Secularist Dogma: Final Refuge Of The Unfeeling?

[toon]

Voltaire's, "A very popular error--having the courage of one's convictions; rather it is a matter of having the courage for an attack upon one's convictions."

I thought that was Nietzsche.

[William Schryver]

Voltaire's, "A very popular error--having the courage of one's convictions; rather it is a matter of having the courage for an attack upon one's convictions."

I thought that was Nietzsche.

You thought right. See this post.

[Jaybear]

I can respect that this may have been your experience. I have no doubt that there are very good and decent and highly intelligent secularists. My intentionally explicit qualifiers should have alerted you that I wasn't stereotyping or making a generalizations. I was simply speaking to my experience. And, my experience is somewhat different from yours, in part because the secularists I tend to interact with are those that quite uncharitably rail against and belittle my faith.

That was the precisely point of my post. "Your experience" will be colored by the fact that, you have the tendancy to insult those that don't share your worldview. Insults usually bring out the worst in people. But I am sure they had it coming.

Evidently, you didn't understand what I meant by "adult fundamentalist mind" (which isn't about blind faith) Oh well.

There you go again.

[wenglund]

That was the precisely point of my post. "Your experience" will be colored by the fact that, you have the tendancy to insult those that don't share your worldview. Insults usually bring out the worst in people. But I am sure they had it coming.

There you go again.

Okay, I appreciate you sharing your perspective.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[Chris Smith]

Loran,

Mao may have been a hedonist, but he was not a pure hedonist; he was also an ideologue. I think the genocide stemmed from the latter, not from the former.

Furthermore, both Mao and Hitler were slightly demented. So to assume that they worked out the implications of secularism in a strictly rational manner is, I think, misguided.

Another finding of the studies on genocide has been that one of the biggest predictors of genocide is totalitarian government. The more consensual the system of government, the less likely it is that that government will perpetrate mass-murder. IMO, this is because an individual is much more likely to act in an evil and irrational manner than an institution with distributed power and checks and balances. One of the great strengths of consensual government is that it promotes compromise and empowers the "median voter," and thus avoids dangerous, irrational extremes.

Peace,

-Chris

[Chris Smith]

Hi jo,

FWIW, I was raised as a very devout evangelical, and had my fair share of powerful spiritual experiences.

Peace,

-Chris

[Facsimile 3]

That was the precisely point of my post. "Your experience" will be colored by the fact that, you have the tendency to insult those that don't share your worldview. Insults usually bring out the worst in people. But I am sure they had it coming.

There you go again.

I'm not sure why anyone is having issues with Wade's comment. It's an attack on people who are dogmatic. Does anyone here really want to defend people who are dogmatic from criticism? The assertion is that dogmatic Mormons (Fundamentalist Mormons) who find their Primary age understanding of things in Church government, Church History or the Gospel challenged by experience (i.e. their strict expectations for the Church or themselves in the Church don't align with their experience), then revert to tearing down another person's fidelity to the Church from their new location in Secular Humanism.

It seems pretty simple. I assert that many people are implicitly Humanists (numbering more than those who are explicitly Humanist writing as Humanists), anyway, and that many who are explicitly Humanist aren't secular, and that many who are secular aren't dogmatic and disrespectful to those who practice their beliefs in God.

So again, saying that dogmatism is a bad thing in Secular Humanism just seems like a simple attack that few would be offended by solely on face value of saying that it is wrong. Insert William James, Dewey, etc into Google and then the word dogmatism and see what pops up. There is always an effort to purge Humanism of these things from within.

Edited August 29, 2011 by Facsimile 3

[Facsimile 3]

Evil doers beware! How was Israel??

Israel was great! It purged me of my desire to pursue politics in an academic way and kind of bent my mind up.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

Loran,

Furthermore, both Mao and Hitler were slightly demented.

Peace,

-Chris

You think? Lol.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

Israel was great! It purged me of my desire to pursue politics in an academic way and kind of bent my mind up.

I forget, why you went there. School?

