United Against Racism

In light of the recent murder of George Floyd, old conservative and liberal fallacies have been given new opportunities to infect the minds of Americans.  While conservatives tend to trivialize the systematic nature of racism against blacks imposed by certain police officers, liberals tend to react to such cases of racism in a way that shows a disregard for non-blacks.  Regarding the latter, some may claim that whites need to "shut up" and listen to blacks, when such a claim is both racist and unpragmatic.  Unity against racism is a moral and societal necessity, without which a culture will be less effective in combating racism wherever it appears.

Rationality and moral character alone decide if someone deserves to speak about any political issue, and the same is true about an issue of any other kind.  The color of someone's skin does not make them qualified or unqualified to contemplate or speak about a given matter.  Racism, like sexism, is an issue of human rights, and it thus concerns all people--especially since practically every ethnic group, including whites, is the target of some sort of racism even in the modern world.  It is therefore hypocritical and asinine to pretend like fighting racial injustices against blacks is a matter that whites must stay out of.

Ironically, there are those who would demand the silence of white people during times like the present while also condemning whites for remaining silent when blacks are victimized on racist grounds.  Many who oppose racism against blacks do not stoop to such stupidity, of course, and someone who truly affirms racial equality will not segregate blacks and whites in the name of racial equality.  What is needed, now and always, is for rational people of all ethnicities to unite in their efforts against racism.  Anything less is an incomplete response at best.

A white, black, or brown person who condemns standing alongside people of other ethnicities to fight racism is himself or herself racist.  Some acts or stereotypes are more racist than others, but no form of racism is less racist than others.  There are no exceptions to the fallacies inherent in discriminating against people because of the color of their skin.  After all, it is racist prejudices against black people--and sexism against men--that motivate the unjust killings of black men by corrupt police officers.  Racist murders do not come out of nowhere.

Logic, people.  It is very fucking helpful.

The Passage Of Time

Without technological means of measuring time, one would be forced to use natural means of measuring time, which are inevitably tied to the position of the sun or other cosmological bodies in the sky.  After all, the day-night cycle only exists due to natural phenomena.  Technology merely helps people track specific times within the day-night cycle in accordance with time zones, even if time zones and the linguistic terms used to describe them are mere constructs of a given culture.  Whether the West primarily looked to natural or technological means of timekeeping, however, certain fallacious beliefs would likely persist.

If the Western world still relied on natural means of tracking time rather than artificial constructs of technology, a key philosophical mistake about the nature of time would likely not disappear.  Clocks and other timekeeping devices, even now, are sometimes confused for the things that ground time, as if time is a social or technological construct!  Emphasizing the natural signs of time's passage would probably not purge this mistake because the same error could simply be modified to fit the cosmological phenomena visible above.

The natural cycles of day and night correlated to the movement of celestial bodies, like clocks and other electronic devices, only indicate the passage of time; they do not create it.  The sun's light and its absence distinguish day from night, but day could not give way to night, or night to day, unless time already existed.  Time is a prerequisite for changes in the material world.  Neither physical events like the movement of the sun nor phenomenological events like the experience of one's sense of time bring time into existence!

A failure to grasp and utilize the abstract laws of logic often leads to a failure to understand how practical, everyday events and objects connect with explicitly philosophical truths about metaphysics.  It is only natural, then, that those who do not even understand the nature of basic logical axioms and epistemology can be easily coaxed into calling time a construct of the physical world, technology, society, or human consciousness.  Although these ideas differ in what time is attributed to, they all share the same fundamental weakness.

Time is merely a series of moments that elapses in tandem with the motion of celestial bodies, which is in turn divided into arbitrary units by humans and measured by timekeeping devices.  The person who sees the sun's light change in visibility from one point in the day to another and concludes that the natural day-night movements of cosmological bodies is time is just as delusional as the person who sees a clock and thinks a device meant to measure the passage of time somehow creates that which it measures.

Churches Were Never Essential

There was never a time where the local church was a necessity for developing one's theological worldview, and there has never been a better time for certain people to be told this than a pandemic where churches have been declared "nonessential."  Church meetings are either gratuitous when it comes to worldview development because knowledge of Christian theology comes from a rationalistic analysis of the Bible, which renders the "educational" role of pastors unnecessary, or because they are marked by errors.

All churches fall into at least the former category, and many fall into the latter as well.  Some churches may provide social benefits to their congregants, but church itself is not a requirement for Christian life [1].  Those who have a default, arbitrary respect for church put themselves at risk for tolerating the fallacies and heresies prized by conservative and liberal churches alike.  Moreover, they fail to exercise intellectual and spiritual autonomy, outsourcing their worldview formation and primary theological discoveries to the hearsay of their preferred pastor.

All that one needs to understand English translations of the Bible is an intentional grasp of reason (so one can see what does and does not follow from the words of the Bible), the ability to read, and at least basic familiarity with the English language.  The subjective, unverifiable "promptings of the Holy Spirit" and the illusory "authority" behind the pulpit are irrelevant to sound philosophy and theology, and these things ultimately reduce down to fallacious appeals to authority and non sequiturs as it is.

Comprehending the moral and metaphysical teachings of the Bible does not depend on social interaction with pastors or other Christians in general.  Knowledge is grounded in reason above all, and reason is available to everyone.  Moral improvement is a matter of an individual's will.  Commitment to Christianity is an individualistic choice that no one can make simply by close proximity to Christians, no matter how sincere or sound they might be.  In all cases, a person's spiritual and moral status is up to them.

Every Christian has autonomous responsibility to ensure that their own worldview, spiritual standing, and moral character are in alignment with Biblical doctrines.  Christianity is a religion that is first and foremost about individuals and their own obedience to God's moral revelation in the Bible.  No one becomes right with God or a better person by attending church, and anyone looking for theological depth will find that there are very few, if any, philosophically sound churches.  Church is not intellectually, morally, or spiritually essential.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/10/sunday-church-construct-of-tradition.html

The Geometry Of Cosmic Horror

It is impossible for anything immaterial or physical to violate the laws of logic, but it is entirely possible for a person to encounter something that is very abnormal by comparison to familiar emotional or sensory experiences.  Although the "alien" geometric designs associated with the cosmic horror genre are sometimes said to defy logic, it is by necessity impossible to do so--yet the foreign shapes and figures of cosmic horror are certainly meant to contrast with "normal" experiences.  In doing so, they implicitly reinforce themes of human helplessness and insanity.

Of course, seeing or feeling a surface that lacks the relative smoothness of many material objects in everyday life is possible, as is discovering objects or environments that lack the kind of architectural consistency that is present in so-called normal environments.  This kind of geometric landscape is not contrary to the laws of logic, but is rather permitted by them.  Foreign architecture and unusual shapes are completely different from geometry that "defies reason," as if such a thing could be done!  The use of strange environments in storytelling can certainly expose the arbitrary nature of what most people consider "normal" with regards to sensory experiences, yet this is the most it can ultimately accomplish.

Right angles can only be right angles; a circle cannot be anything other than a circle.  Furthermore, parallel lines cannot intersect by their very nature, and an acute angle must be smaller than a right angle.  These truths would inescapably apply even on a world shaped by an eldritch entity of the Lovecraftian kind.  While the language used to express mathematical facts and some of the ideas used to explain geometric facts, such as the notion that a circle "contains" 360 degrees, are nothing but mere constructs, the elements of true geometry--that is, the truths about shapes and numbers revealed solely by reason--are necessary truths.

