The Physical And Mental Components Of Actions

Suppose I have the urge to get inside my automobile and drive to a restaurant.  While being driven, the car itself might be moving forward because I am not pressing the brake pedal, which would allow the tires to continue rotating, gripping the pavement due to traction.  Physics-related activities occur in the engine, like the movement of the pistons spinning the crankshaft.  Whatever physical causes and effects are engaged would of course be why, on one level, that being the scientific one, the car is driving.  However, in another sense, the phenomenological/psychological one, this is not why I am driving at all: I am driving because I want to go from one place to another by car.

While neither is the entirety of why the car is moving in the first place, the phenomenological reason behind the event is at the very least no less important than that of physics--and it is logical possibility as dictated by consistency with logical axioms that makes either aspect of this possible to begin with, so matter and mind alike, while being of causal relevance, are not the foundation of all reality here or elsewhere.  Yes, I am driving because I am a conscious being that has intentionality, sensory perception, and freedom of the will [1].  I could stop the car or turn it from its path at any moment.

This does not exclude any of the physical causality relationships (yes, observed correlations might not be causes and effects and almost no cause and effect can be proven/known to go together [2], but either way, some sort of physical causality would have to occur) that are required for a car to literally turn on and then become mobile.  There are electrical and mechanical components that have to function a certain way for the vehicle, under the perceived laws of physics, to operate, and to operate in an effective way that gets me from one location to another as desired.  It is just that desire, intentionality, and choice are inherently of the mind rather than the physical world or the laws of nature tied to it.

Every human action that is not within the mind alone, such as introspective concentration, requires a combination of mental and physical factors.  Someone cannot eat without using their jaw to chew and their throat to swallow food, but they also have to will themselves to lift any utensils being used, to open and close their jaw, and so on.  They could stop at any time, and there might be mental reasons for eating beyond just the need for physical sustenance.  For instance, he or she might want to delight in the taste of a particular dish, which is a mental phenomenon rather than a physical one, although it might trigger bodily reactions like salivation.

As such, there are reasons for things like the movement of a car as it is being driven or the consumption of food that go demonstrably beyond any sort of mere physical occurrences.  The mind is logically necessary for the experience of perception that lurks within the body, for it is the immaterial thing that does the perceiving, whatever its exact causal relationship to the body it is confined to.  The body is necessary for there to be a foot on the gas pedal or to engage in the active behavior of eating, as well as the passive process of digestion, but in these and other such examples, it is because of the mind that there is perception and because of the mind that there is intention and thus intentional action.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2019/07/more-than-biological-machines.html

[2].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2019/07/correlative-relationships.html

Another Dave Ramsey Error

The debt snowball method entails making only the minimum payments on however many debts a person has except for the smallest: with this debt, the method would hold that someone needs to devote as much money past the minimum payment as possible every month to annihilating this particular amount owed.  Once it is gone, the money that would have been assigned to the previously lowest debt is now thrown at the new lowest debt, the amount growing (other circumstances aside) until the highest debt can be addressed all by itself.  The snowball method is not inherently the fastest way to get out of debt, no matter what Dave Ramsey and his employees like George Kamel might say.  His philosophy of debt reduction, really, is only beneficial for idiots, so that they at least make some consistent progress despite their stupidity, or for reassuring the very impulsive spender and debtor that there is a plan they can follow.

The debt snowball Ramsey and his team love to endorse is objectively not the best way to tackle multiple debts of diverse sizes and interest rates.  Logical necessities about interest on principal and the potential disparity between debt sizes alone establish this.  Taking care of a $1,500 debt with 1% interest, to give a random hypothetical example, before putting any resources beyond making minimum payments towards eliminating a $50,000 debt with even just 2% interest, compounding or not, will ultimately cost far more money long-term.  Since the principal and the interest rate are both higher in the latter case, one would not even need to calculate the exact monthly/annual ramifications of this for each debt to realize these things.  When there is a small debt or a host of relatively minor debts along with a significantly greater one, focusing on the largest principal with the largest interest rate is still better for minimizing the time and expenditure of money involved in liberating oneself.

The real benefit of the snowball method, as the Ramsey team might admit, is situational to a person's subjective, individualistic psychological motivation.  Perhaps a person ridding himself or herself of various small debts first, no matter the interest rates or difference in principal between the smallest and largest debts, provides them with a satisfaction or relief that helps them stay personally committed to actually escaping debt across months and years.  This benefit is possible.  However, this method can still take far longer and result in a great deal of money unnecessarily spent as high principal, high interest debts are allowed to grow almost entirely untouched, compounding at much more crippling rates.  The real problem would be in a person's lack of discipline rather than the opposite sort of debt elimination system.

A philosophy of debt reduction strategy is not false just because an individual or many individuals lack the self-control, a totally avoidable thing on their part since actions can be controlled even if desires cannot be, to carry it out consistently or at all.  The snowball method is popular because it can provide quicker elimination of the total number of individual debts, but the individual debts paid off might be much less troublesome in the present and in the future than the ones that have to be ignored to varying extents in order for the snowball approach to be utilized.  Dave Ramsey, as accurate as his advice or that of his cohorts can sometimes be, is reliant on holding to ideas that are at most only applicable in specific situations for specific people and thus are immediately fallacious outside of those contexts, including the snowball debt approach.

The First Impressions Fallacy

The default habit of some where a person is judged based on "first impressions," which almost inevitably involve total assumptions about their worldview or personality or talents (if applicable), is something practiced exclusively by the irrational.  There is often nothing to go off of but emotional perception or how the observed person fits into meaningless cultural norms--though it is not as if knowing someone for a longer time truly bridges minds [1].  The fool tries to participate in whatever sociocultural bullshit their community encourages or forces upon them, maybe even joyfully.  

This kind of person either makes assumptions about others based on very limited exposure (all assumptions are assumptions, though, so no one is justified in having unproven beliefs about others even with more exposure) or they want to bend over backwards to be arbitrarily judged according to someone else's personal biases and cultural constructs about politeness or some other nonsense.  Suppose that someone has a brief verbal/observational encounter with a stranger where the latter is perceived to be arrogant or brutal.  On the level of language, intention, and the actual concepts being communicated, there was no actual harshness, but the former person perceived there to be illusory abrasiveness and, on the basis of how things appeared rather than how they were, made an assumption.

All language is ultimately ambiguous since one is not experiencing any mind but one's own, and one can only know with absolute certainty what one's own words mean, but there are certain things that would almost certainly mean someone is irrational even in an initial conversation.  If someone says that logical axioms are false, that a secondary historical source is as relevant as a primary one, or that Nazism is morally good in your first encounter with them, they are an idiot, yes.  They could change for the better, but the first impression is indeed damning.  They are not a rationalist if they at all mean the standard definitions by those words.  However, things like a supposedly arrogant attitude without any accompanying words or deeds to point towards actual arrogance are irrelevant.

Perhaps the person in question really is arrogant, but mere outward perceptions cannot ever reveal to you the interior of other minds, and simply perceiving how they "come across" to oneself is not even direct evidence of their mental states, much less proof.  Misunderstanding this during a first and potentially only meeting and then fallaciously rejecting the logical possibility of improvements with time, some people not only make assumptions (even proudly), but they also never acknowledge how a person might change for better or worse after a first encounter.

