Freethought & Rationalism Archive

MrKrinkles · 12-13-2002, 08:46 PM

Steve,

Where did you get the idea that Turkel does not accept the doctrine of eternal torture? He has an article defending and supporting the idea here:

<a href="http://www.tektonics.org/JPH_BOC.html" target="_blank">http://www.tektonics.org/JPH_BOC.html</a>

Quote:

The "finite sins" argument.

In our reply to D terp wiz, it was pointed out (following Anselm) that eternal punishment is justifiable on the grounds that any sin against an infinitely holy God amounts to requiring an infinite price. In reply critics argue that finite sins should not require an infinite price, but in terms of actually explaining why, all that is offered is incredulity. Pinnock [Cro.4VH, 39], for example, in between ad hominems and cheap psychological sessions, gushes forth: "Is it not plain that sins committed in time and space cannot deserve limitless divine retribution?" No, it isn't clear at all, and Pinnock offers no reason to think so. In response to the argument above re an infinite price, he only argues that while this argument "worked" in the Middle Ages, it "will not work as an argument today" (Is truth told by the calendar? Is it dependent upon our reception of it?) because:

We do not accept inequality in judgments on the basis of the honor of the victim, as if stealing from a doctor is worse than stealing from a beggar.

We see now, at least, where Robert Price derives his analogical impairments from. To compare any human, doctor, beggar, or plumber, with the infinite holiness of God is ludicrous to say the least...

Like other fundamentalist religious fanatics, Turkel believes that any "sin" against a infinite being represents an infinite "sin" which can only be answered with infinite torture. Turkel believes that skepticism about the existence of God is an infinite sin against God, a sin which demands eternal, screaming torture. Put another way, Turkel accepts and supports the idea of eternally torturing people for their opinions.

Isn't fundamentalist Christianity a beautiful thing?

Brooks

[ December 14, 2002: Message edited by: MrKrinkles ]

MrKrinkles · 12-13-2002, 09:57 PM

Turkel is now responding to the comments posted here in his <a href="http://www.tektonics.org/spaninq.html#peanut" target="_blank">Inquisition article</a>. Here is one comment I found particularly interesting:

Quote:

(from this thread)Why you lucky so-and-so, we are only going to torture you for half a day, if this was a secular tribunal, we would have been busy with you for a full day. And that is not all... Be glad that we are too dumb to brainwash you…so we’ll stick to burning your fingers and toes off.

(Turekl)Tsk tsk, they'll never get past "argument by outrage" will they? Passes right by the issue of whether it's ever justified and just assumes it never is. Okay, chaps, I have a dilemma for you, and it's a real one. Ready? We had dispute lately over whether it would be moral to torture Afghan prisoners in Cuba to get info on whether there were deadly terrorist attacks coming. So I'll put it this way. We have a prisoner named Ahmed who says he knows of an impending attack that will kill tens of thousands of people. But he refuses to spill the details. Do we use the rack, or not? Give me an answer. Then I'll tell you what happened.

The victims of the Inquisitors were not terrorists with plans to kill tens of thousands of people, but were simply people who were unlucky enough to be accused of heresy or witchcraft. Or they were Jews who would not convert. Or they had a lot of money that the inquistors wanted. Comparing the Inquisition's victims to terrorists is bogus.

What is ironic about this analogy is that the inquisitors based their actions on their religion, and the fanatical Muslim terrorists base their actions on their religion as well. These Muslim fanatics think that slaughtering infidels brings joy to Allah, just as the Inquistors believed that torturing and killing infidels brought joy to Jehovah. I wonder if Turkel would be willing to write an essay that "socially" justifies the atrocities of Muslim fanatics now that he has written an essay that "socially" justifies the atrocities of Christian fanatics?

Turkel writes:

Quote:

So the questions return to, "Is it justified?" and the answer lies in, "Is there a greater good to be accomplished?" (i.e., saving tens of thousands from death) and at the same time, "Is the greater good for real?"

So apparently Turkel believes that the Inquisitions were for the greater good. Am I right, Turkel?

