On rape, you might find this of interest -

http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/150003.article

...........To ignore the knowledge that evolutionary biology can provide on why men rape women is the morally questionable stance.

your shtick of insinuating that people who believe evolution are evil is old as fuck please stop ty

Back to ''elevator-gate'' again.

http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2011/07/04/ladies-richard-dawkins-knows-h/

Yes, Richard Dawkins is an asshole. It's possible to both support science and dislike Dawkins. What's your point?

@oscar, you make the mistake of assuming that rape is right if it is not wrong. what if rousseau is right, and it is misguided to talk of morality with regards to man in his natural state? in such a case rape would not be wrong, yet it would not be right either.

If someone has murdered someone and you have 100% certainty (let's say you witnessed it) and there is 0 evidence to convict, thus he gets away with it, the people who say "social order trumps justice" (whatever the hell that means) are just sidestepping the issue and being cowards.

Justice has failed.
Social "order" has failed is murder is occuring and is not brought to justice.

What a stupid cop-out by people afraid to explore a difficult topic of where you morality is derived from. Bravo to the brave few who answered honestly. As for the other "I-grew-from-the-goo" crowd, for whom there is no basis for morality, <-- this statement is evident in your inability to construct an answer. "Because without god I still know right from wrong, so I don't want people killing other people" is a stupid co-out, because the premise of the question is you are allowing, knowingly, a person to do exactly what you said shouldn't be done - in essence, you advocated it (murder), or at least don't think it's that big a deal if you don't think it's ok to step outside the system and correct the wrong.

The natural human aversion towards murder and death, in my mind, is the emotional reactions that most of us get to seeing others suffer the loss of loved ones. We sympathize with them, or empathize if we have also experienced such a loss. Therefore, people automatically connect murder with extreme personal loss to not just the one whose life has been taken, but to all that cared about him/her, and thus it becomes a deplorable offense. Societies past and present that sanction executions and uncontrolled murder have leadership either devoid or ignoring these emotional connections that mostly all of us have that we make with our fellow man.

As a corollary, this would be why a lot of people naturally look down on homeless people because they automatically assume that person has no legitimate connections to others in the world and if they died by whatever means, natural or murder, no tears would be shed.

@socrates, I note your neutrality on the issue of rape.

@mendax
1) In this context is the essence of the difference between the atheistic and theistic world-view a disagreement over whether moral values are absolute or subjective?

2) Moreover, do some atheists adopt Darwinism as an alternative belief system? For the adherents of this deliberately alternative view natural selection (survival of the fittest) becomes justified as a fully explanatory paradigm of the natural order of things. It is in this light that remarks such as - ''To ignore the knowledge that evolutionary biology can provide on why men rape women is the morally questionable stance.'' are to be understood. Moreover, the currently most prominent atheist (who choose to entitle one of his books as The Selfish Gene) feels free to diminish that women’s experience in that elevator. He, after all, supposedly has science on his side.

@y2kjbk

who are these people who ''look down'' on the homeless? I do not think that I ever met one in my circle(s0. We must move in very different worlds. I take heart in this:

''Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?''

Okay fulham. I guess I misread you. It was not a trap in regards to my remark in that other thread. It was instead a trap to allow you to link some moron's blog and suggest that accepting evolution theory equates to condoning rape. Well, at least I was right about it being a trap.

Anyway, I think being punched in the face is not as bad as being shot in the guts. By your reasoning I guess I condone face punching. Thanks for showing your complete lack of rational thought.

Also, darwinism is not a belief system you moron. It's a scientific theory strongly supported by observation. It just states what happens in nature without adding moral judgment. Heck, even Richard Dawkins said on multiple occasions that he'd consider a moral code based on the survival of the fittest (aka conservatism) horrible. You see, we humans got brains (well you don't but most of us do) and so we can build planes to defy gravity and construct a social order to defy darwinism.

@fulham, i'm not neutral on the issue, at all. i was just offering the idea of morality not existing in the state of nature, in a pre societal state, which would make all issues moral neutral/not a moral issue.

@SD

Rape is wrong. Why did you feel the need to have me clarify this?

@oscar, i am pointing out that saying it is not right is not the same as saying it is wrong, and there is a situation where it is arguably not wrong (whilst still not right), because you didn't think there was one

SD, do you think that animals are devoid of morality? That it sets humans apart from all other animals?

Yeah I'm aware of the difference between not right and wrong. Given the context of my remark though, specifically my affirmative respons (Yeah) to fulham's question, it seems like you are nitpicking in this case.