This has consequences for everything from philosophical conversations with non-rationalists (they remain slaves to assumptions and will possibly hate you without any justification) to job hirings and more.  Combined with other biases, someone guilty of the "first impressions fallacy" only sinks more into stupidity and might be genuinely hostile towards someone they do not even know beyond cursory observation.  Non-rationalists can think they are rational for making assumptions, usually selective ones that already appeal to them, but they are worms that fall far short of superior philosophers.  Reality is not knowable through the laziness and haphazard nature of assumptions.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2022/04/the-gulf-between-minds.html

Movie Review--The Cave

"They built the church to seal the save as a display of God's protective power.  Now, try to imagine these Knights Templar entering the cave and, according to the local legend, fighting these winged... demons."

--Dr. Nicolai, The Cave

"Every cave organism we've discovered so far originated on the surface.  Over time, they've adapted.  Lost pigmentation and sight, developed a heightened sense of hearing and smell."

--Dr. Kathryn Jennings, The Cave

The Cave is almost 20 years old.  A PG-13 horror film with its own mark on the cave subgenre, it has a fair amount of potential that it actually realizes.  It is not quite at the level of The Decent, but The Descent is almost perfect in its execution, a masterpiece near the absolute apex of cave-based horror.  The cast and the subterranean beasts are enough to keep the movie more than afloat.  The way the creature is depicted does improve from the quickly-shifting camera cuts that the more intense moments rely on at first, so one of the more prominent weaknesses gets resolved closer to the end.  Also noteworthy is how most of the special effects, even in 2023, do not have a blatantly outdated look and are right at home in the 2020s just as they were in the 2000s.  The same would probably not be true of a CGI-heavy movie released in the last 10 years.

Production Values

The greatest two pillars of the film are the underwater cinematography and the acting, with the former at its best when longer, unbroken shots of the team underwater are onscreen, the cave bathed in blue artificial light.  Additionally, there are some shots of the various animals like scorpions that inhabit the cave's serpentine passages, and these also stand among the best of the otherwise adequate but basic camerawork.  Though it is not always directly, clearly shown until well over halfway into the runtime, the creature of The Cave is different enough from the humanoids of The Descent to make it unique.  Moreover, the ensemble cast ensures that the characters are acted well.  Lena Headey, Daniel Dae Kim, Cole Hauser, and the others do not receive a lot of character development, but they do not bring poor performances.

Story

Some spoilers are below.

30 years after some a group of people is trapped in a Romanian cave system under a church floor and suffer a cave-in, scientists hoping to map out and explore the same cave system find success in locating an underwater entrance.  A kind of mole rat is quickly found below the surface, as well as hints of another, more aggressive animal--and a parasite that is present on both the mole rats and a salamander.  A severed claw from the more aggressive organism resembles a part of the supposed demons seen on artwork from Knights Templar.

Intellectual Content

Again, like The Descent, The Cave lightly touches upon evolutionary adaptations and what it would be like to develop new traits in isolation from the surface world, just more as a way to set up a cinematic situation than as a way to really explore biology, evolution, isolation, and all the existential ramifications of these ideas.  As a result, there is not much of a specific philosophical issue that is directly, intentionally examined, whether it is true or false.  The better cave movie I keep mentioning also had subplots and more explicitly moral issues woven into the overall plot, which gave it additional layers that are simply absent in The Cave, and releasing around the same time was never likely to work in favor of the latter when it comes to reputation.

Conclusion

For what it is, The Cave is not a bad movie.  Some of the cinematography during encounters with the creature could have been smoother, the characters could have been more developed (a smaller cast could have helped with this), and more of the backstory for the cave could have come to light.  In spite of these issues, the execution is competent enough and the acting is strong enough to keep The Cave from ever becoming a terrible movie.  It is also a chance to see Lena Headey before she reached the more mainstream status she has now.  This could have been a distinctly better movie, but it also could have turned out much worse.  For a better horror film about a cave network, see The Descent; for a better, more personal drama movie about a creature in water, see The Shallows.  At the same time, there is nothing about The Cave that reaches the cave floor of movie quality no matter its general reception.

Content:

 1.  Violence:  Exposed bone is directly on camera in one scene, and bloody wounds are shown in other scenes, yet many of the sequences where the scientists are attacked have too little light or are portrayed with such rapid camera cuts that nothing truly graphic is seen.

 2.  Profanity:  Words like "shit, "damn," "bitch," and "bastard" are uttered every now and then.

Ideas Require, People Presuppose

I have heard people say that one given idea presupposes another, and I myself might have used this language before, though I really meant that to believe in one idea which is unverifiable requires, at least if one is consistent, that one believe some preceding, prerequisite idea at well.  Otherwise, I meant that the nature of a certain idea hinges on another.  The idea that stars exist, if true, logically requires that matter exists.  The existence of matter does not logically require, or in other words, necessitate, that stars exist.  No, even in my rationalistic embrace of sensory skepticism, I do not think that stars do not exist, for this too is unprovable.  I only mean that of these ideas, one intrinsically requires the other in order to be true, but not the other way around.

As for people rather than ideas, a person could assume an idea is true or believe it without even having any sincere commitment to its ramifications, presupposing it on faith in sheer epistemological stupidity.  People can presuppose/assume that an idea is correct if they allow themselves to, but an idea can only logically require another idea.  The necessary laws of logic and the concepts they govern do not believe in anything because they are not conscious entities; logical necessity and true concepts are true in themselves whether or not they are grasped or believed, and it is an objective fact that an idea necessitated logically by another idea has that relationship even if the "preceding" idea is false.

However, a person is indeed in error anytime, no matter the subject or the extent of their fallacious persuasion, that he or she believes something without logical proof.  A thing can be both true and demonstrable and still be merely assumed by a fool who has put no effort into avoiding assumptions or attempting to verify the issue in question, starting with the metaphysically self-necessary, epistemologically self-evident truths of logical axioms on which all else depends.  No idea can presuppose another even then because necessary truths do not think.  They are grasped by the mind.  Necessary truths do not depend on the mind, for they are true in themselves with or without other metaphysical things, which means they exist independent of all else--since logical axioms being false still entails that they are true (for instance, it cannot be true that truth does not exist, and so it exists necessarily), logic is more foundational and transcendent than even God [1].