By definition, necessary truths cannot be altered or negated by even the most alien, powerful, and subjectively terrifying cosmic entities which could hypothetically be in existence.  Logical possibility is the same as possibility: if someone ascribes to Cthulhu, Azathoth, or any other entity from cosmic horror the ability to supercede reason, then their conception of that being is a total impossibility.  Fiction can use the concept of something that differs from expected sensory experiences to communicate ideas about reality which are logically possible, but going beyond this is self-refuting.

There is no such thing as an object or truth that contradicts the laws of logic, which means that all necessary truths about geometry cannot be violated.  Certain information about moral and aesthetic values, sensory stimuli, and similar things are subject to a variety of epistemological limitations that prevent humans from knowing anything more than specific logical truths about them.  Logic itself, however, which genuine truths about geometry and the whole of valid mathematics reduce down to (as opposed to the educational constructs used to explain some of them), is the light by which both itself and all other things are seen.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2020/01/the-concept-of-circle.html

Arbitrary Definitions Of God

The word "God" refers to such a specific type of being that it needs to be used consistently if conversations between various people are to be productive.  However, it is often a word used ambiguously and inconsistently, with people often either using random examples of a deity's character as a definition of the word, rather than defining the concept of a deity and then seeing what follows from it, or never explaining what specifically makes a being divine in nature in the first place.  When pressed, many have no definition of God that is not random in some way.

How much power does a being need to have in order to be a deity?  The power to do anything?  It is impossible for any being to violate the laws of logic.  The power to do anything that is logically possible?  While it is possible for a being to have the ability to do all logically possible things, it is still arbitrary to say that this is what makes God a deity.  To define God based upon power, therefore, is to make an arbitrary assertion based on a mere assumption.

What about defining God based upon moral perfection, with God being defined as the being whose character is what defines morality itself?  While it is impossible for moral obligations to exist unless they are grounded in a deity's nature, this definition of God ignores the fact that just because a deity exists does not necessarily mean that morality exists.  In other words, it is possible for an amoral deity to exist--that is, one without any moral nature whatsoever.

The same is true of other logically possible characteristics which are rightly (but still haphazardly) attributed to the Christian deity, like omniscience, omnipresence, and mercy (mercy is by definition not a moral requirement and therefore is a gratuitous but voluntary thing on God's part).  A deity might possess these attributes, but they are not logically required for a being to be a deity and are not why a being, real or hypothetical, is a deity.

However, a being that never began to exist and that at least has the ability to create matter and other minds can be rightly called a deity because it does not rely on any other being for its existence.  It is for this reason that the logical proof of the uncause cause's existence is synonymous with a logical proof of God's existence: God is the uncaused cause of the material world and the direct or indirect reason for the existence of any contingent minds.  Any other definition of God is by necessity false, incomplete, or arbitrary.

An Imagined Economic Shutdown

Even months into a quarantine which has given people who scarcely attempt to think deeply a surplus of time to revisit their wordviews, many people continue to dramatically exaggerate the dangers of COVID-19 or ignore them almost completely.  Philosophy inevitably motivates human behaviors, including behaviors in a pandemic, as worldviews dictate the behaviors of the rational and irrational.  Since many reactions to the current pandemic have minor or major economic ramifications, there have been blatant misconceptions about how the American economy has fared.

Conservatives in particular often claim that the economy has come to a halt and needs to be "reopened," but the shutdown is both temporary and partial.  If the whole American economy was truly shut down, no one would be able to buy or sell anything whatsoever, no matter how "essential."  Anyone who has visited any establishment or ordered anything from an online retailer is capable of realizing that financial exchanges are still being made by American citizens.  It is not as if absolutely no one is earning income, selling goods, or spending money.

A total economic shutdown would be disastrous, yet that is not what Americans have had to live with in recent weeks.  Despite this, vocal factions of people with assumption-riddled ideas--conservatives and liberals alike--have rushed to make blind, irrelevant assertions for the sake of their asinine ideologies.  Some of those ideologies regard the economy more highly than human life.  Some of those ideologies regard the health of a minority of people more highly than the collective wellbeing of a nation.

In both cases, the ideologies being defended are asinine because they are false, hypocritical, or based on mere assumptions.  The economy is not at a total standstill, and economies cannot exist without the people who create and participate in them.  At the same time, pressuring an entire country to take gratuitous and prolonged economic measures for the sake of a minority that is more susceptible to COVID-19's worst effects is far from a rational response.

Knowledge Of What Follows

One reason why absolute certainty extends far beyond basic logical axioms and the immediate thoughts within one's consciousness is that even concepts that cannot be proven or falsified can still be used to establish knowledge of what follows from those concepts.  Whether the concept is merely scientific or wholly centered on abstract metaphysics, some things would follow from it if it is true, and other conclusions are red herrings to the idea and its ramifications.  Awareness of what these ideas would mean about the nature of reality is not contingent on awareness of whether these ideas are true.

There are, in fact, scores of logical facts simply pertaining to what does or does not follow from an idea that is itself ultimately unverifiable.  Although one cannot know if the premise is true, one can still know that it is true that the premise would necessitate certain facts if it does correspond to reality.  There are thus always some truths about a given concept that can be known--strictly logical truths--regardless of whether the concept is true, demonstrable, or even supportable by mere evidence.  Knowledge of what follows from a true or false idea requires only that one consults reason soundly.

Knowable facts inevitably reduce down to aspects of reality that can be proven by reason, either by self-evidence (in a small number of cases) or sound deduction.  However, even proving what is true if a concept is valid still establishes a logical fact about reality and simultaneously rules out other possibilities.  The nature of knowledge is more nuanced than simply knowing or not knowing if a given idea is true, as there are always some truths that can be reasoned out about things that are otherwise unknowable.

There is no way to prove that one is in a simulation that has misdirected one's visual sensory perceptions, but one can still know that the "brain in a vat scenario" requires the existence of matter, without which a brain and a vat could not exist.  There is no way to prove if the Civil War happened or not, but one can still prove that nothing has historically occurred that has violated the laws of logic, as such a thing is inescapably impossible.  Many other examples could be provided, but no specific examples are even required for someone to realize that knowing what follows from a premise does not hinge on knowing if the premise is true.

The Utilitarian Flaws Of Corporate Fraud

Utilitarianism is a common approach to business ethics, with many people equating a pragmatic focus on achieving certain goals with doing what is morally best for a firm.  Sometimes the two may overlap.  In other cases, the two may be at odds with each other, such as when an executive builds a web of lies in order to keep up appearances.  Misleading stakeholders, including shareholders, is not always the utilitarian key to success, and it can actually lead to such public relations and management disasters that a consistent utilitarian would actually avoid this approach.

Even though a deceptive tactic like falsifying sales numbers or exaggerating the recorded number of new clients might be helpful in the short term, it can have a devastating long term impact that undermines the entire basis for engaging in the deception to begin with: helping the company.  The pragmatic benefits can easily give way to lasting corporate wounds.  Furthermore, a developing scandal might become more and more difficult to conceal to the point that hiding the fraud is counterproductive.

