dk

dk: To my knowledge a workable theory to derive morality/ethics or inalienable rights from science doesn’t exist, but Aquinas did derive from the Bible a coherent theory of divine law, natural law, human law and moral law from the Bible.
Ion:
It does exist, albeit without "...inalienable rights..." but with "...morality/ethics..." based on science:
the UN Code of Human Rights.
The problem with Aquinas' theory is that is based on the Bible, a book of falsehoods to the trivial human knowledge.
dk: We live in the postmodern era where grand statements about culture, history, causation and society are a matter of perspective and interpretation influenced by race, sex, sexual orientation, class, geography, heredity, heritage and ethnicity. Sadly the many theories of social justice presented are to numerous to be anything but an incoherent impractical conundrum that reduce to the principles of stare decisis or the squeaky wheel gets the grease.
o ...
dk: I find it strange that atheists so often feel obliged to rationalize charitable acts.
Ion:
Nothing should be strange:
like (snip)since 'God' as described in the Bible cannot exist.
dk: huh?.
o
Originally posted by dk
In this vein the rational philosophies were forged. That’s why I scoff at the rationalist ideas of social justice theories of Marx, Hume, Bentham, and Malthus, it was on these ideas that Europe sold its soul for a guns, butter and empire. I actually like most of what Malthus wrote, but his hopelessly flawed population theory was what the rationalists locked into. My perspective is way off the beaten path recollected by secular historians.
Ion:
Marx, Hume, Bentham and Malthus have an unspecified input in the UN Code of Human Rights.
The idea of the UN Code of Human Rights came mainly after 1945, and was inspired by the burgeoning idea of the Declaration des Droits de l'Homme, from France at the end of the 18th. century:
create a standard code of ethics for all people, based on rationality and with the objective of justice.
dk: All the books I’ve read track human rights through the League of Nations, US Bill of Rights, Magna Carta and Justinian Code.
o
Ion:
For example, the concept that 'Everyone is innocent until proven guilty.' is a rationality started in the Decalaration des Droits de l'Homme that is adopted today in the law of democracies.
dk: The principle “innocent until prove guilty” came from Anglo-Saxon Law to dissuade Anglo-Saxon blue bloods from vigilante hangings. A murderer is guilty the moment after the dirty deed, even when an innocent man might be arrested, convicted and hung in his stead. Corporate abuse of the public and environment interests under the cover of “innocent until proven guilty” has been well documented in the 20th Century.
o
Ion:
After the idea of a standard of justice was revived in 1945, the UN Code of Human Rights strives to promote social justice based on the scientific knowledge up until now.
To invoke a 'God' described in the Bible as the basis for human laws, is to invoke a being that is inconsistent within the text of the Bible, is antagonist with the reality observed outside of the Bible, and is without empirical support.
Therefore, to invoke a 'God' described in the Bible, is false.
dk: Your prescient claims to social justice under the tutelage of science are a joke. The chasm between rich and poor has widened dramatically at the expense of the middle class and 3rd Word over the last 50 years. Psychology, political science, economics, and sociology on a macro and micro scale continue to abuse the public trust by overstating the significance, certainty, quality, cost and utility of their research. The certainty once guaranteed by the social sciences in practice has virtually been reduced to folk-some musings of powerful bureaucrats. If the social sciences have become the bases of human rights then human dignity has been dealt a low blow.

Ion

From 1st John 3:20:
"...God is greater than our heart, and knows all things.".

From Deuteronomy 22:13-21:
if a woman got married and her husband accused her of not being a virgin, her father had to prove that she was;
to do so, the father had to show a rag with blood from the vagina of the daughter, to the elders. ("And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city...");
if there was no blood, she was not proven to be a virgin, so she was to be stoned to death.

Gynecologists say today that this is no proof of virginity.

Therefore, the alleged all-knowing 'God' doesn't know common knowledge of today, and there is contradiction between the claim from the Bible and the reality.

There are plenty of such absurdities in the Bible.

With a faulty 'God' described in the Bible, there cannot be truth in the Bible.

dk

Seems to me God gave to primative people Laws they could understand. Obviously for any law to be just it must be
1) promulgated
2) coherent (understandable)
3) consistent

Jews understood the Law, and brought the code up to date as civilization changed. The Law hasn't changed, and even in today's modern world people cover and protect themselves, neighbors, spouses and progeny by respecting the Marital Act. You haven't provided even one historical source that the Jewish elders stoned a bride. On the other hand the pendemic of incurable, life altering and deadly STDs that mark, sterilize and kill teenagers under the guise of safe sex destroys the families of thousands and thousands of teenagers every year. Sounds to me like God got it right.

Ion

Seems to me and you, that 'God' cannot exist given the Biblical contradictions that I gave you.

Invoking laws by a non existent 'God', that's preaching a dogma.

dk

All Jews, Christians or Moslems take some elements of the Bible as dogma. To an agnostic, athiest, monist, diest or polytheist the Bible is an erroneous basis for dogma, but not necessarily false. We all should be able to agree that morality governs behavior within the context of a complex array of causal relationships...
- - - - informal, - - - - - formal,
personal (informal), public(formal),
religious(personal), cultural(public),
ethnical(religious), social(cultural)
under a unified moral reality that enables people to understand and relate to one another and the problems they face.

Ion

It is dumb to invoke the laws of a Biblical 'God' that doesn't exist.

dk

The existence of God does't depend on personal assent, discretion or knowledge because God is the unmoved mover. You and I, whatever we want to believe or think, are contingent creatures. If we take science at its word and follow the bread crumbs back to the beginning, then time, mass and length cease to exist; therefore material science can't possibly exist. All that's left is faith.

Ion

First of all, 'God' has to exist.

Since it doesn't, you are preaching.

dk

I should have said, if we follow the breadcrumbs of evolution back to the beginning, then whatever existed must be taken on faith.

Ion

On the contrary:

whatever existed must not be taken on any faith, but must be investigated with better coherence than what the the Bible shows;
in the vein of the coherent reasoning first advocated many centuries ago by Rene Descartes in 'Le Discours de la Methode'.

Thus, the pompous contradictory claims and 'laws' from the Bible won't happen anymore in humanity.

The truth about whatever existed, can be found in this scientific manner, little by little.