Human Propensity to "Sin"

Greetings to my opponent, and to the rest of the readership as well. Hopefully this will be a good debate for all those involved. The Resolution: "Humans are not inherently good, but instead possess the hereditary propensity to 'sin.'" Since the title of the debate is not a grammatical resolution, and my opponent specifically said this was the viewpoint he was advocating, I am taking this to be the resolution. I'll ask my opponent to please correct me if he wanted the resolution to be something else. I negate on the grounds that humans do not possess the propensity to "sin." Contention 1: The primary definition of sin is transgression against divine law. To affirm the resolution by this definition, my opponent must show that humans have a propensity for transgression against divine law. This is not possible if there is no such thing as divine law. Thus, in order to affirm the resolution, my opponent must demonstrate, among other things, that divine law exists, which is something he has not done yet. However, that will not be my main contention, as I will adopt a secondary, more applicable definition of sin in the spirit of good debate. Definitions: * Secondary definition of sin: "Intentional wrongdoing." * Definition of propensity: "An inclination or natural tendency to behave in a particular way." [1] * Definition of hereditary: "determined by genetic factors and therefore able to be passed on from parents to their offspring or descendants" OR "relating to inheritance." [2] Rebuttals/Responses: * Biblical references may certainly be used, but unless my opponent is able to first demonstrate their correctness these references should not be taken as authoritative. * Romans 6, verses 1,2, and 17 have not been shown to be authoritative, thus their words are bare assertion. When they speak on the very issue we are debating, it is unjustifiable to not consider that these verses may simply be incorrect. * Individuals who have received no moral upbringing are an aberration from the norm, and not representative of the state of humanity. Human society tends to instill moral teaching in its members, so it is not useful in this debate to look at those who are rare exceptions. However, I will discuss the issue slightly more in contention 2b. * That humans sometimes commit wrongdoing is not indicative of a propensity for wrongdoing. My opponent is setting up a false dichotomy between having a propensity for sin and being morally perfect. There is a wide gap in between where people sin sometimes, but they don't have a tendency toward it. See contention 2a. More contentions: 2: The stability and tendency toward order of human societies shows that we do not have a propensity for wrongdoing. Wrongdoings are at a great minority compared to all the neutral and positive actions human beings willfully take. Ladies and gentlemen, I ask you to recall the last time you were out in public. No doubt if you're observant, you saw people interacting with one another. If so, chances are you also saw people generally treating each other quite decently. Perhaps you were in a grocery store; one person in the store may have been stealing, but all the others were abiding by the rules of society. Thus, it is wrong to say we have a propensity for intentional wrongdoing, as it is rare compared to decent behavior. We have a propensity for behaving decently, not for sin. 2a: Take a 20-sided die. It sometimes lands on a 1. It usually does not. We would say it has a propensity for not rolling ones. We would not say it has a propensity for rolling ones. There is a difference between a propensity [tendency] and mere capability. Sins are rare events. Any existing 20-sided die has likely landed on 1 many times in the past, just as most humans have committed many wrongdoings in the past, but in both cases the events are rare. 2b: Consider heavily weighted dice that usually roll 1's. These represent those members of society for whom wrongdoing is the norm. This includes some psycho/sociopaths and many who did not receive the normal moral guidance. That these dice roll ones often does not allow us to conclude anything about dice in general. Likewise, a few bad apples who sin often are not representative of humans in general. 3: My opponent has failed to show that sinning is in any way hereditary. I'll now cede the floor to my opponent, and wish him good luck. Good luck, 1stLordofTheVenerability. The floor is yours. [1] http://oxforddictionaries.com... [2] http://oxforddictionaries.com...