty. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the Gift of God?

1. It's George Washington's personal opinion.

2. So if John Adams 100% certain the fact that the general principles of nation(American) law on which the fathers(human founder) achieved independence were the general principles(law) of Christianity, so it then justified all other non-believer must be force to follow christianity law? If the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the christianity law then they must immigrate to other country?

3. So if John Quincy Adams 100% certain the fact that The Declaration of Independence laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity, so it then justified all other non-believer must be force to follow christianity law? If the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the christianity law then they must immigrate to other country?

4. So if people like Thomas Jefferson who've 100% certain the fact that God must be the creator who gave everyone life and liberty, so it then justified all other non-believer must be force to follow christianity law? If the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the christianity law then they must immigrate to other country?

5. Abraham Lincoln - These communities, by their representatives in old Independence Hall, said to the whole world of men: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Wise statesmen as they were, they knew the tendency of prosperity to breed tyrants, and so they established these great self-evident truths, that when in the distant future some man, some faction, some interest, should set up the doctrine that none but rich men, or none but white men, were entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, their posterity might look up again to the Declaration of Independence and take courage to renew the battle which their fathers began -- so that truth, and justice, and mercy, and all the humane and Christian virtues might not be extinguished from the land; so that no man would hereafter dare to limit and circumscribe the great principles on which the temple of liberty was being built. Speech at Lewistown, Illinois, on August 17, 1858 (CWAL II:546)

Point 1 - 4 is irrelevent to point 5.

What point 5 said is that everyone have their liberty rights to pursuit their own version of happiness, they're not force to follow a religion/secular law that they don't agree with, they also shouldn't force other people to must follow their own religion/secular law.

Now there is five but I can supply 5 thousand. They are among the most influential statesmen in our history and they speak directly to what you claim is not true. If 5 is not enough 5 thousand would not be.

I'm not sure if i've misunderstand your meaning, are you saying that because you think 5000 most influential statesmen in America's history who you think they're the most influential statesmen in America's history to yourself, so it then justified all other non-believer must be force to follow christianity law? If the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the christianity law then they must immigrate to other country?

Yes it was, it was preached from thousands of pulpits every Sunday. That is not to say it was only a religious thing, so the only issue is how much of it was inspired by faith.

So you mean people shouldn't force others to follow their faith's law/rule/morality?

I am not agreeing with you but lets pretend that is true to begin with. It fits perfectly in line with the cycle of empires I gave.

1. A movement is born in bondage.
2. The desperation of bondage leads to an intense dependence on faith.
3. Faith produces great courage and moral excellence which throws off the shackles of bondage and .

1. What is the bondage you're refering to here? Is that the bondage of a religion to force every non-believer must follow the religion's morality?

2. The desperation of bondage by religion to force every non-believer must follow the religion's morality leads to an intense dependence of every non-believer to happily being force to follow the religion's morality? I really don't know what you're talking about.

3. Those who don't agree that "faith produces great courage and moral excellence which throws off the shackles of bondage", don't agree with this claims. And when non-believer are force to follow faith's own version of morality they don't agree with, it's the faith that are bondage the non-believer.

4. This produces a nation with great freedom.

4. This produces a nation with great freedom, a nation with great freedom of what? A nation with great freedom for believer to force non-believer to follow their faith's own version of morality the non-believer don't agree with? A nation with zero freedom for non-believer to not follow the believer's faith's own version of morality even if the non-believer don't willing to do so?

5. This produces a nation with great abundance. This is where faith starts to be discarded.
6. Abundance produces a lack of faith and the vacuum is filled by selfishness. This is where secularism begins it's march and where consumerism rears it's head.

5. When faith force every non-believer to follow its version of morality, i don't see where is the great abundance for non-believer in non-believer's perspective, or are you mean that there're great abundance for the believer who believe that faith in the believer's perspective?

6. How can abundance only for believer of faith produces a lack of faith to non-believer when believer force non-believer to follow their faith's own version of morality? Does it consider selfish when non-believer don't want to force to follow believer's version of morality?

7. Selfishness produces complacency.
8. Complacency produces apathy (this is the stage we are at now).
9. Apathy produces dependence, this is the stage we are moving into where more people receive from the government than contribute. At this point we are simply bleeding out, drawing on credit we earned in our former faith based years of abundance. Eventually we run out and everything implodes.
10. Then what faith rescued from bondage, the lack of faith has placed right back in it.

7. Behavior of believer of faith that want to force every non-believer to follow their standard of morality produces selfishness, this selfishness produces complacency.

8. Complacency of some believer of faith produces apathy and then force every non-believer to follow their own version of morality (this is the stage we are at now).

9. Apathy from non-believer produces dependence to simply follow government's law(which try to give them the freedom whether they want to follow a religion's morality or not), rather than contribute to voice their opinion to government to enforce a law they don't agree with that every non-believer must be force to follow religion's morality? I really don't know what you're talking about.

10. I really don't know what you're talking about.

Those who deny the true God leave a vacuum we are designed to have filled. It is filled with something which does not belong there, but those who have invented a false God are seldom able to recognize it for a God. I will spare you all the theology about what makes a thing an idol or a God as you would not accept it anyway.