[wenglund]

So again, saying that dogmatism is a bad thing in Secular Humanism just seems like a simple attack that few would be offended by solely on face value of saying that it is wrong.

That is, unless one is a dogmatist and thus takes my citicism personally--which may explain Jaybear's hyper-sensitivity to my rather benign comments.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

Edited August 29, 2011 by wenglund

[mfbukowski]

Israel was great! It purged me of my desire to pursue politics in an academic way and kind of bent my mind up.

Well that's good!

A bent mind reaches around the corners better!

[Loran Blood]

Lauren it isn't helpful for your case to throw out bombs like Utilitarianism, Relativism or Pragmatism with no explanation as to what you mean by those loaded words.

I'm sorry, but "Utilitarianism," "Relativism," and "Pragmatism" are "loaded words?" And here all along I thought they were philosophical systems/bodies of belief.

Lauren it isn't helpful for your case to throw out bombs like Utilitarianism, relativism or Pragmatism with no explanation as to what you mean by those loaded words.

Pragmatism is a close relative of utilitarianism, and both contain the same fundamental weakness in that neither can point to any ultimate.

I am truly interested in what you mean by this. As it stands now, your argument is circular, and I'm worried that as you seek to defend the Church throwing these explosive rounds about, you might actually blow your fingers off instead of hitting your target opponent.

I'm not sure where you see the circularity (and its "Loran," not "Lauren" (I'm male)) at this point, as the argument has not yet even been made at any length (although I did expand a bit upon it above). The problem is really quite simple. Pragmatism asserts that it is the effects, or consequences of an act that determine whether it is moral or not. For MIll, the basis for moral choice and ethical values inhered in the higher strata of society and in experts within the social sciences, including, most importantly for him, education. If one wanted a final ground for ethics, morality, and the highest values, one asked or observed the values, attitudes, and tastes of "the best and the brightest." The fundamental problem here should be, at least, fairly (especially from a gospel standpoint) obvious, and that involves I think, at the very least, two key points:

1. If morality is to be grounded in that which is practical (pragmatic) or in that which produces the most happiness for the greatest number and the avoidance of pain/discomfort for the greatest number, then the question immediately arises as to the basis upon which the determinations of just what good consequences ( a pragmatic understanding) actually means, and why they are to be understood as good consequences, and what counts as "happiness" or "suffering" in a utilitarian system. In other words, Pragmatism looks to consequences as the basis of that which is "moral," and in so doing, immediately begs the question of the origin of the value judgements upon which the concept of "good consequences" rests. Pragmatism, in other words, cannot tell us what is good, but only that something understood as good can be brought about by certain means. In like manner, Utilitarianism, by placing the ground of morality in "the greatest good for the greatest number," immediately begs the question of the definition of the term "good."

What should be clear here is that, in both the pragmatic and utilitarian case, the definitions of what counts as a good consequence of a given action, or what constitutes "good," are subject to the time, place, and cultural context within which these philosophical systems arose. As an example, if I see that if I jump into an already overloaded lifeboat, it will capsize and sink, and I refrain from jumping into it, and go down with the ship for the sake of the greater number already in the lifeboat, a number of value systems would see this as commendable. Both Pragmatism and Utilitarianism, having arisen in a western, liberal context, and already infused with many centuries of Judeo-Christian ethical teaching, would see this as comprising moral behavior within that frame of reference. Notice though, that the cultural frame of reference must preexist pragmatic and utilitarian philosophy. They are "hitchhikers" upon the settled assumptions and principles about just what constitutes the good and the virtuous.

However, other value systems would not so behold the understanding of the term "good," or see the same consequences as being of the same value. In a Nazi value system, I may administratively send thousands of Jews to the ovens, and strip them of all their human rights and dignity. Within the perimeters and frame of reference of that value system, a committed Nazi pragmatist could legitimately say that the gas chambers and ovens were "good" because of the racial purification they were bringing to the world, a greater good upon which other "goods" were dependent. A utilitarian Nazi could claim that the ethnic cleansing of the Jews was, indeed, providing long term benefits to both his nation and the world in the sense of delivering the greatest happiness to the greatest number from within that value system.

