The Bipartisan Delusion

There is never a time when tolerance of stupidity is rational, morally obligatory, or helpful, but 2020 has seen many of the fallacies and hypocrisies of America's two major political parties roar to an even more prominent position.  These displays of stupidity invite refutation and mockery by their very nature, but their influence on American society is becoming more destructive.  In light of this, calls for vague, generic attitudes of kindness towards people across the political spectrum are only becoming more damaging.

Now, like always, is the time for rage against the agents of irrationality that represent any worldview that is not rooted in sheer rationalism.  Of course, this rules out conservatism and liberalism, as all who subscribe to these ideologies betray reason in the process.  There is no place for treating anyone outside of rationalism as an intellectual ally or equal of those who have aligned themselves with the self-verifying nature of reason.

The reach of both parties is so extensive and their tenets are so delusional that most conservatives and liberals act like the only reason someone would criticize one party is because they support the other.  In reality, there are numerous logical and Biblical flaws with both conservativism and liberalism that need to be thoroughly refuted.  Assumptions, fallacies, and other epistemological errors need to confronted regardless of who they originate from.

It is logically impossible for any errors to deserve protection, and the emotional security of conservatives and liberals alike deserves no respect whatsoever.  The only methods of pushing back against the bipartisan delusions of America (here, bipartisan does not refer to compromises between the two parties, but refers to both parties as a whole) that are not valid tools are those which involve irrationality, inconsistency, or any form of injustice.  Short of this, every kind of social pressure can be legitimately used to silence those on either side of the political spectrum.

Until reason rules the country's minds, the asinine troubles that America (and other countries) continues to experience will likely not abate.  Many people wonder what they can do to improve the state of the country, but they almost never admit that personally rejecting assumptions and systematically assessing the logicality of their worldviews is where all intentionally positive social change begins.  Outside of rationalism, there is only darkness, arbitrary beliefs, and the threat of hypocrisy and tyranny.

Logic, people.  It is very fucking helpful.

Invalid Reasons For Embracing Valid Cultural Changes

Sexism--against women and men--and racism were once far more entrenched in Western culture than they already are due to more intense cultural conditioning than that which is often seen today.  There are still people who fiercely affirm fallacious gender and racial stereotypes, of course, but genuine progress has been made.  In fact, many people are now more likely claim to despise sexism and racism than before.  The problem is the invalid, assumed reason for which a high number of these people seem interested in denouncing discrimination on such grounds.

It is irrational to believe in or reinforce stereotypes about gender or race.  However, it is likely that the primary or only reason why so many people are suddenly rushing to at least selectively condemn sexism and racism (there is still a great deal of it that goes without consistent opposition) is, once again, cultural conditioning.  Even several years ago, there was not as much overt social outrage over actual or perceived sexism and racism.  On one hand, the stereotypes that fuel both forms of illicit discrimination are irrational, and it seems to be the case that Western culture is therefore moving away from certain ideas that are both logically invalid and Biblically immoral.

On the other hand, without the societal shift in expected behaviors, there would be no reason to expect many people to make the same claims they do today.  This has nothing to do with whether sexism and racism are immoral and everything to do with how prone to assumptions and social conditioning most people are.  Most people are quite content to simply assume that the values of their culture are objectively obligatory until they have a crisis of conscience, at which point they instead look to their own subjective, irrelevant feelings for moral knowledge, something conscience can never reveal.

Since reason rejects the ideological foundations of sexism and racism, namely stereotypes and other assumptions, it is irrational to believe that those foundations are philosophically valid, but it is also just as irrational to believe in anything due to the arbitrary current of one's culture and era.  Some societies will happen to have values that are more rational, consistent, or probable to be true than others, but popularity and zeal are irrelevant to such matters in all circumstances.  Thus, no matter how true or probable an ideology is, embracing it due to cultural pressures  is asinine and a sign of unintelligence and a malleable set of priorities.

Game Review--Resident Evil: Revelations (Switch)

". . . Veltro.  In honor of thy name, we accept our wrongdoing, and transmute our flesh in remembrance of our sins."
--Jack Norman, Resident Evil: Revelations


Resident Evil: Revelations was introduced on the 3DS, another Nintendo handheld, before being ported to many other systems and eventually making its way to the seeming replacement of the 3DS.  As a 3DS game, it emphasized the graphical strengths of its initial system.  As a Switch game, its graphics are far behind the norm for its new Nintendo handheld, but the serpentine level design of the Queen Zenobia, a ship much of the game takes place on, and the unlockables are just as at home on the Switch as they were on the 3DS.  Its greatest strengths include the layout of the Queen Zenobia, its more serious tone (as opposed to that of Resident Evil 4) and Raid Mode, the successor to Mercenaries mode from earlier games in the series.

Production Values

The 3DS origins of Revelations hold the graphics back, but the animations are still smooth.  It is the lack of detail that is the most distinct issue with the visual presentation.  When it comes to the sound design, the noises from weapons and enemy creatures are clear.  As with many Resident Evil games, the weakness on the audio side of things is the blandness or silliness of the dialogue.  Thankfully, the blatant cheesiness that is so pervasive in Resident Evil 4 and that is toned down in Resident Evil 5 has been toned down yet again.

Gameplay

The slow character movement of every primary Resident Evil game between the third and seventh installments returns.  A dodge mechanic permits you to sidestep some attacks despite your sluggish movements.  Unfortunately, in standard Resident Evil fashion, some enemies have attacks that can kill players in a single hit, so a failure to dodge can lead to death in some scenarios.  The enemy spectrum is diverse, as Jill and the other playable characters have to fight everything from altered fish to pseudo-zombies to an enormous organism that can latch itself onto the ship.

Completion of the campaign unlocks Raid Mode, a series of progressively challenging levels featuring enemies with health bars and (occasionally) special attributes.  Raid Mode is among the best aspects of the game with its 16 maps, three difficulties, and hosts of weapons and upgrades that can be purchased with in-game BP.  The options menu in Raid Mode has a new pixelated minigame that lets players shoot descending enemies before they reach the bottom of the screen, and you can actually earn a significant number of spendable points for Raid Mode--if you chain together kills, that is.

Story

Some spoilers are below!

Jill Valentine and her partner Parker Luciani investigate a ship called the Queen Zenobia, realizing that it is involved in the seeming return of a biological terrorism group known as Veltro, as her close friend Chris Redfield visits a separate region with a partner of his own.  As Jill explores more of the ship, it becomes apparent that the Queen Zenobia is tied to a massive terrorist attack on an aquatic city called Terragregia that occurred a year before.


