You did not give any reasons why my argument or facts were in error.
I'm not saying the 'facts' are in error. I'm saying they're
unsupported
You are committing the logical fallacy of argument by assertion. Merely claiming my facts are "unsupported" doesn't make your claim true.
You need to pull out a specific fact and then give reasons why it lacks "support", thus proving your assertion to be true that you think my facts lacked some kind of support.
RF is a discussion forum. Dueling scriptures do not good discussion make. One poster claims A,B,and C because his scripture says so, another disagrees because hers says something else, and a third finds disagreement with both in yet a third scripture. Obviously this will go nowhere.
You just made a claim that is unproven and unsupported.
You are making a claim that no one's interpretation of Scripture can not be proven to be factually and logically more right than another person's interpretation - but your claim is unproven. The onus is on you to first establish the truth of your claim before you try to use it as an argument against the conclusions I gave about a given Scripture.
In order to prove your claim, you need to establish with reasons why my use of Scripture was in error or why there are other equally valid ways of reading the same Scripture that would give a contrary conclusion to what I gave.
Given that your premise is unproven, your conclusion is invalid that discussions on Scripture "obviously go nowhere".
I gave you a logic based argument for why you cannot claim something is not wrong for humans just because animals do it, and also why it's wrong to assume anything animals do is automatically right just by virtue of the fact that they are seen to do it.
The point is that the behavior is natural and widespread,
Your point is illogical and doesn't serve as a valid counterpoint to anything I said. Your statement is in error for two reasons:
1. It's basis is a logical fallacy, a variant of "argumentum ad populum":
The popularity of a belief doesn't prove it is true anymore than the popularity of a behavior proves it is morally right.
The most common crime committed around the world is theft, but you wouldn't try to argue it's morally right by virtue of being widespread would you?
2. Calling it "natural" doesn't mean or prove anything in the context of your claim. You'd first have to define what you mean by "natural" and then why you think it being "natural" proves it is right.
Because by common definition of "natural" you could say theft is a "natural" behavior for humans in the sense that it is "ordinary" or "commonplace", but being commonplace doesn't automatically prove it's right.
Furthermore, another definition of natural is simply being "present in nature", and the definition of nature is simply "the material world". Well, saying something is present in nature, the material world, doesn't automatically prove it's moral rightness - because humans are part of the material world and I'm certain that you do not believe everything humans do is morally right. So your beliefs contradict the position you're trying to take.
and that there is no supportable evidence of special deontological rules for humans.
Your statement here falls into the logical fallacy of "Irrelevant Conclusion".
Because whether or not your statement is true does nothing to disproving the argument you are responding to.
To remind you, my argument was: The mere existence of a behavior in animals cannot logically be concluded to mean that behavior is automatically morally right. Furthermore, that to take such a position is contradictory to what you actually believe, because you no doubt do take the position that some things humans do are wrong despite the fact that we observe it in animals.
Your statement doesn't rebut my argument in any way, because the issue of whether or not there exists an overriding set of rules for human behavior doesn't change the fact that your argument was based on a logical fallacy and is contradicted by other positions you take.
Given the fact that animals do many things that almost no one would be willing to agree is ok for humans to do. Unless you're prepared to say murder, theft, etc are all ok for humans to do simply because animals are observed to do it. At that point you'd have to be saying no morally right guidelines exist at all for human behavior because animals have been observed to commit every sin imaginable.
I agree that other animals are in a different moral category, inasmuch as they largely lack the behavioral options or insight into consequences that humans do (I do realize you're not making a consequentialist argument).
The "other animals do it" argument, of course, assumes that humans are part of nature and that a behavior natural to other animals might be assumed to be natural to hominins as well.
"Natural," of course, is not the same as moral. The morality of a human action doesn't necessarily correspond to what's natural. In fact, I'd argue that much of morality rests in our attempts to override our natural drives and instincts.
You just agreed with the entire core of my argument and therefore nullified your objection to it.
Ie; Just because something is seen to exist in nature doesn't automatically prove it's morally right.
