151. Logical Proof of the Existence of a Divine Creator, Why Atheism is Not Logically Sound

Comment #191454 by hungarianelephant on June 11, 2008 at 2:13 am

In response to AllanW's suggestion, here's the annotated article. I'm sure the proper philosophers here can do a more complete job, but there's not much left anyway:

One of the beautiful aspects of self evident truths is that they can be proven on both the simplest and the most complex of levels. By contrast, to make an argument for what is in fact an illogical fallacy, one must use plenty of skill, sophistry and remain beholden to a dogmatic protection of what is really an illogical position.

Yet even after a detailed case is made for the illogical side of the argument, it can instantly be deflated like a balloon with the simplest poke of clear logic. It can also be attacked piece by piece with even greater skill and logic, stemming from a steadfast pursuit of the truth.

Nowhere does the above hold more true than with regard to the existence of a Divine Creator. Proof of a conscious Creator is readily available. The simplest proof (yet one that no atheist has ever been able to counter effectively) is that a universe of this size and magnitude does not somehow build itself, just as a set of encyclopedias doesn't write itself or form randomly from the spill of a massive inkblot.[Argument from personal incredulity]

The atheist, on the other hand, needs to build a plausible case for this irrational scenario.[Attempt to shift the burden of proof by unsupported assertion] But first, let's examine how irrational it is:

No one in their right mind would claim that 10,000 hundred story buildings built themselves from randomness, even over time. Yet those who doubt the existence of a Creator believe that an entire universe, containing all of the billions of elements necessary for life to form[False premiss; Big Bang Theory posits only two elements being formed during the initial phase; other elements necessary for life are demonstrably formed in stars], may have come about without a builder. As such, they give credence to billions of times more coincidences to having come about. [True, so not stricken; fallacious in that it attempts to suggest that such coincidences are "more unlikely"; fallacious analogy dealt with below]

They believe that not only did whole planets appear spontaneously[Equivocation; this suggests planets appear from nothing, which is not the case, but also believe that the fact that these planets do not collide as meteors do[False premiss], that they have gravity[Attempt to mislead in that it suggests that gravity is not an inherent property of all matter], that they contain the proper atmospheric conditions for life to take hold and contain sustenance to sustain this life[False premiss; most known planets are known not to contain such conditions] all happened by mere fluke. Yet the same people would (rightly) denounce as preposterous the notion that the Egyptian pyramids built themselves. They would point to the structure and detailed design of these impressive inanimate objects. Yet they outrageously chalk up to coincidence billions upon billions of times more detail and design[Unsupported assertion] in all parts of life found in this universe.

To be sure, someone can build sandcastles in the sky on how the spontaneous coming together of molecules, then turning into bricks, changing further into buildings, culminating in 10,000 perfectly aligned skyscrapers all built with no builder is a plausible scenario. They can form intricate arguments to support this theory. But in the end, the entire proposition remains offensive to logic itself.[Argument from personal incredulity]

While there are complex proofs of the Divine, some dating back to the philosophical writings of Plato and others using modern science[All proofs of God were disproved by Hume. Insofar as this posits new proofs since Hume, unsupported assertion], the most clearly logical concepts are all readily apparent and simple. An entire world does not create itself.[Unsupported assertion / argument from personal incredulity.]

Furthermore, proof of a Divine creator can be seen more readily in the strike and intricate details of the universe than by considering the enormity of the universe as a whole.[Unsupported assertion.]

Consider the following:

Even if all the planets somehow formed themselves, all somehow staying in perfect orbit and possessing gravity, even take for granted that all the chemicals needed for life were so how there as well, by sheer happenstance[Rehash of above (still wrong)], would it then be possible for billions of species to spontaneously come about, each with a male and female of each kind so that they could exist in the long run?[Argument from personal incredulity]

Even if this were possible, would the simplest of animals have been able to survive were it missing even one essential organ?[This is not an argument. By definition, an animal cannot survive without an "essential" organ. To the extent that this posits that all organs must come into being at the same time, unsupported assertion.] Would human beings survive if one organ or cavity was missing or displaced, even after somehow being otherwise perfectly formed with no designer?[Same, and also unsupported assertion that humans are perfectly formed.] The simple fact is that even if humans were so perfectly formed, if food, water, sunlight or any one of a host of details necessary for life to exist were somehow missing, human life would have lasted on this planet for a maximum of a few days.

The contention of atheists, that life simply adapted to the conditions it found itself in is also irrational, as were this to be the case we'd have animals that could solely subsist on snow and ice in some regions.[Argument from personal incredulity and unsupported assertion] By contrast, the ability to adapt to strike conditional changes is also a fascinating aspect of the body, one that shows that much detail was put into its design[Unsupported assertion].

The central point of the atheist, that all somehow came about randomly through evolution, does not help them either. While a separate column will deal with the scientific arguments for creationism and evolution, the topic is not germane here.[Number 10, hence unsupported assertion] Going back to the example of a set of encyclopedias, a set of Britannicas does not write itself, not from one massive ink blot and not starting out as dots, which form letters, which align into perfect phrases, paragraphs, books and sets. In fact, it's even more incredulous to say that they aligned so perfectly, step by step and dot by dot than it is to say that all appeared at once.[Argument, if it is an argument, from personal incredulity] Yet that's what the atheist contends when he chalks up life's existence to gradual and detailed formation with no Creator at the helm.[Application of analogy to non-analogous matters]

However, despite the fact that even after much debate on the issue I have yet to meet an atheist who can make even a feeble argument to counter any of these points[Wishful thinking], they often feel that such grounded proofs aren't complicated enough[Unsupported assertion. And irrelevant. And illogical.]. Just as a man who spends years coming up with a thousand reasons why an elephant is really a duck will not be persuaded of his error without first addressing all of his complicated fallacies, so too the atheist's contentions must be addressed in detail.[Not an argument. This is prejudicial material of no probative value. And it asserts the existence of unspecified atheist "contentions" without evidence. Apparently an attempt to shift the burden of proof] For this reason, we will also address some of the more detailed proofs of the existence of the Divine.

