In effect, you are saying that you know that it is objectively true that each and every person should make decisions regarding sexual activity subjectively. This is called a contradiction.
I can't think of a response to that, so will concede you the point. I guess I'm a bit too dogmatic about what I define as freedom.
But her psychological motivation for writing this book has no bearing on the strength of her arguments.
So, if we reach the right conclusions for the wrong reasons, it's all good? I submit that her psychological motivation in this case makes it more likely that she has made an incorrect choice. How often does panic or despair cause us to pick the right alternative from a set of possibilities?
The primary purpose, hence the name. The pleasurable nature of intercourse is ordered primarily to bringing the act about. In other words, if intercourse wasn't pleasurable, none of us would be here today.
Primary, in terms of it being the way that we all got here, but the vast majority of human sexual activity, even within a marriage, is not going to lead directly to reproduction. That could be said of other mammals that have a "heat" season, during the time of maximum fertility. And such mammals seem to be able to reproduce without the need for mutual pleasure. Of course, they do it by their instincts, and while humans have instincts, we are the creature that is able to control our instincts through reason and education.
And science has made it possible for us to blow up innocent people with remote controlled bombs. What's your point? That all things which are possible are permissible?
Certainly not. But science gives us possibilities that were not conceivable back when the religious texts were written. We have the opportunity to have sexual relations without them leading inevitably to offspring, and those ways could not have been dealt with in a pre-industrial society. Anyone from two thousand years ago that could be whisked to our era would consider a lot of what we do to be some sort of witchcraft, magic, or other product of evil.
Has science discovered a new purpose for the reproductive system?
No, but it has extended the possible uses of that system. I have a set of feet and legs with which to walk places, but science developed a way for me to use them to control gasoline and brake pedals, and go much further than I otherwise would be able to. The separation of sexual expression from reproduction allows people the possibility of utilizing the pleasurable nature of the system.
Modern anesthesia allows me the possibility of having surgery to repair my body, without suffering excruciating pain during the procedure. When anesthesia was introduced, it was questioned as morally suspect, since it was believed that suffering pain had a grace-giving effect. All that was, was a way to rationalize a world that was filled with pain, and reconcile the idea of a merciful supreme being with the fact that most people lived painful lives.
4) Two people who engage in intercourse without professing a lifetime commitment to each other are acting without a proper understanding of intercourse, or are failing by ommission to fulfill the responsibilities that naturally come with engaging in intercourse (i.e., a lifetime commitement to each other for the purpose of bringing forth and rearing children and the mutual care of the spouses).
What you're saying is that the only purpose of marriage and sexuality is to have children, all that "proper understanding of intercourse" thing. So--if an older couple meet, and she is past her childbearing years, they should not be allowed to marry and have sexual activity, since it's imposible for them to make babies? Or, is it OK because "God did that" rather than "human beings decided to control their fertility"?
I believe that we make progress to advance humanity, and even though not all science advances humanity, the majority of it does. As more and more people perceive change as positive, they either leave the old beliefs, or the old set of beliefs tries to catch up to the people, after a period of intense resistance.
You do a credible job of maintaining that resistance!
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Hunter112 says: What you're saying is that the only purpose of marriage and sexuality is to have children, all that "proper understanding of intercourse" thing.That certainly is NOT what the Church teaches. The Church teaches that "the sexual relationship which is demanded by the moral order and in which the total meaning of mutual self-giving and human procreation in the context of true love is achieved."
The Church teaches that sex inside of a valid and licit marriage is both for the purpose of love and procreation.
No. But again, her motivation is irrelevant to the strength of her arguments considered in themselves. I mean, Einstein's theory of relativity would still be true even if he proposed it in order to impress a pretty girl in his physics class.
I submit that her psychological motivation in this case makes it more likely that she has made an incorrect choice. How often does panic or despair cause us to pick the right alternative from a set of possibilities?
At the same time, is it possible that correlation is causation; that the unhappiness that she associates with promiscuity was caused by her promiscuity? That is a logical possibility, at the very least.
But there is also objective, empirical evidence which associates unhappiness and disease with promiscuity.
Primary, in terms of it being the way that we all got here, but the vast majority of human sexual activity, even within a marriage, is not going to lead directly to reproduction.