Intellectual Content

The story addresses no strongly developed themes or concepts beyond a mild exploration of bioterrorism, but there are some optional collectibles and weapon kits that observant players can discover.  The level design is somewhat reminiscent of the environments in Metroid or Castlevania, meaning some areas do not have to be entered at all in order to progress in the campaign even though they hold secrets.


Conclusion

The Switch version of Revelations is a solid handheld port of the game, merging the original content with something new (even if it is just a small minigame in an options menu).  Switch owners who never played Revelations on any other system are in the best position to benefit from the port, as the new addition is minor at best, so anyone who played through the entirety of the game on the 3DS or on another console will have already seen the vast majority of what is offered here.  Still, Revelations is one of the less cheesy entries in the Resident Evil series, and the atmosphere consistently emphasizes mystery and mild horror over action, unlike Resident Evil 5.  The core game itself is far from the worst the series has to offer.


Content:
 1.  Violence:  The mild violence of typical Resident Evil gunshots, punches, and kicks is on display.  Small patches of blood appear when enemies are shot, but explicit gore is absent.
 2.  Profanity:  "Damn" and "shit" are used.

Reactionary Worldviews

What need would there be to address many variants of false ideas beyond simply demonstrating that they contradict verifiable truths unless those false ideas were being advocated for or assumed by other people?  There are numerous relationships between facts that would perhaps never be directly brought up if it was not for misconceptions that demand clarification.  For example, no one would ever need to specifically clarify that two and 413 are not the same numbers unless someone else mistakenly equated them.

In this sense, some specific points are only realized for reactionary reasons.  This is not problematic in itself: there is no philosophical or personal need to reflect on them or mention them to other people otherwise!  However, many logical truths do not fall into this category.  Discovering these truths on a purely reactionary basis is problematic because a person is ignoring the universal accessibility of reason and waiting for others to prompt them.  In other words, when a person never thinks about matters of philosophical truth except when they are reacting to the claims of another person, they have forfeited intellectual autonomy, initiative, and security.

Not everyone is intelligent or self-aware enough at a given time to reason their way beyond foundational, strictly logical truths (as in axioms) without at least some prompting from others, but no one is doomed to a life of reactionary worldviews that are only developed as a response to others.  Whoever looks beyond the cultural issues and popular topics of their day will find that there is far more to sound, rationalistic philosophy than mere reactions to the fallacies of one's society.  Indeed, reactions to the ideologies of others need to be based on prior rationalistic knowledge that one has already contemplated.

At the very least, autonomously reflecting on what others say is a necessity even for those who cannot or do not exercise a more direct intellectual originality by thinking of many concepts, truths, and proofs on their own.  There is no way to argue against this without arguing against reason itself, which refutes all pretense of a right to be treated as an intellectually capable person.  Someone who lacks philosophical initiative and is comfortable to merely parrot or react to others might be stupid enough to think they have taken a philosophically valid approach, but there is no justification for their lack of autonomous thought.

Of course, there are some things that many people might not ever realize without a push in the right direction from rationalists (such as some of the logical facts listed here [1] or those in the even more esoteric class of specific truths alluded on this site several times).  Benefitting from being pushed in the right direction when it comes to the more specific or unspoken truths of epistemology and metaphysics is not a lack of intellectual initiative or competence, and some people may by happenstance hear others mention issues or logical facts that the former would have or easily could have reasoned out on their own.

Hearing basic or otherwise autonomously accessible logical facts by chance does not rob someone of genuine initiative and originality (which can even be expressed by personally reflecting on the information without regard for who it came from), but rationalistic verification, which is a process every person can only carry out in their own mind, cannot be soundly sidestepped in such cases.  This, like every aspect of life, is a chance to exercise needed intellectual autonomy/originality.  When one focuses on the truth in question rather than the person who randomly brought it up, however, it is as if it was never encountered before, and any response transcends mere reactionary ideology.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/12/a-list-of-neglected-truths.html

The "Deep State"

The so-called "deep state" is, according to conservative conspiracy theorists, a shadowy layer of the American government that secretly controls the political system and furthers destructive, immoral ends.  Sometimes used as a justification for why Trump belongs in office (so that he can fight and expose the "deep state"), the theory is, like many other conspiracy theories, incapable of being verified.  This fact is usually either ignored despite the ease of showing the epistemological errors in asserting things that the general American populace could never demonstrate.

There are still reasons why certain kinds of people might want to endorse the idea of a deep state although it is fallacious, of course.  The notion provides a scapegoat and perceived enemy for the followers of a politician whose intentions contradict those of the alleged deep state.  When an official fails to deliver on a promise, whether the goal of the promise is philosophically valid or not, his or her supporters can always claim that the deep state interfered--and possibly cite the politician's failure as a reason to continue showing support to them, lest the deep state continue to achieve its nefarious ends.

The very appeal of the deep state for some is that it is a special explanation for why some political agenda is not enacted (at least not fully) when a favorite official claims to do so, or perhaps it gives its believers a sense of urgency for a cause.  When someone believes that there is an invisible--but somehow detectable--layer of corruption in a government, almost any event can be perceived as part of a wicked plan or an effort to fight back.  Conspiracy theorists can therefore convince themselves that they have some sort of moral high ground despite the many fallacies they have to use when describing or defending their ideas.

Of course, a person who truly cares about moral high ground is not interested in slanderous assumptions or even accurate accusations without evidence; they are interested in being right for the right reasons.  Since the nature of many alleged conspiracy groups is one of secrecy, it could be very difficult to expose them even if they do exist, meaning that claims about the deep state have an inherent epistemological difficulty.  You cannot plainly demonstrate that which is by definition operating behind the visible face of a government.

Creation And Logic

If the Bible actually did teach that God created logic, which is in no way synonymous with the human intellect and thus was not brought into existence when God created humans, one of the best places to look for it would be the creation story at the beginning of Genesis.  Many Christians claim the impossible by saying that God created everything, as if a being without a beginning could have created itself and as if anything could bring necessary truths into existence when they already have to exist by their own necessity.  Of course, they rarely point to Genesis 1 as supposed Biblical evidence for this impossibility.

If they did read Genesis 1 with the intention of discovering Biblical support for the idea that God created logic, they would engage in a fruitless search!  The first chapters of Genesis describe how God created time, the physical cosmos, and living creatures on the earth, but it never says that God created necessary truths, which exist independent of any divine, natural, or biological entity.  God only created things that did not conflict with the laws of logic.  Moreover, a deity that is outside of the metaphysical governance of reason (which is utterly impossible) would terrify many of the Christians who claim to love such a God, as this being could exist and not exist at once, be honest and dishonest at the same time, and so on.

Even if the Bible did say such a thing, it would be false by necessity, as logic is not something that can be removed from existence or brought into existence; logic is the only thing that exists for no reason other than its own necessary nature without reference to any other thing.  Other things can only exist if they are logically possible or if they are logically required in light of some other truth.  That the Bible does not teach that God created everything is one of its doctrines that actually makes it logically possible for Christianity to be true in the first place.