Of the many philosophic and scientific arguments brought forth for the existence of the Divine, three stand out. The anthropic argument contends that the universe is too complex to have no Creator.[Argument from personal incredulity] This is in effect the central point of this column, although explained in a more common manner.[Because some things just need to be underlined] The cosmological argument maintains that finite matter (original matter, which was clearly finite) cannot create a universe that is greater than itself.[Irrelevant, since science posits a total energy sum of zero. To the extent that this distinguishes matter from energy, unsupported assertion] Especially compelling is the teleological argument, that the existence of a Creator can be seen from the fact that the universe works in perfect harmony, as would a giant machine. Gravity, orbits, chemical atmospheres and all other ingredients needed for life to exist come together in unison to allow such existence to happen. An enormous machine that works like clockwork needs to have a Creator.[Argument from personal incredulity and unsupported assertion]

The atheist would also do well to read Anthony Flew's latest book, "There is a God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind." For decades, Flew was one of the leading proponents of atheism. But he eventually decided to give everything a second look and found that all he'd believed and so vociferously advocated for so long was wrong. Upon real analysis, he found that there is, in fact, proof of the Divine.[Argument from authority]

THE TRUTH OF OUR SIDE AND THE REAL CHALLENGE TO DEBATING ATHEISTS

But all of these reasons, in reality, are unnecessary. The youngest school child can tell you that a building does not build itself and that, by extension, neither does a universe.[Argument from personal incredulity / argument from youthful certainty] And this is the beauty of self evident truths. After all the proofs and reasoning in the world, they remain just as self evident, just as they are also, on the deepest levels, thoroughly profound. Here too, all that is needed to demonstrate proof of a Creator is that the world doesn't create itself, not instantly and not over time.[Repeat] All other issues can then be examined in that light.

However, we must realize that while the sophistry it takes to purport a falsehood can be easily countered, the person who has upheld such notions for decades must have each of his or her counterpoints addressed. This is able to be done smoothly, in light of the inherent logic that necessitates the existence of a conscious Creator, but it must be done thoroughly.[Rehash of above]

Encouraging atheists to open their minds to pure logic and to possibilities that they hitherto only sought to counter or to avoid on any pretext also involves an emotional challenge for them, as they must open themselves to the possibility of having to shed preconceived notions that they've held firm for decades. And that, rather than facts, is the primary challenge to exposing them to insightful logic. However, if they are willing to address the issue honestly, a search for the truth should be of paramount importance and enough reason for them to take an open look.[Not an argument; prejudicial material of no probative value]

NOT RELIGION AND SCIENCE, BUT RELIGION AND SCIENTISTS

Scientists as a whole are increasingly open to the idea of a conscious Creator.[Argument from authority. And false.] They realize that science points to the complexity of the universe, a complexity that dictates the inevitability of a Creator.[Same, and wishful thinking] However, some stick to old ways and old dogmas.[Not an argument; assertion of "dogma" is also unsupported] A question that arises is why these seemingly logical people possess such illogical beliefs.[Unsupported assertion of logic] This fact alone has prevented many from considering the existence of a Creator. But when we understand the reason for their animus to belief, their bias comes to the forefront as opposed to any reasoned argument.[Unsupported assertion]

Throughout the 20th century, many scientists were enthralled with the progress that science had made. They mistakenly believed that the physical universe, instead of being a creation, contained all answers in and of itself. Any questions would be resolved by science. To look beyond that was viewed in disdain. The fact that logic necessitates that physical matter must have originated at some point and that a formed universe cannot emerge without a designer was overlooked in the hope that physical science would prove the impossible.

Other scientists, today a greater number than the more dogmatic former group, conceded that there may well be a Creator. But they were wholly disinterested in the subject. They too did not realize that our physical universe points to the fact that it was consciously designed. And many of them had the same rigid disdain for religion as the former.

What's true of both groups is that they refused to consider the subject. As such, their rejection of a Creator does not stem from some well reasoned research or thought, but rather from the absence of such reasoning. Their knowledge of religion and philosophy was on par with their knowledge of economics or any other subject that they had never studied. They knew as much about religion as they knew how to paint a house, the only difference between the two being that had they delved into the former instead of reflexively dismissing it, they would have found it to be of profound logic and give depth to their other areas of study.

But these scientists did not give religious or philosophical questions a moment's notice. And what becomes abundantly clear from their statements on the issue is that they have grave misconceptions about religion, misconceptions that stem from their lack of interest. And while it is their right to do so, reflexively and often emotionally dismissing a belief without giving it a moment's thought isn't logic, but rather the opposite of logic.

To be sure, these scientists are indeed very logical and analytical within their main doctrine. It's just that they refuse to examine that which transcends it. As such, anyone who gives credence their views on this issue should beware, as their opinions do not stem from logic. Scientists who have thought over the issue are generally in agreement on this as well.[This is all the same point. It assumes the existence of things not susceptible to scientific examination. This is an unsupported assertion.]

THE BIBLE

One cannot conclude a column like this without mentioning philosophical and logical proofs of the Divinity of the Bible, the Torah. To begin with, the Bible is the only book in the history of mankind to make the claim that part of it was given by the Creator in front of an entire nation (of 600,000 families, totaling a few million people).[False premiss. The bible claims nothing of the kind.]

If someone were to come along today with a book, claiming that its Divine transmission had been witnessed by millions of people, they'd be laughed out of the room. One cannot convince an entire nation, including its greatest analytical thinkers and its most ardent skeptics, that such a transmission occurred and had been witnessed by them when it hadn't. To those who would counter "What if the Bible came along a few hundred years later?" (claiming to have been witnessed a few hundred years back), such a claim would have been met with equal ridicule, just as a book claiming to have been given by the Creator, as witnessed by millions in the 1700s would be met with ridicule today. There would have been a well known history of such a happening. Simply put, a book that claims to have been Divinely given to millions cannot take hold on a widespread level if it is not true.[Same point, concluding with unsupported assertion / argument from personal incredulity]

That's a basic philosophical case. There are also more hard physical reasons that point to the Bible's Divinity. The Bible states in Genesis and in Jeremiah that the stars of the heaven cannot be counted. Scientists believed that the number of stars were only 1,100, those which could readily be seen. The Bible was way ahead of the time it was given and showed knowledge of that which could not have been known or seen by man.[False premiss. The number of stars is finite and hence countable. The bible is wrong on this point]

The Bible also attested to the laws of thermodynamics, a field that science only hammered out thousands of years later. The first law of thermodynamics is that the total sum of matter and energy in the universe can never change. Energy can change into matter and vice versa, but their combined sum is always constant. Until this discovery, the Bible's statement that "there is nothing new under sun" seemed like a statement that was ready to be disproven. Reasoning went that somewhere in the universe there must be new energy or matter developing. But there wasn't. Universally accepted science showed us that less than 200 years ago. The Bible told us that about 3,000 years before.[Wishful thinking. This is an ex post facto interpretation of ambiguous text. It is also common to other religions, Hinduism in particular.]

