1/8 Christopher Hitchens vs Robert Wright on Religion

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Category:

Education

Tags:

• morality
• utilitarianism
• golden
• rule
• evolution
• facism
• god
• judaism
• jesus
• christianity
• Sam
• Harris
• new
• atheist

[huwrj]

And, to add something - Hitchens says he can't explain altruism. But we find that altruism occurs naturally. The most obvious example being the humble bumblebee that stings the enemy, sacrificing itself so to kill the enemy of its species, so that its genes can survive into the future and keep evolving. So, religion is not required for altruism to exist in animals.

[huwrj]

LOL. Wright is finding it very hard to counter any of Hitchens' points. Hitchens is a legend.

[senortonyful]

Obviously all these cases aren't with exceptions. In which case I might also want to add that with murder you are morally guilty. Accidents are accidents, and legal responsibility may result. Wars and self-defense are justifiable "killings" (presuming the killings are legal ie. against active enemy combatants). The distinction is also made in the O.T. The original Hebrew version of Exodus makes the distinction in Commandment 6 to not murder. The Hebrew word used means an "unlawful" killing.

[senortonyful]

Granted it is a difficult concept to define, but I would say that the intent, either to kill or maim/injure, is required. In the U.S legal system the term "murder" isn't used in cases of accidental deaths that are directly attributable to actions by the "murderer". We use terms like "manslaughter". The person may be legally responsible, but not morally responsible. The same (and a contradiction to my "intent argument") is true of soldiers. They are not legally or morally responsible for murder.

[senortonyful]

@LFWOL Car accidents, accidental physician poisoning, ski slope avalanches aren't examples of murder. Murder, though not defined by, requires intent. The only time murder wouldn't have intent is if the intent were only to main/injure and death resulted. A true accident, regardless of how negligent, is not concerned murder.

[regelemihai]

@LFWOL

There are absolutes as far as morality goes. It's true that every moral action is done in a vaccum, and often times the context in which it's done gives it meaning, but I wouldn't say that murder can be a fluid concept. It's bad.

[regelemihai]

@LFWOL

Right and wrong are not religious precepts. They are things that any rational human being holds to.

[MrPootisman]

are they just pretending to be streaming this or are they just standing on the opposite sides of the bookshelf

[TheWorldFarOff]

HUMANS : our intestinal tracts are too long, which allows for prolonged putrefaction of meat and a prolonged period to sit for the poisonous nitrogenous acids (urea & uric) that this rotting, slow-moving mass carries (kidney disease, atherosclerosis/arterioscleros­is, gout & arthritis plague modern Westerners who consume 3 servings of meat daily).

[Moh5Itachi1]

@TheWorldFarOff its religious nutbags that did that and there now there beign disposed of. Iraq just has there first elected president but i guess your not happy about that.