Philosophy Now Forum

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Oct 13, 2025 2:38 pm
Yes, it is. For example, you could tell somebody the reasons you think they should prefer chocolate to vanilla. But you can't make those reasons moral ones. They're going to start as issues of taste, and end as issues of taste, and no duty on his/her part is ever going to be forthcoming why he/she must agree with you.

And morality's not like that. Morality commands others to agree. And it does so because its uses are not merely selections at an ice cream parlour or a quality of music that tickles the ear, but questions like, "on what grounds should we distribute goods," or "what actions should be rewarded and punished," and "what rules should govern our society," or at least, "even though I may feel torn, which way is the correct way for me to proceed"? Such questions find no answers at all in appealing to mere taste. Taste never obligates agreement.

And obligation is indispensible in moral matters. We need not just to bully people into compliance with what you or I might prefer, but to be able to convince them by good reasons (if they will accept any such, which some obviously will refuse, because not everybody's moral and rational) that this or that way of living, or this or that policy, or this or that reward or sanction, are just and fit to the situation in hand, and we should all coordinate with it. And if we can't provide sound moral reasons, then, as Neitzsche and Foucault and such have recognized, all we are falling back on, ultimately, is brute power to make my will happen rather than yours. And that's tyranny, not morality.

Huh? If people are "obliged" to behave in a moral manner, how is that so few of us comply? Because morality IS determined by God it is "objective"; it is obligatory to comply (although since there is none righteous, nobody does comply). So what? Everyone knows that Christians think morality his handed down from God. Many of us disagree. We think morality is culturally constituted and each individual is responsible for deciding what constitutes moral behavior. We make laws to protect ourselves and some moral tenets are codified in law. Laws obligate us (perhaps, in your sense). But we must decide on our own whether innocently lusting after a beautiful woman constitutes immoral behavior. Personally, I don't care whether God thinks so or not ... "I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul."

Alexiev wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 12:51 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Oct 13, 2025 2:38 pm
Yes, it is. For example, you could tell somebody the reasons you think they should prefer chocolate to vanilla. But you can't make those reasons moral ones. They're going to start as issues of taste, and end as issues of taste, and no duty on his/her part is ever going to be forthcoming why he/she must agree with you.

And morality's not like that. Morality commands others to agree. And it does so because its uses are not merely selections at an ice cream parlour or a quality of music that tickles the ear, but questions like, "on what grounds should we distribute goods," or "what actions should be rewarded and punished," and "what rules should govern our society," or at least, "even though I may feel torn, which way is the correct way for me to proceed"? Such questions find no answers at all in appealing to mere taste. Taste never obligates agreement.

And obligation is indispensible in moral matters. We need not just to bully people into compliance with what you or I might prefer, but to be able to convince them by good reasons (if they will accept any such, which some obviously will refuse, because not everybody's moral and rational) that this or that way of living, or this or that policy, or this or that reward or sanction, are just and fit to the situation in hand, and we should all coordinate with it. And if we can't provide sound moral reasons, then, as Neitzsche and Foucault and such have recognized, all we are falling back on, ultimately, is brute power to make my will happen rather than yours. And that's tyranny, not morality.

Huh? If people are "obliged" to behave in a moral manner, how is that so few of us comply?

To be morally obliged isn't the same as being physically forced or compelled. People still have the choice. But they don't always do what they morally *should* do, because of incentives of various kinds to do otherwise. Still, if they are morally aware, they know they're choosing to do the wrong thing, and they know what they should be doing.

Because morality IS determined by God it is "objective"; it is obligatory to comply (although since there is none righteous, nobody does comply). So what?

The "so what" is actually very serious. It means one is unfit for relationship with a righteous God, and is under His judgment as a sinner. The outcome would be eternal alienation from God, the Source of all that is good. So that would be the "what."

We think morality is culturally constituted and each individual is responsible for deciding what constitutes moral behavior.

A little thought will show that doesn't work. If morality is not external, objective and obligatory, then we actually don't have any reason to care about it at all. Then our impulses are our rule; and as you know, many of our impulses are notoriously bad.

One thing we look to morality to tell us is what to do when our impulse inclines to the wrong thing. In fact, if our impulses were always good, we would never have even thought of a thing like morality. We'd never need it. It's when we're not sure about the moral status of what we are deciding that morality becomes relevant to us. We want to know what's "right," in the face of what's merely "easy" or "desirable."

Laws obligate us

Only through power, if there's nothing objectively moral behind the law. So, for example, the law might say "you shall not murder" because morality also declares, "Thou shalt not murder." But what when the law declares something, and morality is not behind it? Say, when it declares, "a woman is worth half a man," or "you may murder your infants at will," or "Jews have no property rights." Then, it's morality that steps up and declares the law illegitimate.