More compelling is the Bible's clear attestation to the second law of thermodynamics (which was originally the first principle of this field, formulated by Sadi Carnot in 1824). This is that physicality becomes increasingly random and broken apart. Psalm 102 speaks of the heavens and the earth perishing and clearly implies a gradual decay, telling us this law well before it was discovered.[Ex post facto interpretation of ambiguous text. And common to other religions.]

It should be noted here, at least for the sake of accuracy, that the Bible also speaks of a new heaven and earth, meaning a newly fortified one, after the Divine presence is revealed. Such a heaven and earth will exist continuously according to most Biblical commentary, but will reveal their Divine Creator within them. Eventual perfection of the world, after we've been given a chance to do our part, is a key tenet of most religion and is the only logical explanation for the Creation of a world in need of perfection. Such an advent also seems closer than ever according to any study of what the Bible says about its occurrence, especially in view of the rapid and radical changes the world has undergone in the last few decades alone. However, the physical universe as it stands now is in a slow state of decay (before it is refortified), a fact that only the Bible knew for thousands of years.[Unsupported assertion]

It should be noted that although this column is comparatively lengthy, it is still only a column and barely scratches the surface of the clear proofs that evidence the existence of the Divine and the Divine nature of the Bible, the Torah. The reader is encouraged to study further and to ask questions.

152. Logical Proof of the Existence of a Divine Creator, Why Atheism is Not Logically Sound

Comment #191445 by hungarianelephant on June 11, 2008 at 1:40 am

298. Comment #191436 by ypostelnik on June 11, 2008 at 1:05 am

Can you please demonstrate how you know that "a universe of this size and magnitude does not somehow build itself"? This is not self-evident. Also see the excellent post 275. Comment #191190 by sent2null on June 10, 2008 at 10:57 am (link).

153. Logical Proof of the Existence of a Divine Creator, Why Atheism is Not Logically Sound

Comment #191162 by hungarianelephant on June 10, 2008 at 9:57 am

263. Comment #191150 by Podaar on June 10, 2008 at 9:45 am

Flying a plane into a building is the rational consequence of a (particular) irrational belief system.

Moderates are not rational, by definition. If it were true that Jesus was the son of the creator of the universe, and came to earth for your personal redemption, then the rational thing to do would be to run your entire life around that notion, not just marginalise it to Sunday morning. When pressed, moderates know this. Though of course they have a prepared set of rationalisations.

Maybe this is a good thing.

Where's Bonzai when you need him?

154. Court Claim: Chimps Are People, Too

Comment #191066 by hungarianelephant on June 10, 2008 at 7:02 am

The problem these guys have is essentially that they are presenting the court with a binary choice between (a) Matthew is a human with all human rights and (b) Matthew is not a human with no human rights. This tactic worked in United States ex rel. Standing Bear v. Crook. The difference was that Standing Bear was indisputably human, though doubtless many people didn't regard the Poncas as human.

A coherent ethical system would not require a binary choice. Instead it would be possible to recognise chimps (and elephants and whales and dolphins and ...) as creatures having certain inherent rights, if not fully human ones. We're some way off that. The best we can hope for here is probably some sort of continental fudge that says that Matthew is a "person" for the purpose of guardianship, without expressing a view on his "personhood" for other purposes.

[EDIT - Standing Bear was a Ponca, not a Sioux. I am not awake today.]

155. Court Claim: Chimps Are People, Too

Comment #191059 by hungarianelephant on June 10, 2008 at 6:57 am

d11d - That's a little misleading. Corporations are treated as legal persons (for complicated economic reasons which you really don't want me to get into), but they don't get the full panolpy of rights attributed to natural persons.

156. The 14-year-old Afghan suicide bomber

Comment #191054 by hungarianelephant on June 10, 2008 at 6:50 am

Oh yes, I forgot to state "Latin". And anyway it assumes of course that we should pluralise all words of Greek origin in a Greek manner.

I suppose the moral of this is that if one wants to be pedantic, it's at least necessary to do it properly.

Personally, I get much more upset about spuriou's apostrophe's.

157. The 14-year-old Afghan suicide bomber

Comment #191033 by hungarianelephant on June 10, 2008 at 6:22 am

*** Pedantry Alert ***

14. Comment #191002 by Epinephrine on June 10, 2008 at 4:39 am

It irks me to see that indexes, stadiums and octopuses are all acceptable

"Octopuses" is an acceptable plural and the first listed in the OED. "Octopi" would only be the obvious plural if "octopus" were a second declension noun, which it isn't. The people who want to push this seem to have an agenda. Or is it an agendum?

Right, back to suicide bombers.

158. Logical Proof of the Existence of a Divine Creator, Why Atheism is Not Logically Sound

Comment #191013 by hungarianelephant on June 10, 2008 at 5:35 am

Barry Pearson - PM for you.

159. A word for nonbelievers

Comment #191012 by hungarianelephant on June 10, 2008 at 5:32 am

114. Comment #190941 by clearthinker on June 10, 2008 at 1:14 am

The evidence - read any book on the history of the law in Britain. There are numerous examples - the need for two witnesses, the marriage laws etc.

I have read several books on the history of the law in Britain. They don't point to a Christian heritage, because it doesn't exist. The common law arose from a number of sources, the most important of which being custom and practice (I'll come back to this later). The general structure of the legal system, as other posters have pointed out, owes far more to the Roman and Greek systems than anything appearing in the bible. Stare decisis, statutes later than the Torah, and courts of equity don't appear anywhere in Christian literature. And as you acknowledge, civil law is almost entirely absent. (I'm afraid I don't know enough about Scots law to comment fully, but I do know that it is based principally on Roman law.)

What you have done is pull out two examples which hark back to the bible. There are even some problems with these. The need for two witnesses has long since been abolished, and the marriage laws have never properly reflected Christian teaching. When the common law marriage â€" which in Christian terms was not a marriage at all â€" was finally abolished, it was replaced with a formalised system which still allowed, and indeed codified, unsanctified marriages.

