I think the late Dr Francis Schaeffer had something vital to say to us on this.
Let us pause and watch:
Why has human life been historically seen as valuable in our civilisation, and what happens when the evolutionary materialism-driven secular humanist (aka secularist) view takes over?
Are there good grounds to allow that takeover? [Cf. here on.]
Where, then, is our civilisation headed? [Cf here on in context.]
Ought we to be going there? Or can this be dismissed as a mere case of, I don't like where this is headed; without good reason to reject the trend as based on error? [Consider here on in context.]
Should we not ponder Plato's warning from 360 BC? Namely:
[[The avant garde philosophers, teachers and artists c. 400 BC] say that the greatest and fairest things are the work of nature and of chance, the lesser of art [[ i.e. techne],
which, receiving from nature the greater and primeval creations, moulds
and fashions all those lesser works which are generally termed artificial . . . They say
that fire and water, and earth and air [[i.e the classical "material"
elements of the cosmos], all exist by nature and chance, and none of
them by art, and that as to the bodies which come next in order-earth,
and sun, and moon, and stars-they have been created by means of these
absolutely inanimate existences. The elements are severally moved by
chance and some inherent force according to certain affinities among
them-of hot with cold, or of dry with moist, or of soft with hard, and
according to all the other accidental admixtures of opposites which have
been formed by necessity. After
this fashion and in this manner the whole heaven has been created, and
all that is in the heaven, as well as animals and all plants, and all
the seasons come from these elements, not by the action of mind, as they say, or of any God, or from art, but as I was saying, by nature and chance only . . . .
[[T]hese people would say that the Gods exist not by nature, but by art, and by the laws of states, which are different in different places, according to the agreement of those who make them; and that the honourable is one thing by nature and another thing by law, and that the principles of justice have no existence at all in nature, but that mankind are always disputing about them and altering them; and that the alterations which are made by art and by law have no basis in nature, but are of authority for the moment and at the time at which they are made.- [[Relativism, too, is not new; complete with its radical amorality rooted in a worldview that has no foundational IS that can ground OUGHT. (Cf. here for Locke's views and sources on a very different base for grounding liberty as opposed to license and resulting anarchistic "every man does what is right in his own eyes" chaos leading to tyranny.)] These, my friends, are the sayings of wise men, poets and prose writers, which find a way into the minds of youth. They are told by them that the highest right is might [[ Evolutionary materialism leads to the promotion of amorality], and in this way the young fall into impieties, under the idea that the Gods are not such as the law bids them imagine; and hence arise factions [[Evolutionary materialism-motivated amorality "naturally" leads to continual contentions and power struggles; cf. dramatisation here], these philosophers inviting them to lead a true life according to nature, that is, to live in real dominion over others [[such amoral factions, if they gain power, "naturally" tend towards ruthless tyranny; here, too, Plato hints at the career of Alcibiades], and not in legal subjection to them . . .And, the counsel that Locke sought from "the judicious [Anglican Canon Richard] Hooker" from his Ecclesiastical Polity, when he set out to ground the basis for liberty and justice in community and government, in his famed Second Essay on Civil Government, Ch 2 Sect 5? That is:
. . . if I cannot but wish to receive
good, even as much at every man's hands, as any man can wish unto his
own soul, how should I look to have any part of my desire herein
satisfied, unless myself be careful to satisfy the like desire which is
undoubtedly in other men . . . my desire,
therefore, to be loved of my equals in Nature, as much as possible may
be, imposeth upon me a natural duty of bearing to themward fully the
like affection. From which relation of
equality between ourselves and them that are as ourselves, what several
rules and canons natural reason hath drawn for direction of life no man
is ignorant . . . [[Hooker then continues, citing Aristotle in The Nicomachean Ethics, Bk 8:] as namely, That
because we would take no harm, we must therefore do none; That since we
would not be in any thing extremely dealt with, we must ourselves avoid
all extremity in our dealings; That from all violence and wrong we are
utterly to abstain, with such-like . . . ] [[Eccl. Polity,preface, Bk I, "ch." 8, p.80, cf. here. Emphasis added.]
Let us think. END
