A number of people in my comments are claiming that PZ Myers is perfectly justified because some nuthatches sent him death threats. Other commenters are questioning whether he really got as many death threats as he claimed.
Last item first: jesus, who cares? One death threat is one death threat too many.
First last: So the argument is that it's okay, when someone does something awful, to find someone else who agrees with him about something and urinate on their shoes at a fundraiser?
Desecrating a communion wafer because Bill Donohue is an officious jerk is like paining swastikas on the tombstones of a Jewish cemetery because Abe Foxman said something that pissed you off. Your action will, to be sure, upset the jerk public figure. It will also outrage millions of his co-religionists who have done nothing to you. That no one has been physically hurt by your actions is the defense of a toddler.
Generally entertaining posts, but you've GOT to proofread your posts! Two typos in the title of this post alone... This is not the only one with such problems.
Lost my glasses yesterday. Supposed to pick up the new ones today . . .
Hmm. Wouldn't it seem more likely to serve as an example of how ridiculously malicious that figure's opponents are? Wouldn't the figure thus potentially welcome a publicity stunt drawing attention to his cause?
Hyperbole: It's what's for breakfast! =)
The self-righteous hubris behind the idea of taking action against someone else's sacred symbols is disturbing. It amounts to faith-based vigilanteism.
Evidently Ms. McArdle doesn't have children, or she would have chosen a different metaphor. Toddlers are big believers in magical thinking, and would consider saying something mean, or spanking someone else's doll, or whatever, to be much more serious than biting them. The "no physical harm" argument is a staple of adolescents and intellectuals who never grew up past 16.
Desecrating a communion wafer because Bill Donohue is an officious jerk is like paining swastikas on the tombstones of a Jewish cemetery because Abe Foxman said something that pissed you off.
Um, no. No it's not. As you say in your post above, context matters, and there's a context to defacing Jewish cemeteries with swastikas that's more akin to cross burning than to defaming the host.
Which is not to say that PZ isn't behaving like a jackass, which he most certainly is.
When I first saw the typos, I thought they were satirical statement about the typical level of intelligence of those commenting on the matter.
Though "commyunion" is an interesting one, since it's a phoneticism, rather than an apparent typo. I'm quite sure MM knows how to spell "communion." I guess she could have hit both the "y" and the "u" key, but typos are typically either transposed letters or incorrect letters, not extra letters.
Ok, I think by analyzing typos, I've officially crossed into self-parody, so I'll quit.
A thought experiment, suitable for Philosophy 101:
A, unobserved, steals a consecrated host, desecrates it in some horrible way without anyone seeing, never tells anyone about it.
B announces in a forum read by millions that he has done what A did. In fact he has not done any such thing.
Should either (or both) of these actions be punishable, either criminally or civilly? Does either or both offend your personal code of morality? If both, which is worse, or are they equally reprehensible? Discuss.
Has he, in fact, gotten even one death threat that can be proved to have come from a member of the group he is having so much fun mocking?
According to one of the comment threads over there, a woman was fired from 1-800-FLOWERS because a threatening e-mail came from her computer.
She contends someone else (maybe her husband?) actually sent the e-mail, so she was fired for not following computer security rules. I don't know what connection either of them have to the Catholic League or the Church.
Interesting that this is the person to suffer a material consequence from these events.
I don't believe that Megan is arguing for criminal penalties here - if she believed they were called for, I'm sure she'd make it known.
Civil penalties (from a legal point of view)...while MAYBE you could make an argument from some point involving property rights in the original wafer and a social contract involved in passing it on, I don't think it is relevant.
SOCIAL penalties, on the other hand....if somebody openly behaves offensively, you can (a) support that behavior or you can (b) censure it. You can (a) support them and egg them on. Or you can (b) let the jerk know that their social standing has just plummeted.
Megan went with (b). I'll go with (b) myself.
And as the roac scenario goes, I don't think legal penalties of any kind are called for here, aside from the STEALING, which should be uncontroversial. Let's modify the scenario so the host was legally acquired.
Then in case A, the "perpetrator" is harmlessly indulging some personal fetish. I'd still have a drink with them.
In case B, the "non-perpetrator" is being a jerk. Not acceptable.
The scenario depends on the milieu, though. A similar offense where it is ACTUALLY PUNISHABLE, say in the Europe of the Inquisition, would be brave (but foolish).
When Rosa Parks rudely violated the law and the customs by not taking her seat in the "appropriate" place on the bus, she was NOT being a jerk. Legitimate protest.
And before the Myers acolytes come here asserting that Catholics believing in the sacredness of the Eucharist is no different from whites believing the front seat of the bus is white-only territory, it's worth noting that a a bus seat is a public accomodation.
If we Catholics wanted to claim that the left lane of the highway was sacred space reserved for Christian believers and that their its by non-believers was an offensive sacrilege, it would be unreasonable to expect others to indulge it. The same would be true if Catholics marked their territory by placing consecrated hosts on the highway.
It is quite a different thing to claim that a consercrated host that is only available by attending a Catholic Mass, and then stating "Amen" to the proposition that it is the Body of Christ, should be treated with reverence.
Nobody had to go out of their way to avoid desecrating the Eucharist.
So what you're saying is that what you find offensive, is offensive, while what you don't find offensive, isn't? To a Catholic, PZ Myers is presuming to TAKE THE BODY OF JESUS AND DESECRATE IT. There is, in fact, a context for desecrating the Host, and it is not a happy one. I think it's pitiful that one has to explain to adults that sacreligious behavior is not okay just because some member of a religion has offended you.
I'm not religious--I have no dog in this fight. But I generally try to avoid outraging people just to enjoy their pain.
JohnMcG, you are not taking into account the context. But I am glad you agree that the sacred highway lane is ridiculous. That is the problem, you see. Religious people impose their beliefs on the rest of us all the time via the agency of government. You think that the Eucharist should not be desecrated? Fine. I agree - as long as Catholics do not try to restrict access to abortion. As long as morning after pills are freely available to all women. As long as agitation against equal rights for gays is curtailed. As long as opposition to teaching evolution in schools is absolutely curtailed. As long as this nonsense about a 'Christian Nation' is dropped, and that an unofficial litmus test for high office is whether or not he publically professes to be a religious man.
Dan got it in one on the last thread.
"Desecrating a communion wafer because Bill Donohue is an officious jerk is like paining swastikas on the tombstones of a Jewish cemetery because Abe Foxman said something that pissed you off."
Since Bill Donohue and Abe Foxman are equally officious jerks, I think we can deduce from your silly analogy that you think that desecrating a communion wafer is just like "paining [sic]" swastikas on Jewish tombstones. This is another way of saying your analogy is moronic.
Can you say 'differential outrage'? I knew you could. There's certainly enough of it going on in this blog - as you very well know.
As long as we don't agitate against slavery and for civil rights and against torture, too, right?
I also agree that when a Catholic argues against abortion, "my faith says it's wrong" will not do as an argument. And, in fact, it doesn't. And you don't find Catholics arguing for laws banning the sale of meat on Fridays.
But that a Catholic as a belief informed by his faith, such that all persons should be protected by the law, it is perfectly legitimate for us to influence the government to make that happen.
So what's the difference then between a Catholic whose belief that one lane is sacred only to Catholics is 'informed by his faith'? You've just said that was _not_ legitimate. How do you distinguish between the two?
Actually, painting swastikas on jewish graves IS analogous to desecrating a consecrated host. Idiot.
freddiemac--
Are you serious? The reason the host is accorded any respect by anyone is because Catholics respect it as a matter of faith. If they didn't believe it was the body of Jesus, it would, to them, simply be a cracker. No faith or respect of faith is required to respect people's graves. Moreover, no respect of any Jewish beliefs is required to respect the fact that swastikas are inherently offensive to Jewish people, because, ya know, 6 million of them died.
rick,
I am serious. In both cases, no one was actually harmed. No one got hurt. A gravestone is just a piece of rock. The eucharist is just some grain. There isn't anything special about a grave except to those who hold some sort of spiritual beliefs about death. Which is no different than holding spiritual beliefs about communion wafers. Why don't you get it?
How do you distinguish between the two?
If the point can be argued without an appeal to faith. If it is possible for someone to hold the position without holding the faith.
Catholic morality teaches that stealing is wrong, and this is part of the criminal law. Is this is intolerable intrusion of religion on the public sphere? No, because the prohibition on stealing can be defended on entirely secular grounds, and in this case, has been accepted by secular society.
In the case of something like abortion, the case against it rests on two claims:
* The unborn child is a person.
* With few exceptions, all killing of persons ought to be illegal.
Neither of these are religious claims. It is true that the first claim enjoys greater acceptance among Christians than non-Christians, but it is not dependent on religious faith. And it is perfectly legitimate for Christians to try to move public opinion in this direction.
That being said, I am increasingly uncomfortable with the pro-life strategy of sneaking in "our kind of judges" on the Supreme Court to overturn Roe.
The argument for meatless Fridays is that Christians should set aside for penance for their sins. This is complete nonsense to non-believers, since it assumes the presence of a God to whom this is owed, and it would thus be unreasonable for Catholics to expect secular society to accommadate this.
You've just said that was _not_ legitimate. How do you distinguish between the two?
If the person can make a reasonable secular argument for the law then it's legitimate. If they can only say "That's God's Law" then it's not. Quick example, lets take one of the ten commandments "Thou shalt not lie"
If you lie to your wife about a dress making her look fat, then the law doesn't apply. There's really only a morality/religious reason you wouldn't lie here. However, you aren't allowed to defraud somebody (such as promising to do X for Y, then not doing X). You also aren't allowed to lie to police officers or when under oath. The not lying has a basis in religion for many, but there are also strong secular arguments for why lying under oath is punishable by law.
"There isn't anything special about a grave except to those who hold some sort of spiritual beliefs about death."
No. I hold not spiritual beliefs about death, yet I would be really pissed off if someone desecrated by family's grave, as I am sure the vest majority of people would be too.
"Which is no different than holding spiritual beliefs about communion wafers."
Again, no. Respect for the dead is something universal to all cultures. Beliefs about communion wafers have nothing to do with the basic cycle of life, or anything relating to a common humanity. It is simply a man made dogma.
Moreover, painting a swastika on a Jewish person' front door is inherently offensive, but one doesn't need to have any preexisting respect for doors or peoples homes to find it as such.
"Respect for the dead is something universal to all cultures. Beliefs about communion wafers have nothing to do with the basic cycle of life, or anything relating to a common humanity. It is simply a man made dogma."
Is respect for the dead universal to all cultures? I'd like to see some proof of that. It seems that it is true of many religious people, but since we are making this an argument about religious beliefs, then the point still stands. Respect for the dead is simply a man made dogma. It is a religious belief, so it isn't really any different than communion wafers. Dead bodies are just piles of amino acids, there is nothing inherently special about them. Moreover, we were talking about a piece of rock with words carved on them. What is inherently more special about a rock than bread?
"Moreover, painting a swastika on a Jewish person' front door is inherently offensive, but one doesn't need to have any preexisting respect for doors or peoples homes to find it as such."
Now you're just changing the course of the argument. This is a red herring and will be addressed no further.
Why is religion the last acceptable refuge of you can't say/do that pc-ism?
It's just that, with all the recent stories about fake victims (some of them much, much worse than this, with folks actually physically harming themselves to simulate an assault), surely someone was bound to ask for evidence.
No. I hold not spiritual beliefs about death, yet I would be really pissed off if someone desecrated by family's grave, as I am sure the vest majority of people would be too.
So, since you are an unbeliever, you get to set the bar for everybody? If you as an unbeliever thinks something is offensive, then your offense is obviously rationally grounded and is worthy of respect, but if you don't hold it, then all bets are off? Everything to one side of your threshold is offensive, everything on the other side is acceptable and worthy of support?
Moreover, painting a swastika on a Jewish person' front door is inherently offensive, but one doesn't need to have any preexisting respect for doors or peoples homes to find it as such.
No, but one does need to have a preexisting association with the swastika. Painting the same symbol on a Jewish door in 1908 would have been simple and puzzling vandalism, not "inherently offensive."
"Respect for the dead is simply a man made dogma. It is a religious belief, so it isn't really any different than communion wafers."
Respect for the dead isn't solely a religious belief, in the same way that being against murder isn't solely a religious belief.
SoV,
Can you provide us all with a valid set of motivations for votes and political opinions? I am awfully confused here. I had always assumed that not being able to see into the hear t of another person, we had no right to say whether their opinion is valid.
Murder is a violation of the victim's autonomy and an obvious violation of rights. To be against it requires no belief about the sacredness of life.
A corpse is rotting meat and bone - no more no less. That it carries more significance than a side of beef is cultural, and essential religious dogma.
I have not the slightest doubt this is true, but note you haven't explained why this is the case. After a long enough interval, a corpse isn't even a "lump of cells" any more.
"Dead bodies are just piles of amino acids, there is nothing inherently special about them."
So the next time a loved-one of yours dies, you'll just throw his or her body in the garbage (supposing that there were no laws against doing such a thing)?
I really hope you're just playing devil's advocate here.
Related question: Is it okay to misspell blog titles to get back at Mr. Clippy if schoolmarms find your "descreation" of English offensive?
Interesting how the discussion of the use of the word formerly known euphemistally as the n-word seems to have gone in a different direction. I guess the acceptability of gratuitous offense depends on the group to be offended.
Interesting thing to bring up. In olden days of barbarism, "our" tribe's enemies were subhuman, and therefore not deserving of any particular respect, living or dead.
To a Catholic, PZ Myers is presuming to TAKE THE BODY OF JESUS AND DESECRATE IT.
I'm not Catholic, but I thought the wafer is not actually the body of Christ until a certain rite is performed, at which time it transsubstantiates. Until then, it's just a wafer, right?
Please do correct me if I am misinformed on this point. In particular, what's "consecrated" mean?
Ziggy,
Just the miracle of transubstantiation transforms the bread and wine into the body and the blood. Myers was looking for consecrated host, which is the host after the miracle has occurred.
"Myers was looking for consecrated host, which is the host after the miracle has occurred."
He'll be looking forever.
Why is religion the last acceptable refuge of you can't say/do that pc-ism?
It's not. See the adjacent thread about the "n-word".
No, John, the first one _is_ a religious claim(In fact, various groups - religious groups, I might add - keep trying to insert the provision of personhood for the fetus all the time. Moreover, if the Church, Catholic or otherwise, _really_ thought abortion was an act of murder, they'd be pushing for legislation to criminally prosecute women who have abortions.
You also shouldn't be taking offense at all to what Myers is doing, he's an unbeliever, right? What Catholics think about the matter is immaterial, it's an opinion that flows only from their religious beliefs. You _are_ making that argument, are you not?
'nuff said.
So how about this? We'll prevail upon Myers to stop trying to 'desecrate' your bits of bread (and btw, just what does this 'desecration' supposedly consists of? Do you even really know?), and you stop trying to restrict a woman's right to choose. Deal?
If Bears really thought communion wafers were just crackers, he wouldn't make a big hairy deal of stealing them.
I mean, unless that's his thing. Has he put a bounty on saltines and triscuits, too?
Funny that, but at least one person refuses to acknowledge the truth of that statement. Do you acknowledge that death threats have been made?
Myers, I mean. I can never keep PZ Myers and NZ Bears straight.
"So the next time a loved-one of yours dies, you'll just throw his or her body in the garbage (supposing that there were no laws against doing such a thing)?"
In Hindu culture, the bodies of the dead are immolated and the ashes are usually dumped in a river. In Catholic and some other Christian cultures, immolation of the dead is prohibited. In some Christian cultures it is ok to immolate the dead body, but the ashes are revered. To the Hindu, the dead body is just a husk, the soul of the dead person has already left to be reincarnated into a new form. For many Christians, the dead body represents a person who is sleeping (not technically, but spiritually) waiting until the parousia to be reawakened. St. Paul speaks of bodily ressurections, which is where much of Occidental culture developed its grave worship. To the ancient Romans, burying the dead was rather abhorrent (they preferred immolation). So indeed, not all cultures have such reverence for cadavers and graves. Not every culture buries their dead. Such a point of view is cultural, and has its origins in religious beliefs. It has nothing to do with "nature" or the "circle of life". So Megan was right.