I really don't know what you're talking about.

Religious morality is not derived from secular morality. Morality has been associated with God's from the beginning.

Where is the prove?

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence about why morality has been associated with God's from the beginning as you would not accept it anyway" ?

Even when they were false God's it was they who grounded morality, not secularism.

Where is the prove?

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence about why morality has been associated with false God's from the beginning as you would not accept it anyway" ?

Morality has been associated with false God's? Which God is false God, which God is truth God?

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence about which God is truth God as you would not accept it anyway" ?

Secularism is not a thing by which a moral can be wrung from. Secularism is merely the denial of any ultimate moral foundation. It is by definition the worst possible moral foundation even in theory.

Where is your prove that your religion's accepted standard of ultimate moral foundation is really the ultimate morality?

Where is your prove that secularism's accepted standard of morality is the worst possilbe moral foundation even in theory?

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence that which one of the accepted standard of morality is the ultimate morality as you would not accept it anyway" ?

Even children know this, when told to do something the first thing they ask is "Oh yeah, who says".

Yes it's very irrational of non-believer for not wanting to force to follow religion's morality because they don't agree with it.

Even children know this, when told to follow a moral the first thing they say is "Oh yeah, i don't understand the meaning of this moral, is this moral a good moral? why?", not "Oh yeah, i don't understand the meaning of this moral, but i'll not ask why and simply follow it. Who says this moral is a good moral, then it must be the good moral, i've no doubt about it."

Even a rational adult know this, when told about a moral is good moral the first thing they say is "Oh yeah, i don't understand the meaning of this moral, is this moral a good moral? why?", not "Oh yeah, i don't understand the meaning of this moral, but i'll not ask why and simply follow it. Who says this moral is a good moral, then it must be the good moral, i've no doubt about it."

In your world view no ultimate authority says because no ultimate judge exists to have any moral duty towards.

Where is your prove that your religion's God is really the ultimate authority and judge for objective morality for all human?

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence that why my religion's God is really the ultimate authority and judge for objective morality for all human as you would not accept it anyway" ?

You may argue that I should treat you well so some arbitrary goal may be furthered but you cannot show I have any actually duty to agree.

Non-believer can say why you shouldn't force them to follow your religion's accepted standard of morality, but they cannot show you've any actually duty to not forcing them to follow your religion's accepted standard of morality? I don't understand you.

 

[Pudding]

A: My accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral, it's an universal undeniable unarguably fact.
B: No, mine is better.
C: No, mine is superior than your both.
D: No, mine is the best moral.
E: ......

F: My religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral, it's an universal undeniable unarguably fact.
G: No, my religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral.
H: No, my religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral.
I: No, my religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral,
J: ......

K: Morality is originated from my religion, only my religion's accepted standard of morality is the truth one, all other religion/secular accepted standard of morality is just copycat from my religion. It's an universal undeniable unarguably fact.
L: No, morality is originated from my religion, your religion's morality is copycat from my religion's morality.
M: No, morality is originated from my religion, your religion's morality is copycat from my religion's morality.
N: No, morality is originated from my religion, your religion's morality is copycat from my religion's morality.
O: ......

Where is the prove for why my accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral?

Where is the prove for why my religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral?

Where is the prove for why all good morality is originated from my religion and all bad inferior morality is originated from false religion/immoral-secular-society?

I should save the explanation to myself as you would not accept it anyway.

Don't ask me why my religion is truth religion and other religion is false religion, because even if i tell you you would not accept it anyway.

All the immoral crime claimed to done by the name of my religion is all made up and an excuses in attempt to accusing my religion. Don't ask me why, because even if i tell you you would not accept it anyway.

Everything you say that is oppose to my claims, is lies.

Everything i say and claims is truth and fact. Don't ask me why, because even if i tell you you would not accept it anyway.

 

[1robin]

I disagree that the founding document involves any christian authority. Not that it was irrelevent. I think it is just as relevant as you. I do not agree with your interpretation of it.

It involves God, how much bigger authority can you get? Even if you want to try and split hairs and say it is a generic God that is stick far to my side of secularism.

I agree with points 2 through 3. I don't agree with number 1. I think it was poetic way of saying that rights are inborn. We are not born without rights but we are born with rights that are then taken away. This is a sentiment I agree with. I do not bleieve in god and nor do I think that god is required.

Well it is not all that important if you agree with them, the issue is what did they themselves believe.

It is an easy task to debate where rights actually originate but the issue at hand is where they thought they did. I love the argument because it is so easy but I will not venture off topic at this time for lengths sake.

Nothing about two, three or four is Christian. At least not any more christian than Monarchies.

Are we to the point of yeah it's Christian but not that Christian? 95% of those involved in these documents were Christians, do you think they meant Allah. If you want to argue they meant a different God then good luck but most entire types of God's would not fit the bill. Only personal God's apply, only those with moral demands apply, pantheism is out, even created God's like Zeus and Apollo don't fit the bill but this is another issue. I think what God they meant is painfully obvious. BTW the author your contending with did not say those ideas were exclusively Christian.

