"Baseball is 90% mental, the other half is physical." - Yogi Berra

***

A plea for assistance

I have a burning question (well, two) that I am unable to solve satisfactorily:

For those who do not believe in a theistic system of morality, how does morality for them (if any) originate? I am currently in an intermittent debate on Young Republic about whether the moral systems (as it were) of many Liberals, which is based on the harm principle, is in any way a more objective form of morality than those grounded on theistic principles.

Secondly: If, once again, one does not have a theistic framework for morality and rights, is there any basis for saying that humans have an intrinsic right to free speech, freedom of worship and generally "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness"?

***

OUR UNSTABLE LAN
An original ditty by Patrick Kingsley
(To the tune of "Winter Wonderland")

Phone bells ring,
Are you listening?
In IT,
Neck hair's bristling,
A server just died,
We'll be working through the night,
Trying to keep up our unstable LAN.

Print server spazzed,
It's horrific,
A million pages,
of hieroglyphics,
A proposal's due at 8,
Looks like we'll be working late,
Trying to keep up our unstable LAN.

User downloads pornos on the internet,
Gets a virus, brings our servers down,
We'll ask if he's the culprit, he'll say, "No, man!,
So you guys must have broke it; fix it now!".

Error logs,
Looking dire,
Our mail server,
Just caught fire,
Got paged at 1 a.m.,
Time to head back in again,
Trying to keep up our unstable LAN.

User emails 10-meg file attachments,
Our network quickly slows down to a crawl,
Four thousand users working for our company,
And she sent "dancing babies" to them all,

When it snows,
We're all chilling,
All IT's,
Gone snowmobiling,
The backbone's gone away,
LET THEM USE PAPER AND PEN TODAY!,
"To Hell," we say, "with our unstable LAN!"

Repeat to fade:
"To Hell," we say, "with our unstable LAN!"
"To Hell," we say, "with our unstable LAN!"....

***

First they came for the Muslims, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Muslim.

Then they came for the immigrants, detaining them indefinitely solely on the certification of the attorney general, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't an immigrant.

Then they came to eavesdrop on suspects consulting with their attorneys, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a suspect.

Then they came to prosecute noncitizens before secret military commissions, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a noncitizen.

Then they came to enter homes and offices for unannounced "sneak and peak" searches, and I didn't speak up because I had nothing to hide.

Then they came to reinstate Cointelpro and resume the infiltration and surveillance of domestic religious and political groups, and I didn't speak up because I no longer participated in any groups.

Then they came to arrest American citizens and hold them indefinitely without any charges and without access to lawyers, and I didn't speak up because I would never be arrested.

Then they came to institute TIPS (Terrorism Information and Prevention System) recruiting citizens to spy on other citizens and I didn't speak up because I was afraid.

Then they came for anyone who objected to government policy because it only aided the terrorists and gave ammunition to America's enemies, and I didn't speak up ... because I didn't speak up.

Then they came for me, and by that time, no one was left to speak up.

- Stephen Rohde

***

I'm quite disappointed that people are actually resorting to evangelising on Young Republic. Sigh.

Anyhow, another rebuttal of our favourite conservative intellectual:


> 1. The basic logical fallacy you guys are making is that simply because I
> appeal to absolute morality, that must be equated with the morality of the
> past, i.e. torture, slavery and all those multifarious crimes of illiberal
> Christendom. But firstly, why should Christianity be taking all the flak?

Christianity is taking the flak, my dear, because we are critically evaluating Christianity now.

> Related to this fallacy is the absurd notion that Christianity equals the
> established Catholic Church. I would have been hunted down by that same
> Establishment as a Lollard or Huguenot during the times of which you speak,
> so I hardly feel obliged to defend its numerous errors. So far nobody has
> produced proof that true Christianity (read: the Bible) advocates anywhere
> the nefarious evils of torture, domestic abuse of women, slavery, or that
> the world is flat. I anticipate some feeble attempts to challenge this
> statement - go ahead and do your worst. I'll be ready =).

