# Creationism: Why not call a spade a spade? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 5, 2013, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065 "2013-09-05T11:44:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 18
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/341 "2013-09-22T07:34:54Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Please expand on this. I imagine he means “verifiable facts that support an assertion”, or something close to that. There are no ‘verifiable facts’ that support an external agent. Facts are physical proofs. To find physical proofs of a non-physical entity is not likely. There is however argumentation. For example, the existence of an objective moral code, one that cannot be satisfactorily explained by a purely naturalistic understanding of the universe. ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/342 "2013-09-22T07:37:24Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > Yep… Having homosexual relations is an offense to God, and is intrinsically immoral. > > But eating a nice scallop dinner? Oh, that prohibition has passed and is no longer meaningful to us. > > Nice to be able to pick and choose among intrinsic morality! You’ll have to explain where you got the idea that eating a nice scallop meal was intrinsically immoral. ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/343 "2013-09-22T07:40:15Z")
> [@Snowboarder\_Bo](#): > > In that case you have thus far utterly failed to prove that there is any such thing as objective morality. Not so. The torture of an innocent child is morally wrong. Fact. It is morally wrong at all times and under all circumstances. That cannot be justified from within a naturalistic worldview. ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 7:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/344 "2013-09-22T07:47:20Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > Same problem for the “external agency” conjecture. Not so. The external agency hypothesis is supported by the evidence of objective morality. > [@Trinopus](#): > > People band together in groups. If you murder my children, the tribe will take action. They’ll kill you, and probably ostracize (or even murder) your children. It’s really bad game theory. Why would I give a toss what people in your tribe think when my survival is at risk? > [@Trinopus](#): > > Humans have the faculty of empathy. We know how much we’d suffer if our children were murdered, and we extend that to others. Since we’re in the same tribe/clan/band/sept we already have learned the benefits of cooperation. We can hunt more antelope when we work together. So we value each other. When one guy slips on a rock and twists his ankle, we don’t leave him behind: we carry him back to the village, and we feed him until he gets better… We know how much we value our own offspring. If their survival is threatened, or if we need to assert our dominance in some way, empathy will have little sway. Your game theory ideology has no power when it opposes survival. ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/345 "2013-09-22T07:51:29Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > As far as I’m concerned, this “External Agent” stuff is just a case of someone claiming that their morals are superior to yours because they are “Officially Authorized”. At least with a diploma mill you get a fake diploma to hang on the wall. They aren’t ‘my’ morals. That’s the whole point. I may chose to adopt them, but then so does the vast majority of humanity. ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/346 "2013-09-22T08:01:09Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Easily- a society judges that cultural bonds are more important than bonds of blood. Having more children has obvious benefits for supporting a culture (when there is enough food and resources, of course), so getting a “free” child through adoption can have obvious benefits. But that position is not sustainable in naturalism. Naturalism mitigates towards our favouring blood relationships far and away above cultural bonds, which have little or no value. An orphan child does not carry on my genetic traits, so what is the utility > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > We have a view that those actions were wrong. I see no reason to believe that we have an innate view that they were so. The perpetrators thought they were doing a good thing. What then, is the basis of your view? There is no satisfactory naturalistic explanation. > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Perhaps because it makes you feel good, or because you think it is your duty due to your moral and/or religious system. I see no reason to believe that it is because of some objective moral system, especially considering that so many people do not sponsor young african children. Yet many do. How does giving money to someone I don’t know, in a country I have never visited, for a purpose I will never see fulfilled, give me reason to feel good? ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/347 "2013-09-22T08:03:27Z")