Someone might use the wording of one concept presupposing another, but ideas do not perceive, and so they cannot assume anything; they are abstract concepts true or false regardless of belief or perception.  It is people who can be rational or irrational, who can discover, celebrate, neglect, deny, or oppose logical truths.  It is people who can hold the notion that things are true, and in doing so, if they are not rationalistic, they are making assumptions.  Hence, they can presuppose philosophies, but their their philosophies do not presuppose, though they logically require either preceding ideas up to a point or ramifications that would follow from them necessarily if true.  Ideas require, and people presuppose.  The latter do not have to, of course.  It is merely easier to for people who are accustomed to belief based on intuition, social acceptance, personal convenience, emotional persuasion, and so on to continue looking to them.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2020/10/the-ultimate-being.html

Ideological Family In New Jerusalem

Details about the true nature of the Biblical heaven are scattered about.  John 14:2-3 says that there are "many rooms" in the Father's dwelling place, which will be unveiled to the listening disciples upon the return of Jesus.  Revelation 21-22 goes into the most detail of all the relevant passages, describing it as a city in a universe purified of evil that nations go to and from in a broader land.  In Mark 10:29-30, Jesus touches upon how in this age, whoever gives up family and belongings for him will receive far more of the same things that they lost than they had before, and in the age to come (the days after the resurrection, as clarified by the texts that say the dead are nonexistent or unconscious until then, such as Ecclesiastes 9:5-10), eternal life will be added to these blessings.

The context is the immediate aftermath of the conversation between Jesus and the rich young ruler who left saddened by Christ's instructions to sell what he had and give to the poor.  After Jesus has emphasized how difficult it can be for a person committed to their riches to enter God's kingdom, the disciples ask how anyone can be saved.  Jesus says that though it is harder for a rich person to enter God's kingdom than it is for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, this is possible with God, with whom all logically possible things can be done; the being who controls the laws of nature--not at all the intrinsic necessary truths of logic--could certainly alter or suspend them at whim.

The disciples, hearing how difficult it can be to commit to God, assert that they have left everything to follow Jesus, but he says that anyone who has left family and belongings for his sake will fail to have a hundred times this many siblings, parents, and belongings--and in the age to come, after the resurrection of the righteous (Daniel 12:2, 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, Revelation 20:4-6), eternal life as well.  Though Jesus says that even in this life, one will have a multitude of family and friends, since they would enjoy the grander kind of "family" relationship that all devoted to the truth share, this would also be true after the resurrection to eternal life.

Thus, the righteous will be left to enjoy unblemished interpersonal relationships with all people in existence, communing in their awareness of reality (including logical necessities that transcend all else and the scientific behaviors of the restored universe) and in their peaceful status before God and others.  New Jerusalem on Earth will be their home.  Among brothers and sisters of a biological and non-biological kind, they will be free to bask in friendships without end.  How ironic it is that so many Christians have shunned these kinds of relationships on Earth, discouraging women and men from pursuing deep friendship together and prioritizing wicked biological family members over superior relationships between ideological family members who are rationalists.

Whether they embraced this kind of relationship on Earth, all of the righteous and repentant will live forever in bliss without evil or evildoers after their resurrection.  Only the logical possibility of evil exists apart from evildoers, as there are no actual evil thoughts, intentions, or deeds apart from those who practice such things.  Since the wicked are to be banished from existence itself (Ezekiel 18:4, 2 Peter 2:6, Romans 6:23, and many more verses affirm this overtly) rather than suffer the injustices of eternal torment, there will come a time if Christianity is true at which there will be no more evil.  As far as beings go, there will be only the righteous, angelic servants of God, and God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit (who are not the same beings at all) according to what the Bible.

The "Spirits In Prison"

1 Peter 3:19 briefly states that Jesus, after being made alive, made proclamations to imprisoned spirits whom verse 20 calls beings who disobeyed in the days of Noah, perhaps making these spirits the "sons of God" or their offspring from Genesis 6 that sexually engaged with humans before the great flood.  There is another group of beings that is very likely the same one Peter speaks of.  In either case, if this passage is at all consistent with the blatant, repeated teaching of the Old Testament on the true state of death before resurrection, it is in no way talking about Jesus seeing souls in Sheol before he resurrected.  The text says he was made alive before his proclamation, and dead humans are currently unconscious or totally nonexistent on the level of the mind (Ecclesiastes 9:5-10). 

The only spirits the Bible specifically says are imprisoned would be a subcategory of fallen angels mentioned in 2 Peter 2:4 and likely in Jude 1:6, beings confined with chains in the dungeons of what Peter calls Tartarus until their eschatological judgment.  This lone reference to Tartarus (Jude does not mentioned the name of where its fallen angels are kept) does not clarify what sins these angels committed in order to be bound and set aside until they are moved to the lake of fire (Matthew 25:41).  It does indicate that the demons are not being tormented, just imprisoned.  Even for the demons for whom hell was created, as Jesus says in the aforementioned verse from Matthew 25, torment during the wait for their final judgment and punishment is not justice.

Peter is the New Testament author who says both that Jesus spoke with spirits in prison before he returned to the Jesus in resurrection and that there are certain demons chained in Tartarus until "the great day."  This alone would suggest that these two verses address the same group of spirits, which are not human at all, though 1 Peter could be mentioning a different set of fallen angels.  If 1 Peter 3:19 did teach a conscious intermediate state for the human dead before their resurrection, it would more importantly contradict the Old Testament teaching of unconsciousness for the dead in Sheol (Ecclesiastes 9:5-10 again, as well as Job 3:11-19 and Psalm 88:10-12), which is only disturbed by means such as sorcery (the witch of Endor summoning the spirit of Samuel in 1 Samuel 28 would not at all necessitate that the dead are conscious by default right now!).

Any philosophical conflict between the Old Testament and New Testament, in the case of morality, the afterlife, or anything else, would mean that the New Testament contradicts the preceding ideas and books it itself claims are true.  The Old Testament can be true independent of the New Testament's veracity, but the opposite is not true.  Like how the Quran affirms the Torah, the New Testament affirms the Old Testament, and if it, like the Quran does, also contradicted something that it requires to be true, then it would have to be false on at least that point.  Now, the New Testament does not contradict Ecclesiastes, Job, Psalms, or any other part of the Bible that teaches that the dead are unperceiving--if their consciousness exists at all--until they are resurrected to face eternal bliss or the second, final death.

Jesus could have conversed with spirits at some point before or after his resurrection without them being human spirits, and the dead could be unconscious without anything about this being contradicted or vice versa.  Nothing about 1 Peter 3:19 would require that its own truth, if the New Testament is indeed true, logically necessitates that the dead are anything other than nonexistent or sleeping without thought until their bodies are reformed, their souls are reawakened, and they stand before God to experience their eternal life or to be sentenced to the lake of fire and wholly, permanently die (2 Peter 2:6).  Until that time or some other affiliated eschatological event, the demons of 2 Peter 2:4 wait in chains, almost certainly the particular spirits Peter had already referenced before.

The Neglected Misandry Of Some Biblical Misinterpretations (Part Two)

Each book of the Bible containing part of Mosaic Law has at least two passages that explicitly, distinctly refer to men and women and then use male nouns or pronouns in translations like the King James Version to refer to both of them as a whole, which I provided the verses for in part one.  Two pertain to equivalence in the physical mistreatment of men and women (slaves in the case laws) and how the punishment for mistreating one is the same as that for mistreating the other (Exodus 21:20-21, 21:26-27).  Two pertain to the levitical skin disease laws and how men and women alike are to be examined and, if needed, sent outside of the camp (Leviticus 13:29-39, Numbers 5:1-4).  One is about how the obligation to make restitution in applicable cases is for offending men and women, with their punishment being identical (Numbers 5:5-7).  One is about how men and women can voluntarily make a Nazarite vow (Numbers 6:1-21).  Two are about how men and women who commit the same class of sin, in these examples either enticing someone to worship other gods or going further and carrying this out, are to be executed as applicable--again receiving the same punishment as with Numbers 5:5-7 (Deuteronomy 13:6-10, 17:2-7).  Two others, like Exodus 21:20-21 and 26-27, mention male and female servants and state that Hebrew servants have to be released every seven years, while foreign servants do not (with the exception of those encompassed in Leviticus 19:33-34), since this particular obligation is to one's own countrypeople (Leviticus 25:44-46, Deuteronomy 15:12-17).  Lastly, one of them is about how Israelite men and women are to obey Mosaic Law and, if they follow other gods, would be opposed by Yahweh (Deuteronomy 29:18-20).

