Villain

I might be missing something but this thread seems to be talking about everything except the origins of logic.

Death is only a negative if you're pro life.

The fact that it happens is irrelevant to your subjective view of it being a negative thing.

Let's be honest, the above are merely your subjective values and there's no reason why others should hold the same.

I'm not suggesting that some people are hard-wired to be capable of changing preference. I'm saying if sexual preference was hard-wired people wouldn't be able to change. I'm not sure what evidence you're talking about but this suggest that you're wrong: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biology_and_sexual_orientation

Yes, I agree only some people do that, but none the less it shows my point that people don't have sexual preference as a purely innate characteristic. If anyone is begging the question it's your position of sexual preference being hard-wired, the above example of SOME people changing preference blows that out of the water. I could choose in either case, the fact that I don't change my choice doesn't mean I have no choice. The choice of preference exists regards of the option that I choose. I also don't need to like any of them in order to choose a preference among them. This is not an example of preference though, you are singling out spinach and saying that you don't like or have some sort of intolerance to it. This is a reason why you would not prefer it to something more desirable but not a reason why you could not make a choice.

What are you trying to infer by capitalising SOME? For the sake of your question let's assume that I can't change the gender that I'm attracted to, how is my original choice invalidated because I still have the same preference? Does choosing oranges every time you're asked to select from apples, oranges and pears mean that you never make a choice? What is causing you to have the 'retching' reaction in the first place?

The idea that a 'homosexual' may want to be heterosexual but is somehow forced to be homosexual makes absolutely no sense. A person either has a preference for homosexuality or heterosexuality or both. It makes no sense to say that a person prefers homosexuality but at the same time prefers heterosexuality but not both. There are multiple options with regards sexual preference as listed in OP. Sexual preference can't be purely innate since people prefer homosexuality at some stage of their lives but later prefer heterosexuality and vice versa. Regardless of this, would you agree that humans are a combination of innate characteristics and externally influences and if so how would anything be considered a choice then? Your canned spinach is a false analogy. A proper analogy would be: which one of these do you prefer - canned spinach, carrots, none, both (spinach and carrots), beef.

The recent topic of 'Is sexual preference a choice?' has spurned some interesting posts. Most people, if not all, who posted were in support that it wasn't a choice, which brings us to this topic. There are different categories available with regards to sexual preference: heterosexual, homosexual, asexual, bisexual, perhaps even bestiality ,but according to that thread, for different reasons, none of them are a choice. If sexual preference isn't a choice what makes something a choice? At what level does an individual qualify for having made a choice?

A religious person is most likely going to have a deity as a first cause, I don't see anything controversial about something like that, if you're not religious then obviously you're not going to give such an idea any value.

The concept of cause is induced, what we know about cause is from our experience of cause. I doubt you have any experience of what God or a spirit or whatever Craig is alluding to, so how can you say what such a thing can or can't cause and what does any of it have to do with logic?

So basically your beef is that he used the word cause in a way that you feel doesn't work.

I'm not sure what logic has to do with the idea of cause, maybe you should elaborate. Secondly, while one might question if there is meaning in the concept you mention, it doesn't follow that since one one can't think of how something might happen, it can't happen.

Which of my multiple personalities are you again ?

Who could possibly say things exist outside them and how would that make them any more or less real?

The problem is that you both have different starting assumptions and are then arguing from the facts of each which don't have any relevance to the other's position. Arguing makes little sense in such a case, you're not even talking about the same thing.

I'm not sure what is meant by innate, if it's the opposite of learned as you seem to have used it, how is it clearly shown? Even a new born baby is going to have had interaction with it's environment, so to what degree of unlearned are we talking about here?

What exactly are innate and evolutionary ancestors' morals?

I agree that there remains an existential decision with the individual to chose what is or isn't right regardless of religious position, but their religious position then dictates what those choices ought to be. Morals are about what someone ought to do. I don't see much point in debating free will, if I was pushed for an answer I would say we ultimately don't have free will mostly because I can't imagine how such a thing would occur, but that argument is based on beginnings, while this is concerned with where we are regardless of such beginnings.

Ok, well I can see the religious argument for morals: Deity created man Man is therefore subject to deity Deity dictates morals How is that structure implemented without religion or are you saying something, more along the lines of: Each man must chose their own morals No one man's morals are above another's Everybody should just do as they please So you're just assuming that religion wasn't a part of society at some stage and then positing that people still had morals because they didn't die?

I was questioning what your source was for the statement: Since religion is a part of the earliest recorded history, how do you know how morality was doing before that earliest recorded history?

How exactly is discussing the nature of morals in a thread entitled 'You don't need religion to have morals' off topic? You haven't defined what you mean by morals, please do so.

I think first and foremost if you're going to comment on religion, don't generalise, secondly provide quotes to support your argument. I'm sure you can realise that a religion saying x doesn't mean that religion as a whole says x. With regards to 'listening to your inner conscience', what makes you think that people who do 'evil' don't listen to their 'inner voice'? You still haven't defined what good or bad mean. You haven't linked any article. This is a discussion forum and your post doesn't define what is to be discussed, so I think the question is completely valid. It is against the forum rules to post opinions without inviting discussion, as I'm sue you're aware of. It's hard to take this seriously since both the Egyptians and Sumerians (earliest recorded history) had deities. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recorded_history

Right or wrong for who? By what standard are you deciding what is and isn't "a good thing" and why should that standard be better than the complete opposite?

What do you think they are trying to say and how are these morals being defined? Do you believe there are such things as objective morals or are you just talking about subjective morals? This doesn't make any sense to me, could you describe what the difference between a 'good' person and a 'evil' person is please?