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http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bened... Yes. It is a fine code. Every young person should study it and work towards maturity in it's wisdom.

I'd also recommend MacDonald's story The History of Photogen and Nycteris. BTW, Tor.com blogs did a series of MacDonald rereads last year, which may point to more of his books/stories which are worth reading.

The only thing I can find online is this (scroll down to #233). The relevant quote is "These are people who know the way which you would follow, and who are cured of an ill of which you would be cured. Follow the way by which they began; by acting as if they believed, taking the holy water, having masses said, etc. Even this will naturally make you believe, and deaden your acuteness."

In light of your representation of it as flimflamming, I am especially amused by his assertion that this will "deaden your acuteness". I had forgotten that particular phrase :-)

The belief that the Son is of the Father (ie, that Jesus is divine, more than a man) didn't come about until several hundred years after the Church had formed.

Untrue. See, for example, the writings of the Ante-Nicene Fathers.

You're right that certain beliefs and lines of thinking have changed and grown over time -- especially in Roman Catholicism with regard to Augustine's Aristotelianism, but the implication that the roots of Christianity weren't present in written form by at least the end of the first century doesn't fit the historical record.

(I am an armchair historian.)

It's alright, I think I recognize most of your examples (please correct me if i'm wrong), although I think if we look at them in their original context, they don't mean quite what you make them out to mean:

"telling people to kill their children" - Abraham was being tested, but he knew that Isaac would be with God, so this was not a conflict of love. In the end, God provided a ram to be sacrificed instead anyway. If you are talking about the public stoning of your children, this is a great example of what I was talking about when I said there were things that don't make sense or should cause the reader to ask questions. The purpose of this law was not to encourage capital punishment against your children, but rather to discourage it. Compare these laws to the Roman laws, known as patria potestas, which gave the father power to kill his child at whim. The Biblical law requires the cooperation of the mother, as well as the public, while the Roman law left judgement and responsibility with one person, the father. So this increases accountability, which is a major theme in the Bible, and I think a solid moral value (Isn't it better the more accountability leaders have?).

"avoid women on their periods" - This chapter is just talking about when someone is considered unclean (not the same as sin). It lists situations for men as well, and it doesn't say to avoid women.

"kill those who don't believe as they do, shun those who express certain personal choices they disagree with, gain revenge on those whole harm them, kill those who don't observe their sabbath" - Not sure if you're referring to specifics here, but what Jesus says about revenge involves turning the other cheek, and loving your enemy. He doesn't say to kill them or shun them; in fact, Jesus was known for ministering to those that were looked down upon. He didn't shun the lady at the well, and instead of calling for the adulteress to be stoned, He said "let he who is without sin, cast the first stone"). Jesus also healed on the Sabbath, supporting the moral of love.

"endorsement of slavery, sacrifice, child abuse, torture, rape, bigotry and racism"
A lot to cover here, but slavery then is not as we think of it today. These slaves were paid (so you might call them servants), with conditions comparable to low class workers, or army servicemen. I don't believe endorsement of sacrifice (besides human sacrifice) conflicts with love. Not sure where you see child abuse, perhaps you mean the proverb of disciplining child; however, you can see that this doesn't endorse abuse, but discipline, which a loving father will do. If the torture you refer to is Revelation 9:5, context shows that it's not an endorsement, but a prophecy of torture, administered by a "fallen star" (probably Satan). Jesus teaches against bigotry and racism, in the parable of the good Samaritan, and with his own interactions with the woman at the well.

So yeah, these things wouldn't make sense the way you list them, but I think the meaning has been distorted (Not that I think you purposefully distorted it; a lot of these things are commonly mi

Even further OT ... :-) The word "Catholic" in the Athanasian Creed (formulated in or before 361) simply means "universal" -- it has nothing whatsoever to do with the Roman Catholic church over against the Eastern Orthodox or Protestant churches. And in fact, starting in line 3 of the creed, it spells out precisely what this universal, or "catholic", faith consists of...

I agree, I think, with your point that verbal assent to the creeds is not an indication of true belief. But in the case of Mormonism, verbal dissent is a pretty good indication of true unbelief.

It sounds nice, but cite your sources. I find nothing in the church fathers to back up the claim that original Christianity thought of the Bible as "a moral argument expressed allegorically."

Instead, most saw the Bible as a story of God creating and saving His people. That story left room for allegorical elements, more for some of the early patristics (e.g., Origen) and less for others (e.g., John Chrysostem).

But NONE of them taught that the Bible was simply allegorical. I can't accept the claim that the "older, more enlightened conception of Christianity" saw the Bible as entirely allegorical. Do you have sources to back it up?

If they follow the word of the bible dot by dot why don't they punish people bible style.

Because if they did, then anybody who suggested any religion other than Christianity would be killed. Along with their cows.

I'm insisting on God's way, and God's way is the way of love.

You will love your neighbor as yourself

How would I be loving my neighbor by excusing his offense against God, nature, and humanity?

You pick out three or four passages to degrade, demean, oppress, and otherwise bully

They have degraded and demeaned themselves through their behavior.
Oppress?? I'm a guy with a keyboard.
Bully? Better to receive a stern word from a man than to be left in the hands of an angry God.

a group of God's children

Until they are born of the Spirit, they are Adam's children. See 1 Corinthians 15:47-50.

The American Psychiatric Association has removed it from the DSM about 20 years ago (meaning it's not an illness and not a condition to be treated)

God has not changed His position.

The major health and wellness organizations have advocated for gay rights and pediatric associations claim same sex couples make wonderful parents and the children? They seem to turn out just fine.

No, they don't.

I remember a dude named Galileo. He was right. He contradicted the Bible.

Galileo did not contradict the Bible. He contradicted an opinion of the Vatican.

Interestingly, the site converts books to various formats from a source version coded in Theological Markup Language.

Interestingly, the site converts books to various formats from a source version coded in Theological Markup Language.

Early christians were more tolerant and sophisticated than modern fundamentalists, take a look at St Augustine.

Well, no, it actually, it *is* a particularly Protestant view (as well as a Catholic view) to believe that without Adam, there is no sin. That view was taught by Augustine, who was the major source for Luther's arguments in The Bondage of the Will. The same is taught also in Calvin's Institutes.

You might also read Romans 5 for a particularly pointed discussion of the relationship between Adam and Jesus.

Well, no, it actually, it *is* a particularly Protestant view (as well as a Catholic view) to believe that without Adam, there is no sin. That view was taught by Augustine, who was the major source for Luther's arguments in The Bondage of the Will. The same is taught also in Calvin's Institutes.

You might also read Romans 5 for a particularly pointed discussion of the relationship between Adam and Jesus.

Yes, but suppose it were otherwise? Here, for instance, is an interesting piece of fiction depicting an alternate history, where the Roman Empire ultimately fell to hordes of barbarians.

Were there lots of Gospels and Pseudo-Gospels written in the Early Church? You bet. Did they all have an agenda? Again, you bet. Are they all reliable? Not by a long shot. There were all sorts of people making up gospels, ideas, and other whack things in the Early Church.