" It seems that for anti-theists, the demand for social order is the highest value and supplants the 'demands' of "fairies and ghosts" for social justice..."

I think herein lies your problem. Just because we atheists don't believe that justice is mandated by a higher power doesn't mean we don't demand it for ourselves. If you are going to say that atheists are more order > justice then you need more than just your opinion to make this claim.

Darwinism is not a belief system?????

What the heck do you think that the suffix 'ism' implies? I recommend a dictionary.

Note Darwinism as a belief system is certainly distinct from the acceptance of Natural Selection as an explanatory tool for the variety of life on Earth. I would have thought that this is obvious to all, but never mind.

Darwinism is not a belief system?????

What the heck do you think that the suffix 'ism' implies? I recommend a dictionary.

Note Darwinism as a belief system is certainly distinct from the acceptance of Natural Selection as an explanatory tool for the variety of life on Earth. I would have thought that this is obvious to all, but never mind.
.........construct a social order to defy darwinism.
AND
Just because we atheists don't believe that justice is mandated by a higher power doesn't mean we don't demand it for ourselves………… (-I take it you mean everyone, but maybe not-).

In your world(s), where morality is subjective, might I ask just how much these high-flown ideals amount to? Are they to be discarded when environmental stresses reach a high enough pitch? That is when the chances of survival are raised for the individual and his gene pool if he/they act in a selfish, rather than cooperative manner.
Isn’t that just what was meant by - ''To ignore the knowledge that evolutionary biology can provide on why men rape women is the morally questionable stance.''

What the hell? How can this thread have gotten so far without someone objecting to capital punishment? Yes, I am an atheist.

fulhamish: What bullshit world do you live in where morality becomes 'subjective' for those who cannot manage to give credence to the supernatural? This may be a difficult concept for you to grasp, but any logical toddler can come to the conclusion on his or her own that you can do what you want until it annoys the person next to you – at which point you are infringing on another's rights. As for social Darwinism, that worldview originated in the minds of late-19th Century Christian lunatics in the United States (with Theodore Roosevelt as one of the most disgusting examples) who misinterpreted Darwin to justify their racial superiority complex and imperialistic urges. You're not welcome in this thread for a reason; stop hijacking it with your nonsene and get out.

i have no idea how y'all continue to walk right into these traps. you know who you're dealing with

Fulham, again you show how little you actually know about (modern) evolution theory. It's not at all about the survival of individuals. In fact, as indicated by that book title The Selfish Gene, it is instead about the survival of genes. Cooperative, social and moral behavior of individuals developed exactly because it provides a survival advantage to the genes they carry.

As to me requiring a dictionary to figure out what 'ism' means... thanks for clarifying that you think magnetism and embolism are just a belief systems.

Next time you mean to say social darwinism I suggest you don't call it darwinism as they are not the same thing.

Hi fullhamish:

"In your world(s), where morality is subjective, might I ask just how much these high-flown ideals amount to? Are they to be discarded when environmental stresses reach a high enough pitch?"

I won't say that most individuals will discard them. Most will not. But those individuals who have a morality more in line with said environmental stresses will be the ones who pass their morality on to their children. Morality absolutely evolves over time, for the faithful as well as atheists, whether they admit it or not. I don't see many Christians making moral arguments for slavery today, for example. Those unfortunate bible passages that support slavery as a moral system are brushed aside, ignored, swept under the rug by all mainstream Christians. 100 years from now you won't see them making moral arguments against homosexual marriage, either. Over the long term, reality shapes morality, not the inverse.

On a side note, please do remember that whether or not a person believes morality is subjective, they are equally likely to act against their own morale dictates. In other words, Christians rape, murder, and abort at the same rates as atheists.

Hey all, you know what? Let's pretend that Christian morals are 'absolute' while secular morals are 'subjective' and act as though the former are better. Who's with me?

"Christians rape, murder, and abort at the same rates as atheists"

Citation please.

lol Good lord, sounds like some moron is channeling Putin...

Not until he starts denying the atrocities of Russia and North Korea.

http://www.atheismresource.com/2010/atheist-dont-commit-as-much-crime-as-the-religious-do

Wow. Tolstoy, it seriously worries me that you consider "a few murders" as representing "a peaceful resolution" to a problem.

Murdering people is a violent act. Murdering people isn't a "peaceful" act.

HJow convenient that the article is in an atheist website and the study it cites returns an error 404. Find me the study, not a one sided slant written by a pro-atheist organization, so I can look at the details. The studies title suggest religious, not just Christian, so until I see the study I can't refute your statement and you haven't proven or even properly cited it.