To answer your question, I'll probably follow the wishes of the loved ones who die, though more than likely I won't have a choice as there are more "macs" out there than freddie. If I leave a large enough endowment, I'd prefer my lifeless cadaver to be shot into the sun via a cannon, but that may not happen without some sort of corporate sponsorship a la Hunter S. Thompson.
What constitutes proper treatment of the dead is culturally determined. This was demonstrated way back in the 5th century BC by Herodotus, who described one tribe that ritually ate their dead and another who burned them: Each was shocked beyond imagining on hearing of the practice of the other.
Another instance (courtesy of Tony Hillerman's detective novels) is that the Navajo regard the dead solely as a powerful source of (supernatural) contamination, to be disposed of as hurriedly as possible, preferably by a non-Navajo. While other Native American groups may processed the bones of their ancestors into sacred relics.
No, John, the first one _is_ a religious claim
On what grounds do you assert that fetal personhood must, always and everywhere, be grounded in religion? The fetus has, at a fairly early stage, its own DNA, its own heartbeat, and its own neural activity; most of the characteristics of, say, a surgery patient under anesthesia whose breathing and bloodflow are controlled by machines. I presume that bursting into operating rooms and shooting the guy on the table can safely be outlawed without upsetting your theocracy detector.
Anti-theocrats would be wise to tread more lightly than they do; plenty of people argue for government welfare on the grounds that Jesus commanded us to help the poor, or for gun control on the grounds the Old Testament forbids the keeping of a vicious dog. It would be awfully convenient for me to get those sorts of laws chucked on First Amendment grounds.
I believe cremation is frowned upon by the Catholic Church, but is not barred entirely.
Can I still support restrictions on abortion if I am not Catholic? How about not Christian? How about non-religious? What if I am a Buddhist? What if I am a secular biologist that thinks that life begins when a full DNA profile exists and artificial termination of that life deserves contemplation and caution?
Since you refused to answer my questions above, I am really at a loss as to what basis I am allowed to make political decisions on...
Good points, Freddiemac, even down to personal preferences.
Also part of our culture are those individuals who expressly will that their mortal remains be donated to science for med school autopsies or for the sake of helping solve murders and such. I guess it's something not entirely unlike a Desecrate Me movement: Take my body, please!
Skullberg,
I think SOV's suggestion is that you should just crawl into a cave and be quiet. If you can't grasp that opposition to abortion can only be based on illegimate religious reasons, you are clearly an idiot.
Further to Freddiemac: And the Parsis, living among the Hindus, expose their dead to be eaten by vultures. Burning corpses is unthinkable to them -- not because it is disrespectful to the corpse, but because it is disrespectful to fire, which is a deity.
No deal, assuming that what you mean by the euphemism of "to restrict a woman's right to choose" is the continuance of the current legal regime of abortion.
No, John, the first one _is_ a religious claim(In fact, various groups - religious groups, I might add - keep trying to insert the provision of personhood for the fetus all the time.
That a religious group makes a claim and attempts to assert it does not make it a religous claim. Religous people were on both sides of the war debate, and were probably in part motivated by their faith; that doesn't mean either side was a purely religious position that was illegitimate. Both religious and non religious people have positions on when life begins and is worthy of legal protection.
We still have to win the argument, which in the case of abortion we have failed to do. But that is separate from whether it is legitimate to even make the argument.
I am making the argument that it is not legitimate for religious people to demand that the civil law reflect the specific practices of their religion. That I can't eat meat on Friday doesn't mean you can't.
I don't have the right to demand that everybody get out of my way as I walk down the sidewalk, but I do have a right to object to someone coming into my house to punch me in the nose. That is what Dr. Myers is proposing. He has to go out of his way (or solicit others to go out of their way) to carry out this stunt. We don't take consercrated hosts out in public and demand that non-believers respect them.
I don't have a firm position on whether such stunts ought to be legal, but I am quite comfortable that they should be socially stigmatized by believers and non-believers alike.
But, freddiemac, all those burrial practices, rituals. For Hindus the closest relative of the dead lites the funeral pyre, & the ashes are scattered in a sacred river (according to the Library of Congress).
I'm unaware of any culture that sees a body (at least a body of one of its own) as nothing but a pile of amino acids. Don't confuse different treatments of a dead body with the kind of disregard for a dead body that you've been flirting with.
Perhaps SOV is unaware that there are atheists who also are trying to restrict a woman's right to choose. Also, as a matter of logic, one can believe that a fetus or feritilized egg is a form of human life deserving legal protection, while also concluding that women who obtain abortion should not be legally prosecuted. I oppose abortion regulation, but there is nothing about favoring such regulation which requires religous belief.
Doing things which provide great offense to others, not because one believes that doing that thing, like seeking legislation which prohibits abortion, is ethically required, but, rather, because doing that thing, like desecrating the host, only because it does provide offense, is something that only a jackass would do. Worse than that, it's boring for the rest of us; nothing is more tedious than someone trying to be shocking.
Of course at least one threat was made, we have independent confirmation that it exists, know the name of the person in question, have reports about what computer he used and the consequences the the person whose computer it was. But the question was never about that, it was about PZ's earlier claim of having received multiple threats. Did I miss where some actual evidence of this was introduced? If so, sorry for my inattention.
This debate is just ridiculous! There is nothing whatsoever wrong about desicrating a cracker. PZ is not doing anything except challenging the absurdity and illogic of the church's "symbolic" rituals. The religious resort to symbolism because they cannot explain their position with logic or evidence of their supernatural/irrational belief system.
PZ's pointing this out "symbolically" just shows how reason and humor should triumph over wishful thinking.
Of course religious death threats are nothing new. But I have yet to hear an atheist like myself ever do such a thing.
Grow up and think Megan! You do it well in the economic sphere, why would you take offense at something like PZ's pointing out the irrationality of religious symbolism?
SoV -
"No, John, [the unborn child is a person] _is_ a religious claim."
That's irrelevant SoV. Religion makes many claims that are also accepted by non-religious people and vice-versa. Stealing is wrong. It is also not true that only religious people make the claim that abortion is wrong. The Hippocratic oath, followed by Western doctors in some form for longer than Christianity has existed, specifically forbids performing abortions.
Grow up and think Megan! You do it well in the economic sphere, why would you take offense at something like PZ's pointing out the irrationality of religious symbolism?
If Dr. Myers is as brilliant as he says he is, he ought to be able to construct a persuasive argument that would convince everyone how silly Catholics are.
No, instead he's doing the equivalent of stealing our baby doll, ripping its head off, and laughing as we cry over a "stupid doll", as if that proves anything.
It's childish and stupid, and has no place in adult discourse.
> So what you're saying is that what you find
> offensive, is offensive, while what you don't
> find offensive, isn't?
Probably a good idea to address somebody by name, or pseudonym. It doesn't OBVIOUSLY seem to apply to JohnMcG (who hadn't said there was anything he found inoffensive), so I am guessing it applies to me.
I'm saying that what ANYBODY finds offensive is offensive to THEM (although perhaps not to me), and the cost of that offensiveness has to be weighed against whatever benefits the offending action confers.
In the case under discussion, benefits appear miniscule and outrage is great....seems a no-brainer for things to put on your don't-do list.
Some lawyers resort to pseudo-rational claptrap to obscure the truth that they don't have the slightest notion of how to behave in civil society. Luckily, most people, by the time they are in middle school, have figured out that being well mannered is it's own reward.
Never under-estimate the value of ego-stroking to a elf-righteous jackass narcissist like Myers. Methinks the benefits to him and his acolytes is fairly large - though you should note - he doesn't offer to desecrate a Koran. Care to guess why - it starts with 'C' and ends with 'oward'
Jens,
I agree with your assessment.
I was addressing rick's argument (quoted immediately above) that since he is non-religious and finds the vandalism of headstones offesnsive, that is sufficient to socially stigmatize headstone desecration. But because only religious people find Dr. Myers's stunt offensive, it should not be condemned.
I tend not to inlcude names in my comments, in part to make it clear that I am addressing arguments, not people. Brilliant, decent people are capable of making idiotic arguments, and vice versa.
"he doesn't offer to desecrate a Koran."
Maybe thats because he lives in America and the predominant religion is Christianity, not Islam.
SoV seems to believe it is OK to gratuitously and intentionally cause offense to someone's personal beliefs, unless they agree not to act on those beliefs in any way. You think airlines should serve halal meals? Excuse me while I flush this Koran. You want tighter border security? Someone find me a flag to burn!
"Of course religious death threats are nothing new. But I have yet to hear an atheist like myself ever do such a thing."
You've never heard of an atheist making a death threat?
rick,
Then why is he going after a minority religion here? Catholics make up less than a quarter of the population and less than a third of all Christians in America. Protestants don't place any sacred value on the host that I know of.
If he wanted to upset Christians instead of Catholics, he'd target them all, not a minority sect.
JohnMcG,
I was wondering who (or, for that matter, what argument) MEGAN was addressing - your comment was between mine and hers (which I quoted), but did not seem obviously related to it.
Nothing you said really seemed to REQUIRE a name, but Megan's comment started with "You" - and it was not clear to me from concept whom she was addressing.
Religion is just one aspect of culture, and gravestones have significance both within and beyond the religious context.
Generally, defiling the American (or pick the country of your choice) flag would not be considered a religious issue, but would still be offensive. I wouldn't be likely to count somebody that did that among my buddies - UNLESS they had a strong reason that required it, such as protesting an unconstitutional law that prohibitied it.
Jens -- Thanks -- sorry I was confused. The quoted piece looked like something I had written, and then I saw my handle afterward and thought you were addressing me, but now I see it was from Megan's post.
I, too, was unsure whom she was addressing with that.
A number of people in my comments are claiming that PZ Myers is perfectly justified because some nuthatches sent him death threats. Other commenters are questioning whether he really got as many death threats as he claimed.
.
Last item first: jesus, who cares? One death threat is one death threat too many.
I think there is some relevance to the number of death threats.
If the original perpetrator (it wasn't Myers) received a dozen death threats, that is really no different than one. One or a dozen, it is neither acceptable, nor does it justify Myers bizarre behavior. On the other hand, if he received 1,000 death threats from American Catholics, that might indicate a serious problem with that group. It would actually justify Myers' stunt. It would be an "I'm Spartacus" gesture.
However, I can't believe he got more than a handful of threats. I was raised Catholic. I learned about transubstantiation at age 7, and stayed in the Church until I was 18. I never met a single Catholic who said they believed in it other than priests and nuns.
Megan,
To a Catholic, PZ Myers is presuming to TAKE THE BODY OF JESUS AND DESECRATE IT.
I DON'T CARE. IT'S STILL JUST A FRIGGIN' WAFER. The more you express your "outrage" at what Myers is proposing to do, the more I want him to do it.
Your equating Myers' idea to the desecration of Jewish graves with swastikas is even more silly than your equating it yesterday to urinating on someone's shoes. Six million Jews were killed by the Nazis in living memory. Painting swastikas on Jewish tombstones implies the endorsement of an act of genocide. If you really think what Myers is doing is remotely comparable to that, I think you've lost all perspective on the matter.
I would add that I think you vastly overestimate the degree to which modern American Catholics assent to the doctrines of the Catholic Church. Given that they routinely ignore all sorts of teachings that the Church claims to be of central importance, especially those relating to sex, reproduction and marriage, and that their theological views seem to differ considerably from orthodox Catholic teaching (I wonder how many contemporary American Catholics really believe that unrepentant mortal sinners burn in Hell for all eternity, for example), I suspect that Myers' act of "desecration" would be very much less offensive to the American Catholic community in general than you're making it out to be. The ones who are jumping up and down about it are the professional mediawhore Catholics (Donohue and company) who are always looking for an excuse to be "outraged" by something or other someone says or does regarding the Catholic Church.
Atheist communist rulers only made good on death, minus the threats.
Mixner, could you explain why you want someone to offend other people, for no other reason than to give offense? This seems every bit as irrational as believing that a wafer has become the something other than a wafer.
JohnMcG,
In the case of something like abortion, the case against it rests on two claims:
* The unborn child is a person.
* With few exceptions, all killing of persons ought to be illegal.
Neither of these are religious claims. It is true that the first claim enjoys greater acceptance among Christians than non-Christians, but it is not dependent on religious faith.
The fact that the anti-abortion movement is overwhelmingly dominated by religious individuals and organizations makes the claim that it is motivated by a secular ethic independent of religious doctrines highly implausible, notwithstanding the small number of (nominally) irreligious people involved in the movement.
Not being a Catholic or, for that matter, burdened by any of the other mythologies many hold so dear I was curious to know more about communion wafers.
Surely something so apparently sacred as these must be made under special conditions (is there a catholic equivalent of kosher?) by a few select orders of monks or nuns.
Then carefully, lovingly, sacredly transported and distributed by special emissaries of "The Order of The Wafer" (I'm sure that sounds better in the latin).
Surely this must be the case yes???
Then I saw I can get them here:
http://tinyurl.com/5a3m46
and can have them delivered via UPS for free since I am a Prime member.
My question is - are some of the reviewers comments as insulting and inflammatory as PZ Myers'? These comments have been there for over a year- was there similar outrage back then?
What I want to know and none of the reviewers mentions is - do these wafers taste better with a gallon of Tuscan milk?
Stewie,
Those have not been consecrated - the physical material is not what is special.
Mixner, could you explain why you want someone to offend other people, for no other reason than to give offense?
Since I never said I want that, the premise of your question is flawed.
Has Myers himself even said his sole motive is "to give offense?" Where did he say this? An actual citation to a direct quote, please.
This would be a devastating argument if I had claimed that the anti-abortion movement was motivated by secular independent motivations, and that was a necessary condition for its legitimacy.
Fortunately for me, I made no such claim, just that it is neccesary that such a claim be defensible on secular grounds. That even one irreligious person is involved in the movement is sufficent to demonstrate that this is true for the anti-abortion movement.
stewie,
Feel free to do whatever you want with unconsecrated hosts you order through that website. I won't object. PZ Myers can do the same.
As for consecrated hosts, which actually do have to be consecrated by a priest at Mass, and that we keep locked in a special place in our Churches, I will object if you mess with those.
Dude, switch to decaf or something.
Now you're saying that if the act is offensive to non-Catholic agnostics, it should be performed forthwith, especially if you can deeply offend plenty of true-believing Catholics as collateral damage in the process.
That's sort of coming unhinged.
I think it's pitiful that one has to explain to adults that sacreligious behavior is not okay just because some member of a religion has offended you.
Just as a point of fact, the original post by Myers was about how the kid who originally pulled this stunt received a number of death threats. Also, the Donahue outrage machine was very loudly and publicly clamoring for his expulsion from school. It wasn't just about Bill Donahue giving offense.
Mixner, this poll....
http://www.abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/poll010702.html
....indicates that only about 50% of those who favor restricting abortion do so out of religious belief.
I ordered some, thanks, I actually kind of like the taste.
The wafers are very much like wafers Germans use to bake cookies without needing to grease the pan (the cookies stick to the non-stick wafers which I loved as a snack), and you can do ANYTHING you want with them without offending any normal Catholic.
Until they have been transubstantiated in the Holy Eucharist, they are JUST WAFERS. Once the transubstantiation has occured, they are the body of Christ, and no death threats are needed to defend them from Myers or Satanists, deities should be perfectly capable of defending themselves. A disgusted sneer is quite sufficient.