I'll admit that I haven't read the Da Vinci Code. I found out about it months after it was released, when I kept running across people that were espousing crazy ideas about the Early Church and those Medieval societies. Eventually, I learned where it was from, but still haven't read it. One thing I have noticed, though, is that every person I've seen who's been espousing the conspiratorial nonsense has also not read much, if any, primary source material on Christian history.

That's where this book comes in handy. It was written in the mid-second century in opposition to the movements that spawned most of those extra gospels. The TOC is here.

Other questions are such that, why are the societies that secretly kept the truth all Medieval? The Knights Templar goes back to the twelfth century. The PoS is a twentieth century group trying to claim its way back to the first century (and they aren't the first frauds to try that). This is a strong problem, because Christianity had already suffered two great divisions. In 481, many bishops and their churches seperated from the rest. These churches, the Non-Chalcedonian Churches, stretch from the Middle East to India, and they continue to exist to this day. In the ninth century, St. Photius and the Pope Nicholas II had an outing, which though repaired was made permanent in events in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and they hardly would have trusted Germanic societies like the KT in that era.

Prior to the First Schism, Christianity not only was not centralized, but could not be. The Pope had no universal jurisdiction. Simply put, it is impossible for a large conspiracy to take place to hide the truth so that secret societies had to take place. A non-centralized Christianity's response to these "gospels" was unified from India to Rome; it rejected them, largely because they were outside the normative teachings and practices (such as making Jesus a schoolyard bully) of the Church.

Proponents of conspiracy theories, such as I have found people getting from the Da Vinci Code must be able to explain how such a thing took place given the nature of early Christendom. And it must do so with sources of the era, sources on both sides of the issue. I can say this, because while I have not read the Da Vinci Code, I have read many Gnostic works, works from the Early Church, several Jewish Works from the centuries BC, pagan works from the era, etc. I haven't read them all, but I've read a good number. Likewise, I know several people, both those who are Christian and those who are not, who have. The single denominator I've seen in all of us is that we all laugh at the conspiracy theory nonsense.

I'm not meaning to be offensive, but the Da Vinci Code has about as much credibility as the National Enquirer. No, I haven't read the book, but I have come across many of its ideas repeated. It may be a good story, fiction-wise, but what I've heard repeated is nonsense factually. Will I read it? Maybe, but there are many more important things for me to read, such as books on computers and more early works, Christian, Gnostic, and pagan.

Were there lots of Gospels and Pseudo-Gospels written in the Early Church? You bet. Did they all have an agenda? Again, you bet. Are they all reliable? Not by a long shot. There were all sorts of people making up gospels, ideas, and other whack things in the Early Church.

I'll admit that I haven't read the Da Vinci Code. I found out about it months after it was released, when I kept running across people that were espousing crazy ideas about the Early Church and those Medieval societies. Eventually, I learned where it was from, but still haven't read it. One thing I have noticed, though, is that every person I've seen who's been espousing the conspiratorial nonsense has also not read much, if any, primary source material on Christian history.

That's where this book comes in handy. It was written in the mid-second century in opposition to the movements that spawned most of those extra gospels. The TOC is here.

Other questions are such that, why are the societies that secretly kept the truth all Medieval? The Knights Templar goes back to the twelfth century. The PoS is a twentieth century group trying to claim its way back to the first century (and they aren't the first frauds to try that). This is a strong problem, because Christianity had already suffered two great divisions. In 481, many bishops and their churches seperated from the rest. These churches, the Non-Chalcedonian Churches, stretch from the Middle East to India, and they continue to exist to this day. In the ninth century, St. Photius and the Pope Nicholas II had an outing, which though repaired was made permanent in events in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and they hardly would have trusted Germanic societies like the KT in that era.

Prior to the First Schism, Christianity not only was not centralized, but could not be. The Pope had no universal jurisdiction. Simply put, it is impossible for a large conspiracy to take place to hide the truth so that secret societies had to take place. A non-centralized Christianity's response to these "gospels" was unified from India to Rome; it rejected them, largely because they were outside the normative teachings and practices (such as making Jesus a schoolyard bully) of the Church.

Proponents of conspiracy theories, such as I have found people getting from the Da Vinci Code must be able to explain how such a thing took place given the nature of early Christendom. And it must do so with sources of the era, sources on both sides of the issue. I can say this, because while I have not read the Da Vinci Code, I have read many Gnostic works, works from the Early Church, several Jewish Works from the centuries BC, pagan works from the era, etc. I haven't read them all, but I've read a good number. Likewise, I know several people, both those who are Christian and those who are not, who have. The single denominator I've seen in all of us is that we all laugh at the conspiracy theory nonsense.

I'm not meaning to be offensive, but the Da Vinci Code has about as much credibility as the National Enquirer. No, I haven't read the book, but I have come across many of its ideas repeated. It may be a good story, fiction-wise, but what I've heard repeated is nonsense factually. Will I read it? Maybe, but there are many more important things for me to read, such as books on computers and more early works, Christian, Gnostic, and pagan.

No, I would classify it as pulp theology -- it's not incorrect, it's just that it's watered down compared to true devotional classics. It's just enough to make people feel holy for reading it without actually compelling them to change their life. PDL should have "for entertainment purposes only" stamped on the cover. Prayer of Jabez is junk theology.

No, I would classify it as pulp theology -- it's not incorrect, it's just that it's watered down compared to true devotional classics. It's just enough to make people feel holy for reading it without actually compelling them to change their life. PDL should have "for entertainment purposes only" stamped on the cover. Prayer of Jabez is junk theology.

No, I would classify it as pulp theology -- it's not incorrect, it's just that it's watered down compared to true devotional classics. It's just enough to make people feel holy for reading it without actually compelling them to change their life. PDL should have "for entertainment purposes only" stamped on the cover. Prayer of Jabez is junk theology.

The question is, How much land does a man need?

Nobody is saying that a business shouldn't make money, but how much money do they need to make? Are you trying to tell me that EA is on the verge of falling into the red because they can't turn a profit? Wake the hell up man, nobody is asking you to vote for the socialist party. Actually nevermind you don't even begin to make sense.

So, what, we just kill off 98% of people, and that won't be so bad?

This is a well thought-out post, unfortunately by an AC. But let me, to the best of my abilities, address your concerns. First, you seem to be looking for a scientific explanation of God, which is not possible. I made this clear in the original post, but I can see how "God and Science are not mutually exclusive" might be misinterpreted. God is defined by St. Anselm in the Proslogion as that which is greater than anything that can be thought. This is problematic, but satisfactory for this note. People with true faith in God recieve this faith through providence, according to St. Thomas. That is, that God Himself makes Himself known to the person through grace, a private spiritual communication. This is not empirically demonstrable, obviously. That is why it is called faith. Those who call it blind faith do not respect or understand the concept of providence. I have not yet been graced by God to understand Him in all His glory. I can only go through the motions - or not - and await providence which may or may not arrive. Science is ostensibly the pursuit of truth through reason, while religion is the pursuit of truth through spirituality. So, you can see that the scientific method approach to God is silly, and futile. But the two realms *can* mutually coexist. I suggest reading C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianty for a primer. In any case, please feel free to email me if you wish to continue this conversation. I will be much more cohesive... and sober.