Hey Turkel, if you lived in medieval times, would you torture women and children in order to get them to "confess" that they were witches? And would you burn them alive after torturing them into confessing? Yes or no? After all, you apparently believe that the Inquisitions were all for the greater good of society, right? What do you say there, Sport?

Brooks

[ December 13, 2002: Message edited by: MrKrinkles ]

Steven Carr · 12-14-2002, 02:13 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by MrKrinkles:
Steve,

Where did you get the idea that Turkel does not accept the doctrine of eternal torture? He has an article defending and supporting the idea here:

<a href="http://www.tektonics.org/JPH_BOC.html" target="_blank">http://www.tektonics.org/JPH_BOC.html</a>

My apologies to Robert (No Link) Turkel, who I appear to have misrepresented. (Anybody want to bet that my confession of misrepresenting him is the only thing he will quote on his web site)

I was confused by <a href="http://www.tektonics.org/glennall01.html" target="_blank">http://www.tektonics.org/glennall01.html</a>
where he denies that people in Hell get the same punishment. If you multiply anything by infinity you get infinity, so Robert (A majority of the world is Chinese) Turkel, is once again being inconsistent.

His article still undercuts his other article saying that we should torture people to save them from God letting them be tortured. If God is going to arrange that people are punished only a little bit , why pull their teeth out to get them to repent?

Steven Carr · 12-14-2002, 02:24 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by MrKrinkles:

Hey Turkel, if you lived in medieval times, would you torture women and children in order to get them to "confess" that they were witches? And would you burn them alive after torturing them into confessing? Yes or no? After all, you apparently believe that the Inquisitions were all for the greater good of society, right? What do you say there, Sport?

The Economist had an interesting article about children in the Congo who have been accused of being witches. I imagine Robert (No Link) Turkel will say it is all for the good of society.

Curiously, Robert (No Link) Turkel devotes a lot of energy to not providing links

In
<a href="http://www.tektonics.org/trophyroom.html" target="_blank">http://www.tektonics.org/trophyroom.html</a>
he explains why he edits out links to sceptical articles

'Introduction -- this will pretty much speak for itself, but I will add a caveat. Many of the links below are NOT to the page where the works are located. Rather, they are links to the Google search engine, with instructions added so that Google will perform a search for you using selected unusual terms and phrases from the articles of the critics. The purpose of this? To settle some of these whines about not having links being a way of "hiding" things. What crockery! We'll show them complainers just how simple and easy it is to find things. Unless they have a real problem, of course, finding things like their own backsides.'

So Robert (No Link) Turkel thinks his gullible readers can find articles by entering words which exist in the articles that they have not seen!

How exactly do people do that?

For example, he expects his gullible readers to find links to an article by entering 'relevant psychological diagnosis identification divinity' into Google. What a weird way for Robert (No Link) Turkel to salve his conscience from charges that he is too chicken to provide links!

Steven Carr · 12-15-2002, 10:55 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Steven Carr:


Curiously, Robert (No Link) Turkel devotes a lot of energy to not providing links

Robert (No Link) Turkel does not only refuse to give links to sceptical critics

In
<a href="http://www.tektonics.org/funnyfarm.html" target="_blank">http://www.tektonics.org/funnyfarm.html</a>
he refuses to link or other critics , such as

<a href="http://farms.byu.edu/display.php?a=review/14_2_2002_15.html" target="_blank">http://farms.byu.edu/display.php?a=review/14_2_2002_15.html</a>

The authour of the report does catch Turkel's revisionist style, where words mean whatever Turkel wants them to mean, in true Humpty-Dumpty style 'The hermeneutic approach appears to shift as the author moves from subject to subject; the only overriding principle appears to be a search for whatever readings provide the most useful argument against Latter-day Saint beliefs and truth claims.'

Curiously, Turkel complains that the reviewer has misquoted him. Those of us used to seeing Robert Turkel regularly fabricate quotes will not be surprised at this hypocrisy.

McGregor wrote 'Holding" takes up the theme introduced by Mosser and Owen's essay on the need for better quality evangelical apologetics and promises to deliver the goods in the form of "top-notch Biblical scholarship"'

Turkel slams McGregor for 'misquoting' Turkel, for leaving 'bringing' out of 'bringing top-notch'.