I do not agree that this indicates god as any authority. I think it indicates that they wanted to establish that they had endowed rights. Not that god specifically came down to them and granted them those rights.

How in the world do you take "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights" and strip God out and leave any rights in? This seems hyper desperate.

If the basis of our countrie's laws ever required god or Christianity then I would agree. I don't agree because nothing in our government requires or is based upon Christianity. If we could simply shift to a totally secular government (which for all intents and purposes we have) it did not collapse. You don't agree. And I will never make you agree.

I did not mention law. Law is a man made institution which they founded on divine principles.

Yes. Having less forced marriages is morally progressive. I think that with better sexual education we can have fewer young girls having babies before their time. And I don't see abortion as morally wrong. I don't personally like it but I don't think there is an objective moral truth against it. By modern standards it is ethically progressive.

What forced marriages? I gave you a list of about ten points among hundreds showing dreadful moral decline. You said something about forced marriages which was not on the list nor under discussion and I don't even know what your referring to and that you do not consider the destruction of life one day prior to an arbitrary day some politician pulled out of his rear end immoral. Which goes to prove my point? If we have a right to anything it is to live, if you deny that most basic of rights on what do you grant the more advanced rights.

If someone asked me what the most horrific proof that we had completely lost our moral compass was 100 hundred years ago I think that everything I could have invented has occurred, the industrial murder of life for the sake of convenience would probably have been so absurd as to be unthinkable even in a thought experiment. Now not only is it a reality it is not even thought wrong. If tens of millions of unjustifiable deaths of the most innocent human lives in history is not wrong then on what basis is anything wrong?

And yet overall crime is still down.

From 1960 to 1990 violent crime rose 560%. F.B.I. There were about 60 (or 600) general crimes per 100,000 people in 1933, it spiked at about 2000 per 100,000 in 1960, then again at about 5950 per 100,000 in 1980 and slightly higher in 1990. It is currently about ten times as high now as 1950.
http://www.jrsa.org/projects/Historical.pdf

Death and disease is down.

Those are not moral statistics they are a function of technology.

[/quote] Murder rates are down. [/quote] The murder rate in 1950 was 4.5 per 100,000, it spiked to almost twice that in the 60's, it was about 7 per 1000,000 in the last full year of data.
http://www.jrsa.org/projects/Historical.pdf

Rape rates are down.

The oldest rape stats I can find are from 1973. Apparently that is when some huge spike occurred. Most stats I could find are much more recent. Apparently there are little in the way of accurate rape stats from 1970 and before so I can't check on this one.

Divorce isn't immoral and it isn't because of a degregation of morality its because of increased financial independence of women.

A divorce might not be but the increased rate of divorce is not a sign of moral progress but moral regress. I am not arguing against any divorce in particular but divorce is the wrong direction for a society.

Marriage itself isn't moral. Fewer people getting married isn't negative.

So you agree to what my original claim was that the family unit has been being eroded since secularism gained traction n but your argument is that is a good thing. I rest my case.

Children living away from biological fathers is in many cases are not a negative thing in terms of the morality of the people.

I am not picking on any single case but the destruction of the family unit in general is not progress. Countless studies show the negative influence of broken families yet you whistle while Rome burns and point out that a single fire can provide warmth. Almost every psychopath comes from a broken home.

Again never married isn't a bad thing.

Not for an individual but it is for a society.

Illigitimate births is an archaic standard.

I cannot have a moral conversation with someone who does not acknowledge the damage that partial families causes in general.

A lot of that has to do with medical advances. No one ever paid attention. Hell they didn't even know what cancer was back then,.

I did not say secularism produces cancer. Cancer is a biological process, claiming broken families is good is moral insanity.

I will need to see the source for the homosexual male having more than 1k partners. I don't even see how that is physically possible and I doubt its authenticity.

I have actually read that in many places but as it is so far out of bounds it does not matter half it, quarter it, heck call it good if you want, it still is causing massive destruction.

Abortion is a thing.

I don't get it.

This is doubtful. Though to be fair most of the illegal drugs were not illegal back then. Geroge Washington grew pot, cocaine was a great pick me up for getting through the day in the roaring 20s. Heroin was a cough medicine originally.
Good. The weed will chill them out. Its harmless for the most part and its far better than drinking.

I don't know what to do with this.

I don't see the problem.

That is exactly why secularism is not self correcting. I can't get it right because it does not recognize what is wrong.

Everything from here on got formatted out of existence.

 

[1robin]

So if majority founders of a nation is a specific religion X believer, it then justified the nations law must be preserve to religion X law, if the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the religion law then they must immigrate to other country?

Nope and I did not suggest it did.

However if 95% of a countries founders are of a religion, and those same men say point blank that faith is the grounding behind their ideals then yes. That does not translate to any dictatorial laws about having to abbey any doctrine. It simply grounds moral precepts on a world view.

So we know that we can't possible prove whether there is a God which can provided or grounded the foundation of this nation and it's laws. Then it justified that if the founders(human) claimed there was a God exist as fact for themself, then all non-believer must force to acted on that belief? If the non-believer don't want to force to acted on that belief, then they must immigrate to other country?

