Ihedinobi:

Such things as are measurable by the five senses.

The five senses don't measure X-rays, magnetism, radio waves, electrons and many other phenomena.

Logicboy03:


smh

Okay. I will try google then.

thehomer:

The five senses don't measure X-rays, magnetism, radio waves, electrons and many other phenomena.

Going to check those articles out to see what your "physical" means then.

We'll get to my views later.

thehomer:

The five senses don't measure X-rays, magnetism, radio waves, electrons and many other phenomena.

Directly or indirectly through machines, you can measure and perceive these things with your five senses . . .

Uyi Iredia:

That's a possibility I would consider if I were strapped with another human in an extremely isolated place, at the peak of my limit to go on without food or water. You are also inanely ignoring artificial constraints such as laws against the act. The option is even shown less logical when I consider that there are other sources of food readily available.

Che.. Limit the foolishness, pls. You are ignoring just about EVERYTHING.

My point is those laws are there despite you yourself admitting it's perfectly logical in some situations, like the bolded, yes? It is still VERY illegal and considered morally bad even in those situations, why? Because of the VALUE most of us place on human life, a value that need not be logical*.


I have no idea what sort of mental block some of you here have. It's usually related to gods, I know. My point is very, very simple. Your motivation, goals, desires etc dictate your values. Your values dictate morality. Especially not logic. Logic is just a tool you use to achieve your aims, simple. Lower animals do not have logic/reasoning skills of note like you would have us to believe, else pls do show us an animal explaining why it took such and such action. They act on instinct, little to no thought involved, yet they have their own rudimentary moral codes, yes? In fact, that's why the op uses them as an example in his misguided attack on materialism, yes?

Random, skip the rest if you wish, not really relevant;
As for this thread in general, now, we humans tend to value human life more than others, we place a very high premium on it. This is not necessarily logical. Look around, we're the greatest scourge this planet has ever seen. We ought to have killed off more species than any other extinction level event by now. We are a vile, VILE species (you disagree? I give you...well, human history...read up), yet most of us go around entitled, assuming we're extra special and good, and this entire, ginourmous universe was custom built, just very special just right just for special just us.

Please, we won the lottery, attained intelligence, that's ALL (usual materialist's stance).

Op's whole argument is built more or else around this, thus the question of why we value human life more than other animal life. Humans are simply animals, a particularly nefarious bunch no less, arguably the worst ever. So why place more value on human life than on other animal life? That's not logical, is it?

Ignore society and it's effects, ignore the standards of most society's morality. If we were being strictly logical, materialists perhaps should push for the position of valuing all life equally, ie assuming there's nothing particularly special about humans to a materialist. For instance, when you examine what humanity has achieved and balance it with the mayhem it's caused you can possibly see the case for this view (and I do actually, but like I said, I'm a hypocrite, for one, other animals taste too good). Basically, logically speaking, why put such a premium on humans? We're animals, we act like animals (albeit more intelligently), so why so special? Why different rules? (Again, ignore practical effects related to what the populace thinks).

Most people think they are ordained by a 'higher power' (DOG!) to assign a higher value to 'spirit' lives, which supposedly we humans qualify as. Obvious rubbish, but they at least use it to justify why they assign more value to human life. So again, the question here is what is the materialist's excuse?

As has been pointed out to both you and the op for the n'th time, morals DO NOT derive from logic. Again, VALUES. Simple. We value human life more than others, each and everyone of us who has this stance for whatever personal (read: subjective) reasons. For all who place this value on human life, other human life helps us achieve our personal objectives, whatever they may be. Trivial $hit, I want to watch the CL Finals yearly, make sure high quality pron is always available, etc. To more basic, fundamental stuff; food in stomach, family concerns, etc. All these are things I VALUE. Without them I FEEL like $hit. Note the word FEEL. Same with other animals @uyi, they might not be able to compute or reason like us, but they FEEL hungry, then react. Feel h.orny, then react. Etc, etc.

One could deceive himself into thinking that respect for human life need be ordained by a 'higher power', that this is the only option. THIS IS PATENTLY FOO.LISH. Peel off all the layers, our moral codes are dictated by our values, simple. Hence, if I stop valuing life? Suicide. I value 72 virgins in the next life more than my current life and the lives of a few victims? Suicide bomber. Etc, etc, etc. All these 'evil' things now become 'good' to you, see? Your logic used as a tool to achieve an objective, but the objective is based around your values, or what makes you FEEL good.