Without relying on the logically necessary equivalence (independent of the Bible) of men and women committing or being victimized by the same act, the gender equality at the outset of the Bible (Genesis 1:26-27, 5:1-2), or other such things (like, though it never followed from Exodus 22:18 that only a female sorcerer should die, as opposed to also a man doing the same thing, Deuteronomy 18:9-11 expands this to men), the aforementioned verses above already demonstrate that even an older, more conservative translation of the Bible establishes it is speaking of male and female victims or perpetrators of various sins and then uses subsequent masculine language.  There are of course ramifications for the many commands like that Leviticus 19:13, which says to pay one's workers the day of their labor and uses male language for them.  There is no Biblical injunction against female workers or prescription of male employees--not that it is necessary, but it also says to not add to its commands (Deuteronomy 4:2, 12:32).  In fact, some of the aforementioned verses like Exodus 21:20-21, 26-27, and Deuteronomy 15:12-17 make it plain that it is permissible for both genders to work as servants, including to pay off debts (see also Exodus 20:8-11 and Deuteronomy 5:12-15).

Due to cultural stereotypes and the prevalence of complementarian heresy, some people read various portions of the Torah's commands and think that the male nouns and pronouns of verses like Leviticus 19:13 would mean that men must be workers because they are allegedly more suited to it.  I have dealt with similar people who both accept or reject the Bible while thinking it teaches things like this.  On one hand, if this was what it taught, the Bible would be sexist against women, prescribing for them directly or indirectly either reliance on a man for provision or death, since they would supposedly not be to work outside the home.  On the other hand, it would be sexist against men, confining professional labor to men, treating them as if they are just a means to the end of labor, a human pack mule to be worked.  Only one example is enough to demonstrate not only that the Bible would have to command such things for men and women alike to be consistent with reason, but that it also does often refer to men and women by words like "man" or "men," meaning person or people, which is for the sake of consistency how someone would have to interpret passages that do not specify that they only address men or women.  Women are not exempt from commands that do not literally depend on having male genitalia, which is almost none of them: men are not held to a higher moral standard than women despite being people as they are.

The kind of idiotic literalism holding to the contrary, where the sexist interpretation does not logically follow even from what the text says even as the text itself clarifies otherwise, could distort how someone approaches texts like Exodus 21:12-25.  The original text in Hebrew for verses like Exodus 21:12-25, which address murder, manslaughter, kidnapping, attacking or cursing one's parents, physical assault and battery resulting in neither death nor permanent mutilation, and physical harm to a pregnant woman is supposed to be gender neutral with the wording (except for the words father and mother and the victimized pregnant woman of 21:23-25) as reflected in some more recent English translations.  Even if unnecessary or default masculine wording is/was part of the original wording in Hebrew, in light of the many examples listed in the first paragraph, without relying on the other reasons mentioned here [1] for why such verses would have to be gender egalitarian, these laws are not saying men (or women) can be permissibly hurt in such ways by women or that men can murder or batter non-pregnant women without deserving the same penalties.

However, if male slaves should not be abused as is so with female slaves and likewise deserve immediate emancipation for such treatment (Exodus 21:26-27), it could only follow that logical consistency would require that free men and women be of equal guilt for committing the same acts against each other or equal victimization by the same acts, just as logical necessity would already dictate is the case independent of whether the Bible is true; the act is the same and men and women can both commit or suffer it.  The Bible does not say it is fine to treat male servants more harshly than female servants because their bodies or stereotypical "mental toughness" can take it, or that it takes more mistreatment than it does for women for a man to deserve to go free.  The same would by extension be true of other physical assaults in other contexts.  Just Exodus 21:26-27 alone would require that a woman who unjustly attacks or injures a man has also committed the same broad class of sin in Exodus 21:23-25, unless the Bible said otherwise, which it does not.

Aside from everything else that is relevant inside and outside the Bible, if Exodus 21:26-27 treats the assault of a male and female servant as of an equal nature, why would this not be the case with 18-19 whether or not masculine or gender neutral language (which the original text is consistent with) is used?  If Exodus 21:28-32 emphasizes the equality of neglectfully allowing a previously dangerous animal to kill a free man or woman, a son or daughter, or a male or female servant--a triple emphasis on explicit gender equality in a matter less sinful than intentional murder--along with Exodus 21:20-21 treating murder of a male or female slave by abusive corporal punishment identically, why would this gender equality not be the case with Exodus 21:12-14 even if it seems in some translations to speak of male murderers and male victims?  It would not matter even if it did speak specifically of male-male murder in light of Exodus 21:20-21 and 28-32, because gender equality is still literally taught in the latter verses concerning murder or neglect leading to death anyway!

The King James version of the Bible, like many other translations, does not have to always use exclusively gender neutral words to talk about men and women together as a translation like the NIV is more likely to do.  There are not just other laws to clarify commands having nothing to do with something being sinful or prescribed because someone is male or female (like with Exodus 22:18 and Deuteronomy 18:9-11), but also the 10 diverse, aforementioned instances where male and female people are spoken of in relation to some moral issue only to be jointly referenced as if they are men due to the male words.  One of these would already establish that this is what the default meaning of passages that summarize a command as entailing an obligation to or for men.  Repeated emphasis on this throughout Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy reinforces what would be apparent from Genesis 1:26-27.  Obligations having nothing to do with actual anatomy, like circumcision, could only be for both men and women since something that is good (or evil) and can be done by all is good (or evil) for all.

Logic, people.  It is very fucking helpful.

"... And You'll Never Work A Day In Your Life"

As part of the glorification of professional work in America, there is a saying used by people who might be benevolent or encouraging in their intentions, but they espouse something irrational.  "Do what you love, and you'll never work a day in your life" articulates the idea that there as long as you derive pleasure from a job, it is not really work, which then can promote the false idea that work is or should be by default what people find joy in.  Enjoying work can be done without glorifying it above what its nature is, yes.  However, even aside from the issue of work as a low or high priority, there is the logical fact that professional work is always work even if you delight in it.

What some people mean by this phrase might not actually entail a contradiction on a conceptual level, and still the words themselves are so overtly, egregiously incorrect that there is no basis for using them in this manner.  A truth can be conveyed with such misleading or inaccurate language that the communication becomes irrational.  Enjoying a job can make time spent working seem shorter, more emotionally fulfilling, and even something to look forward to, yet by nature, a job is always work.  It is not someone's psychological attitude towards work that makes it what it is.  No, it is work itself and the logical necessities that ground that nature which dictate that.  Professional labor cannot be anything other than professional labor!

