They are not on a continuum. — Hallucinogen

In my mind they are. To me, it is about the level of certainty.

agnosticism and atheism is irrational, because it entails simultaneously not knowing whether God exists and knowing God doesn't exist. — Hallucinogen

This is true if you work with absolutes. If you 100% know something then there is no room for not knowing. But I think a person can be 85% sure that god does not exist and still call themselves an atheist. And they may call themselves an agnostic at the same time because while they do not believe in god, they believe that something should exist, but they don't know what.

Since both atheists and agnosticis lack belief in God — Hallucinogen

I am not sure about this one. I think an agnostic can harbor a bit of belief, they just aren’t sure. An atheist is more sure about the lack of god.

Your premise presupposes what it seeks to contradict. Don’t take my word for; take your own words for it. Re-examine your closing sentence. — ucarr

Any action we take, based on our concept of math or physical law, will still have its origin in physical reality. We observe -> we form concepts -> we let the concepts affect our physical actions. — mentos987

With this I seek to claim that our concept of math did not build the bridge. It was a fallen tree over a creek a long time ago that did. The mental concept of math is an intermediary.

since our numbers are just us mimicking what is already there. — ucarr

I claim here that our concept is mimicking a more complete set of math that is governing the universe.

Take all this with a bucket of salt, I am on loose footing here and I know it ^^

Edit: Thinking about it some more... I don't believe in pure mental concepts at all, not the way you guys are talking about it, so I don't know what I am arguing. I don't think that a human mind can conceive of anything that is completely outside our prior experience, and I think our experience is locked to physical reality.

I can't see how things such as calculus, vector spaces, and higher dimension geometry are somehow derived from our physical world. — Lionino

All complicated math is derived from simpler math. The basics of math are taken straight from reality. More complicated math is simply us running away with the tools we have formed.

First off, I am lost in this entire conversation so this is just me clinging on to something I think may be worth mentioning, maybe.

The issue I see is that math is like physical law. We have a mental concept for it yes, but that concept was brought about from observing the physical world, which already operates on math. Any action we take, based on our concept of math or physical law, will still have its origin in physical reality. We observe -> we form concepts -> we let the concepts affect our physical actions.

"How can mental “objects” have causal effects upon the physics of the natural world? The answer is numbers." -- To me it seems incorrect, since our math is just us mimicking what is already there.

Most people will do research as soon as they find out that they are going to be parents. The ones that do not are also less likely to have taken any prior education about the subject to heart. Nevertheless, the topic is worth investigating.

That is not accurate, neither is it gramatically correct in English. — Lionino

Fair, I retract my statement.

Edit. It seems I got it all confused with this:
"One critique of the dictum, first suggested by Pierre Gassendi, is that it presupposes that there is an "I" which must be doing the thinking. According to this line of criticism, the most that Descartes was entitled to say was that "thinking is occurring", not that "I am thinking"!"

I did not read your entire post because I don't care enough about the subject but --

B) The notion of individual
I think therefore I am — Skalidris

This is a mistranslation of "cogito, ergo sum". A more proper translation would be "thought, therefore existence" or "thought exist, therefore existence is proven". However, it never says that I/me/we are proven to exist, just that our thoughts must have an origin.
Incorrect

Wouldn't you have to argue that physicalism itself is successful? Is that possible? — frank

Who are you asking? And what is the question? If you are asking me then you need to rephrase, because I understand nothing ^^

I don't understand how "physical" is defined here; does it not stand in opposition of "mental" anymore? Because it is true that even our thoughts are based on physical operations done in our brain, but then I feel like the meaning is shifted.

the best arguments for it are — frank

Very few things can be proven to exist with 100% certainty, only existence itself and a few other concepts. However, physical objects and laws are high up there in the 99%. If you want some meat on your worldviews, you can't go wrong with physicalism!

1. Hanover is simply correct that figurative interpretations have been accepted since ancient times. — Leontiskos

This is not the part of his claim that sparks a debate. The part that I question is where he claims that the amount of figurative interpretations has remained the same or lowered since the forming of the religion. He is arguing that fundamentalism has made religion more literal than is ever was, I disagree on this point. For I think that fundamentalism was mealy a resurgence of old ways, an angry reaction to the change in interpretation towards an ever more figurative meaning.

Figurative interpretations have always been a large part of all religion. But this was never in question.

