Crick turned me off on science. I read his sordid book years ago, and saw that it was all a race for fame. He couldn't even resist denigrating the one colleague to whom he owed so much, who ruined her health gathering the images on which he based his conclusions. Now that we are blessed with a government that sticks its nose into every aspect of our lives I cheerfully allow them to make these monumental decisions on the universe, life and human relations while I blissfully ignore them. I do pay taxes and avoid getting in trouble with the law, but my private life is private, and is to a great extent dictated by a morality that pre-existed our regime and will continue after.
There's a lot of popular mythology connected to science, scientists, doctors, etc. The mantra of following the science reminds one of people who know nothing of sausage making.
The entire paragraph beginning with "...Johannes Kepler" you quote is wonderful. I'm saving it, along with your equally wonderful two-sentence comment that follows, for future reference.
That's only a conundrum if the Constitution is a type of Liberaltarian contract. As a matter of history, that isn't the case. The people who adopted the Constitution clearly assumed that the American republic would be a nation with a culture of its own--a civil religion based on Judeo-Christian ideas. That means that marriage is not a civil contract between individuals solely--that is the Liberaltarian view--but that the State is a party to the contract in the sense of setting the terms of the contract through legislation.
It is not at all a religion-free statement to say that all societies are ultimately a structure of engineering, not unlike a bridge or a skyscraper. Good engineering makes the structure solid, stable and enduring, and bad engineering makes the opposite. The (as you call it) Liberaltarian structure we've steadily morphed into is fundamentally flawed engineering, physically guaranteed to collapse of its own weight. (cf "a house built on sand" and all that.)
That's a sort of long-winded way to associate myself wholly with your comment to TexasDude.
I'm not going to go into this beyond noting that you're mistaken on several grounds:
Philosophical: Nature is not amoral, except in anachronistic anthropomorphic terms.
Political: Not a theocracy? Not a confessional state. Constitution makes religion "inclusive"? I don't think that was the historical understanding. Which is why Roberts is correct. Religion in a non-confessional state and broadly understood should be decided through the mechanisms of society as a whole, not through pressure groups appealing to 5 out of 9 legal functionaries.
Your understanding of what "civil" means is deficient, for the above reasons.
That's very obviously not what he's saying. Nor is my agreeing with his statement of how our federal system is supposed to work an agreement with all his decisions. Grow up.
Crick turned me off on science. I read his sordid book years ago, and saw that it was all a race for fame. He couldn't even resist denigrating the one colleague to whom he owed so much, who ruined her health gathering the images on which he based his conclusions. Now that we are blessed with a government that sticks its nose into every aspect of our lives I cheerfully allow them to make these monumental decisions on the universe, life and human relations while I blissfully ignore them. I do pay taxes and avoid getting in trouble with the law, but my private life is private, and is to a great extent dictated by a morality that pre-existed our regime and will continue after.
There's a lot of popular mythology connected to science, scientists, doctors, etc. The mantra of following the science reminds one of people who know nothing of sausage making.
The entire paragraph beginning with "...Johannes Kepler" you quote is wonderful. I'm saving it, along with your equally wonderful two-sentence comment that follows, for future reference.
It takes a village.
That's only a conundrum if the Constitution is a type of Liberaltarian contract. As a matter of history, that isn't the case. The people who adopted the Constitution clearly assumed that the American republic would be a nation with a culture of its own--a civil religion based on Judeo-Christian ideas. That means that marriage is not a civil contract between individuals solely--that is the Liberaltarian view--but that the State is a party to the contract in the sense of setting the terms of the contract through legislation.
It is not at all a religion-free statement to say that all societies are ultimately a structure of engineering, not unlike a bridge or a skyscraper. Good engineering makes the structure solid, stable and enduring, and bad engineering makes the opposite. The (as you call it) Liberaltarian structure we've steadily morphed into is fundamentally flawed engineering, physically guaranteed to collapse of its own weight. (cf "a house built on sand" and all that.)
That's a sort of long-winded way to associate myself wholly with your comment to TexasDude.
Yes, and we're seeing that now.
I'm not going to go into this beyond noting that you're mistaken on several grounds:
Philosophical: Nature is not amoral, except in anachronistic anthropomorphic terms.
Political: Not a theocracy? Not a confessional state. Constitution makes religion "inclusive"? I don't think that was the historical understanding. Which is why Roberts is correct. Religion in a non-confessional state and broadly understood should be decided through the mechanisms of society as a whole, not through pressure groups appealing to 5 out of 9 legal functionaries.
Your understanding of what "civil" means is deficient, for the above reasons.
That's very obviously not what he's saying. Nor is my agreeing with his statement of how our federal system is supposed to work an agreement with all his decisions. Grow up.