Dealing with crime

What an arrogant reply!! The world was savage and amoral until Judaism came along and taught us all how to be proper humans?

You can't compare knowing the distance between the earth and the moon with knowing the difference between right and wrong. One is a calculable scientific fact, the other is an intangible and fluid set of beliefs. I think conscience is something that is innately human, and although it may have evolved and changed over time, I think it's always been present. Take your Ancient Greece point for example, did they not show conscience in doing what they thought was best for a young man by giving him the guidance and love of an older more experience man? It was a different time and a different society, with a different moral conscience, and so different values of right and wrong. Just because we might view sleeping with an 11yr old as wrong now, that doesn't mean it was evil or wrong at the time.

I think that shows that people aren't born inherently evil. The people that you would perhpaps kill at birth today, would have been the scholars/artists/warriors of ancient Greece.

It's all a question of nature/nurture, which is something that's been argued and debated for decades, and I'm not sure there's any concrete answer.

Disprove me.

Judaism gave the world a conscience... prior to Judaism there was no such thing as equality - the weak served the powerful.... Judaism taught the world to love thy neighbour.

No, the relationship was fostered to strengthen the nation. You're reviewing an ancient civilisation through a modern perspective.

Unless you're a creationist there is no escaping that the human conscience is a value spectrum that has evolved over time, it is tangible - but it does not regress - there may be temporary fluctuations but it always rectifies these problems.

It is unlikely that genocide will ever be acceptable as man learns from his errors, this is not to say that genocide will never occur; as it will... but there will be elements within that society that compare their present to mans past and eventually someone will speakout... History would prove my theory correct - yours is theoretical speculation

In the ancient world those that we consider inherently evil may well go on to be leaders of that society as the world was a very barbaric place - the slaughter of millions was an acceptable act if it meant expanding your kingdom.... But over 3500 years we have evolved - just as we no longer swing from trees - we also no longer consider genocide to be an acceptable past time.

I'm not disputing the values and/or qualities of Judaism, just your assertion that the world would have been lost without it. It's absolute arrogance to think that the world's collective conscience is thanks to Judaism teaching right and wrong. There are many religions older than Judaism, such as Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism etc. and they all had their own differing, but equally valid, sets of values. You mention equality, which is a good point, because I'm sure there were many Jewish slave owners/traders, so where does equality fit into this? There are also religions based on a caste system, where's the equality in that? Equality is a moral principle that has developed over time, as man's conscience has developed.

Whether it was done to strengthen the boy's character, or the empire's power, I think it still shows elements of moral conscience. And of course I'm viewing it from a modern perspective, how could I otherwise?

Human conscience is not tangible. There's absolutely nothing you can say to show that it is. It's in intangible, varies from person to person, country to coutnry, and there's no solid evidence to prove it exists or what it is. There's no science behind conscience. The way you're writing makes it seem you think our conscience is some kind of genetic imprint that could be identified at birth, and there's no evidence to suggest this.

History would prove this particular paragraph correct, and I wouldn't dispute it, but it's not exactly what I was getting at, and I'm not sure why you keep bringing genocide up. It's not a question of conscience, rather psychopathic maniacal behaviour, and a country in a mind-set prepared to bend to a dictator or god-like figure. Of course people question Genocide, and questioned it at the time, becuase it would be nearly impossible for an entire populace to be subdued in a brain-washed, figure-lead state, but ths doesn't really prove or disprove anything we've mentioned about conscience.

Judiasm is older than both Buddhism and Hinduism; and while Jainism lay some of the foundations that Judaism rests upon - Judaism was the religion that released these values to the world.

Jainism was an unrealistic vision of what man should aspire to be, Judaism was an achievable state that man was capable of becoming.

Judaic values are the pulsating heart of both Christianity and Islam and it is these two religions that spread throughout the world and provided man with a conscience... Jainism had no real impact on the evolution of mankind.

What does the actions of individuals have to do with the teachings of a religion?!?!?!?

Man didn't suddenly wake up with the notion of equality - it was introduced to him and while there is evidence of such teachings that predate Judaism.... It was Judaism that introduced this idea on mass to the world.

No it doesn't, 90% of the Greek civilisation was kept in poverty and the girls were second class citizens, young male soldiers received such attention so that they could become powerful soldiers that could contribute to Greek society.... it has fuck all to do with conscience.