So the notion is absurd. What then would true Christianity equal? It is also rather feeble to dismiss whatever wrongdoings Christians have done in the name of Christ as not 'true Christianity'. Of course, since you already presume true Christianity to be perfect, which in definition it is, your conclusion is a given and of course our attempts to challenge the statement will be feeble. I contend that what is done in the name of Christianity must be answerable to it. The Bible may not have advocated the 'nefarious evils of torture, domestic abuse of women, slavery, or that the world is flat'. (By the way, your attempt at humour once again undermines your seriousness. It is very likely that one would misinterpret your ironic hyperbole as a belittling of torture and slavery and the domestic abuse of women.) But the fact is that people, who might have meant well, have used the Bible as justification for this. And the fact that you claim that all this isn't 'true Christianity' doesn't seem to my mind convincing. You could say that of anything and win any argument.

> On the contrary, I read in the Bible that husbands should love their wives,
> we should turn the other cheek, go the extra mile and love our enemies.
> Also that masters should treat their servants with fairness and justice,
> bearing in mind that God is their master. And that Christ underwent torture
> without retaliation. If anyone is to blame for the historical examples
> cited thus far, it is the Catholic Church and not Christianity. It goes
> without saying that when I say "Christians" are responsible for leading the
> charge against these abuses, I am NOT referring to the Churchmen who
> behaved in complete contradiction to the teachings of the Bible they
> claimed to believe. After all, Christ Himself defined His disciples as
> those who heard and obeyed His words. You don't have to rely on subjective
> visions and voices in your head when the injunctions are staring in your
> face from the page, neh?

I find your direct and literal interpretation of the Bible disturbing. Just out of curiosity, do you also believe that women are responsible for Original Sin? And by the way I also read in the Bible that women must cover their head in church, that homosexuality is wrong, that everyone must be a Christian or perish in hell, that all other beliefs are false.

So blame the Catholic Church, it's all their fault. Because Protestantism has no blood on its hands. The witch hunts were all fiction. But then again such actions are totally not of 'true Christianity', whatever that might be, neh?

[...]

>And the founders of the modern scientific
> method were Christians such as Francis Bacon who believed that scientific
> laws were a reality because of the existence of a divine lawgiver (as
> opposed to the illusionary world of the Eastern mystics). And until the
> advent of Christianity, women were given the same legal status as cows,
> furniture and other property in the law courts of ancient Greece and Rome.
> As were slaves, but one only has to read Philemon and Colossians 3 to see
> how Christianity changed their status. The true origins of the exclusion of
> women from secular politics must be sought in the constitution-drafters of
> Athens and the other Greek city-states, who needless to say were not
> Christian.

Well of course using your 'true Christian' argument one could argue that since those who committed atrocities weren't 'true Christians', then neither can illuminaries such as Bacon be considered 'truly Christian' (after all, he was by his own admission guilty of bribery), and thus you can't seize his contributions to science in the name of Christianity. Your argument goes like this: whatever bad deeds that Christians do in the name of God I will dismiss as not 'true Christian', whatever good things accomplished by people in any way associated with Christian belief I will claim as the work of Christianity.

And, surprisingly, as a reading of Foucault's History of Sexuality will reveal, Greece and Rome had surprisingly liberal system protecting women: even within marriage, we find that men could not pressure their wives into having sex. Mutual respect was rather important. And yeah, Christianity changed the status of slaves. So that's why slavery in Christian America persisted into the 19th century.

[...]

Here is your paragraph again, in its original splendour:

> Me, I say simple: you really want to stop the problem that you claim is so
> serious, let's do it in utilitarian fashion with CBAs and all that jazz.
> Start with a compulsory yearly blood test (or however often you want,
> depending on the seriousness of the problem), identify all the problem
> cases and offer treatment. Do the same for people coming into the country,
> and make it an offence for them to engage in intercourse until the results
> come out (it takes only 3-4 days, surely you can abstain that long). Tada,
> problem solved. Then whoever wants to have sex with person A can ask
> him/her for proof of AIDS status. If you don't want to ask or want to go
> ahead with a positive status, it's at your own risk, but we will still
> offer treatment thereafter. It's expensive, yes, but eventually the AIDS
> problem will become even more expensive. If the AIDS problem becomes too
> expensive, we can turn to more drastic measures like making everyone carry
> their AIDS status on their ICs, or laser-tattoing it on their necks, or as
> a last resort criminalising sexual intercourse for infected persons. That's
> the amoral, utilitarian approach for you.