Two (poor) examples don't justify your assertion that the law is based on Christian principles of law and justice.

Of course the meat of what you are saying is here:

My question would be for you - what would the law in an atheist state be based upon? In a universe with no justice how can you have justice?

"Justice" is a human concept. You have effectively already acknowledged this, at least in part, since you agree that there are some pretty fundamental issues of justice that Moses didn't come up with and were derived from elsewhere.

You are trying to present us with a binary choice between absolute justice and no justice at all. This is a false dichotomy. Justice is something derived from the collective morality of a society. And I know you think that morality is also a free for all if you don't have absolute morality, but you're wrong. The rules are negotiated between people in the circumstances which are in front of them. Of course we don't do this all the time - instead we rely on custom and practice, changing the rules when they have outlived their usefulness and are getting in the way.

You may end up with different rules for, say, a small tribe of goatherders in the Sinai peninsula and a post-industrial country of 60 million people. But that does not mean, as you think it does, that one is right and the other is wrong.

Perhaps you don't want to get into this anyway, but justice actually has two different branches. The first is procedural - "formal justice" - and involves concepts like due process, fair trials, predictable outcomes. It's largely agreed what this entails (though you won't find most of it in the bible). The other is "substantive justice", "fair" outcomes. And there are many different views as to what that entails. A good place to start is John Rawls' A Theory Of Justice. Personally, I think his project is flawed, but it's a good place to start with a thought experiment.

Before we go down that road, though, perhaps you can tell us if you think there a cogent Christian view on the content of "substantive justice" - what ought to be the case here on our little planet (i.e. any discussion of what happens in the afterlife is irrelevant to the discussion). If so, what is it?

160. Logical Proof of the Existence of a Divine Creator, Why Atheism is Not Logically Sound

Comment #190588 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 9:22 am

It's wooter, only in English.

161. John McCain: America a Christian nation, needs Christian president

Comment #190518 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 8:17 am

So you're saying that you'd prefer a candidate with broad cross-party appeal, who belongs to one party but has frequently supported the other where he thought it appropriate?

Ducks

162. John McCain: America a Christian nation, needs Christian president

Comment #190509 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 8:07 am

166. Comment #190500 by al-rawandi on June 9, 2008 at 7:54 am

The government should be the servant of the people, IMO. Unfortunately many dogmatic ideologues *cough* socialists *cough* think governments are a great tool to impose their ideologies on large number of people, then keep them under foot.

It's not just socialists, though, is it? The people who would like to create an American theocracy are not socialists.

These left/right labels don't make any sense to me. The distinction comes from French revolutionary times and it wasn't all that coherent then either.

Self-styled conservatives bleat on about personal autonomy and small government, but then want to tell you exactly what you can and can't smoke. Self-styled liberals tell you that they believe in the liberty of the individual, but apparently not so much that they trust you to spend your own money. Hitler is right wing, though describing himself as a socialist, Stalin is left wing, and when hard-line communists depose Gorbachev it's a "right wing coup". Huh?

I'm coming to the view that most people simply want to belong to one particular camp, and will then subscribe to nearly all the views of that camp, no matter how incoherent. It's well documented that most people are likely to support a policy if they are told that "their" party subscribes to it. And in a peculiar inversion, a couple of years ago a British opinion poll found that people were significantly less likely to support a policy if they were told in advance that the Conservative party espoused it.

There's some support for this in Cialdini's Influence. I don't have it to hand but can dig out the studies he refers to.

163. John McCain: America a Christian nation, needs Christian president

Comment #190498 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 7:48 am

al-rawandi - The point I was obliquely trying to make was that the concept of "government as agent of the people" is not universally accepted, even in nominal democracies. In the US, all politicians pay lip-service to it, but I wonder how many really believe in it?

Shame I didn't make it a bit more clearly.

164. John McCain: America a Christian nation, needs Christian president

Comment #190488 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 7:37 am

157. Comment #190484 by al-rawandi on June 9, 2008 at 7:27 am

If not, the government should act as an agent of the people, which, by definition, it is.

Whose definition would that be?

The American one, where the constitution begins "We the people"?

Or the European one, where the constitution (ahem, treaty) begins "His Majesty The King Of The Belgians"?

165. Holiday in Hellmouth

Comment #190440 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 5:26 am

Now JuxtaMonkey you KNOW that you're not supposed to show acts of kindness to random strangers on the internet. It says so on page 256 of the Atheist Handbook, as I'm sure nice Mr Robertson will be happy to point out.

166. John McCain: America a Christian nation, needs Christian president

Comment #190437 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 5:20 am

Please, not Chomsky. Not after what happened to the thread the last time. And the fourteen times before that. Please no. Let us never speak of this again.

167. John McCain: America a Christian nation, needs Christian president

Comment #190423 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 4:25 am

Does John McCain actually finish more than about 10% of his sentences?

If he wins, and his legislation is anything like his speech, nothing will get done for the next four years.

Come to think of it, maybe that's worth a try.

168. Holiday in Hellmouth

Comment #190413 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 3:58 am

Last weekend I was making a birthday cake. Unfortunately, there was only enough butter for the sponge. If I used that, then not only might I not be able to finish the cake, but there wouldn't be any butter for our toast the next morning, or the rather nice courgette pasta I was planning for that evening.

I prayed to the FSM for guidance and decided to make the cake with the last of the butter.

But by the time I came to make the topping, the butter in the fridge had been replenished. Hurrah, praise be! There was excatly enough for a topping, AND toast AND pasta.

I did eventually trace the source to a shopping trip by my wife. Yet I had not told her that we would need some butter.

It must have been a miracle. Yes?

169. Holiday in Hellmouth

Comment #190375 by hungarianelephant on June 9, 2008 at 1:56 am

54. Comment #190347 by clearthinker on June 8, 2008 at 11:08 pm

I argue for justice (remember that strange concept that cannot exist in the athiest world of moral relativism?) - so that the rich West do not drive up food prices by feeding grain into our cars.

David, are you saying that moral relativism is an atheist tenet, and that the absence of justice is a necessary consequence?

When you've answered that one, we're looking forward to your evidence on the "word for nonbelievers" thread that the "British" and American legal systems are based on Christian principles of law and justice.

