the *** sex & religion thread (Religious, effect, members, cover)

[anticipation]

Originally Posted by Inuzuka Skysword

A rational man tries to be rational in ALL AREAS.

you are not a rational man, and you will never be one.

[Inuzuka Skysword]

Originally Posted by sleepy jack

This is getting derailed into a discussion about government and rape let's try and move it back to what we really started arguing about (and to be honest, I don't know about you, but I don't want to extend this to two posts responses with paragraphs and paragraphs simply because I want to waste a half hour on an internet forum typing up something that lengthy.) We've gone over the government discussion before and if you want to again I will but not in this thread. As for the rape thing its entirely semantics. If something gives any form of consent I'd consider it sex apparently you don't.

I agreed with you on the rape issue.

The great irony of your entire argument is several times you've said you're a christian. You can flip the arguments for morality and religion around and you're just as "irrational" as you're claiming me to me. Which I find weird. I base my argument as to why religion is false off of a scientific and historical information. The problem is you can't do that with morality. Religion is traditional; morality is ever-evolving. As for basing it off science...you couldn't get anywhere with it unless you found were able to find several groups of people with the exact same definitions of right and wrong for each test which is unlikely and would be a horrible way of going about things because it would be selective and therefore have no actual bearing on reality. I'd really like you to accurately explain how my approach to morality is "irrational" and turning off the "logic-switch" because I find the idea that you can find a personal code objective for billions of people to be, well, just fucking silly.

Yes, I know I am a Christian. Yes, I know I am irrational. The thing is, I don't make bottomless claims like the fact that religion is the cause of all our problems.

@Bold: This wouldn't be an objective morality. No human can be completely objective. Logic is the most objective way of looking at things, and the best we have. It doesn't matter if everyone in the world has the same exact right and wrong in their minds because that would not mean that their morality is objective. Morality is objective because it is logical and rational. So, Rand's definition of an objective morality is one that is rational. Basically, a morality in which one picks what is right or wrong based on the most rational way to achieve his values.

Like I said before, tons of people can believe in a God. However, that doesn't make it right. In the same way, tons of people can have the same morality, but that doesn't make it objectively right.

Now if you're saying there can be wrong or right morals then who's to decide what's wrong or right? A mythical space god? Ayn Rand? A dead Palestinian? To me, if there was an objective morality (which I don't believe there is) it would have to be incredibly vague in order to be timeless, universal and objective. Moral norms and ethical standards are constantly changing as we progress as a world. I think the ultimate goal of a some sort of perfect (or objective) morality is unattainable because it would require a universal agreement as to what right or wrong is. Which isn't going to happen. The only other route would be some sort of moral arbitrator but we have those now anyway. I don't like Jesus or Muhammad or Moses or Joe Smith. I think they teach some very immoral things and I could go on and on about the problems I have with organized religion and their teachings but I've beat on about it so much and unless you want me to I won't here. I think you're approach towards morality shows that you don't understand the meaning of the word (and before you ask I don't think Karl Marx and Jesus ruined the definition of that word either) or have very much scope. I believe it should not be treated as something concrete but as an on-going human discussion about seeking a balance between protecting the rights of humans but respecting the beliefs of others.

@Bold: Logic and reason decide it, just like logic and reason decide whether something exists or it doesn't.

@Underlined:I have already stated how vague the morality is. The basis for morality is reason. In other words, your right and wrong are based on the rational goals you choose and the most rational way to achieve those goals. That is the objective morality.

Also, morality must be concrete if reality is. Morality is a part of reality. If logic works to disprove a god, then it works to disprove that god's morality.

you are not a rational man, and you will never be one.

Woah! Almost got me there. Great argument. I have already said that I am not rational. The fact is, there is something called romanticism and it shows the best that we can be. That is what the purpose of everyone's life is. The pursuit of happiness. The way to achieve it is to achieve your goals, and because morality and reality intertwine, the moral way is always the most practical way. So, your best way of achieving your values and happiness is to follow your moral code, which is based on the most rational way to achieve your rational goals. If you sit there thinking you will never achieve rationality, then your existence is meaningless. This only leads to destruction of the self.