Everyone has his/her own convictions. So what of a materialist? NOT necessarily linked to morals, and I've stated this repeatedly. However, he would place a rather high value/respect on/for life generally, moreso than most religious people actually, as he doesn't place any value on any life other than these ones. No spirits, no next lives, etc. Hence you hear all the talk about you have only one life to live, live it well and try to do the best for humanity, etc.

Consider when you combine these views with being say a humanist, which note, does indeed directly say something about your values and morals unlike materialism, then one would also place a high value on the potential of what humans can achieve, and thereby award them much more respect than say a religionist, whose ultimate focus is - god. You could say humanists worship humanity (or at least its potential), and want to see it progress as far as is possible, unleash all that potential we piss all over. There's a saying that's something like 'within everyone is the potential to move mountains', that sort of optimism is to be found often in humanists. Not so with most religious, everything is contingent on.....gods. Look at muslims eg, hold back half the population (women), why? Because god. Look at xtians, deny people's happiness (homosexuals) why? Because god. Etc etc. You're not going to find many secular humanists affording santa that much respect, no sir.

Anyways, tldr; Your values determine your moral code, not logic.




*btw, general trend is if in such a situation, assuming the victim was at death's door and you can show that, actually is you usually don't get convicted when tried (arguing with @LB actually made me look it up sometime ago, don't tell him he may have been right though). However, in such situations people usually consider the act a necessary evil. Still evil, but unavoidable. Some would even consider it good. As with all things morality, it depends on who you ask and what he values, see?

EDITS

^^^^^^^^
I believe that this thread has been effectively ended with the above post by Wiegraf. Splendid!!! There are some other avenues that remain unexplored but I won't go into them cos I believe that how a thread ends is very important and a post like Wiegraf's above should be one of the last few on this thread. It would have been last, but alas I've just ruined that.

Anyhoo, RIP 'Basis of Morality' thread.

^^^ Sorry, that post, with every respect to dear wiegraf, was meaningless, illogical rambling. In fairness, to him, he confessed as much before so saying. Random thoughts whithout any logical construct, thought development, direction, conclusion or pith of meaning whatsoever.

That post could only be a delight to one such as yourself, who delights in the art of the vague, the meaningless, and the science of saying and concluding nothing, every-time.

I have a different turn of mind. Whether you agree or disagree with what I say, I like to have said something, rather than always being the "neither here nor there-ish", "tend to-ish", "bias for-ish," "cannot know anything-ish" sort - or meaninglessness, which should only exist in outer space and not within the committee of the living, the purposeful, the sentient, the sapient.

As for death, the thread died long long ago, when the likes of thehomer and wiegraf refused to see kindergarten contradictions such as non material considerations for materialists and being an animal, but being evil for acting as all animals do. Everything that has been said afterwards were merely epitaphs on the thread. . . --->

Deep Sight:
What a waste of time.

“But the new rebel is a skeptic, and will not entirely trust anything. He has no loyalty; therefore he can never be really a revolutionist. And the fact that he doubts everything really gets in his way when he wants to denounce anything. For all denunciation implies a moral doctrine of some kind; and the modern revolutionist doubts not only the institution he denounces, but the doctrine by which he denounces it. . . .

As a politician, he will cry out that war is a waste of life, and then, as a philosopher, that all life is waste of time. A Russian pessimist will denounce a policeman for killing a peasant, and then prove by the highest philosophical principles that the peasant ought to have killed himself. . . .

The man of this school goes first to a political meeting, where he complains that savages are treated as if they were beasts; then he takes his hat and umbrella and goes on to a scientific meeting, where he proves that they practically are beasts.

In short, the modern revolutionist, being an infinite skeptic, is always engaged in undermining his own mines. In his book on politics he attacks men for trampling on morality; in his book on ethics he attacks morality for trampling on men.

Therefore the modern man in revolt has become practically useless for all purposes of revolt. By rebelling against everything he has lost his right to rebel against anything.”

― G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

RIP indeed.

Or better said - Shikena.

wiegraf:

Che.. Limit the foolishness, pls. You are ignoring just about EVERYTHING.

My point is those laws are there despite you yourself admitting it's perfectly logical in some situations, like the bolded, yes? It is still VERY illegal and considered morally bad even in those situations, why? Because of the VALUE most of us place on human life, a value that need not be logical*.


