A very good Spencerian analysis of the effect of a single social institution on cultural evolution.

Prager left much out. We may also consider the epidemilogical consequences of the institution. By slowing down the transmission of pathogens through intimate contact, marriage tends to minimize the transmission of various diseases. Then too, there is the effect of marriage of the rearing of children.

The heart of the problem is that, absent a religious sanction, the individual will find that his immediate inclination outweighs the remote consequences of disregarding sexual ethics. Please do not waste our time by pointing out that members of faithful communities and even believers sin. Of course we do, the point being that the religious sanction reduces the spread of disease to a tolerable level and likewise supports supports the edcation of children.

I may conclude by pointing out that sexual ethics are taught in public school in health class, the lesson being that there is no such thing, that one's body is one's own, and that, as the the homosexually oriented curriculum used in our district teaches, ". . .there is no right and wrong. . ." when it comes to these practices. If those of us who may be concerned about preserving the civilizational values Preager wrote about are serious, we must be prepared to do to public education as we know it what we have done to welfare as we knew it.

So, since the link between sex and marriage has been severed, we are doomed to regress to being sheep herders and olive farmers ?

I am unconvinced.

No, those for whom it is severed are regressing to barbarism.

You're talking about mainstream American culture.
What is the evidence of "barbarism" ?

Other than reality shows and Lost, of course.

Michael:

It's less of a problem in America, which remains overwhelmingly Christian, than in Europe. But look at issues like abortion, gay rights, stem cells, euthanasia, etc. and you can see how savage Blue America has become.

"What is the evidence of barbarism"

Well, yesterday I took my toddler down to the park, and I couldn't help overhearing the conversation between two fourteen year old girls (one of whom was visibly pregnant): Interspliced between the obscenities that would make a sailor blush, she was trying to figure out who My Baby Daddy was. 3 blood tests hadn't turned up the answer yet.

It is not coincidence that first recorded act of Jesus Christ's public ministry was to bless the union of a man and a woman, transmuting the water into wine to signify the life-affirming nature thereof.

As for barbarism, we harvest the organs of aborted children--if they are large enough--before giving them a dignified burial in a medical waste dumpster.

And Cannibalism made a pretty good showing in the House the other day.

These are, mainly, practical societal sanctions, and not necessarily religious sanctions at all. Why do you need to bring religious values into it? As Lou Gots points out, not all believers are innocent - well not all non-believers are sex-crazed either.

Those with sexual perversions are as likely to make choices based on social values as religious ones. (Lets dismiss the arrogant view that moral and ethical values are limited to those who believe in a god).

Further - homosexual relations have been a private staple of many religions for centuries. And I don't include homosexuality amongst the sexual perversions mentioned.

Mr. Peaceful;

Absent Creation of Man by God none of it matters.

Mr OJ,

Absent Creation of Man by God and it all matters a whole lot more. If you've only got one shot at it, no afterlife, then you have to do the best you can to make it worthwhile.

If you believe in a God then altruism doesn't exist.

except the most altruistic people are also religous people, and that is a measurable statistic. there is a huge difference between morals and risk avoidance.

Aren't you in danger of confusing altruism with religious obligation? The point of altruism is that you seek no reward for your action. To be truely altruistic you have to expect no reward in an afterlife, but still perform acts that benefit others. I would be interested to know how your measureable statistic takes that into account.

I did not mention risk avoidance. There is, of course, a huge difference between morals and risk avoidance. A human, as a rational being, is capable of making judgements about what is morally or ethically right or wrong without deferring to a religious teaching. That is one of the marvels of humanity.

I'm not knocking religious views, but asserting that morality, including sexual morality, is not purely the preserve of the faithful.

It is purely the preserve of faith though.

Morality is altruistic--it is to be followed irrespective of any desire for reward.

If you are suggesting that morality is a preserve of religion or faith, then I would say that this cannot be equated with altruism, since any religion that offers the reward of an afterlife is promising reward for specific types of behaviour. Thus behaviour based on religious moral codes cannot be altruistic.

Do you think that you would be unable to make ethical decisions without your faith?

Man can't bind God simply by behaving in a certain way.

I did not offer that as a possible argument. I was questioning the assumption that good ethical conduct was limited to those with faith.

In relation to the original topic, are you suggesting that without religion to place controls on sexual activity, we would all regress to barbarism? Are the faithless so incapable of making ethical decisions?

Not just the "faithless". Everyone. "Brave New World" speaks to this very point.

Actually, the next step in the corruption of religion is the formalization of sexual activity as part of 'worship'. It has happened many times in the past.

I note that those moralists also sacrificed animals and children in the high places, but they got over it.

Morals change.

America is a pork-eating country.

no they don't--our observance of them does.

Mr. Peaceful:

Yes, they are.

If you want to know what the difference between a society that is based on monogamous heterosexual marriage and one that is nto you do not have to look very far. Try the slums of any major city. Now make it worse, imagine what it would be like if the boys who terrorize those neighborhoods had no connection with the women who live there other than the occasional accident of birth.

Civilization can only exist where there is repression.

Mr OJ:

To think that would be to underestimate humanity. Anyone is capable of deciding right from wrong, regardless of religious teaching. Many 'faithless' have monogomous relationships, instill ethical values in their children, perform charitable acts and avoid sexual perversions. We are a rational species.

Mr. Peaceful:

Such behavior is irrational. They're adhering to the Judeo-Christian morality of their society. Rationalist philosophers call it freeloading atheism.

OJ:

No, it is quite rational. Lives lived according to the approach Mr. Peaceful outlines above have, in general, far better material outcomes than "immoral" behavior produces.

Making such behavior very rational, indeed: observe, orient, decide, act.

In fact, rational systems like Nazism, communism, etc. have fared rather poorly, as they must, for Reason perforce comes down on the side of selfish behavior.

Small-scale, non-religious communes can work very well as long as all memebers have the same values. Communism couldn't work because it expects people to comply with a system of values they might not share. As for Nazism - I'm not sure where that comes into this at all. That is hardly an ethical system that values humanity (but, incidentally, it could be argued that it was partially based on a particular interpretation of Christian morality).

I am interested in your argument about free loading atheism, but that does not account for empathy. When we watch suffering, unless psychotic, we feel empathy and compassion. That is not unique to 'religious' indviduals, that is common to humanity. If we can empathise, we can understand right from wrong.

OJ:

If I remember correctly, you read Road to Serfdom.

Gave it an A+.

Hayek considered Nazism, Communism, and religion to be comparable.

Perhaps you missed that part.

Jeff:

Yes they and Darwinism and Freudianism are rationalist substitutes for religion.

Not substitutes for religion, but religions themselves.

And since Evolution isn't prescriptive of anything, it clearly doesn't belong.

Jeff:

Sure, you could call them simple heresies. Darwinism is an archetypal example.