[sleepy jack]

Originally Posted by Inuzuka Skysword

Also, morality must be concrete if reality is. Morality is a part of reality. If logic works to disprove a god, then it works to disprove that god's morality

I had written up this long response but after reading this "example" of your "logic" I deleted it all and decided I'm going to stop arguing with you. Not to sound like a complete snob but that was one of the stupidest things I've ever read. I strongly encourage you stop reading Ayn Rand and starting reading things on the scientific method and basic philosophy of logic (especially logic fallacies.) Until then I'm not going to bother arguing with you. There's a reason basically any academic philosopher (and many people who read philosophy) view Rand as a joke you know.

[The Unfan]

Logic 101

Originally Posted by Inuzuka Skysword

It doesn't matter if everyone in the world has the same exact right and wrong in their minds because that would not mean that their morality is objective.

Alright, so intersubjectivity is not objectivity. Makes sense.

Morality is objective because it is logical and rational.

So morality is what is perceptively right from the currently known information. As information changes so must morality. This means it is not "concrete" as you later stated. Also, something being logical and rational doesn't make something objective. With my current knowledge it would be logical to assume that I am going to go eat soon. I am hungry. However, I have not ate soon and therefor it is not factual, nor objective.

@Bold: Logic and reason decide it, just like logic and reason decide whether something exists or it doesn't.

This also isn't true. There are many species of animals that exist that we just don't know about. They're being discovered. It is not reasonable to state that these species just randomly formed before our eyes and then populated their habitats the instant we discovered them. Rather, with what we know about evolution it is logical to conclude the opposite.

Also, morality must be concrete if reality is. Morality is a part of reality. If logic works to disprove a god, then it works to disprove that god's morality.

Physical reality is objective, and this directly contradicts a statement you made earlier. Watch as I quote it.

Morality is objective because it is logical and rational. So, Rand's definition of an objective morality is one that is rational. Basically, a morality in which one picks what is right or wrong based on the most rational way to achieve his values.

If one picks his morality as he feels is appropriate for his values than morality is just that. Its what you feel is moral. Objective feelings? How does that work? What is an objective sadness? Would that mean that its is 100% correct sad? That doesn't make a damn bit of sense.

[Guybrush]

I think you guys are getting off-track on what morality is. I think morality mainly comes from two things. The first is our biology, some sense of morality are adaptations that we have evolved because humans are social animals and morality helps us live together. Second, morality in part changes with culture (including religion).

Evolution of adaptations and "evolution of culture" (if you can accept that as an idea) is predictable and so is morality to some extent.


I'lll provide some examples to illustrate what I'm talking about and I'll start with morality as an adaptation.

One should start with the perception that the gene is the (smallest) unit of selection in evolution as opposed to individuals or populations. Genes are selfish, so that would mean that there is no real altruism. However, altruism (or something like it) would come about because of selfish interest. Think of the gene that gives you blue eyes. That gene on it's own would have very low fitness. It needs all the other genes to make up an eye and then an organism that benefits from that eye in order to be selected for. Even if all genes are selfish, some have higher fitness when grouped with other genes. What you eventually end up with are genes to make humans and other living beings, gene carriers if you will. We will die, but our genes will live on and that's what's important to us, although not consciously.

Remember that genes code not just for our physical bodies, but our emotions. The reward you get from having sex comes from your biology and is supposed to motivate you to having more of it.

As humans, we want our genes to survive and our genes are not just found in ourselves, but also our children and family. This explains kin selection - why we care more for our family members than people we are not related to. Also, just like the gene of blue eye colour needs to work with other genes, humans (as social animals) also enjoy a higher fitness when working together with other people. That means that we must have behavioural adaptations to take care of and/or cooperate with the people around us .. but there's a fine line, at some point you start giving too much and it has a negative effect on your own interest.

So from this point of view, morality should have some rather universal ideas, and it does. Killing other people should be considered bad. Killing your own children should be even worse - and cheating on your partner with other people's partners should be considered bad - and probably even more so if you are a woman because your parental investment is relatively high if you become pregnant. These are extreme examples, but extremes work very well that well. If you are constantly taking more than you give and/or doing things that lead to conflict with other people in your community, like stepping on people's toes and never saying sorry, people will think of you as rude and immoral .. wherever you are.