The value system of Hugh Hefner, and many like him, is wholly oppositional to those of the gospel, from the perspective of the purpose of human sexuality and the relationships between the sexes, but, from within that value system, what a Latter day Saint (or any serious Christian) considers either "good" or "the greatest good among the greatest number" is, for Hefner, inverted. For someone like Nietzsche, it is inverted and then transcended in the "will to power," after the "revaluation of all values." Of what good is a pragmatic or utilitarian ethics to an immoralist except to the degree that they become transmitters of immoralist values?

The problem is, then, that both theses philosophies create, or begin, a regress beyond themselves to the actual core of their determinations as to just what "moral" and "good" means. Both are thoroughly dependent upon preexisting assumptions and settled cultural agreement as to just what a moral action is or is not. Within a different value system, the definitions would change, and both Pragmatism and Utilitarianism could still continue to exist, but as purveyors of very different values and concepts regarding human beings and our relations to one another.

Hence, Pragmatism and Utilitarianism cannot be understood as a basis for a stable ethics, but only as limited carriers or platforms for the ethics and morality of a certain age and society. Hence, both these system kick, as it were, the epistemological and metaphysical can down the road, at which point we must ask, yet again, "What is the ultimate source, or ground, of morality?"

and I'm worried that as you seek to defend the Church throwing these explosive rounds about, you might actually blow your fingers off instead of hitting your target opponent.

I have seen, in this very forum, the attempt to defend the Church from without it, in one case, using postmodern thought, and in another, the present attempt at a syncretistic grafting of secular humanism into the tame olive tree. Both attempts I consider to be, at a minimum, positively Kafkaesque.

Edited August 29, 2011 by Loran Blood

[wenglund]

The problem is really quite simple. Pragmatism asserts that it is the effects, or consequences of an act that determine whether it is moral or not.

As an everyday pragmatist, I would suggest that morals aren't so much determined by results, but rather their value and meaningfulness are confirmed by results. What mostly determines morals for me is revelation.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

Edited August 29, 2011 by wenglund

[Loran Blood]

Loran, Mao may have been a hedonist, but he was not a pure hedonist;

I'm not at all sure what a "pure" hedonist is. Can human beings ever be "pure" in any intellectual or psychological sense?

he was also an ideologue. I think the genocide stemmed from the latter, not from the former.

It stemmed from both in that ideologies of unlimited power, unencumbered hubris, and absolute mortal self sufficiency are closely connected at the outset. Read Hefner's original Playboy Philosophy essay. That's an ideology (which had, indeed, political implications as well as implications for the individual hedonist). This can all be a part of the character of an individual who has little or no power to effect national or world events, but who still expresses these attributes within his own circle of relationships.

Furthermore, both Mao and Hitler were slightly demented. So to assume that they worked out the implications of secularism in a strictly rational manner is, I think, misguided.

I don't know what you mean. They were rationally following the inherent assumptions and premises of the ideas in which they believed. "Demented," in other words, according to what standard?

Another finding of the studies on genocide has been that one of the biggest predictors of genocide is totalitarian government. The more consensual the system of government, the less likely it is that that government will perpetrate mass-murder.

I'd have to agree there.

IMO, this is because an individual is much more likely to act in an evil and irrational manner than an institution with distributed power and checks and balances. One of the great strengths of consensual government is that it promotes compromise and empowers the "median voter," and thus avoids dangerous, irrational extremes.

Well, that's all well and good, but much of that has unraveled around us throughout the West in just a few decades due, not to the presence of totalitarian government, but only to authoritarian government that promotes both ever escalating centralization of power in itself and at the same time an ideology of unlimited, consequence-free radical personal autonomy. That is to say, democracy is just as lethal to the good and the moral, as the totalitarianism that frequently uses it as a vehicle to power.