But... the pleasurable aspect of intercourse is designed to bring about new human life. No pleasure, no intercourse, no new lives, no human race to enjoy the pleasure of intercourse.
That could be said of other mammals that have a "heat" season, during the time of maximum fertility. And such mammals seem to be able to reproduce without the need for mutual pleasure.
I don't have much knowledge in that area, but it's pretty much irrelevant to the argument. We're human beings, not dogs.
Of course, they do it by their instincts, and while humans have instincts, we are the creature that is able to control our instincts through reason and education.
True.
What's your point? That all things which are possible are permissible?
Certainly not. But science gives us possibilities that were not conceivable back when the religious texts were written.
1) I have cited no "religious texts" in my arguments with you, since you are a self-described atheist. I'm basing my arguments on the observable laws of nature.
2) Science has given us technologies that were inconceivable thousands of years ago. But so what? Murder is still murder, whether it's accomplished by a sword or by a remote-controlled bomb.
We have the opportunity to have sexual relations without them leading inevitably to offspring,
Through natural means (natural family planning - NFP) or artificial means. I argue that the use of modern artificial means of birth control (really, induced sterility) is just as immoral as the ancient forms of artificial birth control (or induced sterility), like castration. Technologies change. Principles do not.
and those ways could not have been dealt with in a pre-industrial society. Anyone from two thousand years ago that could be whisked to our era would consider a lot of what we do to be some sort of witchcraft, magic, or other product of evil.
Maybe so, but again, this is irrelevant. The principle regarding artificial means of birth control doesn't change. It's immoral to induce sterility (temporarily or permanently) in order to enjoy the pleasurable aspect of intercourse, while rejecting the end that it's naturally ordered to. Again, such acts are analogous to binging and purging.
Has science discovered a new purpose for the reproductive system?
No, but it has extended the possible uses of that system.
But not the ultimate end. The overarching purpose of the reproductive system remains reproduction. We must use our reason to determine ethical and unethical uses of technology regarding the human reproductive system. Ethical therapies serve the end of human reproduction. Unethical technologies reject the purpose of the human reproductive system and instead, use it as a means to some other end.
I have a set of feet and legs with which to walk places, but science developed a way for me to use them to control gasoline and brake pedals, and go much further than I otherwise would be able to.
Notice that legs are not called the "human walking system." Why? Because legs can be used to climb, swim, walk, run, crawl, stomp, kick and press gas pedals. But the human reproductive system is ordered to one end only, reproduction.
The separation of sexual expression from reproduction allows people the possibility of utilizing the pleasurable nature of the system...
...without regard to the end, just as the gluttonous Henry VIII would separate the pleasurable nature of food from its primary purpose of providing nutrition for the human body.
Science makes lifeless intercourse possible. The question is, is this moral? The possible is not always permissible.
Modern anesthesia allows me the possibility of having surgery to repair my body, without suffering excruciating pain during the procedure.
Most medicines cause ill bodily effects, but these effects ("side effects) are secondary to the primary goal of re-establishing health, i.e., re-establishing the proper operation of the body.
But artificially imposed sterility does not re-establish the proper operation of the body. It prevents the proper operation of the body. It is categorically different. It represents poison, not medicine.
When anesthesia was introduced, it was questioned as morally suspect, since it was believed that suffering pain had a grace-giving effect.
Whoever thought this was mistaken, since all forms of medication would have to be rejected under this rubric. This idea would also contradict Jesus' healing ministry, the healing ministry of the Apostles, the fact that Luke was a doctor, and the fact that Paul issued medical advice.
All that was, was a way to rationalize a world that was filled with pain, and reconcile the idea of a merciful supreme being with the fact that most people lived painful lives.
It's also true, because God can bring good out of evil.