Next, you have morality as shaped by culture. If you want to get a little pseudo-scientific about culture, you can say that culture evolves kind of like living things do. The things that are selected for are "memes", which is basically a culture-way of saying genes - ideas that sometimes make up bigger ideas when grouped together with many others. Memes are selected for or against in the collective human mindscape and what determines a memes fitness is it's appeal to us. Things that trigger emotional responses, such as joy or fear, are labeled as "important" by our brains and as a result, enjoys a higher fitness.

For example, you may have the meme that there is a god. The god-meme should enjoy a higher fitness when grouped with other memes, for example memes that say if you don't believe in this, you go to hell - and if you do believe - you go to heaven. As a result, you would expect some ideas to get selected for together and as a result, the "evolution" of religions. Also, other parts of culture should evolve roughly the same way.

Religions and cultures usually have their own laws and these may differ from the ones that makes sense from an adaptations-point-of-view. For example, it may be immoral to eat pork or the idea of honour may be elevated to such a degree that it justifies the killing of your own child.

I think it is the cultural moral may seem to be chaotic and ever changing, but not all of it is. Back in the feudal chinese times, society may have accepted that the emperor's men could kill the farmer's wife for a trivial reason, but I'm pretty sure your average farmer would think that was an immoral thing to do - just like he would if it happened today.


I know my post is horribly long, but at the same time, it's horribly short because you could write several books about this. If anyone finds this interesting, you should read famous biologist Richard Dawkins' book, "The Selfish Gene" if you haven't already - or possibly some other work of his. These are not all his ideas alone, but his first book gathered the thoughts of many academics.

[sleepy jack]

Well part of the reason we got off track on morality is because we were more dealing with Objectivism and Inuzuka accused me of approaching morality different than I approach religion, which means I'm "turning off the logic-switch" and "irrational". Even though I've been trying to explain to him that I approach religion (and claim its false) based on science/historic knowledge and if you look at history than you'll see morals change from culture to culture and century to century...which doesn't lend any credibility to morality being "objective." Than when I went at it (barring the gene thing) from a scientific study angle he told me that was a bad way to go about it because humans aren't objective. Which struck me as odd since we were talking about the human idea of morality* and if humans aren't objective than how can their ideas on right and wrong be objective either? Basically in approaching morality the same way I approach religion I find that it isn't objective.

Now I've said before (I believe when I went on that long rant in the Morality and the Bible thread) that I don't doubt that morality is a selected trait and that certain societies have had members who didn't act in the best interests of their group (and acted maybe in the best interests of themselves instead or were just lazy or something) and as a result their entire group failed to survive. I think, as you said, that true Altruism is impossible (though admittedly I did not approach that from a biological perspective more from my interaction with humans) but I think operating in absolutes and extremes when it comes to human ideals is just foolish because it's not realistic. You're never going to find someone who lets themselves be violently sexed up because their "selfless."

I did talk to great lengths about morality being adaptive (I believe in the morality and bible thread again.) As I said above (and you have too) ethical standards and moral norms change at different paces and in different places and in some cultures this is okay but in some cultures it's not. If you get very specific though you'll find within that culture that the general society of course isn't all going to agree what is moral and what isn't. To look at the farmer example, what if there's a farmer who is very loyal to the empire (and since in many cases marriage is just a property thing, something which nowadays we generally view as immoral) just views killing his wife as killing a cow and doesn't really care? That sounds cold but I think you get what I'm saying. The sense of right and wrong changes from person to person, there is no objective sense of it. I mean even now, there are plenty of people who are for the death penalty and consider it fair punishment but I find it horribly immoral and I am against it in all circumstances.

