IntenseDebate - ZacAlstin

10 years ago @ Conjugality - Marriage, reason and r... · 0 replies · +2 points

Not 'simply', no. But pretty much every religion I can think of carries a worldly/spiritual dichotomy that critiques human nature or irreligious society, or both.

"What about a religious and moral system that *won't* change even if it's found to be wanting, in error, or no longer relevant? Do you see any point in that?"
Obviously it depends on who finds it wanting, and in what sense. The reasons I find utilitarianism wanting may not be the same as another's reasons for finding virtue ethics wanting.

Relevance is....somewhat relative as a measure. Relevant to what? And how do you know the true relevance of a thing? Relevance implies a predetermined set of personal values, eg. Islam is not relevant to my daily life; but the point of Islam is (in part) to instruct people on what is truly relevant/important in life.

"An organisation or movement also might as well cease to exist if the only purpose it serves is to exist, I reckon." Probably true.

10 years ago @ Conjugality - Marriage, reason and r... · 0 replies · +5 points

Indeed, we'll have to wait and see. I guess the trick is to recognise the bubble we're inside. We may never be able to see the world through an entirely objective lens, but we can at least strive to be aware of the constraints imposed by our beliefs, desires, and indeed prejudices. It's always a good test to try to see 'how it could be otherwise' to what we believe is true.

10 years ago @ Conjugality - Marriage, reason and r... · 5 replies · +3 points

That's really two different questions - whether it should change versus whether change is likely/probable.

The 'good' of the theology and philosophy in light of a culture that ignores it is a good question. On the one hand, some people believe that the religious and moral teaching should reflect the society and culture. On the other hand, others believe the whole point of the religious and moral teaching is to stand apart from the changes in society and culture. Personally, I don't see a point in a religious and moral system that changes itself to fit secular society. Even if one disagrees with the church's philosophy, it would be disappointing to say the least to find that it might surrender the integrity of its approach. An organisation or movement might as well cease to exist once it surrenders its guiding principles and philosophy.

10 years ago @ Conjugality - Marriage, reason and r... · 0 replies · +4 points

But as with all such things, time will tell who is right. Critics of Pope Benedict could not fathom how "God's Rottweiler" could magically transform into such a gentle and loving Pope. The answer is that he didn't transform - he was simply doing his job to the best of his ability in each scenario. Then isn't it a fault of the critics that they could not see past the things they hated about Cardinal Ratzinger as head of the CDF?

10 years ago @ Conjugality - Marriage, reason and r... · 9 replies · +3 points

At least we can agree that the media is misleading.

However, I'm not basing my view on media reports, I'm basing it on my understanding of Catholic theology and moral philosophy, which underlie Catholic doctrine on the issues you mention. It's easy to speculate about possible changes in church teaching; such speculations carry more weight when their author can demonstrate a sound understanding of why the church holds the positions it does.

However, many people believe that the church's positions are 'really' based on prejudice, vested interests, ideology, corruption, misogyny, sheer bloody-mindedness etc etc.
While there's probably a bit of all of that in the church, in my experience there's also a very serious and integrated philosophy that is closely interwoven with everything the church believes.

So when people start to think along the lines of "if only we had a progressive pope who could make real changes and bring the church into line with the modern world" or similar, I begin to suspect they've underestimated the significance of the philosophy.

10 years ago @ Conjugality - Marriage, reason and r... · 15 replies · +7 points

Where do you get your info tba?
Media reporting on the Catholic church is generally woeful, almost always misleading.

The kinds of changes you seem to looking forward to are so improbable, they would constitue a break not only with the fully coherent and elaborated philosophy and doctrine of the church, but also a break with the means by which doctrine has typically been settled.

For the church to change its moral teaching on these matters is about as likely as (and forgive me if this analogy is flawed, I'm doing my best to find an appropriately incredible one) the US Supreme Court declaring Prince George to be the President-elect on account of how cute he is. It's true that Prince George is a cute baby, and I understand the Supreme Court has previously had a hand in deciding who the US President will be, and as a philosopher I can't say it's impossible, but it is so ridiculous that I can only assume you have some seriously good intel that the rest of us aren't privy to, or you've been misled by a media that unwittingly treats the church as its very own rorshach test.

10 years ago @ MercatorNet - MercatorNet: A deal wi... · 0 replies · +1 points

I don't think either side wants to see historic atrocities in East Asia submitted to war crimes scrutiny.

10 years ago @ MercatorNet - MercatorNet: Is it OK ... · 1 reply · +5 points

Agreed. It's not a very good term. But in the context of a debate on racial discrimination law, it should be relatively easy to understand what 'bigotry' signifies. And even if there is not agreement on the details, we can all agree in principle that bigotry should not be encouraged....and then we can argue about where the boundaries of bigotry lie.

10 years ago @ MercatorNet - MercatorNet: Is it OK ... · 0 replies · +2 points

I understand his point Fleur, it's the rhetoric that is a problem, especially in the context of the Racial Discrimination Act which the government wishes to amend. In the context of racism, I think 'bigot' has retained its meaning fairly consistently. It may be true that the word 'bigot' is now used more broadly, but in this instance Brandis was the one using the broader sense of the word to minimise the kind of bigotry associated with racism.
If nothing else, his off-the-cuff comment makes it extremely difficult for people sympathetic to the freedom of speech principle to defend the government.

10 years ago @ MercatorNet - MercatorNet: Is it OK ... · 0 replies · +2 points

Thank you Susan, I'd be curious to know more about Brandis' background in this regard as well.
Your experience with anti-Semitism today is very disappointing. Hopefully it will become more and more rare in future generations.

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