God demands faith which precludes proof but God existence is not the issue, whether the founders relied upon Christianity in a foundational manner is. They claimed they did. I need no further evidence.

1. It's George Washington's personal opinion.

It was a founders opinion on how to govern. How the founders governed is the issue. Whether their opinions reflect fact is not the issue.

2. So if John Adams 100% certain the fact that the general principles of nation(American) law on which the fathers(human founder) achieved independence were the general principles(law) of Christianity, so it then justified all other non-believer must be force to follow christianity law? If the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the christianity law then they must immigrate to other country?

The issue is whether they used faith or secularism as a foundation model for this nation. They did. It is not a debate on what can be extrapolated and forced on people by the nature of that foundation. I am not debating what can be built on that foundation but what that foundation is. Your not having the same debate my comments came in.

3. So if John Quincy Adams 100% certain the fact that The Declaration of Independence laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity, so it then justified all other non-believer must be force to follow christianity law? If the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the christianity law then they must immigrate to other country?

That is not the issue under discussion. I do not care what you think you can extrapolate from what they said about their founding principles, the debate is about what their founding principles were. I am not going to speak for Adams, I can only quote him.

4. So if people like Thomas Jefferson who've 100% certain the fact that God must be the creator who gave everyone life and liberty, so it then justified all other non-believer must be force to follow christianity law? If the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the christianity law then they must immigrate to other country?

Repeating an issue not under discussion is not of any use. What our laws are is not the subject, what the founding principles are. This debate is too long and has been heading in one direction far to long to take an of ramp at this point.

They question was what founding principles did our founders apply. I have given them in their words.

Point 1 - 4 is irrelevent to point 5.

What point 5 said is that everyone have their liberty rights to pursuit their own version of happiness, they're not force to follow a religion/secular law that they don't agree with, they also shouldn't force other people to must follow their own religion/secular law.

I do not care to split hairs on what our rights actually are, the point was that even a non-Christian admitted the foundation of all rights is in our creator.

I'm not sure if i've misunderstand your meaning, are you saying that because you think 5000 most influential statesmen in America's history who you think they're the most influential statesmen in America's history to yourself, so it then justified all other non-believer must be force to follow christianity law? If the other non-believer don't want to force to follow the christianity law then they must immigrate to other country?

Are you arguing that giving what Adams, Washington, Lincoln, and Jefferson said about founding principles is not a fair illustration of what our foundation was.


{quote]So you mean people shouldn't force others to follow their faith's law/rule/morality?[/quote] You have a terrible habit or adding to what others say. In this case I do not see how what you said is in any way related to what I did. The issue was did religion have a role in prohibition, I don't know what your talking about.

1. What is the bondage you're refering to here? Is that the bondage of a religion to force every non-believer must follow the religion's morality?

No, it was the bondage of a government forcing everyone to practice a specific religion a certain way.

2. The desperation of bondage by religion to force every non-believer must follow the religion's morality leads to an intense dependence of every non-believer to happily being force to follow the religion's morality? I really don't know what you're talking about.

You have yet to show anyone forced any religion on any one in this case. You merely took comments about founding principles and made up the rest. I in fact claim the founders concluded the opposite. They had to found principles on something and chose Christianity, and our laws reflect that foundation but our laws contain no religious compulsion. The contain the exact opposite.

3. Those who don't agree that "faith produces great courage and moral excellence which throws off the shackles of bondage", don't agree with this claims. And when non-believer are force to follow faith's own version of morality they don't agree with, it's the faith that are bondage the non-believer.

I am not defending religion in general but yes for better or worse the shackles (right or wrong) of religion can be temporarily thrown off. What is the point. I was specifically referring to democracies and especially to the cycle of ours. If you want to apply it to Iran it won't.

4. This produces a nation with great freedom, a nation with great freedom of what? A nation with great freedom for believer to force non-believer to follow their faith's own version of morality the non-believer don't agree with? A nation with zero freedom for non-believer to not follow the believer's faith's own version of morality even if the non-believer don't willing to do so?

Your entire post so far has been founded on something that is not true, is not under discussion and was merely declared into existence. There is no religious compulsion found in our founding, Christ did not enforce his ideals, neither do those that truly follow him. I am not going to follow you down a rabbit hole you invented.

5. When faith force every non-believer to follow its version of morality, i don't see where is the great abundance for non-believer in non-believer's perspective, or are you mean that there're great abundance for the believer who believe that faith in the believer's perspective?

Because the principles of Christianity are freedom. Christ said he came to set captives free, so principles based on his life would also allow freedom, the greatest freedom possible under the rule of law. It is no coincidence the country more free than any other is also more Christian than any other. In fact Christians more than any other have died to set others free. If we had 1 out 50 verses commanding us to subjugate the world by force like the Quran then you would have an argument. There is not one verse in the NT that allows force for any reason.

6. How can abundance only for believer of faith produces a lack of faith to non-believer when believer force non-believer to follow their faith's own version of morality? Does it consider selfish when non-believer don't want to force to follow believer's version of morality?