So the two may overlap sometimes, but they aren't the same. Legitimate laws are those that repeat the admonitions of objective moral truth. Illegitimate laws are those that violate morality.

But we must decide on our own whether innocently lusting after a beautiful woman constitutes immoral behavior.

We don't have to decide. And it won't matter what we decide, because it won't change the truth: it is immoral. The Lord has already declared it so, and I think we all know in our hearts that yearning after somebody else's wife or future potential wife, or abandoning our own spouse, are evil deeds. We may not like to say so, but we know it.

Personally, I don't care whether God thinks so or not ... "I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul."

That's just brave nonsense. Never was a more untrue line penned. It's from "Invictus." But Henley knows he was wrong now, one way or the other. He'll have found out that he was nothing like in charge of his own soul. But he was right in one way: for a time, during life, he had a say about his fate. But it seems likely he made the wrong choice.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 12:49 am

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 12:46 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 12:41 am
Neither do they have to respond to it. Atheism doesn't leave them any instructions on that.

Correct, they don't have to respond to it, but that's not going to alleviate shame and guilt, probably make it worse.

Right. Because the conscience "knows" what Atheists don't -- that morality is real and objective, and when they fall afoul of it, they feel that as keenly as anybody. That's how God has made us all.

But then, Atheism has failed yet again to explain a very ordinary human phenomenon. For Atheism supplies us no reason at all to care about whatever this "conscience" thing says. There's no duty to follow it attached to it at all, according to Atheism.

Maybe.

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 1:39 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 12:49 am

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 12:46 am

Correct, they don't have to respond to it, but that's not going to alleviate shame and guilt, probably make it worse.

Right. Because the conscience "knows" what Atheists don't -- that morality is real and objective, and when they fall afoul of it, they feel that as keenly as anybody. That's how God has made us all.

But then, Atheism has failed yet again to explain a very ordinary human phenomenon. For Atheism supplies us no reason at all to care about whatever this "conscience" thing says. There's no duty to follow it attached to it at all, according to Atheism.

Maybe.

Logically.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 1:37 am

Alexiev wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 12:51 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Oct 13, 2025 2:38 pm
Yes, it is. For example, you could tell somebody the reasons you think they should prefer chocolate to vanilla. But you can't make those reasons moral ones. They're going to start as issues of taste, and end as issues of taste, and no duty on his/her part is ever going to be forthcoming why he/she must agree with you.

And morality's not like that. Morality commands others to agree. And it does so because its uses are not merely selections at an ice cream parlour or a quality of music that tickles the ear, but questions like, "on what grounds should we distribute goods," or "what actions should be rewarded and punished," and "what rules should govern our society," or at least, "even though I may feel torn, which way is the correct way for me to proceed"? Such questions find no answers at all in appealing to mere taste. Taste never obligates agreement.

And obligation is indispensible in moral matters. We need not just to bully people into compliance with what you or I might prefer, but to be able to convince them by good reasons (if they will accept any such, which some obviously will refuse, because not everybody's moral and rational) that this or that way of living, or this or that policy, or this or that reward or sanction, are just and fit to the situation in hand, and we should all coordinate with it. And if we can't provide sound moral reasons, then, as Neitzsche and Foucault and such have recognized, all we are falling back on, ultimately, is brute power to make my will happen rather than yours. And that's tyranny, not morality.

Huh? If people are "obliged" to behave in a moral manner, how is that so few of us comply?

To be morally obliged isn't the same as being physically forced or compelled. People still have the choice. But they don't always do what they morally *should* do, because of incentives of various kinds to do otherwise. Still, if they are morally aware, they know they're choosing to do the wrong thing, and they know what they should be doing.

Because morality IS determined by God it is "objective"; it is obligatory to comply (although since there is none righteous, nobody does comply). So what?

The "so what" is actually very serious. It means one is unfit for relationship with a righteous God, and is under His judgment as a sinner. The outcome would be eternal alienation from God, the Source of all that is good. So that would be the "what."

We think morality is culturally constituted and each individual is responsible for deciding what constitutes moral behavior.

A little thought will show that doesn't work. If morality is not external, objective and obligatory, then we actually don't have any reason to care about it at all. Then our impulses are our rule; and as you know, many of our impulses are notoriously bad.

One thing we look to morality to tell us is what to do when our impulse inclines to the wrong thing. In fact, if our impulses were always good, we would never have even thought of a thing like morality. We'd never need it. It's when we're not sure about the moral status of what we are deciding that morality becomes relevant to us. We want to know what's "right," in the face of what's merely "easy" or "desirable."

