plaetton:


I say it because I have not witnessed it.
If you one, and an exception, then good for you.
That is still 1 out of millions.

Or would you prefer that I call you a liar just like you have been calling me?

Reading through your posts, I think you are very observant. You talk of a category of people, one that is "innately" bad. I a think you know what your talking of. So am curious. Where do you fall? And all those righteous things you practice, do you adhere to them "innately" too?

Bidam:
So what's your yardstick for judging others who do no such thing. You claim you have quality virtues and you are more righteous than them.
Ok, have you had tendencies to steal?
So what's your parameter for judging some fellow who do no such thing?
Have you had tendencies to cheat?
I know we are talking about your quality virtues that can even be surpassed by a Buddhist monk.
You are yet to prove it here since you slept with peoples wives. What do you think the man who you slept with his wife would feel? What do you think the lady who you used and dump like a sack of potatoes would feel?
For me it does, it killed my pride and pious approach to life.
If that's your definition of Christianity then you have been feeding on the wrong information my brother.

Please o,

Where did I say that I had slept with people's wives
What I said was that I had sleep with many women before I decided in a choice of a wife.
Pls correct that.

I have no regrets and no apologies for that.

You still refuse to get my point.
A typical Christian would either pretend and deny this basic human tendencies, or would delude himself that skydaddy has forgiven him.

muafrika:
Do you seriously do all that? Am curious.

Yes.
Being good is actually easier without the yolk of religion.

plaetton:

Yes.
Being good is actually easier without the yolk of religion.

Are you also innately good/Moral, Or does your mind have a different set of morals?

muafrika:
Are you also innately good/Moral, Or does your mind have a different set of morals?

I am not sure I understand your question.

I am innately cognizant of what is good and what is bad. Good is the promotion of social harmony. I have empathy, which allows me to put myself in another person situation at any time.
So, I don't know if that is what you call innately good.

plaetton:


I am not sure I understand your question.

I am innately cognizant of what is good and what is bad. Good is the promotion of social harmony. I have empathy, which allows me to put myself in another person situation at any time.
So, I don't know if that is what you call innately good.

Well, you said you have never seen religion transform someone who was innately bad. I agree with you. There are people who can destroy you while smiling with you. And not just in church. There are people born with so much darkness inside that the light of good cannot shine through them.

So innately, are you bad or good. Empathy is part of it. Cognizance does not always traslate to positive action. Am asking because I haven't seen many people who are so confident in their "goodness," especially without God. So, is your will equally moral? Is this light shining from the deepest part of your heart?

muafrika:


So innately, are you bad or good. Empathy is part of it. Cognizance does not always traslate to positive action. Am asking because I haven't seen many people who are so confident in their "goodness," especially without God. So, is your will equally moral? Is this light shining from the deepest part of your heart?

Goodness has nothing to do with God. Many people that do not subscribe to your own version of God or subscribe to a different version of another God have been shown to be good. The God idea itself can be shown to be bad. Majority of the actions taken by God in the bible are bad.

dalaman:


Goodness has nothing to do with God. Many people that do not subscribe to your own version of God or subscribe to a different version of another God have been shown to be good. The God idea itself can be shown to be bad. Majority of the actions taken by God in the bible are bad.

So, you believe many people are good. At least plaetton is suspicious of most of them, Christian or not. If thats what you really believe am convinced we have a lost sheep here. You must be more Godly than you are aware of.

If God created both good and evil, shouldn't He project both?

muafrika:

So, you believe many people are good. At least plaetton is suspicious of most of them, Christian or not. If thats what you really believe am convinced we have a lost sheep here. You must be more Godly than you are aware of.

If God created both good and evil, shouldn't He project both?

Many people do good and bad things. Some people are born naturally evil, psychopaths have been shown to be born that way, their brains are physically different from that of normal human beings, brain scans have shown that they lack some connecting centers in their brains as such they lack empathy, fear, remorse and pity. They kill, cheat, rape and hurt others without feeling anything. They have no conscience like the normal human being and yet they were born that way. Psychopathy is now seen as a mental illness and scientist are trying to find a cure for it.

Good or bad has nothing to do with God, it is human function. What is considered to be good by someones God is also considered to be bad by another person's God. You can not point to any God projecting any God or bad. Only humans project good or bad based on what their societies consider to be good or bad. God has nothing to do with goodness or badness since God is a human idea and construct.

@dalaman
I wonder how ever they will cure a lack of empathy and pity.

Some of these are rare virtues, (like peace of mind, for which entire populations are on anti-depressants,) and are hard to find once they are lost. The drugs will just create a new addiction problem.

