Posts by Naddia_the

33

Moral Rigidity vs Ethical Rigidity

by sabastious in

recently i have been pondering about the witnesses self proclaimed "moral superiority" to the outside world.

how can one person's chosen moral be superior to another person's chosen moral?

to quantify the difference betwen morals is to test their percieved benefits, and detriments, in the societies that accept them.

Naddia_the_Godless

Sab said: Which actually would make the staements "There is a God' and "There is no God" bothtrue because all human conclusions that are evidenced must be considered true to the individuals that actually believe them, correct?

Yes, from the perspective of subjectivism this would be true, but I think this position is problematic. First of all, to state that human perception is reality is an affirmative claim. How do you know that individual perception is reality? This is an epistemological question. What is reality? How do you know that the physical universe isn’t the reality, and that we are merely spectators within it?

Protagoras is credited with introducing the concept of subjectivism as a philosophical position. Many centuries later, Rene’ Descartes developed a system of skepticism, which he applied to the physical world. I don’t recall his exact process, but it went something like this: How do I know that this table is real? Maybe I’m imagining it. How do I know that Mathematics exists? Maybe a demon is tricking me. Surely my body is real. Or am I dreaming?

I doubt. Doubt is always there. He could think of other possibilities for the physical, but not for his mind. His thoughts were always there. And hence his famous phrase: I think; therefore I am. He existed because his mind existed, and that’s all he could know.

George Berkeley took this skepticism about the physical world even further. I see an object in front of me. What is it? It’s long, hard, and rectangular. We call it a table, but what is a table? Strip down what we think we know and deal with what we perceive. How could it be described? Hard, brown, firm, smooth. What we perceive is sense data. Colors, sounds, tastes, smells, textures. We put these together in our minds to create a concept that we call a “table.” And we assign it a function. It’s a “table” and not a “desk” because we put food on it at dinner time instead of a computer. But function is cultural. Have you ever seen Little Mermaid, where Ariel finds a bent fork from the human world and thinks it’s a comb for her hair? The only things we know are what we perceive, and what we perceive is sense data. This is known as Idealism, and it’s a strong relativist position.

As I mentioned in the last post, it’s a very good argument to challenge objectivist claims, but it has its own problems. Just because this is our first experience, it doesn’t follow that it is reality, at least in any absolute sense. Also, if it’s true that each person’s experiences and beliefs are just as true as the next, then there is no consistency in reality. If your perceptions lead you to believe that there is no god and another person’s views lead them to believe that there is a god, then there both is a god and isn’t a god in reality. That’s contradictory, and it’s illogical.

Idealism led to a branch of philosophy known as phenomenology. Phenomenology deals with phenomena, not with absolute reality. It goes something like this: We each have minds and subjective experiences that prevent us from connecting with ultimate reality, whatever that may be, but our minds are also structured in such a way that we can connect with objects outside our minds through sense data. Phenomenology throws out the whole concept of ultimate reality because it’s something that lies beyond our ability to know, so it’s irrelevant. Instead, it brings a relative reality down to an experiential level.

Yes you have your mind, your thoughts, your sense, your perceptions, but you did not acquire them alone. You only become who you are by interacting with and in relation to objects outside of your mind. Take an infant, hypothetically, and imagine it born without sight, hearing, smell, or taste. It is kept alive, but never held or nurtured. Would that infant ever be capable of the conversation we’re having?

We think in terms of language, a skill that most humans possess, but it’s not a priori knowledge. It’s experienced. It’s learned. We learn what “hard,” “soft,” “brown,” “sweet” mean through interactions with outside objects, including parents. The self exists first, but who we become and how we think about things, our perceptions, are strongly influenced by our experiences. This led Martin Heidegger to flip Descartes on his head with his phrase: I am; therefore, I think.

In phenomenology, the dialectic between mind and object creates the reality. Reality, therefore, is both subject to experience and determines experience. This is a relativist position, but it’s more defensible than subjectivism because it takes any claims of an absolute nature out of the equation, and brings them all down into the realm of human experience.

This view allows for some objectivity as well. Science, for example, is a method that many people can use to establish ideas about how our perceivable world works. It never gets us to reality (or if it does we can’t know that it does), but it helps us make sense of shared perceptions.