John 1:1-3 even clarifies that Yahweh and Jesus jointly created only every kind of thing in existence which was "made" (in other words, broad categories of things like material objects, human life, and so forth).  In saying this, it specifies that God only created certain things, which is exactly what Genesis 1 already teaches without using the same wording.  God did not create himself, which would be a logical impossibility, but he could not have possibly created the very laws of logic that necessitate the existence of an uncaused cause.  To argue that God created everything is only a conscious or ignorant rebranding of total skepticism through the self-defeating rejection of logic's universal necessity.

Logic is not the same as consistent behaviors of physical phenomena, the intellect of any mind (even God's), or a sense of empirical stability.  It is a set of self-verifying laws that both dictate and reveal what follows and what does not follow from true and hypothetical concepts.  Since logic is immaterial, it transcends matter.  Since logic cannot be changed by any will, it transcends all minds--including the divine mind.  That logic is more fundamental and necessary than God himself is not a heretical dismissal of the Biblical God's nature, but it is actually a prerequisite to consistently understanding the Bible to begin with, including the book of Genesis that contains the creation story.

Logic, people.  It is very fucking helpful.

Deuteronomy 22:5

Pants are considered to be exclusively male clothing even by some contemporary Christians, yet there is nothing "male" or "female" about mere cloth.  Biological anatomy and physiology dictate one's gender; psychological and cultural variables are merely individual or social factors, and clothing falls into the latter category.  There is no logical connection between pants and men or dresses and women, for example.  There is only a general expectation that certain clothing will be worn by either men or women in specific cultures.

Women have worn pants for many years in Western culture, and men have historically worn clothing that resemble dresses far more than they resemble modern male clothing (in the West, at least).  In neither case has a person committed an act that is inherently wrong by Biblical standards.  No particular style of clothing is sinful, no matter how foreign, "strange," sensual, or revealing it is.  Of course, none of those qualities (the objective and subjective ones alike) make a certain type of clothing, like pants, "male" or "female."

However, Deuteronomy 22:5 does prohibit the wearing of clothing belonging to the opposite gender.  Given that it is a logical fact that clothing styles are not tied to gender and are not Biblically prescribed (meaning they are not obligatory), it is important to clarify why the command of Deuteronomy 22:5 does not actually conflict with the logical disconnect between clothing and gender.  Instead of prescribing a particular set of clothing for men and another for women, it is only a condemnation of wearing clothing that a given culture has arbitrarily associated with either gender.

Cultural expectations usually change over time, and consensus and tradition never make a particular action morally obligatory or immoral.  All the same, without cultural clothing norms for each gender, the obligation in Deuteronomy 22:5 could not be fulfilled, though the obligation itself is not rooted in culture.  Clothing that is culturally regarded as androgynous or "unisex" is exempt from this prescription because it is not socially associated with either gender, but there are still certain types of clothing associated with men and women in the Western world that the verse would confine to one gender.

If 51% of a society decided to suddenly shift the public expectation for women to wear dresses and associate them with men, for example, no one could say that the majority of the culture affirms the former standards.  If a single person dresses in clothing that is explicitly, almost exclusively associated with one gender, they could not claim to have changed the societal norm.  Thus, the latter individual would violate the command in Deuteronomy 22:5, but the former individuals would not.

It is in this way that Deuteronomy 22:5 still applies in specific cases despite clothing and gender being things that have no non-cultural connection whatsoever--and despite moral obligations having nothing to do with personal or cultural preferences.  The verse does not say that men or women must wear certain clothing styles, like pants or dresses respectively, that unisex clothing is sinful, or that people have to wear clothing in the first place (nudity is nonsinful, as Deuteronomy 4:2 and other verses confirm).  It merely condemns wearing clothing that is generally associated with the opposite gender in a given cultural context.

Eschatological Paranoia Of Microchips

The mark of the beast, first mentioned in Revelation 13, is a described as something that is required to buy and sell and that signifies allegiance to a figure called "the beast."  Although there is no basis for proclaiming that the world is on the verge of being forced to use this mark, the unexpected chaos of 2020 has convinced many that any reference to human microchip implants is a reference to the mark of the beast, which is supposedly at hand.  The condemnation or fear of microchip technology has simply been appraised within the framework of slippery slope fallacies that almost no evangelical treats consistently.

If it is "sinful" to endorse implanting any sort of microchip technology in humans because it will "inevitably" lead to the mark of the beast, why would it not be sinful to endorse implanting microchip technology in animals, since an obvious benefit of doing so would be to test the chips for future human use?  What about opposing the steps prior to using microchips to track or experiment on animals?  Moreover, if it is sinful to support any kind of technology that could be used for vile purposes by an tyrannical, eschatological regime, practically all technology would have to be abandoned!

The evangelicals who fret about every rumor of a human microchip being Revelation 13's "mark of the beast" would have to literally oppose every technological advance that could be used by a hypothetical regime of an Antichrist if they wanted to truly be consistent in their paranoia and suspicion.  After all, if a microchip will ever be used in such a way, numerous technological innovations would have to be made in order to reach the point where an electronic device used for making purchases could be placed inside a person's right hand or forehead.

The almost universal lack of consistency among evangelicals who look to everything involving a microchip as if it signals the coming of an apocalyptic Antichrist figure shows that they have not thought very deeply about the matter on some levels.  Of course, technology itself is never evil and it is legalistic, and therefore Biblically immoral, to treat it as such (Deuteronomy 4:2), and nothing cannot be misused.  Still, it does not follow from the possibility of a tyrannical misuse of technology that the mark of the beast is around every corner.

2020 has been a year full of renewed unverifiable and unfalsifiable predictions about the allegedly impending mark of the beast, and yet there is no evidence that an Antichrist figure has plotted to force anyone to worship his image and take his mark, lest they be excluded from the world's economies and killed (as Revelation 13:11-17 describes).  More importantly, the evil that so many evangelicals expect to mark the "last days" is actually far tamer today than it was at other points in the historical record [1].  There is no reason to suspect that the current era is on the precipice of an apocalypse, and there is plenty of evidence to the contrary.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2019/12/the-days-of-noah.html

The Epistemology Of Death

The capacity for pain and observations of animal death, which many moderners are more likely to see than human death, strongly suggest that humans are subject to eventual deaths of their own.  While these alone are enough to persuade most people that death is a certainty of human existence, logic reveals that this is far from the case.  Evidence for the eventual death of all humans certainly exists, but the belief that one can know that death is approaching is not epistemologically sound.  All assertions to the contrary rest on some type of non sequitur fallacy.