> [@Latro](#): > > How about closer to home. Male circumcision. It appears this is widespread in the US. While not as bad as the female thing, it is still mutilation. Nonsense. Male circumcision has proven medical benefits. BUt that isn’t the point. Since when was a nanosecond of pain even approaching the definition of torture I gave earlier? ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 8:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/348 "2013-09-22T08:07:56Z")
> [@SirGalahad](#): > > If you maintain that “Objective Morality” flows from, and must flow from, a specific intelligent source, like a Deity, you have founded your ideas on the unprovable. > > It’s perfectly reasonable to presume that as animals become more complex and intelligent, that behaviors will evolve, and ways of thinking linked to physical changes in the brain, that favor “moral” actions. In primitive forms, a mother wolf tenderly cares for her pup, and viciously defends it. In the case of a more complex and intelligent creature, a human, that behavior has many psychological aspects, since we are self aware … we think differently than lower animals, and we have developed such a complex and intricate set of responses and stimuli that we sum these emotions and visceral instinctual feeling up with words like “morals” or “Good and Evil”, when really, they are just highly evolved natural tendencies that promote social structure and non-destructive behavior. We’ve given names to a more highly refined version of the mother wolf’s instincts. A Deity is not required to explain morality, we’ve evolved to be moral … it increases our chance of survival and procreation. You have no ‘proof’ for any of that, it is mere speculation. The existence of an external entity is not ‘provable’, since the concept of proof is limited to the natural universe. In that regard, my hypothesis is similar to , although I maintain more plausible, the multiverse. The multiverse is proposed as a hypothesis for the existence of this universe. There is no proof, not even evidence for such an hypothesis, yet people ‘believe’ it. ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 8:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/349 "2013-09-22T08:10:27Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > On reflection, this sounds kinda specific for a carefully unspecified external agent, don’t you think? Not at all. It flows logically that an EA would require some intrinsic moral character in order to specify a coherent moral code. ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 8:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/350 "2013-09-22T08:25:20Z")
[quote=“tomndebb, post:293, topic:668065”] II don’t need argumentation. I provided evidence many posts ago. [QUOTE} No, you didn’t. But if it makes you feel better believing that, I won’t disillusion you. And yes you do need to support your contentions, moderator or not. > [@tomndebb](#): > > IA rather significant number of societies have permitted children to be “removed” from their families by leaving them out to die. Now, regardless whether that child died of hunger, dehydration, freezing, or torn by wild animals, that child was subjected to what any rational person would recognize as torture. It was placed in a position where it could not escape and subjected to pain until its death. If infanticide was routinely carried out by snapping the neck or even suffocation, you might get away with a claim of no torture, but exposure (the most common method) can only “objectively” be described as torture. That is a not so subtle sidestep. I defined torture when asked. Keep on task. > [@tomndebb](#): > > I(And I now notice that you are throwing in the adjective “civilized” which indicates that the rules are set by society and not by some “objective” agent, otherwise you would be able to make the same (erroneous) claim regarding all societies, civilized or not. By throwing in the “civilized” limit, you are, effectively, placing the origin of the “morality” within the society, since you do not insist that it occurs in all societies.) Ah, no. I simply see the need to eliminate the examples of madmen. I ask again…name a society in which the torture of children, as I defined it earlier, was morally acceptable. > [@tomndebb](#): > > IBeyond that, of course, you are still ignoring the fact that multiple posters replied with “naturalistic” explanations while you persist in pretending that no one has answered your claim. Is this your standard response? If so, it is not particularly sound. A number of posters have made genuine attempts, but all have been rebutted. Can you posit your own? > [@tomndebb](#): > > IAnd you have failed to demonstrate your claim. > > You insist that torturing children is objectively wrong, then go on to weasel out of every exception that is provided to your claim. You are back to simply saying that an act is objectively wrong because you declare it to be objectively wrong. > I gratuitously deny your gratuitous assertion. > > And, again, you have failed to demonstrate that the several “naturalistic” proposals do not successfully explain the perceived morality. You have not provided any reason to accept your denial. In your case, you are gratuitously denying assertions backed by evidence. > > Your ability to persuade anyone of your beliefs is hindered by your own failure to actually make a point that stands up to examination. Good try, but I have rebutted the responses I have seen, and it hasn’t been difficult. There is no valid naturalistic objection to the torture of an innocent child that will not fail in the face of the fight for survival and the division of scarce resources. ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 8:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/351 "2013-09-22T08:29:32Z")
