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From: laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Hitler and Moral Relativism
Message-ID: <5472@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 13-Apr-85 14:16:52 EST
Article-I.D.: utzoo.5472
Posted: Sat Apr 13 14:16:52 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 13-Apr-85 14:16:52 EST
References: <487@lll-crg.ARPA> <789@bunker.UUCP> <453@mcnc.mcnc.UUCP> <4651@umcp-cs.UUCP>, <467@mcnc.mcnc.UUCP>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
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From Byron Howes:
	I don't follow this either.  My point about white southerners
	is simply that despite the fact that many (including myself)
	consider racism and sexism to be inherently evil, there are
	others who consider segregation and traditional sexual values
	to be moral precepts, worth fighting for.  (Note the change in
	words.)  These people are by all objective measures very moral
	people -- following a set of values held strongly in this
	country up till the last twenty years.  Those values are
	gradually being swept away (or broken up, depending on your
	point of view) This is a change in values, not a change in the
	people who subscribe to them.  Is this progression to some
	absolute morality?  Make a case for it.

This is the great question.
Since you believe that racism is inherantly evil is your problem one
of ``why is it that these sincere people do not find the truth
of this belief obvious'' or is it ``why do I cling to this notion
of inherant evils even though there are none''? If it is the first,
then I do not see how you can say that there is no absolute morality -
it is what makes those things inherantly evil. If it is the second, then
I do not see how you can believe that racism is inherantly evil.

Whether we are progressing to a greater understanding of an
absolutely existing morality is another question. It could be that we
are getting less and less enlightened all the time. I tend to
doubt that progress could be made in other areas (such as science) and
not be made in the area of morals - given, of coruse, that an
absolute morality exists.

Laura Creighton
utzoo!laura