While alive, there is no way (at least for a being with my limitations) to even prove that one is not an immortal being, capable of suffering physically and psychologically without ever actually dying.  There is no evidence that this idea is true, but it is entirely possible that it is, as is the case with any matter that could defy scientific expectations without violating the laws of logic (an impossibility).  Death is far from a logical certainty.

Even knowing with absolute certainty that one will die would still not necessarily entail knowledge of when one will die.  There are scores of logically and scientifically possible ways that any given person could die each day, yet death is often treated like nothing more than a distant outcome--even by people who commit fallacies of inductive reasoning and merely assume that an eventual death is an absolute certainty.

None of these points are themselves evidence that death is not guaranteed to come in a specific way or that it will not come at all.  However, they do logically prove that the very presence of death in one's future and the time at which it would come to oneself are, in an ultimate sense, philosophically up in the air.  Sayings like the one about the certainties of "death and taxes" are simply false, as only truths that can be fully established by reason are guaranteed.

It does not follow from this that it is rational to live without regard for potential danger.  After all, an inability to prove scientific matters beyond one's immediate perceptions does not mean that death is not seemingly probable.  Purely logical matters can be proven in full, but scientific ideas can still be supported with evidences.  There is evidence that death awaits all biological creatures, even if death cannot be demonstrated to be an inevitable, universal destination for living things.

Game Review--City Of Brass (Switch)

"In their thirst for ultimate power, the rulers made a final, terrible pact: imprisoning a trio of genies at the center of the city, their guarantee that the city would become immortal."
--Tutorial spirit, City of Brass


City of Brass is reportedly the product of several developers behind the first two Bioshock games--which have actually just appeared on the Switch eShop along with Bioshock Infinite.  It is far less philosophical (to the point of addressing none of Bioshock's important philosophical concerns about morality and human civilization), yet it does have its own unique approach to its style and mechanics.  An exploration game with heavy combat in some areas, City of Brass has several standout features, like the use of a whip and its randomized levels.

Production Values

In environments that are lit adequately (aka, during daytime levels), the colorful nature of the graphics is on full display, from the blue energy when enemies are killed to the red fireballs conjured by sorceresses.  Nightime levels, to the contrary, obscure the color, even if enemy models and objects are still animated just as well otherwise.  The diversity of the enemies also becomes apparent as one journeys from one level to the next--skeletons, rogue genies, shielded warriors, sorceresses of various kinds, and half-intact zombie-like beings are just some of the enemies players can face.

Gameplay

Upon starting City of Brass on the Switch, one can choose to play as either of characters, one a man and one a woman.  They both carry a whip in their left hands, as all unlockable characters do, and they both have swords in their right hands.  Leveling up unlocks more characters with different weapons, such as a soldier who can throw or stab with her spear and a skeleton that can shoot a crossbow.  It is worthwhile to experiment with multiple characters to see which one fits you best.  If you can advance to specific genies placed within given levels using a character, you can purchase "insurance" with part of your treasure count, which allows you to warp to later levels when starting a new game.

The levels themselves have the same chronological sequence, but the individual details of the environment can differ across playthroughs.  City of Brass has procedurally generated levels, meaning the layout is not guaranteed to look a certain way.  Optional bonuses or handicaps, called divine blessings and burdens respectively, allow players to customize the amount of difficulty, perhaps by increasing their health or letting enemies respawn.  The divine blessings can be a major help due to the fact that the core settings only give you four hearts for an entire playthrough.  If you lose all hearts, you must restart the entire game, although the aforementioned insurance can let you skip certain levels.  However, warping ahead uses wishes.  You only have three per playthrough and they are necessary to obtain items from other genies.

Story

Mild spoilers are below, not that there is much of a story.

An adventurer whose name is not specified shows a genie an item and is allowed access to an otherwise hidden city full of wealth and danger.  The city became cursed when its leaders grew so fixated on their wealth that their allies left them, and its inhabitants are fated to transform into exotic beings upon death.


Intellectual Content

It takes intentional strategizing to plan a way past the first few traps, but, after this, avoiding environmental hazards and killing various enemy types is not necessarily as challenging as it may seem.  Since there is no spoken dialogue, no detailed plot, and no "puzzles" besides evading traps, players who enjoy the game will enjoy it for other qualities, like its shifting environments, fighting, and genie system.


Conclusion

City of Brass is a game that unites the style of an indie game with a setting that fits the Bioshock team behind it, even if Rapture is a grander locale than the city of the former.  Its non-traditional approach to the campaign does nothing to undermine the exploration and combat, but it might require an adjustment period for players almost completely accustomed to levels with fixed level geometry (like Call of Duty).  Despite the game being short in the sense that the whole campaign can be completed in less than two hours, it will likely take many players at least two or three times as long to simply make it to the final level without dying and thus needing to start over.


Content:
 1.  Violence:  Whips, swords, and spears can stun or kill enemies, and effects can be added to whip strikes at the cost of treasure or wishes.  The violence is very tame.

Consistently Seeking Justice

Many people refuse to admit that evils against one group or another are routinely tolerated by conservatives and liberals on a selective basis in order to further arbitrary political goals.  Reactions to injustices of various kinds are often aimed at rousing those on the political right or left, not at exposing the injustice of the acts themselves, much less the irrational ideologies that motivate them.  This has led conservatives and liberals to generally confuse working to end the mistreatment of one group as an attack on some other group.  Even if the two parties were not characterized by this grievous flaw, there would still be no excuse for showing higher respect to one non-ideological group than another.

Conservatives and liberals certainly tend to treat specific groups inversely, bestowing special honors on whichever group in question is more overtly regarded with suspicion or hostility by the other party.  There are further nuances to this, but, for the most part, conservatives will specifically excuse irrationality or injustice on the part of patriarchal men, whites, and the rich, while liberals will specifically excuse irrationality or injustice on the part of women, blacks, and the poor.  Each faction clings to its own stereotypes of certain groups and to straw man misrepresentations of important truths.  This blinds them to vital facts about the nature of social justice.

Fighting systematic injustices against men (such as the dismissal of violence against men and the demonizing of male sexuality) does not mean one is not just as committed to fighting systematic injustices against women (such as modesty teachings targeting women and opposition to female leaders in the church).  Fighting systematic injustices against whites (such as the idea that whites are inherently or all racist) does not mean one is not just as committed to fighting systematic injustices against blacks (such as police killings of blacks motivated by racism).  Similarly, fighting systematic injustices against the poor (such as the stereotype that poverty is inherently tied to laziness) does not mean one is not just as committed to fighting systematic injustices against the rich (such as hatred of the rich simply for having great wealth without regard for whether they accumulated it legitimately).

