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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.religion.christian
Subject: Re: The Emperor's New Clothes
Message-ID: <1322@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 26-Jul-85 12:06:43 EDT
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.1322
Posted: Fri Jul 26 12:06:43 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 28-Jul-85 14:37:17 EDT
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Organization: Whatever we're calling ourselves this week
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>>Why? This would be correct if Rich maintained that objectivity was the
>>sole arbitrator, in all cases. I got the impression that his view point
>>was basically that objective claims demand objective evidence. This
>>does not exclude subjective evidence from being useful in cases where
>>the claim is only presented as being subjective. 
>>[Padraig Houlahan]

> I get a different impression:  nothing in an argument is admissible to
> Rich if it is not objective.  If Rich wants to say that that is not his
> position, fine.  But then he must allow subjectivity from other
> people.  And he often objects when other people *are* subjective. [DUBOIS]

People "liking" survival is not subjective.  I'm not saying "I like
survival, therefore it is valued".  I'm saying that people gain pleasure
from surviving.  That is a physical fact about organisms.   A drive for
hunger leads to a pleasurable experience of eating, a drive for procreation
leads to a pleasurable experience of sex.  Etc.  Death is a painful,
non-pleasurable experience, and thus we seek to avoid it.  In what way
is this "subjective"?  Why are you so desperate to admit subjectivity as a
valid thing?  Is it the only thing you've got?

>>I note with interest that the correctness of his statement, in itself,
>>has not been challanged.

> That's right.  So what?

Yeah, what else is new?  :-)

> I already said before that I may agree with
> survival, etc., but I do so for my own reasons (which presumably Rich
> would not agree with).  The "challenge" was for Rich to advance
> reasons of his *own* why anyone should agree with his statements.  This
> he has not done, nor, I think, will he be able to.  He certainly has
> not done it by justifying his preferences by reference to "liking
> them".  If you think the discussion is about whether I agree with his
> *conclusions*, then you are mistaken.  I'm wondering about his
> reasons for the conclusion.

Funny, I didn't think these were "my" preferences.  As I said above, people
like life because they don't want to die, because dying is a painful thing.
This is in our biochemistry.  If we didn't like life, if we were organisms
like Marvin the Paranoid Android from HHGttG ("Life, don't talk to me about
life"), then we'd have died out long ago, not even surviving long enough to
reproduce.  Even Marvin, who hated life lasted millions of years.  Perhaps
because the alternative was worse.

>>>Truly, Emperor Rosen has no clothes.  When pushed back to his real
>>>reasons, he says:  "because we like them".
>>>This is no more than the sanctification of desire.  Instead of "might
>>>makes right", Rich says we should follow "like makes right".
>>>Any three-year-old could tell you that.

>>This type of argument sounds familiar. I wonder where I heard it before?
>>You arndt taking lessons in philosophy 301 now, are you? :-)

> "I note with interest that the correctness of my statements, in themselves,
> has not been challenged."
> It remains true that desire has been set up as the final arbiter.

Of what?  Of our own wishes to survive!  Nothing more.  What's the big deal?
So what if we seek our survival because we desire it?  What other reason
might you want for surviving?  The design of a god?  You say above "like
makes right".  Since "right" is in the "like" of the beholder, that follows
logically.  It's a tautology!!  Which is what I've been saying all along.
Your views on a god determining absolute right and wrong have always been
nothing more than a projection that your "right" is an absolute "right".

No one has challenged the correctness of your statements.  Indeed.  But you
seem to be the one who has the problem with it.  What is that problem?
-- 
Providing the mininum daily adult requirement of sacrilege...
				Rich Rosen 	ihnp4!pyuxd!rlr