Laws obligate us

Only through power, if there's nothing objectively moral behind the law. So, for example, the law might say "you shall not murder" because morality also declares, "Thou shalt not murder." But what when the law declares something, and morality is not behind it? Say, when it declares, "a woman is worth half a man," or "you may murder your infants at will," or "Jews have no property rights." Then, it's morality that steps up and declares the law illegitimate.

So the two may overlap sometimes, but they aren't the same. Legitimate laws are those that repeat the admonitions of objective moral truth. Illegitimate laws are those that violate morality.

But we must decide on our own whether innocently lusting after a beautiful woman constitutes immoral behavior.

We don't have to decide. And it won't matter what we decide, because it won't change the truth: it is immoral. The Lord has already declared it so, and I think we all know in our hearts that yearning after somebody else's wife or future potential wife, or abandoning our own spouse, are evil deeds. We may not like to say so, but we know it.

Personally, I don't care whether God thinks so or not ... "I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul."

That's just brave nonsense. Never was a more untrue line penned. It's from "Invictus." But Henley knows he was wrong now, one way or the other. He'll have found out that he was nothing like in charge of his own soul. But he was right in one way: for a time, during life, he had a say about his fate. But it seems likely he made the wrong choice.

All moral codes imply duty to the authority that sets them on place. If the authority is secular, for instance aggressive atheism, or communism, the duty is to defend one's right to think , or the communist state respectively. Also ,during the French Revolution(Radical Phase) a lot of people, including some leaders of the state, believed Christianity was against reason and churches were closed down.

In all known cases of society there is codified morality, although those are not necessarily written down on tablets of stone or big books. Dance was ( and to an extent still is) another means of expressing moral code.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 1:37 am [To be morally obliged isn't the same as being physically forced or compelled. People still have the choice. But they don't always do what they morally *should* do, because of incentives of various kinds to do otherwise. Still, if they are morally aware, they know they're choosing to do the wrong thing, and they know what they should be doing.

Because morality IS determined by God it is "objective"; it is obligatory to comply (although since there is none righteous, nobody does comply). So what?

The "so what" is actually very serious. It means one is unfit for relationship with a righteous God, and is under His judgment as a sinner. The outcome would be eternal alienation from God, the Source of all that is good. So that would be the "what."

I am morally obligated based on my own morals. If I act immorally it is because I have transgressed against myself --not against you, God, the Bible, or the law.

A little thought will show that doesn't work. If morality is not external, objective and obligatory, then we actually don't have any reason to care about it at all. Then our impulses are our rule; and as you know, many of our impulses are notoriously bad.

One thing we look to morality to tell us is what to do when our impulse inclines to the wrong thing. In fact, if our impulses were always good, we would never have even thought of a thing like morality. We'd never need it. It's when we're not sure about the moral status of what we are deciding that morality becomes relevant to us. We want to know what's "right," in the face of what's merely "easy" or "desirable."

Perhaps your impulses are notoriously bad. Mine aren't. I'm hardly ever tempted toward evil (although I'm sometimes tempted to lust, which I don't think is evil).

Only through power, if there's nothing objectively moral behind the law. So, for example, the law might say "you shall not murder" because morality also declares, "Thou shalt not murder." But what when the law declares something, and morality is not behind it? Say, when it declares, "a woman is worth half a man," or "you may murder your infants at will," or "Jews have no property rights." Then, it's morality that steps up and declares the law illegitimate.

So the two may overlap sometimes, but they aren't the same. Legitimate laws are those that repeat the admonitions of objective moral truth. Illegitimate laws are those that violate morality.

Duh. Laws can be notoriously unjust. MY point was that when morality is codified into law it "obligates' us in a different way than when it is not.

We don't have to decide. And it won't matter what we decide, because it won't change the truth: it is immoral. The Lord has already declared it so, and I think we all know in our hearts that yearning after somebody else's wife or future potential wife, or abandoning our own spouse, are evil deeds. We may not like to say so, but we know it.

That's just brave nonsense. Never was a more untrue line penned. It's from "Invictus." But Henley knows he was wrong now, one way or the other. He'll have found out that he was nothing like in charge of his own soul. But he was right in one way: for a time, during life, he had a say about his fate. But it seems likely he made the wrong choice.

Of course we have to decide, if we have free will. You are contradicting your own positions. Mastering one's own fate and soul is not particularly courageous, but refusing to master it out of fear is clearly cowardly. Yet that is exactly what your silly threats propose. Surely you don't think anyone should accept any belief system out of fear, do you?

