Questioner

Thanks for the insights

We traveled to Ireland this past autumn, and thoroughly enjoyed it. What a captivating country. A book you might enjoy - How the Irish Saved Civilizat...

I never said that quote was from that book

The quote did not come from a Christian missionary, it came from my readings about the Mohawk Nation and Sir William Johnson. You seem to be intent on...

the point is that humans and chimps are closely related, and notions of right and wrong first evolved in an ancestor we shared. We are not closely rel...

Fantasy? No, Trump is very real, and if you read the analysis of Hitler prepared for the Office of Strategic Services by Harvard psychologist Dr. Henr...

Morality looks at questions of right and wrong. The ability to judge between right and wrong must come before any conclusion about what is right and w...

Plunder is as plunder does.

Yes, I knew that. Because she thought Trump could help install her party as the truly democratically elected party in Venezuela, but that wouldn't wor...

Do you believe Machado gave it up willingly? That would be a naive position.

If this is your take on Trump's words and actions, then you are living outside of reality as much as Trump is. Did you have a read of the letter Trump...

The following letter from Trump to Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre was forwarded by the NSC staff to multiple European ambassadors in Washington. In a...

I am reminded of Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning, and the famous quote from it - Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last o...

Yes, and Hitler had Vemeer's The Astronomer - for a while (He'd plundered it, and added it to his personal collection) https://i.postimg.cc/X7PCzPKc/J...

Actually, this was my original quote - "You white folk need a Big Book to tell you what is right, but what is right is engraved upon my heart." Nevert...

I feel the same way.

Something I find frustrating in trying to understand, and something that causes me much consternation. Reluctantly, I have come to accept that there a...

The proposition put forward in the OP is that there is "no secular basis for morality." This implies that all morality grows out of a religious tradit...

I did not read anything in the book that suggested this. I have every reason to believe that Heckewelder produced a faithful and accurate account. Ove...

You did not answer my questions -

What's happening in the States, and Trump's approach to foreign policy, are weighing heavy on my mind. Below is copied a post he made today. He writes...

You're welcome. The brain develops not just by genetic factors, but neuroplasticity may change circuits throughout a lifetime. We never loose the capa...

You quoted me - But neglected to include my very next sentence, which is relevant to your question - But scientific knowledge may be applied to philos...

Lol, I'm not sure if you are playing with me. Yep. Some definitely have clearer vision than others. Education is a big factor. So is the propensity to...

No, that's not me, nor a great number of other critical-thinkers

Yeah, those in a cult don't have the clearest vision.

Your friend is transitioning to female, and you still refer to her as, "he" Tells me all I need to know about your level of understanding.

God, no. An appeal to the best in us is not equivalent to the worst in us.

You don't believe in the power of propaganda?

I think you missed my point that groups of people can be manipulated

I once tried to read Kerouac's "On the Road" but didn't finish it. A poet I am acquainted with said a poem should always end with "a turn" and I guess...

Yes, a good argument for having our political leaders get a philosophy education! Yes, mostly I agree with this quote (I meant to copy the entire quot...

i did not feel like I was critiquing, just pointing out that substantiated knowledge points to a biological basis for behavior. What Christians believ...

the older I get, the more I realize that events down throughout history are constantly cycling, and we are in a precarious part of the cycle right now...

Yes, that poem seems full of sub-text. I quite liked the story-telling aspect of it, and looked up the poet. Seems Kees "went missing" 1955 - never to...

I'm glad you raised this point. Yes, they are - acted upon by environmental factors. Empathy, fear, and hate are biologically imprinted. How they mani...

Understood. I'm sorry, what criticism was that? The point is that all morality comes from our evolution. Grounded in an ignorance of evolutionary biol...

It's short, but it hits hard. I immediately thought of a soldier at war. Sometimes I feel like the lessons of WW2 have been forgotten.

Yes, there are some good lessons from theistic texts. I think also that you underestimate atheists when you posit that they all blindly follow Dawkins...

Thanks for sharing. yes, devastating. Nothing more devastating than the death of a child. There's a real sense of not being able to make any sense of ...

Even chimpanzees know what belongs to them, so the idea of ownership goes back millions of years. As does the concept of punitive behavior. The idea o...

Now you're thinking like a biologist

I'm not sure why a biological basis for behavior would preclude the need for moral rules. I remember reading once that a mother's love is the evolutio...

Not "a" brain mechanism - but the result of the interplay of several brain regions - Key structures that may be involved during altruistic decision ma...

For the teleological explanation, we ask, "What is it good for?" Does it produce a good outcome? Well, in the context of natural selection, we can say...

So, you are saying that goodness comes from God and we know this because the Bible tells us it's so? I think the more likely explanation is that we ev...

Ten years ago I wrote a novel that took place in pre-revolutionary 18th century New York (then a province, and not yet a state) and did extensive read...

But still depends on an external source for empathy - a god - and empathy is not that but something we developed as we evolved as a social species. I ...

It's absurd to think that humanity was a group of brutish, evil monsters without empathy before religion was "invented." Many aspects of religion were...

One word is not a description. We need the fullness of language to describe any one person's experience. We need the fullness of intricate meaning and...