One of the reasons I'm so passionate about Atheism is because I believe that morally religion is detrimental to society. As I've said before if you accept faith or Jesus as a moral arbitrator than logically you have to accept the Qu'ran as a moral arbitrator as well. Which means accepting the abuse of woman it also means accepting acts like 9/11 as strictly moral acts because they're only playing by your rules, as unreasonable in my mind as they are.**

I really just wish we could grow past this idea that morality is something concrete. I believe we need to see it as an ongoing human discussion with an unattainable but beautiful goal nonetheless (world peace and rainbows and all that.) As times change we need to adjust our ideas (and we do.) Even Christians just base the morality their morality off of what is secular and then just go back and use the bible to justify it. I've said before if you asked Jesus about cloning or any of our modern issues he'd have no idea if it was moral or not because he wouldn't even know what cloning was!

*I'm ignoring the rest of species in the world because if we widen our scope to a certain extent this isn't going to get anywhere. I mean you could see morality in the animal kingdom, for instance how wolves operate as a pack, or how a mother takes care of her young, etc. Not that I'm condemning your gene argument, I believe it and it makes sense. I just believe because of our intelligence the human idea of morality is beyond the animal one even if I'd basically define the general goal similarly. Which is that I believe there needs to be a balance between protecting personal liberties and benefiting the society as a whole.

**I do want to add I'm not just attacking Islam here I do believe religion as a whole teaches some very nasty things, particularly Christianity. Masturbation is not something that should make people feel ashamed and you shouldn't feel ashamed over natural impulses either. Lust is normal and I don't believe it is a sin. I also don't believe every situation can be judge strictly as "right" or "wrong" and I think teaching that kind of thing almost condemns independent thought. I also believe teaching children these things at a very impressionable age is immoral. No matter how much my rational mind tells me lust isn't shameful I still believe it is, though logically I know it isn't "sinful." That is psychological damage I don't think can be undone and it was done by a church. I also believe the externalization of blame to be a damaging thing, people need to accept their mistakes. I could go on and on but I'll stop now as this post is already very lengthy.

[cardboard adolescent]

I pray every day that someone will come along and violently sex me up. God's a bastard though, just the same old shit.

[Inuzuka Skysword]

Originally Posted by The Unfan

Logic 101
Alright, so intersubjectivity is not objectivity. Makes sense.

I don't know if you are being sarcastic or not. All I know is that just because many people believe it to be true, it doesn't mean it is true. What is objective is explained by logic. Therefore everyone can have the same morality, but if it is not logical and rational it is not objective.

So morality is what is perceptively right from the currently known information. As information changes so must morality. This means it is not "concrete" as you later stated. Also, something being logical and rational doesn't make something objective. With my current knowledge it would be logical to assume that I am going to go eat soon. I am hungry. However, I have not ate soon and therefor it is not factual, nor objective.

Logic is the objective way to view reality. Therefore it is the objective way to view morality, which is a part of reality. Morality, as I said before, has a set skeleton that will never change. The skeleton is the fact that your morality must be rational making it objective. However, it may be wrong for one person to eat fast food because he doesn't want to get fat. The other, however, doesn't mind it. Therefore, it is only morally wrong for the person whose goal is to stay lean. The morality is the same in that both are rational and are the same approach to morality. Their goals are what vary (though one could argue that their goals could be irrational). There are some things which are similar among all humans. The non-aggression principle is always rational because it is always irrational to use physical force against another human. When you do so, you acknowledge that you yourself have no right to life.

This also isn't true. There are many species of animals that exist that we just don't know about. They're being discovered. It is not reasonable to state that these species just randomly formed before our eyes and then populated their habitats the instant we discovered them. Rather, with what we know about evolution it is logical to conclude the opposite.

Logic still decides what exists in this situation. If you are observing reality through conjectures that your mind makes really fast such as "I can see it so it is probably real" and stuff like that, logic is deciding whether it exists or not. If it doesn't then you are arguing that logic is should not be held as an absolute. Since there is no reason to believe this, logic is what decides whether something exists or not because it is the way of viewing reality, and our only trusted way of viewing it.

Physical reality is objective,

So why isn't all reality objective? Reality must be objective in all of its parts if reality exists beyond the individual consciousness.