"The fact that the CIVIL RIGHTS movement was overwhelmingly dominated by religious individuals and organizations makes the claim that it was motivated by a secular ethic independent of religious doctrines highly implausible, notwithstanding the small number of (nominally) irreligious people involved in the movement"
Does this support the idea that Jim Crow should be reintroduced?
MarkG,
Dude, switch to decaf or something.
Dude, the people who need to switch to decaf are the ones who are making such a ridiculous fuss over the destruction of a piece of bread. You, for example.
Now you're saying that if the act is offensive to non-Catholic agnostics, it should be performed forthwith,
No, I didn't say that. But do keep pretending I said things I didn't say and responding to those made-up statements instead of what I actually wrote.
No, Mixner, you said you wanted Myers to do something, because Megan said that the something would outrage her. Assuming that Megan's outrage does not provide you some sort of measurable benefit, your desire is every bit as irrational as anything Catholics believe. Stop being so crazy, will 'ya, 'ya ol' irrational worshipper of rationality , you!?
If it is not clear to Dr. Myers at this point that he is giving offense, then he is a moron.
So, the most charitable interpretation of events is either that Dr. Myers is a moron, or he is OK with giving offense as collateral damage in exposing Bill Donoahue as a blowhard, which, as we know, is a stunning intellectual challenge.
Mixner provides a shining example of how there is no irrationality quite like the irrational advocacy of rationality.
Can you provide us all with a valid set of motivations for votes and political opinions?
People can vote and agitate based on their religious beliefs all they want. They can form whatever opinions they want and lobby for whichever laws they want. The point is that if they do choose to bring their religion into the political arena, they can no longer claim that it is off limits for public debate, including whether the specific claims made by their religion are true or not. That's the point I'm trying to get across at any rate.
Likewise, if Bill Donahue endlessly bloviates about how P.Z. Myers should be fired and this kid from Florida should be expelled, if people start sending death threats (btw, Myer's posted the email from the 1800Flowers lady on his blog, including the SMTP header which readily confirms that the email was sent from a 1800Flowers mail server), then it is perfectly acceptable to respond by pointing out the demonstrable absurdity of the doctrine of transubstantiation. It is important to remember that this isn't just about the giving and receiving of offense, there were threats of violence made and threats to a man's livelihood.
So, the natural response to this is to obtain something that orthodox Catholic beliefs hold sacred under false pretenses, and desecrate it.
Myths about Atheists:
Hitler, Stalin, and Mao Were Not Atheists
Some people claim that Hitler, Stalin, and Mao were atheists, and they were very bad people, therefore atheism is bad (or some equally specious conclusion). One of the biggest problems with that is that none of those people were really atheists.
Hitler will be first because he’s the easiest. In Mein Kampf and later in a speech at the Reichstag he said, "... I am convinced that I am acting as the agent of our Creator. By fighting off the Jews. I am doing the Lord's work." Oh, but he was just using that for rhetorical purposes, he didn’t actually believe it, right? Wrong, he’s also said, "I am now as before a Catholic and will always remain so." (Both from here.)
Hitler was also a staunch creationist, "Human culture and civilization on this continent are inseparably bound up with the presence of the Aryan. If he dies out or declines, the dark veils of an age without culture will again descend on this globe. The undermining of the existence of human culture by the destruction of its bearer seems in the eyes of a folkish philosophy the most execrable crime. Anyone who dares to lay hands on the highest image of the Lord commits sacrilege against the benevolent Creator of this miracle and contributes to the expulsion from paradise." Any claims that Hitler was inspired by Evolution are mere propaganda attempts to make Evolution look bad.
Besides all of this, it’s quite easy to make a really strong case that, if not for Christianity and its irrational hatred of the Jews up until the middle of the Twentieth Century, the Holocaust wouldn’t have happened. Sam Harris does a wonderful job in Chapter 3 of his book, The End of Faith, and there’s plenty available online, such as here. For some perspective on Nazis, here’s a discussion on books they had banned or burned.
Stalin and Mao are a bit tougher to crack, mainly because there’s no quotations attributable to them either way (at least that I can find, if you know of a reliable source for some, feel free to tell me). But most people seem to assume that because they abolished religion, they must be atheists. In fact, they abolished religion so that they could establish cults of personality, and become gods themselves. They did what they needed to in order to get more power, and religion was a rival power source, which is why they abolished it. Stalin actually reinstated the church after Hitler invaded, because he thought it would help him (from here). Religion simply got in their way, and they eliminated anything and anyone that got in their way.
Even if any of these people were atheists, what would it say about atheists or atheism in general? I’ve never heard an atheist make the claim that because Hitler was a Catholic, Catholicism and Catholics are evil, which is exactly the way people use the Stalin/Hitler/Mao/whoever argument. I would contend that it is far easier to manipulate religion and use it for evil than it is for atheism, mainly because religions are actually organized and unite people with a common belief system, while atheism is unorganized and typically disunited. Religion’s potential for evil is therefore greater, but no more necessary than atheism being evil.
However, put up against each other, religion beats atheism by several orders of magnitude in number of people killed. But that’s another story.
Mixner - Re: The fact that the anti-abortion movement is overwhelmingly dominated by religious individuals and organizations makes the claim that it is motivated by a secular ethic independent of religious doctrines highly implausible
Not really.
In any case the issue isn't motivation, its justification. Plenty of people where motivated to oppose slavery and to oppose official segregation/discrimination because of religious reasons. But the opposition itself is not a religious issue. Its not about who you do or should worship (if anyone/anything), or how you should worship them. Its not about paying support for churches, or requiring some religious observance.
If the opposition to slavery, or discrimination, or abortion, or a whole lot of other things, is motivated by religious beliefs it doesn't really matter, in church/state separation terms, and it certainly doesn't provide any reasonable justification for desecration of communion wafers, or similarly obnoxious actions...
SoV - Religious people impose their beliefs on the rest of us all the time via the agency of government.
Just about EVERYONE, except maybe anarchists and possibly totally apolitical people, impose, or try to impose their beliefs on the rest of us via the agency of the government. For example, people think that social security is a good idea, so workers are forced to pay social security taxes. Should people who oppose social security smear excrement on the FDR memorial?
Except, JohnMcG, you're full of crap.
The kid was given the saltine. He is also a Catholic.
Read moar plz.
So, the natural response to this is to obtain something that orthodox Catholic beliefs hold sacred under false pretenses, and desecrate it.
I don't know if it is the natural response, but I think the point of Myer's post and his plea for readers to send him wafers was to argue that the doctrine of transubstantiation itself is demonstrably incorrect.
Stewie,
Yes, the requirements for the wafers and wine are sorta the Catholic equivalent of kosher. The analogy is not perfect, but not bad.
However, BEFORE they are consecrated, there is nothing considered sacred about them. They are just bread. So feel free to order a bunch to see how they taste with Tuscan Milk. Probably not that great, but you don't have to worry about the Pope busting down your door during the middle of your snack.
After they are consecrated, they are indeed sacredly transported and distributed by special emissaries called Eucharistic Ministers.
And the comments on the link are nowhere near as insulting or inflammatory as Doc Meyers. Roman Catholics have been getting the HAR HAR STOOPID CATLICKS TINK BRED IZ JEEEZUS! flak for hundreds of years.
Doc Meyers didn't just threaten to attack a belief. He threatened to attack something held sacred. Big difference.
Does anyone know if PZ has tenure? Because I think he just Frisched himself.
Oh, it's all about me, is it?
I would note that I haven't gotten excited about this subject yet, and I'm not the one who entered this thread SHOUTING, either.
Quoth Mixner: I DON'T CARE. IT'S STILL JUST A FRIGGIN' WAFER. The more you express your "outrage" at what Myers is proposing to do, the more I want him to do it.
Dunno, looks to me like you're in a vengeful mood because people express disagreement with your opinions.
If it's just a friggin' wafer to all but a group of believers, what's the point of making an effort, going out of your way even, to "harm" it symbolically?
Tax Lawyer, that may be the most illogical proof that Stalin and Mao were not atheists that could be concocted. No, neither Stalin or Mao thought it possible that they could become gods, if the term "gods" is thought to be a religious or supernatural description. I'll leave it for others to dig up stuff which indicates that Hitler was an atheist who employed religious rhetoric when he thought it would benefit him.
"If it's just a friggin' wafer to all but a group of believers, what's the point of making an effort, going out of your way even, to "harm" it symbolically?"
Do demonstrate the idiocy of people like Bill Donahue when they go up in arms about AN EFFIN CRACKER
Bobar,
The civil rights movement was not overwhelmingly dominated by religious individuals and organizations. Black churches were important to the movement in the 50s and early 60s because they were at that time the only effective institutions for organizing black Americans into collective political action. Since that time, the relevance of churches to the movement has declined dramatically. The NAACP and most other organizations today concerned with advancing the rights and welfare of racial minorities have almost nothing to do with religion.
The anti-abortion movement, in stark contrast, is overwhelmingly dominated by religious individuals and organizations. Specifically, the Catholic Church and various evangelical protestant sects. And that speaks to the fundamentally religious nature of the belief that all or most abortions are wrong. To the extent that non-religious people are morally troubled by abortion, their concerns tend to relate to abortions taking place later in pregancy (generally, arond the start of the third trimester, when the fetus becomes "viable"), where secular arguments against abortion have more force. The more extreme view that "personhood" begins at fertilization, and that the destruction of a fertilized egg is morally comparable to the killing of an infant, seems to be confined almost entirely to religious people.
The point is that if they do choose to bring their religion into the political arena, they can no longer claim that it is off limits for public debate, including whether the specific claims made by their religion are true or not.
Dan, what is the logical connection between communion wafers and any political question at all?
Clearly, if somebody wants Genesis taught in place of Darwin, he's opened the door to efforts to prove Genesis incorrect as a matter of cosmology, biology, and geology. But I don't see how screaming "You can't really bring down the walls of a city by walking around it, you moron!" has anything to do with the matter.
rick,
Not understanding your post. Are you stating that just because the kid called himself a Catholic, he had a special dispensation to do what he wanted with a consecrated host? Because if you are, you are the one who needs to read more. The teachings of the Roman Catholic Church on this matter are accessible to anyone who knows how to use Google.
And for any budding scientists: Sliding a consecrated host under a microscope and saying "hey, it looks like bread to me" is not going to get you the Nobel Prize. Unless they have started a Nobel Prize for asshattery.
Sorry for the missed tag above.
Right, that's why today's black leaders have absolutely no connection to religion.
Have you been asleep for the last six months?
The anti-abortion movement, in stark contrast, is overwhelmingly dominated by religious individuals and organizations. Specifically, the Catholic Church and various evangelical protestant sects. And that speaks to the fundamentally religious nature of the belief that all or most abortions are wrong. To the extent that non-religious people are morally troubled by abortion, their concerns tend to relate to abortions taking place later in pregancy (generally, arond the start of the third trimester, when the fetus becomes "viable"), where secular arguments against abortion have more force. The more extreme view that "personhood" begins at fertilization, and that the destruction of a fertilized egg is morally comparable to the killing of an infant, seems to be confined almost entirely to religious people.
So opposition to first trimester abortion is religous-based and facially illegitimate, but opposition to late term abortions is OK?
I will acknowlege that arguments against late-term abortions are more convincing than ones against early abortions or emergency contraception. But that wasn't you were saying -- you were saying that arguments against abortion were illegitimate because they were religously motivated.
That a view is "extreme" does not mean it is illegitmate to argue for in the public square. Again, that argument must be won on secular grounds.
Right, that's why today's black leaders have absolutely no connection to religion.
That *is* sarcasm, right? Most black "civil rights leaders" do seem to be religious leaders as well, after all.
And that speaks to the fundamentally religious nature of the belief that all or most abortions are wrong.
Does that make the pro-choice position fundamentally anti-religious, then?
The more rational explanation for why religious groups are at the forefront of the anti-abortion movement is that religious groups already have extensive funding and organizational networks in place; that's what a church is. Why start "Non-Religious People for Life, Inc" when you can just assist one of the existing religious groups in its anti-abortion work instead?
Yes, that was sarcasm.
Well, one reason is that, as this thread illustrates, the pro-life movement's strong ties to religious groups makes it easier to dismiss as a purely religious movement.
It may have been the prudent course in building up numbers; I'm not sure it was prudent in terms of accomplishing political change.
I’ve never heard an atheist make the claim that because Hitler was a Catholic, Catholicism and Catholics are evil
Excuse me? I've heard claims like this made all the time. Atheists commonly talk about how religion has been a cause of major wars in their arguments for why religion shouldn't exist. Or use the X person is religious and crazy, proof of how religious people are crazy. PZ Meyers is using this exact logic when talking about the death threats he received are proof are the evil catholics.
Besides they weren't using as proof that atheists are evil, just that atheists are just as capable of evil.
Mark G,
I would note that I haven't gotten excited about this subject yet, and I'm not the one who entered this thread SHOUTING, either.
Context matters. Try reading the statement from Megan I quoted before my "shouting."
Dunno, looks to me like you're in a vengeful mood
And it looks to me like you're just looking for an excuse to be "offended."
If it's just a friggin' wafer to all but a group of believers, what's the point of making an effort, going out of your way even, to "harm" it symbolically?
The same point of public political protests and parodies and cartoons. To get people's attention. To shake things up. To challenge entrenched ideas and conventions. To communicate strong opinions in a highly visible and public way. It's the same reason opponents of the Vietnam War took to the streets, burned flags, and drew crude political cartoons mocking Nixon and LBJ instead of just writing polite essays calmly explaining why they thought the war was wrong.
Just about EVERYONE, except maybe anarchists and impossible totally apolitical people, impose, or try to impose their beliefs on the rest of us via the agency of the government.
I don't understand why so many believe that this human urge is just dependent on a believe in God. Look across the Atlantic, and you can find countries that e.g. are more restrictive on stem cell research than the US under George Bush although the electorate is far more secular (and don't just point to the UK, more often than not it is an outlier). Or try to grow GM crops or to keep your shop open on a Sunday.
JohnMcG,
Does that make the pro-choice position fundamentally anti-religious, then?
No.
The more rational explanation for why religious groups are at the forefront of the anti-abortion movement is that religious groups already have extensive funding and organizational networks in place; that's what a church is. Why start "Non-Religious People for Life, Inc" when you can just assist one of the existing religious groups in its anti-abortion work instead?
Huh? The vast majority of organized political and social advocacy in the United States is overwhelmingly secular. If there were a large secular movement against abortion, there would be lots of large secular anti-abortion groups too. But there aren't. The anti-abortion movement is overwhelmingly religious. I can't think of a single major figure in the anti-abortion movement who is not clearly and openly religious. This includes both the leaders of the big national anti-abortion groups (the National Right To Life Committee, Operation Rescue, etc,), and the "intellectual" leaders of the movement who sometimes try to devise convoluted "secular" justifications for their position but whose true motives are obviously rooted in their religious beliefs (Robert P. George, Francis Beckwith, etc.). Public protests against abortion also tend to be drenched in religious imagery and behavior: prayer vigils, signs bearing quotes from scripture, images of Jesus or the Pope, and so on. I really think you have be in deep denial to not recognize the overwhelmingly religious character of opposition to abortion.
Last post should have been addressed to Dan, not JohnMcG.
I really think you have be in deep denial to not recognize the overwhelmingly religious character of opposition to abortion.
Well, heaven forfend that I should be in deep denial.
How does the conclusion (desecration of communion wafers is a good idea) follow from the premise (the anti-abortion movement has a religious character).
How does the conclusion (desecration of communion wafers is a good idea) follow from the premise (the anti-abortion movement has a religious character).
You do ask strange questions. Perhaps you could quote the statement where you think I said, or even just suggested, that desecration of communion wafers is a good idea on the grounds that the anti-abortion movement has a religious character.
How does the conclusion (desecration of communion wafers is a good idea) follow from the premise (the anti-abortion movement has a religious character).
