Provoking an Error Catastrophe

The Joys of Moderating

2009-05-31T17:41:00.002+02:00

This week my efforts came to fruition at the Bielefeld-ZiF-ESF conference on the politicization of science. My adviser and I have been organizing this endeavor for about 8 months or so, and our work was finally realized in an intense 5-day series of talks, presentations, and posters from an interdisciplinary group of philosophers, sociologists, journalists, nano scientists, at least one gravity wave physicist, and a handful of historians.
Being the first conference that I've had a hand in organizing, I would venture to say that it was a great success. In addition to the constructive interdisciplinary dialogue (which happens so rarely!), Bielefeld was able to pull in some prominent thinkers in the HPS community including Helga Nowotny of the European Research Council, Norton Wise of UCLA, John Dupré of Exeter, journalist Dan Greenberg (author of Science, Money, and Politics: Political Triumph and Ethical Erosion), Philip Kitcher of Columbia U, as well as many other interesting personalities. The result was a week of dialogue between thinkers at Bielefeld's ZiF (Center for Interdisciplinary Research, aka Zentrum für interdisziplinäre Forschung), whose wheels I worked throughout the week to oil.

By far the most exhausting portion of the work last week was the unending moderating of talks, whose weight I mostly bore alone. Several stories emerged during the week, and will be featured in a future (this week) post, along with pictures, as I secure the rights from the relevant parties to pass on these tales of interest.

Thanks a lot Chalmers

2009-03-04T18:15:00.006+01:00

I've been having some disturbing thoughts recently. Namely, I think that I may have come up with a new argument for the existence of God. As an atheist, this seems like a counterintuitive use of time, but I am increasingly convinced that this results follows logically from David Chalmers' two dimensional semantics.
I began reading Chalmers during my BA in Cincinnati, under the guidance of Tom Polger, and I've always had the nagging feeling that something wasn't right. However, the best I could come up with at the time was that his argument for property dualism via 2-D semantics strongly assumes a foundationalist epistemology, especially with his characterization of primary intensions. Since then I've put Chalmers on the backburner.
Last week, after I read the creationist push to apply Chalmers' Hard Problem for their agenda, my interest was suddenly peaked again, but this time I came to a disturbing tentative conclusion: there is much more to Chalmers argument for dualism.

I am again pressed for time, so I will pretty much copy and paste an email I sent to a colleague on the matter. For now I will add the proviso that the language in the email is pretty loose, and needs much cleaning up to really get the details of Chalmers argument, but then again these are just preliminary thoughts:

Consider first Chalmers' description of phenomenal consciousness, and other related topics-it's FULL of appeals to intuition exactly where someone like me expects a substantive argument or observation. For example:

"Consciousness is the biggest mystery. It may be the largest outstanding obstacle in our quest for a scientific understanding of the universe." (1996, xi)

"The easiest way to develop a 'theory' of consciousness is to deny its existence, or to redefine the phenomenon in need of explanation into something it is not. This leads to an elegant theory, but the problem does not go away...Some say that consciousness is an 'illusion', but I have little idea what this could even mean...True, I cannot prove that there is a further problem, precisely because I cannot prove that consciousness exists. We know about consciousness more directly than we know about anything else, so 'proof' is inappropriate...There is no denying that this involves an appeal to intuition at some point; but all arguments involve intuition somewhere." (1996 xii-xiii)

Now, replace the word "consciousness" with the word "God", i.e.:

"God is the biggest mystery. It may be the largest outstanding obstacle in our quest for a scientific understanding of the universe."

"The easiest way to develop a 'theory' of God is to deny his existence, or to redefine the phenomenon in need of explanation into something it is not. This leads to an elegant theory, but the problem does not go away...Some say that God is an 'illusion', but I have little idea what this could even mean...True, I cannot prove that there is a further problem, precisely because I cannot prove that God exists. We know about God more directly than we know about anything else, so 'proof' is inappropriate...There is no denying that this involves an appeal to intuition at some point; but all arguments involve intuition somewhere."

This is already fascinating; I've changed ONE WORD, and the force of the comments retain EXACTLY the same force, applied to the respective problem of God's existence. This maneuver also works equally well at other places in his texts, e.g. dismissing Type-A materialism, and conceiving zombies. The next step for me is to apply Chalmers' argument structure to each of the steps where we replace language of "consciousness" with "God". Here's a few ideas in that direction:

1.) First, Chalmers' theory of semantics strongly assumes a theory of epistemology called foundationalism. The basic tenet of this theory is that there are basic experiences that we have that are beyond doubt, and whose experience guarantees their reality. Epistemologists call these "basic beliefs" while Chalmers calls them "Qualia".

2.) It is possible to describe people's experience of God as a kind of Qualia. Things such as Revelations or Mystical Experiences offer two intuitive examples for this class of experiences. Within these things "God", or whatever, plays a central role.
There are several theories that have logically and analytically defended arguments of the reality of Revelation by God or Angels based on epistemic foundationalism. In fact, they actually define this class of mental states as "Qualia". I'm thinking, actually of William Alston's work on epistemology and religious experience, Epistemic Justification (1989), and Perceiving God (1993), respectively.

3.) If it is denied that people have these experiences, then I have two responses;
(a) Use Chalmers' rhetoric in defense of consciousness - Denial = not taking the problem seriously: there are many people who do in fact take these experiences seriously, and denial from skeptics is not going to make these go away. People who

(b) Define these experences as an example of "implicit knowledge". This move is used often in the philsophy of mind and philosophy of language in the context of defining e.g. knowledge of grammar and knowledge of concepts, like by Frank Jackson (Who thought up the Mary-the-blind-neuroscience argument). This strategy is based, historically, on Noam Chomsky's Universal Grammar; a controversial but necessary assumption for the study of language.

Now I simply apply Chalmers' 2-D semantic argumentation.

1.) Primary intensions, i.e. conceptual content of qualia (water is wet, pain is painful etc) represent epistemic possibilities.

2.) Conceptual content preserves an identity relation with a referent in all possible worlds when it designates a necessary relation between this object and its conceptual content (i.e. pain is painful = necessarily true based only on experience [i.e. it is a priori] ; water =H2O is only necessary a posteriori [i.e. we need more than experience])

3.) Mystical experience of God = a class of qualia, whose conceptual content is preserved a priori

4.) Epistemic possibilities represent metaphysical reality when the identity relation between conceptual content designates a referent in all possible worlds.

-----------
5.) Therefore, the conceptual content that designates God in my mystical experience guarantees that God is a metaphysical reality. QED (1-4)

...

I meant for this argument to be a reductio against Chalmers' dualism (assuming the existence of God is absurd), but then I realized that there are probably people who will buy into this whole-heartedly. What to do?
I am currently working on a draft of this with a colleague of mine Kim Boström, a quantum physicist-cum-neurobiologist, and we intend to present this to anyone who wishes to hear it, and perhaps publish it in the near future, if it is well-received.

Chalmers and Creationism

2009-02-21T15:02:00.002+01:00

It's finally happened. I've found a writer that is explicitly connecting David Chalmers' work with creationism.

I was listening to a story on NPR (Doubting Darwin: Debate Over the Mind's Evolution) and followed a link on the page to one of the debater's blogs (the creationist Michael Egnor), who is apparently well-schooled in contemporary philosophy of mind.

Needless to say, this has incensed me in several ways, however since I need to be at work in an hour, I will have to continue this post at another time. For now feel free to gorge yourself on what entails "taking consciousness seriously":

http://www.evolutionnews.org/2008/06/the_hard_and_easy_problems_in.html

Another tidbit:

http://www.evolutionnews.org/2008/12/my_reply_to_dr_novellas_critiq.html

Colorblind Scientists Can Still Know Something About Color

2009-02-08T15:52:00.003+01:00

While I collect my thoughts on some more interesting and current issues, I thought I'd register
my thought on more well-worn abuses in the discussions relating to the sciences (or there unjustified dismissal).

Consider the classical Knowledge Argument from Jackson, which is used to demonstrate the
explanatory gap. In this argument colorblind neuroscientist Mary, who has acquired all of the physical facts of the world and understands everything about the way the brain functions, learns something new when she sees the color red for the first time. In Jackson’s words:

“What will happen when Mary is released from her black and white room or is given a colour
television monitor? Will she learn anything or not? It seems just obvious that she will learn something about the world and our visual experience of it. But then it is inescapable that her previous knowledge was incomplete. But she had all the physical information. Ergo there is more to have than that, and Physicalism is false.”

Before getting into anything, I will register my offense at how the situation is described. This
short and superficial summary of a such a salient issue just makes confusion that much easier. To me this situation is equivalent to offering a boxing ring as an argument against the idea that a circle is always round - "ring" here has only a passing connection to something that is a "circle".
The fact that Mary learns something new when she experiences first person the qualia ‘seeing
red’ is telling in the diagnosis of the mind, because she has been supposed to have already acquired all the knowledge of the mind somewhere in the physical facts of the world. There must be phenomenal truths over and above physical truths (this is reminiscent of Chalmers’ distinction). It follows, then, that the physical or ‘psychological’ method of studying the mind cannot explain conscious experience, and that the explanatory gap is established.

Paul Churchland has argued in several places against the usefulness of this experiment and its
conclusions concerning the mind and consciousness. The problematic claim of the Knowledge
Argument, Churchland believes, is an equivocation of what it means to know something. Specifically, after correctly noting that two distinct ways of knowing (studying as a scientist and experiencing as a conscious person), Jackson carries this into a distinction of the object that is known, inferring that there is also two different things to know. Churchland argues against this, saying that the differences in “ways of knowing” are just two distinct ways of knowing the same object, and nothing more. That is, he believes that though we can grant multiple avenues of epistemic access to a phenomenon, it does not follow from this epistemic plurality that a ontological plurality exists.