What is better:
”Spend some effort to find what misery you spread, then try to lessen it.”
or
”Spend some effort to find what misery you spread and then try to lessen it.”
?

Nicely put.

Should those who think differently than oneself simply be written off as "morally or cognitively defective"? — baker

The commandment would be a way to be good, not the way.

It seems the OP and several other posters here take for granted that the meaning of hate/harm (as well as goodness, evil, etc.) _should_ be transparently obvious to everyone. — baker

Well, I focus on misery and I do define it.

“misery” define misery please. — mentos987

who is the one doing the commanding — baker

No one, it would be a shared belief and at most you would be pressured by your peers to follow it.

under threat of what penalty — baker

None, except by any laws/norms that would be built upon it. I'd say our laws already do push us towards "being good".

something like "motto" be better — baker

This may be true, I'd say the difference between a motto and a commandment is the scale of it and the heavier weight of the commandment.

Commandments in terms of morality/ethics only make sense within religion. Outside of religion, the very concept of a commandment (in terms of morality/ethics) is unintelligible. — baker

Morality and ethics are hardly exclusive to religion. A commandment is, in essence, a command that you adhere to throughout your entire life. This particular commandment assumes that you already want to "be good" and that you are willing to listen to suggestions on how to go about that. Please elaborate on the problem you see.

Literalism is the death of reasoning and judgment. — 180 Proof

I consider this to be nothing but fluff. There are pros and cons to everything. The upsides to figurative wording are that it allows for a greater range of meanings and that it is often more thought provoking. The downside is that "thought provoking" can be hard to grasp and that the greater range of meanings means that the intended meaning can be lost.

To follow any rule, the context in which it is applied needs to be interpreted – adapted to – in order for the rule to be effective; therefore, "following it literally" is myopic and usually counter-productive. — 180 Proof

There is a range of rigidness. You get the best results if you can achieve the highest effect while still maintaining little room for slack. Many rules/laws are rigid and need not ever be adapted to new circumstances, such as laws of science. But even judicial law can be rather rigid in some areas.

Insofar as an animal is harmless – is not causing or threatening harm or has not caused harm – "cruelty" towards that animal is clearly proscribed. — 180 Proof

Well, you did write that it was for our own species. To be clear, I do not think this is an issue, your commandment need not cover everything.

ignored by Joshs & @mentos987 — 180 Proof

Sorry, I lost track.

A naturalistic, twenty-first century formulation of 'Hillel's principle':
Whatever is harmful to your species, by action or inaction do not do to the harmless. — 180 Proof

I like it, but I do not love it: "harmful to your species" would need defining -- "or inaction" I don’t think people should be forced to act -- "to the harmless" I like that it leaves room to deal with "harm". -- "to your species" It probably doesn't handle animal cruelty very well. -- And 0% harm is hard to achieve, probably impossible.

Fairly good, but following it literally would be difficult and it would therefore suffer all the figurative drawbacks I wanted to avoid.

What I claim is that the research shows the literalist tradition you reference is a modern invention — Hanover

I believe that fundamentalism is more of a resurgence of literalism. And I claim that when anyone reads any statement their first interpretation will usually be literal. "I created it in 7 days" (It took me a week’s worth of time to craft something) "He created it in his image" (He crafted something to look like him).

But, whether of not the religious texts were meant to be figurative from the start still does not matter for the OP. If they were meant to be 100% figurative from the start then it only makes them worse. The problem remains.

And there might be more to learn about the war than looking at the flag. — Hanover

You can always do deeper research but why would I expend more effort on disproving your statements than I have to. You have made over a half a dozen arguments so far and none of them have been even slightly convincing to me.

you can determine history by just figuring out what you think likely happened instead of looking at what is documented. — Hanover

So you claim that the church hasn't changed its standpoints based on what science has found? Or do you claim that these standpoints merely changed from one figurative interpretation to another equally figurative interpretation?

I don't need to research this, because I see it. It still happens to this day:

“Evolution in nature is not in contrast with the notion of divine creation because evolution requires the creation of the beings that evolve,” -- Pope Francis

This is one of his many statements done in order to align the Catholic Church with modern science.

You don't figure out who won the Revolutionary War by thinking about it. You look up what happened. — Hanover

I think you can deduce who won that war without opening any history books. Looking at the current flag of the US is a strong indication.

Your assumption is wrong.

