Componentes fisicoquímicos del pisco Mosto Verde

eople always claim that their relationships – with their parents, friends, governments and gods – are based on virtue. However, when you attempt to ask them how they know this and what principles they have applied to derive such objective knowledge – since virtue is surely not just an opinion – they immediately and instantaneously shy away, or become aggressive.

If I claim to have created a medicine that will prevent the spread of HIV – a pronouncement greeted with cheers of gratitude – and then, when a population takes this medicine, what results is the greatest HIV plague that the world has ever seen, will people’s gratitude for my medicine continue unabated?

In the same way, patriots say: “I love my country because my country is the best!”

“Best” in this case always means most moral. Americans talk about the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the separation of powers and so on. In other words, they talk about how the American system limits the power of government, and how right it was for the United States to break away from England in the 18th _century.

When you then ask these patriots how it is reasonably possible to love a system that was designed to limit the power of government that has produced the most powerful government, with the greatest and most destructive military, that the world has ever known, they just shy away or become aggressive.

Furthermore, if it was right to fight against the British state in the 18th

century, when it was imposing minor taxes and duties, and threatening to impose a fiat currency, how can it be possible to love the American state in the 21st _{century, with its crushing tax burdens, ridiculously}

overinflated fiat currency, massive national debt, monstrously imperialistic foreign policy and so on? That’s like saying that you hugely respect the virtue and courage of a woman who leaves her husband because he doesn’t take out the garbage, but that a woman should stay with a husband who half-strangles her to death every other week.

Also, if Americans love their country because the Bill of Rights and the Constitution limit the power of government, then surely they must love their country less and less, as government power grows greater and greater.

If I love sobriety and hate alcoholism, and when I married my wife she rarely drank, surely I will love her less when she becomes a raging alcoholic, hiding gin in the Listerine bottle for her morning “gargle.” If I say that I love sobriety and hate alcoholism, but claim that I love my wife equally after she transitions from teetotaler to raging alcoholic, then clearly I am just making up criteria by which I claim to “love” her.

GOD IS GOOD?

In the same way, when you talk to Christians – or any religious people – and hear from them that God is good, it is reasonable to ask them: “How do you know?” – particularly because most theologies include a deceptive devil as well, and apparently it’s always good to know the difference, to avoid being fooled into worshipping the wrong deity. If they say: “God is good because that is written in the Bible,” then it’s worth asking them whether they believe that the Bible is the Word of God. Naturally, they will say yes.

In this case, we basically have an autobiography in which the writer claims to be virtuous. In other words, a “claim to virtue” is the equivalent of virtue itself.

If “crazy eyes” Charles Manson scratches “I am virtuous” on his prison wall using the tooth of another prisoner, does that make Charles Manson virtuous?

There were many “authorized” Soviet biographies of Joseph Stalin that claimed he was the greatest and most virtuous man who ever lived. In “Mein Kampf,” Hitler also makes great claims about his own virtue, and divine mission, and piety, and obedience to God and so on.

In other words, a self-proclamation of virtue does not prove virtue any more than repeating the words “I am rich” magically creates gold in your hand.

Thus the “virtue” of a supernatural being cannot result from its own self- proclamation, but must exist relative to some other objective standard. A scientific theory is not “proven” because its author says so, but rather relative to the objective standard of the scientific method, which is to say relative to empirical reality. A compass measures “North,” not just me yelling the word “North!”

In this way, the “virtue” of a supernatural being must be determined relative to an objective standard of virtue.

“What, then,” I always ask the superstitious at this point, “is the objective standard by which you measure the virtue of your deity?”

If the response comes back: “The 10 Commandments,” then clearly, since one of them is: “Thou shalt not kill,” I always ask if this supernatural being has ever willfully caused the death of a human being.

Naturally, any honest Bible reader has to answer in the affirmative. We can go through the same process with other commonly-accepted moral propositions, such as “rape is evil,” “slavery is immoral,” “child abuse is unacceptable,” and so on. If we find that the “holy” words of this supernatural being approve of – or even excuse – evils such as rape, slavery and child abuse, then clearly either these things are moral, or the deity is not.

Inevitably, the superstitious cultist you are talking to will find other, more pressing matters to attend to, rather than examining the “virtue” of his own fantasy sky ghost.

I myself would not be able to find any topic more important, more essential for my own virtue, well-being and happiness, than establishing the moral rightness of a being that I loved and worshiped – particularly if my theological model included the existence of an evil and deceptive counter-deity, such as Satan.

If you heard on the news that the medicine you were taking for a minor ailment had a 50% chance of containing a fatal poison, would you shrug and continue to take that medicine, and claim that you had more pressing matters to attend to than figuring out whether it would kill you or not?

Of course not.

When the superstitious claim that they have “more important matters to attend to” than determining the virtue of the being they worship, clearly they have no interest in virtue, either in themselves or others – or in their deity.

Not having any real interest in virtue is not in itself particularly problematic – oysters doubtless do not ponder ethical abstractions, yet we would not call them evil – however, understanding the value and beauty of virtue to the degree that you attempt to pass off your own beliefs as virtuous – and then scamper away in fear or anger whenever the topic of moral principles arises – this behaviour is morally vile, and utterly corrupt.