Furthermore, the supposed first-person access to the nature of light (via luminance) is a highly
flawed and limited mode of understanding light. This is observed by noting that luminance gives one epistemic access to the visual consciousness of the range of EM waves that can elicit such experiences in the human eye. In other words, we can only understand a fatally narrow range of facts regarding light itself via the first-person experiences of light. Physical study of light, on the other hand, is able to be implemented with none of the weaknesses of first-person experience and with greater yield in explanatory depth and in range of things about light that are explained. Because of this, physical study of the nature of light is a superior means to coming to learn something about light in its ontological form (if anything can). Churchland carries this conclusion to the Knowledge Argument. The two cases have a similar structure. Mary’s experience of the color red is not some gnostic revelation about the nature of light itself, but rather another way of knowing a fact about one object.
Other dualists, like David Chalmers, argue that examples like this miss the point of the Mary thought experiment. The point of phenomenal experience is exactly that it carries special properties that cannot be accounted for in any other experience except from the first person.

However, Since the dualist argument with Mary is first of all based on "knowledge", let's be sure we're not being tricked with what it means "to know" something. Jackson says that we cannot truly know what red is by learning all the relevant physical facts about color and brain processes etc.
Why is this?
The reason is that the dualist assumption of "physical knowledge" is meant to include -propositional knowledge- exclusively! That is, all physical knowledge is expressed with sentence-like structure. This is the reason why the dualist can happily (but falsely) believe that physicalism cannot explain experience - because nothing we can read in a book can tell us what a red rose looks like. This is the horrible trick being played on all philosophers the appearance of Mary; this definition of physical knowledge effectively restricts the representation of the physicalistic thesis to information seen paradigmatically in natural science textbooks. Knowledge of this kind is knowledge at a distance: that is, observations of a certain phenomenon are made by researchers, who express their observations using mathematical formulas and specific descriptions that, among other things, ultimately explain only “the form and function” of that phenomenon, but not its essence. This “text-book” knowledge is hence restricted to a third
person perspective, since those things that (physicalistic) scientific explanations are concerned with ("functional" explanations) are attainable externally to the explanandum.
Does it follow from this that that which is expressed in the language of science is not physical?

Much seems to depend on what it means to” know” something, and so let’s ponder on some ways in which “knowing” something can be cashed out. Propositional knowledge, recall, is knowledge that is expressed in sentential structure, and so can be stored in declarative memory as being the only way "to know". However, there are many things we "know" that are not able to be learned nor expressed in propositional form. This way of "knowing" is just as valid a candidate for knowledge as propositional facts, and more importantly, is used (if only implicitly) for even more things than propositional knowledge; for example, knowing how to ride a bike, knowing how to walk, knowing how to cook.....Are facts described with propositions sufficient to -really- know these things?! I think not. This is the type of knowledge stored in other ways, separate from declarative memory (like in procedural memory, or maybe even episodic memory). Secondly and more importantly, there is no reason to think that this form of knowledge is not physical, and this expands the amount of physical facts that the physicalist can refer to.

Ignoring the various non-propositional forms that knowledge can take, philosophers like Jackson are capable of of kinds of speculative mischief. For purposes of getting published and convincing (non-science) undergraduate students, this is an effective strategy : "Ignore the science, make some stipulations, slather with intuition, draw a conclusion, repeat." Here is an extended excerpt of this strategy in action, taken from Jackson (2004), describing the hidden completeness of our folk acquaintance with some complicated psychological phenomenon:

"What do I mean by implicit knowledge? Consider the situation
logic students are in before they are given the recursive definition
of a wff. Although they cannot specify what it is to be a wff,
they typically can reliably classify formulae into wffs and non-wffs.
Moreover, they can say for any ill-formed formula what triggers
their judgement that it is ill-formed. When presented with “(p v q”,
they do not say that they can see that it is ill-formed but cannot
say where the problem is. They know exactly where the problem is
and how to fix it – add a RH bracket after the “q”. Similarly, they
know what changes to a particular wff would make it ill-formed.
They are in the following position: for each particular example (of
reasonable length), they can say whether or not it is a wff and why,
but they cannot give in words a story that covers all cases. The same
is true for nearly all of us in our judgements of grammaticality.
We can say, for particular examples, whether and why they are or
are not grammatical – this is why “behaviourism” about our grasp
of grammar is a mistake – but we cannot give the general story
in words. Or consider the situation of many bridge players. They
cannot state in detail in a way that goes anywhere near covering all
the cases, the rules of bridge. At the same time, for any given stage
of the game, they can correctly identify the legal moves and what
changes to a given legal move would make it illegal and vice versa,
and in principle (and in practice for the more able ones) critical
reflection on their classifications would allow them to write down
the rules. In this sense, they know the rules implicitly.
I think we should say the same about the sense in which speakers
know the representational properties for words like “water” and
“life”. Consider, for example, the discussions engendered by Twin
Earth scenarios. There is considerable agreement about what to call
“water” and what not to call “water” in these various scenarios. The
impact and importance of the writings of critics of the description
theory of reference derive from this fact, and the same goes for the
considerable agreement about what to call “gold” – and what to call
“Gödel”, “Aristotle” or “life”, if it comes to that. But if speakers can
say what to call “water” when various possibilities are described
to them, we can identify the representational property for the word
“water”: it is the property that, often implicitly, guides them when
they say which stuff, if any, in each possibility to call “water” when
presented with the various scenarios. When the guidance is implicit,
the pattern that underlies the various verdicts will be one they cannot
state in words." (272-3; the section is ironically titled "The Language of the Experts and Implicit Knowledge")
[...]

PLoS Bio New Series: "Historical and Philosophical Perspectives on Contemporary Biology"

2009-01-05T11:52:00.005+01:00

pic source: Ectins Project, European Union

The Open-Access scientific journal Public Library of Science Biology (PLoS Biology) has introduced a new series to their publication, which concentrates on the "historical and philosophical perspectives on contemporary biology." I have applauded their focus on making peer-reviewed original-source scientific work more accessible to the public for several years now after being clued into PLoS's existence by Robert Skipper at the University of Cincinnati, and now this interdisciplinary forum that promises to open up more dialogues between these fields of research.

An introductory statement by Evelyn Keller along with the first article in the series can be found in the December 2008 issue. I'm sure this will be a welcome addition for philosophers (and historians, of course) of science.

The journal, in addition to making scientific research in biology more accessible to the public, also includes a smathering of philosophical reflection on matters in the life sciences, ranging from scientific illiteracy in the USA, comments on morally-relevant research concerning sex andgender differences, and the search for/definition of life itself. This is an excellent website to bookmark for your coffee breaks, if not for your own research and reference purposes.

On to New and Better (i.e. Constructive?) Things

2008-12-23T15:56:00.005+01:00

Now that I have christened my fledgling blog with a personal note on the moral and ""scientific"" (double scare quotes a definite must) decrepitude haunting the same-sex marriage/proposition 8 debate, I am looking forward to orienting my posts towards slightly less socially-embedded forums.

Here are some things that I am cooking up for the new year:

1.) In the philosophical discussions of mind/brain issues, one element I find missing is a dialogue, or even sustained commentary, on what exactly the divergence between scientifically-motivated philosophical and the more traditional metaphysically-motivated approaches.

Researchers working in, inter alia, metaphysics and the philosophy of mind and language often seem to have a very dismissive attitude towards other approaches that are more disposed toward asking how sciences that are interested in studying the mind (biology, cog sci, the neurosciences, psychology (?)) may help us orient our questioning, if not help supply an answer to, the most enthralling questions driving all of us.

The feeling is mutual on the other side. Metaphysicians are seen less as serious contenders to offering solutions, and more like an unending source of obstacles to these solutions. Only rarely are they seen as colleagues with a different perspective to offer, at least in my limited experience.

The exceptions to this are indeed interesting, but a general forum thematizing this gulf between methodologies and motivations deserves highlighting. I've been interested in this topic for quite a while, and intend to pursue it in depth with a colleague of mine (who happens to be a quantum physicist-turned-neurobiologist).

2.) Optimality in evolutionary adaptations -- seriously, wtf? Despite the widespread assumption that evolutionary features (but especially adaptations) are optimally "designed", I share no enthusiasm for this intuition. This topic came up in a conversation recently and I still have to collect my thoughts on it.

3.) Perhaps relatedly, I am also deeply concerned about The New Atheism and its brainchild the Brights Movement. The movement's champions, including most famously Richard Dawkins, Dan Dennett, Chris Hitchens (?), and Sam harris, have struck out a very broad frontal assault against religion in the last half decade or so. I am more than hesitant in supporting this attack, however, due to its unabashedly polemic style, and at times dogmatically uncritical content. At the very least, this movement represents a horrible fault in strategy re engaging "the enemy".

I have talked with several other atheists who are enthusiastic about the New Atheism, but I have yet to find one who does not blip into ham-fisted (and hence ineffective) dismissal of everything relating to religion or religious people.

We'll see where this goes...

Tying Up Some Loose Ends: A Critical Reaction to a Recent Proposition 8 Discussion, pt. 3

2008-12-14T16:43:00.018+01:00

[Pic Source]

This Prop8 discussion on Facebook seems to be dying down so I don't think any more extended remarks or argumentation are really necessary, so this post will lay out some of the loose ends that should have received more attention than they did. I am also losing interest in this debate and would like to move on to other things, so this entry will be kept to a minimum.