I am going to respond to any comment that is founded upon your false notion of religious compulsion by simply saying false foundation and moving on from here on in.

7. Behavior of believer of faith that want to force every non-believer to follow their standard of morality produces selfishness, this selfishness produces complacency.

False foundation.

8. Complacency of some believer of faith produces apathy and then force every non-believer to follow their own version of morality (this is the stage we are at now).

I thought I caught a break but you ended up with a false foundation.

9. Apathy from non-believer produces dependence to simply follow government's law(which try to give them the freedom whether they want to follow a religion's morality or not), rather than contribute to voice their opinion to government to enforce a law they don't agree with that every non-believer must be force to follow religion's morality? I really don't know what you're talking about.

If your highest moral authority is a government then the former USSR is your secular utopia and your welcome to it.

10. I really don't know what you're talking about.

Then why did you respond to 1-9 as if you did. BTW it was not what I said. I gave the source and his qualifications and so far we have met every step in his process but the last.

I really don't know what you're talking about.

I know.


[/quote]Where is the prove?[/quote] Are you actually denying that most of the legal codes of history are theologically based? Not even the person I said that to denied that. he simply said they were wrong.

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence about why morality has been associated with God's from the beginning as you would not accept it anyway" ?

What? I said what I was going to say. That the majority of moral principles have been founded on theology.

Where is the prove?

What are you wanting proof of? I can hardly believe your challenging the theological roots of traditional moral principles. Secular folks usually complain of what your denying existed.

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence about why morality has been associated with false God's from the beginning as you would not accept it anyway" ?

Are you somehow copying your own previous statements?

Morality has been associated with false God's? Which God is false God, which God is truth God?

It was not whether the gods exist or not it was whether they were used as the foundations or not. So far not one comment you made had anything to do with the context of what the debate was. You want to have a debate about whether and which God exists fine but this isn't it.

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence about which God is truth God as you would not accept it anyway" ?

How many times are you going to respond to what someone actually said with a false parody of it? I said what I meant to.

Where is your prove that your religion's accepted standard of ultimate moral foundation is really the ultimate morality?

I did not argue that our founders got it right, I merely showed where they claimed to have gotten it. You want to debate whether Crhistianity is true or not I am your guy but this debate was whether it was used or not.

Where is your prove that secularism's accepted standard of morality is the worst possilbe moral foundation even in theory?

Because no natural entity contains a moral property. No atom in the universe has a moral component. Objective morality can only come from something that transcends the natural but that is the very thing secularism denies. It denies the one possible source for ultimate moral values and duties and therefore cannot get any worse.

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence that which one of the accepted standard of morality is the ultimate morality as you would not accept it anyway" ?

I said what I meant.

Yes it's very irrational of non-believer for not wanting to force to follow religion's morality because they don't agree with it.

False foundation.

Even children know this, when told to follow a moral the first thing they say is "Oh yeah, i don't understand the meaning of this moral, is this moral a good moral? why?", not "Oh yeah, i don't understand the meaning of this moral, but i'll not ask why and simply follow it. Who says this moral is a good moral, then it must be the good moral, i've no doubt about it."

Yes Children and men of faith know morality must have an ultimate transcendent source. Good and evil require a moral law by which to distinguish them, a moral law requires a moral law giver, yet this is what secularism denies not what they affirm.

Even a rational adult know this, when told about a moral is good moral the first thing they say is "Oh yeah, i don't understand the meaning of this moral, is this moral a good moral? why?", not "Oh yeah, i don't understand the meaning of this moral, but i'll not ask why and simply follow it. Who says this moral is a good moral, then it must be the good moral, i've no doubt about it."

No, a secular adult says there is no transcendent moral source so lets look at what has no moral properties what so ever and is at best an immoral blind process and guess at what morality is and bind everyone by it. That is if your lucky, many of the "brightest atheists and secularists" rightly admit that without God there is no moral duties and values but merely societal conventions that are a illusory byproduct of biology.

Where is your prove that your religion's God is really the ultimate authority and judge for objective morality for all human?

Your repeating your self again.

Or are you going to say "I will spare you all the theology evidence that why my religion's God is really the ultimate authority and judge for objective morality for all human as you would not accept it anyway" ?

and again.

Non-believer can say why you shouldn't force them to follow your religion's accepted standard of morality, but they cannot show you've any actually duty to not forcing them to follow your religion's accepted standard of morality? I don't understand you.

Your asking the wrong question. If God exists our moral duties necessarily follow. So the only issue is whether he exists or whether he does not what his existence would entail. Almost no one argues against that.

Since you do not seem to have any argument at all against our foundation being one grounded in Christianity and instead simply think it a bad foundation why don't you instead pick out a theological veracity topic and leave our foundation of it.

 

[1robin]

A: My accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral, it's an universal undeniable unarguably fact.
B: No, mine is better.
C: No, mine is superior than your both.
D: No, mine is the best moral.
E: ......

F: My religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral, it's an universal undeniable unarguably fact.
G: No, my religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral.
H: No, my religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral.
I: No, my religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral,
J: ......