Belinda wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 10:03 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 1:37 am

Alexiev wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 12:51 am
Huh? If people are "obliged" to behave in a moral manner, how is that so few of us comply?

To be morally obliged isn't the same as being physically forced or compelled. People still have the choice. But they don't always do what they morally *should* do, because of incentives of various kinds to do otherwise. Still, if they are morally aware, they know they're choosing to do the wrong thing, and they know what they should be doing.

Because morality IS determined by God it is "objective"; it is obligatory to comply (although since there is none righteous, nobody does comply). So what?

The "so what" is actually very serious. It means one is unfit for relationship with a righteous God, and is under His judgment as a sinner. The outcome would be eternal alienation from God, the Source of all that is good. So that would be the "what."

We think morality is culturally constituted and each individual is responsible for deciding what constitutes moral behavior.

A little thought will show that doesn't work. If morality is not external, objective and obligatory, then we actually don't have any reason to care about it at all. Then our impulses are our rule; and as you know, many of our impulses are notoriously bad.

One thing we look to morality to tell us is what to do when our impulse inclines to the wrong thing. In fact, if our impulses were always good, we would never have even thought of a thing like morality. We'd never need it. It's when we're not sure about the moral status of what we are deciding that morality becomes relevant to us. We want to know what's "right," in the face of what's merely "easy" or "desirable."

Laws obligate us

Only through power, if there's nothing objectively moral behind the law. So, for example, the law might say "you shall not murder" because morality also declares, "Thou shalt not murder." But what when the law declares something, and morality is not behind it? Say, when it declares, "a woman is worth half a man," or "you may murder your infants at will," or "Jews have no property rights." Then, it's morality that steps up and declares the law illegitimate.

So the two may overlap sometimes, but they aren't the same. Legitimate laws are those that repeat the admonitions of objective moral truth. Illegitimate laws are those that violate morality.

But we must decide on our own whether innocently lusting after a beautiful woman constitutes immoral behavior.

We don't have to decide. And it won't matter what we decide, because it won't change the truth: it is immoral. The Lord has already declared it so, and I think we all know in our hearts that yearning after somebody else's wife or future potential wife, or abandoning our own spouse, are evil deeds. We may not like to say so, but we know it.

Personally, I don't care whether God thinks so or not ... "I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul."

That's just brave nonsense. Never was a more untrue line penned. It's from "Invictus." But Henley knows he was wrong now, one way or the other. He'll have found out that he was nothing like in charge of his own soul. But he was right in one way: for a time, during life, he had a say about his fate. But it seems likely he made the wrong choice.

All moral codes imply duty to the authority that sets them on place.

Yes. But what "authority" can we say "sets in place" axioms like "slavery is wrong," or "stealing is wrong"? Show the logical progression, if you can.

In Atheism, there's no "duty." Only power. Nietzsche saw this. Hume saw it, but ran away. Modern Atheists are afraid to see it at all. But there it is.

If I, as the leader of an Atheist regime, have the power to punish you for your free thought, then free thought has been made illegal by the state. But you still have no moral duty to obey the state -- all you have is fear of my power. In fact, your moral duty might be to rebel against the state, defy the Atheistic regime, and to assert the unalienable right of all human beings to free speech in defiance of me. And the most ignoble and immoral thing you could do might be to capitulate to me, and allow me to extinguish that right. That is exactly what happened in every Communist regime, in fact. This is how it really is.

Or to go the other way, if the culture determines what's moral, and the culture in the US is "racist," as BLM insists, then it's immoral of BLM to protest the "systemic racism." The system is what determines right and wrong, according to you; so BLM is doing evil. They are being immoral. Even if all rights were being taken away from black folks, and they were being herded into plantations again, your theory suggests that they would have no right to object -- their culture had insisted it should be this way, and so that determined what was "moral."

So that theory's just obviously wrong. It's capable of justifying gross immorality and calling it "right."

Alexiev wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 2:15 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 1:37 am [To be morally obliged isn't the same as being physically forced or compelled. People still have the choice. But they don't always do what they morally *should* do, because of incentives of various kinds to do otherwise. Still, if they are morally aware, they know they're choosing to do the wrong thing, and they know what they should be doing.

Because morality IS determined by God it is "objective"; it is obligatory to comply (although since there is none righteous, nobody does comply). So what?

The "so what" is actually very serious. It means one is unfit for relationship with a righteous God, and is under His judgment as a sinner. The outcome would be eternal alienation from God, the Source of all that is good. So that would be the "what."

I am morally obligated based on my own morals.

You actually aren't. In fact, if you change your own mind in the next five minutes, you have zero obligation to any moral precept at all.

If I act immorally it is because I have transgressed against myself...