Figurative interpretations has been accepted since ancient times: — Hanover

I didn't say the where not, only that a shift has happened towards increased figurative interpretation.

"Biblical literalism first became an issue in the 18th century,[18] enough so for Diderot to mention it in his Encyclopédie.[19] Karen Armstrong sees "[p]reoccupation with literal truth" as "a product of the scientific revolution".[20]" — Hanover

Do you think that the church didn't have trouble with having to adjust to science before this? I do think that Davinci would disagree, since back in his days the church would hunt you down and torture you to death if you were deemed too heretical. And yet the church had to change their standpoints when the evidence against them became overwhelming.

You need to look at the scholarship and not just surmise that since literal views appear outdated and scientific views current, then history must bear out that figurative views arose as the result of scientific advancement. — Hanover

You sound like you are retroactively trying to save face on behalf of religion. If figurative interpretations were as common back in the day as they are now then you wouldn’t have seen the tensions that the "theory" of evolution brought. Evolution is one of many subjects that the church has had to move towards figurative interpretations in.

But, none of this matters much for the objective here. The important thing is that figurative interpretations allows for confusion, corruption and less simplicity. So I do think that a good commandment needs to be able to stand on its own without any figurative crutches.

Hi all.

To offer a criticism: why do you think your commandment is perfect? — Leontiskos

I do not think it is perfect at all. The challenge is to get it as close to perfect at possible, I said nothing of having achieved this ^^. Perfection in this case would be the perfect word combination in English that achieves the purpose that I mentioned in the OP.

The thesis that the ancients began with a literal acceptance of the text and moved from it as difficulties arose isn't correct. The text was always modified by interpretation and by the adoption of other sources as authoritative. — Hanover

I am pretty sure the creation tale was only recently (100 years ago) accepted to be a figurative interpretation after science established that the 7 days of creation did not add up. There are many more examples like this so the trend is clearly going from literal towards figurative interpretations.

Strict four corners literalism is a modern invention. — Hanover

No, literalism has always been the basis in communication. Figurative meanings are added later. How could you possible instruct anyone in anything technical if your meaning isn't literal? And religious texts contains a fair bit of laws and examples that where clearly meant to be literal.

Keep in mind as well that the literal meaning of the words isn't always clear. In your example, the commandment is not that you should not kill, but it's that you not murder. The Hebrew term recognized different sorts of killing, with war killings not being "murder" as used in that commandment. — Hanover

The bible translation that most did follow during our world wars clearly states "kill", and the meaning of "kill" is clear. If the religious leaders thought that "murder" was more correct then they would change the wording.

Your analysis of 10 of the commandments is also arbitrary based upon the way Christianity has used the Bible, but.there are actually 613 commandments, — Hanover

There are 10 main ones, for Jews and Muslims as well. The others you mention I haven't even heard of, nor have most people. So I can confidently say that they are less relevant to the purpose stated in OP.

This is to say, I don't see how one could extract a single over-riding principle from "the commandments" without deciding which ones you were going to look at and which you were going to prioritize. — Hanover

I am out to replace the none-religious parts of the main commandments, just the main essence of the best ones, a cornerstone to rest a great civilization upon. All the other commandments you are talking about should stem from the main ones.

What i would say you have arrived at is a variation in the Christian concept of love — Hanover

They may be right, but I don't see it written out in any way that I would consider a near perfect commandment.

Again, thanks for the feedback. Feel free to come at me with more teeth.

retracted

Merry Christmas! And thank you all for the feedback. I have updated the Commandment with the following text:

Purpose
• This commandment is crafted to contain no logical fallacies and should be interpreted literally, which in turn should render it less susceptible to corruption and degradation. Most of the religious commandments have followed a path like this: people first took them literally -> they then discovered logical flaws in the commandments -> they then started interpreting them figuratively in order to cover the flaws -> others began to use figurative interpretation in order to justify doing whatever they want -> thus we have commandments like "thou shalt not kill" and its followers being main participants in world wars.

Cuation
Simply following this commandment does not make you a complete person. Let your feelings guide you and your thoughts rule you, but let this commandment help you to remain civil so that you may live in a civilized world.

