Ion

dk,
let's see what clue I do have.

Since beginning of February, you do claim in this thread, that:

1) the 'divine' commandments from the Bible are inalienable human laws that constitute the source of the UN Code of Human Rights;
you claim this, in spite of the antagonism between the Bible and the UN;

2) the Jewish are specially chosen by a divinity, and thus the Jews have an outstanding history compared to other people;
you claim this, in spite of the disproving of this Biblical divinity, and in spite of the history of other populations;

3) Exodus is an historic event;
you claim this, in spite of archaeology disproving Exodus;

4) the UN Code of Human Rights condones terrorism;
you claim this without support, just by your sentiment.

You cannot back up any of these four claims with non religious evidence.

Therefore, 1), 2), 3) and 4) are your airhead indoctrination with religious fanaticism.

dk

1. Ion: the 'divine' commandments from the Bible are inalienable human laws that constitute the source of the UN Code of Human Rights;
   you claim this, in spite of the antagonism between the Bible and the UN;
   dk: I don’t agree, you have simply assumed the Bible and UN DoHR as opposing conflicting forces. To actually demonstrate (prove) antagonism, requires some kind of positive evidence, which you haven’t provided. You haven’t even provided a rational or empirical source for the UN DoHR.
   o
2. Ion: the Jewish are specially chosen by a divinity, and thus the Jews have an outstanding history compared to other people;
   you claim this, in spite of the disproving of this Biblical divinity, and in spite of the history of other populations;
   dk: No, the Bible says the Jews are God’s chosen people. The Jewish people exist, and have existed for 3,000 years under the Mosaic Law. I haven’t said Jews or the Mosaic Law are Divine, rather I’ve contented, if the OT Law were sufficient there would be no need for the NT. I would compare the Mosaic Law to statistical correlation i.e. as a necessary but insufficient condition. It is however an empirical fact that the Jews exist, and live under the Law.
   o
3. Ion: Exodus is an historic event;
   you claim this, in spite of archaeology disproving Exodus;
   dk: I’ve already effectively argued the point. The Bible serves as archaeological evidence just like the Odessa and Iliad. Neither serves as a metaphysical proof of [g][G]od[s][ess][es]. Archeology studies antiquities not metaphysics.
   o
4. the UN Code of Human Rights condones terrorism;
   you claim this without support, just by your sentiment.
   You cannot back up any of these four claims with non religious evidence.
   dk: I have no idea what you’re talking about, but the Israel and Jews certainly doesn’t condone terrorism, and historically have never advocated terrorism. I have offered the Jewish people as evidence, not the pretext you interpret from the OT.

Ion: Therefore, 1), 2), 3) and 4) are your airhead indoctrination with religious fanaticism.
dk: You still haven’t offered any rational basis for the UN DoHR.

dk

dk: ... Answer: Scientific Racism, as in “survival of the favoured races”.
lpetrich:
Darwin had used the term "races" in a very generic sort of sense.
dk: I’m not going to belabor or argue the point. Darwin applied Malthus’ economic doctrines to biology in Origin of Species (subtitle truncated). Spencer applied Darwin’s doctrines to perfect people and society through Social Darwinism. Galvin applied Darwin’s doctrines to perfect the individual through eugenics. The Young Turks, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao applied an amalgamation of these theories to perfect nationalism as a logical necessity to progress i.e. the means justify the ends. The application of these theories to society in service to progress becomes the justification for mass slaughter, systematic persecution and the absolute power of the nation-state during the 20th Century. I’m not alleging that Malthus, Darwin, Galvin or Spencer was racist, or that science supports racism. The lesson I take away from the history of the 20th Century is that reason alone is insufficient and inadequate as a justification for “the means justify the ends”.
.
dk: ... and I have provided several references besides Darwin’s title including quotes from Darwin, Young Turks, and Hitler.
lpetrich:
While leaving out the part in which Hitler states that fighting the Jews is following the precedent set by Jesus Christ's famous temple temper tantrum -- it's right out of Mein Kampf. By the way, (dk: I have no idea what you’re talking about, how a about a link, or at least a Chapter.)
Also, dk has a habit of lumping together lots of people who have very little in common, which suggests that he has little real understanding of their beliefs.
dk: Romans 11:26, “and thus all Israel will be saved as it is written.” Sure doesn’t sound like God or the Bible justify anyone’s authority or liberty to commit genocide against the Jews. Here’s an excerpt from Hitler’s Munich Speech April 10, 1923,
-----
“ (snip) IF A PEOPLE IS TO BECOME FREE IT NEEDS PRIDE AND WILL-POWER, DEFIANCE, HATE, HATE, AND ONCE AGAIN HATE....
The spirit comes not down from above, that spirit which is to purify Germany, which with its iron besom is to purify the great sty of democracy. To do that is the task of our Movement. The Movement must not rust away in Parliament, it must not spend itself in superfluous battles of words, but the banner with the white circle and the black Swastika will be hoisted over the whole of Germany on the day which shall mark the liberation of our whole people.”
----- source, whole speech .
(4) The soul of the people can only be won if along with carrying on a positive struggle for our own aims, we destroy the opponent of these aims.
-The people at all times see the proof of their own right in ruthless attack on a foe, and to them renouncing the destruction of the adversary seems like uncertainty with regard to their own right if not a sign of their own unriglxt.
-“The broad masses are only a piece of Nature and their sentiment does not understand the mutual handshake of people who daim that they want the opposite things. What they desire is the victory of the stronger and the destruction of the weak or his unconditional subjection.
. . The nationalization of our masses will succeed only when, aside from all the positive struggle for the soul of our people, their international poisoners are exterminated.”
----- Mien Kampf : Chapter XII : The First Period of Development of the National Socialist German Workers' Party