Edited August 29, 2011 by Loran Blood

[Loran Blood]

As an everyday pragmatist, I would suggest that morals aren't so much determined by results, but rather their value and meaningfulness are confirmed by results. What mostly determines morals for me is revelation.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

Which is precisely my point, in a thimble. The results of "doing good" and loving others can sometimes be abysmal, and over long stretches. I have a wealth of experience within the family into which I married. No good deeds, support, or friendship have ever gone unpunished with this group. I have, nonetheless, continued to represent Christ and the Church to the best of my ability, and have not retaliated against them (though I do not, as a rule, spend any time with them anymore).

As I define morality as "the structural integrity of relationship." and as I also understand myself to be accountable, in an ultimate sense, for my conduct in this life towards others, the consequences of my conduct regarding them is much more centered in my own relationship to my Father in Heaven then in them. That is to say, they may continue to reject my love, and disrespect and abuse me until the very end, but my purpose in leaving them in peace is only secondarily to encourage their own second thoughts. My ultimate goal is:

"to...walk back to the presence of the Father, passing the angels who stand as sentinels...and gain eternal exaltation in spite of earth and h***"

It is far more important, for this task, to known what is right, than to achieve "good" results through specific courses of action, and to center what is right in what appears to "work." Sometimes, no good deed goes unpunished, but Jesus himself could well speak eloquently to that.

Edited August 29, 2011 by Loran Blood

[mfbukowski]

The presumption that Pragmatic morals could result in immoral behavior is really short sighted, and frankly reminds me of the argument that the free market system will always result in the rich pounding the poor into oblivion. The fact is, that that is just bad business. It may work for a little while, but in the long run, it is suicide for a business. Again and again it has been shown that those business which survive show concern for their customers and have good customer service etc.

It's like asserting that rape robbery and pillaging is a "pragmatic" business model. Obviously, it is not. Such a business would not long survive. Armed robbery may work for a while, but I wouldn't plan on it as a career.

There are Pragmatic principles which may be "Pragmatic" but are true for all societies everywhere, which will continue to survive and thrive.

The "Golden Rule" is one of these. A society which does not practice it will fall into oblivion as did the Nazis, the Stalinist Soviet Union and even the Roman Empire.

One can also see this in terms of "social evolution" if one wants to- principles which cause a culture to survive produce- well,- a culture which survives!

There is no more conflict between this idea and the idea that evolution is compatible with the gospel.

Doesn't it stand to reason that Eternal Verities would be also be Eternally Practical?? What's the problem with that?

Because it's an eternal truth it has to be IMPRACTICAL?

Are they true because they are practical or practical because they are true?

Good luck in proving that one!

Edited August 29, 2011 by mfbukowski

[mfbukowski]

Which is precisely my point, in a thimble. The results of "doing good" and loving others can sometimes be abysmal, and over long stretches. I have a wealth of experience within the family into which I married. No good deeds, support, or friendship have ever gone unpunished with this group. I have, nonetheless, continued to represent Christ and the Church to the best of my ability, and have not retaliated against them (though I do not, as a rule, spend any time with them anymore).

As I define morality as "the structural integrity of relationship." and as I also understand myself to be accountable, in an ultimate sense, for my conduct in this life towards others, the consequences of my conduct regarding them is much more centered in my own relationship to my Father in Heaven then in them. That is to say, they may continue to reject my love, and disrespect and abuse me until the very end, but my purpose in leaving them in peace is only secondarily to encourage their own second thoughts. My ultimate goal is:

"to...walk back to the presence of the Father, passing the angels who stand as sentinels...and gain eternal exaltation in spite of earth and h***"

It is far more important, for this task, to known what is right, than to achieve "good" results through specific courses of action, and to center what is right in what appears to "work." Sometimes, no good deed goes unpunished, but Jesus himself could well speak eloquently to that.

The existence of true and practical principles is no guarantee that adversity will cease on the earth or that evil will vanish. We need to see it in the long run, which sound like precisely what you are doing

[Chris Smith]

I'm not at all sure what a "pure" hedonist is. Can human beings ever be "pure" in any intellectual or psychological sense?