[...]

As someone who doesn't have the backing of the one true God behind me, who certainly isn't as assured of salvation, I don't have all the answers. That's why I ask questions.


My shorter follow-up

***

Commissary to the Gentiles by Marcus Eli Ravage [biographer of the Rothschilds] from The Century Magazine, February 1928

"You call us subverters, agitators, revolution-mongers. It is the truth, and I cower at your discovery. It could be shown with only the slightest straining and juggling of the facts that we have been at the bottom of all the major revolutions in your history. We undoubtedly had a sizeable finger in the Lutheran Rebellion, and it is simply a fact that we were the prime movers in the bourgeois democratic revolutions of the century before the last, both in France and America. If we were not, we did not know our own interests. But do you point your accusing finger at us and charge us with these heinous and recorded crimes? Not at all? You fantastically lay at our door the recent great War and the upheaval in Russia, which have done not only the most injury to the Jews themselves but which a school-boy could have foreseen would have that result.

But even these plots and revolutions are as nothing compared with the great conspiracy which we engineered at the beginning of this era and which was destined to make the creed of a Jewish sect the religion of the Western world... when you talk about Jewish conspiracies I cannot for the world understand why you do not mention the destruction of Rome and the whole civilization of antiquity concentrated under her banners, at the hands of Jewish Christianity.

... Perhaps the bitterest foe of the sectaries was one Saul, a maker of tents. A native of Tarsus and thus a man of some education in Greek culture, he despised the new teachings for their unworldliness and their remoteness from life. A patriotic Jew, he dreaded their effect on the national cause. A travelled man, versed in several languages, he was ideally suited for the task of going about among the scattered Jewish communities to counteract the spread of their socialistic pacifistic doctrines. The leaders in Jerusalem appointed him chief persecutor to the Ebionim.

He was on his way to Damascus one day to arrest a group of the sectaries when a novel idea came to him. In the quaint phrase of the book of Acts he saw a vision. He saw as a matter of fact, two. He perceived, to begin with, how utterly hopeless were the chances of little Judea winning out in an armed conflict against the greatest military power in the world. Second, and more important, it came to him that the vagabond creed which he had been repressing might be forged into an irresistible weapon against the formidable foe. Pacifism, non-resistance, resignation, love, were dangerous teachings at home. Spread among the enemy's legions, they might brake down their discipline and thus yet bring victory to Jerusalem. Saul, in a word, was probably the first man to see the possibilities of conducting war by propaganda."

***

"Leonard said: "It is my conviction that the God people make for themselves reflects what kind of person they are." Truer words were never spoken. Couple this with the fact that scripture can be contorted or selectively read so that it supports a *vast* array of different beliefs, and the fact that there are literally hundreds of denominations, each espousing their own peculiar interpretation, and what you have is basically a giant Rorschach test: the religion (god) you want is the religion (god) you see. (At least to a first approximation. Of course, peer pressure and the like certainly do exert influence too.) I have relatives who are devout Christians who disagree on very fundamental points of doctrine; each thinks the other is in danger of going to Hell. They have the same book open in front of them and can read the same words in unison. Yet they reach completely different conclusions; conclusions, I might add, that just happen to match their predispositions. To an outsider (i.e. non-believer), it's very revealing." (link)

Very revealing indeed.


On the cosmological argument:

Ramona said: "But if there ever was a time when nothing at all existed, then there would be absolutely nothing today. It is an axiomatic truth that if nothing exists, then 'nothing' will be the case - always, for nothing simply remains nothing - forever!..."

