You weren’t just making that point. You were asking some-one to acknowledge that child marriage could be considered morally defensible under a hypothetical set of beliefs that they do not hold.
But you are refusing to acknowledge that child marriage could be considered morally defensible under a hypothetical set of beliefs that you do not hold.
Not only have you refused to do what you requested some-one else do, you are denying that you made the request.
The behaviour you claim is morally indefensible was by someone who accepted God and teleology.
Will you admit that if you accept God and teleology it becomes possible and permissible under the right circumstances and in the right social landscape, or are you going to continue being hypocritical?
On the contrary, I argued that within a materialist framework—and the consequent rejection of objective morality—pedophilia could, in principle, be considered defensible if it were to become widely accepted by society on a subjective basis.
The issue is that I do not believe God can command or declare good anything intrinsically evil—anything that contradicts what is good for human nature. Muhammad may have believed that what he was doing was right, but that does not make it any less of a delusion. On the contrary, I see no way for a moral relativist to condemn pedophilia as an objectively evil act. They can only say, ‘It strongly contradicts my moral framework, which has been shaped by the spirit of the age—an age that teaches that ending the life of a child after 24 weeks, as in the Netherlands, may be considered permissible and morally defensible, while pedophilia is always to be condemned.’”
If I were to accept a caricature of God as the true God, then the answer would be yes
So you’re going to continue denying what you wrote earlier, and continue being hypocritical.
Your flat refusal to even consider how your ‘arguments’ may look from any perspective other than your own, religious or non-religious, while simultaneously demanding others consider your perspective, coupled with your repeated insistence that your beliefs are true but the beliefs of others are mere caricatures, illustrates perfectly the closed-minded smug arrogant hypocrisy that guarantees you will never produce a convincing argument in favour of your religion.
I have argued that, under a materialist framework, pedophilia cannot be objectively condemned as an evil act.
I hold that any belief system asserting that God can command or deem as good actions contrary to human nature does not truly refer to God. If I were to believe in those things then of course I would justify them; i just explained why I think it’s absurd to hold that God can deem as good things that go against the good of human nature. I am not a relativist.
It was never my intention—not because I think convincing arguments cannot be made, but because it would ultimately be unproductive, as Luke 16:31 teaches. There is already plenty of evidence for those willing to look.
The debate on morality between theists and non-theists will NEVER be settled because theists apply one standard of morality to humans and one standard to their God (whether that God is the Christian God, the Muslim God, etc.). Only when theists and non-theists apply a common standard of behavior/morality to all beings can we have a meaningful discussion on what “good” and what “moral” really mean.
T_aquaticus
(The Friendly Neighborhood Atheist)
312
If Muhamad stated that Allah allows for the marriage of children then it is objectively moral.
This is the problem with objective moralities. They ignore the subjective nature of humans and replace it with a set of rules which can (and often do) run counter to the things we find most important in our lives.
If God allows for child marriages then it is good for human beings, by definition of an objective morality.
Then you reject the idea that there could be an objective morality.
If morality were objective, it would have to be conceivable that the statement “George’s actions were wrong and he deserves to be punished” would be true even if every human in the world were of the opinion, “George’s actions seem fine to me, perhaps even laudable”.
Thus, if morality were an absolute set by a god, something could be immoral even if every human disagreed. If, instead, human feelings and desires are what ultimately count, then that is a subjective morality.
Islam is not the only religion that allowed men to marry little girls. The Judeo-Christian Scriptures give page after page of rules regarding what you can eat, but not one sentence regarding the age of consent for little girls. In ancient Judaism a man could marry a girl at age three and consummate that marriage at age 12. There is no record of the Judeo-Christian God ever punishing a man for having sex with his twelve year old “wife”.
You cannot claim that your belief system espouses objective morality if your belief system is silent on the age of consent for little girls.
Do you see a problem that the Judeo-Christian Scriptures say a lot about what you can and cannot eat but nothing about the age of consent for little girls?
No – I don’t see what relevance it has today that a set of instructions meant to shape an ancient and fairly cruel society towards greater fairness and compassion failed to address things we worry about today.
So you believe that for that time period and culture, it was moral for adult men to marry and have intercourse with twelve year old little girls. Got it.
If you don’t like people assuming they know what you do or don’t accept, then you should probably try modeling that by not informing others what they do or don’t believe.
I’m not sure if you were addressing that to someone else here - but I’ll jump in with a response since I already commented.
There is a multitude of things scriptures never mention simply because those things (rightly or wrongly) just weren’t issues for them in that time. “Age of consent” for stuff just wasn’t on their radar like it is (rightly) on our moral radars now. And just because the Bible may mention something (or even give some sort of guidance regarding it - like slavery) shouldn’t be taken by anybody (who has any sort of sense of appropriate use of scriptures IMO) as a kind of “forever” endorsement of slavery, or even as an admission that slavery (or marriage with children) is okay and the full vision of what God wants for human communities even back then. But that’s just me. Others who erroneously try to force the bible to be some sort of flat instruction manual without regard to actual scriptural narratives are just (IMO) reading the Bible wrongly (or rather - could hardly be said to be ‘reading’ the Bible at all).
The upshot for me here is that I’m not entirely disagreeing with your pushing on our notions of objectivity here. I think you (and @T_aquaticus and @Roy ) raise many good points and that Christians need to have considerably more humility about whatever hold we think we have on so-called moral ‘objectivity’. But that said, I’m still a believer, and so must part company with those who think it is just all entirely thrown to the cultural winds of the day.
I think what our brief discussion shows is why theists and non-theists cannot have a productive discussion regarding morality. That fact that you and Mervin cannot recognize the immorality of your religion’s silence on this issue is horrifying to me.
That you cannot recognize that there is no such silence demonstrates that you aren’t actually listening to the religion, let alone actually reading its documents.
A reasoning exercise: explain why the Bible is deeply anti-slavery. If you can manage that one you’ll see that what you’re actually horrified at is your own failure to engage with the material.