K: Morality is originated from my religion, only my religion's accepted standard of morality is the truth one, all other religion/secular accepted standard of morality is just copycat from my religion. It's an universal undeniable unarguably fact.
L: No, morality is originated from my religion, your religion's morality is copycat from my religion's morality.
M: No, morality is originated from my religion, your religion's morality is copycat from my religion's morality.
N: No, morality is originated from my religion, your religion's morality is copycat from my religion's morality.
O: ......

Where is the prove for why my accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral?

Where is the prove for why my religion's accepted standard of morality is the universal objective moral?

Where is the prove for why all good morality is originated from my religion and all bad inferior morality is originated from false religion/immoral-secular-society?

I should save the explanation to myself as you would not accept it anyway.

Don't ask me why my religion is truth religion and other religion is false religion, because even if i tell you you would not accept it anyway.

All the immoral crime claimed to done by the name of my religion is all made up and an excuses in attempt to accusing my religion. Don't ask me why, because even if i tell you you would not accept it anyway.

Everything you say that is oppose to my claims, is lies.

Everything i say and claims is truth and fact.

Who was this aimed at? If at me I would not make a habit out of saying what I bolded above unless your making a rhetorical comment. I will not long put up with claims of others lying because you have no access to motivation which is required to know something is a lie or not and I do. However maybe your not talking to me or saying what it seems like you are. Lying implies intent and you have no access to my intent. BTW mere declarations make poor arguments however they are meant. Saying I am right and you are wrong is meaningless unless you give good reasons why your right and others wrong.

 

[Elusive Truth]

Quick definitions for the unlearned:

Amoral: lacking a moral sense; unconcerned with the rightness or wrongness of something.

Immoral: not conforming to accepted standards of morality.

Moral: concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character.

When someone claims that he/she is irreligious, does it give them justifications to negate teachings of religious communities. For example, thou not steal. Does it give someone who claims to be irreligious the right to steal?

Also, which of the above words excellently describes the life of an Athiest?

If English speaking Atheists have morals and ethics for that matter, they do not remember where these morals come from.

Ethics on the other hand is provided them via Law.

 

[Bunyip]

If English speaking Atheists have morals and ethics for that matter, they do not remember where these morals come from.

Ethics on the other hand is provided them via Law.

Ethics doesn't need to be provided by anything, ethics is the study of how we can draw a moral landscape from knowledge and reason alone. Ethics need no external source.

 

[Vishvavajra]

If English speaking Atheists have morals and ethics for that matter, they do not remember where these morals come from.

Ethics on the other hand is provided them via Law.

And by their own innate sense of right and wrong, which all people share, and which appears to be largely instinctual, partly socially determined, and largely independent of religion (hence why so many people happily carry on doing things their religion says are wrong). Laws exist to clarify, standardize, and enforce our basic sense of morality, as well as to come up with more sophisticated applications than the ones we developed instinctively.

I do believe religion can have a role in further refining people's moral sense, but religion is not the origin of people's moral sense. If it were, then ironically it would be impossible for people to ever have a moral sense in the first place, since religious teachings need to tap into something that is innate to people in order to modify it. And of course people are perfectly capable of developing moral philosophy in isolation from theism.

Buddhist morality, for example, is basically naturalist and consequentialist, and, despite being religious in nature, does not have anything to do theistic concepts or require any supernatural intervention.

 

[Monk Of Reason]

It involves God, how much bigger authority can you get? Even if you want to try and split hairs and say it is a generic God that is stick far to my side of secularism.

It involves god as a literary device. But if we look at the document itself we could assume they meant a non-denominational god. Perhaps it was allah? Obviously the Christian majority knew that there would be Christian values in the country. That much should be obvious and I haven't argued against that. I do argue that they gave Christianity any sort of power over any other religions. And this has historically been true for the last 150 years. They have always been more or less tolerant of Jews and have been more than accepting of eastern religious beliefs. Not so much with Islam but in the past ten years it has become more accepting of Islam. Christianity has no more power than Islam in the USA in terms of our government.

Well it is not all that important if you agree with them, the issue is what did they themselves believe.

It is an easy task to debate where rights actually originate but the issue at hand is where they thought they did. I love the argument because it is so easy but I will not venture off topic at this time for lengths sake.

It honestly doesn't matter if they believed it was god or Satan who gave them their rights. they believed they had them naturally. This is the point. They never pushed god into or onto anyone in this respect.

Are we to the point of yeah it's Christian but not that Christian? 95% of those involved in these documents were Christians, do you think they meant Allah. If you want to argue they meant a different God then good luck but most entire types of God's would not fit the bill. Only personal God's apply, only those with moral demands apply, pantheism is out, even created God's like Zeus and Apollo don't fit the bill but this is another issue. I think what God they meant is painfully obvious. BTW the author your contending with did not say those ideas were exclusively Christian.

We are not at that point. You seemed to have attempted to say that our republic was created by Christian philosphy. It was not. It was actually Greek. And I showed you that Christianity also was claimed under Monarchies. This bullcrap of "everyone is equal" isn't actually a traditionally held Christian belief. That we are all equal to god? Maybe but on earth this is pretty new.