So will they use the dated Theological Markup Language (ThML)? Or do they go with Cocoon/TomCat to mark-up this data the same way the CCEL does?

So will they use the dated Theological Markup Language (ThML)? Or do they go with Cocoon/TomCat to mark-up this data the same way the CCEL does?

Its human nature to enjoy sex and sensational themes, yet our religious and "civilized" side just wants us to fit in some pure ideal. But the most fun is where we are right now. We are not in sheer puritan minded times, but we havent degraded to utter pathetically primitive attitudes. Were in the balance right now where we can enjoy the advantages of both ends. We arent at either extreme. So enjoy!

I bet this is what the Romans were saying in the early 500's.

a bit of history

Your foot shall slide in due time so that you may see the "beauty" of Hell.

"Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's and to God that which is God's" is universally misunderstood as Jesus emphasising the separation of authority between the ethereal Kingdom of Heaven from the corporeal world of man (and the empire of Rome).

However, much like the fundamentalists today who believe in the Rapture, many Jews believed that the Kingdom of Heaven was NOT the Afterlife but a real epoch whose time was about to come. The Kingdom of Heaven would be an earthly one as a direct replacement to the Roman Empire. Jesus's statement was actually a fiery refutation of Caesar's authority and a direct reference to taxes. Jesus is encouraging the people not to pay the Romans taxes.

As for what St Paul said, Paul was a Greek Jew who never met Jesus (except in a vision). The Christian Church must have been very submissive and obedient to the Roman authorities, merely to survive, but this has little bearing on Christ's actions when he was alive, as Christ had been dead for decades before they even wrote the Bible.

Which brings us to the whole point of this conspiracy. After Christ died, the Church of Christ faced a dilemma. To survive it could NOT go on with a military Messianic message of rebellion against Rome. If it did it would have been mercilessly quashed by the authorities, even more than it was already. And so it had to change it's central dogma from war and hatred to peace and love for pragmatic reasons.

And, as an anonymous c. pointed out, Matthew 10:34 has Jesus saying "I did not come to bring you peace but a sword." That seems hard to justify as statement by a peace lover.

If you want insight into Christ's times, although it is a dense read (classical phraseology), check out Flavius Josephus' War of the Jews . It will give you an idea of the chaotic, militant, incendiary and bloody situation Jesus stumbled into. My biggest problem with Christian teaching is that Jesus is portrayed as existing in a socio-cultural-historical vacuum, when he lived in a very interesting time. Context is everything.

PS - This is not as off-topic as some might imagine... football is a religious subject after all.

I've often wondered why so many evolutionists are reluctant to question their foundations. Thanks for clearing that up for me!

Maybe I can clear it up a little further.

"Questioning my foundations" is what led me to reject creationism, and favor evolution, in the first place.

It is the height of arrogance to assume that someone is closed minded just because they have reached a conclusion different from yours.

After all, if we hold a view, it's usually because we think it is correct. Each side would do well to remember that this is true of the other side as well. I can't count the number of times I've been guilty of this error myself.

Five-year-old Mary was obliged to undergo an operation, and lost so much blood that it was necessary to resort to blood transfusion. The blood of thirteen-year-old brother Jimmy was found by test to match exactly the little patient's. "Will you give your sister some of your blood, Jim?" asked the doctor. Jimmy set his teeth. "Yes, sir, if she needs it." He was prepared for the transfusion. In the midst of the drawing of the blood, the doctor observed Jimmy growing paler and paler. "Are you ill, Jim?" he asked. "No, sir, but I'm wondering just when I'll die." "Die?" gasped the doctor. "Do you think people give their lives when they give a little blood?" "Yes, sir," replied Jimmy. "And you are giving your life for Mary's?" "Yes, sir," replied Jimmy.

Maul comes from Pilgrim's Progress

thence came forth Maul, a giant. This Maul did use to spoil young pilgrims with sophistry, [asking] how many times have you been forbidden to do these things?"

I'm a Canadian. I've been living in the United States for over five years. I don't like how the United States is devolving, but as long as I can make "Net" more money than I can in Canada I will continue to work here. I say we milk the United States for all its worth and then go to our safe homea, our pockets lined with the money of the United States. I see so many parallels between the decline of the Roman Empire and The modern Western world it scares me. Home may end up no better off.

... the originals were genuine heroes. They were fighting for a way of life, not for moral control or cultural power.

This is a pretty false dichotomy, Jon. As if one's 'way of life' is or could be or should be distinct from one's moral and cultural vision of a good society.

Those utilitarian miracles which science has made are anti-democratic, not so much in their perversion, or even in their practical result, as in their primary shape and purpose. The Frame-Breaking Rioters were right; not perhaps in thinking that machines would make fewer men workmen; but certainly in thinking that machines would make fewer men masters. More wheels do mean fewer handles; fewer handles do mean fewer hands.-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong with the World

Note that, according to Kirkpatric Sale, the Midlands artisans were not averse to technological innovation -- they had adopted many themselves. Where they objected was when the new technologies (backed up by goverment force) cleared the way for sweatshop factories and massive industrial pollution. In other words, the Luddites were rebelling against The Corporation, not Technology. And they were right -- the new machines did make "fewer masters." Ned Ludd had the right idea.

Between efforts such as Project Gutenberg and the Christian Classics Ethereal Library, and countless other sites that provide resources not previously available to most libraries, it is fairly evident that internet access greatly enhances the purpose of the public library.

Another situation is finding which books to look up. Your average Librarian will be clueless when asked which of the 50 books on C++ is best for a beginner, but searching on google for the C++ faq will provide several good answers almost immediately.

The other questions do merit thought.

Here's the question: is God who He says He is? Does He exist? That, in a nutshell, is Pascal's wager. If God exists as revealed in the Bible, then it is the most reasonable thing in the world to follow Him, as to do otherwise results in the ultimate loss!

This is a circular argument, and therefore invalid.

But this is not (from what I can discern from the reading) the argument that Pascal was attempting to make with his wager. See this page for more in-depth exposition of Pascal's wager.

Here is the full text of Pascal's Pensees , if you're interested as well.

Enjoy!

JimD

--

Bruce Sterling is an imaginative and competent wordsmith. He has to be, because otherwise it would be more obvious that this piece of nonsense is just that -- nonsense. It's very nice-sounding nonsense, very quotable nonsense, very trendy (by design!) nonsense. But he still is missing the point of where we have been, where we are, and where we are going.

Here is where he goes off-track:

The twentieth century featured any number of -isms. They were fatally based on the delusion that philosophy trumps engineering. It doesnt. In a world fully competent to command its material basis, ideology is inherently flimsy. "Technology" in its broad sense: the ability to transform resources, the speed at which new possibilities can be opened and exploited, the multiple and various forms of command-and-control -- technology, not ideology, is the twentieth centurys lasting legacy.

The problem with this is twofold:

• Good engineering in the service of bad philosphy is a problem, not a solution.
• It is hubris to believe we are "fully competant" to "command" the "material basis" of this world.