Now, aside from the impossibility of the literal idea behind the statement about never working a day, selecting a job with objective moral significance or subjective personal appeal truly can make the many hours of work more bearable.  That this is so desirable for any people suggests that they truly hate or fear having to work without this condition being met.  Work is objectively intrusive, often far more time-consuming than it needs to be (under American capitalism and all equivalent systems), and is very likely to never be rewarded as much as the work merits (again, at least under the likes of American capitalism).

There is no way to labor without working, but there are ways to be careful about choosing a job, although a job that is a great personal fit can still be ruined by terrible employers, long commutes, irrational coworkers, or some other secondary factor to the role itself.  There are also ways to better ensure one does not become disillusioned with what is otherwise a desired career by overworking or allowing work to take focus away from superior things.  Unfortunately, professional labor, handled the right way, is still more useful for certain ends that promote human flourishing than its absence, and tethering oneself to a worthwhile and enjoyable (and morally permissible, of course) job is ideal.

Without Divorce As An Option

It would absolutely be better to never marry, in either the legal or the true Biblical/relational sense (personal, mutual commitment) if divorce was never or almost never a morally legitimate option.  In spite of however much evidence there is that a person is or would make for a great spouse, there is always the possibility, as long as one has these human epistemological barriers, that this is an illusion.  Marriage is already an enormous commitment.  Without divorce ever being a permissible direction to go in for at least some circumstances, it would be an even more uncertain gamble on whether one would wind up in a horrendous, mediocre, or excellent marriage.

The only mind one can know the existence or contents of is one's own.  No being with my limitations knows the future, and there is scarcely anything a person can truly control.  They do not know if their partner is rational, honest, loving, or sincere, only that they appear that way, and there is nothing at all impossible about them suddenly changing for the worst or revealing that their true self scarcely resembled the facade.  A person who seemed otherwise can unveil assumptions, hypocrisy, greed, unfaithfulness, pettiness, jealousy, or other kinds of irrational or immoral traits--or they could acquire these characteristics only after the marriage starts.

What careless person who truly knows these things would ever think marriage should be treated anything other than an almost total gamble that, on a personal and pragmatic level, could not possibly be worth the potential risk of a lifetime of suffering?  Just having an escape possibility, and a potentially morally valid one at that, makes heading into a marriage so much less suffocating and restricting.  There is the logical possibility of ending a marriage and the moral freedom to do so if it is marred by abusive, neglectful, adulterous, or other behaviors (yes, according to the Bible [1]).  Apart from this, human marriage would never truly be liberating or empowering, and every spouse would be locked into their relationships anyway.

Without divorce as an option, only in extremely rare relationships between rationalistic couples--and even then, this could be rare among them--would entertaining the desire to marry be anything more than an utterly pointless or damaging thing.  Marriage is not necessarily objectively good or subjectively fulfilling, and divorce, as unfortunate as it is that any relationship would need to come to it, is certainly worthwhile in more cases than evangelicals would admit.  To marry is not to Biblically remain fastened to someone no matter how philosophically stupid, how morally unstable, or how predatory or selfish they are.  Again, why would anyone ever want to marry if this was the case when marriage itself is not obligatory?

[1].  For instance, see Exodus 21:9-11 and 1 Corinthians 7:12-16.

Wearing A Hijab

Like wearing a cross necklace for the aesthetic appeal or relative commonality of it rather than to express commitment to Christianity, wearing a hijab does not have to stem from any sort of philosophical allegiance to Islam as a religion.  Wherever a person lives, they could possibly choose to wear something popularly associated with a given religion without the commonly assumed motivation of trying to show devotion to its deity.  Seeing someone wearing a hijab, for instance, does not intrinsically mean that they are a Muslim, much less a devout one.  Maybe they are, and maybe they are not (on both counts).  Ultimately, this expectation is not even reflective of the actual religious philosophy and text (the Quran) it supposedly springs from, as is the case with many lifestyle components evangelical Christians in America promote.

The hijab and the much bulkier burqa are absolutely not a part of Quranic Islam, so wearing them is already not about obeying a supposed command of Allah.  In Arabic culture (though outsiders could obviously wear the same styles), the hijab is the head covering wrapped around the hair and neck but not the face.  The burqa is a full-body covering that envelope the arms and hangs over the legs.  One pertains to a much smaller area of the body than the other, though the terms could be used interchangeably by unfamiliar people.  Neither is actually prescribed in the Quran, contrary to what many people might expect, only in the extra-Quranic legalist doctrines of later Islamic figures.  Muslim legalists and Arabic cultural constructs have become confused with Islam itself by some people who think that association at the level of assumptions and tradition is the same as an inherent conceptual connection.  Someone who has no commitment to Islam could still have a personal interest in wearing Arabic fashion, though it would more likely be with the hijab than the burqa.

As for the idea that seeing a hijab on someone means they are a Muslim, this is only a non sequitur assumption.  The epistemological stance here is like that of someone who sees a person in a church and assumes they are a Christian.  They are not necessarily present because they are a formally committed follower of  Yahweh's/Christ's religion or because they have even a fleeting, surface-level interest in Christianity.  Perhaps they go because of family pressures, similar to how some women might wear a hijab only because of cultural norms and all of the pressures that might come with them.  Perhaps they like the cultural history or influence of church service as a whole, without any philosophical commitment, and attend out of a personal desire to be part of something with others.  Independent of whether a religion is true or even whether people think it is true, some might borrow fashion or lifestyle habits from a former religion they adhered to or from a trend that happens to be affiliated with a religion.

With evangelicals I have encountered, there is a tendency to assume intention and philosophical alignment from things that really might have nothing to directly do with a person's core ideology.  An example among some of these Christians is that drinking alcohol publicly or using profanity might be assumed to signify lack of submission to God, who never opposes such things in themselves.  With the hijab, what of people who are forced to insincerely wear one or who wear it as non-Muslims in various countries because they like the way it looks?  A woman of Middle-Eastern descent might wear a hijab for some unconventional reason.  A foreigner might wear one for some reason besides allegiance to Islam.  The real tenets of Islam and the distinction between them and Arabic culture aside, partaking in things that are associated at a cultural level with expression of Islamic commitment can be done for unrelated, individualistic reasons.

Game Review--Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door (Switch)

"There are many problems in the world, many sorrows.  Do you like such a world?"

--TEC, Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door

A highly creative series, Paper Mario is a spiritual successor to Super Mario RPG, which itself was brought to the Switch in 2023 as a remake.  The platform has accumulated quite the number of remasters and remakes in its console generation that branched out to include Paper Mario.  Like how the 2002 GameCube masterpiece Metroid Prime was brought to the Switch in 2023, the often fondly remembered 2004 GameCube title Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door was brought to the Switch in 2024.  The Switch had already seen the largely incredible Paper Mario: The Origami King debut in 2020 [1]; now, a much earlier release has been resurrected--and I happened to have the freedom to review it far sooner after its release than has tended to be the case in the last two years.  While the thematic approach to the story does sometimes hint at its origins in a very overtly sexist (against women and men) gaming industry of the past, with frequent (at least all but) promotion of gender stereotypes, the gameplay is crafted very well.