[quote=“Intrinsicvalue, post:350, topic:668065”] [quote=“tomndebb, post:293, topic:668065”] II don’t need argumentation. I provided evidence many posts ago.[QUOTE} No, you didn’t. But if it makes you feel better believing that, I won’t disillusion you. And yes you do need to support your contentions. ---
**Author:** ![Intrinsicvalue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@Intrinsicvalue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intrinsicvalue)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 8:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/352 "2013-09-22T08:34:55Z")
[quote=“iiandyiiii, post:338, topic:668065”] He offered one, sure, but he insisted that it was “objective”, and provided no evidence that it was so. So let me pose a question. Assuming you object to the torture of an innocent child, would you object to that action if carried out in a society in which it was accepted as being ok? ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/353 "2013-09-22T08:45:10Z")
> [@Intrinsicvalue](#): > > You have no ‘proof’ for any of that, it is mere speculation. The existence of an external entity is not ‘provable’, since the concept of proof is limited to the natural universe. In that regard, my hypothesis is similar to , although I maintain more plausible, the multiverse. The multiverse is proposed as a hypothesis for the existence of this universe. There is no proof, not even evidence for such an hypothesis, yet people ‘believe’ it. I am very tired of this bullshit argument. Has this external entity any effect on our world, no matter where it is? If not, you’re obviously making it up with zero reason to do so. If it has, that is the physical evidence you claim cannot exist. It might be magic tricks like in the Bible, or it might be getting in our heads. If it did get in our heads, it should do so with a consistent message. As for the multiverse, you don’t have a clue about how science works. No one “believes” it the way people believe in God. It is an interesting hypothesis and that is all, and its proponents will admit that they don’t know how to demonstrate it, and are looking in the math for reasons to support it or falsify it. I love your little sidestep also. Your external entity is clearly fine with exposing infants and letting them starve or get eaten by predators, but is against whatever definition of torture you made up? Nice guy. ---
**Author:** ![Latro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a87d85/32.png) [@Latro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Latro)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 9:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/354 "2013-09-22T09:20:58Z")
> [@Latro](#): > > How about closer to home. Male circumcision. It appears this is widespread in the US. While not as bad as the female thing, it is still mutilation. > [@Latro](#): > > Well, doesn’t this nicely show exactly how a practice that is abhorrent to most of humanity, can be quite acceptable to another culture. Yours in this case. > [@Intrinsicvalue](#): > > Nonsense. Male circumcision has proven medical benefits. Nonsense. > [@](#): > > BUt that isn’t the point. Since when was a nanosecond of pain even approaching the definition of torture I gave earlier? “A nanosecond of pain” Really, is that all you can bring to handwave it away? Apparently you have not been imbued with the intrinsic morality against child torture. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 11:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/355 "2013-09-22T11:12:48Z")
> [@Intrinsicvalue](#): > > There is however argumentation. For example, the existence of an objective moral code, one that cannot be satisfactorily explained by a purely naturalistic understanding of the universe. I don’t believe that this exists, and you have provided no evidence. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/356 "2013-09-22T11:18:15Z")
> [@Intrinsicvalue](#): > > So let me pose a question. Assuming you object to the torture of an innocent child, would you object to that action if carried out in a society in which it was accepted as being ok? Yes, because I believe that it’s wrong. My moral sense, though human derived and not derived externally, applies (for me) to everyone when making moral judgments. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 11:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/357 "2013-09-22T11:27:56Z")