If one picks his morality as he feels is appropriate for his values than morality is just that. Its what you feel is moral. Objective feelings? How does that work? What is an objective sadness? Would that mean that its is 100% correct sad? That doesn't make a damn bit of sense.

I never used the word "feel" in that post. "Feelings" are arbitrary whims and should not be trusted over reasoning. Morality is when one picks his rules based on what his values are. Since morality must be rational, along with the goals, you aren't picking out of a hat. You decide, using logic, which is going to allow me to achieve that goal the best way. One can still choose wrong, and when they do they have the wrong morality even if they reasoned it. It just means that they reasoned wrong.

had written up this long response but after reading this "example" of your "logic" I deleted it all and decided I'm going to stop arguing with you. Not to sound like a complete snob but that was one of the stupidest things I've ever read. I strongly encourage you stop reading Ayn Rand and starting reading things on the scientific method and basic philosophy of logic (especially logic fallacies.) Until then I'm not going to bother arguing with you. There's a reason basically any academic philosopher (and many people who read philosophy) view Rand as a joke you know.

You mention logic fallacies and pull out this bull****. Seriously, how is the logic wrong? If one follows a morality because a god tells him to, and the god is disproven, then whole reason for the morality is rendered void making the morality irrational.

[QUOTEI think you guys are getting off-track on what morality is. I think morality mainly comes from two things. The first is our biology, some sense of morality are adaptations that we have evolved because humans are social animals and morality helps us live together. Second, morality in part changes with culture (including religion).

Evolution of adaptations and "evolution of culture" (if you can accept that as an idea) is predictable and so is morality to some extent.


I'lll provide some examples to illustrate what I'm talking about and I'll start with morality as an adaptation.

One should start with the perception that the gene is the (smallest) unit of selection in evolution as opposed to individuals or populations. Genes are selfish, so that would mean that there is no real altruism. However, altruism (or something like it) would come about because of selfish interest. Think of the gene that gives you blue eyes. That gene on it's own would have very low fitness. It needs all the other genes to make up an eye and then an organism that benefits from that eye in order to be selected for. Even if all genes are selfish, some have higher fitness when grouped with other genes. What you eventually end up with are genes to make humans and other living beings, gene carriers if you will. We will die, but our genes will live on and that's what's important to us, although not consciously.

Remember that genes code not just for our physical bodies, but our emotions. The reward you get from having sex comes from your biology and is supposed to motivate you to having more of it.

As humans, we want our genes to survive and our genes are not just found in ourselves, but also our children and family. This explains kin selection - why we care more for our family members than people we are not related to. Also, just like the gene of blue eye colour needs to work with other genes, humans (as social animals) also enjoy a higher fitness when working together with other people. That means that we must have behavioural adaptations to take care of and/or cooperate with the people around us .. but there's a fine line, at some point you start giving too much and it has a negative effect on your own interest.

So from this point of view, morality should have some rather universal ideas, and it does. Killing other people should be considered bad. Killing your own children should be even worse - and cheating on your partner with other people's partners should be considered bad - and probably even more so if you are a woman because your parental investment is relatively high if you become pregnant. These are extreme examples, but extremes work very well that well. If you are constantly taking more than you give and/or doing things that lead to conflict with other people in your community, like stepping on people's toes and never saying sorry, people will think of you as rude and immoral .. wherever you are.


Next, you have morality as shaped by culture. If you want to get a little pseudo-scientific about culture, you can say that culture evolves kind of like living things do. The things that are selected for are "memes", which is basically a culture-way of saying genes - ideas that sometimes make up bigger ideas when grouped together with many others. Memes are selected for or against in the collective human mindscape and what determines a memes fitness is it's appeal to us. Things that trigger emotional responses, such as joy or fear, are labeled as "important" by our brains and as a result, enjoys a higher fitness.

For example, you may have the meme that there is a god. The god-meme should enjoy a higher fitness when grouped with other memes, for example memes that say if you don't believe in this, you go to hell - and if you do believe - you go to heaven. As a result, you would expect some ideas to get selected for together and as a result, the "evolution" of religions. Also, other parts of culture should evolve roughly the same way.