That something is helpful does not mean it is either morally obligatory or morally permissible, of course, but the effectiveness of corporate fraud can be subject to diminishing returns.  More effort must be put into maintaining the facade in many situations as time goes on, while the benefits become more and more overshadowed by the risks of potential discovery.  A random whistleblower or failure to consistently lie could expose the entire plot, and the immediate benefits of fraud would be immediately shattered.

If shareholders, investors, and executives are expecting a certain amount of profit from exaggerated sales, for instance, the suspicion can easily increase as they continue to go without their returns.  Moreover, if the scheme does come to the public light, the company's reputation could be thoroughly damaged for a generation, which, again, harms the company or individual the deception was intended to save.  The individuals involved in the scandal may not find a welcoming place in the corporate world after their deeds are revealed.

For these reasons, corporate fraud, at least in many cases, is not an ideal utilitarian practice, for it can dramatically worsen a firm's position and destroy the careers of anyone who participated.  The consequences far outweigh the short term and forfeited long term benefits in such scenarios.  Utilitarianism is an illogical moral framework as it is, for an immoral thing is immoral no matter what the consequences of an action are, but a utilitarian analysis of business practices can sometimes ironically indicate that the most pragmatic course of action is to not sacrifice the means for the end result!

Game Review--Lust For Darkness: Dawn Edition (Switch)

"You shall see then, there is no good or evil, and every conflict of this world is an abstract delusion.  Lust is all there is."
--Willard, Lust for Darkness: Dawn Edition


Lust for Darkness deserves acknowledgment for its mixture of bold eroticism and the occult with cosmic horror, but its gameplay and plot are rather lackluster.  The result is that of an excellent concept being squandered on a very mediocre and short game.  Still, the uniqueness of the premise might be enough to persuade fans of philosophical horror to play the game simply for the concepts behind it.  Unfortunately, it ultimately does very little to truly attempt to develop the lore or explore the horror of elevating sexual pleasure above all other things, but it is an indie game that was reportedly made by only six people.  This does not make the problems disappear, but it does mean the team had far fewer human resources than many game development groups.

Production Values

A game directly addressing sensuality and sexuality needs clear graphics in order to capitalize on the visual aspects of the subject matter.  While sculptures and some sequences emphasize the sensual nature of sexuality, the graphics are tame compared to the best of the Switch.  The genitalia of both men and women are notably missing--something that may have been edited for the purpose of avoiding an AO (Adults Only) rating but still removes part of the thematic impact.  Other issues with the visuals have to do with the performance.  Near the beginning of the game, ground textures did not even appear until I walked within a certain distance, and the disparity between the loaded and incomplete textures was blatant.  Thankfully, the sound is more consistent in its performance, even if the voice acting is not of the highest quality.  The dialogue is delivered through largely bland voice acting that is still better than the voicework in the somewhat comparable Agony, but the content of some of the side conversations you can listen to are actually of great philosophical importance.  The unique thematic framework of the game simply is not enough to salvage the deficiencies in the production values and game mechanics.

Gameplay

There is little to do in Lust for Darkness besides walk around, listen to cultists, pick up objects, and occasionally run away from extraterrestrial beings.  This is no exaggeration.  Combat is nowhere to be found, and most of the puzzles are nothing more than moving an object from one place to a nearby slot of some kind.  Many of the random objects you can interact with literally serve no purpose as far as progression or lore in concerned.  In addition to these flaws and limitations, there is only one "boss" in the entire game, which is not even defeated by directly fighting it.  Players expecting a lengthy game full of variety and developed stealth or combat will be disappointed.

Story

Spoilers below!

A woman named Amanda Moon is abducted by the leader of a sex cult, but a letter from her to her husband Jonathan is delivered to him a year later.  Given an address, Jonathan pretends to be a member of the cult in order to find his wife, but he finds that the cultists are about to venture into Lusst'ghaa, a land in what seems to be a separate dimension.  The most genuine devotees of the cult treat pleasure, and sexual pleasure in particular, as the sole purpose of human life.  Lusst'ghaa turns out to be lethal above all else, threatening both Jonathan and those who pledged their lives to discover its secrets.


Intellectual Content

Mild puzzles must be solved to make progress, but the themes dealing with the deep pleasure of sexuality and the ultimate nature of metaphysics, even though they could have been handled with far more depth if the story was stronger, are far more intellectually significant.  Sexuality allows for pleasures that are more personal and potentially intense than many other types of pleasure.  As a Christian and a rationalist, I celebrate this!  However, to elevate it above all other aspects of human nature trivializes even sexuality and pleasure themselves--to understand sexuality, one must use reason to analyze it, and those who love a thing tend to desire to understand it.  Intellectual soundness must be tossed aside in order for pleasure of any kind to be made the chief goal of someone's life.  One of the first casualties of hedonism is whatever small influence a rationalistic worldview might have on those who pledge their lives to the pursuit of pleasure.  Rather than cling to the facts that reason governs all things and that moral obligations dictate how one should live regardless of preference, a hedonist rejects the intellectual pleasures of rationalism for an overemphasis on subjective gratification.

Reason is even hypothesized by one cultist to be madness, which is an utter possibility because one can only be "mad" in the sense of insane when one holds to fallacious beliefs.  Not even experiencing hallucinations, as the main character does in another (and much better) cosmic horror game called The Sinking City, makes a person irrational because experiences do not reflect one's intellect.  Rationality is about belief that is in accordance with the laws of logic, and even people who are not suffering from hallucinations cannot use reason to prove that they are not hallucinating particular external objects into their miscellaneous sensory perceptions.  There is simply no way to prove to yourself that you are sane beyond grasping and soundly utilizing the laws of logic, which cannot be altered by anything.  There is no possible way for even a deity or other imagined or unimagined being to render the laws of logic invalid.  Even if God himself wished for something unsound to logically follow from a concept, he would only wish in vain.


Conclusion

Perhaps one day Lust for Darkness will be remade with the higher budget and more sophisticated storytelling the concepts call for.  As it stands, the game's brevity and simplicity (in the sense that the mechanics are undeveloped or superficial) shackle it to mediocrity.  The foundational themes are spectacular all the same, and it is unlikely that a non-indie creative team would ever produce something that touches on them in the current climate of the Western entertainment industry.  It is also to the credit of the creators that sexuality is not presented as playing a stronger, weaker, or otherwise different role in the lives of men and women--and that a corrupted woman is implied to be moments from raping Jonathan at the very end.  Lust for Darkness does handle sexuality without ever falling into the philosophical and creative pitfalls of gender stereotypes.  If only it handled the rest of its components with the same quality, it could have been a phenomenal indie game.


Content:
 1.  Violence:  Creatures of Lusst'ghaa chase you at specific points and will kill you if you do not flee.  Bloody corpses of cultists are found.
 2.  Profanity:  At least one variant of "damn," "shit," and "fuck" is used.
 3.  Nudity:  Female breasts don't count as genuine nudity, but multiple topless women can be seen in the mansion after the erotic festivities begin.  A woman's naked corpse is seen outside of the first portal to Lusst'ghaa, but her genitalia, like the genitalia of the male bodies, seem to not even have been animated.  Later in the game, a nude man crawls up a staircase, his buttocks visible.
 4.  Sexuality:  The deep nature of erotic pleasure is a blatant theme throughout most of the game.  There is no actual sex shown onscreen, but sexual pleasure is referenced repeatedly, and sexual acts are captured in sculptures.  One shows what appears to be a female alien from Lusst'ghaa holding her foot on the back of a human woman crawling on all fours, the alien also holding a chain linked to a collar on the human woman.

