Amos You Wrote:

The premise of our republic is that educate individuals CAN be trusted to think through their own ethics questions without dogma.

Why distrust individuals empowered with information?

Why might we need dogma on the walls of buildings to guide us? Whatever is wrong with being guided by character, a sense of justice, a code of conduct, moral sensitivity or the letter and spirit of the law?

Those guides, I expect, will see you through far more than any dogma.

There is ALWAYS dogma. For example: "The premise of our republic is that educate(d) individuals CAN be trusted to think through their own ethics questions without dogma."


"Why distrust individuals empowered with information?" it is not a matter of distrust, although distrust exists among pretty much all individuals empowered with information. If you look around the planet you will see there is plenty of information. Information is so plentiful as to be without extrinsic value these days. More important is to have a 'core' assembly point for our multicultural society to respect. A set of values we agree on. This I think is at the heart of a great deal of what we might term "Fundamentalist angst". The Fundamentalists among others are afraid that with the loss of the divine origin of our social and moral compass, our concepts AND our civilization will decay from the root. The secularly driven have done nothing but augment those fears. I think it is the 'other' main reason 'W' got elected.

I am suggesting that the ten commandments is a very useful moral 'Rosetta Stone' It enables us to say "I go my way, you go your way, but I know you're teaching your kids to: Refrain from murder, refrain from stealing, respect your elders, etc.

Without the Ten Commandments, we are left with the law. And a bright man once wrote: "The law is an ass!" Having a simple set of principles we all UNDERSTAND and think well on, is quite useful.

If we pull back a bit and look at the overall view of the situation, I think we see that the 'secular' side looks on the situation as an unwanted intrusion, and the 'religious' side looks on the situation as salvaging a remnant.

Thanks to all of you on this thread I think I'm learning more about the underlying issues involved under the rather simple title heading.