The golden rule is in no way incompatible with enlightened self interest. I don't see it as superior to (or inferior to) but part and parcel of.

Actually, Rabbi Hillel gave the rule as "Whatever is hateful to you, don't do to others," which I think may be superior to the more common form of "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Why? Well, you might desire something that others would find unsavory. (extreme and rude example - "I just don't understand why she objected when I peed on her. It's what I would have wanted.") On the other hand, if you avoid behaviors that you yourself would not enjoy, you automatically go a long way toward modeling to others what you would like or expect from them in return. It's not a bad starting point for a moral system, secular or otherwise.

The sacrifice of the chaplains is laudable regardless of their own belief system. Their decision to give themselves up for the good of four sailors may have been informed somewhat by a sense of expectation. ("As a representative of a higher power, it's better for me to model supreme sacrifice, rather than spend the rest of my life justifying my decision to save myself." Indeed, it would have sounded lame for any one of them to say "I thought it was important for me to survive so I could continue to give moral sustenance to the rest of you." Such a chaplain might well have been seen as a coward.)

I suspect there have been any number of non-theists who have also given their lives for others. Unlike the chaplains, they do so without any expectation of heavenly reward. I could see someone deciding that their own biological imperative simply means less to them than dying for something admirable or heroic. ("I could decide to save myself at the cost of someone else's life, but then, will I be able to live with myself?") Not long ago, there was even a video posted in a thread here showing a dog who was willing to put his life at risk to save another dog on a busy highway. (I'm assuming the dog had some understanding of the danger - I guess it could have been in the so-stupid-I'm-brave category.)

Surely you aren't saying that the actions of Mugabe or Idi Amin are examples of ESI, are you? (Enlightened self interest - one serves ones own interests best by serving the interests of others.) Your examples sound more like its opposite, unenlightened self interest - rapacity and willingness to murder to further ones own agenda. How exactly did society benefit from these guys?

I will agree that societies built around ESI face risk from aggressors who do not share those values of tolerance.

I always interpret the "do unto others . . ." as embracing both acts and omissions. However, whether phrased in the positive or negative, it boils down to "Treat people how you expect to be treated." Since the command would be meaningless and unworkable otherwise, this presupposes a shared value system of substantive expectations of proper treatment and agreed upon procedures for resolving foreseeable disagreements. E.g., "Excuse me, ma'am. May I pee on you?"

So you're saying that, without personally holding a belief in an omniscient, omnipotent entity, you desire morality. You have an internally motivated desire to act morally, and you have a desire that the people around you act morally. Would you agree with that assessment?

Assuming you do, I'd have one more set of questions. Do you consider yourself abnormal? Do you consider yourself significantly different than a large percentage of the population? Is that internally motivated moral desire something that you think is largely unique to you?

So really it seems to me we need to be more Machiavellian about our beliefs - we know there isn't a God but we need to pretend so that we can dupe enough of our people to blindly go of to battle and kill the enemy in the name of God so we can eat their bacon. Still sounds like enlightened self interest, especially if you are not a believer.

Oh dear, no. Definitely not ESI.

Yes, my desire for morality may be biological (or maybe some more enduring metaphysical part of me? Can't prove or disprove that), but the specific morality that I desire is cultural as I mentioned several times.

While the desire for morality may be common, that part is invisible and therefore irrelevant; the results or choice of moral systems are radically different, so yes, I do think there are fundamental differences in people and groups. I don't understand Oprah Winfrey's assertion that "We are all the same inside". Was Hitler the same as Mother Teresa? Is a torturer the same as you or me? Is the mother of a suicide bomber who says she wishes her other sons would do it too the same as the moms you know?

Actually, looking at history and the rest of the world, our way of thinking is probably more of a minority. Which is why I hope we can appreciate and preserve it.

I understand your questions. What I need to clear up about my argument is that I'm talking about the value system, not the theology. Theology can be a personal choice, but it's values that determine behavior, and that morality has to be universal and therefore not a personal choice.

