In addition, Geena, why do you go from talking about living in a harmonious society to referring to the Magisterium of the Catholic Church as a "secret cabal"? It is not secret. It is not a cabal. But your words *are* insulting.

I didn't get from the article that NL is incompatible with atheism, just that some are of the opinion that it is.

What is the "supernatural good" that you think is floating around? The idea of natural law is that the good is human beings acting according to what fulfills them.

I don't think 2-7 are ruled out if you think there is no God. I think it is similar to things atheists ask theists: "If God does not exist what would you expect the universe to look like?" An answer I've heard atheists say theists give is, "I can't imagine a universe without God." I think a better answer is, "exactly like it looks now." The universe obviously exists, God or not. In the same way I think human morality exists even if God does not exist. If I do an injustice to you, you feel outraged, regardless of whether a person behind all reality exists.

I'm glad you found the article helpful. And I can see why you are fond of natural law.

However, as the article notes, it is incompatible with atheism, even without #1 because it still posits a supernatural "the good" floating around apart from us. Also, without #1, #2 is a little silly -- where does the 'authority' come from?

For me, "the good" is in my relationship to others -- family, friends, community, country, world -- and in my recognition that we are physical creatures living in a physical world and our actions have consequences. If I want to live in a harmonious society, I have to participate in making it so.

Further, even were I persuaded by an atheistic 'natural law' concept, I still would be opposed to any secret cabal Vatican or otherwise, deciding what is part of my true, ideal nature and what is the fallen part.

So I read the Murphy article in the SEP and I'm glad you cited it.

He does a much better job in articulating natural law ethics then I ever could. Particular, he describes Aquinas' position as the paradigm of all natural law theorizing as follows:

To summarize: the paradigmatic natural law view holds that (1) the natural law is given by God; (2) it is naturally authoritative over all human beings; and (3) it is naturally knowable by all human beings. Further, it holds that (4) the good is prior to the right, that (5) right action is action that responds nondefectively to the good, that (6) there are a variety of ways in which action can be defective with respect to the good, and that (7) some of these ways can be captured and formulated as general rules.

I think it is a mistake to dismiss natural law simply because one does not believe in God. (2) - (7) can be discussed on their own merits. (1) accounts for the ultimate source of morality and why we should care about morality.

You can always send Geena my way, Kevin. I am quite acclimated.

I will try to be less glib in the future. Maybe you aren't intentionally avoiding the topic when the going gets tough.

I will read the article in the SEP you linked to and then respond.

There is something ugly in this discussion, though. Your comments regularly contain abuse, so that if I am going to have a dialogue with you I have to settle for being abused. On the other hand, I refuse to respond because of the abuse, you can simply claim I gave up.

No worries, Kevin. I didn't consider it a putdown. I did consider it a bit intrusive, but not inappropriately so. But mainly I considered your comment a dodge on your part to avoid -- yet again -- acknowledging the circularity of the 'logic' of natural law and its known errors regarding human nature that robtish, josh, and I keep bringing up.

even through Aquinas is Catholic, indeed maybe "the" Catholic thinker, his work on the natural law is nevertheless philosophy, not theology.

Kevin, Kevin, again with the pedantics and with avoiding my actual questions by "answering" questions I didn't ask and countering "arguments" I didn't make. First, it doesn't make one whit of difference to our discussion whether natural law is theology or religious philosophy, especially since you've just had to acknowledge "how 'identified' natural law and Catholic moral thinking are." Second, either way, it requires a deity.* Third, I didn't call natural law 'theology' and, in fact, called it 'philosophy' twice. So why the heck are you bringing this up out of nowhere?

Can we get back to sex now?

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* Again from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

On the side of metaphysics, [the natural law tradition] is clear that the natural law view is incompatible with atheism: one cannot have a theory of divine providence without a divine being. It is also clear that the paradigmatic natural law view rules out a deism on which there is a divine being but that divine being has no interest in human matters. Nor can one be an agnostic while affirming the paradigmatic natural law view: for agnosticism is the refusal to commit either to God's existence or nonexistence, whereas the paradigmatic natural law view involves a commitment to God's existence.

How would one condemn homosexuality on natural law alone?

One example of your erroneous ideas about natural law when it comes to sexuality: I don't know of any natural law philosopher who says "the primary purpose of human sexuality is procreation; therefore, it is immoral to have sex if procreation cannot happen."

Another error you are making is to argue that just because something can be done it may be done. Another is that just because something obtains for one kind of organism it has some moral bearing on human beings. Another is that albinism has some moral dimension.