Religions and cultures usually have their own laws and these may differ from the ones that makes sense from an adaptations-point-of-view. For example, it may be immoral to eat pork or the idea of honour may be elevated to such a degree that it justifies the killing of your own child.

I think it is the cultural moral may seem to be chaotic and ever changing, but not all of it is. Back in the feudal chinese times, society may have accepted that the emperor's men could kill the farmer's wife for a trivial reason, but I'm pretty sure your average farmer would think that was an immoral thing to do - just like he would if it happened today.


I know my post is horribly long, but at the same time, it's horribly short because you could write several books about this. If anyone finds this interesting, you should read famous biologist Richard Dawkins' book, "The Selfish Gene" if you haven't already - or possibly some other work of his. These are not all his ideas alone, but his first book gathered the thoughts of many academics.[/QUOTE]
What is your definition of morality. In order for me to comment on this post I would have to know.

[Inuzuka Skysword]

Well part of the reason we got off track on morality is because we were more dealing with Objectivism and Inuzuka accused me of approaching morality different than I approach religion, which means I'm "turning off the logic-switch" and "irrational". Even though I've been trying to explain to him that I approach religion (and claim its false) based on science/historic knowledge and if you look at history than you'll see morals change from culture to culture and century to century...which doesn't lend any credibility to morality being "objective." Than when I went at it (barring the gene thing) from a scientific study angle he told me that was a bad way to go about it because humans aren't objective. Which struck me as odd since we were talking about the human idea of morality* and if humans aren't objective than how can their ideas on right and wrong be objective either? Basically in approaching morality the same way I approach religion I find that it isn't objective.

The reason I am saying it isn't objective is because you aren't even using the word Objective right. Just because a million people believe something doesn't make it right. In the same way, just because all people believe a morality is right doesn't mean it is actually right. A morality is right because it is rational. If every human in the world chooses their morals irrationally, but they get the same morality then they are all wrong. Humans can get morality right by taking a rational and logical approach to it.

Now I've said before (I believe when I went on that long rant in the Morality and the Bible thread) that I don't doubt that morality is a selected trait and that certain societies have had members who didn't act in the best interests of their group (and acted maybe in the best interests of themselves instead or were just lazy or something) and as a result their entire group failed to survive. I think, as you said, that true Altruism is impossible (though admittedly I did not approach that from a biological perspective more from my interaction with humans) but I think operating in absolutes and extremes when it comes to human ideals is just foolish because it's not realistic. You're never going to find someone who lets themselves be violently sexed up because their "selfless."

You either put yourself above people or you put people about yourself. If you put people above yourself then you are selfless, which in turn means you put everyone above yourself because using your brain above others would be selfish. Everyone acts to their own self interests. If you fall in love with a girl you don't fall in love because it is for her own good and you like nothing about her. To have any values you must be selfish. If you have certain values then you are bound to like some people and dislike others. This dislike of others and love of others is a sign of selfishness because you are using your own mind to judge things. An altruist must never trust his own mind because he is concerning himself when he does this.

You can't be in the middle of either. It is like a true or false situation. You either use your mind to get you through life or you don't. If you use it sometimes and forget about it others then you are an altruist sometimes and a selfish person at other times.

I did talk to great lengths about morality being adaptive (I believe in the morality and bible thread again.) As I said above (and you have too) ethical standards and moral norms change at different paces and in different places and in some cultures this is okay but in some cultures it's not. If you get very specific though you'll find within that culture that the general society of course isn't all going to agree what is moral and what isn't. To look at the farmer example, what if there's a farmer who is very loyal to the empire (and since in many cases marriage is just a property thing, something which nowadays we generally view as immoral) just views killing his wife as killing a cow and doesn't really care? That sounds cold but I think you get what I'm saying. The sense of right and wrong changes from person to person, there is no objective sense of it. I mean even now, there are plenty of people who are for the death penalty and consider it fair punishment but I find it horribly immoral and I am against it in all circumstances.

Again, just because people believe it doesn't make it objective. If everyone in one room has a drug trip, the trip isn't really reality. However there is a reality that they could all view if they used their reason and logic. Reason and logic are the only reliable ways of decoding reality.