St. Thomas also provides explanations of what are now generally considered to be the two main difficulties of the subject, viz., the Divine permission of foreseen moral evil, and the question finally arriving thence, why God choose to create anything at all. First, it is asked why God, foreseeing that his creatures would use the gift of free will for their own injury, did not either abstain from creating them, or in some way safeguard their free will from misuse, or else deny them the gift altogether? St. Thomas replies (C. G., II, xxviii) that God cannot change His mind, since the Divine will is free from the defect of weakness or mutability. Such mutability would, it should be remarked, be a defect in the Divine nature (and therefore impossible), because if God's purpose were made dependent on the foreseen free act of any creature, God would thereby sacrifice His own freedom, and would submit Himself to His creatures, thus abdicating His essential supremacy--a thing which is, of course, utterly inconceivable. Secondly, to the question why God should have chosen to create, when creation was in no way needful for His own perfection, St. Thomas answers that God's object in creating is Himself; He creates in order to manifest his own goodness, power, and wisdom, and is pleased with that reflection or similitude of Himself in which the goodness of creation consists. God's pleasure is the one supremely perfect motive for action, alike in God Himself and in His creatures; not because of any need, or inherent necessity, in the Divine nature (C. G., I, xxviii; II, xxiii), but because God is the source, centre, and object, of all existence. (I, Q. 65:a. 2; cf. Proverbs 26 and Conc. Vat., can. 1:v; Const. Dogm., 1.) This is accordingly the sufficient reason for the existence of the universe, and even for the suffering which moral evil has introduced into it. God has not made the world primarily for man's good, but for His own pleasure; good for man lies in conforming himself to the supreme purpose of creation, and evil in departing from it (C.G., III, xvii, cxliv). It may further be understood from St. Thomas, that in the diversity of metaphysical evil, in which the perfection of the universe as a whole is embodied, God may see a certain similitude of His own threefold unity (cf. I, Q. xii); and again, that by permitting moral evil to exist He has provided a sphere for the manifestation of one aspect of His essential justice (cf. I, Q. lxv, a. 2; and I, Q. xxi, a. 1, 3).What you're saying is that the only purpose of marriage and sexuality is to have children, all that "proper understanding of intercourse" thing.It is obviously impossible to suggest a reason why this universe in particular should have been created rather than another; since we are necessarily incapable of forming an idea of any other universe than this. Similarly, we are unable to imagine why God chose to manifest Himself by the way of creation, instead of, or in addition to, the other ways, whatever they may be, by which He has, or may have, attained the same end. We reach here the utmost limit of speculation; and our inability to conceive the ultimate reason for creation (as distinct from its direct motive) is paralleled, at a much earlier stage of the enquire, by the inability of the non-creationist schools of thought to assign any ultimate cause for the existence of the order of nature. It will be observed that St. Thomas's account of evil is a true Theodicy, taking into consideration as it does every factor of the problem, and leaving unsolved only the mystery of creation, before which all schools of thought are equally helpless. It is as impossible to know, in the fullest sense, why this world was made as to know how it was made; but St. Thomas has at least shown that the acts of the Creator admit of complete logical justification, notwithstanding the mystery in which, for human intelligence, they can never wholly cease to be involved. On Catholic principles, the amelioration of moral evil and its consequent suffering can only take place by means of individual reformation, and not so much through increase of knowledge as through stimulation or re-direction of the will. But since all methods of social improvement that have any value must necessarily represent a nearer approach to conformity with Divine laws, they are welcomed and furthered by the Church, as tending, at least indirectly, to accomplish the purpose for which she exists.
Marriage has two natural purposes: the begetting and raising of children, and the mutual care of the spouses. Intercourse has two natural purposes also: the begetting of children and the unity of the spouses.
So--if an older couple meet, and she is past her childbearing years, they should not be allowed to marry and have sexual activity, since it's imposible for them to make babies? Or, is it OK because "God did that" rather than "human beings decided to control their fertility"?
In such a case, the couple marries for the mutual care of the spouses. Secondarily, such a marriage serves the common good by channeling sexuality for good societal order.
I believe that we make progress to advance humanity, and even though not all science advances humanity, the majority of it does.
What constitutes societal advancement?
In other words, what "should be" in a universe of matter in motion?
As more and more people perceive change as positive, they either leave the old beliefs, or the old set of beliefs tries to catch up to the people, after a period of intense resistance.
So truth is time-dependent? What about the ancient belief that one plus one equals two? That good is to be done and evil avoided? That the human reproductive system is ordered toward reproduction?
You do a credible job of maintaining that resistance!
;-) I do my best. Most days, anyway.