170. Blogger spreads the gospel of science

Comment #189988 by hungarianelephant on June 8, 2008 at 4:20 am

emmet - Be fair. It's not like the councils have anything else to do, which is probably why the average councillor has the IQ of a turf briquette.

171. A word for nonbelievers

Comment #189977 by hungarianelephant on June 8, 2008 at 2:53 am

91. Comment #189972 by clearthinker on June 8, 2008 at 1:52 am

Actually good legal systems are based on law and justice. The British and American legal systems are based upon Christian principles of law and justice.

Evidence, please.

And good luck showing that there is even such a thing as the "British" legal system. As a good Scot, you ought to know better.

172. Blogger spreads the gospel of science

Comment #189471 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 10:21 am

Cartomancer - Possibly similar to some of the discussions of the people colonising Ireland.

A: What shall we call this park?
B: How about Queen's Park?
A: No, we already did Queenstown. And it might confuse the rangers.
B: Well what about Kingstown?
A: Done that too.
B: Then there's always the name the savages give it, Sebastian.
A: What's that?
B: Parc fhionnuisce.
A: Sorry, say again?
B: I said "Pork fee-on-ish-kuh".
A: Do they keep pigs there?
B: Er, I don't think so.
A: Well they should. And some elephants, too. Start a zoo. Now, how do you spell that?
B: [Spells it.]
A: Crikey, can't have that. Far too many vowels. These chaps need to get together with the Welsh and do a swap. Anyway, "Phoenix Park" - that's close enough. These savages can't brew beer, but they have some damned fine names.
B: But it's nothing to do with a phoenix. It means "park on the clear water".
A: Then we'd better give them a statue of a phoenix. Put it right in the middle. I think we'll build the viceroy's residence next to it, what? Now, half past two. Time for a gin, wouldn't you say?

173. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #189462 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 10:11 am

1364. Comment #189403 by MaxD on June 6, 2008 at 7:52 am

This pretty much summarises what I was going to post this afternoon, so I can keep this relatively short (thanks, Max).

Just one point to pick up:

1. We hold, even with animals we are about to eat that their lives ought to be lived with a minimum of suffering, fear and pain. As such animals are not simply our playthings, they feel pain, fear, anxiety etc. As such this removes them from the sex partner docket because such uses would no doubt cause most of them such reactions, fear etc. (emphasis mine)

I don't think this goes quite far enough, not least because it opens the door to what Appleby thinks is a good argument: "What if you could show that it doesn't harm a particular animal?"

We have adopted an ethical system which treats humans as autonomous entities who are entitled to control their own destinies, except insofar as this infringes on anyone else's entitlement. This requires certain basic limitations, or "rights", if you prefer. Since we are confined to our bodies, the most basic one is that we have the general right to bodily integrity.

This does more than imply that we have the right not to be raped. It implies that we have the right not to be touched at all without justification.

What justifications? The most obvious is consent: the willing cannot be harmed. There are other possible justifications. For example, we allow citizens, and to a greater extent the state, to use a limited amount of violence to protect these and other "rights".

This is reflected in the major western legal systems. At common law, "an unwanted kiss is a battery". So is any other contact except that which is taken as consented to, for example ordinary jostling in a busy street. Similar rules apply in Roman-derived systems.

Animals are not human, but since they are clearly sentient, we extend them broadly the same courtesy. They are entitled not to be touched, except insofar as is justified.

A different list of justifications does come into play. The most obvious is that we need(ed) to eat, and so we need(ed) to do what was necessary to farm them, including killing them. But we do not torture them, or inflict unnecessary suffering, because that is unjustified.

It's possible to argue that killing them is no longer justified, but that's an entirely separate argument. What it will never do is somehow prove that having sex with them is justified. You can't find a justification because there isn't one.

The argument that "consent doesn't apply to animals because animals can't consent" is hogwash. Logically, you would have to extend it to very young children, the mentally ill and people in comas, the "justification" presumably being "I needed to get off and it hasn't harmed them". Or you would have to draw a distinction between humans and animals which just can't be made to stick.

Appleby's remaining argument is that this is just our personal ethics, and there are other ethical systems. That's true, of course, but it doesn't advance the argument. An ethical system which permitted sex with animals would have to have invented a meaningful distinction between humans and animals, which doesn't exist (yes, a scientific question) or priorities the right to stick your penis where you want above the right of someone else not to have a penis stuck into them. Quite how any ethical system could come up with a coherent scheme reaching such a conclusion is beyond me, though Appleby is welcome to try.

Does this have anything to do with homosexuality?

No, not in ethical systems which treat humans as autonomous entities. Not all ethical systems do this, of course. In a bronze age tribe, it probably makes more sense to develop ethics which put the interests of the tribe above those of the individual. As I mentioned in a previous post, this gives you rules against adultery, covetousness or dishonouring your parents etc. It probably also gives you rules against homosexuality, because of the importance of producing offspring. But these are entirely incompatible with Enlightenment thinking, even if it took us several hundred years to shake off the old ethics.

174. Blogger spreads the gospel of science

Comment #189440 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 9:28 am

49. Comment #189435 by Cartomancer on June 6, 2008 at 9:20 am

Taunton is a town in England (it is the county town of Somerset, where my family now live). It is not a port however, being nowhere near the coast.

FWIW, Bath is also not a port and nowhere near the coast. It is, however, the headquarters of the Royal Navy. This is for excellent reasons which no one can quite remember.

175. Blogger spreads the gospel of science

Comment #189436 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 9:24 am

Tez - Blighty is Britain. In WWI, "blighters" were people who were in Britain, and hence not fightint the war. Thus:

Blighters

Siegfried Sassoon

The House is crammed: tier beyond tier they grin
And cackle at the Show, while prancing ranks
Of harlots shrill the chorus, drunk with din;
"We're sure the Kaiser loves our dear old Tanks!"

I'd like to see a Tank come down the stalls,
Lurching to rag-time tunes, or "Home, sweet Home",
And there'd be no more jokes in Music-halls
To mock the riddled corpses round Bapaume.

I appreciate that irate's answer is probably more helpful.

176. Town moves against Islamic school

Comment #189400 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 7:36 am

357. Comment #189395 by Quetzalcoatl on June 6, 2008 at 7:22 am

Terror supporters could be deported- but it depends on precisely what they have done.

Well now, there's your problem.

Terror supporters, even actual terrorists, can't be deported if they can show a "well founded fear of persecution" in the country to which they are sent. And why? Because it's "a breach of their human rights".

