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Right. And secular governments enforce rules that don't fit with the moral rules set by God where you commit those immoralities. Like taxes.

loup-vaillant 14y ago
Actually… yes. It is again a question of size (God is quite greater than any one government), and of comprehensiveness (secular governments are quite lenient with religious, sexual, and reproductive practices). Just two minor details: First, thanks to having eaten the Forbidden Fruit, we no longer need to consult God to know what's immoral. We are now quite capable of making our own decisions. If my moral standard sufficiently diverges from God's, that just makes us enemies. Second, to the best of my knowledge, there is no God. At least, nothing resembling Yahweh.
- saraid216 14y ago
  If you'd like to debate theology, you're welcome to state a position and stick to it. You either consider yourself the final arbiter on morals, and thus whether or not taxation is moral, or you don't. If you'd like to introduce nuance into the dichotomy, you are welcome to. But it sounds to me like you are not a person who recognizes the validity of any argument that doesn't extend from force in one way or another, so I'm having trouble seeing how your concept of God works with your agreement with people who pretend to be God.
  - loup-vaillant 14y ago
    If possible, I'd avoid debating theology. It would take months for us to agree on the existence of God alone, and provided it does exist, you likely know far more about God's morality than I do. > Only if you consider yourself God. That one pushes us way back, but my initial response was a "proving the other wrong" knee-jerk reaction, and I failed to ask: what did you actually mean by that? More precisely, how one needs to consider oneself God to believe in the similarities between states and organized crime? > You either consider yourself the final arbiter on morals, and thus whether or not taxation is moral, or you don't. That I can answer. Strictly speaking, I do consider myself the final arbiter on morals. Meaning, what I want has priority over anything else. There's a couple of catches however. First, I do care about other people, and I do care about what they want and what they consider moral. If I were to impose my will on everyone, I'd leave considerable leeway for others to do as they please. Second, I don't really know what I want, and what I consider "moral". Third, even if I knew, I'm not sure how to achieve it. Take taxes for instance. They have a host of consequences, some of which are obviously desirable (like, money to build schools), some of which are obviously undesirable (like, kicking some people out of their houses). And when I compare the benefits and the costs, I'm not sure which outweigh the other. > But it sounds to me like you are not a person who recognizes the validity of any argument that doesn't extend from force in one way or another, so I'm having trouble seeing how your concept of God works with your agreement with people who pretend to be God. Sorry, I cannot make sense of this one. What does it mean for an argument to "extend from force"? What do you think my concept of God is? What is your model of people who pretend to be God?
    - saraid216 14y ago
      So, I've been using neologisms pretty freely. I'll try to correct that. In the context of this thread, "God" is a final moral arbiter, or FMA to make it shorter. An FMA is an entity that considers themself to be the last and only meaningful measure for morality. Your first caveat of "leaving considerable leeway" for others would not apply in practice; it is common for people who unwittingly consider themselves FMAs to claim this and yet nevertheless denounce behaviors as immoral even when they are not overtly harmful. This is what happens with taxes. If you'll notice, discussions on taxation as extortion always come back to the Weberian definition of a state. This isn't because libertarians were only able to understand force, but because this is the only argument through which they can conclude that taxation is immoral. And since this is the only useful argument, it has been reduced to a golden hammer fallacy: force rapidly becomes the only thing they really understand and the only way to engage with concepts. It is a Hobbesian worldview, i.e. "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short". The attraction of being an FMA is the "arbiter" part: an arbiter can back up his claim with force. God is commonly conceived as an FMA because it is the most distant concept of force: none can bring force against it, but it can bring force against you. This is why you see gun protests in America where people bring assault rifles as counter-protests. And the thing about being a final arbiter is that there can only be one. If there are many, then there is the possibility of disagreement and a further arbiter would be required. So either you are a final arbiter, or you are not. (Or you are part of a hive mind that thinks in unison.) Incidentally, I am not religious.

loup-vaillant 14y ago

Actually… yes. It is again a question of size (God is quite greater than any one government), and of comprehensiveness (secular governments are quite lenient with religious, sexual, and reproductive practices). Just two minor details: First, thanks to having eaten the Forbidden Fruit, we no longer need to consult God to know what's immoral. We are now quite capable of making our own decisions. If my moral standard sufficiently diverges from God's, that just makes us enemies. Second, to the best of my knowledge, there is no God. At least, nothing resembling Yahweh.

saraid216 14y ago
If you'd like to debate theology, you're welcome to state a position and stick to it. You either consider yourself the final arbiter on morals, and thus whether or not taxation is moral, or you don't. If you'd like to introduce nuance into the dichotomy, you are welcome to. But it sounds to me like you are not a person who recognizes the validity of any argument that doesn't extend from force in one way or another, so I'm having trouble seeing how your concept of God works with your agreement with people who pretend to be God.
- loup-vaillant 14y ago
  If possible, I'd avoid debating theology. It would take months for us to agree on the existence of God alone, and provided it does exist, you likely know far more about God's morality than I do. > Only if you consider yourself God. That one pushes us way back, but my initial response was a "proving the other wrong" knee-jerk reaction, and I failed to ask: what did you actually mean by that? More precisely, how one needs to consider oneself God to believe in the similarities between states and organized crime? > You either consider yourself the final arbiter on morals, and thus whether or not taxation is moral, or you don't. That I can answer. Strictly speaking, I do consider myself the final arbiter on morals. Meaning, what I want has priority over anything else. There's a couple of catches however. First, I do care about other people, and I do care about what they want and what they consider moral. If I were to impose my will on everyone, I'd leave considerable leeway for others to do as they please. Second, I don't really know what I want, and what I consider "moral". Third, even if I knew, I'm not sure how to achieve it. Take taxes for instance. They have a host of consequences, some of which are obviously desirable (like, money to build schools), some of which are obviously undesirable (like, kicking some people out of their houses). And when I compare the benefits and the costs, I'm not sure which outweigh the other. > But it sounds to me like you are not a person who recognizes the validity of any argument that doesn't extend from force in one way or another, so I'm having trouble seeing how your concept of God works with your agreement with people who pretend to be God. Sorry, I cannot make sense of this one. What does it mean for an argument to "extend from force"? What do you think my concept of God is? What is your model of people who pretend to be God?
  - saraid216 14y ago
    So, I've been using neologisms pretty freely. I'll try to correct that. In the context of this thread, "God" is a final moral arbiter, or FMA to make it shorter. An FMA is an entity that considers themself to be the last and only meaningful measure for morality. Your first caveat of "leaving considerable leeway" for others would not apply in practice; it is common for people who unwittingly consider themselves FMAs to claim this and yet nevertheless denounce behaviors as immoral even when they are not overtly harmful. This is what happens with taxes. If you'll notice, discussions on taxation as extortion always come back to the Weberian definition of a state. This isn't because libertarians were only able to understand force, but because this is the only argument through which they can conclude that taxation is immoral. And since this is the only useful argument, it has been reduced to a golden hammer fallacy: force rapidly becomes the only thing they really understand and the only way to engage with concepts. It is a Hobbesian worldview, i.e. "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short". The attraction of being an FMA is the "arbiter" part: an arbiter can back up his claim with force. God is commonly conceived as an FMA because it is the most distant concept of force: none can bring force against it, but it can bring force against you. This is why you see gun protests in America where people bring assault rifles as counter-protests. And the thing about being a final arbiter is that there can only be one. If there are many, then there is the possibility of disagreement and a further arbiter would be required. So either you are a final arbiter, or you are not. (Or you are part of a hive mind that thinks in unison.) Incidentally, I am not religious.