One of the reasons I'm so passionate about Atheism is because I believe that morally religion is detrimental to society. As I've said before if you accept faith or Jesus as a moral arbitrator than logically you have to accept the Qu'ran as a moral arbitrator as well. Which means accepting the abuse of woman it also means accepting acts like 9/11 as strictly moral acts because they're only playing by your rules, as unreasonable in my mind as they are.**

My problem with the anti-religion view is that you are missing the root cause of why religion ruins society. It is irrational. Nonreligious people can go around murdering people just like a religious person. What is common in both? They are irrational. There is no conflict of interests among rational men. Also, believing Jesus as a moral person does not take any more faith than believing that Martin Luther King Jr. was a moral person (excluding the fact that Martin Luther King Jr. lived not long ago). We do have evidence of Jesus, however whether he is God or not there is no evidence. I would agree in that one who accepts the Bible must accept the Koran, but once I believe in a god I am already highly irrational and obviously don't care about my rationality. So for me to say the Koran is wrong would not be a huge step. Also, Jesus's message is much different than Islam's message. While you have heard that Jesus was just a get-out-of-jail free card, this is not the true message. His true message is to bring peace and love to the world and restore it to its original creation. There is no slave driver god telling people they must follow him. I have biblical evidence to support that there is no such thing as eternal damnation, Satan, etc.

I really just wish we could grow past this idea that morality is something concrete. I believe we need to see it as an ongoing human discussion with an unattainable but beautiful goal nonetheless (world peace and rainbows and all that.) As times change we need to adjust our ideas (and we do.) Even Christians just base the morality their morality off of what is secular and then just go back and use the bible to justify it. I've said before if you asked Jesus about cloning or any of our modern issues he'd have no idea if it was moral or not because he wouldn't even know what cloning was!

That really isn't argument against Christian morals. Christian morals are based off of loving your neighbor as yourself. If something isn't loving such as murder, then this is obviously against Jesus's morals. However, cloning can be used to save lives so why Jesus would be against it, I really don't know.

I do want to add I'm not just attacking Islam here I do believe religion as a whole teaches some very nasty things, particularly Christianity. Masturbation is not something that should make people feel ashamed and you shouldn't feel ashamed over natural impulses either. Lust is normal and I don't believe it is a sin. I also don't believe every situation can be judge strictly as "right" or "wrong" and I think teaching that kind of thing almost condemns independent thought. I also believe teaching children these things at a very impressionable age is immoral. No matter how much my rational mind tells me lust isn't shameful I still believe it is, though logically I know it isn't "sinful." That is psychological damage I don't think can be undone and it was done by a church. I also believe the externalization of blame to be a damaging thing, people need to accept their mistakes. I could go on and on but I'll stop now as this post is already very lengthy.

I would argue that altruists who force their children to give to others are a reason why society is getting worse. I would argue that handicaps are damaging to society because they suck up the welfare that could be used on gifted kids (though I am against welfare in general). I also believe that societies teaching of materialism is wrong. Etc, etc, etc. I obviously don't agree with all of this stuff. because the handicap thing was a bit cruel. If you have a problem, feel free to speak out about it. No one has a problem with that. All I have a problem with would be you forcing me how to parent using the law. That is all people use these days. They whine to their politician and decide how my child, which I brought into existence should believe. You would be restricting my free speech. I know you didn't mention using the law, but I am just saying.

[sleepy jack]

You need to answer a few questions because I can't trust the dictionary with you since you're convinced Karl Marx and Jesus have corrupted it.

Define objective.
Define rationality.
Define morality.
Define right.
Define wrong.

Then when you're done doing that please explain who the moral arbitrator would be and if there isn't one then please explain what are the "Objective Morals" that are unquestionably, rationally and logically moral. Also please use the scientific method in explaining the rationality of these objective beliefs.
Thanks.

Also a few other things, can you explain to me how when I explain why I'm against organized religion it's logical for you to start talking about Jesus and not the church and then tell me why you demand rationality of everyone else but not of yourself. Could you also provide historical evidence that Jesus actually existed?
Once again, thanks.