I meant to write intangible

That’s not what I'm saying at all, I'm saying conscience is something that has developed over the course of history and it will continue to evolve as it is an infinite concept.

Take the commandment thou shalt not murder, since its introduction to the world it has become a universal standard… It is highly unlikely that there will come a time in man’s story when murder is considered justifiable (as a standard has been set)… However there may come a time when killing (which is justifiable by modern standards) may become unacceptable… Conscience is affected by intelligence and as man acquires knowledge his conscience expands.

However, it is my opinion that there people born with the capacity to commit crimes against society, science suggests that brain circuitry of many psychopaths differs from the average man… Why does that concept seem so alien to you? Just as we look different on the outside – we are also different on the inside.

If you’re suggesting that one can be born a psychopath then surely you’re supporting my argument.

And I use genocide as its an extreme example of evil.

I'm pretty sure Hinduism and Jainism (not sure on Buddhism) are older than Judaism, but it's a moot point, and not the core of my argument. Obviously religion has had a major impact on conscience. Even going back to polydeity societies like Greece and Rome, they still lived according to their various gods' perceived whims and ideals.

You started off saying that someon can be born inherently evil, and I think there are two important distinctions: psycopathy, which I would class as a genetic defect in someone's brain (I completely agree we're all as different on the inside as we are on the outside); and a lack of consience, which I would class as comething that is learned, taught or instilled and not something you are genetically born with or without.

Conscience has developed over time, and is entirley flexible. I disagree that it can't 'regress', although I wouldn't necessarily call it regression. For example, taking another human's life, you have called it killing and murder, which is interesting. Killing is the actions of taking a life, whilst murder is the crime of taking a human life. Killing was more accpeted millenia ago, as you have said, in human sacrifice and battle. Then as conscience developed and adapted, killing became frowned upon, barbaric, savage, and then illegal. It can still be justifiable, for example in war, but what about acts of euthanasia? This is illegal, and is technically murder, but whiule one person's conscience might tell them that it is a much better thing to relieve someone of their suffering and end their life, another person might see this as an egregious killing, and murder.

Perhaps in the future the majority's conscience will be that killing is right, even though it contradicts religious practice?

i aggree it not like joe crack loard makes a few mill then says "you kow what im rich now i'll give up" lower down the scale though a lot just see crime as an easy buck tbh with the pathetic sentencing that we get in this country and the clear up rate the police have it's no wonder crim's are running amock

I believe that all this religious rumination has acted as distraction from the debate at hand, if we are to examine the argument in detail we’d discover that religion helped carve out the fundamentals of human conscience - but the advancement of secularised understanding has given impetus to the redefining of these values.

Language is homologically correlated with conscience, the majority of us are born with the ability to develop the two - but without instruction they remain a redundant neural asset.

It is through the exploration of the relationship between nature-v-nurture that we find a neural imprint on mans reaction to stimulus... Conscience (or at least the ability to form a conscience) is a heritable emotion (just as the ability to love, be joyous and be miserable are), those that you categorise as psychopaths lack this heritable character trait.

Now if we delve into the evolution of the conscience there is an unquestionable progression, we take the knowledge of our forefathers and apply it to the standards of today - I cannot think of an example where mankind as a single entity regressed to antediluvian morality.

There have been attempts at regression; Adolf Hitler believed Judaism to be the cause of equality, which countered his belief of inequality amongst races - ultimately resulting in his belief that Judaism was a smear against the progression of mankind... His rhetoric was vociferously opposed as history had provided man with a set of robust values and once these values had been established they were near impossible to erase.

yeah but we're just talkin common sence really arn't we i mean think about it thats all the 10 commandments really are!

before they existed they weren't common sense, 99% of all ancient civilisation practised the diametric opposite of what Judaism taught.

But religion was a distraction that was diluting the core debate... so lets not wander off track again

yes there was no crime when we had National Service.
There was also no crime when we used to hang people for stealing a sheep.
what we need to do to eradicate crime is to be unutterably cruel and barbaric to criminals. This would teach them about how deserving of respect our society is. hand chopping, eye gouging, letting the victims family loose on them armed with razor blades. lets go the whole hog. torture is too good for them. hanging drawing and quartering, that would stop muggers dead in their tracks.
this is the sort of society we should be aiming at.





our criminal justice system is mainly there to protect the haves from the have nots, thats the reality.