The Connecticut Catholic bishops have issued a dire warning to the faithful that a proposal to lift the statute of limitations for victims of Church abuse to sue would threaten their very religion, putting “all Church institutions, including your parish, at risk,” .
The Bishops warned that the right to sue “would undermine the mission of the Catholic Church in Connecticut, threatening our parishes, our schools, and our Catholic Charities.”
Under current Connecticut law, sexual abuse victims have 30 years past their 18th birthday to sue the Church.
The bill has some novel provisions. For example, anyone older than 48 who makes a sex abuse claim against the church would need to join an existing claim filed by someone 48 or younger. Older claimants would need to show substantial proof that they were abused. That itself raises some questions about the disparate treatment given victims. I have never seen such a provision in legislation.
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Gyges,
I think my idea for quantifying the morality of acts of free will, pretty much reduces the discussion of a choice between good and evil being necessary for free will to a mere semantic point which I am happy to concede. To me the interesting part of the discussion is that the SIGNIFICANCE of acts of free will depends on their having a non-zero moral component. If you would like to continue this discussion in that context I’d be happy to. I took up this argument to explore free will, which you have ably assisted, thank you. As I tried to explain to goneville, the only way to get you to engage in a discussion is to convince you that you want to, so if you want to drop it here, that’s fine by me. Either way, thanks for helping me to illustrate the point, even if goneville wasn’t around to see it.
Gyges,
If you accept my good vs. evil continuum hypothesis (ranking acts on a scale of -1 (ultimate evil) to 1 (perfect good) instead of the binary ranking that you were objecting to), then every act of free will can be ranked on this scale (most acts will cluster around 0 and it would be very interesting to know the statistics on this distribution). Thus it is fair to say that every act of free will has a moral dimension (even if that dimension is zero). Therefore when we talk about the moral ramifications of acts of free will, we may, without loss of generality*, restrict our attention to acts of free will with non-zero morality.
*This may be the first time I’ve ever used this term other than when writing a proof. 😉
Bdaman,
Here’s the sanitized version:
For one, I watched some of the video last night but turned it off due to language. Not that I have virgin ears but had mixed company last night. Secondly, I can factually state that I remember seeing you on National T.V. while watching Duke basketball.
Thats cool Dr. Slarti. I gain more and more respect for you with each passing day 🙂
Slart,
That’s a good reason to limit a discussion, not a definition.
Suppose we’re arguing about photosynthesis. I say “no living thing can photo synthesize.”
You’d point out plants.
If my reply was “I don’t find plants interesting, so I don’t consider them living thing” how would you respond?
The problem is the argument of evil being necessary for free will only works if I accept your definition, so the it’s pretty central to your argument. You need a MUCH better reason to sell it to me.
bdaman,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYOgC2Qbqh4
At 2:10 into the video – the guy between me and the Viking Guy is a dean or something (it’s not my favorite paint job, either…)
can’t find it
Bdaman,
Search Youtube for ‘This is why Duke sucks’ and pay attention during the line ‘Old ass men dressing up like freaks’ – that’s me and my friend ‘The Viking Guy’.
Dr. Slarti there has to be some youtube videos of you on the net.
Bdaman,
By the end of my time at Duke, I was getting more TV airtime than some of the players… During the Michigan State v. Duke game (do you know what it’s like to have 4 – 5,000 people chant ‘He’s a TRAITOR!’ at you? I do.) the ESPN announcers showed a group of MSU fans in the grad section late in the game and one said, ‘The Cameron Crazies have been giving the Michigan State fans a hard time – the shot zoomed in on me and he said, ‘Especially him.’ I did have a very nice Magic Johnson throwback jersey on (and a green and white paint job – not the greatest since my usual head artist wouldn’t paint me for some reason…) instead of my usual #11 (Bobby Hurley – the second one, I don’t wear the first since Bobby signed it). And Cal Ripken Jr. told me that I have a good handshake, so I’ve got that going for me…
Yes you don’t remember. Your head reminds me of mine, all bright and shiny and I swear that i can picture you with your game face on at a Duke basketball game. I know you’ve been on national T.V.