This notion that we need to abandon philosophy and ideology in favor of "pragmatic" or "engineering" solutions -- well, let me phrase it this way. "Because many of our troubles this century have been due to poor philosophy, let us give up on trying to have better philosophy." Forget worrying about what is right and wrong, let's all amuse ourselves with gizmos!

Instead, this is precisely the moment when we ought to be analyzing what was right and what was wrong with the "-isms" of the 20th century. As G. K. Chesterton put it nearer the beginning of the century:

WANTED, AN UNPRACTICAL MAN

Idealism is only considering everything in its practical essence.... But I know that this primary pursuit of the theory (which is but pursuit of the aim) exposes one to the cheap charge of fiddling while Rome is burning. A school ... has endeavored to substitute for the moral or social ideals which have hitherto been the motive of politics a general coherency or completeness in the social system which has gained the nick-name of "efficiency." I am not very certain of the secret doctrine of this sect in the matter. But, as far as I can make out, "efficiency" means that we ought to discover everything about a machine except what it is for. There has arisen in our time a most singular fancy: the fancy that when things go very wrong we need a practical man. It would be far truer to say, that when things go very wrong we need an unpractical man. Certainly, at least, we need a theorist. A practical man means a man accustomed to mere daily practice, to the way things commonly work. When things will not work, you must have the thinker, the man who has some doctrine about why they work at all. It is wrong to fiddle while Rome is burning; but it is quite right to study the theory of hydraulics while Rome is burning.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong With The World

The second faulty assumption here is that we are "fully competant." Clearly, we are not, nor are we likely to be so anytime in the forseeable future. Take global climate -- it's pretty clear at this point that (a) we have the power to muck it up pretty badly, to our own pain and sorrow, and (b) we don't understand completely how it works. Most ecological issues exhibit this same dynamic -- we have the power to destroy, but not the knowledge to understand, and certainly not the wisdom and will to forbear from destroying. When American agriculture produces more bushels of soil erosion than bushels of crops, can it be any more obvious that we are incompetant?

If progress be measured in human enlightenment in the use of resources, the Amish are the most progressive people in society.
-- Gene Logsdon, "Practical Skills"

The Amish, in many ways, exemplify Sterling's "clean, supple, healthy means of support for a crowded world." And yet, they achieve this by adhering to a strict ideology, subordinating technological innovation to their chosen vision of a way of life. Meanwhile, all the hip post-modernists, "free" from "-isms", seem caught on the iron treadmill of "rigid, monolithic, poisonous and non-sustainable" techno-determinism proceeding "with that Stalinesque seriousness that demands the brutal sacrifice of millions."

There's more wrong -- for example,

In this new Belle Epoque, this delightful era, we are experiencing a prolonged break in the last centurys even tenor of mayhem

Ah, well. I would hope that the foolishness of advocating the "demystification" of Gizmos, while at the same time placing our hope of earthly deliverance in them, would be obvious, even through the clever wording ...

For cleverness kills wisdom; that is one of the few sad and certain things.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong With The World

The Luddites maintained that the automation of their work would

1. transform their economy from one of many small independant workers to that of a few owners running sweatshops
2. result in a lower-quality product than what was produced previous
3. and that ultimately this destruction of an relatively independant and self-sufficient community was a Bad Thing

As for "semi-terroristic", please remember that the Luddites, when simple protests didn't work, destroyed the offending property. For this, they were hanged, even on suspicion of Luddism. Thus, history records that the Luddites were a violent sort, as opposed to the calm, dispassionate peaceableness of those who had them executed.

At least you've provided a fine example of the attitude that Wendell Berry described in my previous post. It is apparantly not enough that the Luddites lost their struggle to preserve their way of life; no, their name must be forgotten except for its use as an epithet.

Democracy has one real enemy, and that is civilization. Those utilitarian miracles which science has made are anti-democratic, not so much in their perversion, or even in their practical result, as in their primary shape and purpose. The Frame-Breaking Rioters were right; not perhaps in thinking that machines would make fewer men workmen; but certainly in thinking that machines would make fewer men masters. More wheels do mean fewer handles; fewer handles do mean fewer hands. The machinery of science must be individualistic and isolated. A mob can shout round a palace; but a mob cannot shout down a telephone. The specialist appears and democracy is half spoiled at a stroke.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong with the World

While I'm impressed, as an engineer, at some of the cleverly simple hacks used to discriminate events ...

... do we really want to dumb down security guards anymore? If security guards are clever and attentive, they might be able to make good use of such a system -- but if they were clever and attentive, who would need such a system in the first place?

In 99.44% of real installations, I see use falling into exactly one of two patterns:

• George learns to rely on the system, and anyone whom the computer profiles gets some security guard hassling
• George gets annoyed with false positives, and learns to ignore "das blinkenlight."

Meanwhile, we catch a few dumb crooks, the smart crooks learn the holes in the system, and everybody gets trained in the subtle paranoia of knowing that deviation from behavior that doesn't readily compute as "law-abiding" will give you hassles with The Man. This does not strike me as particularly healthy for a people who aspire to be free and democratic.

Democracy has one real enemy, and that is civilization. Those utilitarian miracles which science has made are anti-democratic, not so much in their perversion, or even in their practical result, as in their primary shape and purpose. The Frame-Breaking Rioters were right; not perhaps in thinking that machines would make fewer men workmen; but certainly in thinking that machines would make fewer men masters. More wheels do mean fewer handles; fewer handles do mean fewer hands. The machinery of science must be individualistic and isolated. A mob can shout round a palace; but a mob cannot shout down a telephone. The specialist appears and democracy is half spoiled at a stroke.
-- G. K. Chesterton,What's Wrong with the World

Why can't you be specific about why you believe his statements are not racist, sexist, homophobic, etc?

Simply Real Life(tm) constraints on how much time I have to give to this conversation.

Seems like she already started it and you had no real response. I'd really love to see what you have to say that could possibly make those statements seem like something other than a bigot's display of his true colors (npi).

Yes and yes; and I was acknowledging that. That darn Real Life(tm) again. But I have a few minutes now, so I'll give it another try.

Anti-Semite: this one is so baseless that it's almost funny. I note that darkrose didn't bother trying to back this particular one up, other than by allusion to Farrakhan. I would hope that all I should have to do is point to the number of Jewish friends, collegues, and admirers of Buchanan whose response to the charge of anti-Semitism is "Huh? I may disagree with Pat, but he's no anti-Semite." Farrakhan? Please. Buchanan's religion teaches that all people are of equal dignity before God and that anti-Semitism is a sin; Farrakhan's teaches that whites and Jews are of the Devil. The two don't even belong in the same breath. Unless one uses that strange definition of "anti-Semite" as "one who occaisionally criticizes the national policies of Israel or of the pro-Israel lobby in the USA," in which case practically half the Jews of the world are "anti-Semites."

Homophobe: too often a code word for "thinks homosexuality is wrong", something which is certainly true of Buchanan. So I don't give this one much credit -- by that definition, I'm "homophobic" -- never mind that I'm not "phobic" about anyone, and (cliche'd as it is) some of my best friends really are gay. The relationship between AIDS and (male) gay sex is hardly "phobia", it's hard epidemiological data (although we do have the fun fact that "if AIDS is God's judgement, lesbians must be the Chosen People"). But this is a whole topic I hate to even mention, given the likelihood of any "debate" on sexuality degenerating rapidly into (1) namecalling and (2) a black hole for time.