So what? Most criminals 'believe' they are not guilty of their crimes. Moral reasoning and judgment is preventative, or proactive, not an in media res reaction. Hillel's principle is not subjectivist or relativist. Read Epicureans, Stoics, Aristotle, Spinoza ... — 180 Proof

The point of a commandment is to give people some simple rules to follow in order to promote a good civilization. If all people have to read several texts and go through mental gymnastics for it to work then the commandment isn’t very good. And if a five year old can find logical flaws in the commandment then it isn’t very good either.

Don't shift the goalposts. The OP thought-experiment mentions "commandment" for nonreligious persons. Nothing I've said here has any whiff of "divine command theory". — 180 Proof

I am the OP. The goal is to craft the perfect commandment for nonreligious people. In order to do this I work from an already established basis, the religious commandments.

Religious commandments are a cornerstone of civilization and we need them or something like them. — mentos987

That which is hateful¹ [harmful] to you, do not do to anyone. — 180 Proof

Likewise, it is hateful [harmful] to be imprisoned except as the only way to (temporarily) prevent me from continue doing to others what is hateful [harmful] to them/me. — 180 Proof

You have already complicated the fairly simple statement itself. If I was a criminal I would still consider it "harmful" to me if you locked me up, If I was a murderer I would consider it harmful/hateful if you killed me in retaliation.

Literalism is the death of reasoning and judgment. — 180 Proof

It seems to me that you don't like to take commandments literally, we differ greatly here. Because the way I see it a major problem with the religious commandments is this: People first took them literally -> they then discovered logical flaws in the commandments -> they then started interpreting them figuratively in order to cover the flaws -> others began to use figurative interpretation to justify whatever they want -> thus we have commandments like "thu shall not kill" and its followers being main participants in both of our world wars.

I'd say that figurative interpretations are where commandments go to die.

I want to thank you 180 Proof. The difference between figurative a literal interpretations is an important point that should probably be included in the preface.

But I agree about there being a threshold ...however this shows there are always caveats to commandments, always some time when it's acceptable to break and thus it will be wildly interpreted by the vast diversity of humanity. Already fragmenting the commandment into gradations there of that pervert it. — Vaskane

The commandment does not tell you how to act, more how to think, and we cannot police thoughts. I do agree that people who followed the commandment would probably come to different conclusions of what to do and how to act. But I do not agree that this adds caveats or that this breaks the underlying message since the commandment itself doesn't leave much room for interpretation.

The above misses the point. You are talking about 'public policy"' and Hillel is talking about moral conduct. No "loopholes" when comparing apples and oranges. — 180 Proof

It sounds to me like you don't want me to interpret it literally. Which I think would undermine any commandment that would be used as a foundation to support civilization. You may as well tell people to "be good" then.

Also consider your example, mentos: in most instances it is, in fact, more hateful/harmful to victims not to "imprison criminals" than it is to do so. — 180 Proof

You can help victims by locking the criminal up; this does not change the fact that this action also "harms" the criminal, thus invalidating this action if you follow this "moral conduct" in any literal way.

Hi all.

in formulating an idea of the good that is universalizable. This requires a kind of faith in goodness, the same faith that underlies godliness. — Joshs

I don't work with any assumed “universalizable goodness”. I claim that most people want to be good, but this is something they are taught or decide on their own.

How does our heart direct us to the good without itself being directed by something universal? — Joshs

I should maybe reword this. With "follow your heart" I mean more like "follow your feelings" rather than "be good".

Huh, funny how Misery is often paired with Happiness, depending on the outcome of a venture it could be either or. So to reduce your output of possibly making people miserable can affect you risking positive gains. — Vaskane

True, the commandment could make people more cautious, which could lead to a shorter range of extreme emotions overall.

Some peoples appearance/hygiene standards are enough to bring misery and disgust to a person. What are they to do? Butcher themselves under the knife to look like Kim Kardashian? — Vaskane

I believe that ugly people don't elicit much more than pity and maybe mild disgust, as far as misery go this is rather low and you needn’t bother changing it. Hygiene on the other hand can elicit much more disgust in others that are forced to interact with you, so if you stink you may want to consider working on it.

That which is hateful¹ to you, do not do to anyone. — Hillel the Elder, first century BCE — 180 Proof

If locking someone up is "hateful" then we can't imprison criminals, if it isn't then anyone can imprison anyone. So many loopholes here. Nature dictates that life is a competition, herd mentality and civilization has brought us further but we can never lose sight of this basic fact. We need to retain the capability to harm and to kill.

Thanks for the feedback and do keep it coming. Feel free to rip and tear.