How in the world do you take "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights" and strip God out and leave any rights in? This seems hyper desperate.

I see it for what it is. Literary. The term "creator" for example doesn't denote god. They may have believed it denoted god but they intentionally did not say god. Creator in this instance is simply a term used to denote that it is inborn.

I did not mention law. Law is a man made institution which they founded on divine principles.

So we can blame god for taxes? Or we can blame god for questionable military action? Or abortion? No no no. The basis for law was pragmatic and intentionally separate from religion. In your argument it was to save religion from government but even if that was 100% true it doesn't matter because that separation is still there. The founders laid it on their own morality for some of the bill of rights but it is not a historically Christian thing to do to offer freedom of religion.

What forced marriages? I gave you a list of about ten points among hundreds showing dreadful moral decline. You said something about forced marriages which was not on the list nor under discussion and I don't even know what your referring to and that you do not consider the destruction of life one day prior to an arbitrary day some politician pulled out of his rear end immoral. Which goes to prove my point? If we have a right to anything it is to live, if you deny that most basic of rights on what do you grant the more advanced rights.

Marriages because of teen pregnancy that no longer happen is one example that is a direct counter to several of your points. The women more or less having to stay with their husbands due to either society or economics is another. The rule of "thumb" for how to best discipline your wife is a great example of why we needed divorce. The fact that marital rape wasn't even a law in any states till the 70s and wasn't a law in all 50 states until 1993.

I base my rights on philosophy if you are curious. But we have had that debate over and over before.

From 1960 to 1990 violent crime rose 560%. F.B.I. There were about 60 (or 600) general crimes per 100,000 people in 1933, it spiked at about 2000 per 100,000 in 1960, then again at about 5950 per 100,000 in 1980 and slightly higher in 1990. It is currently about ten times as high now as 1950.
http://www.jrsa.org/projects/Historical.pdf

Weird how your own article disproves your point. Go back and read it. It actually explains why there was an increase and why crime rates were so "low" in the earlier parts of the century.

Murder rates are down. [/quote] The murder rate in 1950 was 4.5 per 100,000, it spiked to almost twice that in the 60's, it was about 7 per 1000,000 in the last full year of data.
http://www.jrsa.org/projects/Historical.pdf[/quote]
The US Murder Rate Is on Track to Be Lowest in a Century | Mother Jones

The oldest rape stats I can find are from 1973. Apparently that is when some huge spike occurred. Most stats I could find are much more recent. Apparently there are little in the way of accurate rape stats from 1970 and before so I can't check on this one.

That is because rape for the longest time wasn't even considered a major crime. It was more or less damage of property.

A divorce might not be but the increased rate of divorce is not a sign of moral progress but moral regress. I am not arguing against any divorce in particular but divorce is the wrong direction for a society.

And what is your argument that it is the cause of the divorce rate?

So you agree to what my original claim was that the family unit has been being eroded since secularism gained traction n but your argument is that is a good thing. I rest my case.

I stated that marriage isn't a moral thing. Its neither moral or immoral. I don't care that the family unit has been eroded because that isn't a good indicator of morality because the family unit has been historically oppressive and abusive.

I am not picking on any single case but the destruction of the family unit in general is not progress. Countless studies show the negative influence of broken families yet you whistle while Rome burns and point out that a single fire can provide warmth. Almost every psychopath comes from a broken home.

Not for an individual but it is for a society.

I cannot have a moral conversation with someone who does not acknowledge the damage that partial families causes in general.

Then I guess we should stop here. Because that is what I am saying.

I did not say secularism produces cancer. Cancer is a biological process, claiming broken families is good is moral insanity.

I didn't say that either. I stated that our knowledge of diseases increased. That is why we have more diseases than before. Not because of an actual increase in the number of diseases.

I have actually read that in many places but as it is so far out of bounds it does not matter half it, quarter it, heck call it good if you want, it still is causing massive destruction.

Sounds like a propagated lie. So I wouldn't buy into it. If you can find me an offical source that states something like that I can give it some weight but until then I will chalk it up to conservative propaganda and lies

I don't know what to do with this.

Learn I guess.

That is exactly why secularism is not self correcting. I can't get it right because it does not recognize what is wrong.

Everything from here on got formatted out of existence.

I don't believe there is a perfectly "right" way. I think we will continue to evolve and change as a society with the constant attempt to be better with our laws and society. But I don't think there will ever be a point in time where we are "done". Some things can be settled such as the removal of bigotry in general but since there are conflicting views of what is "good" there will never be a perfect society.

 

[Elusive Truth]

And by their own innate sense of right and wrong, which all people share, and which appears to be largely instinctual, partly socially determined, and largely independent of religion (hence why so many people happily carry on doing things their religion says are wrong). Laws exist to clarify, standardize, and enforce our basic sense of morality, as well as to come up with more sophisticated applications than the ones we developed instinctively.

I do believe religion can have a role in further refining people's moral sense, but religion is not the origin of people's moral sense. If it were, then ironically it would be impossible for people to ever have a moral sense in the first place, since religious teachings need to tap into something that is innate to people in order to modify it. And of course people are perfectly capable of developing moral philosophy in isolation from theism.