Racist: doubt it, given his open admiration for Alan Keyes. I would like to see some context for the quoted comment on Sharpesville; but as for the European roots of the USA and the relative ease of assimilation, those seem to me to simply be statements of reality, not evidence of racism. Acknowledgement that the USA began as a European transplant and still retains much of that character, opposition to affirmative action and 'multiculturalism' do not equate to racism.

Sexist: let me simply suggest that Buchanan is hardly the first or only person to notice that capitalistic competitiveness is not exactly friendly to women or femininity. Especially for women who wish to exercise their traditional calling as mothers. But again, a good discussion of capitalism and gender is well beyond the scope of what I have time for on Slashdot.

David Duke: please, this is guilt by association. I find it highly plausible that Duke did crib from Buchanan's economic platform. That doesn't make Buchanan a Klansman. Given that Buchanan seems to be the only national politician addressing a number of the issues important to blue-collar and rural folk (many of whom happen to be white), doesn't it make sense that a Klansman trying to gain respectability (Duke) would do just that?

There, some specifics to chew on. I have now more than exhausted my time for such fun; so I'm going to have to let everyone else have the last word.

Both the characteristic modern parties believed in a government by the few; the only difference is whether it is the Conservative few or Progressive few. It might be put, somewhat coarsely perhaps, by saying that one believes in any minority that is rich and the other in any minority that is mad.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong With The World

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
- Benjamin Franklin

I think you have been reading too many Tom Clancy novels. How can the ordinary citizen know that the NSA is "essential" for "fighting terrorism" when the NSA's very existance was classified for years, and its budget and most of its operations are still classified? Your statement about the NSA's "necessity" is in the classic sense pure pseudo-science, because it is non-falsifiable. How has the NSA prevented any bombs from going off on American soil. "Sorry, sir, that's classified. But trust us, we're the government, and we have your best interests at heart." The American politicial experiment is based on the assumtion that we dare not trust that the government has the best interests of the people at heart, and so the government is supposed to be accountable to the people, and restrained by the rights of the individual.

The erosion of liberties rarely comes packaged with a label that says "here is a totalitarian control; please hand over your freedom now." It most often comes packaged as "there are Bad People(tm) out there! Let us protect you!"

If we "need" a secret police state to protect us from terrorists, we have already lost the real struggle. A wise teacher once said, "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" (Mark 8:36, KJV) The same question certainly applies to nations. What will it profit America if we become the new Roman Empire, able to enforce a pax americana at home and abroad, if we lose the very idea of what it meant to be "America" in the first place?

Evil and undemocratic means do not give real security

While I will no doubt offend the rabid secularists of /. with this, I would like to point out that the inscription on our currency of "In God We Trust" is a great and necessary viewpoint for the preservation of freedom. [Whether the USA is truly living up to this motto is another matter -- I think it is clear we do not.] If you don't like the word "God", feel free to substitute "Providence", "Fate", "the Universe", or what have you, according to your own tradition and belief. Regardless, the point is that one can try to create one's own security through strength and power, or one can simply try to do the right thing, and trust that it will all work out in the end. That is what "In God We Trust" ought to mean -- that as a nation, we are committed to the principles of liberty, and are willing to risk "our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor" to live as if this mattered. Even in a dangerous world with certifiable Bad People(tm) out there.

The "security" offered by relying on power is no security at all. Totalitarian regimes fall. Empires crumble. Economies collapse. "Invincible" armies are defeated, "impregnable" defences are broached, and the wheel of history turns again. And really, power is not so absolute as all that. If the USA were to turn into a privacy-lost, thought-police-controlled Absolute Safety State tomorrow, do you really believe that we could make ourselves invulnerable?

If we are willing to send our young men and women to fight and die for oil in the Mideast, don't you think the rest of us ought to be willing to assume some risk to live and die for liberty?

(Of course, the sadly obvious answer is that most Americans would today gladly trade essential liberty for a little temporary safety.)

This is a bug, not a feature

If our society is so fragile that a few terrorists, or the actions of a minor rogue state, can bring us to our knees unless we adopt draconian security measures, I think we ought to admit that this is a bug in the system, rather than resign ourselves to it as a "feature". Slashdotters are quick to lambast the fragility of Microsoft products and praise the stability and robustness of Linux -- now apply this same criticism to the larger technical, economic, and political infrastructures.

Does the electrical power grid offer key targets of opportinity for terrorists? Well then, we should get serious about "negawatts" in the Amory Lovins sense, and look at distributed, locally-generated power rather than relying on a massive electrical grid with a few key failure points and modes. Or even be willing to contemplate the practice of certain Amish groups, which have the rule of "use as much electricity as you want, as long as you make it yourself and don't tie into the grid." Better this, than to live with a secret police.

For an example that's nearer to fruition, consider Richard Stallman. While I might quibble with his analysis of freedom and software (I don't think access to source code is quite as fundamental a right as RMS does), he has certainly done the correct thing with his analysis -- he determined not to allow what he considered to be essential freedoms to be bargained away for the sake of convenience and security, and did the work necessary to live freely. We are all reaping the benefits of his adherance to principle today.

Repeat this analyis with other points of vulnerablity as needed. There's certainly lots of room for debate as to the benefits and drawbacks of particular answers, be we certainly have more options than to be forced to choose between secret, unaccountable intelligence agencies and "a war zone."

For a start on considering this way of thinking, there are several essays by Wendell Berry that may be helpful. (Note: Berry is not a pacifist -- but he believes that our current strategies of "national defense" fail to defend our nation.) Try "Property, Patriotism, and National Defense" in Home Economics and "On Peaceableness Toward Enemies" in Sex, Economy, Freedom, and Community.

This is the huge modern heresy of altering the human soul to fit its conditions, instead of altering human conditions to fit the human soul. If soap boiling is really inconsistent with brotherhood, so much the worst for soap-boiling, not for brotherhood. If civilization really cannot get on with democracy, so much the worse for civilization, not for democracy. Certainly, it would be far better to go back to village communes, if they really are communes. Certainly, it would be better to do without soap rather than to do without society. Certainly, we would sacrifice all our wires, wheels, systems, specialties, physical science and frenzied finance for one half-hour of happiness such as has often come to us with comrades in a common tavern. I do not say the sacrifice will be necessary; I only say it will be easy.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong with the World

Well, alienation of labor was not a bad idea (I'm not sure if Marx came up first with it, though), but I'd like to point out that in a lot of situations the pre-industrial peasants were "working for somebody else" because they didn't own the land.

I don't know for certain that Marx originated the idea, but he certainly made heavy use of it.

And I don't think the fact that there were abuses of the peasantry invalidates the point of the alienation of industrial labor. It's just a different deviation from the ideal of a person who is working skillfully, with dignity, and enjoying the benefits of their own labor.

Besides, treating the worker as an automaton is a consequence of the Industrial Revolution, and not necessarily capitalism.

