dk

I think Ralph Ginsburg was convicted on an obscenity charge.

Morality regulates conduct so the lions share of the money a government spends on education, courts (family, civil, criminal, juvenile), peace keeping, family services, civil suites, prisons, security and police is regulates conduct. One might say only moral people are free from the law. Or one might say my liberty ends where the rights of other begin. One need only look at the teenage: pregnancy rates, unwed mothers, absentee fathers, teenage violence, teenage drug use, teen sex crimes, domestic violence, govt., corp., instiutional corruption to understand why morality is a big deal to a society.

99Percent

I was thinking that in relation to objective morality.

For objective morality to exist there must be a reason of being which is the fundamental nature of being, ie the ontological foundation.

For example, what is the reason for living? If there is no reason for living then nothing is good or bad in relation to living, for living would have no significance.

RogerLeeCooke

I know all that. My point was, he *wouldn't* be convicted today, but all those parents, who got fame and money from endangering their children, *would* be. Is that now clear?

dk

My point is that all societies spend substantial resources regulating behavior. Morality regulates behavior with reason by teaching ‘people’ about the value and potential of human life. A primary concern of morality is children, and to the extent youth are placed in harms way by a culture or society the culture is immoral.

In 2002 most public schools in the US are policed by metal detectors, armed guards, drug sniffing dogs and security cameras. In 1960 most public schools were policed by volunteer student hall monitors. The suicide rate amongst teens has gone up 1000% from 1960. 1/16 babies born in the US are to teenage girls, up from 1/50. STDs disproportionately afflict teenagers presenting grave life altering health and reproductive risks. Our culture has become so immoral its questionable whether the US can raise enough healthy children to fund social security past 2030. Morality is a big deal because a nation or society grows and prospers by solving problems that rise to meet each successive generation. Immoral people create problems, not solutions. Savage societies solve problems by killing people.

RogerLeeCooke

To quote John Cleese in Fawlty Towers, "Let's get you on Mastermind, specialty: the bleeding obvious." I don't know why you go on about these things as if somebody was arguing with you about them. But I won't interrupt your train of thought further by trying to get you back on track.

[ August 21, 2002: Message edited by: RogerLeeCooke ]</p>

dk

Sorry, but when human law acts against moral law it rains on everybody’s parade, so everybody suffers. Likewise in a moral society laws are virtually unnecessary. In 1950 very few people wanted illegal drugs, so the drug war we fight today was inconceivable. When people keep their commitments, obey parents, teachers etc.. everyone benefits.

The ontological foundation for scientific morality is therefore human suffering and sacrifice. Immoral people cause themselves and their neighbors to suffer. In response Moral people sacrifice to become their neighbor's keeper. But when immoral people become the keepers of the law, then the law becomes a weapon that turns neighbor against neighbor.

NFLP

I am philosophically incompetent. This thread makes Bertrand Russel's quip more clear to me:

"All ontological argument is a case of bad grammar."

dk

Freak shows have always been entertaining, and television and movies are by and large a freak show that succeeds by mainstreaming depraved values through mass media. This is nothing new. In Roman Empire citizens tolerated human slaughter for the sake of entertainment. Public executions by hanging, guillotine or fire have always drawn large crowds because they shocked people. Post modernist society has simply raised the bar on deviant behavior, for better entertainment. Artistic expression has been given license to explore taboos, and acquires fame by mainstreaming taboos. What is unique about the post-modernist world is the high cultural status given to entertainers that become living freaks.

Infinity Lover

Everything exists, because it's opposite, non-existence, doesn't.

Now how are you going to base any form of moral protocol on that???

Erm... actually I'm having a solid wack at it, by using the ancient questions that spawned religion, and profiding them with answers that are based on the principle that existence is absolutely infinite. How I'm exactly doing that would require quite an elaborate explaination, but a formulation of the questions and answers are posted on the philosophyboard ("the word of infinity") One extraordinary aspect is how there turns out to be a system to the q&a. They work in couples, (What happens to us when we die? and Is there a certain part of us that lives on? being limitation and potential. Where did it all come from? and What does the future offer? being source and destination, etc.) and there is a specific logical order to place them in...

guess time will tell how big a fool I am for doing this

99Percent

Next step then is the question of how do you acquire the knowledge of everything's existence?