Production Values

The graphical style of the GameCube release is maintained in this remaster for a system that exceeds the GameCube in its capacity.  Yes, the hub of Rogueport is intentionally a visually disorganized and unsanitary place.  It is, after all, a place falling into disarray between prevalent criminal/gang activity and its perpetuated reputation as a haven for people who do not necessarily want to be found.  Between traveling to various regions, the player often comes back to Rogueport, so the location is one that gets a lot of screentime in the game.  As aesthetically chaotic as the town is, the game's graphics are not at fault.  The other parts of the world, like Twilight Town, have a very distinct look and environmental setup, so there is variety, and some areas are even quite colorful and organized in contrast to Rogueport.  Paper character models and objects are used to great visual and thematic effect, with clear animations.

Gameplay

The up to 30+ hours of The Thousand Year Door will see many bouts of combat and exchanges of dialogue, but there is far more to the game than what is mandatory.  Between completing the increasingly challenging Pit of 100 Trials, helping characters with their Trouble Board postings (which involve miscellaneous tasks), and finding hidden or sometimes openly displayed items like Star Pieces, a great deal of content is optional.  Anyone introduced to the series with The Origami King can see that you actually do gain XP from fights and level up here, which incentivizes entering otherwise entirely optional fights up to a point.  Hammer and jump enhancements are found with story advancement and provide boosts to attack power in a more typical RPG fashion.  You even play as Peach and Bowser after acquiring each star, something different from the 2020 entry.  Peach and Bowser never join the party, though, as they are only playable in between chapters of Mario's progression.  Only Mario is directly controllable in the free exploration of the overworld; other party members are controlled during fights.

Each partner nonetheless has an ability that is vital to progressing in the story or required to obtain certain collectible/secret items.  Koops can be kicked out by Mario to retrieve floating or distant objects or strike otherwise inaccessible switches or blocks; Madam Flurrie can blow away removable stickers blocking pathways; Vivian can pull Mario into another dimension to avoid enemy attacks in the walkable world.  As Mario advances, he will acquire more than partners.  He gains special paper-related abilities like that of folding into a paper airplane to reach high or distant ledges from certain vantage points.  Eventually, a roll (a literal roll of paper that allows him to go under specific structures) and boat form are added.  As with partners, these powers are utilized in a mandatory way for the story, but they can also be used to find optional items.

As for combat, the range of moves is initially very limiting.  With more party members, more consumable items, and more optional badges (to be explained below) come broader choices for attack and defense.  Each 100 Star Points earned from finishing enemy encounters levels up Mario, eventually granting him a larger and larger audience.  Yes, fights take the characters to a stage where the onlookers can fill a special ability meter, such as when players press buttons at just the right time, that Mario can use to steer the confrontation in his favor.  You can even use a turn to appeal to the audience and fill more of this meter.  The XP earned from fighting the same types of enemies in a given location does drop over time as one levels up, however, so infinite XP farming is not feasible to reach these higher audience capacities.

Upon leveling up, a choice is presented: Mario's health can be increased by five units, his flower points (required for special offensive or defensive measures in fights) by five units, or his badge points by three units.  Equipping badges for either Mario or a partner uses up a particular amount of available badge points and allows additional moves or passive effects, with different badges requiring different values, so not all of them can be utilized at once.  They can be of immense assistance inside and outside of combat.  One of them, for example, electrifies enemies that directly contact the wearer.  Another boosts Mario's HP by five as if he was a level higher.  Beyond having their own badges equipped from the same pool of badge points, partners can be leveled up as well, but not by Star Points.  This comes from exchanging special items found throughout the game to a Rogueport sorcerer so that a partner receives more HP and an additional FP-based move.  Far enough into the game, a second tier of upgrades becomes available for them.

Story

Some spoilers are below.

Peach finds herself kidnapped from Rogueport and in the custody of a mysterious group bent on obtaining the seven Crystal Stars, but before this had occured, she had sent Mario a map for a grand treasure.  A city had its glory destroyed on this site many years before, and a legendary treasure is supposedly still underneath Rogueport.  Arriving upon prompting from Peach, Mario comes to the town only to find her missing.  One by one, he meets new companions and hunts for the Crystal Stars connected with an enormous door under the town.

Intellectual Content

There are some puzzles and collectibles that can be found by exploration and careful observation, as well as well-implemented breaks of the fourth wall showcasing the meta potential of gaming, but, in contrast to other Mario games I have played, The Thousand Year Door at least presents sexist stereotypes as if they were humorous or admirable.  There are many outright sexist claims by characters, especially concerning male characters as to how "manly" or supposedly not they are, though gender stereotypes are inherently false.  Having certain genitals and secondary sex characteristics pertains to the body alone; nothing at all about one's mind is necessitated by this.  What one person is like psychologically, man or woman, does not in any way require that another person, man or woman, has the same personality traits.  Moreover, if a man and woman can both do something, it is morally good, bad, or neutral for all of them as applicable, social constructs and subjective preferences being wholly irrelevant.  

The Thousand Year Door treats men, however, as if they have additional, burdensome obligations to be bold and accomplished, and women do not, and as if male romantic/sexual consent does not matter.  Mario is both erroneously regarded as "manly" by many female characters, though masculinity and feminity are logically impossible as opposed to gender-specific anatomy and physiology (Mario is a man because of his body no matter his personality or behaviors), and told frequently by them that he is some variation of gorgeous.  Female characters adoring his appearance is not sexist or otherwise problematic at all on its own, and in fact is contrary to the sexism that regards only or mostly women as beautiful.  It is just that he is even kissed against his will by Madame Flurrie, who joins the playable party: he literally gestures that he does not want it.  I played The Thousand Year Door on the GameCube many years ago, well before I became a rationalist.  I did not remember such things being present upon the release of the remaster.  It is not the portrayal of irrational characters, however, that is itself irrational.  It is the way these things are included, as if they are valid or trivial or both.

Conclusion

The Thousand Year Door provides a more conventional RPG experience than The Origami King, which did not feature XP.  With The Origami King being the most recent novel game of the series to be released, the Switch version of The Thousand Year Door provides contemporary players a way to directly experience a high point for the acclaim of the series.  As far as the gameplay is concerned, it is indeed a high quality game, and Nintendo continues to successfully revive games 20 years old or even older on its hybrid platform.  The Switch's time is coming to an end, but the system is not without its excellent titles.  Not for the first time with an impactful but aged Mario game, the Switch has established itself as a portal to classic games.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2022/04/game-review-paper-mario-origami-king.html

Stealing From Corporations

As people steal basic items like food from corporations, some believe that this is not immoral or is even good.  To steal from a company, especially a megacorporation, might have hardly a noticeable impact in a specific case, and many businesses exploit their workers and client/customer base, they insist.  It is not true that a corporation is automatically predatory; this depends on the individual people involved in it and how it is run.  It is also not true that the nature of theft itself changes based upon the severity or situation.