You do ask strange questions. Perhaps you could quote the statement where you think I said, or even just suggested, that desecration of communion wafers is a good idea on the grounds that the anti-abortion movement has a religious character.
Well, it's more of a question for the general pro-desecration camp than you in particular. As I understand it, boorish attacks on religion are justified on the grounds that religious believers are trying to impose their views on the rest of us through the legislative process. This effort makes critiques of religion--including vulgar critiques--necessary, or at least socially acceptable.
The desecration of the host is one of these legitimate and valid critiques, and the anti-abortion movement is one of the examples of religious believers imposing theocracy. Hence, I would like a clearer idea of the connection between the two.
Dan and SoV have both explicitly taken this position. If it is not your position, then perhaps you could clarify why you think deliberate offensiveness to the devout is a good idea.
Mixner,
Guess I just don't think of someone else's religious views as long as they're not trying to take my life, liberty or property because their preferred deity gave them explicit instructions to do so.
Tax Lawyer,
Hitler was enamored of Nietzsche claiming to have killed God. In fact, after using religion to gain power, he and Himmler (I think) worked hard to create an Aryan religion by inventing prehistoric artifacts and a cult around his "master race" in the belief that religion was an instrument for subjugation.
Stalin, forced into Georgian religious schools as a child, spent years worth of purges in the Russian Orthodox clergy. Before he "found" religion after the Germans attacked -- also in the Marxist belief that religion was a tool for manipulating people -- most of the Russian churches had been converted into grain silos and whatnot.
I can't say anything to Mao off the top of my head, but it's nearly impossible to claim Hitler and Stalin were religious. Out of their mixtures of narcissism and paranoia, it's hard to conceive of them "believing" in anything but their own infallibility.
As I understand it, boorish attacks on religion are justified on the grounds that religious believers are trying to impose their views on the rest of us through the legislative process.
Different people seem to be have different ideas about why Myers' proposal is justified or proper, so it doesn't make much sense to respond to them as if they are a single monolithic group acting from a single common purpose or motive.
My own view is the one I have explained above, and is not predicated on either death threats to Myers or attempts to impose religion through civil law. I think religion is harmful nonsense and that American culture tends to treat religious nonsense with an absurd degree of deference and accommodation. I generally welcome efforts to challenge this status quo, including Myers' stunt here.
I would add that I think there is considerable hypocrisy and double standards at work in the mentality and behavior of apologists for religion. Minority and unconventional religions like Scientology seem to be considered fair game for "offensive" mockery and attack by many of the same people who adopt this "shocked, SHOCKED" attitude any time anyone dares to make fun of more conventional forms of religious gobbledygook like the Catholic doctrine of transsubstantiation. My view is that it's all nonsense and should be treated as such. If Tom Cruise deserves to be ridiculed for becoming an Operating Thetan Level VII (or whatever it is) in the Church of Scientology, Catholics deserve to be ridiculed for their own equally nonsensical religious beliefs and behaviors.
Of course at least one threat was made, we have independent confirmation that it exists, know the name of the person in question, have reports about what computer he used and the consequences the the person whose computer it was.
So... was the sender of the alleged "death threat" message a member of the group that Myers is having so much fun mocking? And what exactly was the text of the alleged death threat?
I'm just asking. Seems as if it's still unclear.
Heinz - I don't understand why so many believe that this human urge is just dependent on a believe in God.
Many people think this basic human urge is dependent on belief in X, with X equaling anything they dislike and/or want to try to make a rhetorical point against. Sometimes its a genuine belief, other times its just part of their rhetoric.
Mixner - The vast majority of organized political and social advocacy in the United States is overwhelmingly secular.
Majority? Probably. Vast majority? Not unless you have a pretty wide definition of what constitutes vast.
The anti-abortion movement is overwhelmingly religious.
So what? Religious people get to have opinions, get to state them, and get to participate in the political process, just like everyone else.
The fact that religious people are pushing an idea, doesn't make the idea a religious idea.
try to devise convoluted "secular" justifications for their position
There isn't anything convoluted, or inherently religious, in trying to protect human life.
Religious people get to have opinions, get to state them, and get to participate in the political process, just like everyone else.
Of course they get to participate in the political process. But the constitution forbids laws that establish religion. That means, among other things, that all laws must have a secular purpose. And that means a real, valid, bona fide secular purpose. Not a sham secular purpose fabricated as a pretext for a law whose true purpose is religious.
The fact that religious people are pushing an idea, doesn't make the idea a religious idea.
If the people pushing the idea are overwhelmingly religious rather than secular, then it is highly implausible that the idea is secular rather than religious.
My catholic roommate in college once told me about satanists who would take the Eucharist and desecrate it. He was deeply concerned about it. And while there may be a dimension of paranoia in his attitude. There is no excuse for PZ Myers. exploiting it for his own ends.
Mixner,
Skepticism towards religion is something I can relate to. I'm more of a here-and-now type, and less moved by celestial conjecture. But one thing that I have found, is that a lot of hard-edged anti-religion diatribes are way, way overblown. Or have you experienced religious fanaticism personally that fits the anti-arguments?
I grew up deep in Bible Belt country, but I can't say that all of the competing sects have ever done anything to me. In fact, I find their members quite easy to get along with, no matter what I think of their beliefs. And I figure the feeling is mutual to an extent. They've never shown the least bit of interest in my take on whatever they believe. So I say "live and let live" suffices.
Beyond my own life-long penchant for skeptical agnosticism, I have noticed that the religious around here do a helluva a lot of good with their various charitable efforts. My evangelical dentist never tries to "save my soul," but he does spend his summer month-long vacation offering free dental work to poor rural Hondurans for his church. My mother works at her church's weekly charitable kitchen for the poor members of the community.
The worst things I can ever remember any of the local religious groups do to draw criticism was to split from another group in a huff over different interpretations of scripture.
Just because the urbanocentric liberal media has attempted to scare everyone about the supposed turn of the country into an unenlightened, rural theocracy doesn't mean it is so.
Politically, too, you'll find Christian groups on all sides of just about every issue if you pay enough attention.
Free churches in America are a true strength of the country (as opposed to the establishment monoliths you find just about everywhere else).
mixner, can I get mail ok Dec. 25th? Can I go to the DMV? Funny I haven't seen any establishment clause protests about those.
And you have a very special definition of 'establish'
If we're banishing arguments from the public square in a country that has free speech, I think we need a higher standard than, "highly implauisible that it's secular."
To some, the wafer represents the flesh of their god, to others (who know some history) it represents a reminder of the willingness of Christians to torture and kill anyone who might believe something slightly different. Strange how quickly people forget just how much death the Church of Rome has handed out during its 2000 year lifespan. Death to the unbeliever (by burning, boiling, drowning, impalement, etc) was absolutely standard doctrine up until relatively recent times.
Strange how easy it is to forget that Nazi Germany was not the first regime to persecute Jews, they merely employed industrial efficiency to make political mileage out of a longstanding grudge. The Third Reich did not invent Aryanism, they bent an existing device to their own ends by taking earlier studies of European racial groups and emphasizing their own self-importance.
If you want to follow the racial point of view, the struggle between the Semitic races and the "white" Indo-Eurpoeans has been highlighted by generations of Crusades, by Vlad the Impaler, repeated sieges of Constantinople and continuing into the oil-wars of the present day.
If you think that the religious side of things is more significant, then once more it comes back to Rome and European religious intolerance. Regular crackdowns on Jews and heretics including the famous Inquisition (actually, multiple waves of Inquisition). Now that the Jews have some measure of power, they are showing themselves no better by their regular mistreatment of Palestinians so all this proves is people with power and a belief in their own righteousness, will suit themselves -- hardly surprising.
Turning sacred cows into hamburgers is the duty of rational people who don't want to see the intolerance of history repeated. We know how religious people work (just like any political power base works), once they get one concession that becomes leverage to demand the next concession, and the next and the next. Today we mustn't laugh at a dry biscuit, tomorrow we must all cover our heads, next week bare ankles will be beaten with sticks, after that the truly pious must prove their worth by acts of public self-flagellation. Organized religion is a method of systematically getting privilege for a select group that is not available to the wider group, while subjugating the choices of many to the whim of the few.
Okay, I'm proving myself obsessive by now, but one last observation.
My ten-to-fifteen-year experience in Germany taught me what a true establishment church is. First, if you're not actually a member of any church, you have to commit to either the state-approved Catholic or Protestant churches on your tax forms (more recently including the national Judaism and Islam "councils"). Your tithes are taken out of your paychecks as taxes. In return, the "officially recognized" churches get to claim public schools in their name and teach mandatory "religion" classes at each grade. The state funds upkeep on their massive real estate holdings. They even get a slot in the weekly rotation of "Word for Sunday" television slot each Saturday night on public TV, which is itself funded by a per-TV-set surcharge paid to a quasigovernmental "state corporation".
The "official churches" use their influence with top party political officials to ensure their continued existence, meaning that they suppress other sects. The recognized churches toe the party line on StaMoKap-corporatist government in Germany, in fact, and have essentially given the German welfare state a religious justification as it expands "for the good of the poor." The state churches, in return, are fully behind every bleeding-heart, Euro-socialist policy, scriptural arguments in tow.
Getting yourself off of the tithing tax rolls is a time-consuming, arduous process. They really want you to prove you're not hiding in the closet and praying to an unrecognized Scientologist or Jehovah's Witness God or something when they're not looking. Good luck with that.
The brilliance of Jefferson -- whether he knew it or not at the time -- was the establishment clause. It guarantees that people in their natural search for larger answers have a plethora of churches to choose from. And as secular as the real attitude in Europe is, I would say it's only because they lack any competition amongst religions. Even though all countries there guarantee "freedom of religion."
The American experiment of anything-goes religious experience is one helluva lot better than the official non-religion sold in Europe. The latter actually makes life for atheists and agnostics much, much harder.
I use religious in this sense not only to cover official religious doctrine, but also religious in the larger sense of an undecidable question that's been decided upon in the minds of certain people.
So, tell me, Rob, just what is a 'person' anyway? And what is your justification for this? If people can't even agree on the definition, then I think it's pretty safe to say that the position is essentially a religious one.
No. But as someone else as pointed out, when the only thing you have to defend it with is essentially, 'because I say so' or some other authoritarian argument, then it's not really Kosher to impose that belief on other people.
Note that you are perfectly free to vote on whether or not to criminalize abortion, or, for that matter, a resolution that this is a Christian Nation.
What is _not_ acceptable is to do this as a matter of Church ideology. So, no Catholic or Baptist anti-abortion groups. Or rather, they can exist, I suppose, but they definitely lose their status as tax-exempt organizations.
Tel,
Great stuff. Any stories since the founding of America, whose attitude in favor of tolerating multiple religious sects has predominated? All I can think of are that religious bozo John Brown whom we should thank that we don't still wonder whether "chattel" as personal property has human rights, and then there's Dr. King.
Perhaps you could mention nuts like Tim McVeigh or Eric Rudolph, but I'm not aware of any present religious orders in America welcoming them as theological gurus.
You get the sense that the other side knows its losing when it has to resort to mischaracterizing your arguments. No, it's okay to mock and ridicule and intentionally cause offense to other people who continually offend you, who won't leave you alone, and who insist on legislating their personal idiosyncratic beliefs into law, beliefs that you object to and do not wish to follow.
That's really the long and short of it. Stop mucking with abortion. Stop harrasing gays. Stop trying to ban the theory of evolution being taught in school, or other such flim-flammery like this country was founded as a 'Christian' nation or that the founding fathers were Christian (oddly enough, my own personal religious observances seem to be a lot closer to those worthies than say, one JohnMcG - I'm a Unitarian.)
This is nonsensical; your 'claims' have nothing to do with it. May I ask why you think it would? This being America, I don't think it would be too hard to find 'one irreligious person' who would be prepared to argue that one traffic lane should be dedicated to Catholics - on purely secular grounds, of course. Does that mean then, that this is now up for legitimate debate? Of course not.
And again - if you want to make the argument on purely secular grounds, fine. But no organized Church pushing for that legislation. No organized Church funds being used to prop up anti-abortion or anti-gay or anti-evolution groups, etc.
Why didn't you answer the question? I'll repeat it: Has Myers himself even said his sole motive is "to give offense?" Where did he say this? An actual citation to a direct quote, please. An even cursory familiarity with his position is that these people have a ridiculous belief system, and that moreover, these people are trying to code some the systems doctrinal beliefs into law that non-believers would be forced to obey.
If you've got anything different, I'd certainly like to see it.
And was this subjugation of the people a success? Why, yes it was, the people were fully subjugated and willing to believe it was for their own good too. The combination of the carrot of some "official" belief to cling to, plus the stick of painful death to the unbeliever was equally useful to Hitler as it was to Christian Rome, and Islam for that matter (actually, Islam tended to be more tolerant, for a while at least). The exact details of the irrational belief being fed to the populace doesn't much matter.
One big tick for the instrument of subjugation.
And I do believe that Stalin won that war, even when faced with an enemy just as extreme and loony as himself (let's face it, Hitler's Eastern front was the best thing that ever happened to Western Europe -- start with too nutters, finish with only one). The Russian Orthodox church was only too willing to accept their slightly less oppressed position and give their blessing to their new Party overlords, just as Stalin knew they would.
Two big ticks for the instrument of subjugation, and one tick for Marx, for accurate documentation.
I would classify Mao in the realm of "personality cult", but China never had a hierarchical organized religion to be turned to state purposes. Taoism is decentralized and mystical, various Buddhist temples ran their own affairs, and Confucianism is too difficult to turn into a political power base (although one could argue that Confucianism is designed to reinforce the power of the Emperor and Mao sort-of stepped into the position of Emperor, but it's a stretch).
Although these 20th century killers were not following the exact doctrine of previous generations, they were employing the same techniques as earlier religions and getting impressive results from those techniques. If we want to avoid a repeat, we need at least some social mechanism to detect and counter this.
Voltaire's logic still applies today.
At any rate, although Hitler, Mao and Stalin were without a doubt, the biggest killers known in history (by number of deaths). It's not entirely fair to compare just a skull count, you have to consider the population at the time and the tools available. If you want to measure years of terror, and cruelty of dispatch methods then religious leaders win hands down.
So, anyone want to explain why transubstantiation is not an absurd doctrine? Anyone is free to believe it, but I don't think I've seen anyone ever defend it on any but pre-determined theological grounds.
I'm also curious as to what, precisely, would not be considered 'desecration' of this wafer. I'm getting the distinct impression that just about anything would count with these people. So getting the vapors about 'desecration' as if Myers is going to dissolve the thing in a chalice of goat's blood and throw it into a sulphurous fire, or public urinate it into a soggy mess seems to be just that - mere vapor. My guess is that if he ever gets hold of one of these wafers, he'll 'desecrate' it in a way that will look innocuous to non-Catholics, but will have the Donohue crowd hopping with bulge-faced apoplexy.
Sigh. The key word is not 'impose'. That's a vacuous assertion. The key phrase is 'their beliefs'. As in 'their religious beliefs.'
Tel, I mentioned above the uniqueness of the American experience. All the other murderous episodes came from nation (nationality-based) states. America, especially the USA -- as the historical and geographical definitional limits -- does not indicate any systematic barbarous tendencies, despite recurring racist outbreaks of US government.
I'll admit to being out of touch with many details of US history. As it turns out, I support the idea of tolerating religious sects, even when those sects get a bit self-destructive. If they want to do stupid things to themselves then it is sad, but that's part of life. When they start to get significant political power and try to foist their beliefs on other people, that's when the trouble starts, but the same goes for Atheists too... it is just as wrong to use force to prevent someone believing in religion.
The US "founding fathers" tried to build legal protection for minority beliefs into the Constitution of their new nation. I have noticed that the effectiveness of the US Constitution is weakened when no one bothers to read it. I suspect that more Americans are noticing this every day, and it does seem that the original US experiment has reached a point of instability that wasn't what was originally intended.