Hitler often quoted or referenced the Bible for effect and gravitas, so did the Devil. Hiterl explicitly declares racial purity as the spirit of a Neo-Germanic movement to supersede the Bible, for example, “The spirit comes not from above, that spirit which is to purify Germany.” Hey, what do you think elite German intellectuals wrote about the spirit of NAZISM.

Ion

This antagonism was posted January 6.

(Many more afterwards.
Having a short memory, dk?)
Again:
any proof of "...the Jews are God's chosen people?" outside your religion, dk?

Because claiming it inside a religion, means nothing to the outside world.
Archaologists consider the Bible as making extraordinary claims that are disproven by archaeology.

The stories of Exodus, Genesis and Jesus for example.
You still haven't backed up this accusation that you made:
I wrote January 21 that Exodus 21:4 and 21:6 are garbage compared to Article 4 and 5 from the UN Code of Human Rights.

dk, you still haven't addressed this post from January 13, but sure you blah-blah:

dk

DMB: OK, dk. I don't in general like long posts, but you post in such a tangled way that this will probably end up rather longer than I would like.
First of all, with reference to Darwin's full title of the Origin of Species, you originally posted this:
DMB: I replied to you at the time:
DMB:I note, however, that you still think that this title alone is evidence that Darwin was racist. I wonder whether you have actually read the book in question rather than merely looking up references to it on websites. If you had, you would know that in it Darwin looks at the origin of speciation in non-humans and does not deal with humans. That is one reason why much later he wrote the separate book on The Descent of Man. My understanding of the word "racist" is that it applies to discrimination between the supposed "races" of humankind, not other animals. So in The Origin, Darwin was certainly not dealing with what you apparently mean by "Scientific Racism", so your stuff about the survival of the Jews seems to have nothing to do with this, just as it has little or nothing to do with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
(snip)
---------------------------------
dk: I never said Malthus, Darwin, Galton and Spencer were racists, the were an economist, biologist and sociologist, respectively. Malthus was the first to state the Principle of Population, then applied it to economics to perfect commerce. Darwin applied the Principles of Population to biology to perfect evolution. Spencer applied Darwin’s biological principles to government to perfect society. Hegel, Nietzsche, and Marx supplied the rational philosophical trappings to justify the means to an ideological utopia (end) then Lenin, Hitler, Stalin and Mao applied the ideological solution to perfect their nations and empires.

1. "Population, when unchecked, increases at a geometrical ratio, while subsistence increases by an arithmetical ratio. "
2. "Population must always be kept down to the level of the means of subsistence.”
3. Malthus was the first to inquire into “the means by which this level is effected.” .