I have no idea what sort of mental block some of you here have. It's usually related to gods, I know. My point is very, very simple. Your motivation, goals, desires etc dictate your values. Your values dictate morality. Especially not logic. Logic is just a tool you use to achieve your aims, simple. Lower animals do not have logic/reasoning skills of note like you would have us to believe, else pls do show us an animal explaining why it took such and such action. They act on instinct, little to no thought involved, yet they have their own rudimentary moral codes, yes? In fact, that's why the op uses them as an example in his misguided attack on materialism, yes?

Random, skip the rest if you wish, not really relevant;
As for this thread in general, now, we humans tend to value human life more than others, we place a very high premium on it. This is not necessarily logical. Look around, we're the greatest scourge this planet has ever seen. We ought to have killed off more species than any other extinction level event by now. We are a vile, VILE species (you disagree? I give you...well, human history...read up), yet most of us go around entitled, assuming we're extra special and good, and this entire, ginourmous universe was custom built, just very special just right just for special just us.

Please, we won the lottery, attained intelligence, that's ALL (usual materialist's stance).

Op's whole argument is built more or else around this, thus the question of why we value human life more than other animal life. Humans are simply animals, a particularly nefarious bunch no less, arguably the worst ever. So why place more value on human life than on other animal life? That's not logical, is it?

Ignore society and it's effects, ignore the standards of most society's morality. If we were being strictly logical, materialists perhaps should push for the position of valuing all life equally, ie assuming there's nothing particularly special about humans to a materialist. For instance, when you examine what humanity has achieved and balance it with the mayhem it's caused you can possibly see the case for this view (and I do actually, but like I said, I'm a hypocrite, for one, other animals taste too good). Basically, logically speaking, why put such a premium on humans? We're animals, we act like animals (albeit more intelligently), so why so special? Why different rules? (Again, ignore practical effects related to what the populace thinks).

Most people think they are ordained by a 'higher power' (DOG!) to assign a higher value to 'spirit' lives, which supposedly we humans qualify as. Obvious rubbish, but they at least use it to justify why they assign more value to human life. So again, the question here is what is the materialist's excuse?

As has been pointed out to both you and the op for the n'th time, morals DO NOT derive from logic. Again, VALUES. Simple. We value human life more than others, each and everyone of us who has this stance for whatever personal (read: subjective) reasons. For all who place this value on human life, other human life helps us achieve our personal objectives, whatever they may be. Trivial $hit, I want to watch the CL Finals yearly, make sure high quality pron is always available, etc. To more basic, fundamental stuff; food in stomach, family concerns, etc. All these are things I VALUE. Without them I FEEL like $hit. Note the word FEEL. Same with other animals @uyi, they might not be able to compute or reason like us, but they FEEL hungry, then react. Feel h.orny, then react. Etc, etc.

One could deceive himself into thinking that respect for human life need be ordained by a 'higher power', that this is the only option. THIS IS PATENTLY FOO.LISH. Peel off all the layers, our moral codes are dictated by our values, simple. Hence, if I stop valuing life? Suicide. I value 72 virgins in the next life more than my current life and the lives of a few victims? Suicide bomber. Etc, etc, etc. All these 'evil' things now become 'good' to you, see? Your logic used as a tool to achieve an objective, but the objective is based around your values, or what makes you FEEL good.

Everyone has his/her own convictions. So what of a materialist? NOT necessarily linked to morals, and I've stated this repeatedly. However, he would place a rather high value/respect on/for life generally, moreso than most religious people actually, as he doesn't place any value on any life other than these ones. No spirits, no next lives, etc. Hence you hear all the talk about you have only one life to live, live it well and try to do the best for humanity, etc.

Consider when you combine these views with being say a humanist, which note, does indeed directly say something about your values and morals unlike materialism, then one would also place a high value on the potential of what humans can achieve, and thereby award them much more respect than say a religionist, whose ultimate focus is - god. You could say humanists worship humanity (or at least its potential), and want to see it progress as far as is possible, unleash all that potential we piss all over. There's a saying that's something like 'within everyone is the potential to move mountains', that sort of optimism is to be found often in humanists. Not so with most religious, everything is contingent on.....gods. Look at muslims eg, hold back half the population (women), why? Because god. Look at xtians, deny people's happiness (homosexuals) why? Because god. Etc etc. You're not going to find many secular humanists affording santa that much respect, no sir.