If you desire, in the next five minutes, to act in a way that five minutes before that you considered immoral, how have you "transgressed against yourself?" Is it not obvious that now that you believe in taking that action, it would be a "transgression against yourself" if you stuck with your former view against your present one?

A little thought will show that doesn't work. If morality is not external, objective and obligatory, then we actually don't have any reason to care about it at all. Then our impulses are our rule; and as you know, many of our impulses are notoriously bad.

One thing we look to morality to tell us is what to do when our impulse inclines to the wrong thing. In fact, if our impulses were always good, we would never have even thought of a thing like morality. We'd never need it. It's when we're not sure about the moral status of what we are deciding that morality becomes relevant to us. We want to know what's "right," in the face of what's merely "easy" or "desirable."

Perhaps your impulses are notoriously bad. Mine aren't. I'm hardly ever tempted toward evil (although I'm sometimes tempted to lust, which I don't think is evil).

Then you make God out to be a liar, says 1 John 1:10, for God has said you're a sinner. And though you might like lust, perhaps, you call Jesus Christ a liar, for He personally condemned lust after women that are not your wife (Matthew 5:28). But perhaps if you see neither God nor Jesus Christ as morally competent to make such a claim, and you see yourself as more competent, this will not move you. That will be your choice; but it will not affect the status of lust if that status is objective. Objective morality does not require human consent in order to be true.

Only through power, if there's nothing objectively moral behind the law. So, for example, the law might say "you shall not murder" because morality also declares, "Thou shalt not murder." But what when the law declares something, and morality is not behind it? Say, when it declares, "a woman is worth half a man," or "you may murder your infants at will," or "Jews have no property rights." Then, it's morality that steps up and declares the law illegitimate.

So the two may overlap sometimes, but they aren't the same. Legitimate laws are those that repeat the admonitions of objective moral truth. Illegitimate laws are those that violate morality.

Duh. Laws can be notoriously unjust.

Well, before you just "duh," think. Think about the implications of what you just admitted as "duh" obvious. For I agree, it's very, very obvious. We should both already know it is.

If that's right, then human codes are not the source of morality. They are, at most, human attempts to reflect the objective moral truth. They are not the sum of it, and not the source of that truth.

MY point was that when morality is codified into law it "obligates' us in a different way than when it is not.

Why? Why should an axiom you've written on paper be more "obligatory" to me than one you've stated verbally? And then, why should one my society has written down suddenly become obligatory in a way that it's not if one person writes it down, if it's exactly the same axiom?

We don't have to decide. And it won't matter what we decide, because it won't change the truth: it is immoral. The Lord has already declared it so, and I think we all know in our hearts that yearning after somebody else's wife or future potential wife, or abandoning our own spouse, are evil deeds. We may not like to say so, but we know it.

That's just brave nonsense. Never was a more untrue line penned. It's from "Invictus." But Henley knows he was wrong now, one way or the other. He'll have found out that he was nothing like in charge of his own soul. But he was right in one way: for a time, during life, he had a say about his fate. But it seems likely he made the wrong choice.

Of course we have to decide, if we have free will.

No, we don't. Not about that. For we have been told what the objective status of that action is, by God Himself. Our free will will consist in either bowing to it or denying it. But our will will not change it.

Mastering one's own fate and soul is not particularly courageous,

Oh, I think it is. Think of what it is claiming: omnipotence for a mere human...and not just control of the now, but total mastery of the hearafter, as well. He couldn't be more brave...or less honest with himself.

but refusing to master it out of fear is clearly cowardly.

Nobody is master of his fate. No human being has ever been. That's no more "cowardly" than to say, "I refuse to flap my arms and fly" is cowardly. I cannot do it. I cannot even come close to doing it. All I can do is delude myself about my own potency. That's not cowardice, it's simple realism and appropriate humility.

Yet that is exactly what your silly threats propose.

I haven't threatened anything. All I've done is said the truth: that Wm. E. Henley now knows what he did not know before. If you find a "threat" to you in that, it's deductive on your part, and no doing of mine.

But if you feel threatened, then maybe ask yourself why a statement about a dead poet would trouble you so much personally. There might be cause for that. Only you will know. I can't say, and haven't even tried to say that.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 3:18 pm
You actually aren't. In fact, if you change your own mind in the next five minutes, you have zero obligation to any moral precept at all.


If you desire, in the next five minutes, to act in a way that five minutes before that you considered immoral, how have you "transgressed against yourself?" Is it not obvious that now that you believe in taking that action, it would be a "transgression against yourself" if you stuck with your former view against your present one?