Take the Amish as an example, I think that rejecting technology is a foolish gesture because the clock won't turn back no matter how hard anyone tries. On the other hand, they are harmless enough and they don't go looking for trouble, so might as well leave them in peace. Sure there are plenty of jokes about the Amish, but they don't show any outward sign of getting pissed off.
In contrast, Australia has a group called Hillsong who are overtly political, non-Democratic, tending towards fundamentalism and continually growing. They use modern psychological techniques (similar to corporate motivational classes) and pop-concert style music to get young people involved. They also extract a decent tithe from the congregation and spend the money without external accountability.
skullberg,
mixner, can I get mail ok Dec. 25th? Can I go to the DMV? Funny I haven't seen any establishment clause protests about those.
I'm sure there have been some. But I don't think the mere correspondence of a single annual public holiday with a Christian holy day represents any kind of meaningful establishment of religion. Unlike, say, posting copies of the Ten Commandments in court rooms or public school classrooms, or organized prayer in public schools.
And you have a very special definition of 'establish'
It's basically the same definition the Supreme Court has been using for 40 years, so I'm not sure why you think it's "special."
SoV,
I don't know that this is the time and place for a debate about personhood, but suffice to say that I have struggled to define it in a defensible way that excludes fetuses while including lots of people we would like included, such as surgery patients, the elderly, and the disabled.
Rob,
That's easy: you can't see them.
'Struggled in a defensible way', eh? What a beating that word 'defensible' takes. I think that defining corporations as 'persons' is indefensible. But obviously others disagree.
The same with this 'Life Begins at Conception' definition[1]. Presumably this is code for personhood, since both the sperm and egg are alive. Personally, requiring that a person be multicellular seems to me to be a fairly 'defensible' requirement. One which, moreover, seems rather definitively place things into either one of two mutually exclusive categories. Other people disagree obviously, but that's the point.
[1]Since in humans the prenatal stage of development is sandwiched between the embryonic stage and birth, and since the transition from embryo to fetus doesn't occur until the 11th week of pregnancy, presumably you have no problem saying that embryos aren't persons. Guess what, restrictions on the termination of a pregnancy don't generally kick in until the second trimester. This was the compromise of Roe vs Wade that various religious groups don't want to abide by.
Personally, requiring that a person be multicellular seems to me to be a fairly 'defensible' requirement.
Well, the first division happens long before it's even theoretically possible to discover you're pregnant, so that gets you in vitro embryos but not much else.
I'm not sure what the technical defintion of "embryo" vs. "fetus" is, but I'm not necessarily inclined to let word choice rule the question.
And "defensible" is in there because it's easy to engage in a bit of special pleading--"outside the womb" or whatever you like.
Finally, I find the objection to corporate personhood odd; all it means is that corporations can own property, sue and be sued, hire emplyees, and generally do the things that you do. I'm not sure what the alternative is.
You're shifting arguments. The question is what is the definition of 'person' that we all agree upon. Saying that we can't usually detect this doesn't invalidate the definition. Do you disagree?
Nail. Hammer. Hit. The definition of 'personhoond' is a _legal_ definition, a definition which is used to circumscribe legally allowable behaviours. Nothing more. Insofar as I know, that is. To say that an eight-week old embryo is a 'person' is nothing more than an attempt to assume the conclusion. Uh-uh. Not going to happen.
And - I repeat - these people want us to adopt a _legal_definition_ based upon their religious views. Said being definition then being the basis to outlaw abortion. That's sort of like the Church trying to proscribe homosexuality because it's 'abnormal behaviour'. It's not. It's a tried and proven evolutionary strategy (the (generic) Church isn't too big on that either.) The only objection they have seems to come down to dogma. And again, if they want to believe that, fine. I don't particularly care. I do care when they try to force their views upon me under the color of law.
SoV, I found your latest post quite confusing, so please understand that I am guessing at your meaning rather than trying to distort it.
I do agree that the issue is one of legal definitions rather than ordinary everyday semantics, and that simply declaring "personhood" is inadequate without further discussion. My point is that, in attempting to define personhood in a sensible, rational way, I have found myself either excluding people I wanted to include (infants, the disabled, surgery patients), or else including the unborn.
If the question is framed as "What can everyone agree on," allowing us to declare gray and controversial zones as zones of presumptive non-personhood, then we need an explanation as to why we choose that presumption rather than the opposite, and also a threshold of how many people must object before something becomes a gray zone and the presumption attaches.
My inclination is to eschew presumptions and simply put the question up to a majority vote. Do you have a good reason for doing otherwise?
That seems rather odd to me; it seems that there are any of a number of good ways to define 'personhood'. A person must show some sort of brain activity. Or a person must have recognizable organs. Or a person must have a notochord. Or a person must be multi-cellular. Or you can have a chopping-off point designed to capture most of those attributes most of the time. A person must weigh over half a pound. A person must be at least twelve weeks old. Etc.
Note, btw, that trying to say that 'personhood begins at conception' is _not_ a religious criteria doesn't even pass the smell test; trying to criminalize 'morning-after' pills is most definitely trying to inject religion into other people's lives.
Note also that people like JohnMcG are also going for a double-standard; the people who object to what they percieve as the injection of religion into politics must prove far, far, beyond a reasonable doubt that this is really the case (JM's 'if even one person advances the proposition for what they claim are secular reasons' argument). But if they act on that in a way that 'outrages' a religious group, that is enough to have their actions be curtailed.
This seem like an odd inclination. Are you suggesting that we put up every law for a majority vote? I would have no objections however, to a vote such as this, provided that it could be shown that religious considerations weren't the deciding factor in the way a ballot was cast, say we allow only atheists/agnostics to participate. I'd also say that in the ballot language it be mandated that if, say 'personhood begins at conception', every person who gets an abortion will be charged with premeditated murder. Could we agree on that?
No, you just have to win the argument. (as you currentky are in teh cases of abortion, emergency contraception, embryonic research, same sex marriage, etc.) Part of how you may win the argument is observing that the opposition seems to be religiously motivated.
You are proposing standards for an argument not being even admissable in the public square. I think that has to be a very high bar indeed in a country that celebrates free speech.
There is no secular basis for holidays on Dec. 25th or government closing on Sundays. These are simply religious laws that apparently have been oppressing the rest of secular society for as long as I have been alive. Those are far, far closer to 'establishing' religion than say restricting abortion rights or limiting the legal definition of the word marriage.
Red herrings all around. The arguments in this thread is that any idea, so long as some plurality supports out of morals devised from 'religions,' is out of bounds of public discourse and an EC violation. That is what the definitions getting thrown around here are - that unless it is supported entirely on moral or ethical grounds absent of religious input, it is out of bounds.
No, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about the fact that people like you are claiming that Meyers activities are beyond the pale, even though it is just pushback from what you guys are doing. The double standard comes in when you insist on an absurd level of proof (Btw, why didn't you answer any of my earlier questions?) to show that your activities vis a vis gays, abortion, etc. are essentially religious in nature, yet fail to make the same allowances when going in the other direction.
Not cool, my friend, not cool at all.
You are perfectly free to do this as private citizens and for perfectly secular reasons.. But no Church groups, no Church funds, No Church support. If you don't want to play by the rules, don't act 'wounded' when people point out the essential absurdity of your religion as a tactic to push back.
SoV,
Glass houses ... stones...
But no Church groups, no Church funds, No Church support.
Really, all of these groups are out of bounds:
www.catholicsforchoice.org - Catholics for my.barackobama.com/page/group/ChristiansforObama08 - Christians for Obama
catholicsforobama.blogspot.com - Catholics for Obama
my.barackobama.com/page/group/EvangelicalsforObama - Evangelicas for Obama
my.barackobama.com/page/group/BaptistsforObama - Baptists for Obama
my.barackobama.com/page/group/UnitarianUniversalistsforObama - Unitarians for Obama
my.barackobama.com/page/group/JewsforObama - Jews for Obama
As are all the churches that allow campaigning in them:
Apostolic Church of God - www.christiantoday.com/article/obama.speaks.on.fatherhood.at.chicago.church/19566.htm
Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem - www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/01/20/obama-clinton-speak-at-b_n_82379.html
Any number of churches during the civil right s movement.
Should of these churches be stripped of their legal status? I think this is a fairly extreme position, that a church can't make pronouncements about policy, can't allow their buildings to be used for members to gather for support of a cause, that campaigns can't speak at churches are all way outside the mainstream beliefs of most Americans.
skullberg,
There is no secular basis for holidays on Dec. 25th or government closing on Sundays.
The secular basis is that these are long-standing national traditions. Whatever religious purposes these policies may once have served or still serve, they have long since been drained of any substantive religious content. It's like retaining the motto "In God We Trust" on our coins. I don't like it, and I think eventually it will be eliminated, but I agree with the Supreme Court that it doesn't raise any substantive establishment issue.
Red herrings all around.
Er, the Supreme Court doesn't think so. It has struck down laws and policies that supported those actions as unconstitutional violations of the Establishment Clause. I agree with the Court. Do you disagree?
The arguments in this thread is that any idea, so long as some plurality supports out of morals devised from 'religions,' is out of bounds of public discourse and an EC violation.
Huh? You'd better take that argument up with whoever made it. I certainly haven't. I don't think any belief is "out of bounds" in "public discourse" on the basis of its source, whether that source is religion or anything else. I do think that in order for a law or government policy to be constitutional under the Establishment Clause it must, at the least, have a valid secular purpose. If the law serves only religious purposes, and has no valid secular purpose, it is unconstitutional, period. And the secular purpose must be legitimate, not some sham purpose invented to try and pass off a law whose true purpose is religious (e.g., posting the Ten Commandments in public school classrooms) as a "secular" law.
Megan, not long ago you wrote:
"I have considerable ire towards people who think that the correct response towards blasphemy is violence, threatened or actual." [Jan. 16, 2008]
Now that people have threatened PZ with violence for his act of blasphemy, please show us that "considerable ire". Or, was that ire only considerable when it was Muslims threatening violence? I have yet to even see light to moderate ire from you.
That quote, of course, is from the Danish cartoon controversy. It provides an interesting comparison. In both cases there was a strong, "its just a cartoon/cracker" argument.
I think if one dismisses the cracker argument, one must dismiss the cartoon argument as well.
In one case, the belief is that no one is to make any sort of visual representation of God. This is pretty much obey the 10 commandments ("Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth").
Interestingly, it is that same commandment that the Catholics edited out of the 10 commandments (and split the 10th into 2 to keep the overall number as 10). It is also this same commandment that many protestants (having restored that commandment) believe Catholics are breaking when they claim that the Eucharist is physically and truly the actual body of Jesus Christ. This is why many protestants think the cracker just represents Jesus (ie, a symbol of Jesus), whereas the Catholics think it is actually a piece of Jesus himself (ie a physical hunk of meat). Catholicism). This difference is also why the Catholics think its ok to have crucifixes (Jesus on the cross) everywhere, whereas protestants do not show Jesus on the cross.
To me its really interesting that it all comes back to this one commandment. Islam takes it VERY serioulsy, Jews take it very seriously as well (but don't riot when its broken), protestants take it seriously enough to not have crucifixes nor to claim the Eucharist IS TRULY Christ, whereas the Catholics edited out the commandment completely.
In short, you have people getting quite upset about others not respecting their beliefs over the same commandment. If non-Catholics have to respect the Catholic version, then non-Muslims should respect the Muslim version. If you cannot claim, "its just a cracker" then you cannot claim, "its just a cartoon". If you denounce the violence and threat of violence made by the Islamic world, then you must also denounce the threats made to PZ Myers. (IE, denounce everyone!!!!)
And, out of personal curiosity, what Catholics here truly believe that the Eucharist really and truly turns into the actual flesh of Christ once blessed and placed into their mouth? Can anyone state how widely this belief is held within Catholicism?
Re: The argument for meatless Fridays is that Christians should set aside for penance for their sins.
Um, no. At least not originally. One upon a time the arguemnt for abstaining from meat on Fridays (and also Wednesday, though Catholicism dropped that part quite some time back) was that one should master the flesh and its desires to enhance the spirit. That's still a religious argument I suppose,
but it's a fairly ecumenical one, something that even Hindus and Buddhists and neo-Pagans can grasp in their own terms.
Re: Is respect for the dead universal to all cultures?
Is there a human culture that does not devote certain forms of ritual toward their dead? No culture I have ever heard of simply leaves their dead to rot where they fall as animals do. Even the few that dispose of coropses by exposure have special places set aside for them, and various rituals that are performed when they are laid there.
Re: Respect for the dead is simply a man made dogma. It is a religious belief
No it's not. Secular people, even militant atheists, respect their dead too. I give you Lenin's mausoleum as Exhibit A. And on a personal level, we respect our own dead because these are people we once knew and perhaps loved and valued, and because we know that we too will follow them. From there we deduce that as a simple sort of tit-for-tat we should grant other people the courtesy of respecting their dead too.
Re: No, John, the first one _is_ a religious claim
How so? I will agree that John misphrased his first claim-- it's not that fetuses *are* persons but that they *ought be* considered persons-- a normative claim, not a factual one. "Personhood" is not a scientifically verifiable fact. It is a legal/ethical status that we chose to grant or withhold. Should we someday create sentinent AI or encounter intelligent life from other worlds we will have to consider granting personhood to such entities though they are not remotely biolegical humans. One can argue whether fetuses ought be granted personhood, but as a general matter the argument lies on the same terrain as arguing that [insert name of group once considered sub-human] should be legal persons.
Re: St. Paul speaks of bodily ressurections, which is where much of Occidental culture developed its grave worship.
Tombs as places of great significance and special veneration (and superstition) can be found woldwide. This is certainly not a Western-only custom. The Pyramids were raised almost three millennia before Paul of Tarsus was born.
Re: To the ancient Romans, burying the dead was rather abhorrent
Actually, the Romans had fairly extensive graveyards and necropolises. Latin epitaphs from Roman grave plaques are used in teaching the language to new learners.
Re: Strange how easy it is to forget that Nazi Germany was not the first regime to persecute Jews
No, that honor belongs either to the New Kingdom of Egypt (if you believe that Exodus has any truth to it), or to the Assyrian Empire otherwise.
So a person sent an e-mail from 1-800-FLOWERS?
So was the e-mailer a Catholic, or not? And what exactly was the text of this alleged death threat?
I hate to belabor this point, but if Myers is justifying his rudeness on the grounds that his opponents are even nastier, I'm interested in seeing some evidence that he's actually got such nasty opponents that it's justifiable for him to be sociopathically rude to the entire group.
SoV, the reason I find your proposed definitions of personhood unsatisfying is that none of them seem to capture what makes personhood special to us. Pigs can weigh more than half a pound, have brain activity, etc, but we go ahead and kill them for food. That is, those sorts of definitions seem to me to be a form of special pleading designed with the sole purpose of achieving a desired conclusion (abortion is OK) instead of answering the question, which is "Should abortion be OK?"
JohnF sums up my argument very well with this:
I will agree that John misphrased his first claim-- it's not that fetuses *are* persons but that they *ought be* considered persons-- a normative claim, not a factual one.Personhood" is not a scientifically verifiable fact. It is a legal/ethical status that we chose to grant or withhold.
Suppose an animal rights activist declares that we should treat pigs as children: they can't vote or drive, but the can't be eaten, either. Is that person making a religious claim? I don't believe so; they are not arguing based on revealed "truth" or the wishes of a diety. They simply believe that pigs have enough in common with children to merit protection. The claim that we should treat zygotes as children is not any more religious, so far I can tell.
Rob, you're moving the goal-posts. Here is what you originally wrote:
Now, do my definitions take care of this objection, or do they not?