Well, that's a pretty fine distinction there, given how the two are intertwingled.

I think there's a good argument to be made that much of the technology of the Industrial Revolution was shaped by and for capitalism, and that the effect, coincidentally or by design, was to widen the gap between owners and laborers, and to bring about just the situation of "alienation of labor." But that's a longer argument that I have time to get into right now ...

Not true. Laissez-faire capitalism assumes a large mass of competing capitalists. If the means of production become concentrated in the hands of the few, monopolies and cartels appear and the invisible hand breaks down.

Well, yes, but if you take the steps to keep that mass of little capitalists from coalescing into a few cartels and monopolists, is it truly laissez-faire anymore?

At any rate, I consider the fact that we do need to worry about cartels and monopolists under capitalism (witnes the Microsoft-DOJ trial) as very good evidence that capitalism, in any sort of "pure" form, does tend to the concentration of capital in very few hands. A situation that is not especially friendly to "little" things like freedom and democracy ... which are not synonomous with "free-market capitalism."

Democracy has one real enemy, and that is civilization. Those utilitarian miracles which science has made are anti-democratic, not so much in their perversion, or even in their practical result, as in their primary shape and purpose. The Frame-Breaking Rioters were right; not perhaps in thinking that machines would make fewer men workmen; but certainly in thinking that machines would make fewer men masters. More wheels do mean fewer handles; fewer handles do mean fewer hands. The machinery of science must be individualistic and isolated. A mob can shout round a palace; but a mob cannot shout down a telephone. The specialist appears and democracy is half spoiled at a stroke.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong with the World

Care to show us some correct ones?

Oh, I think Marx hit the nail on the head with his "alienation of labor" idea -- that is, industrial labor is qualitatively different from agrarian/craft labor, because (1) the laboror is no longer in control of the "means of production", so he is working for somebody else, not himself, and (2) industrial labor treats the worker as an automaton, not as a real human. Based on my experience in factory work, I think he was 100% correct there. And he was justifiably outraged at the horrific abuses going on in the factory sweatshops of the early 1800's.

Now, Marx was completely wrong about the nature of the human problem (Marxian thought holds that people are fine, generous, and unselfish by nature, and if we can only get the social structures right we can create utopia), about "historical inevitability" and the natural progressions of societies (so wrong, that Lenin had to drastically revise Marx to explain Russian Bolshevism, as KM taught that it would be impossible for a society to move directly from a peasent/agrarian state to a Communist state without industrialization first -- precisely what did happen in Russia). And, of course, so awfully wrong about the "dictatorship of the proletariat" and the "withering away" of the State that it would be funny if it weren't so tragic.

Also, keep in mind that there are in fact many options besides Marx's "dictatorship of the proletariat" and Smith's "invisible hand" of laissez-faire capitalism. In fact, both stand for the concentration of working capital and the means of production in the hands of a few -- the difference being who those few are (Communists choose goverenment officials, Capitalists choose captitalists). For one alternative, try a search for "Distributism", or simply read some of the political works of G. K. Chesterton, such as What's Wrong With The World

Big Business and State Socialism are very much alike, especially Big Business.
-- G. K. Chesterton

... is that it's occaisionally necessary to discuss Hitler and the Nazis, even on the Internet.

Hitler wanted to kill Jews, saying they were less than human. Singer wants to kill handicapped kids, saying that they are less than human. Therefore, Singer's position is quite similar to the Nazis, we've just changed the definition of who is untermenschen. Hitler's policies were implemented, and mass murder resulted. Singer's policies have not yet been implemented. If they were, the results would be the same -- lots of handicapped kids would be killed. Singer would not "define" this as mass murder, but I do.

So far, nobody has shown to me that there is a logical falacy in this progression; I simply get called names for daring to note the resemblance. Oh, yes, and I'm a "censor", according to Katz, for noting the resemblance and daring to exercise my own freedom of speech.

The abolition of child-killing was one of the main tenets of the early Christians, and was one of the major reasons for Christianity's success in the old Roman Empire. It went against the old Romans, who routinely killed their own children for any reason they deemed fit. So this issue strikes and the very heart of Christian belief. So it naturally cannot even be discussed.

This is why I wrote in the previous discussion that Singer is not offering any new viewpoint -- he is simply advocating a return to the old Roman practice.

But you are (ahem) reality-challenged if you believe that this is not even being discussed, as the AP news references and these very discussions on Slashdot prove.

Almost every contemporary proposal to bring freedom into the church is simply a proposal to bring tyranny into the world. ... I may, it is true, twist orthodoxy so as partly to justify a tyrant. But I can easily make up a German philosophy to justify him entirely.
-- G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

While I'm sure this makes a lot of sense to you, not everyone shares your religious beliefs.

I am well aware of that fact.

It's fine to use those beliefs to determine the parameters of your own behaviour. What's not fine is to use the tenets of your religion as moral backing for public policy.

Why not? Am I supposed to have to pretend to be a secularist to participate in a public debate? That's hardly "freedom of religion."

Since we are talking public policy here, I suggest that you either limit your proposal to countries with explicitly religious governments, or try again with a secular support for your position rather than a religious one.

Sorry, I'll pass on that suggestion, for a couple of reasons. One is that I think the problem of "what is a person? what defines humanity?" is irreducibly religious. Any answer will ultimately boil down to religious (or irreligious) reasons, to our beliefs about ultimate reality and meaning. To pretend otherwise is a fraud, and I think we'd get further if we just admit that this really is a religious debate. Then there might be at least the possibility of clear definitions and real working compromise.

We have actually contrived to invent a new kind of hypocrite. The old hypocrite ... was a man whose aims were really worldly and practical, while he pretended that they were religious. The new hypocrite is one whose aims are really religious, while he pretends that they are worldly and practical... It is a fight of creeds masquerading as policies.... We are all, one hopes, imaginative enough to recognize the dignity and distinctness of another religion, like Islam or the cult of Apollo. I am quite ready to respect another man's faith; but it is too much to ask that I should respect his doubt, his worldly hesitations and fictions, his political bargain and make-believe.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong with the World

The other reason is that I'd really rather write plainly about what I believe on this issue, rather than translate it into secular terms. I trust that people who don't share my particular religion are perfectly capable of translating into their own terms, and seeing what makes sense to them.

I cite as an example Richard Stallman, who, although an athiest, has based his Free Software philosophy squarely on the Golden Rule (a Christian teaching). Why? Because it makes sense to him. Look at the abolitionist and civil rights movements as well. Those were religious movements, which others who did not share the same religious views still joined in because the argument made compelling moral sense to them anyway.

I recommend that people who think all public discourse ought to be stripped of the religious basis of its participants go read The Culture of Disbelief : How American Law and Politics Trivialize Religious Devotion by Stephen Carter.

"These are the days when the Christian is expected to praise every creed except his own."
-- G. K. Chesterton

My turn to be a touch "reactionary," as you put it ...

What hubris it is for humans to even dare suggest that they are indeed exempt from natural selection.

Who made "natural selection" God that we ought to be subject to it? Since when is "might makes right, all hail the surviving lifeforms" a moral philosophy immune to criticism? Do you truly think that is is "hubris" to believe that it's wrong for us to murder each other?

