Ants Thread Replies

I didn't mean to come across as so evangelical in my Christianity. My
intention was to use Christianity as an example of the many
ethical-spiritual systems which have been used successfully to preserve and
communicate a system of ethics and common values. I thought I made that
clear by putting equal emphasis on Buddism and on the a non-secular but
equally sturdy system of right and wrong, as illustrated by the thrifty
German farmer. The reader who disapproves of Christianity is invited to
substitute any other cohesive system of values into my comments in its
place.

What I don't believe is that humans can settle into a stable society of more
than a small number of families --size does matter :) -- with neither
government nor some kind of common understanding of right and wrong.
Spooner's "social contract," which he claimed was sufficient to keep people
living in peace and order in the absence of government, has to be read in
context. In a late 19th Century America which modeled itself after
Victorian England, and which suffered under a U.S. government shot through
with graft and corruption, it might have made sense to say that "people" (by
which I'm sure he meant middle- and upper-class white males) would naturally
live in peace and harmony without a government due to the social pressures
to conform, and to stick to a socially conservative lifestyle ingrained by
several generations' practice. No such pressures exist in any meaningful
way today, outside the confines of small towns where everybody sees
everything. Urban anonymity has erased most pressures to conform, leading
to the police state that most cities are.

If children growing up far from God seems appealing to people, then let's
change the debate. I assert that children who are brought up to believe
that the only good is what's good for themselves, and who are brought up to
believe that laws are merely the evidence that powerful people have hijacked
the system, rather than that laws exist for the good of all, children
brought to believe that they owe their fellow citizens nothing if they can
avoid it; such children will as adults seek to subvert law and order for
their own benefit at any opportunity. I believe that widely-held ethical
systems (whether based on religions or not) tend to steer societies toward
seeking a common good that cannot be reached by a nation of individuals each
pulling in their own direction.

I call people who believe there is no common good, and that all people are
only out for their own self interest "sociopaths," in the sense of people
who work against society (what I would call society). I will state flatly
that I will not live in a space colony of sociopaths. I believe a society
made only of sociopaths requires more, not less, policing, because each
individual will seek to do whatever it takes, up to and including mass
murder, with no conscience or restraint, when it serves their best interest,
unless forced to do otherwise by the threat of incarceration. I believe
that a society with commonly-held sense of right and wrong (whether it
springs from a religion or not), a society with respect for laws, and with a
belief that obeying laws contributes to the success of the society, will
advance farther, with less policing, because it can be brought together
cheerfully to work toward a common good. Spooner was in essence saying that
his society was like that, and that it didn't need any government at all, it
was so self-regulating. That such systems sometimes get hijacked by
sociopaths (sociopaths after all make darned good politicians) for a time
should not detract from the obvious success that they have enjoyed. And yes
I include secular and non-Christian societies in that statement. I for one
am eager to see one part of Osama's vision come true--a single, unified
Islamic nation, from North Africa to the Phillippines, although one
committed to peaceful coexistence, would wipe so many of today's conflicts
off the front page for good, and would be a fascinating experiment in
whether a nation guided by religious principles can truly be more ethical
than those we have today. But that's a debate for another day.

There, stripped of any Christian elements, is my opinion. Please don't let
my previous use of Christianity in this debate confuse the discussion of
these important points.

Brad Walsh