DMB: You also say “Spenser, Darwin, Galton, Hegel, Nietzsche and Marx became intellectual fascists independent of their personal opinions and intentions “
This is an extraordinary claim. I do not see how anyone can become any sort of fascist independently of his personal opinions and intentions.
dk: First you’ve taken my comments out of context, and second whatever Malthus, Darwin,,, etc intended, the carnage fanatical megalomaniacs effected under the auspices of “National Purity”, “Aryan Superiority”, “Social Darwinism”, “Command Style Communism” or “Eugenics” was justified by the science they practiced. The optimal word is “becomes”. What any particular scientific theory becomes in practice has nothing to do with the scientific discovery or the scientist. For example atomic fission may become the basis of cheap power through atomic fusion, or it may become a doomsday device. My point is that whatever a scientific theory or discovery becomes, is a function of the question “do the ends justify the means?”. In the 20th Century Lenin, Hitler, Stalin and Moa found the science of Malthus, Darwin, Galton, and Spenser sufficient to justify destroying the lives of 100s of millions of people around the planet. In hindsight it should be obvious to a block of wood that the science provided insufficient justification. While Hitler and his ghouls were convicted of “crimes against humanity”, Lenin, Stalin, Mao and many lesser megalomaniacs have never been called to justice for the gulags, economic policies and social depravity that systematically destroyed the lives of about 100 million people. Now, if you still haven’t guessed the basis for the UN DoHR I’ll tell you, it was the Nuremberg Trials held after WW II.
.
DMB: Your claim about "a long and bloody partnership between science and racism" appears to come down to various ideologies being based on the ideas of Malthus. Malthus was undoubtedly influential in the 19th Century, but I would suggest that his infulence was much less than you seem to think. Darwin and Wallace came to their conclusions mainly as a result of direct observation of nature. Marx and Engels came to theirs at least partly because of direct observation of the misery of the poor under the early capitalist system. And although we may pick out particular names like these, political and economic thought in the 19th Century was being developed by a large number of people, many of whom also used their own direct observations to come to their conclusions.
dk: That’s a little like saying Kepler, Newton, Coulomb, Boyle, Avocadro and Faraday’s influence faded in the 19th and 20th Century. Quite the opposite, their influence grew as the basis for a new paradigms in science, e.g. the Periodic Table, X-Rays, quantum analysis, radium, relativity, atomic structure, and Hubble’s constant. You’re the one trying to underwrite metaphysics with science. That’s why the simple question, “What is the basis for UN DoHR” sends you fallaciously into ad hominem attacks.
.
The basis for Human Rights has always been deontological, not positive law. In fact the basis for "the rule of Law" is likewise deontological. The problem with positive law is that it sets the governing body above the Law as benefactor, and by extension above God. The 1st Commandment "Thou shall not have strange gods before me" contextually puts all men under the Law, and the ruling body as servants. This makes Universal Human Rights possible, not science.
.
Further trying to equate the Bible, verse by verse, to the articles of UN DoHR amounts to a fallacious equivocation. Today, intellectual elites hypothesis that all things are possible without god, but the hypothesis only serves megalomaniacs that consider themselves above the Law. History documents that elite intellectuals have no defense against the powerful, and are quick to cut one another’s throats for mere snippets. In effect elite intellectuals without god are completely dependent on table scraps they beg from robber barons, corporate moguls, and government, or the philanthropical institutions set up by robber barons, corporate moguls and government. If you want proof, look at the salary of a good used car salesman, professional athlete or collegiate basketball coach compared with a top-notch tenured university researcher. DMB: OK, dk. I don't in general like long posts, but you post in such a tangled way that this will probably end up rather longer than I would like.
First of all, with reference to Darwin's full title of the Origin of Species, you originally posted this:
DMB: I replied to you at the time:
DMB:I note, however, that you still think that this title alone is evidence that Darwin was racist. I wonder whether you have actually read the book in question rather than merely looking up references to it on websites. If you had, you would know that in it Darwin looks at the origin of speciation in non-humans and does not deal with humans. That is one reason why much later he wrote the separate book on The Descent of Man. My understanding of the word "racist" is that it applies to discrimination between the supposed "races" of humankind, not other animals. So in The Origin, Darwin was certainly not dealing with what you apparently mean by "Scientific Racism", so your stuff about the survival of the Jews seems to have nothing to do with this, just as it has little or nothing to do with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
(snip)
---------------------------------
dk: I never said Malthus, Darwin, Galton and Spencer were racists, the were an economist, biologist and sociologist, respectively. Malthus was the first to state the Principle of Population, then applied it to economics to perfect commerce. Darwin applied the Principles of Population to biology to perfect evolution. Spencer applied Darwin’s biological principles to government to perfect society. Hegel, Nietzsche, and Marx supplied the rational philosophical trappings to justify the means to an ideological utopia (end) then Lenin, Hitler, Stalin and Mao applied the ideological solution to perfect their nations and empires.