Now that the two camps have retreated to their respective corners and forsaken further dialogue with one another, I want to quickly consider the peripheral arguments that began to appear in the Note's subsequent discussion. As intuitions and critical reflection began to clash with the shoddy statistical gestures and crypto-religious posturings of the note, the supporters of Pro8 began adapting their tactics away from arguing with nonsensical flimflam to the delightfully ambiguous "evidence" of biology on all matters homosexual.

"For those of you who CHOOSE homosexuality how in the world would society ever exist if it weren't for the principles and sacredness of family and procreation???"

"If anybody doesn’t want to use RELIGION as a good argument then use BIOLOGICAL reasons. God made our bodies so perfect so that MAN and a WOMAN can make sense when they are intimate. I don’t want to go into much detail but I hope you get the point. ;)"

"This is not soley religion dictating a particular position. Scientific research is beginning to define what religion has taught all along (www.acpeds.org/index.cgi?CONTEXT=art&cat=10005&art=50&BISKIT=711636269). Please note that this is an independent organ[iz]ation that has published these points. Traditional families should b[e] the mainstay of our society and anything that takes our society away from this principle will be detrimental to the same."

(added emphasis designated with italics)

Each one of these statements makes a specific "scientific" claim in support of banning gay marriage. These claims are (if it's not obvious already: (1) Being homosexual is a conscious choice, and is not significantly influenced by one's biology, (2) Humans are (perfectly) designed [biologically] to engage in heterosexual behavior, and (3) Homosexual parents are proven to be a destructive element in the development of children.

(1) As a general note, the public's and media's fascination for biological research focusing on traits of social note is almost universally continuous with a lack of respect towards interpretation of its results and also towards placing that research in the context of its genesis. Biology, it may shock many people to learn, is a very different kind of science than physics, whose portrait pervades the classical folk-understanding of "science". Far from discovering universal laws and deriving conclusions of relatively high certainty, biological research is marked by its emphasis on local phenomena that are necessarily and inextricably embedded in a system or systems that in turn are also deeply interconnected with further systems and influences. To abstract away from this fact at all, let alone for the sake of establishing the legitimacy of a political agenda, is an abuse of science and morally shameful.

The importance of this should be immediately clear with respect to (1) above. The poster of this statement is obviously not familiar with research concerning, e.g., genetic expression. In most of the conversations I have with people concerning genetics and personal traits, there is a pervading tendency to think of genes as 0/1 switches or some related mechanism by which traits are inherited, and expressed, as simple Mendelian traits (cheek dimples, eye color). Hence if you have "the gene", you're chained to causality. This, in some cases, is the birth of genetic determinism. Conversely, if there is no gene for it, or you don't have it, then it is not biologically influenced at all. In its extreme form, this leads to cultural determinism.

I don't want to review the arguments or history of the real complexities of gene expression but I will observe that social agenda is directing the argumentation here, and certainly has nothing to do with the literature on the "cause" of being homosexual. The minority of thinkers vainly (?) trying to hold a more sophisticated middle position between the determinisms are often swept aside by the parties so as not to interfere with the affirmation of their respective conclusion. Any critical comment on this topic would not deviate far from the blanket (yet intellectually honest) statement "WE DON'T KNOW FOR SURE".

There's another reason for avoiding any long description of how genetics figures into personal traits. Namely, it is irrelevant to the moral aspect of this debate. Human rights should not be granted on the basis of biology, nor on the basis of interpretations of biological reasoning. Any possible metric of evaluation must presuppose some framework by which to assess the thing in question as "right" or "wrong"; invariably, this metric in social debates emerges in the pernicious form of normalcy. As intractable as it is to find measures in establishing the norm in the biological realm (which is usually geared towards simply understanding something), it is downright hopeless to try and find such a thing in a social context (which is oriented towards differentiating people as "right" or "wrong"), at least one with such flared passions.

In reality the derivation of social norms from biological research is one of the most virulent sins committed by those whose interests lie in influencing societal policy. Here the specters of eugenics, racial and social classification derived from IQ test performance, and sociobiology emerge into our awareness to remind us of the iniquities that accompany such enterprises. This point is made decisively by Richard Lewontin et al. (1984):

"Pressure to conform to social norms, and institutions that propagate and reinforce these norms, are, of course, characteristic of all human societies. In advanced...societies, the norm becomes an ideological weapon in its own right, foreshadowed by Huxley's Brave New World and Orwell's 1984 but cloaked in the benign language of those who only wish to help, to advise, but not to control and manipulate. Let us be clear: norms are statistical artifacts: they are not biological realities. Biology is not committed to bell-shaped curves."

Far from establishing moral superiority in citing the norm to dispose of gay marriage, the Pro8 supporters have simply further demonstrated their intolerant conceit. I talked about this issue in the last post.
...

(2) Inferences of design in biological features, and the perfection of this design, should be a puzzling observation with which one may be confronted. When one, however, reads within the text in the quote above the fluidity between religious and biological reasoning along with this designation of "perfection", we may surely forgive the reader's palm involuntarily reaching slowly reaching for his or her face. Regarding perfection in biological design, figure 1 best summarizes my opinion on the topic.

Additionally, the writer of that quote also lacks the imagination to consider whether homosexuals also have the perfect bodies for engaging in sexual acts with their partners. I think he might be wrong about that too, but I'm not going to think about that too hard.

Figure 1: Perfection in biological design.
...

(3) Finally, regarding the notion in the third quote above that "science is beginning to define what religion has taught all along" (i.e. that same-sex parents are harmful to children), it should hardly surprise the reader that I am equally unmoved by its claim. The article it cites is a wolf-in-sheep's-wool of sorts in that it begins by qualifying its content by stating that:

"Data on long-term outcomes for children placed in homosexual households are very limited and the available evidence reveals grave concerns. Those current studies that appear to indicate neutral to favorable results from homosexual parenting have critical flaws such as non-longitudinal design, inadequate sample size, biased sample selection, lack of proper controls, and failure to account for confounding variables."

However, it's conservative agenda-driven motivation is nonetheless laid bare immediately in the midst of this empty gesture towards methodological honesty. Directly after this statement the authors demand that:

"Childrearing studies have consistently indicated that children are more likely to thrive emotionally, mentally, and physically in a home with two heterosexual parents versus a home with a single parent. Therefore, the burden is on the proponents of homosexual parenting to prove that moving further away from the heterosexual parenting model is appropriate and safe for children."
...
"Violence among homosexual partners is two to three times more common than among married heterosexual couples. Homosexual partnerships are significantly more prone to dissolution than heterosexual marriages with the average homosexual relationship lasting only two to three years. Homosexual men and women are reported to be inordinately promiscuous involving serial sex partners, even within what are loosely-termed "committed relationships." Individuals who practice a homosexual lifestyle are more likely than heterosexuals to experience mental illness, substance abuse, suicidal tendencies, and shortened life spans."
source: American College of Pediatricians (2004)
...
Oh my. This is very convenient, at least for the Pro8 crowd. It looks like we really are putting our children in grave danger when they are brought up in same-sex couple households. But then again, maybe not. Given the long list of atrocious flaws in the "scientific" evidence offered in the "20 arguments" I begin to wonder if sentences like "critical flaws [in experimental design]" really has any meaning for the pro8 crowd other than the emotional appeal of sounding "scientific" in its accusations. In a field where there is limited, or very flawed, data, the qualification of such harsh conclusions hardly seems to fit for the label "consistently indicated".

If the person who posted this link on Tyson's note had taken just a few minutes to check out other respectable "independent organizations", he would have found that such politically-charged conclusions are not worth the label of "scientific" whatsoever. Consider what other such organizations have said regarding same-sex parents:

"Current research shows that children with gay and lesbian parents do not differ from children with heterosexual parents in their emotional development or in their relationships with peers and adults. It is the quality of the parent/child relationship and not the parent’s sexual orientation that has an effect on a child’s development. Contrary to popular belief, children of lesbian, gay, or transgender parents:

Are not more likely to be gay than children with heterosexual parents.
Are not more likely to be sexually abused.
Do not show differences in whether they think of themselves as male or female (gender identity).
Do not show differences in their male and female behaviors (gender role behavior)."

Source: American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry (August 2006)

"Children growing up in same-sex parental households do not necessarily have differences in self-esteem, gender identity, or emotional problems from children growing up in heterosexual parent homes."

Source: WebMD, summarizing study results from several projects (2005)

"A growing body of scientific literature demonstrates that childrenwho grow up with 1 or 2 gay and/or lesbian parents fare as wellin emotional, cognitive, social, and sexual functioning as dochildren whose parents are heterosexual. Children’s optimaldevelopment seems to be influenced more by the nature of therelationships and interactions within the family unit than bythe particular structural form it takes.^{"

Source: American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) (2002)}

" Studies have shown that children with gay and/or lesbian parents are ultimately just as happy with themselves and their own gender as are their friends with heterosexual parents. Children whose parents are homosexual show no difference in their choice of friends, activities, or interests compared to children whose parents are heterosexual. As adults, their career choices and lifestyles are similar to those of children raised by heterosexual parents.

Research comparing children raised by homosexual parents to children raised by heterosexual parents has found no developmental differences in intelligence, psychological adjustment, social adjustment, or peer popularity between them. Children raised by homosexual parents can and do have fulfilling relationships with their friends as well as romantic relationships later on."