According to this view, if you ask: Is each person’s belief or nonbelief in a god true? It depends on how you’re defining truth. If both are attempting to use an objective method like science, no, they can’t both be right. That violates the laws of logic. However, logic, reason, and science are all subject to the experiential dialectic, as are subjective experience and personal revelation. So if a person claims to believe in a god because they have personally experienced god, how could anyone claim otherwise? It’s not that both are true in an absolute sense, but they may be experientially. If I look down and see spiders crawling all over my body, and you at me like I’m crazy. There are no spiders. Which of us is right? My experience is as valid as yours. But that’s all it means. Maybe there are spiders; maybe there are not. Nobody can escape their experiential existence to get to a place of meta logic to make good their claims to the contrary.

So from that standpoint, I would say that a person who claims to believe in god, as long as they don’t try to prove it with science, could be right. Although it’s also possible they could be wrong, if they later believe they misinterpreted certain experiences that caused them to believe in a god, and now they no longer do. But in any instance, "god" too is subject to human experience.

Nad

33

Moral Rigidity vs Ethical Rigidity

by sabastious in

recently i have been pondering about the witnesses self proclaimed "moral superiority" to the outside world.

how can one person's chosen moral be superior to another person's chosen moral?

to quantify the difference betwen morals is to test their percieved benefits, and detriments, in the societies that accept them.

Naddia_the_Godless

Sab said: Couldn't a case be made that beauty, and as other Forms, is only a definition that didn't exist before the definers came to be?

Yes! Protagoras provided a counter argument to Plato's objectivist view that the Universe is the reality, or that reality is unaffacted by human influence. For him, man (humans) is the measure of all things. Our perceptions are our reality. How do we know what lies beyond them?

Modern philosophy parted ways with strong objectivist views like Plato's centuries ago with Descartes and Kant, and metaphysics is often relegated to arguments among theologians. Most modern philosophers either take a softer objectivist view (materialism, empiricism) or a softer relativist view (phenomenology, existentialism). Strong objectivist positions like Natural Law have mostly gone the way of the dinosaur, in the world of philosophy, that is. It's still very much present in religion. Strong relativist positions like Berkeley's Idealism and pure subjectivism are used largely to challenge objectivist claims, but can't stand on their own either.

Nad

33

Moral Rigidity vs Ethical Rigidity

by sabastious in

recently i have been pondering about the witnesses self proclaimed "moral superiority" to the outside world.

how can one person's chosen moral be superior to another person's chosen moral?

to quantify the difference betwen morals is to test their percieved benefits, and detriments, in the societies that accept them.

Naddia_the_Godless

Sabastious said: So what Plato was referring to was the existence of Natural(absolute) Law, correct?

Plato believed in the reality of the Universe. We as humans are not able to fully see or grasp this nature because we are limited by our subjective perceptions, but the reality is out there. Through the Forms, knowledge filters down to us, so by the time it reaches us we have only an abstraction of that reality.

Beauty, for example, exists in an absolute sense, a Form. Beauty is real. It’s here whether you’re here to observe it or not. What you experience as beauty is an abstraction. How closely your concept of beauty relates to the true Form of beauty determines whether or not your perception is correct, but ultimately it’s something you cannot know entirely.

The same is true of Justice. There is an absolute Form of Justice. We may not always know what is best, but the closer we get to “real” justice, the better we will fair. It’s a metaphysical approach to ethics, but it doesn’t invoke a god. In Plato’s vision, philosophers, not religious leaders, would best be able to determine what laws would align with the Forms. It’s also interesting to note that the ancient Greeks did not view same sex relationships as immoral.

Aristotle took a more physical approach to natural law. He didn’t believe in Plato’s Forms, but he did believe in essences of forms. The physical universe is made up of physical forms, and those forms each have their own essence. Its essence is its reality, its true nature. Therefore, the closer you can get to understanding the essence of any given thing, the more you can align yourself with nature.

Centuries later, Paul’s writings in the New Testament indicate that he may have been familiar with natural law and Greek philosophy. He makes reference to “unnatural” acts, or leaving behind one’s nature. Something to that effect.