The Situational Legitimacy Of Treason

No president, king, queen, or other kind of political leader deserves allegiance that depends on anything other than the leader's intellectual and moral competence.  These twin characteristics are minimum requirements for sound leadership rather than secondary add-ons.  As such, they are requirements for any political follower to be justified in backing a given candidate or figure.  The "crime" of treason, which refers to a betrayal of one's country or ruler/national leader, is therefore far from immoral when a leader loses their way or does not deserve one's loyalty to begin with.

It is reason and justice that deserve allegiance, not people who deviate from them.  A ruler who forsakes reason has no basis for philosophically defending himself or herself; a ruler who forsakes justice cannot soundly claim that it is unjust for others to oppose them.  Only the things for which a just ruler stands deserve the unconditional loyalty of the citizens they preside over.  Power and concealment cannot absolve someone of whatever tyranny or neglect of duty they may be guilty of.

If a murderous, predatory, sexist, or racist official holds power, it is not only nonsinful to oppose him or her, but obligatory, even if that opposition is only in thought and word.  Treason is a charge empty of all moral significance unless the victim of treason is a just person or unless the treason plot involves immoral methods (like murdering random civilians or torturing someone).  Those who defy reason and morality deserve hostility and contempt.

Moreover, those who condemn treason often do so selectively at best, arbitrarily attacking whoever mocks or criticizes political figures they subjectively like and ignoring criticism of other political leaders.  Of course, hypocrisy only proves that some people are inconsistent, but this particular kind of hypocrisy establishes that treason is not usually seen as a truly universal evil.  This much is true, but, even in a situation where it is wrong, treason is never immoral because a political leader's followers are emotionally upset by it.

Treason is not an inherent violation of one's moral obligations.  By necessity, backstabbing or otherwise working to overthrow an incompetent or unjust leader is morally commendable, given that no one, not even the tyrant, is mistreated in the process.  Only just actions are valid even when deposing a tyrant.  However, treason itself has no inherent injustice: sometimes it is the only just course of action a person can take.

Energy And Matter

Energy and matter tend to be referenced as if the concepts are distinct--which is indeed the case--even by those who would say that nothing exists which is not made of matter.  Ironically, the very energy featured in some scientific models, including some modern ideas about quantum physics, cannot be made of the matter it interacts with.  One cannot prove anything more about the quantum world other than that nothing in it contradicts the laws of logic, but one can prove that certain conclusions follow from certain premises about quantum energy--including the fact that pure energy, if it exists at all, is by necessity immaterial.

For instance, the unverifiable tenets of string theory predict that matter is made of nonphysical subatomic energy, which would mean that matter reduces down to an immaterial "substance" [1].  String theory, if true (not that anyone can demonstrate it is true or false), would not have anywhere near the same kind of grand metaphysical ramifications if it simply posited that matter reduces down to more matter.  That is the only option if matter does not ultimately consist of something immaterial!  Of course, any existing subatomic energy could not be directly perceived because it would be the thing that undergirds matter, so it could never be directly observed or proven to exist when the senses do not perceive past the external world.

Science must study an immaterial thing like pure energy (or at least ideas about how hypothesized pure energy fits into a given scientific model) through observations of how it impacts matter.  Pure energy itself is strictly immaterial, yet it could likely not be perceived by the senses if there was no materially detectable correlative impact of it on physical matter.  Here, I am referring to energy in the way that some quantum physicists refer to the quantum world as a vast region of sheer energy, not in the sense of a comparatively mundane aspect of matter like the ability of a ball to continue rolling until it loses "energy" (i.e. momentum).   Despite the fact that string theory's pure energy is nonphysical in a way that makes its existence unprovable, there are immaterial existents that are associated with science, albeit not in ways that many scientists ever seem to discuss, which can be demonstrated to exist.

Even if energy was just a manifestation of matter, meaning there would be no point in ever distinguishing between them at all, two things without which science cannot be conducted are immaterial in nature: the laws of logic and the consciousness of the observing scientist.  Without the laws of logic, there could be no sensory experiences to process, for nothing can exist without logic--not in the sense that logic is just a description of whatever states of matter or mind exist, but in the sense that logic dictates what can and cannot exist in the first place.  As for consciousness, one cannot observe the external world without a conscious mind which does the observing, and a mind is not identical to a physical brain.

One does not even have to go this far into the metaphysics of material and immaterial things in order to show that even seemingly naturalistic scientists might contradict their own philosophically invalid beliefs when elaborating on the distinction between energy and matter.  Of course, the distinction between energy and matter would not refute all forms of naturalism.  There is a difference between the form of materialism holding that everything at all that exists is physical and the form of materialism holding that whatever immaterial things exist cannot exist apart from matter--but both of them are easily falsified by the nature of the laws of logic [2].


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-pseudoscience-of-string-theory-part_3.html

[2].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/11/the-ramifications-of-axioms.html

The Morality Of Humor

Humor is one of many pleasurable aspects of human life that the Bible does not oppose, yet there are situations or topics that might provoke a sense of discomfort when treated as a source of humor.  Even dark humor is not sinful (1 John 3:4 and the realization that the Bible never condemns dark humor are all that is necessary to establish this) despite the intentional use of controversial or painful subject matter for comedic purposes.  If someone tries to draw lines and assert that something on one side of a line cannot be legitimately joked about, they will be making an arbitrary leap based on personal or collective preference.

Why would murder be suitable for jokes but not racism, torture, or involuntary slavery?  Some beliefs and actions are far worse than others, but any attempt to distinguish subjects that can be joked about without moral error and subjects that should not be joked about is inherently arbitrary and therefore inherently fallacious.  However, this does not mean that there is never such a thing as an immoral way to joke about a topic or deed.  The motive and audience are the two factors that determine if a given joke is morally legitimate or not.  Unlike separating some subjects from others, these two factors are not arbitrary at all.

If an act truly is wrong, it is by necessity also wrong to reference it for the sake of humor if one does so out of a lack of concern for the actual nature of the act and its consequences.  For example, someone who jokes about sexism or prison rape in an effort to make others regard them as trivial or morally defensible is guilty of an erroneous worldview and of apathy towards the men and women harmed by such things.  Likewise, someone who simply jokes about murder is not sinning (although murder is far from the most malicious or harmful of actions), but someone who thinks murder to be something that should be philosophically dismissed is sinning.

As for the audience of a joke, it is not the feelings of an audience member that ultimately make some humor morally illegitimate, but, again, the moral apathy of the one telling the joke.  There is nothing inherently wrong with joking about mental health issues with friends, for instance.  No one can make a sound Biblical or non-Biblical argument against this.  Nevertheless, if someone treated mental health issues like depression as trivial things even when they have been told that their friends are in deep, personal struggles with depression, their lack of concern for the issue would be problematic.

No Christian has to feel guilt over merely wanting to make a clever or well-timed joke about a sinful or destructive behavior.  Left to itself, this is not sinful, and anyone who insists otherwise is actually the one in violation of Biblical commands, one of which literally condemns the prohibition of acts not condemned by the Bible (Deuteronomy 4:2 is relevant here, as it is in so many other cases).  It is reducing sinful acts to nothing but potentially humorous jokes that is immoral, as ignoring a thing's true nature is not the same as using humor to lift someone's spirits or entertain them.

