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To: GSlob
I am an atheist, and thus in my reference frame your [religious] one is deranged. [And I fully expect reciprocity here]. The statement that all "goods" are apparent in their nature is not even judgeable in terms of being a "good" in itself or not. It is a statement which merely forms a part of a certain value system methodology. It is a methodological tool, and as such it is value-neutral. If the methodology is logically self consistent, and if it allows for building a system with a modicum of explanatory and predictive power with regard to more mundane things and situations, that's all I'm asking from it.

Is this system truly good, (i.e, conforms to objective reality) or is it just something you're "asking from it." If the latter, why should anyone else care? If the former, you're assuming that that which is good is that which conforms with reality --that truth is good.

And the whole methodology for building a system, or the system itself, is not a "good", greater or lesser. It is a tool, more or less useful,

Something is useful insasmuch as it serves an end --a good. Utility assumes goodness and end.

...and allowing potential access to "goods".

You're using the term good, so please provide me with your definition of this term. Otherwise, I don't know what you're referring to.

The essence of true goodness is that it is convertible with being, oneness, truth and beauty. In another sense, a thing is good which lacks defect --a thing that is true to its form (in the Aristotelian sense).

"A good" notion...

"Notion" also needs to be defined. Is a notion a secretion of brain chemicals? How would chemicals in my brain conform with external reality? If my thought reduces to matter in motion, how would it be possible for me to know with certainty that an external reality even exists?

...could apply only to some of its applications, and of these some are greater goods than others. Capacity to explain, understand, and predict is "a good".

Why are these things "good" (whatever "good means)? Are these things truly "better" than inexplicability, incomprehension, and unpredictability? How do you know that?

In fact, these things are truly good, since truth is convertible with good, and the good of the intellect is knowledge and truth. Truth and knowledge are its proper object.

Why a bunch of chemicals in my brain would care about truth, or even know what truth is, is a mystery to me.

The following true story is an illustration of advanced application of such a value system: At my former workplace they were conducting an executive search for a "sweep" - a senior VP. The large sweep's office stood empty for something like a good part of a year, and nobody knew who or when would come to occupy it. A couple months before they found their sweep, I had predicted to my coworkers the nameplate to be put on that office door. I assumed a wild facial expression of prophets from bad movies, stretched my hands towards that door, defocused my gaze, and muttered: "I see it... I see it... GREEDY A-HOLE!" Everyone laughed. Couple months later they found their sweep, and everyone had to stop laughing. A year later they had to squeeze him out -he proved to be too much even for them! No, I was not on the search committee. But what I knew was that the sweep would be chosen on the basis of conformity to the existing corporate culture [which I knew, and knew only too well], and that was sufficient for the prediction.

Not sure what your point is.

You need to think more deeply atheism and materialism. There are logical consequences to the false notion that reality reduces to matter in motion, consequences that few atheists ever consider, but consequences that make materialism self-refuting.

540 posted on 03/09/2007 5:53:16 AM PST by Aquinasfan (When you find "Sola Scriptura" in the Bible, let me know)
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To: Aquinasfan
Something is useful insasmuch as it serves an end --a good. Utility assumes goodness and end.
Dead wrong. Ability to run fast - [using your reference framework] - could be used to a "good" end [exercise, health] or to not a so good one [running away with the money after holding up a bank]. Utility is the same, the ends are not. That's why the tools are only tools, and are beyond value judgment.
541 posted on 03/09/2007 6:50:20 AM PST by GSlob
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