1. "Population, when unchecked, increases at a geometrical ratio, while subsistence increases by an arithmetical ratio. "
2. "Population must always be kept down to the level of the means of subsistence.”
3. Malthus was the first to inquire into “the means by which this level is effected.” .

DMB: You also say “Spenser, Darwin, Galton, Hegel, Nietzsche and Marx became intellectual fascists independent of their personal opinions and intentions “
This is an extraordinary claim. I do not see how anyone can become any sort of fascist independently of his personal opinions and intentions.
dk: First you’ve taken my comments out of context, and second whatever Malthus, Darwin,,, etc intended, the carnage fanatical megalomaniacs effected under the auspices of “National Purity”, “Aryan Superiority”, “Social Darwinism”, “Command Style Communism” or “Eugenics” was justified by the science they practiced. The optimal word is “becomes”. What any particular scientific theory becomes in practice has nothing to do with the scientific discovery or the scientist. For example atomic fission may become the basis of cheap power through atomic fusion, or it may become a doomsday device. My point is that whatever a scientific theory or discovery becomes, is a function of the question “do the ends justify the means?”. In the 20th Century Lenin, Hitler, Stalin and Moa found the science of Malthus, Darwin, Galton, and Spenser sufficient to justify destroying the lives of 100s of millions of people around the planet. In hindsight it should be obvious to a block of wood that the science provided insufficient justification. While Hitler and his ghouls were convicted of “crimes against humanity”, Lenin, Stalin, Mao and many lesser megalomaniacs have never been called to justice for the gulags, economic policies and social depravity that systematically destroyed the lives of about 100 million people. Now, if you still haven’t guessed the basis for the UN DoHR I’ll tell you, it was the Nuremberg Trials held after WW II.
.
DMB: Your claim about "a long and bloody partnership between science and racism" appears to come down to various ideologies being based on the ideas of Malthus. Malthus was undoubtedly influential in the 19th Century, but I would suggest that his infulence was much less than you seem to think. Darwin and Wallace came to their conclusions mainly as a result of direct observation of nature. Marx and Engels came to theirs at least partly because of direct observation of the misery of the poor under the early capitalist system. And although we may pick out particular names like these, political and economic thought in the 19th Century was being developed by a large number of people, many of whom also used their own direct observations to come to their conclusions.
dk: That’s a little like saying Kepler, Newton, Coulomb, Boyle, Avocadro and Faraday’s influence faded in the 19th and 20th Century. Quite the opposite, their influence grew as the basis for a new paradigms in science, e.g. the Periodic Table, X-Rays, quantum analysis, radium, relativity, atomic structure, and Hubble’s constant. You’re the one trying to underwrite metaphysics with science. That’s why the simple question, “What is the basis for UN DoHR” sends you fallaciously into ad hominem attacks.
.
The basis for Human Rights has always been deontological, not positive law. In fact the basis for "the rule of Law" is likewise deontological. The problem with positive law is that it sets the governing body above the Law as benefactor, and by extension above God. The 1st Commandment "Thou shall not have strange gods before me" contextually puts all men under the Law, and the ruling body as servants. This makes Universal Human Rights possible, not science.
.
Further trying to equate the Bible, verse by verse, to the articles of UN DoHR amounts to a fallacious equivocation. Today, intellectual elites hypothesis that all things are possible without god, but the hypothesis only serves megalomaniacs that consider themselves above the Law. History documents that elite intellectuals have no defense against the powerful, and are quick to cut one another’s throats for mere snippets. In effect elite intellectuals without god are completely dependent on table scraps they beg from robber barons, corporate moguls, and government, or the philanthropic institutions set up by robber barons, corporate moguls and government. If you want proof, look at the salary of a good used car salesman, professional athlete or collegiate basketball coach compared with a top-notch tenured university researcher. It is a laugher, obvously if the powerful people valued the findings of elite intellectuals, there pay would be commensurate. This kind of cynicism originated from the traditions of Ancient Greeks. The elite intellectuals were called sophists and traveled from city to city to justify the perpetual wars between city/states, the wars that bled Greek Civilization of its life blood.