You said: Then Aquinas immediately blows the concept when referring to homosexuality as an "unnatual act." He was very wrong so his forumla was obviously flawed or he didn't uphold it. Since the misstep was made on the topic of homosexuality I would guess that he made the ancient mistake of taking his own ideas and attributed them to God. Which is a mistake we all make including me.

Well, Aquinas came along over 1000 years after Christianity began, but he was a hugely influential theologian. He was a Christian, but he also strongly respected Aristotle’s view of natural law. Plato and Aristotle lived in a society that embraced same sex relationships, but Christianity did not. Aquinas fused many of Aristotle’s views with Saint Paul’s views to arrive at his own argument for natural law. It upheld the Christian view that sex outside of marriage, including homosexuality, was unnatural, and therefore wrong, but he brought in Aristotle’s philosophical framework of natural law, with essence in forms, to back up why homosexuality is unnatural. For Christianity, it’s unnatural if god says it’s unnatural, but by using Aristotle’s essences, he can also argue that it violates the natural essence of the form.

A man and a woman are opposites by nature. The man is superior in almost every way, a woman inferior. Nature dictates that a man would never want to put himself into a “female” position. Blah, blah, blah. You know the arguments. The point is, by drawing from Aristotle, Aquinas was able to bolster his Christian position on morality, because each system is a natural law ontology.

You said: What is discouraging is that I still see so many people displaying an infinitely more tolerant attitude towards ciggerettes (smoke breaks for instance) than they will about a substance that is illegal and it is those people that position themselves as tiresome obstacles to a better, more ethical, approach to government.

Well, the debate over legalization of drugs and banning cigarettes, at least in public places, has been going on for years. I’m wondering, what alternative do you suggest?

It seems to me that laws must exist for the safety and well-being of society. A society without order is anarchy. By subjecting yourself to the laws of your country you do give up some personal freedom, but you also gain a lot of benefit and other freedoms. Those laws are not absolute though. In a democratic society, laws can be changed. If you want to see particular laws change, you can join movements to change them. It often takes years, but often it pays off.

Take homosexuality for example. I was a kid in the 80’s when gays stayed in the closet unless they wanted to become a punch line, or a headline. It was perfectly acceptable to make homophobic slurs in public, and the most sympathy you’d get was from people who pitied you for having a horrible mental illness.

There are still people who see it this way, but fewer and fewer do, and as these older generations die out and more people continue to fight for gay rights, it will continue to change. Gays, lesbians, and allies have spent decades fighting like hell for their rights, but it’s working. In a society of rigid absolutes, your hands would be tied. Change would be a futile endeavor.

If you’re passionate about legalizing drugs, get involved in promoting that change. Become an activist. But keep in mind that others are just entitled to their beliefs as you, and in a democratic society they have as much right to fight against you. And as a side note, I will mention that I think the US government offers us such a bastardized sham of democracy. But in theory, can you come up with a better system?

Nad

33

Moral Rigidity vs Ethical Rigidity

by sabastious in

recently i have been pondering about the witnesses self proclaimed "moral superiority" to the outside world.

how can one person's chosen moral be superior to another person's chosen moral?

to quantify the difference betwen morals is to test their percieved benefits, and detriments, in the societies that accept them.

Naddia_the_Godless

Sabastious,

What I mean by Natural Law is a system of ethics that was promoted by Plato and later Christianity. This system holds a belief in realism, that the world around us is real and has an essential nature. Whether it be the Forms or God, there is an absolute measure of truth and justice. Natural Law within Christianity can be traced back to Paul, but it was Thomas Aquinas' fusion of Aristotelian philosophy and Christianity that strongly fueled Natural Law ethics for many more centuries.

Within this view, God is the source of truth and purpose. Therefore, every action a human takes must align with that purpose. Sex, for example, was only part of the divine purpose when used for reproduction. The carnal self must be denied; the temporal self, the soul, is what fulfills God's purpose. If you read Aquinas, he details many sexual acts, including homosexuality, which are not natural because they don't fulfill God's ethereal purpose.

That position has been widely debated over the centuries, and many religions have relaxed their views on what is allowed, but they do this by reinterpreting the Bible. They still hold that right and wrong is determined by God, not by humans.