Of course not. But as usual, you're missing the point. The point is that the genocides perpetrated by Hitler and Mao did not stem from atheism qua atheism. They stemmed, instead, from individual insanity and a nationalist, racialist ideology that could be held as well by Christians and atheists alike.

I don't know what you mean. They were rationally following the inherent assumptions and premises of the ideas in which they believed. "Demented," in other words, according to what standard?

Demented in terms of their ability to accurately perceive and process reality. Hitler's physician diagnosed him as manic-depressive, and there's also been much speculation that he had early-stage Parkinson's Disease. As for Mao Zedong, he became increasingly erratic in his old age, and historians have speculated that he suffered some sort of brain damage due to drug use. The point being, these are not exactly the best examples of sober, rational thinkers carrying atheism to its logical conclusions. They are, however, prime examples of the dangers of totalitarianism, in which criminally insane extremists can sometimes control the resources of a fully modern superpower.

Well, that's all well and good, but much of that has unraveled around us throughout the West in just a few decades due, not to the presence of totalitarian government, but only to authoritarian government that promotes both ever escalating centralization of power in itself and at the same time an ideology of unlimited, consequence-free radical personal autonomy. That is to say, democracy is just as lethal to the good and the moral, as the totalitarianism that frequently uses it as a vehicle to power.

I'm not particularly interested in discussing politics with you.

Peace,

-Chris

[wenglund]

The existence of true and practical principles is no guarantee that adversity will cease on the earth or that evil will vanish. We need to see it in the long run, which sound like precisely what you are doing

In addition to the excellent points you have made, I think it wise to also look at things as a whole, and on balance. If we focus in on just the thorns of a few presumably failed earthly relationships, we may not rightly notice the roses of successful earthly and heavenly relationships. In other words, if we are going to look at results, it is best to look at the good as well as the bad in determining what "works" or not.

I would suggest that believers in the Church who have reservations about pragmatism, consider the 13th Article of Faith, which essentially summarizes my pragmatic LDS view.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[Loran Blood]

The presumption that Pragmatic morals could result in immoral behavior is really short sighted, and frankly reminds me of the argument that the free market system will always result in the rich pounding the poor into oblivion. The fact is, that that is just bad business.

Pounding the poor into oblivion is, indeed, "bad business," but it really goes far beyond that. The consumer and the producer are, in essence, the same people. Hence, to produce is to consume, and vice versa. It seems a bit of an apples and oranges stretch here, mf, to use this analogy. LDS (and all interested in revealed religion and the life of the spirit) want to know what is right, and what its absolute ground is. Pragmatism can only carry and disseminate already existing cultural assumptions and norms, but it cannot generate them. The same is true with utilitarian ethics.

There are Pragmatic principles which may be "Pragmatic" but are true for all societies everywhere, which will continue to survive and thrive.

The "Golden Rule" is one of these. A society which does not practice it will fall into oblivion as did the Nazis, the Stalinist Soviet Union and even the Roman Empire.

The Nazis fell into oblivion because they lost WWII, the outcome of which was quite open to question in the first few years of the war. By the mid-eighties, the Soviet Union, directly or indirectly through client states, proxy military forces, and political/economic alliances, was in the process of literally surrounding the United States and the NATO nations. A look at a map of the world showing those parts of the earth under Soviet/communist influence is nothing less than startling. That empire, with was the antithesis of the Golden Rule, lasted nearly a century, and the ideology that inspired and produced those societies lives on still. Sparta, a nation at who's height was based on an ideology of conquest and militarism, went on far long than either Nazi Germany or international communism. The Aztecs carried on with their own conquest, bloodletting, and human sacrifice for quite sometime.

The Mongol hordes fell into oblivion eventually, yes, but only after a very long run of conquest and rapine, based hardly upon the Golden Rule.

One can also see this in terms of "social evolution" if one wants to- principles which cause a culture to survive produce- well,- a culture which survives!