Ion

The problem with "...and by extension above God.", dk, is that you have to prove that a 'God' exists, without referring to religion.

Otherwise, your 'God' doesn't exist, and you waste time in a mirage.
Article 18 from the UN Code of Human Rights denies the 1st Commandment.

Myself, I agree with Article 18.
Again, dk, first prove with non religious evidence that there is a 'God' that makes a 'Law'.

Otherwise, your comment is null.
This last part is about certain aspects of human ethics.

The UN Code of Human Rights doesn't address these aspects.

I am "...without god..." and with a "...kind of cynicism...".

Regarding these specific aspects of ethics that you mention, I don't condone greed, I don't condone quick opportunities without moral principles (for example, it took me years to construct thru willpower what I do now, I despise the lottery culture, and I am an immigrant chosen on skills that I build), I don't condone dog-eat-dog competitions, and -in what I saw from the past that matters to you- I don't condone abortions, which -irresponsibly I believe- terminate natural possibilities for life.

However, that's my education.
I don't force it onto others.
I look for like-minded people.

Again, the UN Code of Human Rights doesn't address these aspects.

lpetrich

dk:
... you have simply assumed the Bible and UN DoHR as opposing conflicting forces. ...

Why not do a blow-by-blow analysis of the UN DoHR and see how it stacks up.

dk:
... It is however an empirical fact that the Jews exist, and live under the Law.

Or at least some interpretation of it and explaining-away of awkward parts. Many present-day Jews are less-than-Orthodox, being Conservative or Reform or secular.

lpetrich:
Darwin had used the term "races" in a very generic sort of sense.

dk:
I?m not going to belabor or argue the point.

So are you conceding defeat, O dk?

Darwin applied Malthus? economic doctrines to biology in Origin of Species.

Totally mixed up. What interested Darwin about Malthus is Malthus's description of overbreeding. As to economics, Darwin had read Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations with its classic description of the operations of a market economy; he was most interested in how it was produced by the activities of its participants without any central planner directing them. He found that a useful analogy for how an ecosystem works without a central planner directing it it.

Spencer applied Darwin?s doctrines to perfect people and society through Social Darwinism.

Spencer's views were different from Darwin, who had not believed in a might-makes-right ethic.

The Young Turks, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao applied an amalgamation of these theories to perfect nationalism as a logical necessity to progress i.e. the means justify the ends.

It's "the end justifies the means". But their reasons were that Evil People were to be exterminated, whether Armenians or Jews or capitalists.

The application of these theories to society in service to progress becomes the justification for mass slaughter, systematic persecution and the absolute power of the nation-state during the 20th Century.

Implying that all of previous human history was a saintly, pacifist Garden of Eden.

Which is absolute bullshit.

I wonder if anyone can check this out, but someone once claimed that wars in previous centuries were even bloodier than 20th-cy. wars, when one considers the relative number of casualties.

lpetrich:
While leaving out the part in which Hitler states that fighting the Jews is following the precedent set by Jesus Christ's famous temple temper tantrum -- it's right out of Mein Kampf.

dk:
By the way, I have no idea what you?re talking about, ...

This from someone who considers himself an expert on Adolf Hitler's thought.

lpetrich:
Also, dk has a habit of lumping together lots of people who have very little in common, which suggests that he has little real understanding of their beliefs.
dk:
Romans 11:26, ?and thus all Israel will be saved as it is written.? Sure doesn?t sound like God or the Bible justify anyone?s authority or liberty to commit genocide against the Jews. ...

Matthew 27:25 -- "May his blood be on us and on our children!"

In effect, "His death will be a black mark on our records, and those of all our children." And this doctrine of collective guilt became a favorite belief of Christian anti-Semites.

(Hitler's speeches...)

Seems more like assertive nationalism than evolutionary biology.

dk:
Malthus was the first to state the Principle of Population, then applied it to economics to perfect commerce.

Shows how little dk knows about Malthus's work.

dk:
Darwin applied the Principles of Population to biology to perfect evolution.

