“Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. The truly civilized man is always skeptical and tolerant, in this field as in all others. His culture is based on ‘I am not too sure.'”
Has it really been eight years since science guy Bill Nye debated Ken Ham of the Creation Museum on the question of Evolution vs. Creation?
Has it really been a hundred years since H.L. Mencken said what he did about moral certainty?
I really don’t watch live television anymore, but I recall this debate piquing my curiosity enough that I watched a good bit of this event. The moment I remember most was when the moderator asked the two men what would happen if they believed something only to learn that the facts actually supported a different conclusion.
Nye said changing facts would change his opinion.
Ham said his opinion would remain unchanged.
Game, set and match to Mister Mencken.
If there is one thing that always amazes me, it’s how people who believe in the Biblical creation story believe it’s incompatible with any other explanation.
People who see creation as something that happened in six 24-hour days and then resulted in a day of rest.
People who don’t understand metaphor.
It seems to me that the true believers are some of the unhappiest people in the world. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say they are unhappy with the world.
The billboard at the beginning of this piece has always amused me. The entire “God said it” debate is sort of silly, since as far as we know, God stopped actually speaking with human beings after Moses died. Even if we credit all the things Jesus said to people two thousand years ago, no one living now actually heard those words.
In fact, no one living has actually heard the people who heard the words.
We have only read them, and we have read them after they were translated again and again by flawed human beings.
Human beings with agendas. Few things have been used to keep people in line throughout history as much as religion. Behave yourself or you’ll spend eternity in hell.
I’ve frankly had it with other people’s moral certainty. It amazes me that people who proudly call themselves Christians seem to have totally different priorities than Christ himself actually had. The worst part of that is the so-called Prosperity Gospel, the idea that Jesus wants you to be rich.
Oh, and he hates homosexuals too.
It’s funny. My own moral certainty about Jesus comes down to two things. First, he told us to love God with our heart, soul and mind. And second, he told us to love our neighbor as ourself.
Rich folks? He said if they wanted to follow him, they should give their riches to the poor.
Maybe God said it, I believe it. and that settles it would work quite well.
If they based it on what he actually said.