CADRE Comments

[Note: the contents page for this series can be found here. The previous entry, concluding Chapter 36, can be found here. ] [This entry constitutes Chapter 37.] Even though I still ended with a deadlock on a proposal of merely secular interpersonal ethics, I will reiterate here that I believe it is important to recognize, respect and appreciate the special strength of that theory. Despite its weaknesses, I consider this to be the best secular ethical theory on the market today; and I expect this, in one or another variation, to be the best that secular ethicists can ever really do. ‘And we don’t need God for it!’ the sceptic will emphasize. Not on the face of it, no; but then again, as I noted in my previous chapter, there are aspects of the theory which, when followed out, might point toward our accepting the existence of God after all! Which, in essence, is what I had done already, in the chapters before I began this section on ethics. So far, I have presented this section of chapt...

[Note: you may return to the harmonization index here. ] A Prologue of Prologues In the beginning (sings the Evangelist) was the Word; and the Word was (acting) toward God; and the Word was (emphatically) God. This one was (acting), in the beginning, toward God. Everything came into being through Him, and not one thing came into existence without Him. What comes into being within this one was life, and the life is the Light of men, and still the Light is shining in the darkness! --and the darkness seized (or understood) it not. There did come a man, sent with a mission from God; his name was John. This one came for a testimony, that he might bear witness of the Light, so all might believe through him. That man was not the Light, but, he came to bear witness of the Light-- this true Light Who is enlightening every person who comes into the world! He was in the world, and the world was made through Him; but, the world did not know Him. Unto His own He came, but those who are His own d...

Introductory note from Jason Pratt: I am here appending in several parts some excerpts from an unpublished book of mine (not CoJ incidentally), originally composed late 99/early 2000, wherein I work out a progressive synthetic metaphysic. The current topic is ethical grounding; and up until recently I have been analyzing crippling problems along the three general lines of ethical explanation, including general theism. The previous entry, though, returned to the argument I had been developing for several hundred (currently unpublished) pages, and used those developed positions to begin solving the philosophical dilemmas I had covered in previous entries. This entry continues chapter 32, "the solution to the question of ethics", in my original text. I ended my previous entry by writing, "I am by this extension arguing that God [meaning a singular unity of distinct Persons as the Independent Fact grounding and generating all existence, which I had decided on other grounds...

Introductory note from Jason Pratt: I am here appending in several parts some excerpts from an unpublished book of mine, originally composed late 99/early 2000, wherein I work out a progressive synthetic metaphysic. The current topic is ethical grounding; and I have been analyzing problems along the three general lines of ethical explanation. The previous entry, which critiqued a promising variant of the first general ethical theory, can be found here. Technically this entry begins chapter 32, "the solution to the question of ethics", in my original text; but with some new modifications to take into account the new chapter (31-1/2, so to speak {g}) that I have written in the previous two entries. Incidentally, this previously unpublished work is not the same as the novel Cry of Justice , which will be released in stores around Labor Day this year, although I am that book's author, too. (The two books are not topically unrelated, of course. {s} But CoJ has more, um, bloo...