Misconceptions About Marketing

The business world as a whole suffers slanderous assumptions about the inherent nature of business, but particular aspects of business may receive a larger amount of fallacious criticism than others.  Marketing is an example of a subcategory of business activities that is especially criticized by some for its allegedly deceptive nature and supposed power to brainwash consumers.  Although there are ways to use marketing for selfish or otherwise immoral ends, it does not have to be used in such a way.

Marketing, in a business context, is nothing more than the public promotion of that which a seller offers to buyers.  While there are various strategies a marketer could use and various intentions that might be behind marketing, morally positive or negative, none or them have to entail any sort of distortion of the truth or desire to totally reorient the consumer's life around the product or service being advertised.  Increasing awareness of a seller's inventory is not a predatory thing left to itself.

Trying to make a product or service look appealing to consumers and actively trying to persuade those consumers to voluntarily exchange money for the thing in question is not deceptive.  Although some individuals who lack self-control and are hyper-interested in a wide array of products might feel pressured by marketing, there is not even anything psychologically coercive about using advertisements or commercials--or any other form of marketing (such as in-person promotion of products).

This is not to say that there are no ways to use marketing for irrational, immoral ends, even if the error is only in the intentions behind the marketing.  For instance, an executive who approves of a marketing strategy because he sees consumers as nothing more than potential sources of profit has economically objectified his or her consumer base and cannot legitimately claim to be morally neutral or innocent.  Similarly, anyone behind a dishonest marketing campaign cannot be soundly defended.

Marketing is logically or morally flawed when it promotes stereotypes about gender or race (or any other such category), promotes genuine lies as if they are truths, is intended to build interest in an immoral service, or is motivated by a desire for profit above all else.  Outside of such cases, however, marketing a product or service that is morally neutral is itself morally neutral.  Where there is no deception, greed, or simple moral apathy, there is nothing objectionable about the practice of business marketing.

The Folly Of Postmillennialism

Postmillennialism, otherwise known as dominionism, holds that the church will develop a larger and larger degree of influence over world cultures in a "millennium" that might literally last 1,000 years, a trend that culminates with the Second Coming of Christ.  It may posit an optimistic prediction of humanity's practice of Christian ethics, but it is merely an assumed optimism.  The Bible goes beyond simply not predicting that a golden age of Christian influence will or must occur before Christ's return (here, I mean the influence of intelligent, just Christians, not the influence of the shallow anti-intellectuals and anti-moralists identifying as Christians).  It actually states the opposite!

The church is never promised "dominion" over the earth prior to the return of Christ.  Contrarily, the Bible predicts that the church will suffer various persecutions and that the world as a whole will see increasingly destructive natural disasters and pestilences before Christ returns (as is described in much of Matthew 24).  Of course, this does not mean that there cannot be years or even centuries of collective moral progress.  It only means that the Bible teaches that the era before the Second Coming will not end before it is marked by calamities and moral disarray.

Yes, Biblical eschatology does see the church survive these trials and emerge victorious in an ultimate sense, but the Second Coming is never said to be contingent on the church gaining any level of social or political power.  This is not to say that a culture's values have any philosophical basis outside of theism; morality itself cannot exist unless there is a deity in whose nature it is grounded, as conscience and cultural agreement are irrelevant to everything about moral epistemology and metaphysics.

Rather, this means that there is no threshold of church influence (not that members of the church having influence is positive unless they are rationalistic and morally sound to begin with) that serves as a prophetic prerequisite to Christ's return.  Any dominion on the part of the church as a whole is not guaranteed until after the Second Coming, for the church will almost certainly not be free from oppressors until the eternal state.  After all, it is because of Christ's power that the church is promised power in a life to come, not because of social influence.

Appeals To Renowned Scientists: An Apologetics Red Herring

The red herring nature of appeals to any "authority" other than reason renders the occupational background of any individual person irrelevant when it comes to verifying or appraising their claims about reality.  If they cannot logically demonstrate that an idea is true, or at least probable, their alleged "expertise," experience, and "intelligence" are of no philosophical value.  This has never dissuaded the typical evangelical from talking as if the allegiance of certain scientists or intellectuals to Christianity is somehow evidence for Christian ideas!

It does not matter if supposedly intelligent scientists were Christians or theists, nor does it matter how many scientists claimed this.  To even imply that this, true or false, is of any epistemological significance at all is a betrayal of reason.  Despite this, many Christians like to reference the alleged Christian worldview of random historical scientists in a seeming effort to persuade non-Christians to consider Christianity.  At best, this is a persuasion tactic rather than a proof or evidence, and thus the only reasons to mention it in the context of apologetics are to dismiss it as irrelevant or to simply clarify a misconception about a certain scientist's worldview.

Ironically, some Christians who use this tactic may very well be trying to persuade themselves first and foremost.  They assume that a historical figure associated with intelligence was truly intelligent without thoroughly comprehending what intelligence even is to begin with, and they assume that they are right to believe in what someone they respect also believed.  Of course, they can always pretend like the beliefs of sciensts have apologetic value when conversing with others, but they can still draw a sense of personal conviction from sharing Christian ideas with renowned figures.

Nevertheless, there is no philosophical value to appealing to the spiritual beliefs of scientists as if being believed by scientists makes them true or even likely to be true.  If there was no evidence for Christianity whatsoever, the endorsement of even legions of historical scientists would be a meaningless thing, as it could never amount to evidence or proof of Christianity.  Likewise, the endorsement of historical scientists is completely irrelevant to the genuine evidence for Christianity that can be found.  In either case, only a fool thinks that there is anything epistemologically significant about scientists approving of or expressing personal commitment to Christianity!

A scientist, like anyone else, is rational for having a worldview that aligns with reason, which itself corresponds with reality.  The inverse is not true: a worldview is not more or less rational because a famous scientist embraced it.  It is therefore irrational to pretend like a position is verified or even supported by the mere approval of a scientist (or prominent philosopher or historian).  Many renowned figures are far from deserving of the positive intellectual status they are perceived to have in the first place, but even if they were deserving, there would be nothing intellectually sound about treating their beliefs as evidence for the truth or falsity of any worldview.

The Philosophical Importance Of Economics

Certain concepts behind economics deserve the attention of philosophically-minded individuals even if they are not at the forefront of philosophy as a whole, as economics, like politics, is the application of philosophical ideas to a particular aspect of life.  In this case, the side of life in question pertains to the social contruct of money and the ethics of commerce.  While contemplating economics will not reveal any grand truths about metaphysics, its blend of practicality and abstract ideas is worth comprehending on some level.

The practical and the abstract aspects of reality are both contained within philosophy, as no truth about reality is outside of philosophical facts and inquiry.  Economics is just a particularly important place where practical needs and moral ideas overlap in daily life.  Without at least the possibility of some sort of financial incentive or security, human life would be far more dificult than it already is, yet the fulfillment of practical needs is never an excuse to violate whatever moral obligations one has to other beings.

Because of the need for some kind of socio-economic practice, there is also a need to understand what does and does not follow from given ideas about economics.  As with other aspects of reality, there are myths about economics on all sides, and they have power over the individuals and cultures that treat them as facts.  Capitalists and communists alike often succumb to some of these myths [1], so it is not as if being economically conservative or liberal is sound in and of itself!  Every truth about economics is revealed by reason rather than political traditions such as those adhered to by both major sides of the political divide.