Also, given your particular example of conferring personhood, I can't resist quoting myself:
Note again - that when I say 'religious' I mean not just in the orthodox sense of theological doctrine, but in the broader sense of having a definite opinion on a subject on which no real informed consensus opinion is possible, say (as per my previous example when I explained this before, someone claiming that there is no such thing as 'free will'.) Be glad I didn't slip in a bit of wordplay about Catholic tastes.
First, note that John and others made the claim as if they had 'evidence', that is, that there is some abstract attribute of personhood that exists on it's own right, rather than the pronouncement of law (In fact, I believe they are basing it on the concept of ensoulment>/a.)
Now, if you meant just as a general argument, you are more or less correct. But if you meant the 'terrain' as we should grant the status of person-hood to fetuses that we did to [insert name of group once considered sub-human] _for_the_same_reasons_ you are dead wrong.
Let me ask this question again, since there seems to be a certain reluctance in addressing it: _If_ person-hood begins at conception, then using a morning-after pill or some other means to prevent implantation is an act of premeditated murder, and should be prosecuted accordingly. In fact, any woman who gets an abortion should be tried for murder one, and if convicted, jailed for a period of not less than thirty years.
Or take another common example: There is a fire in the hospital, and you can either save five three-year-old kids or fifty of those so-called 'snowflake babies'.
If people who take the position that the person-hood begins at conception agree that women who have abortions should be jailed for life, and that the snowflake babies take precedence, well, I'll disagree, but I'll at least give them points for being consist and sincerely believing what they profess. If they don't, then they don't really believe that a blastocyst is really a person.
It's the same thing with other issues: people can claim that they're against gay civil rights or gay marriage for non-sectarian reasons. But they can't really articulate those reasons beyond some form of 'because I say so'. The same thing with creationism - I'm glad to see that ID is generally fading as the alternative moniker, btw - one can claim to be a 'contrarian', one can claim that one believes in creationism for purely secular reasons. Or that the age of the universe is on the order of thousands of years rather than billions. No, I really don't think the burden of proof is on me to show that these are not sincerely held beliefs with any trace of validity to them.
Re: The same thing with creationism - I'm glad to see that ID is generally fading as the alternative moniker, btw - one can claim to be a 'contrarian', one can claim that one believes in creationism for purely secular reasons.
How is it possible to be a secular creationist? Creationism explicitly presupposes a Creator -- a supernatural deity. So with creationism we are in religious territory right from the start.
With regard to gay issues I have never yet come across an anti-gay argument that did not have either religion on personal aesthetics (the "yuck" factor) at its base. In principle secular (and non-aesthetic) arguements against homosexuality should be possible, except that any such argument would also be equally valid against heterosexuality which is why I don't think we find them anywhere.
When we get to abortion (and I mean abortion- not stuff about blastocysts, embryos etc-- I mean the deliberate and wilfull termination of pregnancy involving a fetus) then I think you can indeed have purely secular arguments that this is wrong.
To be sure such arguments will have some sort of metaphysical underpinning, but these need not be religious in nature. After all, any and all ethical posituions must necessarily have a metaphysics lurking somewhere underneath to support them. A secularist is a person who wants to keep religion out of public life and an atheist does not believe in god(s). Fair enough-- but you cannot keep metaphysics out of ethical arguements any more than you can prevent trees from having wood or water from being wet.
SoV,
I agree that your definitions are successful in excluding zygotes and blastocysts from personhood, but as I explained, I don't think they meet the "sensible, rational" test because they amount to special pleading in favor of abortion--your very own version of "because I said so." It happens that all people weight more than half a pound, but weighing half a pound is neither unique to being human nor, in an abstract sense, truly necessary.
I do agree that if full personhood begins at conception, then abortion is first-degree murder. But we needn't go that far; we could say that conception results in, say, half-personhood, with correspondingly lighter penalties.
Jon, in the context of this thread, we were talking about a certain amount of push-back against those trying to force their beliefs on us through the employment of laws. Specifically, PZ Myers 'desecrating' a consecrated wafer to demonstrate the absurdity of the Catholic Church's dogma. So this:
It doesn't really apply. The Catholic position, the belief that 'person-hood' begins at conception is certainly a religious beleif. Also, when people talk of outlawing abortion, they mean outlawing abortion - period. Since the fetal stage doesn't start until eight weeks after conception, I'd have to say that we're not just talking about metaphysics in this instance.
Oh, and one more thing:
How is it possible to be a secular creationist? Creationism explicitly presupposes a Creator -- a supernatural deity. So with creationism we are in religious territory right from the start.
This is part of what I mean about using the term 'religion' to mean more than a theology plus some dogma. In fact, some of these ID'ers are crank sf-fans. No Old-Testament Immanence, just some good-old fashioned high tech. Adam and Eve in a test-tube if you will. By some estimates, biologists are less than twenty years away from artificially creating life from complete scratch; no living percusors, or organics obtained from living percusors at all. And in a century? Six-legged giraffes, talking spiders, cats that beg. 100% artificial. I don't think that the people doing this are what the biblical literalists are pushing as a God.
Jon, in the context of this thread, we were talking about a certain amount of push-back against those trying to force their beliefs on us through the employment of laws. Specifically, PZ Myers 'desecrating' a consecrated wafer to demonstrate the absurdity of the Catholic Church's dogma. So this:
It doesn't really apply. The Catholic position, the belief that 'person-hood' begins at conception is certainly a religious beleif. Also, when people talk of outlawing abortion, they mean outlawing abortion - period. Since the fetal stage doesn't start until eight weeks after conception, I'd have to say that we're not just talking about metaphysics in this instance.
Oh, and one more thing:
How is it possible to be a secular creationist? Creationism explicitly presupposes a Creator -- a supernatural deity. So with creationism we are in religious territory right from the start.
This is part of what I mean about using the term 'religion' to mean more than a theology plus some dogma. In fact, some of these ID'ers are crank sf-fans. No Old-Testament Immanence, just some good-old fashioned high tech. Adam and Eve in a test-tube if you will. By some estimates, biologists are less than twenty years away from artificially creating life from complete scratch; no living percusors, or organics obtained from living percusors at all. And in a century? Six-legged giraffes, talking spiders, cats that beg. 100% artificial. I don't think that the people doing this are what the biblical literalists are pushing as a God.
Or take another common example: There is a fire in the hospital, and you can either save five three-year-old kids or fifty of those so-called 'snowflake babies'. If people who take the position that the person-hood begins at conception agree that women who have abortions should be jailed for life, and that the snowflake babies take precedence, well, I'll disagree, but I'll at least give them points for being consist and sincerely believing what they profess. If they don't, then they don't really believe that a blastocyst is really a person.
I have no idea why this is supposed to be a "common example", since I don't recally reading about such incidents the local paper with any frequency, nor do I expect that the life-at-conception extremists find themselves in this position often enough to properly test their mettle. In fact, some old crack about angels and pinheads come to mind.
In any case, you've sabotaged the example by framing it as an either/or choice in which a lot of mitigating context is present. If it were a choice between grabbing the five snowflake babies or the CD-RW library that contains the last year's worth of research files, you might be on to something. Assuming, again, that this was the kind of thing that happened very often. Hopefully not, as I'm not really a fan of hospital fires.
I guess desecrating a communion wafer is kinda mean toward Catholics. But it's nothing like vandalizing Jewish graves. That's because the latter involves vandalization.
Myers' actions are akin to breaking the news to a child that Santa Claus isn't for real. It can be hurtful and distressing, no doubt about that. Few are ever loved for pointing out the emperor has no clothes. But if anything, I think it's Catholics who need to grow the hell up, accept the fact that religion is an inherently irrational belief, and will be treated as such by unbelievers.
It's one thing to be treated like that child being told about Santa Claus. It's another thing entirely to act out like that child.
Re: Specifically, PZ Myers 'desecrating' a consecrated wafer to demonstrate the absurdity of the Catholic Church's dogma.
This is not "push back". It's more akin to the sort of tantrum you'd get from thwarting a five year old's desires. Push back is something like this would involve taking legal and/or political action to counter the legal/political actions of those you oppose.
Re: In fact, some of these ID'ers are crank sf-fans. No Old-Testament Immanence, just some good-old fashioned high tech.
If one explains the origin of life on earth as due to alien technology, then one must explain where the aliens came from. Other aliens made them? Problem is the chronology gets awkward. Life on Earth is nearly four billion
years old. Go too much further back in time than that and there aren't enough heavier elements
to make living things, or Earth-like planets.
Re: But if anything, I think it's Catholics who need to grow the hell up, accept the fact that religion is an inherently irrational belief, and will be treated as such by unbelievers.
Life, or bvetter: reality is inehrently irrational. Human reason is a useful tool, but nothing more. One should not invest it with any sort of cosmic significance.
It strikes me that being multi-cellular, or having a recognizable brain in which there is recognizable brain activity are rather minimal requirements. To argue otherwise, would, I think, be considered by most people to be special pleading. So to turn it around, why should we exclude the multicellularity requirment? Because _you_ said so? Also, I thought I made it clear that the weight or time requirements were just a line in the sand beyond which brain activity would be indisputable. No slippery slopes. I detest people who argue that because we can't pin down where yellow shades into green, we might as well concede that there is no difference between the two colors.
I do agree that if full personhood begins at conception, then abortion is first-degree murder. But we needn't go that far; we could say that conception results in, say, half-personhood, with correspondingly lighter penalties.Posted by Rob Lyman
Again, it strikes me that be a being little bit of a person is like being a little bit pregnant. Why would you want to argue this, other than to get people on board who aren't down with the idea of jailing women for life if they've had an abortion? And why bring it up _now_? Is this why you brought it up? If not, why did you?
Oh, so when people say that's exactly why they are doing these sorts of things, we shouldn't believe them? That if people who don't hold with religion as being the literal truth are just polite enough, those oh-so-nice tolerant and forbearing religious types will ease up? I suggest that this Just Ain't So. I also suggest that taking people like Donohue at their word that they are offended, but thinking that others are not at least as offended by organized religions trying to legislate their beliefs - and saying so - strikes me as being prejudicial as all get-out.
Your original statement was that 'creationism without religion' seemed to be nonsensical. I'm simply pointing out - from personal experience - that it's very plausible to consider that the beings who may have created life on Earth weren't all that Awesome; it's been used in sf a multitude of times. Heck, I don't now how many times it's been used in TOST and the STTNG series (Star Trek, to all of you not familiar with those particular anagrams.) And as a matter of plausibility, it's quite possible that completely synthetic life will be created by very mundane Earthly biologists within the next twenty years.
And there's no particular reason to posit that this process couldn't have been repeated backwards ad infinitum. The idea that there is Creator also suffers from exactly this defect - who made the Creator.
This makes no sense to me. To say that 'reality is inherently irrational' would seem to mean that there is no persistent physical law, that events are just random in some sense, but this is obviously not the case.
Again, it strikes me that be a being little bit of a person is like being a little bit pregnant.
Well, I suppose it is possible to be a "little bit pregnant," in the sense that the odds of a pregnancy resulting in a healthy viable baby increase as the pregnancy progresses; the law could choose to punish assaults resulting in loss of the embryo/fetus (or intentional abortions) differently depending on what stage of pregnancy had been achieved. Perhaps this is the morally correct result; perhaps a 3-week old embryo is morally equivalent to a cat based on a net-present-personhood analysis. At least, so arguing doesn't seem totally insane to me.
I detest people who argue that because we can't pin down where yellow shades into green, we might as well concede that there is no difference between the two colors.
I'm not trying to say there's no difference, I'm trying to say that it is not obvious to me that the gray area--or yellowish-greenish area--should be presumed to be a "kill at will zone" rather than a "don't do any harm because it might be a person" zone. Reagan, you may recall, compared it to a building demolition in which there is a possibility of a real child remaining in the building. Even if there's only a 10% chance that the kid is actually there, would you proceed with the implosion?
I'm not sure there's any point to getting too bogged down in discussing what a person is. To return to the point of the thread, I don't think that one needs to be particularly religious to be troubled by--or to outright oppose--the criminalization of abortion. We have managed to discuss the point without bringing God or ensoulment up, so I don't think that either can be said to be essential to opposition to abortion.
If you encounter a Catholic who says that we should ban abortion because God wants us to, feel free to mock his argument--it's a really terrible one. But don't confuse his argument with mine.
Mixner - RE: "Of course they get to participate in the political process. But the constitution forbids laws that establish religion. That means, among other things, that all laws must have a secular purpose. And that means a real, valid, bona fide secular purpose. Not a sham secular purpose fabricated as a pretext for a law whose true purpose is religious. "
Those who oppose abortion, do have a real, valid (validly secular, of course the opposite side will disagree about the arguments and ideas themselves being valid), bona-fide secular purpose.
That purpose is the protection and the preservation of innocent human life.
Protecting human life isn't a religious issue. It isn't about God, or worship. It isn't a theological issue.
It certainly isn't something that goes against the establishment clause. The establishment clause prevents the establishment of religion. The establishment of religion is making a religion an official religion and/or supporting it with government funds.
The fact that religious people are pushing an idea, doesn't make the idea a religious idea.
If the people pushing the idea are overwhelmingly religious rather than secular, then it is highly implausible that the idea is secular rather than religious.
It wouldn't matter if every single one of the people pushing the idea was the worshiper of some particular sect. The idea itself is not a religious idea. The inspiration for the idea is irrelevant to the establishment clause.
SoV- Re: "I use religious in this sense not only to cover official religious doctrine, but also religious in the larger sense of an undecidable question that's been decided upon in the minds of certain people."
Then you use "religious" in a non-standard way, and in a way that's irrelevant to the establishment clause, or the more general idea of the separation of church and state. You use of the term "religious" would cover philosophical ideas as well, including any that would provide the basis for your own opinion. If any such question is out of bounds for the political debate in the US, than we can't have a political debate in the US.
re:"It strikes me that being multi-cellular, or having a recognizable brain in which there is recognizable brain activity are rather minimal requirements."
When an abortion actually takes place you are talking about killing a multi-cellular organism. In some cases there would be recognizable brain activity.
And even when you only have a single cell, you have a new unique member of the species homo sapiens, just one at its more primitive state of development. There is a new human to deal with.
Now people might not consider this point important, but pointing it out, or arguing against the legality of abortion based on this idea, is neither special pleading, nor a violation of the letter or even the spirit of the establishment clause.
And getting back to the point of the blog post we are all commenting on, its not a justification for PZ Myers' actions.
Re: Oh, so when people say that's exactly why they are doing these sorts of things, we shouldn't believe them?
Not sure where you're getting that from. all I said is that when people advocate laws and policies you dislike you should fight them in the proper venue: the legislature and the courthouse and the ballot box. You shouldn't indulge in childish behavior that would be beneath the average 13 year old.
Re: Your original statement was that 'creationism without religion' seemed to be nonsensical. I'm simply pointing out - from personal experience - that it's very plausible to consider that the beings who may have created life on Earth weren't all that Awesome; it's been used in sf a multitude of times.
OK, I had even considered flaging my statement about Creatoionism with this possibility, but didn't because your suggestion is a very minority view. and at any rate it doesn't answer the problem of creation at all, just relocates it back another step. If aliens created life on Earth, then who created the aliens? (And my point about the time frame is a serious one: the much younger universe had too little carbon, iron, etc to support life)
Re: To say that 'reality is inherently irrational' would seem to mean that there is no persistent physical law, that events are just random in some sense, but this is obviously not the case.
I did not say, or at least did not mean to say, that reality is totally irrational. I will however insist that human reason, being human and limited and a product of evolution not its source, is not all the way up to the task of decoding reality in all its minutest details. There is a degree of incomprehensible weirdness to reality, and without it I doubt the whole business would have lasted more than a Planck second (look it up). As Whitehead said, the universe is not stranger than we imagine, it's stranger than we can imagine.
