"Groupthink of Left orthodoxy " how on earth does the Author think he'll be taken seriously other then the usual rubes with a statement like that.

The Author clear just wants to fan the flames of the partisan war. Pathetic really.

I'm sure if the author was a bit older he would be railing against the dangers of rock music.

This a silly simplistic post, the author does not understand how in a liberal democracy that we derive our laws from the people not from made up gods. Nor doesn't he seem to understand what the idea of personal freedom means

The author has used so many straw man in this piece that the flames rival those from the fire bombing of Dresden.

oh and btw it's Judeo-Christian-islamic values, all three religions are cut from the same cloth even the Pope agrees on that one.

Thoughtful article Peter.

I think the basis of the problem is that if people believe that humanity has unintentionally happened to have evolved from the primeval slime, for no ultimate purpose, then, it is hardly surprising that all sense of value and right and wrong are being lost.

In such a universe it really is the case that nothing has intrinsic value and there is no basis for morality.

If that is the real state of the universe there is no point pretending otherwise and we will have to learn to live with an increasingly unpleasant world.

It truly is pathetic when religious people suggest that an Atheistic view of the world has no moral basis.

Every evil act you can think of has been justified at one time or another by a religious world view.

Human sacrifices, genital mutilation, caste systems, slavery, the death penalty, cutting peoples hands off, burning witches...etc

Yet we still get religious (particularly on the right) waving their little books at the rest of us telling us we are immoral, that their actions are justifiable and moral because it says it's okay in their little book.

Hi Cobber,

You suggest rightly that " .... we still get religious (particularly on the right) waving their little books at the rest of us telling us we are immoral, that their actions are justifiable and moral because it says it's okay in their little book."

Are you referring to ISIS and other reactionaries ? What you say certainly seems to fit :)

Cheers,

Joe

Cobber - I don’t deny that you can create your own moral framework. You may also find others who make up a similar moral framework as your own. You may decide to call your moral positions “right”.

But why should anyone care what you decide to say is moral or immoral?

After all, you have just made it up. Even if lots of people choose to agree with each other about what is moral, if atheism is true, it is still all just made up.

You may want to try and use force (the law) to try and make people comply to your moral rules but that does not change the fact that your moral rules are just made up.

No, atheism cannot provide a basis for morality.

If you think it can, please demonstrate that.

Gotta agree mainly with Chis C but point out the left has been sliding to the right now for several decades.

And are little more than fiscal conservatives and but a pale shadow of the right.

There was a time when multimillionaires, would have found themselves part of Menzies conservatives, but now find that that brand has also headed right.

To the point that new ideas and reform is stifled and the contractionary (cause and effect) policies they seem to prefer, which just contract the economy and force various spending reductions?

We may be adrift in a world of ideas, yet if nobody even considers something new we stay where we are. Simply put, it is madness to do what you've always done while expecting different outcomes.

Keynesian economics gave us a post war period of unprecedented prosperity. And a time when we were the third wealthiest nation on earth, and a creditor one at that. All in the public record!

Since then we sold almost all the national estate, and now struggle with growing deficits!

I mean telecom alone used to provide consolidated revenue with around 7 billion annually? And the CBA a similar amount? Sell of your income streams and what else can you expect?

All the power authorities were once public entities, and as the first consequence industrial power and manufacture here was still affordable! Since then we've seen the wholesale flight of capital, manufacture and corporate tax liabilities.

And due, I believe, due to the most inept indolent politicians God ever put breath into, our best people and their better ideas soon followed.

Adrift in a world of ideas? Not us, we 're just adrift, with no competent helmsman at the rudder? And the oarsmen (idealogues) manning the ship of state are all rowing in opposite directions, figuratively speaking. Left, right, left, right.

And then we wonder why we with just one exception are the most overgoverned country on earth.
Rhrosty.