Subject:
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Re: Arguing about nature, Nature, and ethics
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Mon, 18 Dec 2000 23:24:53 GMT
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Viewed:
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319 times
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Before leaping in to this part of the discussion, Steve, let me see if I
have understood your point correctly:
"Homosexual sex cannot naturally result in progeny, therefore it is
immoral."
Is that a correct restatement of your argument? If not, can you restate it
yourself in one sentence?
Steve Thomas wrote in answer to Larry ...
> I don't think there is any confusion about the biological facts that I
> addressed. You've acknowledged that there is an inherent difference (apart
> from any tampering we might imagine) between heterosexual intercourse and
> homosexual acts. One question I might ask is, with this obvious difference
> in human nature, why does your understanding of morality go unaffected by
> this difference?
My question is, why *should* it be affected? Why draw a *moral* conclusion
from *this* biological fact, when many moral conclusions have no biological
facts behind them (eg the morality of taking a bribe) and many biological
facts have no moral conclusions drawn from them (eg the fact that women
become infertile beyond a certain age, and men are fertile for decades
longer).
> But this leap bites both ways: How does one with atheist tendencies • overcome
> this problem _in general_, as it applies to the entire project of objective
> morality? How does one move from the naturalistic world, as it is, to the
> world of oughts so often unrealized? What duty can atoms have to be in
> position X rather than Y?
You seem to be assuming that an atheists moral view must derive from the
naturalistic world, Steve. Why? It seems to me that morality is a human
invention, and not part of the naturalistic world outside humanity at all,
therefore it cannot be derived from it.
Kevin
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: Arguing about nature, Nature, and ethics
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| (...) Steve can speak for himself but I think he's responding to me. I've said that I had in the past foundered on trying to derive a justification for natural rights from reasoning about how animals do things and about what evolution has crafted. I (...) (24 years ago, 19-Dec-00, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
| | | Re: Arguing about nature, Nature, and ethics
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| In response to "Kevin Wilson" <kwilson_tccs@compuserve.com> in message news:G5sE42.BEG@lugnet.com... Kevin, (...) I appreciate your effort at understanding my position. That's a tall order. I'll try to be as clear as possible, but to do that I'll (...) (24 years ago, 19-Dec-00, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Arguing about nature, Nature, and ethics
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| In response to "Larry Pieniazek" <lpieniazek@mercator.com> in message news:G5qotE.M0q@lugnet.com... Larry, I appreciate the interaction you've provided. Before going any further, I'm glad that you're not a relativist (which means, in turn, that you (...) (24 years ago, 18-Dec-00, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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