A little thought will show that doesn't work. If morality is not external, objective and obligatory, then we actually don't have any reason to care about it at all. Then our impulses are our rule; and as you know, many of our impulses are notoriously bad.

One thing we look to morality to tell us is what to do when our impulse inclines to the wrong thing. In fact, if our impulses were always good, we would never have even thought of a thing like morality. We'd never need it. It's when we're not sure about the moral status of what we are deciding that morality becomes relevant to us. We want to know what's "right," in the face of what's merely "easy" or "desirable."

This is nonsense. Of course we can change our minds. Some of us (fools that they are) may even convert to Christianity. NLOnetheless this in no way implies that we, "we actually don't have any reason to care about it at all." Why would it? We care about many of our opinions.

Perhaps your impulses are notoriously bad. Mine aren't. I'm hardly ever tempted toward evil (although I'm sometimes tempted to lust, which I don't think is evil).[/quote]

Then you make God out to be a liar, says 1 John 1:10, for God has said you're a sinner. And though you might like lust, perhaps, you call Jesus Christ a liar, for He personally condemned lust after women that are not your wife (Matthew 5:28). But perhaps if you see neither God nor Jesus Christ as morally competent to man,

This is true only if one thinks God wrote the Bible, which no intelligent person (especially one who denies the authority of the orthodox church) does think.

Of course we have to decide, if we have free will.

No, we don't. Not about that. For we have been told what the objective status of that action is, by God Himself. Our free will will consist in either bowing to it or denying it. But our will will not change it.

No it doesn't. We can do neither. IN most cases, I subscribe to standard Christian morals rather than denying them. "Bowing" implies a subservience to the authority not of God, but to that of the Bible and the Church, both of which were created by humans. The notion that the Bible infallibly represents God's "word" (even if there is a God) implies a reverence for the moral laws of the men who wrote the Bible, those who canonized it, and those who interpreted it (the Church).

but refusing to master it out of fear is clearly cowardly.

Nobody is master of his fate. No human being has ever been. That's no more "cowardly" than to say, "I refuse to flap my arms and fly" is cowardly. I cannot do it. I cannot even come close to doing it. All I can do is delude myself about my own potency. That's not cowardice, it's simple realism and appropriate humility.

I haven't threatened anything. All I've done is said the truth: that Wm. E. Henley now knows what he did not know before. If you find a "threat" to you in that, it's deductive on your part, and no doing of mine.

But if you feel threatened, then maybe ask yourself why a statement about a dead poet would trouble you so much personally. There might be cause for that. Only you will know. I can't say, and haven't even tried to say that.

William Henley is long dead. It is likely that he doesn't "know" anything. Your comment remains a "silly threat".

Alexiev wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 4:04 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 3:18 pm
You actually aren't. In fact, if you change your own mind in the next five minutes, you have zero obligation to any moral precept at all.


If you desire, in the next five minutes, to act in a way that five minutes before that you considered immoral, how have you "transgressed against yourself?" Is it not obvious that now that you believe in taking that action, it would be a "transgression against yourself" if you stuck with your former view against your present one?

A little thought will show that doesn't work. If morality is not external, objective and obligatory, then we actually don't have any reason to care about it at all. Then our impulses are our rule; and as you know, many of our impulses are notoriously bad.

One thing we look to morality to tell us is what to do when our impulse inclines to the wrong thing. In fact, if our impulses were always good, we would never have even thought of a thing like morality. We'd never need it. It's when we're not sure about the moral status of what we are deciding that morality becomes relevant to us. We want to know what's "right," in the face of what's merely "easy" or "desirable."

This is nonsense. Of course we can change our minds. Some of us (fools that they are) may even convert to Christianity. NLOnetheless this in no way implies that we, "we actually don't have any reason to care about it at all." Why would it? We care about many of our opinions.

But if you happen to stop caring about one of your former opinions, and start caring about something different, or if somebody else starts doing something contrary to your mere "opinion," then what makes them, or you, morally wrong?

Nothing. Which means that whatever you were considering to be "morality," it's not telling you anything but what you happen to want to hear in a given moment. It's not doing what we expect morality to be able to do for us, namely, give us a moral compass as to what to do when our feelings and opinions are conflictual, unclear, or shifting...which is most of the time, actually, in real life.

Alexiev wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 4:04 pm

Alexiev wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 4:04 pmPerhaps your impulses are notoriously bad. Mine aren't. I'm hardly ever tempted toward evil (although I'm sometimes tempted to lust, which I don't think is evil).

Then you make God out to be a liar, says 1 John 1:10, for God has said you're a sinner. And though you might like lust, perhaps, you call Jesus Christ a liar, for He personally condemned lust after women that are not your wife (Matthew 5:28). But perhaps if you see neither God nor Jesus Christ as morally competent to man,...