I see this less and less in our legal system. Laws that attempt to regulate morality are based less on absolutes and more on what is beneficial or preferable to the majority. This is why people of different races can marry. Women may take birth control. Divorce is common. Gay marriage is gaining ground. And inversely, children are protected from pedophilia (there was nothing in Natural Law protecting a 12-year-old girl from marriage and pregnancy), slavery is outlawed, and restrictions on cigarette smoking are increasing. The fact that laws are changing, that they are even capable of changing, and are not based on religious tradition is evidence of a Utilitarian influence.

There are still some remnants of Natural Law in our legal system, but I see them fading over time.

You said: How is it that cigerettes, with their mountains of provable societal detriment, are perfectly legal to buy, virtually anywhere, whereas I will be placed behind bars, if caught, if I walk in the forest to collect hallucinogenic mushrooms?

I'm certainly not stating that every law on the books is fair or just or right, but simply that the framework allows for a relative approach to ethics. Twenty years ago, cigarette companies advertised on TV and the harms of smoking were swept under the rug, while you could be imprisoned for possessing marijuana. Laws on these have shifted greatly over the past couple decades. There are many bans on cigarettes and a ton of negative media attention. There is more public awareness of smoking cessation than there is advertising for cigarettes. Marijuana, on the other hand, is gaining ground. It's now legal in certain places and for certain reasons, and there is a big push to get it legalized. Is it possible that another ten or twenty years down the road, pot will be legal and cigarettes won't? This is a perfect example of how Natural Law is fading into the background, being replaced by a more relative ethical system. I would also agree that money plays a factor in just about every aspect of our society, but that's capitalism for yah.

Nad

33

Moral Rigidity vs Ethical Rigidity

by sabastious in

recently i have been pondering about the witnesses self proclaimed "moral superiority" to the outside world.

how can one person's chosen moral be superior to another person's chosen moral?

to quantify the difference betwen morals is to test their percieved benefits, and detriments, in the societies that accept them.

Naddia_the_Godless

Dat bees me. Hi Snoozy!

Nad

33

Moral Rigidity vs Ethical Rigidity

by sabastious in

recently i have been pondering about the witnesses self proclaimed "moral superiority" to the outside world.

how can one person's chosen moral be superior to another person's chosen moral?

to quantify the difference betwen morals is to test their percieved benefits, and detriments, in the societies that accept them.

Naddia_the_Godless

There have been a number of different influential ethical systems throughout history. The three major systems that still influence modern western ethics are Natural Law, Deontology, and Utilitarianism.

Natural Law Ontology can be traced back to Plato, Aristotle, Paul and Christianity, and Thomas Aquinas. These influential theologians and philosophers believed that there were absolutes in nature, and therefore absolutes of right and wrong. For Christians, the determiner of natural law is God. Consequences are meaningless in a system of absolutes. It’s always wrong to lie, steal, fornicate, etc.

Immanuel Kant was a Christian, but he tweaked out a new system in which Reason was the determiner of ethics. Instead of looking to the Bible or religious leaders to explain what God’s natural law required, we could all employ human reason to understand right and wrong. His categorical imperatives could be universalized, which still meant ethics were absolute and both motives and consequences were irrelevant, but it did take some control away from religious leaders and place it in the hands of individuals.

John Stuart Mill is credited with Utilitarianism, which is probably the most influential ethical philosophy in our western culture. He asserted that right and wrong can be determined by what brings greater good to the majority of people. In this system, both motive and consequence are important factors.

John Rawls proposed the idea of the Veil of Ignorance, which is also influential in our legal system. According to this position, a hypothetical moral dilemma is created, but you do not know what role you play. For example, a woman has an infection that may kill her if she does not take antibiotics, but she cannot afford the medication. Her husband obtains the medication from a pharmacist but explains that he has no money to pay for it, but that his wife may die without it. The pharmacist denies him the medication, so he grabs it and runs out the door. The pharmacist alerts the police. The police arrest the man.

Clearly the man broke the law by stealing, but he did so to save the life of his wife. Put yourself behind the veil of ignorance. What if you were the woman? The man? The pharmacist? You could be the one dying, or the one trying to save your loved one's life. Is stealing medication or food to feed hungry children as bad as robbing a bank to pocket the money? According to Natural Law and Deontology, it's always wrong to steal. It's always wrong to lie. Utilitarianism and the Veil of Ignorance allow us to look at each situation and its variables to determine whether it was right or wrong, not based on absolutes, but on the relative nature of benefits/harm.