This is not a joke.

In fact it goes further than that. You are supposed to seek asylum in the first country you come to. Many don't, and simply make the onward trip to Britain. Britain is quite entitled to send them back again, say to France. But the human rights lawyers have managed to convince the courts that being sent to France, yes, that wonderful country of which Richard Morgan is a resident, would be a breach of your human rights, because the French have different rules on deportation.

Sources available when I can be arsed, sorry.

177. Town moves against Islamic school

Comment #189390 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 7:04 am

347. Comment #189371 by irate_atheist on June 6, 2008 at 6:24 am

Citing the Daily Mail as a source is like wheeling Jeffrey Archer in to court as your character witness.

Oh, so that's why I kept losing cases.

178. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #189344 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 4:40 am

Quetz - Appleby's misinterpretation. I'm sure you wouldn't suffer from that, being a deity and all.

179. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #189335 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 4:17 am

1263. Comment #189110 by Diacanu on June 5, 2008 at 1:26 pm

Religion attaching morals to people's consentual behavior has been a disaster for humanity.

I have to add a qualifier to this.

The original intention was sound. We're talking about a desert tribe of goatherders, consisting of maybe a few hundred people. They are a close-knit group.

Consider the effect of adultery. It frequently causes a breakdown in trust. If the cuckoo is someone you know, you are hardly going to remain friends with them. There's often recourse to violence.

This is not such a big deal if you live in a city of several million people. But the tribespeople are all closely dependent on one another. Maintaining these relationships requires a strong prohibition on adultery, just as it requires a rule against covetousness (the engine of a western economy).

The problem comes when religion treats these commandments as given for all time and all situations, rather than being the working rules of the society where they originated.

I'd suggest that homosexuality is a problem in small tribes because offspring are vital and homosexual relationships don't prevent offspring. Hence, abomination (same as shellfish, which can be dangerous to health). There might be some other factors in play here too, so I'm not wholly confident that that provides a complete answer.

One of Appleby's points - I won't call it an argument because he doesn't go anywhere sensible with it - is that ethical systems are different and that different ones can be chosen. This is true. What it doesn't imply is that they are all of equal value and we should treat them with indifference. Some strategies are more stable than others. I'll try to address this later today.

Another issue is consent. Appleby's argument, and I use the word loosely, is that although he acknowledges that consent is the determining factor in human relationships, it is inapplicable to animals because they are incapable of consent. This is a load of bollocks, for the reasons that several posters have pointed out. He's forced into this position by not condoning heterosexual rape. I think he would have been better off directing the argument at the whole concept of "consent".

1345. Comment #189328 by Quetzalcoatl on June 6, 2008 at 3:48 am

Not me. I didn't admit that harm caused by sex with animals is not unequivocal, but since you quoted me as saying that it was, I wanted you to point me to the specific point where I said that.

Quetz - I think that is a (deliberate?) misinterpretation of something Rachel Holmes and I both said. I'll get to that later too.

1346. Comment #189330 by Brian English on June 6, 2008 at 4:03 am

Now imagine if you weren't gettin' it. But gay guys were gettin' it. Well, you'd just want to ban it. It's obscene ;P

I think there's a lot of this about. There are a substantial number of noisy people whose entire lives appears to be dedicated to stopping other people having fun.

They used to bang the religious drum. Nowadays, most of them seem to have moved to the green lobby.

180. Stupid flies live longer: study

Comment #189325 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 3:30 am

Is this news? I thought it was well known that larger and more active brains required more overhead. That's hardly going to increase the lifespan, though it might provide an evolutionary advantage in marginal environments.

Christopher Davis, you'll have to fight me out of the way first.

181. Town moves against Islamic school

Comment #189323 by hungarianelephant on June 6, 2008 at 3:16 am

337. Comment #189316 by epeeist on June 6, 2008 at 2:41 am

No, my argument with the DM is that its policy is to give its readers a "daily hate". It panders to racism and Islamophobia.

As such anything printed in it should be treated with suspicion.

While not disagreeing with that, should we not also treat anything broadcast / published by the BBC with suspicion, given its policy of anglocentrism and political correctness?

182. Town moves against Islamic school

Comment #189057 by hungarianelephant on June 5, 2008 at 9:49 am

AllanW - Given that the most pressing problem inherent in Islam is that it generates a number of nutters, I think I'd prefer to approach it by getting as many sensible people onside, and marginalising the nutters. Even if it is representative, I think I'd still refuse to deal with the MCB, or anyone else it's impossible to talk sense with.

IMO a better approach would be to stop treating Muslims as children who can't think and act for themselves, and instead address them as people with real concerns that go beyond 7th century theology, same as everyone else. Engaging with self-styled "community leaders" tends to promote the radicals and give them an undeserved influence within their communities.

I'm not optimistic that this will happen. Firstly because the government seems incapable of treating anyone as an adult. And secondly because its working template is how it surrendered to the IRA. And the jihadists are far more dangerous than the IRA, who at least believed that life (theirs) was better than death.

183. Town moves against Islamic school

Comment #189051 by hungarianelephant on June 5, 2008 at 9:34 am

AllanW - I wasn't suggesting that the MCB were moderate. I was suggesting that it might not be quite as unrepresentative as we might hope.

I'm an occasional optimist, and take some comfort from the fact that 60% of Muslims in Britain don't want Shariah. Still, we wouldn't take the government, voted for by only around a quarter of British adults, as "unrepresentative".

184. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #189046 by hungarianelephant on June 5, 2008 at 9:23 am

Has anyone seen Appleby and wooter in a room together?

185. Town moves against Islamic school

Comment #189040 by hungarianelephant on June 5, 2008 at 9:09 am

315. Comment #189035 by AllanW on June 5, 2008 at 9:00 am

The government has finally woken up to the undoubted fact that the MCB is very unrepresentative of Muslim opinion in this country

It is? (Serious question.)

186. Town moves against Islamic school

Comment #189006 by hungarianelephant on June 5, 2008 at 7:48 am

307. Comment #188995 by Quetzalcoatl on June 5, 2008 at 6:58 am

Just because it has been declared that Sharia will never be implemented doesn't mean that the fundies will stop trying to get it implemented.