Gosh, the hypocrisy of a Turkel, who cannot bear to see even one of his words left out, while he himself *butchers* articles he is responding to.

Steven Carr · 12-15-2002, 11:24 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by MrKrinkles:
Turkel is now responding to the comments posted here in his <a href="http://www.tektonics.org/spaninq.html#peanut" target="_blank">Inquisition article</a>. Here is one comment I found particularly interesting:

So apparently Turkel believes that the Inquisitions were for the greater good. Am I right, Turkel?

Brooks is right. Turkel wrote 'Here's where the Skeppies have some analogy problems they'll refuse to admit: The justification for torture in a hierarchy of morals lies only in a truly greater good -- as my Ahmed example above. A false "greater good" -- as all but a few would agree with Hitler's case -- offers no justifcation.'

So Turkel thinks the supremacy of the Catholic Church is a greater good which justifies the torture of innocent by Catholics.

MrKrinkles · 12-16-2002, 01:28 AM

Steve,

Yes, that seems to be what he is saying.

Once a person believes that his religion represents moral goodness in its very highest form, he can then justify any type of moral atrocity done to protect that religion, claiming it is all for the "greater good."

Brooks

[ December 16, 2002: Message edited by: MrKrinkles ]

Steven Carr · 12-16-2002, 01:45 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by MrKrinkles:
Steve,

That seems to be what he is saying. Once a person believes that his religion represents moral goodness in its very highest form, he can then justify any type of moral atrocity done to protect that religion, claiming it is "all for the greater good."

Brooks

Turkel gives a link
<a href="http://www.christian-thinktank.com/rbutcher1.html" target="_blank">http://www.christian-thinktank.com/rbutcher1.html</a>

which tries to justify killing children because they did not 'repent' of what their ancestors did 400 years earlier.

Apparently, Miller and Turkel believe that these people had to be entirely exterminated because they have read a book saying that they were evil, although, as Miller states 'Although we have no extrabiblical records of these people at all, this 'cultural profile' of marauding bands and slave-traders is common in the ANE.'

So Miller has no extrabiblical records of these people at all, but has read a book saying that they should be killed, and so agrees that they deserved to be slaughtered.

In Germany, they have banned 'Mein Kampf' because they think people might read a book and then say it is justified to kill an entire group of people.

Why is the Bible not also banned?

[ December 16, 2002: Message edited by: Steven Carr ]

lpetrich · 12-16-2002, 01:50 AM

Turkel's position reminds me of an old Communist apologetic, that the end justifies the means, that it is necessary to break eggs in order to make an omelet.

Steven Carr · 12-16-2002, 02:29 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by MrKrinkles:
I thought that people might be interested in seeing a Christian apologist rewrite history in regards to the Inquisitions. He minimalizes it horrors and seems to try and justify it as an effort, however misguided, of maintaining social order. He also tries to distance the Catholic Church from responsibility for it.

<a href="http://www.tektonics.org/spaninq.html" target="_blank">http://www.tektonics.org/spaninq.html</a>

Turkel quotes Henry Kamen a lot.

Kamen writes '... in Granada, the brutal enslavement of the entire population of Malaga after its capture in 1487 gave hint of a new savagery among the Christians'.

I wonder if Turkel reports this 'brutal enslavement' and 'savagery' in his article....

12-16-2002, 01:28 AM	#17
MrKrinkles Junior Member Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: NW USA Posts: 93	Steve, Yes, that seems to be what he is saying. Once a person believes that his religion represents moral goodness in its very highest form, he can then justify any type of moral atrocity done to protect that religion, claiming it is all for the "greater good." Brooks [ December 16, 2002: Message edited by: MrKrinkles ]</p>

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12-16-2002, 01:50 AM	#19
lpetrich Contributor Join Date: Jul 2000 Location: Lebanon, OR, USA Posts: 16,829	Turkel's position reminds me of an old Communist apologetic, that the end justifies the means, that it is necessary to break eggs in order to make an omelet.

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