Through the centuries, our views of ethics have become less absolute. Laws exist, but motive, consequence, and remorse play a big part in determining punishment for crimes. But there are still many in our society who believe in Natural Law ethics even though our legal system is gradually abandoning that system. They are still hearing “homosexuality is unnatural and wrong” from the pulpit even though our society as a whole is creeping away from that view. Religions that are able to adapt to the changes in society will probably fair better and live longer than those who staunchly hold to old world views on ethics.

Nad

27

Sharon Roe to be df'd tonight.

by avishai in

once again, the jw's are trying to silence someone that is so hurt it is almost beyond imagination.

sharon roe, sister in law of robert bryant is being df'd by the wts to keep her quiet about how they drove her brother in law to the brink of despair & beyond, by constantly hounding him & supporting his parents in their battle to undermine his headship as a parent by trying to get visitation and/or custody of his children.

they knew he was severely depressed & yet continued to harass this man, to the point where something so horrible, so unspeakable happened.

Naddia_the_Godless

LyinEyes,

Im new to this board and havent had time to post an introduction yet, but I wanted to reply to your post about your mother. Reading about the loss of your mother really triggered my emotions. I can only imagine how mentally tortured she must have been to leave behind a daughter. And it must have been very difficult for you, especially as a teenager, to lose your mother.

When I was 9 years old my parents went through some big ordeal in the congregation. I was never informed of all the details, but I know that my father was either deleted or stepped down as an elder. Afterwards he stopped attending meetings for a while and my mother became very depressed. She attempted suicide and was hospitalized for a while. She had suffered with chronic depression most of her life but had managed it. This acute episode that led to the suicide attempt was precipitated entirely by problems within the congregation and guilt feelings of unworthiness before Jehovah.

But apparently that wasnt enough. Attempted suicide is a gross sin and must be dealt with appropriately, so the elders met with her in the hospital to inform her that she would be privately reproved. What a loving arrangement. The sad thing is that she felt she deserved the punishment.

I feel so badly for her and I worry about her all the time. Ive dealt with a lot of guilt, sadness and depression from leaving this deleted up cult. But I can take one look at my little girl and know that it could never be bad enough to cause me to leave her. I can only imagine how much guilt, hopelessness and despair a mother must feel to abandon her family by committing suicide. But I can imagine it. My ex husband, who is still an active JW, has told me many times that my input regarding my daughter doesnt really matter because the end of this system is coming any day and I will be gone, out of the picture, and he will be raising our daughter on his own. I suppose that if I still believed that bullshit I might think it better to end my life now than to have my daughter watch Jehovah destroy me during Armageddon.

My mother will no longer associate with me because Im disfellowshipped. She will only speak to me regarding babysitting arrangements for my daughter, only necessary business dealings. She often sounds very sad when I talk to her, and a few times Ive asked her if shes ok or if there is anything I can do for her. She always says, No, Im not ok. I need you to come back to the truth. She pleads with me to come back to the religion. But I just cant do it. And I often worry that one day Ill get a call that she killed herself. Her mother committed suicide when she was a child and I believe that she is capable of going through with it if she sinks low enough, especially if she stops taking her medication.

It breaks my heart that this religion can tear apart something as precious as families. It ruins many lives, sometimes permanently and with finality. Im sorry that you and your family have had to lose so much because of this crazy cult. Im glad that you have found your freedom, LyinEyes. And at least youre here now to preserve your mothers memory. My heart goes out to you.

Nad

Edited by - Englishman on 12 February 2003 10:35:32

37

Logansrun.....has arrived

by logansrun in

jw
friends

i just thought i would post a little about myself here, even though some of you might know me from the "beyond jehovah's witnesses" forum.

my name is bradley and i live in a suburb of chicago illinois.

i'm currently twenty six years old and left the jws about nine months ago after a year and a half of intense doubts, many hundreds of hours of research, cognitive dissonance and bouts of vomitting (stressful, eh?).