Buddhist morality, for example, is basically naturalist and consequentialist, and, despite being religious in nature, does not have anything to do theistic concepts or require any supernatural intervention.

I think wisdom is a revelation from the divine/God.

Buddhism is still theistic deism correct?

Than you for your thoughts.

 

[Elusive Truth]

Ethics doesn't need to be provided by anything, ethics is the study of how we can draw a moral landscape from knowledge and reason alone. Ethics need no external source.

In my opinion Atheists have selfishness.

Our society provides morals for us, via Law.

 

[Vishvavajra]

I think wisdom is a revelation from the divine/God.

Buddhism is still theistic deism correct?

Than you for your thoughts.

Buddhism isn't deistic. There's no god in the monotheistic sense of the word, and whatever powerful spiritual beings there might be said to be, they are not the origin of wisdom or morality.

Buddhist morality derives from wisdom, which is seeing reality for what it is and understanding how it works. In that light, there are actions that are useful and ones that are unuseful. This may require people to think more deeply about the consequences of their actions than they're used to, but it does not require that they rely divine revelation, and Buddhist logic, moral and otherwise, is always drawing things back to the level of empirical observation and the inferences that can be drawn from it.

In my opinion Atheists have selfishness.

Our society provides morals for us, via Law.

Atheists are no more selfish than theists. They have actually been found to give more to charity than theists do. Selfishness is one human impulse, but so is compassion, love, fairness, solidarity. It is not true that the basic nature of people is selfish and that non-selfish feelings have to be learned from elsewhere. If that were the case, how would people even have the capacity for non-selfish feelings, if our nature were pure selfishness? Laws do not create empathy or compassion for others. Laws do not make people love each other. Laws do not engender gratitude or generosity. At most they keep people's worst impulses in check, but they do not create good impulses. Those must already be present in order for people to cultivate them.

People who think our fundamental nature is fallen and wicked have a very pessimistic and misanthropic view, and it's not one that accords with the evidence of experience. It's also a hopeless view, since if we're essentially wicked, there's nothing that can be done for us—in that case, if we stopped being wicked, we'd stop being ourselves. Much better to see wickedness as a disease that people can catch, but which can also be cured.

And that's not getting into the fact that people have had moral codes for as long as there have been people, which is a lot longer than there have been monotheistic concepts of God. Morality is a universal human trait. Some people fail at it, but there has never been a time in which people did not have some sense of right and wrong.

 

[Elusive Truth]

Buddhism isn't deistic. There's no god

This is Buddha coming down from out of Heaven...

Should I read the rest of your message if it is based at the onset under false pretext?

*Deism
A religious belief holding that God created the universe

 

[Elusive Truth]

Buddhist morality derives from wisdom.

Wisdom comes from God/Nature/Universe, we are the same...

Thank you for your message, I did read it and have agreements with you.

*though I question the wisdom of a warlord name Muhammad

**forgive my rudeness/defensiveness

 

[Vishvavajra]

This is Buddha coming down from out of Heaven...

Should I read the rest of your message if it is based at the onset under false pretext?

*Deism
A religious belief holding that God created the universe

I believe you're jumping to conclusions based on comparison with other traditions. In many cultures, a scene like that would be associated with the creator of the universe. In Buddhist tradition, the world was not created by heavenly beings. Heavenly and earthly beings are both products of the universe, not the other way around.

The point of this image is to show how the Buddha is honored by all beings, even the ones in heaven, since his teachings will liberate all beings from the vexations that plague them.* Buddhas (there have been an infinite number, not just one) travel to different realms to preach their teachings and help the inhabitants to be enlightened. The goal of most Buddhists is to attain that enlightenment and become Buddhas themselves, and to then use their attainment to help others in the same way.

*Yes, even heavenly gods are not immune to vexations in Buddhist thought. Nor are they immortal, although their lives are so long that they seem to be. In fact it is thought that a human birth is preferable to birth as a celestial being because life in heaven is so blissful that the inhabitants don't bother to practice the Dharma, so when the bliss finally ends they fall into deep despair and often end up in hell.

In any case, being a Buddha is a very different sort of thing from being a god, and overall it's better than being a god. But Buddhas didn't create the universe. And they don't prescribe morality from scratch; they merely have observed which behaviors are useful and which are unuseful and make recommendations based on that.

 

[Vishvavajra]

Wisdom comes from God/Nature/Universe, we are the same...

Thank you for your message, I did read it and have agreements with you.

*though I question the wisdom of a warlord name Muhammad

**forgive my rudeness/defensiveness

No problem.

I also question the wisdom of any warlord. In the Buddhist view, wisdom and compassion are ultimately the same thing: if you truly understand the nature of things, then you will naturally be compassionate towards others, since you will know that you are not ultimately different from them, and that happiness is not a prize you can win by competing with others.

Being violent and killing people draws people away from that realization, so it could be called unwise. In that sense it is also clearly immoral. There may be times when there is no other choice, but people ought at least try to find other ways to solve their problems.