Yes, you did address the very specific examples I had given but you in no way presented and argument to refute it. The first one you said was something taken out of Milton Friedman, which it wasn't, but even if it did does not refute the point. The second example you dismissed because you said that I could easily make a moral argument against speeding which I can't. Again not presenting an argument but speculating what I would or can do. And yes, there are still archaic sodomy laws still on the books that nobody got around or bothered to include in a congressional session as it has become so trivial no one bothers. Tell me a case where someone was jailed for cheating on his wife?
Saying that there is a massive body of literature and making reference to an obscure
debate over 60 years ago is again not an argument. Just like saying there are "massive" numbers of debates both pro and con for the existence of God is not an argument. And just to be clear Fuller claimed that morality is a source or an inspiration for many laws (an act can be both immoral and illegal, i.e. murder). So though there is often a connection between morality and laws, morals control both the internal and external behavior (conscious and action) whereas laws can only control the external (what you actually are caught doing). Therefore, often related but not the same. It is not a sin to park illegally or to take steroids.
But that is neither here or there as again it depends on one's perspective as to who you think "won" that debate. What is pertinent here is that making reference to it is not arguing your point.
So I still stand by my claim that I would never knowingly argue for something that I knew was wrong. I am sincerely concerned only with the truth and have no problem being proved wrong. You gave no concrete arguments against my examples so it still stands as is. Your condescending and superior tone that giving examples to prove a point only shows my confusion is so patently preposterous and absurd. Giving concrete real-world examples is what clarifies often obscure topics. And I can prove it right now. Do you want to jail a person who commits adultery? Let us see how you would act in a real-world situation?
And of course, in an ideal world Judges would base their decisions on the law and the Constitution independent of their own personal opinion and beliefs. But nobody believes this is the case 100% of the time. As human beings, we have our own personal bias and beliefs and it is quite a feat to detach one's self completely from this. Some do it better than others. How else can we have such strong disagreements with, say, something like the 2nd amendment? For each side, it is crystal clear even though they reach opposite conclusions. But just because a principle isn't followed strictly 100% of the time doesn't mean we should get rid of it as the ideal to strive for.
And it should be noted that just because someone doesn't understand or grasp a concept or idea does not in and of itself make the concept or idea incoherent. There are many concepts and ideas that simply go "over one's head" and have taxed the upper limits of one's comprehension and understanding. A lot, if not a majority of people, do not understand where the concept of morality comes from. And even if they did, their own personal bias would not accept it.
Morality, objective morality independent of a person's inherent bias, and therefore must exist outside of one's self. Other than that it is simply an opinion. Not so much what is right or wrong but what I like and dislike. Morality does not exist physically. If I ask you how you know, say, murder, is wrong what would you say? In the physical world, you show physical concrete examples. If I say I weigh 200 lbs or that piece of lumber is a 2x4 we can measure that. Not so with morality. It exists apart from the physical world. It is above nature. It is supernatural. So the very existence of objective morality outside and above human opinion proves the existence of something beyond nature and beyond man. And that's what we call God. And without God morality is just personal opinion which varies widely from person to person and known as moral relativism.
‘There are many concepts and ideas that simply go "over one's head" and have taxed the upper limits of one's comprehension and understanding.’
That’s probably the first accurate thing you’ve said, and the rest of your post serves as a clear example of something going over one’s head. You are literally all over the place and it
is incoherent. The reason for this is that what you are replying with has no logical connection to what I presented. As for my ‘condescending and superior tone’ that was allegedly present last time: it wasn’t. Stating that you are unfamiliar with something, and then demonstrating why, is how reasonable people debate. I deliberately withheld any acerbity in order to give you the benefit of the doubt and argue fairly about a specific point. Allow me to therefore inject some condescension into my tone and see if your stupid fucking brain can spot the difference (this is humour, but I'd never turn down a free flight to Hawaii if it's offered). In addition, allow me to remind you about what it is we are discussing:
You have stated, quite forcefully, that ‘morality and legality are two different issues entirely and you should not conflate the two’.
This is what I have challenged. Asking me irrelevant questions about my own personal views, e.g. do I want to jail a person who commits adultery? (No, I don’t) does nothing to make your point. In addition, your entire last paragraph here is completely redundant. It is also embarrassingly confused. There is absolutely no reason at all to trail off onto some tangent about ‘objective morality independent of a person's inherent bias’ and how it ‘exists apart from the physical world, is above nature and is supernatural’. Clearly, this is simply your opinion presented without argument. Given that I have already stated that natural rights can be grounded in both theistic and secular conceptions of morality, it is a needless elaboration. Stating your own Christian morality does nothing to strengthen your initial statement; it merely strengthens mine and I’ll demonstrate why:
For somebody arguing your position they face a number of problems. For the sake of brevity I’ll simply mention one: is something a moral act because God commands it, or does God command it because it is moral? If it is the former, then the commands are arbitrary. If it is the latter, then we have no need for God as we can ground a concept such as rights in the same source of external morality as the religious texts do. Tautological answers to this dilemma will not suffice. I happen to find the naturalistic grounding of morality, without the need for some deeper transcendental meaning, very appealing and currently spend far too much time wrestling with it (it’s not objective but the logical conclusions of it currently trouble me at times). But I will again put this aside and instead highlight the fact that Jeremy Bentham famously dismissed the notion of natural and inalienable rights as ‘nonsense upon stilts’ (1792). His point, however, was that this notion of rights exists only as a mental construct of the human mind, without any unambiguous referent in the external world. He sought to establish a rational foundation of ethics and legal rights based on utilitarian principles and you may have heard of this seminal work. It’s called
An Introduction to the Principles of MORALS and Legislation (1789). Morals and legislation? Pellius cries! Nonsense upon stilts! The two are entirely separate!
I’ll try and bring this to a close as it’s getting far too lengthy. ‘Tell me a case where someone was jailed for cheating on his wife?’ I could give innumerable cases from all over the world. Why is this? Possibly some sort of vague connection between conceptions of morality and law?
‘The second [first] example you dismissed because you said that I could easily make a moral argument against speeding which I can't.’
When I said that you could easily make an argument as to why speeding should be considered both immoral and illegal and I then followed this up with an example. I did it for you. I take it that you still reject the idea that speeding past a school would be immoral? Seeing as you are intent to stand by your statement, tell me
why doing this is not immoral, or
why speeding when you have, say, a baby in the back of your car wouldn’t be considered immoral? Clearly I think it is both immoral and illegal, given that the individual speeding is recklessly endangering the lives of other, very vulnerable people. It is YOU who has no argument here. As to your claim that ‘there are still archaic sodomy laws still on the books’ which nobody has yet bothered to change. Ask yourself, how did they get on the books in the first place? Clearly you think that morality and law are entirely separate and should not be conflated, yet there are ‘archaic’ laws in existence which should now be removed. Why remove them? Let me help you out with this by reminding you of what you’ve now claimed in your rebuttal:
‘there is often a connection between morality and laws’. Quite different from your initial statement, isn’t it? And with that statement, allow me to borrow your own words: Game, set, match.