Not a single human civilization has ever "survived." Not a one. Can you name one?

There is no more conflict between this idea and the idea that evolution is compatible with the gospel.

I see no relation between them whatsoever.

Doesn't it stand to reason that Eternal Verities would be also be Eternally Practical?? What's the problem with that?

Nothing, but the problem with pragmatism is that one of its entire points was to displace absolute standards of right and wrong based in revelation and eternal verities with relative standards of effects or "utility." You don't seem to have grasped my point yet that any such system is itself only viable to the degree that it drags already preexisting moral sentiments and norms along with it. It cannot be a source of morality, but only a culturally bound interpreter.

In many cases, doing "the right thing" brings pain, suffering, and deeply negative effects, from the perspective of the individual undergoing such sacrifice or suffering. If many more others are helped by such sacrifice, one can always point to this and say, "See, it worked. Hence, it was moral." The problem is that, as a culture and its core values change, pragmatism has no alternative but to simply follow those trends. It cannot "raise a warning voice" and "cry repentance" as it has, itself, no ultimate ground.

When Lenin put vast numbers of his own countrymen in gulags during his "red terror" or simply murdered them outright, as "counterrevolutionaries," he was acting upon an alternative value system that does not recognize the Golden Rule. A pragmatic Lenin would say that in doing so, although many suffered, they were "class enemies" who had to be removed so that a glorious, utopian future could ultimately be realized. If such was really the case - if a glorious utopian future for mankind could actually be realized, and the murder of millions of human beings was the price that must be paid, upon what basis could the gulags and fireings squads be criticized in a "pragmatic" sense, especially in a world without God (and hence, without ultimate standards) governed only by economic and social (base and superstructure) forces?

Because it's an eternal truth it has to be IMPRACTICAL?

If you are married, have children who love and depend upon you, and have a good job, and you commit a very heinous, serious crime, in which you victimize others, is it practical to admit to the crime and be placed in prison for a long period, in which your wife and children are denied their breadwinner, husband and father? Is it practical, from an economic standpoint, relative to the support of your family? is it practical, from the emotional and psychological support that will be withdrawn from them while you serve your sentence? Is is practical from the standpoint that the experience may psychologically scar or destroy you in the process of accounting for your crime, not to mention having a permanent criminal record that employers will be able to look at when considering hiring you?

Or is it right to confess to the crime and account for your behavior? Are your victims not entitled to justice? From a pragmatic perspective, and depending upon either your individual moral philosophy or that of your society, this question does not have a clear, settled answer. This is part of the basis of the entire postmodern worldview. Only in revelation and in the absolute standards of the gospel, as revealed to human beings through prophets throughout time, can a settled standard be arrived at.

Are they true because they are practical or practical because they are true?

They are true because they are true. They may be deeply impractical (like Abraham's call to sacrifice Issiac), but they remain true all the same.

Good luck in proving that one!

I don't need to, as I see the question as involving a false dichotomy.

[Loran Blood]

Of course not. But as usual, you're missing the point. The point is that the genocides perpetrated by Hitler and Mao did not stem from atheism qua atheism. They stemmed, instead, from individual insanity and a nationalist, racialist ideology that could be held as well by Christians and atheists alike.

I don't buy into this for several primary reasons, the first of which is that there is not a shred of evidence to support the contention that Hitler or Mao (or some others of similar bent) were in any clinical, psychological sense, insane. The insanity explanation for the behavior of these people has long been the favorite retreat for cynical, secularist moderns deeply threatened by the concept of radical evil. Secondly, atheism qua atheism removes any and all barriers to radical evil, even though it does not prescribe it overtly. Atheism is a sufficient condition for radical evil of all kinds, even if not a direct incitement to it in all cases. It is both enough and "the perfect storm."

