>Glenn's reply:
>>
>>If it implies lust, then it MUST imply moral accountability. And if the
>>maker was morally accountable, then regardless of whether he personally
>>had a religion or not, he needed one.
>
>The appropriate definition of lust, I believe, from Webster's ninth
>collegiate dictionary is "intense or unbridled sexual desire." Based on
>that definition my neighbor's Malamute Husky can experience lust, but I
>don't believe he (the dog, not his owner) is morally accountable. I
>certainly agree that art is an indication of the level of mental activity
>that we might expect of morally accountable beings, but I think you need
>more than art to establish it. Perhaps a legal code...
Considering that writing is a function of urbanized societies ( see Colin
Renfrew, Archaeology & Language_ Cambridge Univ. Press 1987, p. 20) it is
highly unlikely that we will ever know whether or not they had a legal
code. Most "primitive" societies do have legal codes of one sort or
another even if they do not have a written language.
I agree that I can not prove that the making of a statue of a naked lady
means lust is afoot or that moral accountability accrues to the artist.
But if these statues were found in ancient Egypt or in my son's bedroom, I
would have no question as to the moral accountability of the artist. Why
do we hesitate to ascribe similar moral accountability to the person who
made the first statue we know of? I would suggest that we hesitate only
because of the age of the statue not because of the act itself.
glenn
Foundation,Fall and Flood
http://members.gnn.com/GRMorton/dmd.htm