Have you noted how morals of the society change with change in the phylosophy of the reigning political system and not necessarily with time? Some of the things that surprise us now may not have happened in the preceding age but did in the age before. Its also geographical in variability, which of course translates to race, ethnicity and more specifically, bloodline.

Just pointing out the vulnerability of the world here. Every person on it has his own place. It is not as idealistic as it looks. Those who can see, the elites, manipulate and use the rest to gain advantage. And they use the same old age realities that secretly apportion the earth to us differently.

muafrika:
@dalaman
I wonder how ever they will cure a lack of empathy and pity.

Some of these are rare virtues, (like peace of mind, for which entire populations are on anti-depressants,) and are hard to find once they are lost. The drugs will just create a new addiction problem.

Have you noted how morals of the society change with change in the phylosophy of the reigning political system and not necessarily with time? Some of the things that surprise us now may not have happened in the preceding age but did in the age before. Its also geographical in variability, which of course translates to race, ethnicity and more specifically, bloodline.

Just pointing out the vulnerability of the world here. Every person on it has his own place. It is not as idealistic as it looks. Those who can see, the elites, manipulate and use the rest to gain advantage. And they use the same old age realities that secretly apportion the earth to us differently.

Scientist are trying different options, parts of the nerve endings that rely messages to the parts of the brain responsible for fear, emotions and feelings generally are absent or not well connected in the brains of psychopaths. If something can be made to connect them some scientist feel that the problem can be solved. I agree with the second part of what you wrote. That to me is more reason as to why morality has nothing to do with God. It is a man made concept that has nothing to do with God, people create moral principles and use God as an enforcing mechanism as mazaje will say.

dalaman:


Scientist are trying different options, parts of the nerve endings that rely messages to the parts of the brain responsible for fear, emotions and feelings generally are absent or not well connected in the brains of psychopaths. If something can be made to connect them some scientist feel that the problem can be solved. I agree with the second part of what you wrote. That to me is more reason as to why morality has nothing to do with God. It is a man made concept that has nothing to do with God, people create moral principles and use God as an enforcing mechanism as mazaje will say.

Aside from the presence or absence of God, why do we need these morals. Better yet, why do we need laws? Why do I have to pledge allegiance to a small confine called a country? Why all the economic, political and social systems that we serve more than they serve us?

Why don't freedom include the freedom to chat our way through life without any coercion, for whatever purpose?

muafrika:
Aside from the presence or absence of God, why do we need these morals. Better yet, why do we need laws? Why do I have to pledge allegiance to a small confine called a country? Why all the economic, political and social systems that we serve more than they serve us?

Why don't freedom include the freedom to chat our way through life without any coercion, for whatever purpose?

We do that because we want to avoid living in a chaotic society.Without law and order there will be chaos and every body will eventually lose out even the strong. With rules, regulations and enforcement we avoid such quagmire.

dalaman:


We do that because we want to avoid living in a chaotic society.Without law and order there will be chaos and every body will eventually lose out even the strong. With rules, regulations and enforcement we avoid such quagmire.

Don't you think that with the current arrangement, the strong are absolutely fleecing the weak?

muafrika:
Don't you think that with the current arrangement, the strong are absolutely fleecing the weak?

Sure they are, but not in all societies. The societies where there is equal distribution of wealth, rights, privileges, and.opportunities are much better than those without.

dalaman:


Sure they are, but not in all societies. The societies where there is equal distribution of wealth, rights, privileges, and.opportunities are much better than those without.

I don't know. My opinion of this whole Human Rights cherade is poor. One minute you have a group of people plundering the earth for their own satisfaction, and in the next, when they have established their control over the same, they sit again and come up with the idea of Human Rights. I think it is a fallacy created to protect a mischief.

Opportunities may make things better, but does the status quo really change?

Lets take the US, the land of opportunity(thanks to our mines, e.t.c) There, 1% of the population control the wealth of the rest of the population. Out of that tiny 1% is a further 1% that bankrolls the rest of the group. This scenario prevails in the rest of the society.

Is it a case of my suffering being better than anothers? Why are we settled on that?

Interesting thread.

ok

dalaman:
I realized I was always giving christianity the benefit of doubt, even when it clearly failed I still found myself actually making things up, spinning things, or out-rightly telling lies just to rationalize and justify thing because I truly believed or wanted to believe. I just decided to stop giving faith the benefit of doubt and allow it to prove it's self if it's actually true. It has never proven it self and I stopped believing. Right now I consider my self to be some one that is on a journey.