Source: AAP (March 2007)

It seems there is little consensus on the "scientific" (actually, medical) perspective[s]. I can claim no knowledge on whether or not same-sex parents will necessarily harm a child's psychological development, but I am at least aware that the literature calls for much more restraint in condemning same-sex parenting. The only thing I could think of that does represent a challenge to such children is the ostracism and intolerance that they may encounter as a result of the hounding and belligerence of the families in support of Prop8; however, this hardly calls for a moratorium on allowing homosexual couples to raise children. The puritanical regimentation that a child may experience in a Mormon family suggests itself to me to be harmful to their psychological development. But then again, I have no data to support such a polemical attitude, and I have no intent on pushing such an agenda.

Conclusion:
If it somehow wasn't clear from the content of these three posts, I damningly condemn the Pro8 position of Tyson and his colleagues on the Proposition 8 debate, and gay marriage in general. This is a text book example of intolerance motivated by religious belief, and should serve as a reminder that the values we all claim to endorse are most viciously assaulted by those who claim so fervently to be their guardians.

In reality, the certainty of their "universal" truths begin and end with the individual who buys into them. They have nothing to do with me, with other people, nor with the nature of the world. In a rabid blindness these people call their arrogance "faith" and derive an unending stream of arbitrary judgment on whoever their institution so uncritically labels "sinner". The content of these Pro8 posts are caustic to human dignity and they should be ashamed of the Paleozoic alchemy that they attempt to pass off as fact. That they additionally have the nerve to call themselves tolerant cries for the judgment of hypocrisy.

I also find it fascinating that such a group grasps so emphatically, and in such an unsophisticated manner, at scientific research in order to push a politico-religious agenda. This is fascinating because it immediately begs the question of how they stand on other scientific issues at large; evolution, stem cell research, GMOs, etc. If it is anywhere near the conservative religious opinion re creationism, it is noteworthy that their vitriolic attacks turn so suddenly into open arms in the name of spreading the word.

Most of Tyson's colleagues (and Tyson himself) are Mormons. As unwilling as they are to comment on the significance of their perspective as Mormons, I think it is undeniable that this implies religious, social, and political influences that cannot be ignored. In one pitiful maneuver, Tyson censored one of my posts for including a link to "anti-mormon" literature, which can be found here. This OpEd was written by a Mormon who felt that LDS (the Mormon church) had failed to learn from its own history of non-traditional weddings in its condemnation of gay matrimony. He said of that article, and my posting, in personal communication:

"I read your link, and many others like it. I have done my share of research, trust me. It's like I said before, there are lots of truths in what she mentioned...but like a lot of things, some people put their own spin on it. Some of the most anti-mormon people were mormon at one point, that's how it usually goes."

No. That's how opinion "goes." The atmosphere of censorship in this FB discussion, in addition to the content of the dscussion, has had a chilling effect on me. Indeed, this chill continues to propagate, as I have recently reread the note's discussion, and was shocked to see that many of the comments (including a large number of my posts) were cropped from the discussion. [I have two screen caps of the discussion before and after this censorship, if anyone is interested] For all the respect I still feel for my several Mormon friends, I am left asking myself the question: is this censoring of others' opinions the act of a single person or is it indicative of something more general? I have no conclusive evidence to answer this.

Addendum:
To my homosexual friends: you have my sympathies. I have approached this topic as one of intellectual interest, and I am fully aware that my technical outrage must be belittled by your personal outrage, as my own life is untouched by this development in any concrete way. I hope you profitted from reading my posts.

"Pro8 = ProH8?" A Critical Reaction to a Recent Proposition 8 Discussion, pt. 2

2008-11-24T23:37:00.010+01:00

This entry has no statistics...sorry.

II. The Role of Intolerance in this Prop 8 Discussion

Continuing with my extended response to a note on Facebook discussing Proposition 8 in California, another thing that struck me was what I perceived as a conscious effort to not recognize the stake that homosexuals might have in this situation. I don't mean in the original "20 Arguments", though that is where the tone begins, because this is exclusively a political spin; I mean in the subsequent discussion with several other of Tyson's (Original Poster) friends/colleagues. In setting this tone, all of the original 20 arguments ranging from "Protecting America" to "Protecting Morality" included a very unambiguous proviso that support for Pro8 does not demonstrate a hatred/bigotry/etc. toward gays. Take for instance:

"Speaking on matters of public morality – including gay marriage – does not constitute abuse or the frequently misused term 'hate speech.' We can express genuine love and friendship for a homosexual family member or friend without accepting the practice of homosexuality or any re-definition of marriage."

or:

"If gay marriage becomes the law of the land state authorities will be required to treat opposition to gay marriage as 'invidious discrimination,' 'irrational,' or 'motivated by hate [and this is wrong].'"

In addition, this moral dodging by the Pro8 crowd seeks to further caricature the No8 position by saying that this unjust univocation of Pro8 and Hate ("ProH8?") is widely employed to assault "traditional values", "Christianity", "democracy" etc. Of course, there is no systematic attempt to establish this, but rather only single cases that are said to support (via intuition and sympathy) this generalization, like seen in the following:

"The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal [in the city of Oakland] backed up the district court saying administrative efficiency in a government office is more important than free speech, and that municipal employers can completely censor the terms 'natural family,' 'marriage' and 'family values' as hate speech."

So the Pro8 camp has a vested interest in not being categorized as "hateful" in their support for anti-gay marriage legislation. What are we to make of this? When hate becomes manifested in a political position, recent history has shown us (with relief) that such ideas in their most explicit form are almost universally reviled. The history of the USA has had a stormy coming-of-age with this topic in the last century, as seen in the institutionalized hatred immortally portrayed by the Jim Crow laws of "separate equality" and the sometimes bloody struggle to overturn this tradition during the Civil Rights Movement. It looks by and large like hatred on the national level has been expunged by open-mindedness and tolerance for our intrinsic but morally-irrelevant differences; political positions with overtly hateful positions no longer stand as great a chance of being supported by the greater constituency. One could say that this is because of one of two reasons (or sometimes both): (1) People have truly learned that not all differences need be cause for establishing social exclusion or inferiority or (2) The truly hateful have shifted their strategy away from appeal to reptilian passions.

The No8 crowd has repeatedly decried the Pro8 position as openly "hateful" or "bigoted". If Proposition 8 could definitively nailed down as such, then it would almost certainly have faced defeat at the polls. But it won, with a surprising margin. In California, one of the most liberal states in the Union. Either there was an implicit meta-understanding among the yes-voters that garnered to a collective subliminal hatred for homosexuals, or there were other things stirred in their minds that made them react strongly to the gay marriage. I, for one, think that looking for just one reason will lead to few fruitful conclusions, since the reasons were many and the intuitions just as diverse as the No8 side. I don't think there was any universal reason that the Pro8 people had as a group that made them vote for Prop8. The smaller constituencies within this group certainly have their reasons, and exactly this makes it difficult to generalize over them all. Some voted based on their political party's line, others for "religious" reasons, others because of hatred, and still others for other reasons.

Looking at the comments following the note, however, the message was strong and consistent that the Pro8 people in this thread were not speaking from hate:

"In response to [Dan - myself]: Well, there you said it. That's exactly what we are pushing. Hatred. That is the absolute core meaning behind all of us supporting this. And if you read carefully as obviously you didn't, the words you chose were not mentioned once. Just because there are some who support this does not mean that they are homophobic and hate homosexuals."

"We can love everyone and we should love everyone--no matter what they are about. But that does not mean that we have to agree or accept their lifestyle."

"Love the sinner but never justify the sin."

"I had no idea [an old friend] had chosen [!!] that lifestyle, but why would I ever be embarrassed to have had him as a friend? I’m not! He was always a friend of mine. People make us out to be 'homosexual-haters' because they don’t understand [our Christian beliefs]"

"I think it is shameful that the "hate" argument is used so much because it is simply untrue. In all honesty, the only time that I ever felt anything that resembled hate during this whole campaign was when a group of adults and children (including my wife and six-month old son) had eggs and cigarettes thrown at while being subject to every hateful word (and gesture) and one could imagine. I was beside myself and as I looked around at the group that I was with, I noticed that there was not retaliation, no returned gestures (unless a wave and smile count), and not a foul word uttered about the perpetrators. It was very clear to me that afternoon whose actions were motivated by hate."

"While standing with my Prop 8 sign, on Tuesday night I was called terrible names, given the bird, cussed out, threatened, and have had bottles and trash thrown at me, all by those opposing Prop 8. Just today I had someone try to run me off the road in their suburban because I have a Prop 8 bumper stick on my car.
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Another man cussed out my wife and I at a red light for having a bumper sticker. A friend of mine has his tires slashed last week because he had a 'Yes on 8' bumper sticker on his car.
Now you tell me Dan and Zach, and anyone else out there who thinks 'Yes on Prop 8' is a matter of hate... who is demonstrating the Hate here? There has been ZERO retaliation.
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I have always been taught to love everyone. I will continue to do so and to teach those same principals to my future children, but that doesn't mean I have to support something or someone who does something I disagree with. Withdrawing my support doesn't make me a hater."

"Prop 8 is NOT about discrimination, hate, or bigotry.
It IS about protecting parents' right to teach their children morality according to their own values, and NOT to have state-imposed values taught to each child.
It IS about preserving morality in the United States
It IS about protecting clergy members from prison time for practicing their beliefs
It IS about protecting children and their young, malleable minds.
It IS about protecting a sustainable way of life for our country."

"[T]he words "hatred", "bigot", and "intolerance" are being thrown around A LOT and I'm not sure they're being used responsibly......If a person supports Prop 8 does that mean they are a bigot? No...and it's prejudice to assume so." [emphasis added]

This last quote is especially interesting. It claims that it is not only wrong to attribute hate to the Pro8 position, but "it's prejudice to assume so." This strikes me as true in some cases. But a silver bullet against the No8 crowd it is not. It does, however, call on us to explicate why it is that we can so fluidly accuse them of being, e.g. "intolerant" despite their insistence on not being driven by hate. How would something like this look?