This is a common "axiom" that apologists often invoke, along with "every effect has a cause". So, where do these "axioms" come from, Ramona? Are they just common sense? Are they empirical? Are they hard scientific facts? Well, you may want to sit down for this one. According to modern physics, they are both FALSE. That's right, they are flat out false. Both are falsified by "vacuum fluctuations," an effect that is predicted by quantum mechanics and is observable in the laboratory. Vacuum fluctuations are the spontaneous creation of particle anti-particle pairs out of NOTHING. Absolutely NOTHING. Vacuum. Indeed, according to modern physics, there can be no true vacuum, because nature immediately introduces a "foam" of particles that spontaneously pop into existence, then (usually) self-annihilate. Before you throw up your hands and say I'm crazy, or that scientists are crazy, do a little research. Also, ask yourself what your "axioms" are based on. My guess is that they are rooted in nothing more than naive intuition, which is heavily based on every-day observation. Because you have never seen anything "pop into existence" you assume that it is impossible. Well, nature reveals some very strange things when studied under conditions that are not normally experienced by people: i.e. very high speed (i.e. relativistic), very small or very large scales, very high temperature, etc. In almost all cases what is observed in counter-intuitive. Our intuitions are honed for terrestrial living, so they end up being dead wrong under extreme conditions.

Ramona: "The very fact that scientists attempt to assign an "age" to the universe is revealing within itself."

That is the time since the Big Bang. Cosmologists have a fairly clear picture of what must have taken place back until about the first millionth of a second (actually, more like 10^-30 of a second) after the Big Bang, but have thus far been unable to get a clear picture before that. Many cosmologists (such as Stephen Hawking) have struggled with the "singularity" that exists at time zero. There is no clear consensus yet (to my knowledge) except on this point: naive intuition is absolutely useless when contemplating such things. In your imagination you probably picture the Big Bang suddenly happening at some point in time, then expanding into empty space. Well, if that is so, then you are already completely off base, lead astray by "common sense" and intuition. If you want to have a serious discussion of these matters, start by reading about some of the recent theories cosmologists are contemplating (such as bubble universes) and read at least a lay introduction to quantum mechanics. You will forever cast off the type of argument that you have offered here.


Ramona: "If you get on a plane you have faith it will not crash. You cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that it will not crash, therefore, you have faith that it won't."

I'm sorry Ramona, but I have to call a spade a spade. That is complete bullshit. (Maybe I'm just getting tired.) When I get on a plane, I do so because I have ***confidence*** that it was designed and maintained well. That confidence is based on many things. It is based on an understanding of science and engineering, and it is based on a rough assessment of statistics (i.e. relative number of plane crashes to auto crashes, how many plane crashes in this type of plane, at this airport, etc.). Finally, when I get on a plane I ***know*** there is a chance that it may crash, just as I know that every trip I take in my car may end in a crash. But I deem the level of risk to be acceptable, just as you do when you get on a plane or into a car. (I honestly cannot fathom why so many religionists want to paint everybody with the "faith" brush!!! It never works, and all it does is to make "faith" look sillier. Someone, please explain it to me.)

Hahahahahaha

***

The following 2 articles were sent to me by the same person:

Nazism - Its Brahmanic Origin [ Nazism has clear Links to Brahmanic India. Apartheid, the Swastika and Fascism are all Vedic concepts adopted by the German Nazis ] - I don't know how anyone can read this without flinching or laughing. Random, disparate facts are thrown at the reader and no attempt is made to make a case of any kind, and they try to pull a quod erat demonstrandum (aka QED) on you. Wth?!

Meanwhile, we have the almost as illogical but at least slightly amusing Brahmins do not have the right to call themselves Indians by a "Dr Kancha Ilaiah". What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.

***

Debate upsets some in audience - "Singaporeans rely too much on the Government for social welfare provision"

Ooh, sneaky; the person who formulated the motion is begging the question. Having a debate on this motion is like debating the motion "Why is the Earth flat?"

People's comments:

"I came from schools where the debate teams were top notch, and I gotta say, I often find debating a rather pompous affair - using big words to impress and confuse, rather than being concise and getting straight to the point."

"I think a debate's a poor format for it, mainly because what these people know about a debate is really "Who wins?" rather than expressing opinions that you care about, and then backing them up with facts and arguments rather than throwing insults."

"I think the prob with most debates I've seen is that if it goes wrong, it ends up being a fight over semantics, definitions, fact-checking etc etc. And that it's cleary a platform for being [too?] partisan - you'd only consider the Opposition/Propositon's views with the aim of crushing them."


I'm not surprised, really. Debates don't aim to advance the cause of mankind or human knowledge; they are mere vehicles for rhetorical steamrolling :)