Obviously, a person stealing from a grocery store to eat or a pharmacy to survive, driven by desperation and despair, is not committing as serious an act as a corporate leader who takes so much money from a business's earnings that the employees are not paid liveable wages.  The first is about survival marked by tragedy.  The second is about greed for the sake of egoistic emotionalism or taking from others.  These are very different forms of theft, and the latter is objectively far worse than the former.

Theft is theft no matter its manifestation, though, and thus one kind being less immoral than another would not mean it is ever permissible or good.  What is immoral in itself would still have this nature even when it is done with far less sinister, selfish, irrational motives.  If theft is morally wrong, then yes, stealing from corporations is also wrong no matter how small its impact on the company bottom line is, but this in no way makes it equal to the mass, devastating theft practices by many companies.

Resolving the genuine problems that make stealing from corporations so pragmatically beneficial (in some ways, it is, this just has nothing to do with moral obligation) is the way to best discourage the smaller theft other than adherence to a correct, rationalistic worldview.  For corporate greed, neither its philosophical invalidity nor amoral factors like public scorn (public approval or disapproval in itself has nothing to do with whether something is wrong, only if it is popular) are likely to deter an executive or employer with enough power to withstand any sort of human opposition.

The hypocrisy of condemning theft by corporations and supporting theft by consumers is glaring, although one is often far worse than the other.  Both of these things are true at once.  There are people who are emotionalistically in favor of either of these forms of stealing.  Like with murder or kidnapping, the core nature of theft is the same in one scenario and another.  People with fallacious hostility towards either consumers/employees or corporate leaders regardless of their personal status just do not like this.

Scientific Awe

The superior nature of the laws of logic, both when it comes to metaphysical self-necessity that is not dependent on anything else and when it comes to its absolute certainty and supreme epistemological foundationality, might weaken a person's enamorment with science in all of its facets, especially because scientific events and correlations are not even verifiable beyond the level of subjective perceptions.  They are secondary either way to reason, hinging on it.  None of this actually has to interfere with someone's appreciation for scientific laws or the scientific method, whether that involves focusing on correlations they personally observe in daily life or ideas they would have no reason to reflect on unless prompted by hearsay (such as quantum physics, volcanic geology, and so on).

I have encountered people who trivialize scientific clarity, to the very limited, ambiguous extent that science brings clarity only to what seems to be occurring specifically to the metaphysically contingent (on the laws of logic, the uncaused cause, and preceding empty space) external world of matter, for a separate reason.  This one is not legitimate.  They suppose that having more scientific information weakens a person's ability to experience awe/wonder, as if there is some apparent moral obligation to feel awe or as if this is not a subjective reaction altogether.  Aside from matters that have not yet been fully explored with the senses directly or by technological extensions, even familiar scientific laws or events could sustain fascination, time after time, in someone's mind.

It is in a sense strange that a certain kind of light (that from a solar body approximately 93 million miles distant) would darken the skin, and the results of this correlation last differing amounts of time for different people.  It is strange that out of all the objective logical possibilities that transcend mind and matter, there are creatures very much unlike those of the planet's landmasses reported all the way down to the bottom of the oceans, where pressure and darkness and scarcity of opportunities to eat present their own impact on life.  It is strange that, again, out of everything that is logically possible--and anything that does not contradict axioms or what follows by necessity from something else is possible even if untrue--there would be billions of microorganisms teeming within one's body, unnoticed by macroscopic, external perception.

Would it be expected based upon ordinary macroscopic experience that there would be nuclei of protons and neutrons orbited by electrons, particles which supposedly do not break down into other extremely miniscule particles, while the units of the nucleus reduce to various quarks?  Even if familiar to many, the phenomenon of gravity and how it holds objects on the world could be subjectively alluring, though it is far from being as central as the inherent truth of logical axioms, the uncaused cause behind the universe one way or another, and the direct, absolutely certain nature of introspection.  Radiation, genetics, thermodynamics, and more all have their own nuances, and, though these nuances are utterly trivial compared to those of higher philosophical issues like strictly logical truths or God's nature whether or not the uncaused cause is the Yahweh of the Christian religion, they can inspire deep captivation.

A person could be fascinated by these concepts and their seeming observational, probabilistic evidence even knowing that much of what is experienced in the external world could be an illusion and the truth of this is unverifiable either way.  In fact, having more scientific information could make them experience a deeper fixation that does not exclusively pertain to curiosity towards unexplored aspects of nature, but to what is already perceived.  Awe or wonder is never the inevitable reaction of a mind to scientific notions or experiences, but it is also not automatically quelled by observational or experimental information.  A still stronger fascination could be had towards the deeper ways that science depends on more fundamental philosophical truths than anything having to do with laws of nature.  

No one can know if scientific events exist apart from conscious, subjective perception, for instance, for no one can observe them apart from observation to discover this and there is no independent logical necessity in this being the case, and the subjective intoxication of awe can be united here with the absolutely certain knowledge of reason, the supreme reality, as what logically follows from scientific experiences and concepts in particular is grasped.  What one person feels towards science does not dictate its nature in any way. While the objective, intrinsic laws of logic reveal that science is far from inherent--there could have never been an external world at all, much less the exact correlative events we see therein--and while scientific laws are not metaphysically central whatsoever, feelings of wonder are not contrary to having more clarity about the cosmos.

No Fault Divorce

The Bible not restricting divorce to only adultery or, hell, sexual immorality does not mean anything remotely similar to no fault divorce is authorized.  Matthew 19:9 is not the only verse on the morality of divorce: Exodus 21:9-11 addresses neglect and abuse as justifications for divorce, Deuteronomy 24:1-4 addresses general sin in this context but does not specify which sins are not severe enough, and 1 Corinthians 7:12-16 addresses abandonment.  In no way is this divorce for any and every reason, as some think Mosaic Law allows, for this is not the same as the broadness of the no fault divorce laws of America.  Leaving a spouse for even a minor or easily correctable error at least is to do so because of something more than sheer preference!

With a no fault divorce, a wife and husband could casually, even amicably end their legal marriage while maintaining that neither of them has committed some grievous wrong.  One of them could have literally had the sudden arbitrary whim upon waking up to get divorced even though the relationship is otherwise safe, loving, and, most importantly, perhaps even up until that point based on rationality (though it would be irrational for either spouse to actually leave for this reason).  Acting on this would be subjectivist or emotionalistic.  In this type of scenario, the couple could terminate the marriage through no fault divorce by indicating that there is no fault that is to blame, only a divergence of personal interest.  This course of legal action can also be pursued to quickly escape the likes of an actual abuser less expensively and painfully.

Just calling a divorce no fault would not actually have to mean that there was no divorce-worthy problem lurking behind the scenes, as it could be the case that neither party is accusing the other of such a thing even though it did occur.  Still, in spite of how there might have ultimately been infidelity or abuse, it would be unjust to present the marriage to friends as if it is ending for unrelated, trivial reasons.  Divorce for the sake of mere emotional preference or a sudden lack of attraction is not legitimate, and a cheating (which is adultery, not flirtation, having opposite gender friends, and so on) or abusive spouse deserves to be confronted and cast aside on those grounds.  Whether this is brought to the attention of the legal system is a separate matter.