No it doesn't, but taking a firm line on key issues might persuade the deafeningly silent "moderates" / Meccan Muslims / kafirised Muslims to come out of the closet and not be afraid to assert some sort of ownership of their religion - to tell the fundies that they do not speak for everyone.

What does it tell them when, after the latest terrorist attempt, senior government figures seek out photo opportunities with the loopiest imams they can find?

187. Ben Stein 1, Yoko Ono 0 in 'Expelled' copyright spat

Comment #188964 by hungarianelephant on June 5, 2008 at 4:03 am

72. Comment #188895 by Teratornis on June 5, 2008 at 12:10 am

I'll be less devastated if you act like it really, really hurts to disagree with me.

Touché

Can you rigorously define the difference between "information" and "the form of expression"?

Rigorously? Probably not. That's why we have case law. And in a way that survives all future technological progress? Again, probably not, but there are principles which can be applied and adapted. If they don't work, it's open to change them.

Suppose, for example, that I rewrite all the "information" in The God Delusion and publish it as my own derived work. How much do I have to change to avoid violating copyright? How much of the original "information" will really survive my rewrite?

That's a better example than you might think. I'm sure our good professor would be happy to admit that none of the facts or arguments stated in TGD are themselves original. It is essentially a rehash of old information.

Of course, it is much more than that. It is expressed in a particular way (shrill, I'm told). It's the expression that counts. You could do your own rehash of all the arguments without infringing copyright. There is no copyright in the ideas, and there never was.

Now that we have computers, it is clear that all information has a digital expression. In fact, infinitely many digital expressions. For example, you can scan a copyrighted photo and express it in hundreds of different standard file formats, without having to write any code ... You are not free to express the information in the original photo in new ways that appear recognizably the same to a viewer. The only thing two different encodings of a copyrighted photo have in common is that they both map onto the same visual information. So in this case, the copyright protects the information rather than the expression.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

You are conflating the technological understanding of "information" with the legal meaning. The photo itself is regarded as a form of expression. That form may be reduced to an electronic stream of ones and zeroes, or to film (which amounts to much the same thing except that because the bits of silver are randomly distributed, it's difficult to turn it into a coherent string). You may call it "visual information", but it is a form of expression.

What is not protected (by copyright, anyway), is the subject matter of the photo. If I take a picture of the collapse of a bridge, I can't stop anyone else from coming and taking a similar photo. There's no copyright in the collapsing bridge. It's the way I choose to take the photo that's important.

It will be possible, then, to patent something like a person. The magic black box distinction that historically made brains a completely different kind of "stuff" than everything else will start to lose its meaning. We will have machines that mimic people ever more completely and convincingly; and from the other side, we will have increasingly more complete and predictive mechanistic models of the human brain.

Now, that is interesting. What rules do you propose to deal with that?

73. Comment #188897 by Teratornis on June 5, 2008 at 12:49 am

Disclaimer: I am a citizen of country which rebelled against said Monarchy. No hard feelings, I trust.

Of course not. You can have them back if you want. Except Philip, who is great for a laugh.

What you might want to consider, though, is that you replaced it with a constitution that was deliberately difficult to change. The result has been relative stability, the only major glitch being the civil war (where both sides wanted to make a radical change to it). Compare and contrast, say, the history of France in the same period. Which political system would you prefer?

Conservatism also creates many opportunities for unintended consequences, particularly conservatism in an environment of rapid technological change.

That is true (and I was putting the point forward as an empirical observation rather than a logical deduction). There's a difference, though: at least you work through the problems of the paradigm in turn, rather than having to deal with all manner of new problems at once.

The only way to determine whose fallacy works out to be an error and whose works out to be a useful heuristic is probably just to try them both. We've given conservative copyright laws a fair shot already so let's see what happens with something else. The open source movement seems to have demonstrated that copyrights are not essential for stimulating human creativity.

As epeeist has pointed out, the open source movement uses copyright law for the very purpose of protecting the work of the open source movement. I'm not certain whether you are suggesting that the whole rule book be torn up, or just expressing frustration at certain aspects of it. If the former, it's not clear to me exactly what that is supposed to achieve.

There are undoubtedly some changes that need to be made. For example, the idea that you can't rip a CD you bought and put it on your own MP3 player for personal listening is stupid and should be changed. For some, this doesn't go far enough - the ease of moving music around as data is apparently a compelling reason for allowing that to happen. And bollocks to the artists. I don't know whether this is your view, but if you want to propose some other mechanism for ensuring that artists are rewarded, the onus is on you to show that it is viable.

In the meantime, it's open to artists to go down the open source route. Radiohead, for one, will not be doing that again.

188. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #188948 by hungarianelephant on June 5, 2008 at 3:00 am

1202. Comment #188938 by Appleby on June 5, 2008 at 2:39 am

You know what your problem is, Quetz? You think you've got something there but you don't. You picked up something I said, took it out of context, and then applied it to some other situation we are not even discussing. It is frankly an insult to think that I would assume we can base laws on science *alone*. Of course not. But it is often used to substantiate laws. Just like with gay rights (and their right to adopt, for example).

For the 85th time, no it isn't.

The issue is that gay couples should be treated as equivalent to straight couples, unless there's a good reason not to. Ethical issue.

Some people want to raise arguments that the child is likely to be harmed. They can be shown to be spurious. Scientific issue.

You seemed to have this yesterday. What's so difficult about it?

Now, may Quetz please have an answer?

189. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #188945 by hungarianelephant on June 5, 2008 at 2:54 am

Mitchell - The discussion has moved on somewhat since yesterday, but maybe I can come back to this:

1090. Comment #188658 by Mitchell Gilks on June 4, 2008 at 10:51 am

Do you consider that non-existent things have rights? Desires? Can suffer? Do you consider it an ethical issue at all to kill a potential person? Masturbating, abortion, stem-cells; what have you?

Shouldn't we also make sure every person is bore despite whatever ends may await them?

Those are two seperate questions:

1. Do non-existent/potential individuals enter into ethical considerations, and if so, why and how so?

2. Is making sure these potential individuals get to exist top priority, and trump whatever ends may await them?

Your answers should be analogous to both potential humans and non-humans alike.

You still haven't said in terms that you feel it's better for the cow not to live at all than to live and be slaughtered. But I'm guessing that that is indeed your view. Correct me if I'm wrong.