You're just restating your assertion without doing anything to prove it. I've asked you several times now why you think we should decree that person-hood begins at conception. You haven't been able to give a good, rational (to use your choice of words) reason for this. So it just boils down to 'because I say so.' Iow, trying to force your personal beliefs on me.
But you're not giving any reasons for why this should be considered. Again - the only reason I can think of is to let people think they can declare that person-hood begins at conception without the consequence that people who have abortions are convicted of murder and jailed for life.
You haven't given me any other reason of your own, so I guess that's really what the partial portion is all about. Uh-uh.
Hey there, podner, don't you have to in fact establish that human life is being lost before you can protect and preserve it? And aren't pronouncements like 'life begins at conception' - drumroll - just expressions of personal beliefs? Beliefs which, moreover, you want other people to abide by, even though you haven't a shred of support for your contentions other than 'because I say so?'
Uh-uh. You need to practice your card tricks.
I think you should check your dictionary. I'm using the term entirely correctly. Moreover, what you have said about 'philosophical ideas forming the basis of an opinion' is patently false. You are perfectly free to believe or disbelieve in free will, for example. But you can't legislate that 'religious' belief into law. It's that simple.
Now people might not consider this point important, but pointing it out, or arguing against the legality of abortion based on this idea, is neither special pleading, nor a violation of the letter or even the spirit of the establishment clause.
Fine, then let's hear your argument for why person-hood begins at conception. And no, 'because I say so' is not an argument. Arguments for this tenet of the Church seem to be strangely lacking in a discussion where some are trying to say that this is a completely non-sectarian opinion. ;-)
One could define "person" so as to include "any entity which, without external interferences, might possibly become an uncontroverted person." To put in another way, one could claim that legal personhood should attach to anything which has the capacity for future personhood.
Now, that may be a bad definition, or a wrong definition, but I can't see how it's a religious definition, any more than the decision to, say, grant pigs the same legal protection as children would be a religious decision.
I agree that I can offer nothing resembling a final, mathematical proof of what personhood is. Neither is there a final, mathematical way of proving what the appropriate predicate offenses for the felony murder rule are, or whether burglary should include a requirement that the acts occur at night, or when there is a likelihood of confusion between two contested trademarks, or for that matter whether chocolate is preferable to vanilla. Yet none of these things are properly called religious matters. Personhood is the same way.
Would you please be up front about what I dislike: I dislike people forcing their personal beliefs on me through legislation. If you persist in your mis-statement of other people's beliefs, I'm going to assume that you are being deliberately provocative, or to try to think what is in your head a rhetorical point. So stop it.
Now, as to who is being childish: in this instance, it is the religious types who are insisting that we abide by their beliefs. This is behaviour that is, as you put it, beneath the average 13-year-old.
I know your time-frame is a serious one. But you're very out of date with regards to temporal extension. Current thinking is that the beginning of the universe was not the beginning of everything. In fact, it seems likely that the formation of black holes at least in some instances creates completely new, completely fresh baby universes that can grow to be as large as ours or larger, and which in turn form new black holes of their own. There is no reason to suppose that this cycle does not extend indefinitely far back into the past.
And you know, I'm just a little bit peeved: I'm guessing that if I were to ask you who made the Creator, that question would be either rejected as nonsensical or I'd be given a nonanswer. The double standard is appalling.
SoV, you might ask yourself (and then tell us the answer): why is murder illegal? Is it because there is some way to prove--beyond personal opinion and "because I say so"--that murder is bad? Or is it because a majority of us want it to be illegal, and don't feel at all bad about imposing that belief on the (thankfully tiny) minority who would legalize murder?
And how do the details of what constitutes "murder," as opposed to "manslaughter," "negligent homicide" and "justifiable homicide" get decided? Is it not the same process?
I don't see why, in your thinking, abortion isn't subject to an identical vetting by the ordinary rules of legislation. You keep wanting to discuss what constitutes personhood, but I think that's a distraction--the fundamental issue is not what decision we make, but how it gets made. What's wrong with majority rule (or, more properly, majority in legislature rule) in this context, when it's allowable in other, similar contexts?
"At any rate, although Hitler, Mao and Stalin were without a doubt, the biggest killers known in history (by number of deaths). It's not entirely fair to compare just a skull count, you have to consider the population at the time and the tools available. If you want to measure years of terror, and cruelty of dispatch methods then religious leaders win hands down."
On numbers and cruelty, surely the Mongols (Genghis Khan and his sons) are strong contenders.
Grouping "religious leaders" together seems odd. Religion of one form or another has been part of the vast majority of civilizations, hasn't it? Thus, to add up all bad things done throughout time by "religious leaders" is stacking the deck.
Or perhaps you're talking about true religious leaders, as opposed to leaders of societies that professed some sort of religion that may have been used by those leaders in some way. After all, even the Crusades were primarily about plunder (the first Crusade was very profitable; none of the others were, but the leaders kept hoping).
Do you have examples of these murderous 'religious leaders'? I'm sure that there are a few, but even proportional to the world population at the time, the top two would have a hard time coming close to the records of Stalin and Mao.
Re: I dislike people forcing their personal beliefs on me through legislation.
Under any system of government we all have to live with the possibility that laws will be made that we disagree with-- perhaps vehemently. That's part of life. At least in a system like ours (however imperfect it is and however corrupt and unresponsive it seems to be to We The People) you have your chance to argue against such laws, in multiple venues. That's all you can expect. You do not have ultimate veto power: you can't say to the rest of the citizenry: "You may only pass laws I personally approve". L'etat ce n'est pas toi.
Re: If you persist in your mis-statement of other people's beliefs
Huh? I have not mistated anyone's belief as far as I know. Please do not put words in my mouth.
Re: Now, as to who is being childish: in this instance, it is the religious types who are insisting that we abide by their beliefs.
Anytime a law is passed about anything you are being asked to abide by the beliefs of the people who supported and passed that law. I don't see why it matters whether those beliefs are religious or secular or based on nothing more than a bad case of indigestion. Again, fight laws you disagree with, but don't expect to have personal ultimate veto power.
Re: Current thinking is that the beginning of the universe was not the beginning of everything.
It was the beginning of matter, energy, space and time in their current definitions. Before/outside the universe Elsewhere (note: that's not just just a whimsical or poetic term) may always be there, but nothing remotely like the current universe is. Elsewhere, time and space are indistinguishable (and some rather unusual arithmetic and geometry hold sway). When time twists logically orthogonal relative to three spatial dimensions then we get the universe of matter and energy, and the rest is history.
This is a circular definition, you know. More to the point, there are severe birth defects which are fatal either before birth, or immediately after. So in these cases, there is no 'person' involved, right? Even though with simple interventions these birth defects can be drastically eliminated or curtailed. So there is no person-hood involved, and abortions are perfectly okay.
Moreover, you still haven't explained why these developmental stages should have person-hood attached to them without the mothers being jailed for life if they have an abortion. Your definition must be consistent. It also can't have any ad hoc fix-ups to try to claim that it is 'not really' about some sort of religious belief. You can't, for example, place the ten commandments in the classroom with the fig-leaf that it is 'educational', for example, and you certainly can't challenge me to prove that it isn't.
Or it could be a nonsensical definition that uses itself to define itself, as I've already pointed out. But I'm curious now, what would make a definition 'religious'. I'm guessing that you've got a very, very narrow definition, one not commonly used.
Didn't we just already go over this? Didn't you already concede that it wasn't a matter of 'proof'? Further, you're contradicting yourself from paragraph to paragraph; in the one immediately prior you assume the existence of a 'religious definition', and here, you deny that any such thing exists.
I might add that some of the examples you mentioned are indeed 'religious' matters:
So, for example, as I've mentioned the belief or disbelief in free will is a religious matter as well.
I'll also note for about the ninth time that members of the Catholic Church are perfectly free to vote in ways they please, lobby their congressperson, distribute petitions, etc. I don't think anyone says that they can't or shouldn't. What they can't do is do it as a Church. So no Church resources, no Church money or donated help, nothing of the sort. I'll concede that if the proportion of those opposed to abortion in the nonbeliever set roughly approximates that of the church-going types, that possibly even that restriction might be modified. But you need to show that first. John's notion that if he could find even one non-Catholic who held that certain highway lanes are sacred and should only be used by Catholics, then that is a 'non-religious' proposition is just insane.
Your last sentence makes no sense, and again it looks as if you are trying to slip in some special pleading. What is the 'context' that allows majority rule? Can the majority of people simply vote to say that jews and blacks are not persons? And that therefore it is perfectly okay to treat them however you feel like?
So yes, you are _exactly_ right that _how_ the decision gets made is important. As you've just superbly illustrated.
Huh? I just told you that you mis-stated _my_ beliefs. Now stop it. You're being extremely rude when you do this.
Sigh. Where, exactly, did I ever imply that I expected - or even wanted for that matter- personal and ultimate veto power? You're putting words in my mouth again. Stop it.
What I said was that as long as people keep trying to impose their religious dogma on us, I do not think it is at all out of to mock their religious beliefs. Here, I'll even quote myself:
Shrug. It looks to me like the people who are trying to get their religious credos made into a law that the rest of us have to obey are the ones being childish. I'd also point out that ridiculing the religious beliefs is _also_ good strategy for making sure laws of those sorts don't get passed. It is thus an extremely good move . . . according to you. Perhaps that's why you don't want to see it done.
Er, no, that's not necessarily true. Physical laws in other universes can either be indistinguishable from our own or vary so much that even the number of 'time' dimensions is different. I suggest you read some more on this stuff; there's a surprising amount of good pop exposition on the subject.
Posted by JonF
Re: Physical laws in other universes can either be indistinguishable from our own or vary so much that even the number of 'time' dimensions is different.
There are some pretty strict limitations on universes. Vary the fundamental constants of nature even a little, and you can't even get a universe: it collapses back in on itself almost immediately (or some other factor destroys it at birth). Yes, multiple universes, as in the plot device beloved of some scifi writers, are possible, with very different outcomes in terms of the specifics, but you're not going to find plural time dimensions and three is the limit and the requirement on spatial dimensions. It is however true that there may be "unexploded" background dimensions which never took part in the Big Bang or Inflation, if that's what you're referring to. A very different arithmetic and geometry applies to these dimensions. They are the Elsewhere of my previous post.
This is a circular definition, you know.
I know. I was trying to avoid being excessivly wordy. The extra-wordy definition would say something like "any entity capable, absent deliberate intervention to prevent it, of becoming something that everyone agrees is a person, should also be considered a person."
The felony murder rule states that, when someone dies during the commission of certain felonies, the offender may be charged with murder, even when that offender did not intend, or even directly cause, the death. Robbery is one of the predicate felonies, so if you point a gun at a bank teller and demand that she go to the safe to get money, and as she turns to obey, she trips and breaks her neck, you're on the hook for murder. Medicare fraud is not on the list, so even if someone has a heart attack when they see how much you've stolen, you're off the hook.
I'll concede that the definition of "personhood" is necessarily religious if you'll concede the choice of predicate felonies is also necessarily religious, as in not subject to ultimate logical determination and being, essentially a matter of opinion which may require a majority to "force its beliefs" on a minority.
(BTW, I don't deny that a religious defintion of personhood is possible, just that it's not essential).
Can the majority of people simply vote to say that jews and blacks are not persons? And that therefore it is perfectly okay to treat them however you feel like?
Obviously, I would oppose any such move. I'm not certain, however, that my opposition would not be "religious" according to your definition.
SoV, to note a rare point of agreement, I'm fine with banishing Church funds from politics, and I believe some churches have been in trouble with the IRS for excessive political activity.
Let me try to sum up my problem her in one sentence: you seem to be declaring that most questions which people would concede are a "matter of opinion," are actually "religious." Since it's impossible to give a definitive answer to "What is a person?" and reasonable people may differ, any effort to legislatively make that determination are inherently "religious." Is that a fair statement?
And that's the only thing I was looking for. Thank you. As to the rest, look at the definition again: to say that one prefers chocolate over vanilla is an opinion. To declare that chocolate is better than vanilla is more in the nature of religious belief. Iow, the former is a subjective preference, the latter a declaration of fact. Note btw, that Roe vs Wade _was_ a compromise; Here's Blackmun:
So all of this was specifically addressed long ago. Note that those who did want to declare some sort of person-hood _did_ get their way, partly. But they don't want to compromise. They want to keep redrawing the line until the 'compromise' is exactly what they wanted in the first place.
Where do you get this stuff? This isn't even at the level of pop-sci exposition. More like Sunday supplement reading. You might look at the stuff by Lisa Randall, Brian Greene, Leonard Susskin, or even (watch out) Max Tegmark. The actual mathematical exposition is just a little harder, but it is essentially looking at loop spaces, if you want a semi-meaningful reference to start with. Oh, and here's a wiki reference where at least one constant is way off from our universe, yet everything still looks just the same.
Roe v. Wade is one of the finest examples of a "because I said so" Supreme Court opinion, well, ever. Despite declaring that the Court doens't know when life begins, Blackmun goes on to conclude that it can't possibly begin before the second trimester, the embryo before that representing the mere "potentiality" of life. If human gestation lasted 12 months, who knows if he would have gone for quarters, sixths, or what? It's just a pity Justice Thomas wasn't on the Court then, because I'd have loved to see his dissent.
Even Bush v. Gore makes more sense doctrinally, and it makes precious little sense.
ScentOfViolets - Re:
If there is no imposition in this context, there would be no serious problem, so impose is very much the keyword.
Your statement was that religious people impose their beliefs all of the time, but in the US they can't really impose their religious beliefs to any great extent. They can't convert with fire and the sword, they can't make you pay tax money to the church.
What they can do is put their views forward in the political process like everyone else. Doing so does not violate the establishment clause unless they are seeking to establish a religion. Arguments like when human life, personhood, or whatever other point you think is important in the abortion debate, begins are obvious effected by religious beliefs, and by the teachings of religions to a very great extent, but that doesn't make them religious ideas, at least not in the sense that the establishment clause, or even the more general idea of the separation of church and state, deals with. They are not issues of theology or worship, they are issues about philosophical understandings of human rights, just like both sides of the pre-civil war debate about slavery in the US where.
If religious people don't get to have an equal say in such debates, or if some position that gets heavy support by some religion is considered out of bounds for the political process, then (at least if the "out of bounds decision is enforced in some way), you aren't creating a neutral arena, unbiased by religious orthodoxy, you are rather tilting the arena against religious people. You certainly aren't limiting the action to defending the establishment clause, because their is no violation of it, or potential violation of it, that you are defending against.
No, it is (at least when I use it, and I suspect more generally) the idea that a new human life begins at conception. An embryo is a living human being (a member of the species homo-sapiens) in its earliest form. Perhaps it would be a better phrase if it was "A life begins at conception". Obviously life began billions of years ago.
SoV -
Human life is being lost, that is a simple scientific matter. A living homo-sapiens is killed by the process. The moral, philosophical, legal, and political significance of that fact can be debated. But neither side of the debate should enjoy some privileged status where it can rule the other side out of bounds for the political process. (Which is not to say that it can not defeat the other side in the political process, only that it should have to actually win, not just declare a victory before the game starts).
Well the way I use the expression, its only an expression of a personal belief, if the statement that a baseball is heavier than a proton (under the exact same conditions in terms of velocity, acceleration, gravity etc.) is a matter of personal belief. Yes it is a personal belief in the widest sense of that term, but its grounded in established fact.
"Life begins at conception", could be used to have a slightly different meaning, rather than "a new life form is created at biological conception" or "A human life begins at (human) conception", it could be used as "a human life, which is a new person, and should have the legal right to not be killed (and perhaps other legal rights), is created at the moment of (human) conception".
That last idea IS a statement of personal belief. But personal beliefs are legitimate parts of the political process, and in fact can not, and should not, be removed from it.
It is a personal belief, but it is not a violation of the establishment clause. It isn't imposing theology or worship, or major or direct support of either. Its a matter in personal belief, like the belief that segregated eating facilities and lodging should be illegal (or the belief that they shouldn't be).