This is true only if one thinks God wrote the Bible,

No. It will be true, or it will be false that God said these things; but it will not make any difference what one thinks. One cannot stop God from speaking by sticking one's fingers in one's ears and humming.

Of course we have to decide, if we have free will.

No, we don't. Not about that. For we have been told what the objective status of that action is, by God Himself. Our free will will consist in either bowing to it or denying it. But our will will not change it.

No it doesn't. We can do neither. IN most cases, I subscribe to standard Christian morals rather than denying them. "Bowing" implies a subservience to the authority not of God, but to that of the Bible and the Church,...

No, I'm not suggesting you should bow to any particular human religious organization. Such can even potentially have only as much value as they have truth in them, and not all do. And I suggest you only accept the authority of the Bible to the extent God speaks through it. But yes, bowing means accepting a lower place; and a man who would not accept a place lower than God Himself would not be acting wisely, would he?

but refusing to master it out of fear is clearly cowardly.

Nobody is master of his fate. No human being has ever been. That's no more "cowardly" than to say, "I refuse to flap my arms and fly" is cowardly. I cannot do it. I cannot even come close to doing it. All I can do is delude myself about my own potency. That's not cowardice, it's simple realism and appropriate humility.

I haven't threatened anything. All I've done is said the truth: that Wm. E. Henley now knows what he did not know before. If you find a "threat" to you in that, it's deductive on your part, and no doing of mine.

But if you feel threatened, then maybe ask yourself why a statement about a dead poet would trouble you so much personally. There might be cause for that. Only you will know. I can't say, and haven't even tried to say that.

William Henley is long dead. It is likely that he doesn't "know" anything. Your comment remains a "silly threat".

Interesting. You seem sure of that. What's the basis of your confidence that W.E. Henley doesn't know he was wrong?

There's no threat. I'm simply telling you what the Bible says about that. You can, and will, take it or leave it; that's not my affair. Compulsion is no part of faith. But the truth is, and I'm just telling you what the Bible says the truth about that is.

Immanuel Can asked me:-

Yes. But what "authority" can we say "sets in place" axioms like "slavery is wrong," or "stealing is wrong"? Show the logical progression, if you can.

I got ChatGPT to answer your question as it's a plain matter of fact question.
Yes. But what "authority" can we say "sets in place" axioms like "slavery is wrong," or "stealing is wrong"? Show the logical progression, if you can.

The moral code that says slavery is wrong is found most clearly in:

Modern Christian and Islamic ethics,

Enlightenment humanism,

Kantian and utilitarian moral philosophy, and

The contemporary human rights framework.

(ChatGPT)

Aristotle , Christianised by Thomas Aquinas, was a big influence.


Aristotle’s ethics is shaped by:

Socrates & Plato: From Socrates, he took the link between virtue and reason; from Plato, the idea of the good—but he made it practical, not ideal.

Teleology: Everything has a purpose (telos); for humans, it’s eudaimonia (flourishing) through rational activity.

Greek balance: Virtue is the “mean” between extremes (courage between rashness and cowardice).

Empiricism & politics: Ethics is based on observing real life and belongs within the life of the community (polis).

Human nature: The good life harmonizes reason and desire; virtue is proper function.

Against relativism: Rejects Sophists and hedonists—pleasure supports, not defines, the good life.

ChatGPT

Belinda wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 6:50 pm I got ChatGPT to answer your question

So the ol' brain just wasn't working today? You preferred some programmer's answer to your own judgment?

The moral code that says slavery is wrong is found most clearly in:
Islamic ethics,

Utterly hilarious. Don't you know that Islam is the biggest purveyor of slavery in history?

Enlightenment humanism,

Nope. That's just a kind of vague optimism.

Kantian and utilitarian moral philosophy,

This is simply not the case. Kantianism would depend on whom you classified as a "person," and the various Utilitarianisms would allow slavery if it was more hedonic overall than not.

The contemporary human rights framework.

Which is derivative from Lockean Protestantism, and has not derivation from anything else.

Let's suppose ChatBS was actually telling you something important. Maybe what you should do is ask it how any of these "ground" their claims, because that's missing from your explanation there. It's one thing to put in a code, "No enslaving folks": it's quite another to be able to prove why it's wrong. None of what you provided came remotely close to even trying to do that.

If you're not going to think, this is going to be a very short conversation.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 7:09 pm

Belinda wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 6:50 pm I got ChatGPT to answer your question

So the ol' brain just wasn't working today? You preferred some programmer's answer to your own judgment?