I don't want try to offer an exegesis on what "hate" means, mostly because of the connotations that come along with the word's usage. As I hinted at above, it seems to play a dismissive role when used to describe a political position. In any case I have to admit that I am hesitant towards attributing it to the posters in this note's commentary, but some understanding of "hate" doesn't seem to be irrelevant either. Clear cases of hatred for me are connected to the vitriolic speech and motivations of avowed hate groups like those of the white pride movement etc. I don't know the people involved in this discussion personally, and in the absence of such inflammatory rhetorical indicators I think its best to first identify what it is about the Pro8 position that drives people to describe it as "hateful".

That being said, my gut reaction to the original 20 arguments was to slander it:

"Yes, let's institutionalize hate and finally show those faggots that they're inferior to the rest of us. That'll get us to heaven faster.

And yes, that's all that these 'arguments' are pushing. "

Without considering the perspectives of Pro8 more closely, it bears for me an unmistakable resemblance to the kind of matter-of-fact racism of the nineteenth century. At that time, it was not just a trans-cultural truth to speak regularly of the inferiority of other races in comparison to Western white civilization, it was presumed to have scientific and sociological precedence (sociology wasn't really an established science back then, but I think this retroactive label isn't too wrong). For the layman, but also for the professional (think Thomas Huxley and Abraham Lincoln), the natural balance was seen in the established status quo between the [relatively] omnipotent Western imperial powers and the colonized third world of Australia, Africa, and South America, where many people differing most starkly to Europeans in appearance happened to live. For this society, it was perfectly rational, and correct, to speak of the natural hierarchy of worth and merit between the races; that is, it was far removed from "hate".

But this comparison, too, is wrong, according the Pro8 posters in the note.

Obviously, our civilization moved (mostly) beyond this deep error in observation concerning the races. Nonetheless, speaking of homosexuality as "unnatural" or of homosexuals as "sodomites" implies very strongly either a similar attribution of inferiority to them as a group at one extreme, or a significant deviation from "normalcy" as "trivially" observed in e.g. biology, society, or religion, both of which justify the exclusion of their ability to interact in society in the same way as "straight" people.

One heavy burden that the Pro8 people do have on their shoulders is to differentiate themselves from confirmed hate groups that use the same argumentation that they themselves mobilize. To this point I invited the Pro8 people in the note to read through this story published by the socially conservative website worldnetdaily.com: "Sparks fly as 'gay' activist mob swarms Christians". The language, and the embedded Youtube video included on the page [can't find: please see the source link for the vid] are strongly reminiscent of the Pro8 position exhibited in the original 20 arguments and in the discussion afterward. Here are some excerpts:

""[The gay activists] started saying, 'We're going to kill you,'" she said. "They started taking our pictures and saying, 'We're going to kill you. We know who you are."....Then she said a man jumped through the crowd and pushed her forehead. Just then, a squad of police officers arrived in riot gear, surrounding the Christians and forming a protective human wall...The woman said her group had merely organized a peaceful fellowship and wasn't there to condemn homosexuals. "We hadn't preached," she said. "We hadn't evangelized. We worshipped God in peace, and we were about to die for it."

What I failed to immediately mentioned was that I found the link to this story in the forums of www.stormfront.org, a renowned white supremacist internet platform. Like a number of the quotes above, this article juxtaposes the "hatemonger" label onto the "gay activist" crowd involved (with a degree of justification), and to the No8 position in general. Gays are not the victim, the Christians are! The cited article also refrains from any blatant hate speech (though not so in the thread I found it in), much like the posts above. My point in this little maneuver is to demonstrate that to a certain point, the Pro8 position as described in Tyson's note is in many ways symmetrical to the one discussed among white supremacists themselves. If supporters of Prop8 need an explanation for why some people so easily label them "hateful", it is because of the perceived associations via language and argumentation with real hate groups. Whether or not this is warranted, the association surely inspires feeling that are not easily ignored. I've already said this connection may not be warranted for the people in this note, but it is something to think about.

I am open to the Pro8 people in this note to demonstrate that they do not demean homosexuals in their support for Prop8. They certainly claim not to intentionally do this; But this is exactly where I want to press them now. The most important move for them in establishing this is to remark on something pertaining to the "unnatural-ness" of homosexual behavior or inclinations, thereby isolating it from the person's identity. From this it follows very easily that they are attacking something other than the person his/herself. For both of these points a host of observations and "evidence" is claimed about the nature of what it means to be homosexual, and most often this flood of support comes from purported "scientific" evidence (i.e. homosexuality is a disease, a conscious decision, or is determined by genetics), or from biblical precedent (no comment). The result is always the same: homosexuality is bad/detrimental/unhealthy/dangerous. For now I will further avoid the responsibility of sketching out whether or not one's sexuality is a necessary part of one's identity (I'm inclined to think that it is), and will stave off commentary on the nature of this kind of "scientific" evidence until the next post.

Rather, I want to work towards reorienting the discussion towards the issue of whether or not something like intolerance resulting from inequality (rather than e.g. hate) comprises a necessary part of supporting Prop8, and whether or not this is acceptable. Intolerance, for one thing, is tangible, whereas hate is only detectable when attached to something else. Talking about intolerance also slightly avoids the political connotations of buzz words like "bigot" and "hate" so as not to be dismissive. This, it seems to me, is a much better way of discussing this issue in terms of a moral right or wrong. It may turn out that Prop8 discriminates against homosexuals in society and that, being finally insulated from any connections to hate or bigotry, its supporters will find this perfectly acceptable. Neutrally speaking, if something like this is the case, we will have found finally an important chasm separating the two camps where intuition really does have the final word. Where we go from there is another question completely.

Look at the two sides perspective on what this debate is about. For homosexuals, it is the right to marry, for the Pro8 crowd in the note, it is preservation of man-woman marriage. So, what is then at stake for the two sides such that they want these two things? The No8 side desires equality between gays and straight couples regarding marriage, while the Pro8 side claims that such equality would have "devastating consequences", and that "feelings don't trump these consequences".

Consider the fantastic claims of the Pro8 side and the "devastating consequences" that equality between homosexuals and straight people will cause. According to the original 20 arguments, this equality would cause "irreparable damage" to:

"marriage, families, parenting, children, morality, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, majority rule, separation of powers, states’ rights, and America."

These things can be organized under two general categories of scope, namely a 'wider'
social/sociological scope, and a more 'local' personal scope. Many of the specific "arguments" for how these things will be affected wanders between these two scopes of in terms of describing the damage that they will endure. Most of the claims in the original 20 arguments have a wide scope, saying, where there is any concrete claim of what the damage entails at all, that the effects will be visible at a societal level if homosexual marriage were to be instituted. I will not review my thoughts on these (which I worked through in the last post on this issue), but I will remind the reader that none of these claims were at all compelling under closer inspection. The methodological problems of the empirical claims (where present) are insuperable, and their interpretations are unsupported by the data. The other claims fall into a black hole of [formal and informal] logical absurdity, or unclear subjective standards that lack any normative interpretation.

Some of these claims, on the other hand, have a transparent local application to the Pro8 individuals themselves (the effect on children, family, parenting, various freedoms). Here a different kind of evidence is required to demonstrate or even characterize their effects (such as medical studies on the quality of parenting by homosexuals). Here I will simply say that the evidence offered for this is at best inconclusive, or at worst not worthy of publication. It does not, in any case, support the claims made in the note nor in the comments. I will deal with these kinds of claims and their supposed evidence in the next and final post on this topic.

More importantly, I want to now consider how the Pro8 supporters perceive the stakes of the No8 side and evaluate theirs as more important. For the Pro8 position, this damage, both societal and personal, is the argument they offer against No8. Here then, is the core of their position:

"The issue over legitimizing gay marriage is not one of equal 'rights'...It is, instead, a question of equal 'dignity'. Proponents of gay marriage do not want homosexuals to feel like 'second-class citizens' as a result of not being allowed to use the familiar and highly favored designation of 'marriage'. (Again, being treated like second class citizens is not the issue – there are plenty of legal protections to keep that from happening. It is the feelings of gay couples that are the concern.)" [emphasis added]

This paragraph needs unpacking. For the Pro8 crowd, the question of equality has nothing to do with "rights" but rather "dignity". "Dignity" according to homosexuals actually amounts to nothing more than "feelings". Gays feel insulted because they feel like they are treated like second-class citizens. "Rights" don't even come into question. So the REAL-REAL issue is whether or not we want to change the nature of marriage so that we don't "hurt anyone's feelings".

These stipulations and sleight of language represents the lever by which the argument gains its traction against the No8 position. For, naturally we don't want to hurt anyone's feelings:

"Virtually everyone would be willing to grant “equal status” – if it did no harm."

Therefore, the primary motivation driving the Pro8 camp is captured in one short sentence:

"We cannot allow this effort [that is, keeping gay marriage legal] to 'not hurt people’s feelings' lay waste to so many institutions, principles and rights."
...

IIa. "Feelings", Dignity, and Rights

The Pro8 crowd is exactly right that the core issue here regards equal dignity. However, I take extreme exception to the assertion that human dignity amounts to nothing more than "feelings". Here the Pro8 position slips badly in its conceptual structure, and in its appeal. If human dignity means nothing more than simply some feelings, what does this imply about the value of life in general? Or more rhetorically; "What is life without dignity?"

