This Blog considers assisted suicide/euthanasia, bioethics, human cloning, biotechnology, radical environmentalism, and the dangers of animal rights/liberation. My views expressed here, as in my books and other writings, reflect my understanding that the philosophy of human exceptionalism is the bedrock of universal human rights. Or, to put it another way: human life matters. (The opinions expressed here are my own and not necessarily those of any organization with which I am affiliated.)
This was expected: Arizona legislators will introduce an assisted suicide legalization bill. Typically, the media report states that the opponents will be Christians and Catholics. That's just the tip of the ice berg with disability rights and civil rights organizations also opposing, along with medical professional organizations.
posted by Wesley J. Smith @ 6:59 PM
7 Comments
I am a Senior Fellow in Human Rights and Bioethics at the Discovery Institute and the author of 12 books, including A Rat Is A Pig Is A Dog Is A Boy, which is relevant to the issues considered by this blog.
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7 Comments:
interesting..you make a distinction between "catholics" and "christians" THOUGHTS?
Tweet! And there's a penalty flag on the field. Let's not get into theological discussions as to whether there is a difference between "Christians" and "Catholics." The reporter was probably inexpertly distinguishing between evangelics and Catholics. Chalk it up to more ignorance.
I just found it amusing that you would allow such an elementary mistake to be in the heading to your blog; i thus took the heading to be representative of your views and, more importantly, your intelligence.. but yes you're both right this is not the central issue here..on a more relevant note wesley i have read your article condemning peter singer and his appointment at Princeton. It contains just about every fallacy of reasoning and rhetorical ploy in the book..his water-tight logic is matched with intuitive remarks and unargued propositions on your behalf. have you had much feedback regarding this issue?
I just found it amusing that you would allow such an elementary mistake to be in the heading to your blog; i took it to be representative of your views and, more importantly, your intelligence.. but yes you're both right this is not the central issue here..on a more relevant note wesley i have read your article condemning peter singer and his appointment at Princeton. It contains just about every fallacy of reasoning and rhetorical ploy in the book..his water-tight logic is matched with intuitive remarks and unargued propositions on your behalf. have you had much feedback regarding this issue?
Take-them-on:
Interesting the way you worded your statment there, me bucko. Let me see if I remember my rhetoric and debate classes - what you did was pretty much a set-up to make the opponent look less sophisticated by bluntly pointing out an "error" made by said opponent, and then related the supposed fallacy to both the intelligence of the opponent in question and to the quality of the opponent's article.
In layman's terms, you stacked the deck against Wesley by playing up a supposed "error" on his part and trying to disuade the audience on that basis, rather than listing the fallacies that you found in Wes' article and clearly refuting them.
Dirty pool. I'd give you a C+ if I were feeling generous.
And to clarify once and for all so that this doesn't get abused in the future, Catholics and Christians are often differentiated by the media becuase of structure. Catholics (and by the way, "catholic" literally means "universal") all follow a set structure that affects the workings from the highest clergy to the common parishiner. The Catholic Church is also a political entity as it is the government of Vatican City. "Christians" on the other hand are of all sorts of various denominations, or non-denominational, and they do not follow a particular structure all the way down, and they may or may not be political.
"Christians" would be fine, or "Catholics and Christians" would be fine, depending on if you were speaking politically or not.
And Wesley - this isn't a religious argument, it's a language argument. I hate seeing people abusing a perfectly good linguistic system to trap an audience into a particular emotional state. Take-them-on was intentionally manipulating the language to make you look bad. THAT is what I'm objecting to, here. I don't like people playing that way.
A correction:
""Christians" on the other hand are of all sorts of various denominations, or non-denominational, and they do not follow a particular structure all the way down, and they may or may not be political"
That SHOULD have read:
""Christians" on the other hand are of all sorts of various denominations, or non-denominational, and they do not NECESSARILY follow a particular structure all the way down, and they may or may not be political."
Typo, my goof.
Tabs: I just didn't want us to discuss here theological differences. As for our friend takethemon77, he just has a chip on his shoulder.
takeon: I have written about Singer often. It's all there if you are interested.
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