The Stupidity of Dignity: Conservative bioethics' latest, most dangerous ploy. Steven Pinker reviews Human Dignity and Bioethics, the latest report from the President's Council on Bioethics.
posted on May 28, 2008 - View this thread

"From a review of the anthropological and evolutionary literatures [Edge.org]... there were three best candidates for being additional psychological foundations of morality [embedded video], beyond harm/care and fairness/justice. These three we label as ingroup/loyalty (which may have evolved from the long history of cross-group or sub-group competition...); authority/respect (which may have evolved from the long history of primate hierarchy, modified by cultural limitations on power and bullying...), and purity/sanctity, which may be a much more recent system, growing out of the uniquely human emotion of disgust, which seems to give people feelings that some ways of living and acting are higher, more noble, and less carnal than others.
posted on Sep 11, 2007 - View this thread

Can we have an intelligent non-religion-bashing discussion about this article? ". . . perhaps the most shocking implication of my inquiry into the role religion plays in our lives" : ". . . those who have an unquestioning faith in the correctness of the moral teachings of their religion are a problem: If they haven't conscientiously considered, on their own, whether their pastors or priests or rabbis or imams are worthy of such delegated authority over their lives, then they are taking a personally immoral stand. Please RTFA before commenting.
posted on Jan 26, 2006 - View this thread

Bill Bennett apparently has plenty of extra time (and cash) on hand in light of his success preaching morality and virtue. "I've gambled all my life and it's never been a moral issue with me. I liked church bingo when I was growing up ..."
posted on May 2, 2003 - View this thread

The National Religious Partnership for the Environment is preparing a grass roots campaign linking fuel economy to morality. The group includes members from the Catholic, Jewish and Evangelical faiths.

Why is this important? With BIG religion vs BIG Oil, where does this leave the Republicans?
posted on Nov 19, 2002 - View this thread

A bill is currently being pushed through Congress that will give health care providers, including those that are federally funded, the right to refuse to perform abortions or administer contraceptive medication for personal moral reasons. Next week: firefighters allowed to let houses burn down because they hate the color of the curtains.
posted on Sep 25, 2002 - View this thread