Hitler was democratically elected, I believe. Certainly

Posted on: October 11, 2017 at 16:21:26 CT

millions of Germans shared his beliefs in large measure.

But even if his was a minority opinion... even if he were the only person who held that opinion, if there is no objective right or wrong, then his subjective opinion is just as "right" as anyone else's opinion, no? In such a case it would really boil down to who can muster the force to make their subjective morals prevail over anyone and everyone else's.

A baby rabbit might think it quite immoral for a cat to kill her mother, but the momma cat might think it is the epitome of morality to teach her kittens how to kill their supper. It all depends upon one's perspective in a subjective world.

"And the aztec example makes a different one of my points. AT THAT TIME, ripping the heart of of an enemy or sacrificing children to the god of corn, were societal norms. Not just theirs, but their enemies and others as well.

Human kind has evolved past that.

At that time, that was moral behavior."

I beg to differ. What about ISIS warriors who capture someone and then let them cower in fear for days while they make them beg on camera for their lives so they can use the footage for propaganda purposes, then eventually film themselves cutting off the helpless person's head, again for propaganda purpose. Raping their daughters and wives and taking them for their own wives isn't much of an "evolution past that" in my opinion. But in their subjective moral code they are doing good and may earn rewards of more virgins for doing Allah's will.

Or what about human traffickers who promise families that they will get a better life for their daughters, while paying the families a stipend as an advance on the money she will make... then brutally gang rape them to shock them into submission for their new lives as sex slaves? Maybe in their own minds they aren't doing anything immoral. They're just taking advantage of suckers... Darwin's Law and survival of the fittest and all.

Mafia guys have their own moral code. If morals are subjective and there is no objective standard, who is to say that they are "wrong" and you are "right" with a different set of subjective moral standards?

"I am certainly no scholar, but doesn't the bible have some rather harsh punishments for vanquished foes, notwithstanding the "turn the other cheek" thing?"

Yes, God did command wiping out some people in the Old Testament. But that was not a blanket 'This is what you do to your vanquished enemies' type of command, but specific instructions for dealing with a particular people at a particular time in history. I think entire books have been written on the topic, or at least chapters of books, but the gist of it is that in that particular historical context, their enemies were doing grave evil in the sight of God, and had also been harassing the Israelites for quite some time, killing stragglers & perhaps women and children &/or kidnapping them and so on. As I understand it, they also could not reasonably take prisoners and feed them, take care of them etc.

"I suggest that morality evolves. Even the written part, like our constitution is subject to some interpretation."

I agree with you, but it is still an objective moral standard. I would liken it to the rules we live by as we grow and mature. They are based upon the same moral standards from the time that we were infants to the time that we become adults, but the rules can change and adapt to the circumstances and to the maturity of the person. Young kids might have to stay in the yard and come in when it gets dark. The rules change as they get older and mature, but the underlying moral values do not.

"Thou shalt not kill. Ever? Self defense? Death penalty?
The right to free speech. Always? Yelling FIRE in a crowded theatre?"

There can be multiple principles and values in play and they may seem to contradict each other and may in fact require some subjective judgments, but again the core moral values do not change.

For instance a parent might tell a child to stay in the house while she's gone, but if her child saw a baby crawling out towards a busy street and ran out to grab the baby before she got run over, that child would probably be praised rather than punished for realizing that the general principle to obey his parents was superseded in such a situation.