Secular ethics ought to be prioritized over religious ethics in the legislative process.

Thanks to L for the invigorating debate. 1/a) Actually, my claim about secular ethics was made as a parallel rebuttal argument to Pro's own claim about her and many others not seeing the concept of God as rational so therefore not a good grounding to influence the legislative process. Sure, I can accept that - but yet if I don't see secular ethics as rational then, again, by the same token, they lack sufficient grounding to influence the legislative process (or at the very least be prioritized). I was arguing on Pro's own terms. If there is a clear cut specific case of religious ethics leading to a peaceful state of affairs but secular ethics leading to the opposite (unjust violence perhaps) it seems clear that one ought to choose to choose the religious ethics *even if they disagree with the reasoning*. One could argue that laws exist to protect God-given rights in any case. "This is a strawman; I never denied that evil can be done in the name of secularism." ...which is exactly the point I've been driving at this whole debate! If the same can be said of secularism then one of Con's original grounds for prioritizing secular ethics over religious ethics - the dangers of religion - is rendered a moot one! Pro argues that it's much harder to implement bigoted laws using secular ethics (!) because at the very least they don't rely on circular logic like "the Bible told me so" (even though that wouldn't be circular anyhow) but then says that of course people have come to immoral conclusions utilizing secular ethics (that kind of negates the whole point of secular ethics prioritization, no?) but ultimately it leaves more elbow room for rational discussion because a theist won't question God's will and if they do then that means morality is independent of God's will. I have several things to say about this: 1b) It's not clear that using only secular reasoning would lead to more rational discussion (see: China). 1c) This presupposes that there couldn't be as much rational discussion about theological reasoning; that seems clearly false as there have been many discussions about what exactly is or is not a divine command - especially in medieval Europe. If someone came up to me and claimed that they had been told by God to sacrifice their child on an altar to ensure safe passage on airplane flight I naturally am going to be suspicious and more than likely argue with them about it (after calling the police of course). 1d) This confuses a basic matter of epistemology and metaphysics. It cannot be argued from the simple fact that their is disagreement about what exactly God' will is or that whether we can know it (an epistemological claim) to therefore morality is independent of God (an ontological claim). It'd be like me saying because there is disagreement about whether the morning star is the evening star therefore the morning star is not the evening star. 2) (^_^) 3) Yes, laws apply to every person - religious and secular alike. What I've been waiting for is reasons why the asymmetry in regards to religious ethics is justified. The only reasons Pro has offered can be equally applied to Pro's own position. Pro's position puts a burden on religious people (that they cannot use their own religious beliefs in influencing the legislative process) that is nowhere present on secular people (they can use their own secular beliefs however) and has not adequately justified why this is. Pro's contention about a Muslim politician actually helps illustrate an important point I've made continually throughout the debate. The major reason *anybody*, including myself, would oppose a Muslim politician imposing Islamic laws on everybody is because *I believe they are false*. I wouldn't oppose it because there's something special about religious ethics that automatically rule them out. I'd be similarly opposed to a secular law that banned me from praying before my meals in public. Sure, secular folks might be peeved that they have to live with an ethical system they believe is false influencing their legislative processes but that is NO grounds for de-prioritizing religious ethics as, analogously, situations can be brought up that if Pro's logic were followed then SECULAR ethics would have to be de-prioritized. Imagine their is a Muslim woman, in say, maybe, France. She feels it is her religious duty to wear a burqa yet there is an anti-burqa law there that requires her to uncover her face. She rejects the secular rationale for that law as false. The similarities are striking. What this suggests is that is not whether the grounds are religious or secular that is important when evaluating what type of ethics should influence the legislative process; it's that the reasons should be evaluated ON THEIR OWN MERITS. This does not support Pro's contention that secular ethics ought be prioritized. It makes absolutely no sense to prioritize secular ethics over religious ethics when secular ethics are subject to the the very same type of criticisms that led to religious ethics being de-prioritized. I'd also like to point out that Pro claims humanism provides a universal standard that is not limited to a particular sect of believers...but that problem is that is! It's limited to the believers of humanism. As Pro well knows there are tons of secular ethics theories out there that offer different and contradictory conceptions of the terms justice and what "morality" even means. Humanism hardly offers the benefits that Pro touts it does. 3a) It does not follow. For one, I argued one does not need proof to have a justified belief in God and for two Neither did I make the claim that since one cannot disprove God that it doesn't make sense to apply secular ethics. My argument, since the start, has been that all the reasons that Pro offers for secular ethics' prioritization in the legislative process equally apply to Pro's own position. Pro's last argument would be like me arguing that since we don't know if morals actually exist or not (moral nihilism) then no ethics should be prioritized in the legislative process because we can't even prove if there is such a thing as what it means to be moral. Even if we can't strictly prove the existence of morality it makes no sense to rule it out of the legislative process. Pro's position here seems absurd. Pro is literally saying that appealing to religious ethics in the legislative process is unjustified at all times and at all times a secular justification must be given instead. Again, this raises the specter the abolishment of slavery and apartheid and the like due to people advocating specifically religious ethics. That would be fine if Pro had given a sufficient argument for to conclude. Unfortunately, I don't think Pro has made that case. I think Pro misunderstood me. It's entirely correct for me to view murder as wrong and expect the government to impose a punishment on someone who thinks the opposite and decides to murder random people. 3b) No, I'm under the impression that the freedom of religion concept came from religious thinkers and Pro's appeal to the pre-socratics leaves me confused because I am not exactly sure what Pro is referring to as I cannot see the source. 4) Does not follow. To conclude that religious ethics are essentially worthless and unknowable because there has been disagreement on them is fallacious. It's a non-sequitur. 4a) Sadly, I don't have any space to get into this and as Pro say it is largely irrelevant. I'd just like to note that Oxford Dictionary defines a slave as: "a person who is the legal property of another or others and is bound to absolute obedience, human chattel". Locke correctly noted that ebed in the OT were not considered to be property and it was illegal to an ebed (Exodus 21:26-27) or murder an ebed (Exodus 21:20-21). ======== Conclusion ======== I think my case has been made sufficiently. Thanks for reading.