Black Wolf

What you're referring to is pragmatism, the believe that morality should be suspended for practical purposes. This is unacceptable, because you can not be truly practical when you reject morality.

I had no idea you were referring to -our- nature. So you're saying it's in our nature, specifically, to develop a relationship with the opposite sex? Anatomically? No. Relation-ship wise? No, but the difference is mostly nurture than anything. And even so, you're not being specific about what characteristics a male can provide that is nurturing to a kid that a female can't. Most objections to any deviation of the traditional family unit is one in which the father goes to work and provides the income, while the mommy stays at home and cooks dinner for everyone. If people stayed true to this idea, we wouldn't have any female C.E.O's, Senators, lawyers, or any non-teacher/stay at home jobs.

The question of whether or not beastiality is immoral would be dependent on whether or not it is based on psychological flaws. Using an animal as a form of entertainment is not immoral in itself. Incest, as well, as taboo as it may be, is not immoral

It should be up to the guardian to decide if the parents are unfit to adopt him. It should be the child's decision if the guardian accepts, but the child doesn't. Children aren't pieces of jewelry. No, it's not a "legitimate" concern. "Common" concern and "Legitimate concern" are two different things. There's a common concern that removal of "One Nation Under God" is an assault on religious freedom, but it's not a legitimate concern. The "mother-father" relationship is not a fact of nature. A real fact of nature, is very often, the male rapes the female and never sees her again, leaving her with kids to take care of. As a matter of fact, the fact that we think of marriage as an institution of love is so far beyond nature that it's not even funny. The best thing about humans, is that we are civilized and don't follow "nature". It's an arbitrary decision, because it's not proved. It's not proved that children will develop some sort of negative disorder if they are adopted by gays. And I ask you: what does a "father-figure" do for a child? What does it mean for him? How does it contribute to his growth? And in what way do they "need one"? What is the positive correlation between the genitalia of the parental guardian, and the psychological development of the child?

Yeah, that's what I mean. It was part of an argument about whether or not "science can an answer moral questions". How's this for a response: "The rule that you can't prove a negative only applies to arbitrary explanations of what exists. It doesn't apply to questions of right or wrong. In fact, to determine that something is "wrong", you must prove that there exists a harm outside of what is normally practiced, so it can be reasonably concluded that you are called upon to prove that something is immoral."

It seems like this guy is trolling, considering this statement I'm not going to respond, however, because like eveyrone else here, I'd like some more substantiated claims.

If you're asking if the child or adoption center should be the one to decide if he wants to get adopted, the answer is yes. If you're asking if gays shouldn't be allowed to adopt just because they'd be bullied, or because they've having "conufsing messages about sexuality", the answer is no. The possibility of bullying is not sufficient grounds to make something illegal, otherwise you might as well make glasses, braces, and being intelligent illegal. "Gender roles"? What roles does a gender imply? Kids are confused by many things, so I don't know what you mean. It's the people who want to ban non-married couples from adopting that are the ones who are social engineering. They arbitrarily decided that a child is doomed to be confused if he does not have a stereotypical "Leave it to beaver" family. Well, it's hard to do a study on something if you don't let it happen, and just dismiss all 49% of gay couples want to adopt, and claim they are willing to take on "less desirable" children. http://www.mombian.com/2007/03/27/two-million-glb-people-want-to-adopt-study-says/

So, let;s say somebody, without provocation asks you "prove the morality of X", can they be dismissed?

Ayn Rand's position on the arbitrary is: you are not called upon to prove a negative. That's her stance on what exists, but why if you were to say, for instance, "Being gay is immoral" Are you called upon to prove negative morality?

http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/taxes/2008-04-10-immigrantstaxes_N.htm What about the ones that do?

Er, in case anyone misunderstood me, I meant to say that Al Qaeda would not get to claim "total war" as a justification for what they did. But I honestly wasn't really thinking about what I was trying to say. What I meant was - that wouldn't have been the appropriate action to take for "Total War". Crashing a plane into the Twin Towers - seems more like an act of vindication, than an attempt to end aggression as quickly as possible. Though, we didn't initiate aggression against Al Qaeda, so it's kind of m00t.

I'm just curious... Where did you get this info?

It seems to me that Mattis's comments imply more of an apathy towards those who wish to initiate force against women. All it seems like he's implying is that there is no sympathy for people like that. And he shouldn't. The things he has to say about Afghani civilians seems to imply that he understands the difference between civilians and terrorists. "Every time you wave at an Iraqi civilian, Al Qaeda rolls over in its grave." I think this is a better attitude to adopt - even if you assume Total War.

DAMNIT! That was totally a thought that crossed my mind.. but never had the courage to voice. Thanks. 2046, is the ship you're referring to the USS Stark? Quo Vadis, thanks also. "Total War" makes sense to me, and even if we did initiated aggression against Iraq, what Al Qaeda did does not satisfy the criteria for Total War.

I've seen this rhetoric quite a bit, and I'm not sure what exactly to think of this. Leonard Piekoff believes that it's okay to treat an civilian of an enemy country as if he's a threat, because that's an act of self-defense. I've been confronted with the argument that American Aggression has been initiated against people: It's been initiated against Saddam Hussein, in response to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. Saddam didn't initiate aggression against us, they initiated aggression against Kuwait. Al-Qaeda formed in response to our attack against Saddam. Was Al-Qaeda moral in crashing planes into the twin towers after a failed attempt?

In a government regulated market, the wealthy will more than likely produce the same amount, and simply fire workers so that there is more money for themselves.

But at what point does it become an individual? When the umbilical cord is cut?

What comments do you find particularly disgusting? The author of this article is making his own fair share of misconceptions - that Ayn Rand was against charity completely. He makes the typical assumption that charity is the same thing as altruism.

I got into an argument with a friend on the interwebs, and I admit I wasn't very prepared for this one. I argued that a child has rights once it is no longer dependent He asked me: "Well, what if you cut off a baby's head when it's attached to the umbilical chord" I argued that it depends on what point the baby is no longer dependent on the umbilical chord He asked me: So a baby can have rights when it's still attached to the mother. I argued yes. I'm really not sure how to go about this. Could I argue that, once the umbilical chord becomes useless, it's not longer a real attachment anymore than, say, being stuck to someone's hair?

I would hope not. I'm taking this out of context because it's completely awesome.

This assumes that Obama shakes hands. Obama would more than likely juts bow to people. No, I wouldn't shake his hand. There is no moral obligation to shake someone's hand.

Because radical Islamic terrorism largely exists and their fundamentalists still want to destroy us. Furthermore, there are still Islamofascist states that have initiated force against us decades ago (Iran) and have yet to be met with proper justice. They have nationalized the oil that American enterprise has drilled, they have murdered 36 of our marines and have yet to be met with the crushing defeat that is necessary stop it.

If a person, be it a leader of a nation or a citizen, has initiated force against us, or has threatened to, they need to be dealt with. We're not currently in Iraq nor Afghanistan to fight Islamic terrorism. We're there to "spread democracy". Which is wrong, because 1) We were never a democracy, and we should be treating democracy as if it's a dirty word. 2) It is immoral to force soldiers to die for countries that they did not agree to help. Much of what we're doing isn't related to self-defense, unfortunately. However, there is still a need for national defense, and joining the military is the only way to further that.

What would that benefit be?

Oops... I started a new topic about that and didn't see your response. Sorry.