Economics, like science, is governed by logic and is thus a philosophical subject, but, like science, it is far from the heart of philosophy.  Epistemology, metaphysics, and morality are of greater significance than practical concerns alone could ever be, and economics is at its most important when it is assessed in light of these three domains of philosophy.  All the same, truths about economic practicality are not of no importance whatsoever.  Even if they are lesser truths than those about purely logical matters, they are not worth ignoring.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2019/12/economic-reductionism.html

Evangelical Selfishness

One of the reasons why evangelicals tend to dismiss serious Biblical objections to their typical moral stances, such as those involving sexism towards men and women, is that morality is treated as a lesser goal than promoting the salvation message of the New Testament.  There might sometimes be a facade of righteousness, but this is quickly given a place behind the gospel in order to influence others when it is convenient.  Now, it is not that salvation is not an important part of Biblical theology.  Instead, the truth is that evangelicals overestimate its important out of a selfish set of priorities.

Their words and actions reveal that they are far more concerned with whether they will go to heaven due to mercy--something that they cannot deserve--than whether they understand and live out the Bible's moral commands.  In other words, personal gain in the afterlife is a higher priority than avoiding and condemning the sins that make a person deserving of hell in the first place.  Since a morally upright life is the only visible evidence that a person is even saved to begin with (Matthew 7:15-20), morality comes before and after soteriology.

At their core, common evangelical ideas about morality at best cling to a facade of righteousness that is incomplete, backwards, and hypocritical.  Not only do evangelicals routinely ignore actual commands of the Bible in favor of advocating for social constructs like gender roles and other legalism, but they openly focus on salvation more than morality despite the former being trivial by comparison to the latter [1].  Morality is the only reason soteriology even matters!

A sound analysis of the Bible would never place salvation above justice, no matter how enthralled by salvation one is.  To refuse to stand alongside evangelicals in this error is to refuse a crucial part of evangelicalism itself.  Any rational Christian must forsake evangelicalism along with all other fallacious distortions of Biblical Christianity, and rejecting any ideology that pretends like salvation could possibly matter more than ethics is a necessary part of rational theology.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2019/12/morality-comes-before-soteriology.html

The Inescapable Categories Of "Us" And "Them"

Emphasis on a division of people into ideological categories of "us" and "them" may be condemned as tribalistic, unhelpful, and misguided, but these categories are an inescapable part of human existence as long as there are people who hold to conflicting philosophical ideas, whether those ideas are about epistemology, metaphysics, or morality.  Even if every person alive was in complete ideological agreement, there would always be the potential for someone to deviate from the group and form a new one, thus reviving other factions.

To even condemn or oppose advocates of an "us against them" mindset, a person must ironically have a mindset that separates people into ideological or moral groups!  Moreover, no one can uphold an ideology that treats everyone as ideological equals and allies without making their ideology's societal power weak, as they cannot criticize their opponents without dividing people into the categories of "us" and "them."  There is no such thing as an ideology that promotes truly consistent abolition of "us" and "them" categories unless it does not allow for its adherents to enforce its ideas without hypocrisy.

Furthermore, if truth has value, then the people in separate philosophical and moral factions are by no means of equal value, for they would not all be equally close to the truth, and concern for things of importance makes one more valuable by merely choosing the proximity.  If truth has no value, there is no obligation to be tolerant of other factions to begin with.  Regardless of what obligations may or may not exist, therefore, those who seek to treat others as if their worldviews and actions cannot render some people closer to reality than others are adrift in delusion.

The flaws of tolerance aside, reason divides people into ideological categories by default (the only exception would be a hypothetical state of total agreement among all people, regardless of the truth of what they agree on).  Some people are intelligent, and far more are devoid of any serious intelligence.  Some people have sound worldviews, and many more do not, thanks to intellectual laziness or incompetence.  Every individual falls into one of the latter categories, even if they want nothing more than to pretend like all people are ideologically and morally equal.

The Lies Of Femininity And Masculinity

Even as the world slowly becomes more consistently egalitarian, the myths of femininity and masculinity continue to have supporters.  A desire for truth does not deter them because they do not truly want truth.  Instead, they seek a mixture of freedom from oppressive discrimination against men and women and the familiarity of the social conditioning behind much of that discrimination.  Both people who believe in some sort of positive form of femininity and masculinity and those who believe in the "toxic" versions of them collectively succumb to the same assumptions and non sequitur fallacies, even though they try to distinguish themselves from each other.

Phrases like "toxic femininity" and "toxic masculinity" (or their "positive" counterparts) have no philosophical legitimacy, but not for the reason many would say.  These phrases are not powerless constructs because "real femininity" or "real masculinity" aren't toxic, as those who try to distinguish between some fallaciously stereotypical characteristics of men and women try to insist; they are powerless because there never was and never will be such a thing a masculinity or femininity.  There are only male and female bodies and socially expected behaviors or desires arbitrarily associated with one gender or the other.  A phrase referring to a nonexistent thing does not make the concept behind it true when it is repeated numerous times.

Rather than point these logical truths out to a world engulfed by stupidity and assumptions, Christians (and non-Christians) who identify as egalitarians tend to favor some stereotypes while opposing the ones that they personally dislike the most--sometimes this means they only actively oppose stereotypes or other injustices facing just one gender!  Social conditioning is too familiar a prison for such Christians for them to wish to escape it entirely.  All who are guilty of this fundamental hypocrisy are egalitarians in name only, as their words and actions betray their lack of consistency and depth.  No one who does not reject the lies of femininity and masculinity in full deserves the indignation of the only true egalitarians.

As with many other issues related to gender, many self-proclaimed egalitarians are not consistent at all when it comes to fighting gender stereotypes, instead dismissing some stereotypes while claiming others, selectively confronting issues that affect men and women on a discriminatory level, and equivocating words that are not synonymous.  Those who think they have fulfilled the ideology of egalitarianism by simply rejecting a handful of stereotypes about women that have kept them out of positions of church or corporate leadership have stopped far short of living out genuine egalitarianism.

You cannot fully embrace gender equality on the level of social justice, criminal justice, and friendship when you accept any of the poisonous ideas that have been used to harm men or women, regardless of the intent behind them.  A half-serious "egalitarian" can even be far more devastating to the pursuit of gender equality than someone whose idiocy is far more blatant to the legions of incompetent thinkers with the power to influence their society.  If sexism against men or women is open and fierce, those who might have otherwise agreed with it might instead reject it.  If it is more subtle, a legion of fools will be all the more receptive to it.

Logic, people.  It is very fucking helpful.

Movie Review--Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice (Theatrical Cut)

"Everything's changed.  Men fall from the sky.  The gods hurl thunderbolts.  Innocents die.  That's how it starts, sir.  The fever, the rage, the feeling of powerlessness that turns good men cruel."
--Alfred Pennyworth, Batman v Superman

"That son of a bitch brought the war to us two years ago.  Jesus Alfred, count the dead.  Thousands of people.  What's next?  Millions?  He has the power to wipe out the entire human race, and if we believe there is a one percent chance that he is our enemy, we have to take it as an absolute certainty."
--Bruce Wayne, Batman v Superman


One of the most controversial films of its decade, Batman v Superman was released in early 2016 and has recently passed its four year anniversary.  For all of its promise, Batman v Superman suffers from the same key problem as the eighth season of Game of Thrones: it rushes ideas that truly do have merit because the creators did not want to tell the story over a more prolonged period of time.  Putting the death of Superman in the second DCEU film is a horrible storytelling strategy!  Now, this does not mean that everything in the film is an utter disaster.  Far from it!  It does try to address a host of important philosophical topics while referencing all sorts of DC figures like Man-Bat, Joker, and Darkseid.  It does have solid action sequences.  However, it tries to accomplish too much too soon.