I'm not going to give a long analysis of the "ins and outs" that dignity entails, but I will claim that my authority in talking about this specific topic is derived from my humanity itself. Dignity is not something that should be thrown around so haphazardly as it is done in this Pro8 note. I do not expect anyone or anything to prop me up, or to make me "feel good", but I do expect that they leave me in peace and allow me to pursue the humble things that I call meaningful.

Human dignity is not just "feelings". It is a sophisticated and complex aggregate of one's sense of well-being, made of emotions, relations with others, relations with society, and who knows how many other factors. It interacts dynamically with our psychology state, and can be the source of misery if injured, or contentment if nurtured. It serves as the basis that our fundamental rights guarantees, not something that tangentially floats nearby. Human rights may be fundamental, but what is the measure of their worth in our moment to moment experience and thoughts if not in our dignity? Both certainly exist, but rights are external to us, and must therefore stand in relation to something. This thing is dignity.

In all of the acute atrocities that humans have enacted upon one another in our history, the first and most important target of the offending party is the dignity of his victim. This thing must be robbed of the victim so that they can truly be defeated, and defiled. The textbook example of this in history is the plight of the Jews in pre-Holocaust Nazi Germany; The systematic dismemberment of the Jews' humanity was accomplished by removing, step by step, the bricks of their human dignity. In the end declaring them Untermenschen was an inert label for an exhausted, weak, and devastated population of homo sapiens. This spiral was also set into motion because of the perceived damage to German tradition, culture, and society perpetrated by the Jews.

For a more contemporary and relevant example, consider this SBS documentary:

Two questions for the Pro8 reader: (1) Was the dignity of these prisoners denigrated in these pictures? (2) How can humiliation occur without first annihilating one's dignity?

By now any Pro8 person reading this must be livid. I will try and direct their anger by saying that I am not directly implicating their involvement with Prop8 with the Nazis persecution of the Jews, but rather pointing out the value of human dignity. If the guarantee to not violate a person's, or a group of persons', dignity is removed, the most basic consequence of this is their debasement in relation to the one removing that dignity; they can never be equal to you. At worst...you know. There is nothing that justifies placing a whole group of people below you in terms of value, whether this is your goal or whether it follows from a position you take. The Pro8 posters in the FB note may not hate gay people, but their complacency in robbing them of their dignity is alarming. To deny your part in this does not subtract from the de-humanizing effect of your actions.

Abu Ghraib, Kristallnacht, and all the atrocities in history that presuppose a bloody hierarchy between those harmed and their violators share a legacy with Proposition 8 - it is the willingness to let ignorant unfounded knowledge justify stripping a group of human beings of their dignity. Contrary to the platitudes of the Pro8 crowd, human dignity is not just "feelings". This is a real consequence - is it acceptable?

I hereby submit that the consequences of supporting Proposition 8 are too devastating to allow to remain in law.

IIb. Marriage

What about marriage itself? Through all of this trollop, surely the prospect of getting married amounts to something more than just "feelings". No, it doesn't, according the the definition of marriage given in the note:

"Prop 8 protects marriage as an essential institution of society. Marriage is an institution which pre-exists both church and government, and is the foundation of all known civilizations and societies. History shows us that marriage is an essential institution in preserving social stability and perpetuating life itself – which is why the state has a compelling interest in preserving and protecting it. Central to the state’s interest in marriage is the procreation and rearing of children. Marriage advances the state’s interest in ensuring the birth and rearing of children in the setting most likely to ensure their well-being and protection, and providing the next generation the training and attributes necessary to sustain a civilized society. Hence, married couples in almost every culture have been granted special privileges and have been held to important obligations, by force of law, all aimed at sustaining their relationship and promoting the environment in which children are reared."

So according to the Pro8 position in this note, marriage is nothing more than a mechanism of society for creating babies. PERIOD. NOTHING MORE. Marriage is hence important to the state only insofar as it fulfills this function. This is radically different from the vision of gay marriage shared by proponents of gay marriage, apparently:

"Advocates of gay marriage tend to see marriage as a ceremony between individuals, primarily to ratify their affections. Contrary to what gay activists assume, the state does not endorse marriage because people have feelings for one another. The state endorses marriage primarily because of what marriage does for children and in turn for society. Society gets no benefit from redefining marriage to include homosexual relationships -- only harm."

Just a quick note, the remark that homosexual marriages cannot produce children is squarely false. As far as creating children goes, these people are not sterile! Gay women can accept artificially implanted sperm or zygotes and raise them quite effectively. Gay men on the other hand are perfectly capable of fertilizing an egg if they find a donor, and a willing surrogate to carry the child to term (think about Phoebe from the show Friends hosting her brother's and wife's fetus - there's no difference). As far as rearing children, these options are expanded to include adoption (ill-informed claims of the quality of this rearing will be dealt with in the next post).

Anyone that subscribes to this definition of marriage is a cold, cynical individual. If this is the basis of their marriage, then they should not be married. I'm not sure there is much more to say to this.

For other people, marriage has significant personal meaning attached to it (duh). Wedlock is not only a contract between two people and a baby-factory for the state, it is the recognition of a bond between two people by the most powerful and universal of human institutes, i.e. Religion and/or the government. To deny a couple from marrying is to deny it the highest external recognition. Within the external eyes of society, marriage then becomes a means of denigration for those whose relationships have been confirmed by their society, and in this way opens up yet another moral avenue of hierarchical differentiation.
...

Keeping the content of this post in mind, I think my actual comments to the Pro8 crowd may have a different effect now:

"I think it's easy to support Prop8 when its content deals with something completely external to your life...If enacted, this law will not affect in any concrete way the lives of its supporters. As for the peace of mind you get knowing that whatever sanctity you subjectively place in "marriage" is safe from "decay", I'd say the lengths your motivations have to stretch reality to make this appear true are the issue here, but no one is going to seriously question their own motivations here, unfortunately.
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There is a lot of clammer about this proposition supporting "morality" "sustainable way of life" etc. but the more you deny that you re dealing with REAL people, the more dehumanizing the effect of YOUR rhetoric has on this debate. Trying to make this an issue of morality etc shows a willful blindness in acknowledging that this law could have CONCRETE consequences for REAL people. This is where the hate develops from; it's surely not from the intention to discriminate, but from the unwillingness to acknowledge other peoples' stake in this.
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Where is the human element here? Well, not in the motivation for Prop8; the relevant values and world views it supports are FAR from universally supported; there are many others who are arguably just as good or better. What arrogance motivates one to tell me what constitutes a sustainable society on this level?...Though the intention may be good, its effect is intolerant because the force of its authority comes from something where NO ONE can claim any authority over one other."

"[I]f you don't deny that [intolerance] can subtly develop even in the absence of intention on one's part, then you can't deny that support for P8 -could- be like this; it's like making a drug to cure AIDS that also happens to cause terminal cancer - the intention is good, but has unintentional consequences that necessarily follow. Again, this is very different from idiots throwing bottles on the street."

"I've said several times now that the perceived hate or intolerance seen BY SOME in supporting P8 can have a subtle origin, and may have nothing to do with your intent at all. Human behavior is so complex that we would be fools to claim we could see all the consequences they can have. In fact, if intolerance were an unintended consequence of your position here, then it might [MIGHT(!)] actually be beyond your control to expunge from your position, regardless of your feelings toward gays. This isn't a knockout argument against P8, but in fact it creates a point of dialogue; both sides are talking past each other, and this is a plausible way to progress in the conversation. There is still the question of e.g. whether this unintended consequence is actually -intolerance- but maybe that's just the next step."

A Critical Reaction to a Recent Proposition 8 Discussion, pt. 1

2008-11-21T13:42:00.009+01:00

I was recently home in the USA for a spell and came across a note on Facebook posted by a friend from middle school, which was called "20 Ar[gu]ments for Prop 8". I read through the document and was not shocked at its content, despite being opposed to it, but I was deeply shocked at the utter decrepitude of the statements it offered as "argument". It may be a truism that we humans are not especially critical of anything that corroborates a deeply-held belief or set of beliefs, but the substantial lack of any critical attention of the writer while compiling these statements towards, say, relevance, structure, validity, clarity, or support for his "arguments" should be appalling to any reader, regardless of their position on this issue.

After responding with a polemic gut reflex to the note (I was the first to respond), a long and impassioned debate quickly developed on the matter, which I continued to follow with interest. Though sometimes it failed to progress into much more than a roll call of the yes/no camps of the debate, there were some elements that I thought might be of especial interest, and deserving of comment. I will devote one post for each of these elements, and will include: (I) the integrity of the 20 arguments given in the note, (II) the role of intolerance in this debate, with special attention given to the comments of the note and (III) the biological/scientific arguments offered later in the comments. This does no justice to the amount of dross in the note; however, a comprehensive analysis of the all the notes faults would probably turn into a dissertation.

Note to my European friends: I found that the discussion in the note serves as an exemplar for understanding social debates in the United States. I'd like to hear your thoughts on this.

(I) The Abysmal Lack of Substance in the Original 20 Arguments: As though this needs pointing out, the actual argumentation here is minimal. Most of these "arguments" are free-floating statements, rather than arguments, e.g: "Legalizing gay marriage severs children from their right to know and be raised by their biological parents. Children have the right, insofar as society can make it possible, to know and to be cared for by the two parents who gave them life, known as the 'child’s bonding right.'" or: "Promiscuity in marriage will become more generally accepted [as a result of gay marriage]" as well as questionable conditionals: "If gay marriage becomes the law of the land state authorities will be required to treat opposition to gay marriage as 'invidious discrimination,' 'irrational,' or 'motivated by hate.'" But alright, let's not be too caviling; this is a political position being pushed, whose goal is to convince rather than investigate.