In the same way that people believe that its a good idea that we have X,Y, and Z government programs, and require me to pay for them, or that they believe that we shouldn't be allowed to drive over 55 on a local interstate, and I'm legally required to abide by that.
Re: use of "religious"
A dictionary with very extensive sets of definition may include yours, but it isn't the normal use of the term. More importantly it isn't the meaning of the term religion is used in the establishment clause. The clause forbids formal acceptance or support of a religious worship or dogma by the government, not any law, regulation, or financial support involving any idea which isn't and perhaps can not be settled by science. The later would be a bizarre idea, and totally unworkable as a foundation of how the government works.
You're arguing that drawing a line anywhere is 'because I said so.' I take that back, you're asserting it with presenting any argument anywhere. And you still haven't given a coherent definition of person-hood that is internally consistent. Seems to me your long on assertion and short on reasoning.
Now, let me repeat, this was a _compromise_. No matter how the decision fell out at the end, somebody was going to be unhappy. So both sides got something they wanted - early abortions are unregulated and later ones are. The trouble is, one side isn't happy, and not willing to abide by the compromise.
And it is the religious types who are the big driver there. Take away the theistic elephant and there is very little push to change abortion law.
Re: Where do you get this stuff?
From science books. Ask any physicist what the consequences of either a weaker or stronger gravitational constant would be-- a weaker or stronger Planck's constant-- a heavier or lighter electron rest mass-- a stronger or weaker Strong Nuclear Force.
You've been reading too much science fiction. There's very good reason to think that the fundamental laws and constants of our universe are the only possible ones (and I'm hardly in rare company there-- that was Einstein's opinion too). I certainly don't mean to imply that the contingencies of evolution, history etc must all be the same. Very much not. As for your "weakless universe" get back to me when someone observes such a thing. (And in a weakless universe what's up with the electromagnetic force? It has something to do with that too you know) Until then it's idle speculation-- unless I am to take it one faith.
But this is a thread jack which has nothing to do with the topic at hand, not even remotely.
You're arguing that drawing a line anywhere is 'because I said so.'
That's exactly right. Just as allowing one to kill and eat pigs while forbidding the killing and eating of humans is 'because I said so.' And making assault a predicate offense for felony murder (as it is in WA but not most other states) is 'because I said so,' etc.
And you still haven't given a coherent definition of person-hood that is internally consistent.
I believe I said right up front that I lacked a satisfactory definition.
Now, let me repeat, this was a _compromise_.
True, but it was not a compromise not between differing parties who consented to it as a way of each getting half a loaf, but a compromise between 9 unelected old men as a way of getting a majority. That is, it wasn't really a compromise, it was an imposition of personal beliefs by the Supreme Court on the rest of us, whether we like it or not. I believe that some in this thread have taken the position that such impositions are inappropriate through the democratic process, never mind the judicial process. The Constitutional fig leaf--"substantive due process," for connoisseurs of oxymorons--is almost too tiny to be detected.
It's hard to fault a party to a "compromise" who never consented to it for agitating to overturn it.
When I ask "Where do you come up with this stuff?", you're supposed to give some specific sources. 'Science books' sounds borderline illiterate. I've already mentioned the landscape as an easy pop reference. You might check out some of the other books on that page. Oh, and here's a snippet of a review:
"Many Worlds in One: The Search for Other Universes" by Alex Vilenkin is along the same lines, though slightly more difficult, and we have this in the top review: "Cosmologists ask many difficult questions and often come up with strange answers. In this engagingly written but difficult book, Vilenkin, a Tufts University physicist, does exactly this, discussing the creation of the universe, its likely demise and the growing belief among cosmologists that there are an infinite number of universes."
And so on and so forth.
Uh-huh. If you want to pay for the article , might be something you'd be interested in reading. But I suspect that you'll just continue to claim that you're right and I'm wrong.
To be blunt, you don't know what you are talking about, and further, this so-called 'thread jack' was initiated by you with your claims that purely secular beings created life on Earth only pushes the problem of a creator back one remove. Of course, a supernatural Creator has exactly the same problem, but I replied anyway, pointing out that we can push the removes as far back as we like, infinitely far back as a matter of fact. This was first pointed out (as far as I'm aware) sometime in the forties or fifties, the thrust of the argument being that no matter how arbitrarily improbable life is, in a a sufficiently large universe, it's appearance is virtually guaranteed.
As I said, this is all standard stuff. You should read up on it before presenting any more opinions.
Tim, you seem to be under a slight misapprehension here. The thread is about PZ Myers and pushback against organized religion, specifically about desecrating a 'cracker'. Since you want people like us to stop doing this, you've got to give reasons why. So when you robotically assert religious people 'can't really impose their religious beliefs to any great extent', you're not being very convincing. And expecting people like us to stop our ridicule unless we can convince people like you that it really is imposing religious beliefs (this has already been done, if you'd read the thread; yes, legislating highway that only Catholics could use would be imposing religious beliefs.) is, well, to be kind, not very realistic.
Number one, as I've already pointed out, those 'philosophical beliefs' do constitute a religious belief. I've pointed this out before, and that this is in fact in accord with the usage in the dictionary. If you want to convince me otherwise, you'd do better than to blandly and merely assert otherwise. Number two, I don't think anyone has an objection to people weighing in on these questions _as_people_. Any member of the Catholic church is free to vote, talk to the congressperson, etc. What is verboten is using Church funds, Church organization, Church volunteers to influence the political process.
So yes, again, it really is about religious people trying to impose their beliefs on the rest of us. I suggest that if you really want to convince me otherwise, that you make an attempt to be a little more persuasive.
Again, you are setting the bar way too low. Suppose religious people maintain that certain highway lanes are sacred and only believers can use them. You're arguing that if even one person can be found who is not religious and who also argues that certain lanes be reserved for religious people then that belief ceases to be 'religious'. I'm not buying that one.
So _why_ do you want to declare certain things persons now? There must be a reason. Me, I'm more or less happy with what we've got now.
What?!?! Compromise happens _all_the_time_ in the government in this respect. A lot of which happens with the consent of neither party, say, compromise legislation balancing the interests of developers vs. environmentalists. And it happens 'whether we like it or not.' And you're raising this objection _now_? I suppose then that if Congress were to pass a law that person-hood begins at conception this would be unacceptable too then, right?
The impositions considered are inappropriate because they have the force and resources of a large sectarian organization backing them. This has been pointed out multiple times, so please drop this aspect. And your last statement just makes no sense - it implies that if _all_ abortions became legal, that is, if there was no compromise, then one party could very much be faulted for trying to overturn that decision.
That seems to me to be a highly idiosyncratic response.
Compromise happens _all_the_time_ in the government in this respect.
Indeed, but legislative compromise is one thing, and judicial "compromise" is quite another. If the outcome of Roe v Wade were imposed by Congress and/or state legislatures instead of the Supreme Court, it would have considerably greater legitimacy.
it implies that if _all_ abortions became legal, that is, if there was no compromise, then one party could very much be faulted for trying to overturn that decision.
This is a somewhat idiosyncratic reading of what I said. What I meant was, if somebody imposes a decision on you without your consent with which you disagree, there is nothing wrong with you trying to reverse it. That the imposing party gave you some of what you wanted doesn't bind you, morally speaking, in the same way that your assent to a genuine compromise would.
Put another way, Roe v. Wade isn't really a compromise between negotiating parties, it's a decision imposed on both sides by a third party. I can't see that either side would be wrong for agitating to change it.
The impositions considered are inappropriate because they have the force and resources of a large sectarian organization backing them.
I trust that opposition to the death penalty will henceforth be ruled out of bounds, given that very same large sectarian organization has also taken that position.
SoV, allow me to illustrate my position on "compromise" with an example.
Suppose you offer to buy my car fo $500. I counter with $2000. After some back and forth, we agree on $1000 and the deal closes. It would be wrong of me to then start bothering you to pay me the second $1000.
On the flip side, suppose we both stay firm at $500 and $2000. If you sneak into my garage, take the car, and leave $1000, I have every reason to object. You can't defend yourself by saying "Hey, it was a compromise! What are you complaining about?"
What I meant was, if somebody imposes a decision on you without your consent with which you disagree, there is nothing wrong with you trying to reverse it.
Every decision is up for continued debate and reconsideration in a democratic society. If not, someone should notify all the people agitating to end the Iraq War that since the democratic process has already reached a decision on the issue (via the AUMF), they have no basis on which to reexamine the war effort.
SoV
The thread as a whole is about PZ Myers and his actions and statements. The specific sub thread about "imposing beliefs" is not directly about that.
But getting back to Myers, the reason why is that doing so is acting like an ass. That isn't reason to make the action illegal, or to use force to stop it, but it is reason not to do it in the first place.
No it wouldn't. It would be a bad idea, and illegal. It would be discrimination based on religion, but it wouldn't be imposing religious beliefs.In any case no one is proposing such a law, and such a law doesn't closely resemble what anyone here is proposing or supporting, so its pretty much a straw man idea.
Number one, as I've already pointed out, those 'philosophical beliefs' do constitute a religious belief.
Number one, your simply wrong about that.
If you want to convince me otherwise, you'd do better than to blandly and merely assert otherwise.
All you have done is make a bland (and false) assertion to that affect.
If you want references
1: relating to or manifesting faithful devotion to an acknowledged ultimate reality or deity
2: of, relating to, or devoted to religious beliefs or observances
3 a: scrupulously and conscientiously faithful b: fervent, zealous
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/religious
Being scrupulous, conscientious, faithful, fervent, and/or zealous, is indeed a wider definition, but its a definition that has nothing to do with the concept of the separation of church and state, let alone the establishment clause. That clause, and the more general ideas preceding and following from it, are about theology, worship, formal dogma, and religious institutions.
No that isn't verboten. Formally supporting a particular candidate is, but even that, is because of laws about receiving tax exemptions, not because of the status of the organization as a religion. Influencing the political process in general isn't against our constitution or relevant laws (and if it was against statute law, that law would violate the 1st amendment provisions of freedom of speech and arguably free exercise of religion), and even directly supporting candidates in an election would be allowed as long as no tax exemption is claimed.
Using your definition if someone was zealous about the concept of freedom in general, and they formed an organization about it then according to you (at least if you are being consistent, I don't claim you actually directly stated this) that organization shouldn't be allowed to participate in the political process. After all "freedom", and when and how and to what extent it should apply, isn't an issue subject to scientific answers. Its a philosophical issue that fits the way you use the terms "religion" and "religious".
Only in the same way that everyone (or at least just about everyone) tries to impose their beliefs on everyone else.
It doesn't cease to be religious, because to cease it would have had to have been religious in the first place.
If no secular person supports the idea, it still isn't a religious idea, because it isn't an idea about religion.
It would be illegal discrimination based on the religious organization someone belongs to, but it wouldn't be about a religious issue. It would also not be a proposal that resembles anything that someone in this discussion is supporting.
Me neither.
This idea was brought up by me as an example of what would be an unreasonable imposition of religion on the public.
Perhaps I should have qualified better.
It would be difficult for me to imagine a non-religiouos person supporting a Catholics-only lane on a highway; it is an inherently religious proposition.
I can imagine a non-religious person supporting, for example, a Nativity Scene in front of City Hall. Maybe they see it as a harmless accommodation of religious people, maybe while they don't believe in God, they see religiion as a positive force in some people's lives. That would still not make it non-religious, because it still assumes religion.
For abortion, non-religious people have made argument against it that do not appeal to faith, the accommodation of faith, or acknowledgement that faith is a good thing. These arguments could be made if religion did not exist, while the above two could not. To me, that is sufficient to establish that opposition to abortion is not an intrinsically religious issue.
Its inherently discrimination based on a persons religious sect, but it isn't really an issue of theology, doctrine or worship.
I agree with you that it is an unreasonable imposition on the public, its just not exactly religion that is being imposed.
For abortion, non-religious people have made argument against it that do not appeal to faith, the accommodation of faith, or acknowledgement that faith is a good thing. These arguments could be made if religion did not exist
I agree
Sigh. Tim, _I_just_told_you_ the context I was arguing in, and the context for why we were talking about imposing beliefs. Are you just reflexively disagreeing with me? Or is it that your own position is nothing more than assertion?
Now, the idea is that Myers is behaviour is disagreeable to you, so if you want to get this sort of behaviour to stop, you've got to, at a minimum, convincingly explain why issues like abortion, gay marriage, stem cell research, etc are instances where people are not really trying to impose their religious beliefs.
The key phrase is 'convincingly explain'. You have not made the slightest attempt to do so. Will you at long last try to give an explanatiion, instead of an assertion?
So what is this non-faith argument that person-hood begins at conception? I've heard arguments that it starts much later, based upon activity in the nervous system (and it's the one I agree with, as well as most atheists who favor some restrictions on abortion.) It's also a consistent argument in the sense that in conferring person-hood at this stage of development, I'd be comfortable of leveling a charge of murder on the person getting the abortion.
So what is this non-faith based argument that life begins at conception? This non-faith based argument that termination at these early stage - the snowflake babies - constitute premeditated murder? I must confess that it is a new one on me.
And I told you the context I was arguing in.
In any case Meyers isn't forcing his religious beliefs on people, and other people aren't forcing his religious beliefs on him, in the context of his talk about the communion wafers. So if your talking about forcing religious belief, your either talking about some other action, or your making a bizarre statement.
His behavior is obnoxious and offensive, whatever opinion you have on all those other issues. There is no reason to have to explain anything about them in order to legitimately recognize that he's acting like an ass.
As to why something is not forcing religion on someone, you have it pretty much backwards. You have to explain why it is.
Particularly in the case of stem cell research funding the assertion would be unreasonable, because the issue is about federal funding of an activity, not outlawing it. Arguing against or refraining from funding X with tax dollars is forcing neither X nor not X.
The other points aren't less unreasonable, but "less unreasonable", doesn't equal "reasonable".
Abortion is about human life, not about theology, or worship, or religious institutions.
Marriage is a matter of general cultural norms, and even the definition of the word. It is mostly a moral issue in the eyes of those who would ban it but "moral issue" doesn't equal religion. Drugs and prostitution are largely illegal because of moral beliefs, even things like a minimum wage have strong connections to moral opinions. If we are to expand the definition of religion, for purposes of the establishment clause, to all organized advocacy of moral beliefs, then they would qualify as well. But such a stretch would be unreasonable and uncalled for.
The key phrase is 'convincingly explain'.
Nice attempt to play burden of proof games. Yes if I'm not convincing, and not even to most readers, but to you and/or Myers (who almost certainly isn't even reading this), than I lose.
Sorry, it doesn't work that way.
So what is this non-faith argument that person-hood begins at conception?
The very concept of personhood, and ANY definition of it, would be religious, by your definition of the term.
In an case, my argument isn't about person hood. Its about a human life being intentionally destroyed.
Tim, you're just being contrary . . . as well as willfully snipping:
No one insofar as I know is trying to get you to stop doing anything. To the contrary, people like you want Myers to stop this 'desecration'. Since there is _nothing_ you can do legally, all you can do is be persuasive.
Guess what? You're not being persuasive. You are not even, as far as I can tell, _trying_ to be persuasive. So, tough, ridiculing religion in general and in this case in particular is going to keep happening. It is not a matter 'losing'. Really, this isn't at all hard to understand, and given what you chose to deliberately snip, I suspect that you really do; it's just that you don't _want_ to be persuasive.
Though the fact that you see things that way speaks volumes about someone who wants to call themselves a 'Christian'.
No neither of those terms describes my statement.
I would like him to stop, but my point is not "he must stop", but "he's being an ass". I don't have to persuade him of anything to make that point. In any case I don't expect anything that could be said by anyone would be likely to be persuasive. (And even if I'm wrong about that, the chance that he is reading my comments is only very slightly above 0%)