In their petty delusions, members of both parties overlook the fact that both human rights and the capacity for evil are not limited to only people of one gender, ethnicity, or economic class.  No person is good or evil, rational or irrational, or worthy or unworthy of life simply by being part of these groups.  It is a person's worldview and actions that determine if they are worthy or unworthy of admiration, scorn, acceptance, or hatred.  Intelligence is required to see past the asinine stereotypes and biases that conservatives and liberals continue to support, but intelligence has seemingly never been common.

Rather, common stupidity has kept many from seeing that it is both logically possible and morally necessary to oppose any legitimate injustice, no matter the gender, racial background, or class of the victim.  Whoever ignores injustices against one group or another is himself or herself an obstacle of justice and deserving of hatred, opposition, and refutation.  Any emotional pain from an actual wrong that drives such a person to inconsistency is irrelevant to the fact that they have betrayed reason and morality.  Men, women, whites, blacks, the rich, and the poor are all victimized by widespread biases and mistreatment, and it is hypocritical and unjust to show privilege to one group or another.

Logic, people. It is very fucking helpful.

The Identity Of Satan (Part 2)

The Biblical story of the fall of Satan, like other aspects of Satan's identity, does not have the clarity it is merely assumed to have by many Christians.  Genesis 3 introduces Satan as the serpent of Eden, yet the serpent and the devil are not even confirmed to be the same figure until Revelation 12.  Nothing in Genesis hints at a past expulsion of fallen angels from heaven, and no explanation of the serpent's reason for opposing God is provided.  Even the New Testament does not lay this story out plainly!  Rather, it is Ezekiel 28:12-28 that seems to address Satan's origin and self-imposed corruption--although the subject of these verses may not even be Satan at all.

Ezekiel 28:12-28, unless the passage is almost wholly metaphorical, at least partly addressed an angelic being that possessed moral perfection and incredible beauty before it turned against God.  However, nowhere in these verses is the name Satan or Lucifer used.  What is established by these verses is that the being in question is said to have been a "guardian cherub" with the privilege of visiting Eden and bearing every kind of precious stone on its body.

The description of the King of Tyre leads to two clear possibilities: either 1) the passage is referring to two separate beings, one human and one formerly angelic, or 2) the passage is solely referring to a supernatural and formerly angelic being.  In the case of the latter possibility, Ezekiel 28 would therefore be saying that the true ruler of Tyre is not a person at all, but a demonic entity.  Hints of this are even present in the other possibility.  The human monarch is at a minimum being compared to a cherub that has allowed itself to forsake God's will in pursuit of arrogance and violence.

Now, there is no ultimate confirmation that the entity called the devil in the New Testament is the figure described here, but the passage certainly appears to be literally referring to a created non-human entity that appeared in Eden before the first humans were cast out.  At some point, this being was covered with every precious stone before being expelled from God's "mount," something that the Bible never even suggests is the case elsewhere about any mere human.  Even the first humans were only sent out of Eden, not out of a more explicitly supernatural realm.

The way the "King of Tyre" is addressed nevertheless overlaps with how many Christians describe Satan's past and fall.  Still, Ezekiel never directly equates the figure of Satan (or "the devil") with the King of Tyre.  While the two names could refer to the same being, it is also possible that they are two distinct demonic entities.  At a minimum, both are wicked spiritual beings that oppose God, but this similarity in no way proves that the Bible treats the two as the same demonic presence.

The Avenger Of Blood

There is a significant difference between the accidental killing of a human, also termed manslaughter, and intentional murder, even if both extinguish a human life outside of circumstances that require death for the sale of justice.  Mosaic Law does not prescribe any legal punishment for manslaughter, but it does withhold a manslaughterer's protection from a figure called the avenger of blood.  The avenger of blood was a person morally permitted to hunt down and kill someone guilty of murder if the two met (Numbers 35:16-21), seemingly in circumstances other than those leading up to the execution of a murderer on the testimony of two or three witnesses (Exodus 21:12-14, Deuteronomy 19:15).

In order to protect anyone who had committed manslaughter, cities of refuge were chosen.  Exodus 21:12-14 not only specifically acknowledges that accidental killing that has nothing to do with self-defense is not murder, but it also states that some sort of safe haven for men and women who commit manslaughter would later be designated.  However, it does not specify which regions would eventually serve as places of safety for manslaughterers.  In fact, Numbers 35:9-15 tells the Israelites themselves to select these cities of refuge, although it does require that they designate a certain number of cities of refuge in Canaan and on the other side of the Jordan.

The avenger of blood, as long as he or she did not pursue an irrelevant person, would not be guilty of murder for killing someone who had committed manslaughter if the latter appeared outside of a city of refuge--unless, of course, the high priest living at the time of the manslaughter died (Numbers 35:22-29).  Otherwise, it was not unjust for the avenger of blood to kill one who had unintentionally killed another human, given that the method was not one condemned by Mosaic Law (Deuteronomy 25:1-3 is an example of a passage that separates torture and capital punishment while placing relatively high limitations on corporal punishment).

The Biblical God is so concerned with discouraging the careless killing of humans without malice or premeditation that, although he exempts manslaughterers from mandatory capital punishment due to the genuinely accidental nature of their actions, he does not consider it murder if someone "guilty" of manslaughter does not hide from the avenger of blood.  While manslaughter is not a capital offense, it is still, in a sense, just for someone who has committed manslaughter to die, or else it would not be allowed at all.  The avenger of blood's role is the closest thing there is to a Biblical punishment that is supererogatory.

Refuting Gender Stereotypes: The Unnecessary Nature Of Social Experience

If social experience was in any way relevant to "confirming" gender stereotypes, there would not even be a single man or woman who is slightly different from the asinine, arbitrary stereotypes of men and women prescribed by complementarianism.  There are large disparities between the degree to which some wrongly stereotype men and women, but many of the core traits overlap in complementarian stereotypes of different intensities.  It follows that any traits truly rooted in a person's gender would never be absent in the thoughts or behaviors of anyone else of the same gender.  In order to show that social experience is not consistent with complementarian fallacies, one only needs to find even a handful of people who are not afraid to defy the constructs that are hurled at them from many directions.

If gender stereotypes were tied to biology, as complementarians are forced to claim unless they want to abandon the only ideological basis for complementarianism, there would be no men who experience passionate emotions besides sexual desire and anger.  There would be no women who have a talent for leadership.  There would be no men who are not mindless brutes.  There would be no women who are not content to accomplish little besides becoming a mother.  There would be no men who are sexually or otherwise physically victimized by women.  There would be no women who are overtly "visual" when it comes to sexual attraction.  Indeed, there are numerous other examples one could point to.