Which can only be called pure ignorance of Darwin's work. He was not trying to "perfect evolution", but instead fo work out what had happened in the history of life on Earth.

dk:
Hegel, Nietzsche, and Marx supplied the rational philosophical trappings to justify the means to an ideological utopia ...

Which is bullshit, plain and simple. I'd be surprised if dk knows anything about what these gentlemen had thought. For starters, Hegel died when Darwin was a young man.

dk quotes Malthus:

• "Population, when unchecked, increases at a geometrical ratio, while subsistence increases by an arithmetical ratio. "
• "Population must always be kept down to the level of the means of subsistence.?
• Malthus was the first to inquire into ?the means by which this level is effected.? .

I think that dk is trying to insinuate that Malthus had been an advocate of mass murder. The reality is totally different. He was simply considering what would keep humanity's population from outrunning the carrying capacity of the land. He considered these methods:

• "Vice" -- birth control, abortion, etc. -- which he considered abhorrent
• "Moral restraint" -- lengthy celibacy for much of the population -- which he considered impractical
• "Misery" -- overpopulation and starvation -- which he considered the inevitable alternative

dk:
History documents that elite intellectuals have no defense against the powerful, and are quick to cut one another?s throats for mere snippets. ....

???

(dk's related assertions are too difficult to follow; he lives in his own world, it would seem)

dk

Originally posted by dk
I don’t agree, you have simply assumed the Bible and UN DoHR as opposing conflicting forces. To actually demonstrate (prove) antagonism,...
Ion: This antagonism was posted January 6.
(Many more afterwards.
Having a short memory, dk?) dk: And if you recall I answered the issue by providing a link to a Catholic Theologian that explained the basis of Leviticus and Deuteronomy in terms of God’s Covenants with the Patriarchs.
Ion: Now one of these was inspired by depraved fallible humans while the other many claim was inspired by an omnibenevolent deity. Which society would you prefer to live under? The biblical deity wouldn't be my first choice to run an organization like Amnesty International.
dk: As I explained earlier, Leviticus and Deuteronomy were written in response to Israel breaking God’s Covenants (Golden Calf, Sin of Baal Peor) to estrange themselves from God’s plan. Even more to the point, Israel didn’t become a nation until the Davidic Kingdom centuries later, so Leviticus and Deuteronomy really don’t apply to this discussion except to prefigure nationhood with limited power putting the rulers and priests under more severe Laws. This was not what God intended for Israel, but what Israel became by breaking God’s Covenants, especially the Mosaic Law by worshiping false gods. The more complex the laws, the more unjust the laws became, and the more the people suffered. In this way God in his mercy permitted the Jewish people to know him. In the case of UN DoHR, Article 18, China, India, Pakistan, most of Sub-Saharan Africa, etc.. grievously violate Article 18. How has the UN responded? Answer: The UN Human Rights Council booted the US off, then voted Sudan into the Human Rights Council. Yes the same Sudan that openly practices slavery, abductions and forced labor to subjugate dissidents with religion. To be honest Article 18 sounded great in 1948, but with Sudan on the Human Rights Council Article 18 only serves to illustrate the hypocrisy and demagoguery so unbecoming to the governing body of the UN. In a biblical context the UN has thus become a corrupt irrelevant institution, just when it is most needed. I’m certain this is not what the human authors intended the UN to become in 1948 because of the UN DoHR. On the other hand, the Mosaic Law has served the Jewish people for 3,000 years. Go figure, and I have no rational explanation for the historical facts except, “There but for the Grace of God go I!”.[/quote]

dk

dk: I was asked to illustrate how intellectual elites become the handmaidens of powerful political factions, and provide evidence. At every historical turn in the 20th Century intellectuals elites sacrificed “the truth” for the table scraps offered up by powerful bullies. In the 21st Century intellectual elites have become so corrupt and cynical they perform like trained seals “as the guiding light”, on behalf of powerful political, governmental and philanthropic forces that live above the Law. The UN DoHR has become increasingly meaningless and subsequently the UN increasingly irrelevant on the world theatre, precisely because they cater to factions that Live above the Law. In hindsight the decline of the UN and civilization serves to accentuate the primacy of the First Commandment, “Thou shall not have strange gods before me.” Clearly the basis of Universal Human Rights succeeds by holding everyone accountable to the Law, as the First Commandment of Moses (OT), and the 1st of the 2 Greatest commandments (NT) clearly stipulate.

