Let me start by saying that I like the article, and found the main point both insightful and likely true. However, I think you chose a poor example, and did not explore the example thoroughly enough.
I think that your assumptions that both parties will accept your dissolution, or even should, are flawed. You’re attempting to dissolve an argument between a straw atheist and a straw Christian.
As an atheist, I disagree with B. Leviticus 18:22 is not clear on the subject. The bible does not ban homosexual conduct any more than it bans wearing mixed fibers, requires animal sacrifice, or permits selling your daughters into slavery. Any Christian who claims that the Bible speaks to homosexuality without accepting as equally strong the other provisions, is clearly getting some of their morality and claims from sources outside the Bible, whether those are personal morality, their culture, historical interpretation of the Bible, or something else. (I choose not to use the uncharitable interpretation that Christians making such claims are hypocrites and only speaking loudly about the parts that are easy to follow for them, though I’ve heard that basic claim advanced. I don’t think it’s consistent with other observed behaviors.) Given that when people refer to “the teachings of the Bible”, they seem to be referring to something more like “the teachings of the bible as interpreted by [me / my parents / my priest / talk radio / historical authors]”, I think it’s fair to say that B has connotation / denotation problems that you haven’t yet resolved, and that it’s fair for me as an atheist to disagree with statement B.
Furthermore, there are Biblical scholars more knowledgeable than I who say that Leviticus 18:22 bans male temple prostitutes, and should not be taken as law outside of that context. I’m not enough of a scholar to have a strong opinion on this, but it seems relevant if accurate. (I should also note I’m not familiar with the responses to those interpretations, and that I don’t feel terribly inclined to find out all the details, because this is not my true rejection.)
I’ve also seen multiple arguments against A (none of which I agree with, but they do exist). You’re hurting the other person you’re engaging homosexual relations with, by damning them to Hell. Such an act can’t properly be described as consensual, in the same way we don’t let people consensually murder and eat each other.
There’s also a fairly prevalent argument that homosexual relationships hurt other people in the society in one fashion or another.
(I feel compelled to state that I think both those arguments are horribly flawed, factually wrong, and fairly insulting. However, they are not arguments over definitions, and are not dissolved by your proposed definitions of the term “immoral”, so they seem worth pointing out, distasteful as I find them. It didn’t seem fair to call your atheist a strawman without making the strongest complementary claim about your straw Christian that I could.)
While I think it might be possible to dissolve much of this argument through good definitions, I don’t think you can dissolve all of it, and I don’t think you’ve yet dissolves it as far as possible. I still think that some of the points of debate actually need to be refuted on their merits, which you have not done.
I think that your assumptions that both parties will accept your dissolution, or even should, are flawed. You’re attempting to dissolve an argument between a straw atheist and a straw Christian.
They were never really intended to be more than straw. Sure, arguments A and B are open to attack; but here I’m interested in the participants’ choice of what-to-argue, not merits-of-argument. You’re right, my choice of example was crap. I think in future I may borrow Eliezer’s rubes and bleggs for such things instead.
That’s still a really good rebuttal of the assumed positions, and made me think a bit more than usual about how theists might view their sacred texts. Thanks.
Let me start by saying that I like the article, and found the main point both insightful and likely true. However, I think you chose a poor example, and did not explore the example thoroughly enough.
I think that your assumptions that both parties will accept your dissolution, or even should, are flawed. You’re attempting to dissolve an argument between a straw atheist and a straw Christian.
As an atheist, I disagree with B. Leviticus 18:22 is not clear on the subject. The bible does not ban homosexual conduct any more than it bans wearing mixed fibers, requires animal sacrifice, or permits selling your daughters into slavery. Any Christian who claims that the Bible speaks to homosexuality without accepting as equally strong the other provisions, is clearly getting some of their morality and claims from sources outside the Bible, whether those are personal morality, their culture, historical interpretation of the Bible, or something else. (I choose not to use the uncharitable interpretation that Christians making such claims are hypocrites and only speaking loudly about the parts that are easy to follow for them, though I’ve heard that basic claim advanced. I don’t think it’s consistent with other observed behaviors.) Given that when people refer to “the teachings of the Bible”, they seem to be referring to something more like “the teachings of the bible as interpreted by [me / my parents / my priest / talk radio / historical authors]”, I think it’s fair to say that B has connotation / denotation problems that you haven’t yet resolved, and that it’s fair for me as an atheist to disagree with statement B.
Furthermore, there are Biblical scholars more knowledgeable than I who say that Leviticus 18:22 bans male temple prostitutes, and should not be taken as law outside of that context. I’m not enough of a scholar to have a strong opinion on this, but it seems relevant if accurate. (I should also note I’m not familiar with the responses to those interpretations, and that I don’t feel terribly inclined to find out all the details, because this is not my true rejection.)
I’ve also seen multiple arguments against A (none of which I agree with, but they do exist). You’re hurting the other person you’re engaging homosexual relations with, by damning them to Hell. Such an act can’t properly be described as consensual, in the same way we don’t let people consensually murder and eat each other.
There’s also a fairly prevalent argument that homosexual relationships hurt other people in the society in one fashion or another.
(I feel compelled to state that I think both those arguments are horribly flawed, factually wrong, and fairly insulting. However, they are not arguments over definitions, and are not dissolved by your proposed definitions of the term “immoral”, so they seem worth pointing out, distasteful as I find them. It didn’t seem fair to call your atheist a strawman without making the strongest complementary claim about your straw Christian that I could.)
While I think it might be possible to dissolve much of this argument through good definitions, I don’t think you can dissolve all of it, and I don’t think you’ve yet dissolves it as far as possible. I still think that some of the points of debate actually need to be refuted on their merits, which you have not done.
(EDIT: fixed statement labels)
They were never really intended to be more than straw. Sure, arguments A and B are open to attack; but here I’m interested in the participants’ choice of what-to-argue, not merits-of-argument. You’re right, my choice of example was crap. I think in future I may borrow Eliezer’s rubes and bleggs for such things instead.
That’s still a really good rebuttal of the assumed positions, and made me think a bit more than usual about how theists might view their sacred texts. Thanks.