Even on an empirical level rather than a strictly logical one (gender stereotypes can be deconstructed and refuted with reason alone prior to any social experience), the foundation of complementarianism is contradicted.  It would be impossible for any man or woman to deviate from gender stereotypes at all if being a man or woman truly ensured certain talents, psychological traits, and moral obligations!  The fact that anyone is not wholly identical to the imaginary, stereotypical man or woman necessarily means that a person's psychological features are not tied to the kind of genitalia they are born with, but are instead either individualistic features or are shaped by their cultural upbringing.

The scourge of complementarianism can be fully disproven by either of two methods: 1) by showing that personality traits and non-physiological abilities do not logically follow from the gender of one's body (or from one man or woman having them that another must) and 2) by showing examples of men and women who naturally defy stereotypes, oneself included.  Regarding the latter, using introspection to prove to oneself that one's own psychological characteristics do not match stereotypes is an easy way to falsify the claims of complementarians.  A person who does not align with gender stereotypes—despite heavy social conditioning, it is likely that almost everyone does not align with them at least in part--can have absolute certainty that they have their own traits no matter what Christian and secular complementarians fallaciously insist.

Ideologies And Religions

All religions are ideologies, but not all ideologies are religions.  Even some forms of theism have nothing to do with religion, such as deism or an agnostic theism that acknowledges the existence of an uncaused cause.  A religion is a specific type of theistic ideology that is associated with an organized religious system.  Some religions are more nuanced, socially complex, or moralistic than others, but their shared components of an organized theology and the potential for socially living out that theology make them religions.  Atheism, for example, lacks the possibility of being a religion because it has no organized theology.  No matter what some theists say, atheism cannot be a religion.

If it is not zealousness, moralism, or mere spirituality that makes a set of theistic ideas religious, why, then, do some religious people, typically conservatives, call any ideological system they are opposed to a "religion?"  Ideologies pertaining to evolution and secular approaches to social justice are two contemporary examples of philosophies that conservative Christians tend to think of in religious terms, although both are often asserted in nonreligious contexts (ethics, including the ethics of social justice, is philosophically connected to theism, but here I am focusing on people who embrace ideas about social justice apart from religious motivations).

Usually, conservatives call a nonreligious ideology a "religion" in a seeming attempt to highlight how erratic or irrational its adherents are, or at least the most vocal ones.  This is ironic because they are also normally the ones to defend religious beliefs rooted in tradition, personal experience, or something else that reduces down to unproven assumptions, but it is also clear that they are trying to attack an ideology based on the behaviors of its followers instead of its actual epistemological, conceptual, or moral nature.  Calling that ideology a religion is just an empty rhetorical tool or an expression of personal stupidity.

A political ideology does not become a religion when it is supported with vehement passion or incoherent motivations.  A scientific premise does not become a religion when it is protected from scientific criticism.  A theistic ideology does not even become a religion until it has at least somewhat organized, systematic followers and tenets!  If theism itself is not automatically religious, how could ideas that have no inherent connection to theism be religious in nature?  They cannot be!

An economic, scientific, or historical claim is simply not religious in nature unless it is logically associated with a religious concept--and not even all theistic concepts are religious ones, as specified above.  To call anything other than theologies like those of Christianity, Islam, or Greek mythology (even though Greco-Roman deities are not even true gods or goddesses in a conceptual sense) a religion is blatant dishonesty that exposes at least one of two things: the claimant's stupidity or their desire to dismiss an ideology by calling it a religion rather than refuting its tenets.  In many cases, both of these things are likely present.

A Confession Of Gullibility From William Lane Craig

It is clear from many statements that William Lane Craig is not the beacon of rationality many theists regard him as, due to a host of fallacies and errors, such as his selective cry for assuming things to be true if they cannot be disproven (like the idea that conscience reveals moral obligations or that one's sensory perceptions match up with the actual external world).  On his Facebook page, he recently admitted to basically assuming that certain scientific claims he read about particle behavior are true (he shared the initial article on June 6th), leading him to recall his support in a follow-up post (on June 7th).

The exact issue of particle physics he commented on is not relevant to the fact that there is no rational basis for accepting miscellaneous scientific claims from others as true because hearsay and agreement (among scientists or anyone else) has no logical connection to metaphysical and epistemological truths, but the article he shared claimed that CERN scientists recorded particles travelint faster than the speed of light.  Craig freely confesses in the later post from June 7th that he is "too trusting" of what he reads, as well as asserting that the article was fake--as if trust in the sense of belief in what cannot be fully proven by strict logicality could ever be anything short of fallacious as it is!

Science is epistemologically inferior to reason in every way; it hinges on logic, whereas logic transcends science and matter.  Neither the elements of scientific perception that cannot be logically proven, including the universality of scientific laws and the nature of physical phenomena beyond what is immediately observable, nor hearsay about scientific matters is what a rational person points to as an example of demonstrable truths.  There is no rational, epistemological justification for believing that a chair one is looking at is even there beyond one's sense of sight, much less that there are particles that travel faster than light.

Craig's assumption that the words of a publication are true is not without precedent, of course.  When explaining the historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus, he appeals to the words of historians instead of directly referring to the documents that mention Jesus!  Historical documents prove nothing more than that someone recorded a claim about history, of course, just as scientific essays and publications prove nothing more than that someone wrote a scientific claim.  As rationalistic Christians might expect, he does not even clarify the distinction between evidence and proof in this context!

It is no surprise that William Lane Craig would believe something that is ultimately unverifiable on the grounds of hearsay.  In other cases, he openly affirms that he believes it is rational and perhaps even necessary to do so!  His own comments about how he would be a Christian in the absence of any evidence whatsoever due to the perceived presence of the Holy Spirit [1] shows that he is no stranger to making assumptions if they do not contradict the philosophical ideas he wants to be true.  On the basis of preference and persuasion, he is content with making and believing blind assertions.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/04/william-lane-craigs-foundational.html

Artistic Originality

Some similarities in how two works of entertainment handle plots, character arcs, subversion of expectations, and genre norms are inevitable, but similarities alone do not exclude originality and quality.  In some cases, similarities can even be a sign of quality.  It is a logical and artistic mistake to regard a work as insignificant or mediocre simply because its storytelling, characterization, or themes overlap with those of previous works.  Indeed, some similarities are artistically necessary!

For example, merely having a protagonist or antagonist is often a necessary repetition of something that audiences have already seen hundreds or thousands of times before.  Does this mean that making a story with a protagonist or antagonist is a dull, cheap endeavor?  Of course not!  Similarities between stories of this type are inescapable.  There are only so many story elements that are possible to begin with, and working within these immutable confines is not the same as lacking originality--either in the sense of independent thinking or creative innovation.