Photo credit: AntMan3001 on Visualhunt / CC BY-SA

Production Values

Several performances easily rank among the best components of the film.  Gal Gadot's Wonder Woman is one of the better parts, as is Ben Affleck's Batman; it is hardly surprising that Wonder Woman's later solo film is the best the DCEU has offered thus far.  The different take on Batman here deserved its own prequel to show more of how this "Bat of Gotham" became a figure who deserves condemnation for his own injustices (branding criminals and sometimes torturing them).  Some of the supporting characters simply are not realized as well as these two.

Jesse Rosenberg, for example, plays a strange version of Lex.  He is awkward, scatter-minded, and fixated on Jolly Ranchers.  It is even confirmed that he is the kind of person who mistakes familiarity with history, linguistics, and books for philosophical intelligence.  In short, he is weak intellectually and as a character.  Martha Kent, Lois Lane, Alfred Pennyworth, and several other side characters fare better, but the film belongs to Batman and Superman first and foremost.

Aside from the performances of Gal Gadot and Ben Affleck, the most competently executed part of the movie is the action.  The "Knightmare" scene is spectacular, the titular fight between DC's two most recognizable icons is handled well even if it is brief, and a warehouse fight involving Batman is excellent.  However, there is far more filler than action throughout the film.  If all of the storytelling was as superb as the majority of the action and effects, Batman v Superman would be a far better movie--yes, the "Ultimate Edition" is supposed to be far better at telling the story, but here I am only analyzing the theatrical cut.


Story

Photo credit: AntMan3001 on Visual hunt / CC BY-SA

Spoilers are below!

A year and a half after Superman saves Metropolis from Zod, Lex Luther seeks to create a "silver bullet" to allegedly stop further Kryptonian attacks, and Bruce Wayne, who witnessed the destruction of Metropolis, has descended into his own kind of villainy.  Both men fear or despise Superman because of the possibility that he could use his powers to threaten all of humankind (of course, both are using obvious slippery slope fallacies).  Lex Luthor soon conjures up a plan to force Batman and Superman into a fight to the death, as both figures are obstacles to his goals.


Intellectual Content

Director Zack Snyder crammed a wide array of philosophical ideas or references into Batman v Superman, but they are often most evident in the characterization of major presences in the film, like Batman and Lex Luthor.  For instance, Batman implements a moral framework that favors preemptive, preventative killing instead of waiting until someone has done something to deserve death, which naturally leads him to literally equate a 1% probability of Superman destroying humankind with absolute certainty.  Most people have thoroughly unsound epistemological ideas, but they can still distinguish between the concepts of minimal evidence and absolute certainty!

Snyder's Batman as he is initially presented simply cannot tell the difference incidental destruction of Metropolis in an effort to save the planet and malevolence.  Moreover, this Batman's behaviors reflect the petty assumptions he makes about morality.  He tortures criminals in unbiblical ways and even seems to approve of prison violence targeting people he has branded (not that prison is Biblically just even without sexual or nonsexual assaults), allowing his weariness of life in Gotham to reduce him to committing injustices he would otherwise try to thwart.

Lex has his own fallacious beliefs, including the belief that power is always malevolent--which is especially ironic given that his inherited corporation appears to have a great deal of social, political, and research-based power.  Just prior to the fight promised in the title, Luthor goes so far as to posit the philosophically invalid claim that a deity cannot be morally good and supremely powerful simultaneously (he uses the phrase "all powerful" without even clarifying if he means the power to do anything at all, which is logically impossible for any being, or immensely powerful).  Now, none of these idiotic beliefs on the part of the characters signify artistic incompetence, but the movie is nonetheless full of blatantly fallacious assertions.


Conclusion

For all of its shortcomings, Batman v Superman still gets far more right than Suicide Squad, Justice League, and Aquaman, with Justice League being the only one of those three additional films that suffers more from sheer mediocrity than anything else.  Shifting from the darker themes of Batman v Superman to the cheap nonsense of Aquaman has not been a healthy change for the DCEU, even if Wonder Woman, Shazam!, and Birds of Prey are much better films than Batman v Superman despite being lighter in tone.  The second entry in the DCEU could have nevertheless been a far more focused film.


Content:
 1.  Violence:  The PG-13 rating tones down fight sequences that could have been quite brutal, but there are plenty of serious blows that land on numerous characters.
 2.  Profanity:  There is not much profanity in Batman v Superman, but "goddamn," "bitch," and "shit" are used.

Ignorance Does Not Necessitate Innocence

The intellectually honest person who is not committed to Christian theism on evidential grounds can only appeal to subjective feelings (conscience) and arbitrary consensus if he or she wishes to make probabilistic claims about having moral obligations.  Mere theism does not establish that the existence of moral obligations is even probable (it is possible for an amoral deity to exist), and religions like Islam contain moral contradictions that render them incapable of being true [1].

It is a basic fact of moral epistemology that human preference is entirely irrelevant to the existence and nature of morality.  If morality exists, it is not because humans hope it does; if it exists, human awareness and comfort do not make particular behaviors obligatory.  The existence of morality is tied to the existence of a deity with a moral nature--if God does not exist, morality cannot exist, but if God does not have a moral nature, morality likewise does not exist.

That there is evidence for the veracity of Biblical Christianity means there is evidence for Biblical morality.  The Biblical description of moral epistemology aligns with what reason reveals: moral obligations, if they exist, must be tied to God's nature, and only God can reveal moral obligations to humans that are otherwise lost in the irrelevant subjectivity of conscience (Romans 7:7).  In light of this, a theonomist Christian might wonder how God will punish the many documented nations which expired before the revelation of Mosaic Law or that came into power afterward but were not exposed to that moral revelation.

There is no historical evidence that all cultures have had equal access to the Bible, much less awareness of the historical evidence for the Bible.  Nevertheless, it would be unjust to overlook abominations like slave trading, sexism (against either gender), sexual abuse, and militarism simply because a culture had no access to the evidence suggesting those things are morally wrong.  Ignorance and innocence are completely separate conditions!

Mercy is by definition never deserved, and an atrocity is still an atrocity even when it is perceived positively by an entire culture.  These two facts require that people still deserve destruction even if they have absolutely no evidence that they are in moral error--something that is the case when a person has only conscience and culture to look to.  Even though numerous people have lived without access to Mosaic Law and the evidence that supports Christianity, there is no ultimate excuse for wrongdoing.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/03/quranic-punishment-surah-538.html

The Fallacious Nature Of The Principle Of Charity

To assume that someone is in error without any direct evidence in support of the stance is slanderous, not to mention irrational.  At most, very few would fully deny this.  To assume that someone does not mean whatever idiotic or contradictory things they say, though, or that the comments of a stranger should be treated with a default respect is likewise irrational.  It does not matter whether an assumption about a person or set of claims is positive or negative; by virtue of being an assumption, it is unjustifiable and fallacious.