The moral code that says slavery is wrong is found most clearly in:
Islamic ethics,

Utterly hilarious. Don't you know that Islam is the biggest purveyor of slavery in history?

Enlightenment humanism,

Nope. That's just a kind of vague optimism.

Kantian and utilitarian moral philosophy,

This is simply not the case. Kantianism would depend on whom you classified as a "person," and the various Utilitarianisms would allow slavery if it was more hedonic overall than not.

The contemporary human rights framework.

Which is derivative from Lockean Protestantism, and has not derivation from anything else.

If you're not going to think, this is going to be a very short conversation.

ChatGPT is only my research assistant . It was I myself who asked it for details about Aquinas and Christianisation, and the people who influences Aristotle. ChatGPT has more access than I to recorded historiography. I could have researched all this myself in a library, however Chat is a lot faster.

You show you do not understand how to use an AI machine, Chat GPT is not a "programmer" it's a large language synthesiser. It combines language utterances sans input from a human.

Kant's default basis for human nature is the transcendent self.

Belinda wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 7:22 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 7:09 pm

Belinda wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 6:50 pm I got ChatGPT to answer your question

So the ol' brain just wasn't working today? You preferred some programmer's answer to your own judgment?

The moral code that says slavery is wrong is found most clearly in:
Islamic ethics,

Utterly hilarious. Don't you know that Islam is the biggest purveyor of slavery in history?

Enlightenment humanism,

Nope. That's just a kind of vague optimism.

Kantian and utilitarian moral philosophy,

This is simply not the case. Kantianism would depend on whom you classified as a "person," and the various Utilitarianisms would allow slavery if it was more hedonic overall than not.

The contemporary human rights framework.

Which is derivative from Lockean Protestantism, and has not derivation from anything else.

If you're not going to think, this is going to be a very short conversation.

ChatGPT is only my research assistant .

Well, do some thinking about how you're trying to "use" it. You didn't ask it what the grounds of any such claims were, just whether or not there were some such in that code. And some of what it told you, like about Islamists, is just laughably wrong, and you didn't even catch that. A moment's thought, or even the most superficial knowledge of the history of slavery, should have alerted you to the mistake.

But it didn't. And why not? Because people blindly trust ChatGPT, and never imagine it can lie to them or be in error, or that it's been programmed by somebody, a somebody invariably with his own prejudices and PC interests. But they think all that doesn't matter, because technology = superior, in their thinking.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 7:29 pm

Belinda wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 7:22 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Oct 14, 2025 7:09 pm
So the ol' brain just wasn't working today? You preferred some programmer's answer to your own judgment?

Utterly hilarious. Don't you know that Islam is the biggest purveyor of slavery in history?

Nope. That's just a kind of vague optimism.

This is simply not the case. Kantianism would depend on whom you classified as a "person," and the various Utilitarianisms would allow slavery if it was more hedonic overall than not.

Which is derivative from Lockean Protestantism, and has not derivation from anything else.

If you're not going to think, this is going to be a very short conversation.

ChatGPT is only my research assistant .

Well, do some thinking about how you're trying to "use" it. You didn't ask it what the grounds of any such claims were, just whether or not there were some such in that code. And some of what it told you, like about Islamists, is just laughably wrong, and you didn't even catch that. A moment's thought, or even the most superficial knowledge of the history of slavery, should have alerted you to the mistake.

But it didn't. And why not? Because people blindly trust ChatGPT, and never imagine it can lie to them or be in error, or that it's been programmed by somebody, a somebody invariably with his own prejudices and PC interests. But they think all that doesn't matter, because technology = superior, in their thinking.

It's always correct, as you have done, to seek sources in a bibliography. I will if you like go back and ask ChatGPT what are its sources for the info I relayed to you .

Chat has a good reputation and its owners Open AI want to keep the good reputation intact. This makes commercial sense. ChatGPT has some built- in ethics which are widely accepted in all modern communities.

Sources / Bibliography (Types of References Consulted)

Historical texts and legal codes: Roman laws, Islamic Sharia, Talmudic law, Scandinavian medieval codes.

Modern historical scholarship: peer-reviewed studies on slavery and abolition, e.g., works on Quakers, West African societies, and European abolition movements.

Religious and philosophical writings: Buddhist, Confucian, Christian, Jewish, and Islamic ethical texts addressing servitude.

Comparative anthropology and ethnography: studies of Indigenous cultures and societies with minimal or no slavery.

Verified secondary sources: encyclopedias, university databases, and historical compendiums summarizing global slavery practices and opposition.

Slavery is not binary. There are systems of slavery some of them involve less suffering and unfairness than others. Some conditions of employment are close to slavery.You would be better to do your own research to discover those variations that interest you.