Moreover, that two stories (whether they are presented in literary, video, or gaming form) share obvious, thorough similarities does not mean that either work lacks quality.  If two athletes both possess the same amount of skill, neither athlete's ability nullifies that of the other.  If two speakers share the same level of masterful articulation, neither speaker's skill removes that of the other.  In the same way, a book, video game, film, or TV/streaming show can still be artistically valid even if it intentionally or unintentionally mirrors much of a previous work.

It follows from these facts that complaints about similarities between various works of entertainment are not valid unless the similarities actually cause the latter story to fail to reach a greater potential it may have had.  Short of this, the best of the worst case scenarios is a new, artistically sound (at least overall) release that parallels an older, artistically sound release.  There are far worse things that can happen to a new entertainment project than not being the first work to explicitly utilize a concept, style, or other sort of creative technique.

Dave Ramsey's Non Sequitur Financial Advice

Positions that might seem or even be extreme are sometimes correct.  The comparative or perceived intensity of an idea is never an automatic indicator of truth or falsity, but some extremes can attract attention far more easily than truths.  Perhaps this is why some of Dave Ramsey's ideas about personal finance have been accepted by listeners.  Dave Ramsey is a popular financial advisor whom many evangelical Christian circles are familiar with, so to deconstruct his claims is to hold up yet another asinine ideology associated with evangelicals to the light of reason.

One of the most renowned parts of Dave Ramsey's philosophy of personal finance is his universal or near-universal disdain for credit cards, which he regards as an enslaving, overpowering force that will drive almost anyone into debt from overspending.  He encourages credit card users to cut up their cards and switch to exclusively using cash or debit cards.  While committing blatant logical fallacies, he asserts that there is some inherent emotional connection to using cash that will inevitably help people avoid making at least some unnecessary purchases.

For some people, feeling and seeing bills or coins might be all the deterrence they need to avoid overspending.  For others, whether due to intelligence, self-control, a simple lack of desire, or any combination of these factors, using credit cards poses no threat to their financial security.  Even in the cases of people who use credit cards to the point of incurring gratuitous debt, it is never the credit cards that are the problem, but the way they are being handled by their owners.  The latter facts are the ones Dave Ramsey denies or ignores.

Credit cards even offer rewards that most debit cards do not, which can be an incentive to use credit cards within one's means rather than using cash.  Using cash simply depletes one's supply of cash; using credit cards can help a person strategically make necessary purchases while returning a portion of their spent money back.  If one has both options available and there is no tendency to abuse credit cards, there is no reason to use cash other than pure preference!  It is pragmatically superior to use credit cards in such a scenario.

Dave Ramsey is merely overreacting to some people's weaknesses by discouraging all credit card use in favor of cash or debit cards--but mostly cash.  In doing do, he commits non sequitur fallacies by appealing to slippery slope errors and extrapolating from one person to another.  Neither slippery slopes nor extrapolating psychological traits and struggles is a sound way to approach any subject.  A framework of personal finances that demonizes credit cards is irrational because no framework is sound when assumes something to be positive or negative.

The Epistemology Of Conspiracy Theories

Political power can be a very nuanced thing.  Sometimes power is held in seemingly unlikely places.  Sometimes, however, power might be held exactly where it seems to be.  The goal of conspiracy theories is to persuade people that the true political "elite" is out of sight, dictating policies and events from shadows that only a select few can see past.  While it is not logically impossible for certain conspiracy theories to ultimately be true, it is logically impossible to verify if many of them are true.  Given the way these conspiracies are defined, they tend to fall into the territory of the unverifiable and unfalsifiable.

Conspiracy theories are often not rooted in actual evidence, as they are instead usually formed when someone interprets events in a fallacious way by making assumptions about what is truly happening.  Perhaps they feel special due to having such "knowledge" that is supposedly too esoteric for the common person to be capable of understanding, or perhaps their ideas about an alleged conspiracy let them feel a desired sense of urgency.  Perhaps they are simply irrational enough to believe in random ideas as long as the ideas are subjectively enthralling.

Whatever their motivations, conspiracy theorists are usually the victim of their own stupidity.  It is not that it is logically impossible for an unseen political cabal to be in place, but that the very fact that such a cabal would be invisible from the perspectives of most (or all) outsiders that undermines almost all attempts to argue for a conspiracy.  The very conditions that would hide a conspiracy from the public eye, if it indeed exists, would likely prevent it from being knowable.

A conspiracy is almost never embraced on the basis of evidence--and a conspiracy could never be logically proven, only supported with mere evidence at best.  The very fact that a conspiracy remains in the shadows puts it in a negative epistemological light: you can't support a conspiracy theory by appealing to things that by nature are concealed from anyone who investigates it!  A conspiracy theorist usually argues from a default position of unverifiability.

As with all other unverifiable claims, there is no basis or justification for believing in an elusive conspiracy that is by definition concealed.  A person with a sound epistemology only embraces that which can be established by reason.  If reason can establish that an idea is true, a rational person regards it as true.  If reason can establish that an idea is reinforced be evidence, a rational person believes that it can be reinforced by evidence--which is still distinct from believing it is true.  Conspiracy theories are neither logically verifiable nor, in most cases, supportable with evidence.

What Sexual Hedonism Is Not

A desire to avoid hedonism has led many Christians to abandon all outward indication of interest in pleasures of certain kinds, as if they would offend God or intelligent, non-legalistic Christians simply by expressing interest in sensual pleasure or admitting to appreciating it deeply.  This has particularly hindered many Christians from enjoying their own sexualities in ways that God does not oppose, yet these efforts are needless: sexual hedonism goes far beyond a craving or desire for sexual pleasure, stimulation, or release.  It is the prioritizing of sexual pleasure above reason, God, morality, and others.

A single or married person can regularly think about sexuality, and not only in an intellectual sense, to the point of looking forward to seeing members of the opposite gender to whom they are sexually attracted, masturbating multiple times a day, and looking at sensual images of the opposite gender with sexual intent (or masturbating to them) often without embracing sexual hedonism.  Even a man or woman who relentlessly dwells on sexual pleasure in the privacy of their own mind has not indulged in hedonistic ideology or practice.  There is a sharp difference between love of pleasure and slavery to pleasure!

Hedonism is not anything short of holding up pleasure, and sensory pleasures in particular, as the ultimate or only good.  In other words, actively pursuing nonsinful pleasures is not hedonistic, even if one devotes a large amount of time and thought to doing so.  It is possible to devote a great deal of effort towards having pleasurable experiences without ever sacrificing obligations to God or others in the process.  To do so would be to elevate pleasure above other things which are more important, but anything less is not a philosophical "deification" of pleasure.

