John E.D.P. Malin

Hedonologist:

I have never owned an animal!

I consider them too demanding to care for.

Forgive me that I have not experienced 'bestiality' or sodomy. Perchance, I have a deep fear of pollution via feces contamination.

I presume your moral nature is free from these experimental modes of human sexuality!


Lord Malin


P.S. Your Greek cover-name does imply "one who studies pleasure"; this need not imply sexual perversion.

Monkeybot

Lord Malin,

Your verbose screeds would do well to truncate the prodigious quantities of thesaurus-gleaned verbal units. Indeed, it would be a most regrettable predicament were you to display the countenance of a pompous ne'er-do-well.

I trust my submonition shall not go unperpended.

Sincerely,

The Simian Android

John E.D.P. Malin

Single Dad:

I do not single you out, but you invoked logic in your rebuttal to me.

An exceptionally powerful mind is always gifted in logic---especially its brutal use in symbolic logic (I am a software developer by trade)!

Don't contrain your logical studies to the sterility of Aristotelian syllogisms. I would claim that if 5.9 billion humans held sodomy to be immoral, and 100 million held it to be moral, I would judge it 'universal' that sodomy is immoral!

Universal predicators are absurd with running computers of teraherzt calculating one trillion operations per second now!

Study cellular automata theory!


Lord Malin

John E.D.P. Malin

Monkeybot:

Spend a lifetime learning ancient languages! It does aid your correct use of language.

Words must be used in context as well as content for semantic enlightenment!

You use language to obfuscate the mind or retard intellectual insight! I use it to cast insight or light as opposed to heat or mindless verbosity!

Lord Malin


P.S. Learn from me!

SingleDad

John E.D.P. Malin

Insults are usually not held to be innocuous.

Nor do you apparently invoke reason, logic, common opinion, or any other source than your own personal authority. It is idiosyncratic to hold that failure to acknowledge your personal authority is evidence of obduracy.

Use of such a pejorative word as "sodomite" is inappropriate for a reasoned, objective discussion. Also, as the use of this term derives entirely from the JC bible, it tends to reveal a bias.

Apparently your magnificent brain does not appear to have a good grasp on logical terminology, such as the fallacy of <a href="http://www.infidels.org/news/atheism/logic.html#begging" target="_blank">Begging the Question</a>; the noted forms of sexuality were offered as items which people consider more depraved than bestiality.

Again, apparently your impressive brain has a problem with english grammar; In American English, collective nouns such as "all" take a plural verb. I normally don't correct grammar, but when someone is so boastful about his intelligence, I assume that even the most trivial correction is welcome for the purpose of education.

And Pedophilia and rape are commonly held to be morally evil because they violate consent. It is not the sexual content of the activities but the lack of consensuality that leads to the conclusion.

All of these issues have to do with consent. If a person consents to an activity, unless it is physically or economically harmful or we have reason to believe (such as mental defect) that they cannot categorically offer consent, we generally presume that the activity is not considered by the actor to be detrimental.

Few if any of us will find happiness by taking at face value your assertions of personal authority.

Yes, we all form our moral opinions based on the suspicions of a stranger on a message board.

Hey Einstein, conditions change. Our society is not under extreme stress. And again, your "suspicions" do not constitute evidence of anything.

However, you are being judgemental. It is the mark of an intelligent person that he says what he means and means what he says. If you do not mean to be judgemental, then don't talk about activities being morally wrong.

I am myself judgemental when I choose to be. If I assert a belief that an activity is morally wrong, then that is a judgement.

Then why call it morally wrong? That is evidence (as is your next statement) that you do give a damn.

Explicit contradictions should be embedded more artfully than in immediately adjacent sentences so as to generate more challenge for the reader.

And I'm sure we would all be willing to take up a collection to provide you with a one-way ticket to Iran, where I'm sure the moral climate would be more to your intolerant sensibilities.

Please restrict yourself to modern English.

[ December 14, 2001: Message edited by: SingleDad ]</p>

SingleDad

John E.D.P. Malin

Apparently to your consternation.

As am I. However, the trade apparently doesn't help everyone in this manner.

This point has nothing to do with "sterile Aristotelian syllogisms." Understanding and using the plain meaning of a word is necessary to precise argumentation. As has been noted, universal means adhered to by all members of a group. Other words, such as preponderance, have the more precise meaning that you are looking for.

Secondly, your argument is fallacious regardless. Even a universal opinion, much less a preponderance of opinion, does not imply the objective truth of the object of that opinion.

At best, you can say that if 90% of a group holds a particular opinion, the preponderance of the group holds that opinion.

For a soi disant computer programmer, you appear to have severe difficulties with both precise speech and logical argumentation.

This statement is a fallacy of non sequitur. There appears to be no relationship with the power of computers and the sensibility of universal predicates.

Indeed you are again contradicting yourself in successive sentences: If universal predicates are absurd in general, then your universal predicate is absurd.

I have. It's very interesting. However the connection to this discussion seems entirely opaque.

Uh huh... Riiiiiight.

[ December 14, 2001: Message edited by: SingleDad ]</p>

Mad Kally

lol

Monkeybot

Oh, I`ve learned plenty. I`ve learned not to write in needlessly dense, pretentious language.

I`m sure your elementary school teachers were impressed when you mastered the use of the thesaurus. We are not.

John E.D.P. Malin

Single Dad:

Heed more the spirit than the letter of my insight!

One can get bogged down with untidy details.

A sexual act is moral if consent is involved?

Nonsense! Old whores can prey on the young to induce consent.

What sort and degree is involved here?

Since you restrict your reading to modern English, read the translation of Psychopathia sexualis, Catechism of the Catholic Church, Indiana Kinsey Sex Institute studies and Greek Homosexuality (by the classical scholar Dover). These books are at the top of my head at 2:14 AM. There are many more.

I shall pass over your impertinence in regard to my command of logic. I have nothing to prove! You do need to beef up on your distinction between judgment and opinion! 'Moral' is a Latin term which means the "custom (of the tribe)." Perchance, you give it some more vulgar meaning.

If 1% approves sodomy, and 99% abhors it, it is universally despised by common humanity. Opinion does not play here! Judgment alone.

Bestiality is universally despised by common humanity! It violates both morals and ethics [philosophical morals]!

Did you wish to dignify sodomy? Should we give it a fancy name, so a vile moral crime is less heinous to the threatened criminal practicing the crime? Does this make us more rational, more philosophical?

What sexual acts enhance the dignity of man and his sexual relationships? I suspect this admits of many answers.

If you have a particular fetish you wish me to address, spit it out.


Lord Malin

John E.D.P. Malin

Monkeybot:

Christ sake's! I am a classical scholar!

Do you think I require a stupid theasaurus to have mastered the 600,000 words of the English language?

I shall improve on your ignorant theasaurus prose above:

"I trust my admonition dare not be perpended!"

You must take Latin prose composition. It will teach you how to write literately in English. Did you wish to write like a Yahoo? Or a Negro Rapper?


Lord Malin


P.S. When the zeal of argumentum ad hominem wanes in your brain, do write me a critical question to answer for you. On international chat rooms you encounter usually inferior minds. Take advantage of your opportunity with me!