Anyways, tldr; Your values determine your moral code, not logic.




*btw, general trend is if in such a situation, assuming the victim was at death's door and you can show that, actually is you usually don't get convicted when tried (arguing with @LB actually made me look it up sometime ago, don't tell him he may have been right though). However, in such situations people usually consider the act a necessary evil. Still evil, but unavoidable. Some would even consider it good. As with all things morality, it depends on who you ask and what he values, see?

EDITS

Sorry but I insist on this being the Last word.

^^^ And so shall it be! : I am off to open a thread on cruelty to animals, and have someone explain to me whats wrong or right with it as a concept. You are welcome with your thoughts, but please if its the usual "we cannot know anything-ish" stuff you have on offer: don't bother - consider that already heard and noted, and even "not known for sure" either - since of course, all permutations in eternity are not known.

Ciao.

Deep Sight: ^^^ Sorry, that post, with every respect to dear wiegraf, was meaningless, illogical rambling. In fairness, to him, he confessed as much before so saying. Random thoughts whithout any logical construct, thought development, direction, conclusion or pith of meaning whatsoever.

That post could only be a delight to one such as yourself, who delights in the art of the vague, the meaningless, and the science of saying and concluding nothing, every-time.

I have a different turn of mind. Whether you agree or disagree with what I say, I like to have said something, rather than always being the "neither here nor there-ish", "tend to-ish", "bias for-ish," "cannot know anything-ish" sort - or meaninglessness, which should only exist in outer space and not within the committee of the living, the purposeful, the sentient, the sapient.

As for death, the thread died long long ago, when the likes of thehomer and wiegraf refused to see kindergarten contradictions such as non material considerations for materialists and being an animal, but being evil for acting as all animals do. Everything that has been said afterwards were merely epitaphs on the thread. . . --->

DOHOHOHOHO

You're not alone, seems I have trouble getting through to a few folk. My bahdt (not saying I'm going to be doing much about it though, so I'm not really sorry).

A somewhat abridged version. Materialism says nought (well, nothing directly) about your morality. It doesn't say you should respect human life more. Then again, it doesn't say you should respect human life less either. Just like it doesn't insist you marry 4 wives, or roast babies. It doesn't say you should worship the sun because you believe it is made of matter. Not sure how you're drawing conclusions like these, perhaps you are looking for dogma somewhere? You might have well just opened an 'Atheism is A Religion' thread. So yes, waste of time. I can only hope you weren't trolling.

Something like Humanism on the other hand is a little more involved...

Ooh, yeah, more random of sorts. The pastor is correct about most of what he's said, it's just something most ignore. It's similar to how an atheist might tell you he is fully sure no gods, but when asked to give a number he'd say 99.999^. You cannot fully know anything, for practical reasons I just ignore this though.

And I'll let this die now...

wiegraf: Ooh, yeah, more random of sorts. The pastor is correct about most of what he's said

Sorry, I am not aware that the Pastor said anything on this thread. The Pastor is very taciturn and I have rarely seen him say anything since 2009 when I joined this forum. He is more comfortable dithering this way and that and arriving at nothingness. I would challenge the Pastor to shew just one conclusion on any subject he has ever made on this forum. It doesnt exist. Maybe it is laudable humility and he is leaving it to God to make the conclusions.

wiegraf:

DOHOHOHOHO

You're not alone, seems I have trouble getting through to a few folk. My bahdt (not saying I'm going to be doing much about it though, so I'm not really sorry).

A somewhat abridged version. Materialism says nought (well, nothing directly) about your morality. It doesn't say you should respect human life more. Then again, it doesn't say you should respect human life less either. Just like it doesn't insist you marry 4 wives, or roast babies. It doesn't say you should worship the sun because you believe it is made of matter. Not sure how you're drawing conclusions like these, perhaps you are looking for dogma somewhere? You might have well just opened an 'Atheism is A Religion' thread. So yes, waste of time. I can only hope you weren't trolling.

Something like Humanism on the other hand is a little more involved...

Now this is disgraceful, and shows how terribly and disastrously you missed the premises. Meet me on the cruelty to animals thread and maybe we can knock our brains together a bit further for fun.

Laterz.

THE INDISPENSABLE TRUTH FOR TODAY !!! (2 COR. 4:6-17; MATT. 16:24-27) http://credoexperience..com/2014/07/the-indispensable-truth-for-today-2-cor.html