What I'm getting at is that you appear to be having regard to "harm" and "sufferance" only, and eliminating all other potential factors. If you follow that logic through, then the best thing for the world at large would be mass extinction, as that would eliminate all future suffering. And since in your ethical system there's no relevant distinction between humans and other animals, that applies to us too. So it's goodbye cruel world.

This is tied up with your insistence on "rights". Rights are a much overused concept, which frequently don't add anything useful to the debate. What they can do is lead you into the trap of thinking that they are all there is, much as the Catholic church is trapped into its insistence that zygote = human => zygote has inalienable rights.

Your question 1 is a fair one. I don't see how it is possible to place zero value on a potential life. That does not mean that "every sperm is sacred" (even if you could treat sperm as entities distinct from their producer) - it merely recognises that potentially, some life is better than no life.

Question 2 is a straw man. No one - well maybe the Pope - suggested that it is a "top" priority. Clearly other interests are in play. In the case of abortion, the mother has an interest in her own autonomy. (Digression: does the father?). And as you rightly point out, plainly the quality of the potential life is a relevant factor.

Having seen the conditions in which battery chickens are kept, for example, I would personally take the view that they would be better not having been born at all. But what of a free range chicken? It exhibits more or less normal behaviour, is well fed, and is slaughtered almost painlessly. You're welcome to argue that this is worse than not living at all, but that's a case that still has to be made.

190. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #188667 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 11:09 am

Mitchell, I'm going to have to pull a number 10 until tomorrow. But I'd first observe that I never mentioned "rights". They have a habit of clouding the issue. I merely asked whether you would prefer that a cow never lived than that it lived and was slaughtered and eaten. And I still don't think I know what your answer was.

191. Ben Stein 1, Yoko Ono 0 in 'Expelled' copyright spat

Comment #188664 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 11:06 am

61. Comment #188649 by Teratornis on June 4, 2008 at 10:29 am

I might add that I can't wait for intellectual property attorneys to realize they can start patenting their legal strategies, and begin charging other attorneys to use those same strategies in court.

This is a misunderstanding of patent law. Ideas cannot be patented. I suspect you are thinking of some of the doubtful "business method" patents, some of which are obviously spurious. A legal strategy is a further stretch still - and you can bet on there being prior art every time.

Some attorneys a while back did start adding copyright notices to their draft contracts. It didn't catch on. This probably had more to do with the difficulty of enforcing it against arguments of "fair use" than any notion of collaboration.

FWIW, however, I have personally been involved in projects to create standardised template commercial documents. Strictly, they are licensed out, in the form of a book / CD-ROM. As a practical matter, the information is nearly free compared to the time-value saved by not having to regenerate it. But that is to largely miss the point. As in most jobs, 80% of what lawyers do is simple, and it's the 20% that creates real value for the client. These projects fall squarely in the 80% category. Anything near the 20% category would have been deliberately excluded from the project. We are not suicidal.

63. Comment #188655 by epeeist on June 4, 2008 at 10:44 am

I pretty much agree with all of this. Do you know why the copyright period has been extended? It was largely because of lobbying by the Disney Corporation, who were on the brink of financial catastrophe before the change.

James Joyce's books are back in copyright. His grandson is still living off them. He appears to have no talent whatever other than being able to invoke copyright laws. But it would be quite possible to get rid of this sort of nonsense without ripping up the entire rule book, as some want to do (not going to accuse Teratornis of this, as I'm not quite sure what his proposals are).

192. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #188652 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 10:39 am

1087. Comment #188647 by Mitchell Gilks on June 4, 2008 at 10:27 am

Apply the same reasoning to abortion.

I think I'm being a little slow. What exactly is your analogy?

193. Ben Stein 1, Yoko Ono 0 in 'Expelled' copyright spat

Comment #188651 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 10:34 am

Teratornis - I'm normally an avid reader of your posts, but I'm afraid that that one completely missed the boat.

Copyright law does not protect information. It protects the form of expression. At its most basic level, this means there's no copyright in an item of news, only in the way in which it is expressed. The basic premiss of your post is flawed.

Wouldn't it be great if, instead of constantly being decades if not centuries out of date, the law could actually lead us into progress?

Law is deliberately conservative. It helps protect against the worst effects of the law of unintended consequences. Immobile common law sometimes acts as a block on progress, but for truly spectacular fuckups, you need radical legislators.

EDIT: This was addressed to 188646 - may have to plead no. 10 on the last one.

194. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #188644 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 10:19 am

Mitchell - Why would it be better for farm animals not to exist at all than for them to have a life, at the end of which we slaughter and eat them?

195. Ben Stein 1, Yoko Ono 0 in 'Expelled' copyright spat

Comment #188608 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 8:51 am

57. Comment #188594 by Philster61 on June 4, 2008 at 8:32 am

Yoko has been unfairly accused of many things and this is no exception.But when you have a judge with the last name Stein then he isnt exactly going to side with Yoko Ono now is he?

By which you mean what?

196. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #188606 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 8:47 am

At least it's irrational English.

197. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #188586 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 8:12 am

1044. Comment #188583 by Appleby on June 4, 2008 at

I guess the onus is on the party saying it's harmful. Or am I supposed to assume this by default?

I'll consider answering that when Quetz gets an answer to his question.

198. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #188581 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 8:09 am

Just to add to the previous point, try Googling "volenti non fit injuria". Roughly, "the willing cannot be harmed". It's a key principle of tort law, which deals with non-contractual wrongs. I'm sure you can understand why.

(Edited for clarity)

199. Storm erupts over 'virginity' divorce

Comment #188578 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 8:06 am

1034. Comment #188570 by Appleby on June 4, 2008 at 8:00 am

Sounds like bestiality is permitted too, then.

Indeed - if you can establish the absence of harm. Rachel Holmes has already walked you through this point. Good luck with that.

200. Is Science Killing the Soul?

Comment #188574 by hungarianelephant on June 4, 2008 at 8:03 am

33. Comment #188555 by Artful_Dodger on June 4, 2008 at 7:49 am

The questioner who referred to the television analogy was onto something, and neither Dawkins noir Pinker addressed the point. The same could be said about the message encoded in the signs that we call "language", or an argument "materialised" in the pixels or in the ink of a text. The message/argument and the materialisation of it are not consubstantial with each other. I have raised this issue again and again on this site and no one has produced a reasonable response to it.

MPhil, amongst others, dealt with it. The lack of consubstance, if that's even a word, proves nothing.