Sexual hedonism is therefore not a deep appreciation of sexuality on an intellectual, personal, or spiritual level; similarly, it is not the same as engaging in Biblically permissible sexual acts such as masturbation, even to imagery of the opposite gender, as often as one can without neglecting any of one's moral obligations.  As such, it is erroneous and unjust to consider people who are merely open about their sexualities as slaves to pleasure when they are not imposing their desires on members of the opposite gender in nonconsensual or otherwise sinful ways.

The Identity Of Satan (Part 1)

Despite his prominence in Christian art, literature, and discussion, Satan is more of a background figure in the Bible than collective churchgoers seem to imply.  Satan is mentioned in the Old Testament, but not to the same extent as in some of the later books of the Bible.  In fact, one of his most renowned appearances is not even specified to actually be an appearance of Satan until the final book of the Bible.  One could read much of the Bible without ever actually coming across any of the ideas about the devil found in the church and in entertainment.

The sheer ambiguity of Old Testament information about Satan would probably surprise many Christians if it was more widely known.  The Old Testament is far more helpful, clear, and foundational than the New Testament when it comes to matters like moral revelation, but the identity of Satan is simply not a clear matter in the Old Testament.  Satan is referenced in the Old Testament, but it is not until the gospel accounts that the Bible begins to more fully describe his nature as a cosmic adversary of God.

After this, other New Testament books, such as Revelation, more frequently mention Satan by one of his alternative titles, such as "the devil."  In fact, it is Revelation 12 that finally reveals the identity of the serpent of Eden in Genesis 3--prior to this chapter, no details about the serpent are provided other than those provided in Genesis.  His manipulative craftiness, opposition to God, and selective acknowledgment of truth are all established in the narrative of Eden, but his identity beyond this is withheld until Revelation.

Satan, despite the aforementioned information provided in the Bible, is not as prominent of a figure in Biblical theology as many Christians and non-Christians seem to think.  For example, the exact story of his rebellion against God and his motivations for doing so are not clearly laid out anywhere in the Bible.  Miscellaneous information about Satan is given at various points, but there is no singular passage that explicitly develops the Christian theology behind Satan in the way many people imagine.

This does not mean that there is not enough for Christians to develop a Biblical theology of Satan.  On the contrary, Satan is an important figure in Christian theology!  He is merely in the background far more than popular ideas suggest.  It is not as if there would not be such a thing as sin without him, as humans are completely capable of sinning on their own.  Satan is never even implied to have the power to override human free will, much less cause all human sin and misery.  However, he is presented as an entity to take seriously, even if that means little more than acknowledging his somewhat ambiguous role within Biblical theology.

The Earth's Shape

The subject of the earth's shape is associated with an amount of controversy that might surprise those who have never thought of the issue since school.  As with many things, true or false, the spherical shape of the earth is merely assumed to be true by societies that scarcely concern themselves with epistemological inquiries.  There is genuine evidence that the planet is a sphere, of course, but the issue is considered so fundamental to many who see the current consensus challenged that it is dramatically exaggerated in importance.

Does familiarity with the evidence for a spherical shape transform the experienced daily life of humans?  Of course not!  Whether our planet is a disc or a sphere is of no relevance to the nature of reason, the uncaused cause, morality, or human consciousness, all of which are more significant than the shape of cosmological bodies ever could be.  The shape of the earth is simply of little to no consequence for the future of humankind or for how we live in the present.

Of course, the earth's shape is a matter of truth, as all material objects must by logical necessity have some sort of shape.  While it is ultimately impossible to prove which shape the planet has beyond our perceptions for the same reason it is impossible to even prove that one's body ultimately has four limbs (sensory perceptions and the actual appearance and shape of material objects do not necessarily align), it is possible to find evidence for the earth having one shape or another.

It is nonetheless true that a flat or spherical earth is of no grand philosophical consequence, as is the case with many scientific matters that plenty of modern people obsess over with a disproportionate amount of zeal and attention.  Affirming the evidence for a spherical planet is one thing; it is another thing to pretend like a particular model of the earth's shape is an absolute certainty like the veracity of a sound logical deduction or the immediate perceptions of one's consciousness.

Whether the earth is a flat disc or a sphere is simply a minor matter at best even after one has considered the epistemological limitations which prevent a person on the planet's surface from seeing the whole of the earth from a distance.  Yes, either one of these ideas is false or both of them are.  Yes, there is evidence that the earth is indeed spherical.  All the same, it takes an incredible amount of philosophical incompetence to think that this is truly an issue that is of deep, pressing importance.

A Christological Mistake

In 1 Corinthians 11:1, Paul insists that Christians imitate his example as he imitates Christ.  Although many Christians cannot even point to an exact book, passage, or verse that addresses the sinlessness of Jesus at all when cornered (as is true of other genuine and erroneous doctrines), the moral perfection of Jesus is a central idea of the New Testament, even if it is rarely mentioned directly.  What this does not mean is that every action performed by Christ is obligatory or that every act not performed by Christ is not obligatory.  Indeed, many of Christ's acts in the gospels are at most supererogatory--that is, morally good but not intrinsically obligatory (feeding specific crowds and forgiving sins are examples of this).

There is no Biblical or extra-Biblical evidence that Jesus married, drove a car, or used the internet, but singleness, driving, and internet use are objectively nonsinful on the Biblical worldview (Deuteronomy 4:2).  While none of these examples are necessary to show that it does not follow from Jesus being morally perfect that one must not deviate from any course of action he took, they do establish that the behaviors of Jesus are not especially relevant to Biblical moral epistemology.  Mosaic Law, which Jesus affirmed core tenets of (such as in Matthee 15:1-9), is the primary source of moral revelation in the Bible, and Jesus does nothing to dispute this.

It is one thing to call Jesus sinless, but it is another to look to his situational, often supererogatory behaviors rather than the moral ideas of the Old Testament which he affirms in the New Testament.  Christians in general are quick to point to principles Jesus vaguely acts on in the gospel accounts, but they are slow to look first to the very laws that Jesus came to represent.  No one can construct a sound and complete Biblical framework of social justice, criminal justice, government, sexual ethics, and so on simply by appealing to the words of Jesus.  In fact, the New Testament as a whole is utterly vague in its moral teachings because many of the specifics are already detailed in the Old Testament.

The person who says he or she just wants to "show the love of Jesus" cannot even firmly define which acts are and are not loving without knowing what rights the Bible assigns to their fellow humans, and nowhere does Jesus thoroughly elaborate on any of these rights.  One can identify numerous rights that the Torah describes as being possessed by all humans--and the person who truly loves their neighbor will treat others justly in accordance with these rights rather than in accordance with either party's conscience.  Gratuitous kindness is gratuitous; appealing behavior is subjective.  Until Christians on the right and left stop looking to the New Testament, including the words of Jesus, for the Bible's primary moral instructions, they will be forced to live out vague, arbitrary, and irrelevant ideas about love and justice.