For example, you can believe in the Holy Trinity and I can believe that the Dalai Lama is the reincarnation of the first Buddha. But we both share the common value that stealing is wrong. There is actually a lot of overlap of values between the Buddhist value system and the JudeoChristian (JC) one, and that's fine.

The reason I don't advocate for Buddhism is that it doesn't value fighting wrongdoing like the JC one does, and therefore will eventually be destroyed or subjugated to regimes that perpetrate more evil, as we are seeing already. The result is a worse world. To many, physical violence even in self defense is wrong. This is a major difference with JC and in fact is a more and more a shared value with the Western European Secular system (WE).

In this regard, the WE system is worse, because many don't even believe in a universal concept of wrong to begin with; it's a personal choice. They seem to have a problem identifying evil and even doubt its existence. This is emblemized by Sweden, who could not see any moral difference between the Allied and Axis powers in WWII, nor between the US and Soviets in the Cold War, or the Israelis and Palestinians today. I think this is because they have put the value of equality above all else, to the point that humans are all the same inside (regardless of their outside behavior apparently), terrorists are freedom fighters or justified because those who they attack enabled them, animals have the same worth as people, etc.

Now, I understand that not everyone falls neatly into the WE or JC category and we all have a certain combination of these beliefs. This is because the WE people's grandfathers who built their cities and societies came from the JC tradition, and it has evolved and morphed from there into WE secularism. I point to the Scandinavian examples because the process is more advanced in Europe and the US is far more religious still.

In the JC system, fighting both in self defense and in aid of others who arevictims of wrongdoing is not only permissible, it is an obligation, which is one of the reasons the US has always had an interventionist foreign policy. I am not saying it's perfect and doesn't often make mistakes. My point is that the benign, "enlightened" secular world has done harm by enabling the harmful forces, both secular and radical religious.

Just because I am not religious myself, doesn't mean that I can't acknowledge the real world consequences of important differences in these ideologies.

Strangler, I enjoyed reading your post. With regard to your examples of Hillel and the Constitution (which I also hold in high esteem), it seems to me that you are going out of your way to extract the God part and leave everything else. (Maybe you are not personally adverse to it, but you are doing it to respond to my arguments to test if God is necessary to them, which I hope is the case). Whether or not these depend on God for validity, it just happens to be historically true. Picasso’s sketches were criticized by those who said that an eight year old child could have drawn them. His response was: “Maybe, but the eight year old didn’t.” I am trying to build my case on results, not theory.

But now that you bring them up, it seems that God is rather integral to them:

Hillel didn’t attribute the golden rule to himself, but rather the God of Abraham and the introduction of monotheism to the world. And the founding fathers did not say that Washington or Madison were conferring rights on those they governed; they had the vision that they themselves were blessed by that same God and they wanted to affirm that for everyone. (An earlier version of the US Seal they designed depicted Moses leading the Jews to Freedom, and the Liberty Bell in Philly has an inscription from the Torah on it). I’m not sure if the idea of specific rights can even exist without someone conferring them to someone else – can molecules or matter or give us rights?

Morality has to be universal? I'm not so sure of that. It seems to me more like an ever-shifting consensus. Anyhow, our most formidable enemies right now are quite committed to the God of Abraham (even if they call him Allah), but their version of monotheism sure isn't pointing them to a morality that benefits their own people, or anyone else for that matter. I'm willing to admit it's possible that WE societies have taken tolerance to a level that endangers their own best interests.

And yes, rights are something conferred upon us by other people. We may say that they are part of natural law, or God given, or whatever, but, sure seems like a human invention to me. (A human invention I am all for, by the way.) This is easily demonstrated by the fact that we have all seen rights taken away, by humans from other humans. (Really recently, in fact!) The molecules couldn't do a thing about it. It will be up to humans to give those rights back.

Hey, let's not go crediting the Judeo-Christian deity for the ethic of reciprocity. It's much older than Yahweh.

We are definitely not all the same inside. (I don't think anyone here claimed as much.) I suspect Oprah hasn't thought that one through very hard. (Of course, she's no heavy thinker. She's more about making her viewers feel warm and fuzzy.)

My goodness it's late.