Right Reason

Some years ago now I was involved in exposing somebody as a publisher of child pornography. That man is no longer in New Zealand as a result, and I am glad of that.

I would find child porn reprehensible no matter what my family situation, but I have four children. That makes the thought of child porn even more grotesque to me. In recent discussions over the last day or so with a couple of self-styled libertarians, they put it to me that a libertarian (which I am not) should oppose all censorship, and since banning child pornography counts as censorship, it should not be banned. One of these men was a particularly vile defender of the child pornographer who is no longer in this country. I could understand this coming from him, but the other person is ostensibly a Christian. The principles of liberty and free speech, he insisted, extended to the publication of child porn.

What say you then? If you believe in free speech, do you extend this freedom to a person who writes homosexual erotica where men in their thirties seduce and engage in sexual acts – acts described in lurid detail – with young boys (pre-pubescent), and who advocates in that literature that people stop persecuting “boy lovers?” If not, why not? (I use this example because this was one of the examples I was confronted with in the case of the child pornographer I referred to earlier). I’m interested in what readers think about this. Do you agree that libertarianism should lead to the freedom of the child porn industry?

Please be aware that in this particular thread I will be enforcing the blog policy fairly strictly. Read it before posting if you’re not sure what it involves. Please note also that I will not publish any advocacy of child porn or paedophilia at this blog. This is my blog, and you don’t have the freedom to use it however you like. Just don’t post it OK?

There has been a bit of a buzz about Stephen Hawking’s latest book The Grand Design.

I haven’t read it, and since I’m not all that familiar with intricate physics and cosmology I probably won’t read it (another reason is that my existing research interests are keeping me more than busy enough). But the impression I get from the buzz is that there are people out there who are treating the book as though it reveals something new and exciting about big bang cosmology that creates a new problem for the cosmological argument for God’s existence.

As a novice in the subject, and as someone who is unlikely to read the book, the best I can do is offer the perspective of people who hold a very different view on God from Dr Hawking and who do in fact have expertise in big bang cosmology.

Here are William Lane Craig’s comments on the articles about Hawkings’ book (note, Dr Craig freely admits that at the time of his comments the book had not come out, and he was relying on the new articles written by Hawkings about the contents of his book):

The overall impression Craig clearly got – and for that matter this is the general impression commentators online seem to have as well – is that Hawking’s book doesn’t have a new argument. The reasons Hawking gives for saying that God did not create the universe are the same that he has always used.

(Incidentally, there’s a dirty wee rumour going around thanks to Victor Stenger that Dr Craig had earlier misrepresented what Hawking had said in his earlier book A Brief History of Time. For an explanation of why this rumour is not correct, see here.)

One issue that I’ve seen pop up in a number of different contexts recently (one prominent example is the debate between Matt Flannagan and Ray Bradley on God and morality) is the issue of whether and when to interpret biblical passages literally or metaphorically. It’s an issue that I think highlights the shortcomings of “fundamentalism” (OK, I don’t like that word but it’s convenient sometimes). Interestingly as was highlighted in that same debate, and is also painfully clear in a number of similar exchanges, is that it also highlights the shortcomings of the way in which a number of self-proclaimed sceptics and atheists interpret the Bible when trying to discredit it or Christianity. In fact I can’t see any appreciable difference between the way those two groups, in general, interpret the Bible.

Geoff recently brought the following clip to my attention (thanks Facebook!). It’s a brief but interesting discussion of the issue of interpreting the Bible “literally” from N T (aka Tom) Wright. Enjoy! 🙂

In a recent blog on the moral argument, I noted (in the comments) that in the real world we all find ourselves faced with certain moral facts, like the fact that we shouldn’t do unnecessary harm to others. Somebody objected to this, thinking that it was clearly not true. For example, the inquisitors harmed people and they thought it was right, right? So clearly they had quite different moral beliefs, and they did not think that we have a duty not to do unnecessary harm to people.

As I pointed out briefly in reply, this is a very hasty conclusion. The fact is, those inquisitors believed that, if they were successful, they would not be harming people in the long run but helping them. They did believe that we have a duty not to harm people. They just believed, rightly or otherwise, that their actions could be construed as ultimately good for people, rather than harmful.

I decided to write a new blog on this subject because it’s one that does come up from time to time in discussion on ethics, and I think it represents a common error: Does different behaviour on what we might think are moral issues prove that the people exhibiting that behaviour hold basically different moral beliefs from us?

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As you may know, while I was in the UK recently I visited Justin at Premiere Radio who hosts the Unbelievable? Radio show. We recorded two episodes, and the first one aired on the 4th of September (my birthday – how appropriate!) and is now available in the show’s podcast. You can subscribe to the show over at the iTunes store, or you can head on over to the Unbelievable website and find the episode there.

The first show was a discussion with John Haldane of St Andrews University on the mind-body problem from a Christian point of view. It was a real pleasure to chat with John, he’s a scholar and a gentleman, and the conversation was most cordial and enjoyable. Enjoy!

We recorded two episodes on that day. The second was a discussion between me and Arif Ahmed, an atheist from the University of Cambridge on morality and God. That episode will air three weeks after this one. Apparently the Pope is visiting the UK and that’s more important in terms of radio coverage. Sheesh, priorities!