DMB: What you have here is a bit of a damp squib:a possible bit of bullying by Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton (hardly part of either an acadmeic or a social elite). As for the stuff about HIV, worldwide it is overwhelmingly a heterosexual disease, heterosexually transmitted, although there is also transmission by needles, by blood products and from mother to child. And I still don't see the relevance.
dk: The point was to illustrate how elite intellectuals become handmaidens for powerful factions to rationalize a personal agenda.
DMB: I note your link to the Contributors to The Oxford Companion to Philosophy. I suppose they do constitute some sort of academic elite, but are you accusing the whole boiling of some sort of evil conspiracy? You must be more paranoid than I thought. What has the falling birthrate in the overcrowded continent of Europe got to do with anything? As for the link between abortion and lower crime rates, I am not aware that anyone is advocating abortion for this reason. It is a speculation based on the fact that unwanted children are often neglected children who go on to become criminals.
dk: Europe doesn’t have enough people to maintain infrastructure, staff its military to protect borders, finance its social security system, run the industrial complex or sustain its oversized Welfare System. The birth ration is indicative of a civilization in a state of rapid decay. Elite European intellectuals have been so smitten with Malthus’ Population Principle they can’t read the handwriting on the wall.

DMB: Finally we come back to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (and, I would think, subsequent UN human rights instruments).
dk: Ok, What is the basis for the UN DoHR?

DMB: You say:
-----
dk: The UN interprets its Code and Charter from NGOs well practiced in the art of semantic gynmastics, and they determine what the articles of Human Rights mean.
-----
DMBI don't know where you get this idea from. NGOs do have a voice in the UN, but the main voice is that of governments, not NGOs. It is governments who agree what goes into UN documents and how they should be interpreted. NGOs have as much voice in the UN as they do in individual governments. Some NGOs act as pressure groups, but the best they can do is to influence public opinion so that it in turn brings pressure to bear on individual governments.
dk: Yeh right, here’s what the UN DoHR means according to the member nations,
DMB: I note your view on the future of the UN but am unconvinced. That, however, is neither here nor there. The OP of this thread asked about the Universal Declaration as a basis for morals. You feel it is in some way weakened because the UN has failed to back it up with action. If we compare this with the bible as providing an alternative code, what sort of action are you thinking of: burning of heretics? religious wars?
dk: In my opinion the UN DoHR has become a joke precisely because it courts the favor of opportunistic Totalitarian Regimes, Demagogues and Ideologues (TRDI) that place themselves above the Law, even to use terrorism, torture and slavery as a legitimate political weapon. Intellectual elites promulgate the UN DoHR as a multilateral international platform for world peace, prosperity and justice precisely because they are lapdogs for TRDI, cowed to rationalize mankind’s inhumanity to man as a logical necessity prescribed by scientific progress i.e. as the means to justifies the ends.

You still haven’t answered the question, “What is the basis of the DoHR”.

Ion

The Bible says that God "...knows all things.".

"...knows all things." also means that God knows beforehand that Israel was to break "...God's Covenants...".

So everything that happens, is "...what God intended..." because God "...knows all things." including all the conditions that make the things happen.

"This was not what God intended..." doesn't exist together with God "...knows all things.".

"...Leviticus and Deuteronomy really don’t apply to this discussion..." is wrong:
they fully apply to this discussion, since they are in the Bible and the discussion is 'UN Code versus the Bible'.
Again, dk, there is a need for proof -independent of religion- for the existence of God.

I can think of this one more proof of the God non-existence:
.) God "...knows all things.";
.) somewhere in the Bible (I can find out where) God tells people to determine that females are virgin if they bleed at their first intercourse; if they don't bleed they are to be stoned to death;
.) gynecologists, who are non-omniscient people like God allegedly is, say that this method of determining one's virginity is faulty;
.) so God who "...knows all things." doesn't know all things, and this God is a creation from supertitious ancestors.
Here you are pinpointing UN shortcomings in implementing things.

Bear in mind that:
.) UN is young, less than 60 years old;
.) UN is evolving in the right direction, in depth of knowledge and in implementation;
.) it was pointed out to you (by Ipetrich in this thread) that the Chinese culture has served the Chinese for longer than the Bible has served the Jews, and the Chinese don't believe in the Biblical God.