> [@Intrinsicvalue](#): > > But that position is not sustainable in naturalism. Naturalism mitigates towards our favouring blood relationships far and away above cultural bonds, which have little or no value. An orphan child does not carry on my genetic traits, so what is the utility The utility is for the society. Many people value their society as much as or even more than their blood. And there is collective value- most people in a society might value it, whereas only an individual family values their bloodline. In America, for example, there is far more value collectively placed on the idea of freedom and the pursuit of happiness than on any individual bloodline. > [@](#): > > What then, is the basis of your view? There is no satisfactory naturalistic explanation. “Naturalism” doesn’t mean that the only value is on blood relatives and bloodlines. You need to get past this. Humans put value on many things- for example, someone may value their cultural legacy (that they or their works be remembered). A “meme”, the cultural equivalent of a genetic trait, can spread very quickly. > [@](#): > > Yet many do. How does giving money to someone I don’t know, in a country I have never visited, for a purpose I will never see fulfilled, give me reason to feel good? That’s a question for you to answer. For many people, it would not make them feel good. I give to the needy because it would make me feel bad not to- because I think it’s the right thing to do. That human-derived moral choice comes because I value my society and my species, and think the future for both is brightest if we treat each other with compassion and value every individual. I want humanity to thrive and succeed. This is a moral choice I make- I don’t have to put value on humanity and society (and many do not), but I choose to. You assert that there is an objective morality, yet you provide zero evidence. You haven’t really even tried- you just say that torturing children is objectively wrong. I think it’s wrong, but I believe all morality is derived from human beliefs. For me to believe in an objective morality I would have to believe in some sort of external agent- it doesn’t make sense to believe in the first without the second. It doesn’t work backwards- it can’t, logically… it would be like believing in a light without a light source. So since I see no evidence for an external agent (God), then there is zero reason to believe in objective morality. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/358 "2013-09-22T13:19:37Z")
> [@Intrinsicvalue](#): > > That is a not so subtle sidestep. I defined torture when asked. Keep on task. Get on task, yourself. You have provided NO definition of child torture. You have provided a single example of a single event that you would regard as the torture of an innocent child, but you have never provided a definition. Instead, you have simply hand-waved away every discussion of a naturalistic rationale to prevent torture, generally inventing positions for naturalism that exist only in your mind, and then have repeated your assertion that there is an objective morality without providing a single shred of evidence to support your personal belief. Where is you evidence from people expressing a naturalist philosophy that supports the positions that you have attributed to them? Where is your evidence of an objective morality? > [@Intrinsicvalue](#): > > There is no valid naturalistic objection to the torture of an innocent child that will not fail in the face of the fight for survival and the division of scarce resources. Once more, you are inventing a position for the naturalistic approach while failing to demonstrate that what you claim to be naturalism is actually anything more than the creation of your own mind. Under the naturalistic position that any harm to any other person when not behaving defensively harms oneself, your beating and raping a three-year-old is wrong under naturalistic law. There is no “fight for survival” in “the face of scarce resources” that would justify beating and raping a child. I fully expect you to deny that reality in some fashion, but you will, again, fail to support your position with anything other than your personal belief. You are utterly unpersuasive of your personal beliefs and you are really not making any point in this thread except to demonstrate that some people cannot differentiate between their own beliefs and the real world. - ::: shrug ::: \* ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2013, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/359 "2013-09-22T22:35:06Z")
> [@Intrinsicvalue](#): > > “Near universality”. I would argue that that is precisely what we see. You did argue that, and you were shown to be wrong. Repeating the assertion is not a form of substantive argument. ---
**Author:** ![Conservian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@Conservian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Conservian)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065/360 "2013-09-23T01:55:02Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > He offered one, sure, but he insisted that it was “objective”, and provided no evidence that it was so. > > Every individual? I don’t think I buy this. And I would agree with him. The ‘evidence’ he provided is just as credible as that which naturalism provides. You just choose to place your faith in the latter. I didn’t say “every individual.” > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Yes, because I believe that it’s wrong. My moral sense, though human derived and not derived externally, applies (for me) to everyone when making moral judgments. Of course it’s derived at by yourself, and by your own choice. But that design came from an external source. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065.md?page=17) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creationism-why-not-call-a-spade-a-spade/668065.md?page=19)