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From: mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Where to morals come from?
Message-ID: <1481@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 29-Nov-84 22:37:13 EST
Article-I.D.: umcp-cs.1481
Posted: Thu Nov 29 22:37:13 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 30-Nov-84 17:44:42 EST
References: <58@decwrl.UUCP> <608@amdahl.UUCP>
Reply-To: mangoe@maryland.UUCP (Charley Wingate)
Distribution: na
Organization: U of Maryland, Computer Science Dept., College Park, MD
Lines: 24

In article <608@amdahl.UUCP> gam@amdahl.UUCP (Gordon A. Moffett) writes:

>B F Skinner (my hero) said morals and morality are characteristics of
>a particular culture, and their purpose is to ensure the survival of
>that culture.  They are, if you will, the defense mechanism that
>maintains cultural identity.

>So to say that "Thus and such is (morally) wrong" is to say "Thus and
>such is detremental or harmful to (will cause to change) my culture."
>Note that this is entirely relative.  Human sacrifice in religious
>ceremonies was morally right to the Aztecs, and to disallow this would
>be to take part of their culture away.  Unfortunately, Cortez took all
>of it away.
Does this mean that I have no right to judge the Nazis morally wrong, because
I am a member of a different culture?  I don't think I'm going to concede
this right, because anyone can justifiably call themselves a culture of one.

I also see a problem in that no person can then be considered to be more
moral than his society.  I should point out that all these difficulties are
discussed in Bishop Krumm's _The Moral Climate_ [Forward Books; see your
local Episcopal parish for a source], and have been batted around in the
liberal theological community for years.

Charley Wingate  umcp-cs!mangoe