A romantic commitment to someone is no small thing, especially if one will live with, have sex with, and spend a great deal of time with them.  It is irrational to charge into a dating or marriage relationship blindly or to stay no matter what comes from it out due to the same emotionalism that might lead some to flippantly abandon their relationship.  Yes, it is also no small thing to leave a relationship, particularly if it had progressed to the point of marriage, on a legal level or in the sense of greater commitment.  There would need to be specific realizations and motivations to make this rational.

The Biblical position on divorce is not that it is always evil or that it is only permissible in an extremely rare, narrow kind of circumstance.  It is multiple different kinds of sins that free the other spouse to totally sever themselves from the marriage.  They must actually be moral offenses (Deuteronomy 24:1-4), though, not subjective whims!  The kind of divorce Jesus contrasts the Biblical kind with in Matthew 19 could not be some no fault divorce of Mosaic Law because the Torah does not permit actual no fault divorce (again, this does not mean legal opportunity for no fault divorce cannot be used pragmatically to a victimized spouse's advantage).  Entering or leaving a romantic partnership for anything less than rational responses to whatever evidence one has access to about the other person is baseless.

The Neglected Misandry Of Some Biblical Misinterpretations (Part One)

Some translations of the Bible, such as the King James Version (KJV), use masculine pronouns like "he" or "him" in moral prescriptions when they are really talking about/addressing things applicable to either men or women.  Actually, passages in Mosaic Law like Exodus 21:20-21, 26-27, Leviticus 13:29-39, 25:44-46, Numbers 5:1-7, 6:1-21, Deuteronomy 13:6-10, 15:12-17, 17:2-7, and 29:18-20 all clarify explicitly at first that they are referring to male and female people, often as the perpetrator of a given sin or its victim, and then default to masculine pronouns for all parties involved afterward.  Obviously, even as an older, more conservative translation much less likely to reflect genuine gender neutrality already in the original language (at least in meaning), the King James Bible gives example after example of cases in Mosaic Law itself where it is not, for instance, saying that only male or only female servants are to be freed if abused (Exodus 21:26-27), though the pronouns tend to be as if for men.  Some people severely misinterpret Biblical statements in reaction due to their own false assumptions about gender or what they have been told about historical Christian interpretation.  Beyond doing the same with basic necessary truths of reason that are not denied by the Bible even in the King James, they must distort or neglect whatever the Bible nonetheless does or does not say which is contrary to their stances on what it proclaims.

Of course, it is not as if even such statements as that of Exodus 21:12-14 in the King James Version would only apply to men irrespective of its blatant, repeated tendency to use male language for women it just mentioned.  While the language, in a purely literal sense, would seem to speak of how an adult human male who murders another adult human male should be executed, the Bible never says something such as "A man who murders another shall be put to death, but not a woman who murders", or "A man shall not murder a man, but he may murder a woman".  While mistranslations of gender neutral pronouns can certainly make the Bible very superficially seem to be misogynistic in its philosophy with some things, it also makes the Bible seem to be very distinctively misandrist, or sexist against men.  For instance, Deuteronomy 17:12 would then, according to this flawed interpretation/approach, teach that only a man who opposes a judge or priest of Yahweh is to be killed, not a woman who does the exact same thing that any person who can speak is capable of doing if they wished.  Deuteronomy 21:18-21 would then hold that a son who engages in the specified form of disobedience to parents should die, but not a daughter who does the exact same thing (and there are worse ramifications than this).

It is just that many people are hyper-fixated on whether passages that are plainly not sexist against women in context (like Ephesians 5:21-22, even in the wording of the King James) to the point of seemingly not caring about how, on their misinterpretations of the Bible, it would follow that Christianity discriminates against men just as much or moreso than they think it does towards women (and it does not).  This reinforces still other misperceptions and beliefs on outright errors, not that a person cannot avoid assumptions and recognize various truths about the matter regardless by looking to reason, that lead them to the interpret passages like Deuteronomy 20:10-15 [1] in sexist ways, and here I particularly mean sexist against men.  For aforementioned passages like Exodus 21:12-14, which deals with murder and its prescribed punishment of death, though it might erroneously seem to teach that murdering a woman is permissible (if the literal pronoun wording is as vital as so many pretend in other passages), it would also seem to say that women murdering men is not as serious as a man sinning in this way by not mentioning specifically female perpetrators in the case law as well.

With the subject of murder, almost no one would be stupid enough to think that the Bible literally teaches that it is a sin for men to murder, but not for women to murder men.  Perhaps they think of Exodus 20:13 and Deuteronomy 5:17, which say in various translations, without mentioning gender one way or another, "You shall not murder," "Do not murder," or, in the KJV, "Thou shalt not kill" (as in murder).  Here, they might be more willing than in other cases to admit the logical equivalence in itself, independent of direct mention of it in the Bible, of murder committed by or against men or women, as well as how the two both bearing God's image (Genesis 1:26-27, 5:1-2) would mean there is no difference concerning the depravity of murder, no matter the gender of the murderer or the victim.  They do not tend to approach certain other verses like this (like Deuteronomy 22:25-27, which addresses a very specific kind of rape and yet outright says the act itself is like an instance of murder), so they are hypocrites, since there is not anything in the direct wording, the broader context, or the strictly logical necessities true of all concepts that requires many other ideas supposedly taught in the Bible.  Among these which are ultimately foreign or rejected by the text would be that rape is only committed by men, or that the rape of men by women is of lesser severity morally and psychologically.

In part two, I will specify additional reasons why the gender-specific interpretations of statements like the KJV's version of Exodus 21:12-14, save for those about things like circumcision of male babies or menstruation, could only be assumed and, more than this, false whether or not the Bible is true.  I will also tackle the ramifications one way or another for issues like physical and sexual assaults not involving murder.  Look past the fact that if Christianity as put forth in the Bible is true, it must be consistent with logically necessary truths, such as how a man and woman who commit or are victimized by the same act are logically equivalent, so an action that can be committed by both genders, if morality exists at all, cannot be good or evil for just one of them.  Similarly, look past the fact that Genesis 1:26-27 and 5:1-2 make it clear that the Biblical position is that men and women are equal before God metaphysically, both bearing his image.  Look past how the Bible makes no statements about an act being truly sinful for just one gender of the nonexistent kind for murder discussed above (compare Exodus 21:1-11 with Deuteronomy 15:12-17, Numbers 30:1-16 with Deuteronomy 23:21-23, or Exodus 22:18 with Deuteronomy 18:9-11 for three examples of how a statement mentioning one gender or the other is clarified later on, though there are reasons why the sexist interpretation does not follow from the initial text in each).  Whether it gives case laws specifying a male aggressor and female victims (as with Deuteronomy 22:25-27) or uses purely masculine language all the way through a passage in the KJV, the Bible mentions many kinds of physical and sexual assaults in Mosaic Law, yet these are absolutely never presented in a misandrist or misogynistic way.  This is of no minor importance.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2024/05/the-torah-on-treatment-of-wartime-male.html