This man is a genius. To think people condemn him for having a view that conflicts with their own.

I see little evidence of "genius" on Singer's part. Oh, I'm sure his IQ is respectably above 100. But he's not really developed anything new here. At most, he's articulating the logical conclusion of a line of thought that's fairly obvious given the premises. And he certainly has a knack for publicity-generating pushing of hot buttons, but that doesn't count as "genius" in my estimation.

I don't condemn Singer for having a viewpoint that's different than mine. There are lots of folks whom I don't agree with that I can respect. But I do condemn Singer for the particular viewpoint that it's OK to kill kids if they don't measure up. Same as I (arrogantly, no doubt) would condemn other people for viewpoints that say it's OK to kill people if they're not of the Chosen Race, or that it's OK rape women, or any number of other things.

[On the comparison of Singer to the Nazis:] Oh please! This man is talking about the ending of suffering, not the complete opposite: torturing an entire people and putting them to death. The Jews weren't "unfit" to live.. Hitler was simply a sick, very sick, man.

Hitler was not simply a sick man, he was an evil man. That's a distinction that tends to get lost these days.

Keep in mind that one lesson we ought to have learned from the Nazis is that concerns about "suffering" and "compassion" can go hand in hand with a willingness to see millions die. Adolf Hitler was not a drooling monster, despite his great evil. He was apparantly nice to animals and children, didn't kick the dog, was even vegetarian. Somehow, this tenderness of heart failed him when looking at the Jews, though. And Himmler had a "compassionate" reason for ordering the construction of the gas chambers, because he felt sorry for the anguish that German soldiers were feeling carrying out the orders to execute the 'human-seeming' Jews. So he found a way to automate the process, to reduce the amount of suffering in the world ...

Singer talks about reducing suffering, but the result, if his ideas are adopted, will almost certainly be the death of millions.

Throw off the shackles of conventional "thought", and actually ponder these weighty issues before making a snap judgement. The world will be better off for it.

This is namecalling. It's a sophisticated way of saying "if you don't think like me, you're obviously not thinking."

This also assumes that we get to declare answers based upon any sort of moral tradition out of bounds, as "shackles" to be thrown off rather than foundations to be built upon. Personally, I find a moral tradition that says society does not have a right to have me or my children killed because we might not measure up to some "standard" to not be much of a shackle at all. Liberating, even.

And just to show that I have spent some thought on this, let me point out that Singer himself is not being entirely consistant here. Would he begin to eat meat or wear leather if we could assure him that the animals were killed "painlessly"? If not, then why the insistance on "painless" euthanasia for children? Why not simply throw them to the dogs, or expose them to the elements, as was done by earlier tribes? It would seem that he values bulls over babies.

What should give parents the right to decide to kill their child? Is the child property, as a dog or a goat is property? What magic criteria would have to occur before parents can no longer kill their kids? Age five days? five months? five years? Fifteen years? Passing a standardized IQ test and a physical? What is there about the parent-child relationship that gives a parent the right to kill a "useless" kid, and doesn't give an employer the right to kill a useless employee? ("Termination" would have a whole new meaning ...)

Oh, but since I think it's actually wrong to kill people, I guess I'm just incapable of "thinking" about these issues. Or perhaps simply incapable of being heard.

We often read nowadays of the valor or audacity with which some rebel attacks a hoary tyranny or an antiquated superstition. There is not really any courage at all in attacking hoary or antiquated things, any more than in offering to fight one's grandmother. The really courageous man is he who defies tyrannies young as the morning and superstitions fresh as the first flowers.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong with the World

You know, I wouldn't worry about Dr. Singer so much if he was a lone crackpot. The trouble is (as is shown already on this Slashdot discussion) that so many people are willing to go along with this nonsense. Pope John Paul II is right to warn that we have a "Culture of Death", where our answer to problems is to simply kill. [No, I am not Catholic; however, I believe JPII is absolutely correct about this.]

This is exactly what the pro-life movement has been warning about for decades now. I can date my conversion to a pro-life viewpoint pretty exactly; it was when, as part of a "bio-ethics" class, I was exposed to the viewpoints of Joseph Fletcher, Peter Singer's predecessor in such positions as the alleged morality of infanticide. I hadn't really thought about abortion very much, but I concluded that, if there was such a consensus about the fact that there really isn't any ethical difference between a fetus and a baby, that there is no magic moral pixie dust that confers personhood and humanity by a trip out of the uterus (something Singer and Fletcher would agree with), then either we arrive at a viewpoint where, if human life is sacred at all, we must treat life in the womb as sacred, or else humans are simply animals that may be killed when they are too much trouble, and there is no logical reason not to kill unwanted children, or unhappy and unwanted old people, or anyone that enough of us feel are inconvenient.

The only reason that Singer stands out is that he boldly embraces and proclaims this logical conclusion, rather than stopping short of it. So the man is not a hypocrite. I don't consider this much of a virtue. I'd rather have a person who is hypocritical and inconsistant in refusing to follow a bad premise through to clearly evil ends, than someone who in the name of "boldness" or "consistancy" or "integrity" follows through a bad premise to consistantly evil ends.

(Side note -- I'm bothered by the subtle and not-so-subtle ad hominem attacks going on here. It seems as if, according to Dr. Shapiro, Roblimo, and the majority of Slashdotters, that by definition anyone who holds to the traditional Christian position that it's simply wrong to kill children, or anyone else, because they are "defective" by some standard is "unthinking", whereas anyone who's willing to entertain Dr. Singer's philosophy is by definition an intellectual. This is nothing more than name-calling.)

At the risk of invoking Godwin's Law, I would like to know how this differs in any essential way from Nazi philosophy. The Nazis declared that ceratin people were defective, and therefore that killing them was not an immoral act, since they weren't really "human" or "people" anyway. Singer is saying the same thing, he's simply replaced "Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, and anyone who doesn't get along well with the Third Reich" with "children of any race who don't measure up phyically and mentally, or whose life might cause their parents too much suffering."

I propose a simple alternative philosophy. It's not new, but neither is Singer's. It is this: that human life is sacred. It is sacred because it is a gift of God, and we are made in His image. It is a gift, and therefore we have it by simply being born into this world. As a gift, we do not earn it by being smart enough, or fit enough, or pain-free enough. We simply have it, and to deny this is to deny legitimate human freedom and dignity.

The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong With The World

Almost every contemporary proposal to bring freedom into the church is simply a proposal to bring tyranny into the world. ... I may, it is true, twist orthodoxy so as partly to justify a tyrant. But I can easily make up a German philosophy to justify him entirely.
-- G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

You know, I wouldn't worry about Dr. Singer so much if he was a lone crackpot. The trouble is (as is shown already on this Slashdot discussion) that so many people are willing to go along with this nonsense. Pope John Paul II is right to warn that we have a "Culture of Death", where our answer to problems is to simply kill. [No, I am not Catholic; however, I believe JPII is absolutely correct about this.]