Nonetheless, the "arguments" here fall into at least two general categories of weakness in terms of their strength relating to; (A) the evidence supporting the claims, and (B) the role of subjective standards behind the argumentation.

(IIA.) Claims that cite 'empirical' evidence supporting the claims. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there was no mention of sources for any of these evidence claims. [edit: I thnk there was one or teo, but these were links to rhetorical soundbites] Since most of these claims were social or sociological in form or scope, there are already going to many things that will be difficult to substantiate at all, let alone conclusively. Indeed even here there is a sub-categorical distinction of claims that cite [overwhelming, etc] evidential support, but (a) make no mention of what this research might be, or why it is so compelling, ex: "Research shows that marriage is weakest, in nations where support for gay marriage is strongest", or (b) offer only lip-service evidence that happily push the intuition behind the sentence, but say nothing of its relevance or accuracy to the point. Here I'll analyze two examples from the post.

1.) With respect to the "Protecting Marriage" argument it is claimed:

"There already are disturbing social impacts where gay marriage has been legalized. The experience of European countries that have legalized gay marriage demonstrates that any dilution of the traditional definition of marriage erodes the already weakened stability of marriage, family and children. Research shows that marriage is weakest, in nations where support for gay marriage is strongest, and that there is a direct connection between gay marriage and illegitimacy. As scholar Stanley Kurtz concluded, 'If gay marriage were imposed here by a socially liberal cultural elite, it would likely speed us on the way toward the classic [European] pattern of less frequent marriage, more frequent out-of-wedlock birth, and skyrocketing family dissolution. In the American context, this would be a disaster.' (The Weekly Standard 9, No. 20 (February 2, 2004): 26-33.)" [emphasis added, CS]

Besides the intriguingly explicit dislike (here and elsewhere in the document) of European society, the weakness of this claim is poignant. First of all, what is the standard of "weakness" or "strength" of a marriage? A complete measure will surely be elusive, but what kind of statistical data could possibly be offered to represent something like this? The second point, not unrelated, speaks to the actual data in the US and the EU. I took the liberty of selecting a few possible criteria by which to compare marriage in American society with marriage in European society and doing a quick search at reputable sources on their distribution; rate of illegitimate children (also mentioned in the quote, as I understood it), divorce rate, and the rate of domestic violence. The data may be surprising to some, as it not only places the US firmly within the range of statistics found in other EU countries (and that's putting it politely), but also squarely contradicts the significance of the criteria as a measure of homosexuality's effect on the respective societies.

i. Illegitimate Birth Rate

source: "Live births by legitimacy status, and percent illegitimate: 1990 - 1998" - United Nations; further statistics: UN Statistics, Natality
note: I know these stats are a little dated, but finding a template with such comprehensive data was difficult, and I do have a life after all :) I may look for more if people make a big deal out of it.
Some of the data:

United States (No [Universal] Gay Marriage)
1991 ............................29.5
1993 ............................31.0
1994 ............................32.6
1995 ............................32.2

Germany (No Gay Marriage, but Civil Unions)
1991 ............................15.1
1992 ............................14.9
1993 ............................14.8
1994 ............................15.4
1995 ............................16.1
1996 ............................17.0
1997 ............................18.0

France (No Gay Marriage, but Civil Union)
1991 ............................31.8
1992 ............................33.2
1993 ............................34.9
1994 ............................36.1
1995 ............................37.6
1996 ............................38.9

Netherlands (Gay Marriage)
1990 ............................11.4
1991 ............................12.0
1992 ............................12.4
1993 ............................13.1
1994 ............................14.3
1995 ............................15.5
1996 ............................17.0

Sweden (Gay Marriage)
1990 ............................47.0
1991 ............................48.2
1992 ............................49.5
1993 ............................50.4
1994 ............................51.6
1996 ............................53.9
1997 ............................54.1

Spain (Gay Marriage)
1991 ............................10.0
1992 ............................10.5
1993 ............................10.8
1994 ............................10.8
1995 ............................11.1
1996 ............................11.7
1997 ............................13.1

United Kingdom (No Gay Marriage, but Civil Unions)
1990 ...........................27.9
1991 ...........................29.8
1992 ...........................30.8
1993 ...........................31.8
1994 ...........................32.0
1995 ...........................33.6
1996 ...........................35.5
1997 ...........................36.7

Ireland (No Gay Marriage)
1990 ..........................14.6
1992 ..........................18.0
1993 ..........................19.9
1994 ..........................20.8
1995 ..........................22.3
1996 ..........................24.8
1997 ..........................26.6

China - Hong Kong SAR (No Gay Marriage)
1990 .........................5.0
1991 .........................5.2
1992 .........................5.2
1993 .........................5.3
1994 .........................5.4
1995 .........................5.4
1996 .........................5.5
1997 .........................5.6

Estonia (No Gay Marriage)
1990 ........................27.1
1991 ........................31.1
1992 ........................34.0
1993 ........................38.2
1994 ........................40.9
1995 ........................44.1
1996 ........................48.1
1997 ........................51.6

I think it is clear from this data that there is no significant relation between a country's stance on gay marriage and its rate of illegitimate births. In all honesty, why would one expect there to be?

ii. Divorce Rate

Sources:
US stats; National Average - CDC National Center for Health Statistics* (2005(?))
State by State - CDC National Center for Health Statistics (2005) [Different Link!]
*note: I found numbers ranging from 2.9 up to 5.6 for the national average, and decided to stay with this number because it's on the lower range (hence more conservative), and I take the CDC to be a reliable first approximation.

World Stats: - UN Statistics "Divorces and crude divorce rates by urban/rural residence: 2000 - 2004"

US
Nationwide divorce rate: 3.6 per 1000
This number is obviously a gloss, given the size of the country, the size of the population, and the diversity of culture within the landmass, so here are some 'typical' "blue" and "red" states:

(All rates per 1000 People)
Alabama
1999........................................5.7
2000........................................5.5
2001........................................5.4
2002........................................5.4
2003........................................5.2
2004........................................4.9

Alaska
1999........................................5.0
2000........................................3.9
2001........................................4.3
2002........................................4.6
2003........................................3.9
2004........................................4.3

California - No Data; wtf?

Kansas
1999........................................3.4
2000........................................3.6
2001........................................3.4
2002........................................3.6
2003........................................3.3
2004........................................3.3

Massachusetts
1999........................................2.5
2000........................................2.5
2001........................................2.4
2002........................................2.5
2003........................................2.5
2004........................................2.2

Nevada (!!)
1999........................................7.8
2000........................................9.9
2001........................................6.3
2002........................................7.1
2003........................................7.3
2004........................................6.4
[LOL]

New York
1999........................................3.3
2000........................................3.0
2001........................................3.5
2002........................................3.4
2003........................................3.2
2004........................................3.0

Ohio
1999........................................3.9
2000........................................4.2
2001........................................4.0
2002........................................4.0
2003........................................3.7
2004........................................3.6

Texas
1999........................................3.8
2000........................................4.0
2001........................................4.0
2002........................................3.9
2003........................................3.8
2004........................................3.6

Vermont
1999........................................4.4
2000........................................4.1
2001........................................4.3
2002........................................4.2
2003........................................4.0
2004........................................3.9

[For the rest refer to the source link]

Europe
All numbers refer to national averages
(Check source for sample sizes etc)

Estonia (No Gay Marriage)
2000........................................3.09
2001........................................3.16
2002........................................3.00
2003........................................2.94
2004........................................???

France (Civil Unions)
2000........................................1.93
2001........................................1.990
2002........................................1.94
2003........................................2.09
2004........................................???

Germany (Civil Unions)
2000........................................2.37
2001........................................2.40
2002........................................2.48
2003........................................2.59
2004........................................2.59

Ireland (No Gay Marriage)
2000........................................0.69
2001........................................0.74
2002........................................0.66
2003........................................0.74
2004........................................0.83

Netherlands (Gay Marriage)
2000........................................2.18
2001........................................2.31
2002........................................2.05
2003........................................1.94
2004........................................1.91

Spain (Gay Marriage)
2000........................................0.97
2001........................................0.70
2002........................................0.73
2003........................................0.75
2004........................................???

Sweden (Gay Marriage)
2000........................................2.42
2001........................................2.36
2002........................................2.39
2003........................................2.36
2004........................................2.24

United Kingdom (Civil Union)
2000........................................2.62
2001........................................2.65
2002........................................2.71
2003........................................2.80
2004........................................???

[Refer to source for more]

Like the rate of illegitimate children, this data shows no significant relationship between the nation's stance on gay marriage and divorce rate. Actually, (1) Other than Russia, Moldova, and Ukraine, the United States exhibits a higher rate of divorce than any European country! (2) More generally, any explanation for this trend will undoubtedly be heavily influenced by local culture and history. The intuitive link (if there ever was one) between supporting gay marriage and this criterion of the quality of marriage is thereby drowned out completely by other criteria that have nothing to do with gay marriage, for example the nation's dominant religion. Ireland and Spain, for example, are Catholic countries (divorce is illegal/strongly frowned upon in Catholicism), and despite having differing stances on gay marriage (one yes, the other no), they have similar divorce rates. HOW SURPRISING.

iii. Domestic Violence

note: This nature of this topic makes it extremely difficult to offer any clear assessments in the form of round figures. Even trying to understand what domestic violence is introduces daunting problems for any measure of its occurrence, in any society. First of all, how should one define it? The many forms that domestic violence can take, ranging from the more obvious, like physical assault and rape, to the more subtle, like psychological intimidation, stalking, and controlling behavior, make it very difficult to conceptualize the phenomenon in order to measure it. Each source has a section that comments on the approach they took in defining the explanandum. Other problems in data collection itself also threaten the accuracy of any statistics regarding domestic violence. I found an obscene amount of figures and studies, all of which were different in scope, experiment design, goals, and analysis. For this reason I will relay the reader to many different sources so that they can organize the numbers and parameters yourself.