It would be irrational and unjust to misrepresent an idea, claim, or person, and no one who is even slightly concerned with truth is unable to fully recognize this on their own.  Any sincere rationalist would be quick to affirm this.  However, the principle of charity does not stop here.  Those who condone it go beyond not straw manning a concept and aim to interpret someone's words in the best light possible, tending to treat people and ideas as if they are not unintelligent, laughable, or dangerous in cases where they clearly are.

The idea behind the principle of charity is one of tolerance and respect for diverse ideas (even though all of them cannot be correct), no matter how gratuitous or undeserving of respect the concept being defended with it is.  When one sees that any sort of assumption is an offense against reason (and therefore reality), it becomes clear that the goal behind the "principle of charity" is no less stupid than that of an approach to ideas and people that involves intentional misrepresent and malice.

If an idea is fallacious or inherently self-defeating, it cannot deserve protection.  If a person embraces a false or fallacious idea and does not reject it when it is refuted, being too irrational or stubborn to refute it themselves, they cannot deserve intellectual respect.  That someone who claims to seek knowledge would defend the ideas or people that interfere with that pursuit only shows that they do not truly care for rationality to begin with.  Rather, they are interested in tolerating stupidity or in making themselves feel better about liking fallacious figureheads for their ideologies.

Of course, they very well may not be so charitable to someone who challenges or refutes the principle of charity!  Hypocrisy does not itself disprove the claims of hypocrites, and reason alone exposes the epistemological folly within the rule of charity.  All the same, hypocrisy does reveal a fundamental inconsistency or insincerity, and many proponents of the rule of charity seem to merely want mercy for their own stupidity or the stupidity of whatever historical or contemporary authors they subjectively appreciate.

The principle of charity is rejected by logic for the same reason a plethora of other frameworks and concepts are rejected by reason: it rests entirely on an assumption that is used to argue for other assumptions.  There is nothing more that can be said in its defense beyond assuming the conclusion for the sake of preference or emotional comfort.  No one needs to make positive assumptions about another person in order to avoid slander, and thus there is neither a strictly logical nor moral basis for doing so.

The Introspective Potential Of Masturbation

Sexuality is a significant part of human existence, including the spiritual side of human life.  After all, the Bible credits God with making humans sexual beings--and yet many Christians shun what God intentionally created.  Christians who have difficulty bringing themselves to address the issues regarding interpersonal sexual behaviors usually have difficulty addressing self-pleasuring, even though it offers the potential for thorough reflection on the personal nature of pleasure and the fact that pleasure itself is far from sinful.

Masturbation can be enjoyed with little emphasis on self-awareness and with immediate pleasure in the spotlight, but self-stimulation can also be a deeply introspective experience.  One can explore one's mind just as thoroughly as one's body with or without additional stimulation in the form of mental imagery or erotic media (of a Biblically legitimate kind [1]).  Since sexuality is such a deep part of human existence, this should not come as a surprise.

The social dimensions of sexuality do not account for its full scope, and this was not a fluke on God's part.  Since the act of masturbation is objectively nonsinful (Deuteronomy 4:2), there is nothing problematic about admitting that God made the human body to be capable of giving itself sexual pleasure.  Moreover, since sexuality is a phenomenological thing with physical expressions, it is the psychological aspects of masturbation that can be the deepest and most pleasurable.

All pleasure is experienced on a personal level, but only select pleasures are self-imposed.  Masturbation is especially personal because it falls into the latter category and because it is a sexual act, a manifestation of the capacity for sexual pleasure that God implanted within humans.  Christians have all the more reason to enjoy masturbation for its pleasure and its introspective potential, as it is a natural, nonsinful expression of human sexuality.

If people were to more openly discuss the emotional and spiritual aspects of masturbation, perhaps self-pleasuring would not be seen as something that is of practically no philosophical or spiritual relevance.  On the contrary, masturbation can express deep features of human introspection and spirituality.  It is only because of a reluctance to engage topics of sexuality on a rationalistic level that more people have not realized this.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/12/the-truth-about-erotic-media-part-2_19.html

Classist Perversions Of Justice

Even when the right penalties are legally assigned to the right crimes, other biases and injustices can creep into a legal system.  Perhaps all cultures (even ancient Israel at times) have failed to uphold even the former, but the latter has many manifestations.  Throughout recorded history, one such manifestation is a bias in favor of or against the poor in matters of criminal justice.  The Bible rejects both biases, with Exodus 23:1-3 and 6-7 affirming that true justice is not biased towards or against the poor.

Siding with either a rich or poor person because of their economic status is an abomination.  Wealth is neither an indicator of moral character or corruption, and the same is true of poverty.  A person's economic class is irrelevant to their guilt or innocence.  Justice is inflexible, remaining unchanged when the rich and poor are the offenders and remaining unchanged when the rich and poor are the victims.  It is for this reason that Exodus 23 says to neither show favoritism towards the poor nor deny them justice.

If the members of a society truly seek justice, they will not be partial to the wealthy or the poor.  The hope of receiving part of a rich person's wealth in exchange for helping them escape justice may be a strong temptation for some, just as helping a poor person escape justice out of sympathy for their poverty may be a strong temptation for some, but to act on either impulse is a classist injustice, and Yahweh rejects classism in any direction.

Both the rich and poor have the same human rights, for those in both groups bear God's image; their social status is a red herring to matters of just punishment.  In order to ensure a just society (though there is far more to ensuring a just society than this), those in power must not be biased for or against the rich, poor, or middle classes.  To do so is to forsake the fact that moral obligations transcend class.

Wealth and the lack of it can be powerful motivators.  There is only nothing problematic with this--as long as they do not motivate someone to violate their obligations to others.  Justice demands that one consistently look to the humanity and guilt or innocence of a party rather than their class, gender, race, nationality, or any other irrelevant trait.  Class does not define guilt or innocence, and class is not all there is to an individual's existence.

COVID-19's Disruption Of Ecclesiological Legalism

The COVID-19 quarantine has disrupted many things, the standard weekly model of church attendance among them.  Virtual church sermons have at least largely replaced in-person gatherings at churches--and this is, at least in many cases, not spiritually negative at all, but not for the reason many might think.  Prolonged isolation grants additional opportunities to think about their worldviews and how individuals may conduct their lives differently even after the crisis has passed, including how they will regard church.

There never was a Biblical obligation to meet with potentially large groups of Christians in a church building, much less to meet with them at arbitrary times like Sunday mornings or Wednesday nights.  Christians who are just now having to rethink their church attendance habits out of necessity during the pandemic may end up realizing that they only attended the traditional model of church on Sundays out of a misguided sense of obligation.  If so, they will be making a very profound discovery about their spiritual priorities.

Perhaps the alternate church plans during the COVID-19 pandemic may have the effect of leading people who would have otherwise never challenged tradition to see that they are not less spiritually mature for not attending church either physically or virtually.  If many Christians opt to not make gathering with shallow congregations a part of their lives when the pandemic passes, they have done nothing wrong.  Such a decision may reflect a desire to follow truth rather than meaningless constructs of Christian legalists.

It is always worth drawing attention to the fact that many churches do not deserve followings to begin with due to their numerous fallacies and examples of legalism (including the legalistic idea that attending church in any capacity at all is a moral or spiritual requirement).  In fact, frustration over shallowness and errors can drive many genuine, committed Christians away from church gatherings!  Not attending a church regularly or at all is by no means a sign of spiritual apathy.