This is exactly what the pro-life movement has been warning about for decades now. I can date my conversion to a pro-life viewpoint pretty exactly; it was when, as part of a "bio-ethics" class, I was exposed to the viewpoints of Joseph Fletcher, Peter Singer's predecessor in such positions as the alleged morality of infanticide. I hadn't really thought about abortion very much, but I concluded that, if there was such a consensus about the fact that there really isn't any ethical difference between a fetus and a baby, that there is no magic moral pixie dust that confers personhood and humanity by a trip out of the uterus (something Singer and Fletcher would agree with), then either we arrive at a viewpoint where, if human life is sacred at all, we must treat life in the womb as sacred, or else humans are simply animals that may be killed when they are too much trouble, and there is no logical reason not to kill unwanted children, or unhappy and unwanted old people, or anyone that enough of us feel are inconvenient.

The only reason that Singer stands out is that he boldly embraces and proclaims this logical conclusion, rather than stopping short of it. So the man is not a hypocrite. I don't consider this much of a virtue. I'd rather have a person who is hypocritical and inconsistant in refusing to follow a bad premise through to clearly evil ends, than someone who in the name of "boldness" or "consistancy" or "integrity" follows through a bad premise to consistantly evil ends.

(Side note -- I'm bothered by the subtle and not-so-subtle ad hominem attacks going on here. It seems as if, according to Dr. Shapiro, Roblimo, and the majority of Slashdotters, that by definition anyone who holds to the traditional Christian position that it's simply wrong to kill children, or anyone else, because they are "defective" by some standard is "unthinking", whereas anyone who's willing to entertain Dr. Singer's philosophy is by definition an intellectual. This is nothing more than name-calling.)

At the risk of invoking Godwin's Law, I would like to know how this differs in any essential way from Nazi philosophy. The Nazis declared that ceratin people were defective, and therefore that killing them was not an immoral act, since they weren't really "human" or "people" anyway. Singer is saying the same thing, he's simply replaced "Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, and anyone who doesn't get along well with the Third Reich" with "children of any race who don't measure up phyically and mentally, or whose life might cause their parents too much suffering."

I propose a simple alternative philosophy. It's not new, but neither is Singer's. It is this: that human life is sacred. It is sacred because it is a gift of God, and we are made in His image. It is a gift, and therefore we have it by simply being born into this world. As a gift, we do not earn it by being smart enough, or fit enough, or pain-free enough. We simply have it, and to deny this is to deny legitimate human freedom and dignity.

The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong With The World

Almost every contemporary proposal to bring freedom into the church is simply a proposal to bring tyranny into the world. ... I may, it is true, twist orthodoxy so as partly to justify a tyrant. But I can easily make up a German philosophy to justify him entirely.
-- G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

I highly recommend that you find and read The Culture of Disbelief by Stephen Carter on the attempted exclusion of faith-based views from American politics and law, and then contemplate a "freedom of religion" that actually celebrated people freely and unapologetically following their religions, or a "multi-culturalism" that didn't mind people propagating their own cultures.

But just whose God are you talking about? Are you speaking about the Christian God, the Hindu God (which one), the Muslim God (arguably the Christian God) ...

Oh, please. Amphigory is obviously a Christian, and is arguing as such. So clearly he believes that the Christian view of God is the correct one. Why should he pretend otherwise?

News flash: most Christians are aware that not everybody is a Christian, and that other views of God exist. But it would be incredibly tedious to have to mention that fact every time the word "God" is used, so most of us don't.

Obviously I am taking a poke at you because you seem to believe that you have the right to impose your religious views on me.

This is not about "imposing" religious views. No one is trying to forcibly convert you to Christianity.

Oh, but you mean that his viewpoint is religiously motivated, and you disagree with him, and therefore he's trying to "impose his religious view" on you? To that I have to say, "get over it." If you disagree, do so on the real grounds that you disagree. But, if Amphigory were advocating exactly the same position, not out of Christian theology but out of some secular existentialist "I-have-chosen-this-side-in-the-debate-to-actualiz e-myself" philosophy, what would you say then? I guess you have to meet the issue face on, since you couldn't dodge behind illusions of religious persecution.

Not to too strongly offend you, but take your Christian belief system and go take a long walk off a short pier.

Nice to see you not imposing your irreligion on anyone.

Keep your moral code out of our lives.

So, if I see you getting mugged someday, I should just walk on by? After all, robbery, assault, and murder are against my religion, but you wouldn't want me to go around imposing my religious views on anybody, would you?

In return I will agree to leave your children alone.

I thought the debate was precisely about how to accomplish just that.

... no man ought to write at all, or even to speak at all, unless he thinks that he is in truth and the other man in error.
-- G. K. Chesterton, Heretics

someday, parents are going to have to grow up and realize that it's a big, bad world out there.

Do you have any idea how condescending this sounds?

What makes you think parents don't already realize this?

Part of good parenting, IMNSHO, is the attempt to make the home a shelter, in as much as reasonably possible, from that big bad world out there. Especially for the youngest children. Right now, I don't want my children to have to deal with some of the "realities" of life (which can be pretty unreal, at times). There will be time enough for that as they mature.

This does not mean raising kids as hothouse flowers, so delicate that they faint at the first touch of the outside air. But I do believe that kids will do better if given a chance to grow strong before exposure to the harsher elements.

teach your children what filth is.

No. I do not want to teach them what filth is. I want to teach them what health is, and hopefully the filth will be obvious by contrast.

But I am of the belief that one doesn't have to wash in filth to recognize that it is filthy.

tell them that your value system doesnt support men peeing on women or girls fucking snakes.

What about my ability as a parent to determine when it is appropriate for my children to learn about such topics?

To pick a non-Internet example, I know a lot of parents who were extremely unhappy with the media coverage of the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, because they didn't appreciate having to explain to their seven-year olds what "oral sex" was.

if you raise them correctly, seeing this garbage isnt going to permanently scar their minds.

Maybe, maybe not. I would hope so.

But what we see does affect us. Images are highly effective at implanting themselves in our brains and affecting our attitudes and behaviours. Even if we don't buy into the message at a conscious or intellectual level. This is why advertising works, and why corporations spend billions of dollars/yen/euros every year on it.

If something wounds my kids, it's not a great consolation to know that it might not scar if we're lucky.

and if you think it's going to, keep your damned kids off the internet.

If my only choices are (a) keep my kids off the Internet altogether or (b) drink from the firehose of sludge trying to get the few pearls, then what do you think I'm going to need to choose?

I'd like another choice, which is why I hope that we can come up with some sort of rating system, or at least some effective netiquette, that will allow some leeway between "all" and "nothing."

Now most modern freedom is at root fear. It is not so much that we are too bold to endure rules; it is rather that we are too timid to endure responsibilities.
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong With The World

LinuxOne will support these new technologies with its sophisticated proprietary device drivers...

While this will certainly not win the good graces of RMS, last I knew it was Linus's interpretation that linking a binary-only driver with the Linux kernel did not constitute a "derived work" per the GPL. Given that much of the kernel is © Linux Torvalds, I'd say that his interpretation goes.

Of course, this is a colossally stupid thing to do. But it's not actually illegal.

"Cleverness kills wisdom"
-- G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong With The World Today