Secondly, Christians cannot hold to such ideologies without having first abandoned Christianity in any serious, normative sense. The genocides and totalitarian slave states of the 20th centuries were not the results of insane individuals, but of deeply evil individuals following evil ideas out to their logical and conceptual conclusion in a rational, calculating manner. Individual Christians can be evil, and hold to evil ideologies in a process of doublethink within their own Christian context, but deep conflict ensues here. The atheist can choose good or evil, and hold to any ideology he pleases, just as the Christian can, but with a very salient difference: for the Christian, that ideology represents an foreign body invading healthy tissues. There is an inherent conflict that can only be resolved by either abandoning the anti-Christian belief or by repressing the conflict psychologically. For the atheist, no such conflict is necessary. Atheism qua atheism will support any ideology whatever, even if the indiviudal atheist, due to other philsophcail tendencies, will not.

Demented in terms of their ability to accurately perceive and process reality. Hitler's physician diagnosed him as manic-depressive, and there's also been much speculation that he had early-stage Parkinson's Disease.

Any number of people are manic-depressive and still function. Calling manic depression, or bipolar disorder "insanity," is a bit of a stretch, in any case, as is questioning Hitler's ability to "accurately process reality" (to what extent, along what dimensions, affecting what mental processes?). There appears to be no doubt that he know exactly what he was doing, and why, until the very end. He became reckless and was consumed with hubris, but so are numerous others. Are all such "insane?" The core of your own argument here belies the tendency among secular humanists to discount the reality of evil and place all bad behavior, especially the most radical, into medicalized, therapeutic categories borrowed from psychiatry and psychology, while avoiding the existential threat to their own worldview posed by the existence of "good and evil."

As for Mao Zedong, he became increasingly erratic in his old age, and historians have speculated that he suffered some sort of brain damage due to drug use.

Naked speculation and factless conjecture in search of an argument, it would seem.

The point being, these are not exactly the best examples of sober, rational thinkers carrying atheism to its logical conclusions. They are, however, prime examples of the dangers of totalitarianism, in which criminally insane extremists can sometimes control the resources of a fully modern superpower.

If you would like to actually adduce a serious argument showing that either Hitler or Mao were "insane" in any clinical sense, and not rational, calculating planners and executors of their own wills and ideological visions, please do.

I'm not particularly interested in discussing politics with you.

Wise decision.

Edited August 29, 2011 by Loran Blood

[mfbukowski]

In addition to the excellent points you have made, I think it wise to also look at things as a whole, and on balance. If we focus in on just the thorns of a few presumably failed earthly relationships, we may not rightly notice the roses of successful earthly and heavenly relationships. In other words, if we are going to look at results, it is best to look at the good as well as the bad in determining what "works" or not.

I would suggest that believers in the Church who have reservations about pragmatism, consider the 13th Article of Faith, which essentially summarizes my pragmatic LDS view.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

Thanks

Having joined the church as an adult, I always feel a little embarrassed by the fact that I never memorized the articles of faith- and tend to miss their "gemological value"!

[Loran Blood]

The point being, these are not exactly the best examples of sober, rational thinkers carrying atheism to its logical conclusions.

Atheism, carried to its logical conclusion, means only that, as a matter of boundaries and inherent limitations upon human behavior, everything and anything is permitted and acceptable providing a society evolves toward a tolerance and/or acceptance of those things and they are accepted by a critical mass of that society.

Atheism, as it by definition destroys the possibility of absolutes in matters of morality, opens wide the gates. No individual atheist need go through them, but that is not because atheism qua atheism does not invite him.

Edited August 29, 2011 by Loran Blood

[Loran Blood]

Wade said:

As an everyday pragmatist, I would suggest that morals aren't so much determined by results, but rather their value and meaningfulness are confirmed by results.

I think that moves close to what I'm trying to argue here, and which I've expressed by saying that while pragmatism can express the good, it cannot be its source. It cannot generate the basis of morality. It cannot be the foundation itself.

My other criticisms, regarding the degree to which, because of this, pragmatism must follow cultural change and cannot ground a society in perennial standards (constancy amid change, as President Kimball once phrased it), are closely connected to this.

Edited August 30, 2011 by Loran Blood