Appealing to the popularity of an action in nature to prove it's moral rightness is logically invalid, and inconsistent with what you actually believe is true because you wouldn't try to do that with most other sins we see in nature.
You won't be able to prove they were in error, even if you were to try, because they aren't actually in error. The logic and scriptural fact usage is sound.
"Scriptural facts?" I question the authority and applicability of your scriptures.
You're confusing different issues. You seem to lack clarity about what you're actually objecting to and why.
Questioning my premise that the Bible is an authority for determining Truth is not the same as questioning the logic of my core argument, nor is that the same as questioning the factual conclusions I've made about what the Bible says. I will explain why for you:
You are logically free to challenge my premise that the Bible is a truthful authority on what is right or wrong for humans on the basis that I did not establish the truth of that premise in this post - but you are wrong to think that my argument's validity rests on whether or not the Bible is authoritative. It doesn't.
As I pointed out earlier, the basis of my logical argument does not depend on the Bible being accepted as authoritative in order to be valid.
Purely on a logical basis I've demonstrated already that it is illogical and baseless for someone to think that the mere observance of a behavior in an animal automatically makes that behavior right for a human because such a belief would be contradictory with their existing belief that right or wrong behavior does exist for humans.
Furthermore, challenging the Bible as authoritative also does nothing to disprove the truth of how I correctly applied specific Scriptures to the topic at hand. The two concepts are not linked together. For instance, someone could be give me an accurate representation of what the book of Mormon says, and they wouldn't necessarily be wrong in their claim about what the book says just because I believe we can establish that the book is not actually true. The topic of whether or not the book is actually authoritative as a source of truth would be a separate issue from discussions about whether or not an individual's factual statements concerning what the book says is true or not. The opposite could also be said: It's possible for the Bible to be true but for individuals to make untrue statements about what the Bible says. The two concepts are not necessarily linked.
The fact is, my logical argument against your premise doesn't even depend on referring to Scripture, so the authority of Scripture isn't even an issue that's relevant to the core of my argument.
So by challenging my premise that the Bible is authoritative as Truth you are neither refuting my logical arguments nor the facts of what Scripture says.
Given that, there's no need to even get into a debate yet about the authority of Scripture because the core of my argument doesn't depend on it. I will freely admit I operate from the premise that the Bible is authoritative truth, and am willing to argue in favor of that in other contexts, but in this context it doesn't appear to be necessary to do so - unless you want to admit that my logic was sound and my use of Scripture was correct, but then you want to move on to debating a separate topic of whether or not the Bible can be an authoritative source for moral truth. But if you're still stuck trying to challenge the logic of my argument, that doesn't even rest on Biblical authority to make, then there's not yet any reason to get into a debate over Biblical authority because it's not necessary to the point you're currently trying to challenge.
Logic? Where does this apply?
It seems to me you don't understand what a formal logical argument's structure looks like - which is why you have trouble responding to my logical argument because you don't know how to spot it for what it is, let alone the proper way one needs to respond in order to refute a logical argument.
I will break down my logical argument into it's basic components so it will be easy for you to recognize it for what it is, and therefore give you a chance to attempt to refute it with arguments of your own.
Logic is a process whereby premises are combined together in a logical structure to support or prove a conclusion.
This is an example of a logic based argument:
"Appealing to the popularity of an action in nature to prove it's moral rightness is logically invalid, and inconsistent with what you actually believe is true, because you wouldn't try to do that with most other sins we see in nature."
It has several premises that support a conclusion. If you want to challenge the conclusion you can try to demonstrate why the premises are factually wrong or why the premises are connected together in a illogical way that makes it an invalid argument.
1. Premise: Appeal to popularity is illogical and cannot be used to determine truth.
2. Premise: We see animals commit sins in nature.
3. Premise: You believe right and wrong exists for human behavior.
4. Premise: We see animals commit the wrong behavior you wouldn't accept for humans.
5. Conclusion: Not only is your argument logically invalid to start with, but the position you are trying to take contradicts the position you already hold to.
Now with that outlined clearly you should be able to take a stab at trying to disprove the logic or facts I used to reach that conclusion.