More generally, this point forces once again the question: if this criterion is indicative of the strength/weakness of marriages in a country, how the heck could one possibly isolate the factors affected by the legal status of gay marriage? Let alone present this clearly in a study?

% of women who have experienced domestic violence (minor to severe):
[Several figures given when possible]

US (No [Universal] Gay Marriage)
22% (WHO) [very dated; 1995-6]
25.5% (Joint Survey by NIJ, NCIPC, and CDC) [also dated - 1996]

Canada (Gay Marriage)
29% (WHO) (1995-6)
Another Source: "Family Violence in Canada: A Statistical Profile"

France (Civil Unions)
[Couldn't find anything concrete - figures ranged from 20-35%]
One interesting source (UN)

Germany (Civil Unions)
No reliable [national] information

Ireland (No Gay Marriage)
29% (National Crime Council Report; 2005)

Netherlands (Gay Marriage)
21% (WHO) (1986(!!))
25% (Dutch Ministry of Justice Report) (1997)

United Kingdom (Civil Unions)
30% (WHO) (1993(!!))

Like I said above, these figures are not transparent to interpretation. Nonetheless, I think it is clear that here the anti-gay marriage supporter will find no support in establishing their link between gay marriage and the quality of family life. The gross numbers that I cited are all very similar to one another, and to suggest any relationship between homosexuality and the prevalence of domestic abuse challenges the flexibility of our credulity. The author of the "20 Arguments" and its supporters in this note are obviously grasping for anything in order to make a political point, and the integrity of their claims suffer decisively for this lack of epistemic standards.

2.) With respect to the "Sustaining the Population" argument it is tersely claimed:

"To sustain the population we need a birth rate of 2.1 children per woman. Countries that have legalized gay marriage have some of the lowest fertility rates in the world. The Netherlands, Sweden and Canada all have birthrates around 1.6 children per woman, and are losing population."

I briefly commented on this argument early in the discussion, saying:

"First, those countries that have legalized gay marriage (Netherlands, Sweden, Canada are mentioned) or are considering it belong to a more general group - called the industrialized world; low fertility rates are found in all these countries. The places that most vehemently deny any concessions to gays DO in fact have very high fertility rates - and they happen to mostly be in third world/developing countries (Mid East, India, China, Africa). Is our respective stance on gay marriage relevant to this? Why/not?
Second, fertility rate is one way of conveying information on population growth. Another is to look at the trends themselves. Canada and the Netherlands both actually have -positive- growth in population (look at the CIA fact book, maybe also WHO records(?)). But Germany, who does NOT have legalized gay marriage has negative population growth."

I still agree with this statement, so I'll only flush out some points a bit further.

First, have a look at the world fertility rates by country from highest to lowest, compiled in the CIA Fact Book. The quote above is correct in saying that the Netherlands, Sweden, and Canada all have low birth rates. So does the entire industrialized world (except Israel and South Africa). The highest industrialized nation on the list as far as I see is Israel at #84 (2.77), followed by South Africa at #108 (2.43). The highest Western industrialized country is the USA at #124 (2.1), followed by France at #133 (1.98).

Insofar as supporters of Prop8 want to demonstrate the significance of this trend for their position, they are obliged to offer an explanation for its ubiquity in ALL industrialized countries despite the different positions regarding gay marriage. Like e.g., the divorce rate of a country cited above, this trend has many other more intuitive and actual causes than the legality of gay marriage (say, liberation of women, etc). I take this as trivial, and will not go into it further.

Second, of the demonized countries named above (Netherlands, Sweden, and Canada) all exhibit positive population growth (+0.46%, +0.147%, and +0.83%, respectively)! Germany, on other other hand, has negative growth rate (-0.044%); what shall we make of this, if we took the Prop8 argument seriously? That Germany is suffering for the Netherlands? That countries with legalized gay marriage are some kind of disease vectors that are immune to the effects of the pathogen, but can easily transmit it to unassuming victims? This. Is. Ridiculous.

I should emphasize, however that population sustainability is an critical issue in the industrialized world, but for different very reasons than the Prop8 platform entertains. The sooner we realize this, the more efficiently we can analyze real, tractable means of dealing with it.

..............
CONCLUSION
With respect to the original 20 "arguments" in support of Prop8, these two examples are symptomatic of the gossamer-thin support they claim to be so "overwhelming". They display an acute allergy to respectable standards of [empirical] research, the manner of displaying and interpreting information, and constructing relevant (or even significant) factors of influence for the phenomena they cite. My creative interpretation in including divorce rates and domestic violence as relevant factors for measuring strength of marriage magnifies this point further. As I will further argue in other upcoming blog posts, this pattern repeats itself in the comments of the people involved in the subsequent discussion. The more "local" (especial "biological") arguments that were offered are deserving of a post for themselves (here, most of the empirical arguments are of social scope) For now, let's further consider the other kind of "arguments" that the original note offers.

(IIB.) Claims that draw their motivation from subjective or implicit standards of evaluation.
By far the most passionately defended class of claims in the "20 Arguments" are those that either (a) are offered as lawlike axioms who carry their normative force in their utterance, or (b) lack internal and/or external logical consistency. Such claims include, for example:

"The civil rights [aspect of this] issue actually runs in favor of the 96% of the population who are not gay. Implementing gay marriage will trample upon their civil rights"...."Churches will also be pressured to compromise their beliefs or face loss of equal access to a wide array of government benefit programs and licensing regimes"..."Proposition 8 does not interfere with gays living the lifestyle they choose".... "[Prop8 will] protect RELIGIOUS FREEDOM [-] When rights for gay couples are expanded, freedom of religion is threatened as citizens are coerced to act against conscience and belief."...."Gay marriage gives a confusing message, totally marginalizes marriage and family, and fails to prepare children for heterosexual marital relationships – thereby destabilizing the basic unity of society – the family."...."Gay marriage would radically redefine marriage to include virtually any sexual behavior."

this one is particularly funny, deserving its own paragraph:

"[Prop 8 will] protect AMERICA
A defeat for marriage at the polls in California will embolden activists who have always planned to export their radical agenda to all 50 states – and basically install 'European a-morality' (which many believe is “immorality”) throughout the country. A centerpiece of that agenda is taking away the basic rights of those who disagree with them – and those fundamental rights, of free speech, of free exercise of religion, and freedom of assembly, are what differentiate America from every other country. We need to protect American Judeo-Christian morals, and American freedoms – because no other country will."

So....where to start?
Some of the statements here are simply absurd, from a logical standpoint. Others are just plain absurd. Regarding the former, take the claim that "Gay marriage would radically redefine marriage to include virtually any sexual behavior". This is one of the necessary links on the argument's [to protect morality] premises. As I hinted at in one post, this would mean that there is some property of gay marriage that makes it consistent with any sexual behavior; whether this means sex with animals, sex with cars, masturbation, and even "normal" straight sex (though they probably didn't mean this last one, as this would lead to a fullblown contradiction, AND WE DON'T WANT THAT NOW, DO WE?).

What, then, is this property, and what does it do? Ostensibly, this mysterious property of homosexuality identifies an attribute belonging to all things that one can have sex with as sufficient for entering a marriage with that thing. But what property could possibly identify a homosexual with a car, or a [non-human] animal? In lieu of any clarification, this attribution at worse equates homosexuals with [non-human] animals (and/or cars?), or at least deprives them of the status of being agents to whom we not are morally bound. But why think homosexuals are less deserving of moral considerations, and where is the connection to marriage? Most probably, there is some value judgment happening here, whereby a certain inferiority re morality is being attached to being homosexual. No matter what their feelings towards homosexuals are, this is a consequence of their position, as written.

Additionally, this mysterious property implies that all sexual behavior that excludes heterosexual pairing is wrong, but without clarification this leads to a viciously circular begging-the-question fallacy [non-heterosexual sex is wrong because it is non-heterosexual sex]. I won't even go into negative properties (i.e. the property of not being x). More likely, this draws its motivation from some subjective source that resists investigation. This became very clear during the subsequent discussion of the topic, as people began to simply state specific beliefs of theirs. (I will discuss these beliefs in a later post in more depth) For now, however, stating a belief is far removed from demonstrating its normative strength in affirming a principle that should motivate the behavior of others. I, for one, believe that brussel sprouts are disgusting. Should I then derive support for Prop8 from this?

I could go on and on about this. But it is sufficient to say that these subjective standards are unacceptable for an argument where strong passions are at play. Not only are they unclear, but they are not necessarily shared by those in the debate. Hence, they should be clarified as much as possible so that a rational discussion can even happen. Simply assuming their truth and normative precendence, and then implementing them as the primary motivations pushing an "argument" (or 20 of them, for that matter) leaves completely unclear how the conclusions of the argument are supported by the premises. In other words, it is not even an argument at all.

On the other hand, if it really comes down to beliefs or values, then clarification of these things will at least alert us to the fact that discussion is not possible, and, just maybe, help us understand more clearly what is at stake here for all sides. In such cases, democracy must take over. But whichever side democracy chooses, this is far removed from concluding that that side is right. Justification is much more subtle and complex than casting a vote. And the platform of Proposition 8 is FAR from being justified. Perhaps infinitely.