Religion is not the source of morals or ethics, so I find that reasoning a little flawed.

David Cameron is an anti-progressive wanker who does not care at all about the social costs of the comuing recession as long as he can give the 6% of the richest people in the UK a £1bn tax boost by abolishing inheritance tax.

Moron!

Its a pity that its looking so good for Cameron at this point. Brown is a much better candidate for PM at the moment. Mostly because he has the best understanding and hold over Britain's finances. Why break in a new guy when you've got someone with a lot of experience as Chancellor of the Exchequer(sp?)?

I've also heard half a dozen foreign leaders say how well he understands what's going on and what needs to be done. I haven't heard anyone other leader's grasp of the situation complimented, doesn't that tell you something?

The election in the UK does not have to be until June 2010. Cameron's conservatives have seen a 22 point poll lead evaporate to 3 points... After next weeks tax report from the Chancellor, expect Labour to take the lead and speculation to start again on a spring poll!

I really can't see Labour leading, they're the incumbent government in a large-scale financial crisis. I hope Brown retains control during the worst of it but I can't see it happening.

I also don't see Cameron as PM material. To be fair I haven't seen much of him from Bangkok but he seems kind of obnoxious. Not putting forward realistic plans but pointing out his opposition to government policies in sound-bites.

@TheGameMaster - All laws, rules and philosophies are arbitrary. We do share some common values though from which we attempt to create society. All western democracies are built on a value of liberty and equal rights/opportunity for all. Denying the right of people who are born differently contradicts that basic value. IMO homophobia shouldn't trump the implications of lack of liberty for minorities in a western democracy.

The commitments of marriage combine assets, pledge to spend the rest of life together and basically to sleep with that one person for the rest of your life. Two friends don't make that commitment. Your argument is actually better for the abolishment of all marriage benefits because they might possibly be abused.

You're also still mischaracterizing my argument. Its any married couple should gain the same legal benefits as a married couple. Not any gay couple should gain the benefits of a married couple. Married gay couples should gain the benefits of a married couple. There's still going to be unmarried gays and they'll be proportional to unmarried heterosexuals.

"@ cteno4: Granted I do accept evolution and natural selection as a more-or-less correct understanding of life on this planet, but I have hard time believing that there's mathematical proof of it (I'm not calling you a liar, or anything. I actually find this stuff facinating and would love you to explain it). Also it's not clear whether organisms like bacteria develop immunities through and evolutionary process. Even in TB cases, an individual infection can become immune to it's treatment if the patient stops medicating for even a few weeks. Most evolutionary changes, even on a microscopic level, occur over millennia, not weeks. So it's not really certain whether it was this process that lead to the bacteria's development or a separate chemical alteration within them."

@Tetra. I wouldn't say evolution is so much mathematically proved as it is overwhelmingly empirically proven. There are however mathematical models that help describe evolution though they don't really prove the theory as much as they ride upon it as useful tools when modelling evolution.

Evolution is based on a few premises (not necessarily in this order) which have been empirically proven and natural selection follows as the logical conclusion.
1. There are finite resources and more individuals than can necessarily be supported, thus competition between the individuals.
(True, this is a unanimous theme in nature.)
2. Individuals are not identical (True, genetic variation in the form of mutations, sexual reproduction, and crossover via meiosis)
3. The more well adapted individuals are more likely to acquire the finite resources and reproduce and less likely to die. (Keyword "likely", luck plays into this but this is the general tendency yes?)
4. The characteristics that make these individuals more well adapted are heritable. (True, that mechanism being DNA)

It's not hard to see that it logically follows that genes which express themselves as favourable phenotypes in an individual are naturally selected for success in the gene pool and more and more individuals in the future will likely have this gene.

Regarding microbial evolution, the process that confers immunity is almost (barring a very rare exception?) certainly evolution. The reason it happens relatively fast is that bacteria have extremely short generations and because evolution acts between generations and not during an individual lifespan this means that bacteria evolve much faster than organisms with longer generations. This is why bacteria are by FAR the most populous and most diverse group of organisms on the Earth.

As well, antibiotics, being designed to take out these bacteria represent a very serious change in the bacteria's environment. Since the antibiotics represents the major selecting influence upon the bacteria, any bacteria with even a marginal advantage or resistance to the antibiotics will rapidly be selected for, and this process continues very quickly because evolution runs on a positive feedback loop. If you take the immune bacterial culture outside of the antibiotic, you find that the cost of maintaining resistance to an antibiotic that is no longer present penalizes those bacteria that are unnecessarily immune and the culture reverts to it's previous state of vulnerability to antibiotics.

Evolution only takes place on a longer span of time for organisms with longer periods between generations or during long periods in which the environment remains relatively static.

@ Chrispminis: I had a hunch this was the case, but you definitely clarified it for me. Thanks.

@ TheMasterGamer: I appreciate playing Devil's Advocate as much as anyone, but I can't tell if you're arguing against gay marriage, or against any marriage. Whether it's arbitrary or not, the laws prohibiting minors for marrying, and even to an extent, polygamy, are in place for protection. Prohibiting gay marriage has no protective qualities, it's only one more arm that church dogma has in our legislature.

Also, didn't bother googling the exact quote, I just wrote what I remembered, but I think the first line you quoted was "That the strong might not injure the weak" which sounds eerily similar to what I said.

"I don't think it's ever been a human right to get married to whoever one chooses. What about underage people? Or siblings? I know I'm falling into the old trap of the slippery slope argument but I'm starting to believe that it shouldn't be so readily shot down by us. This truly is a redefinition of an old institution and should be given lots of thought. (I for one support the redefinition since I have no great love for the existence of the institution in the first place, but that is a different matter...) The fact is that gay people and straight people have the exact same rights: they have the right to marry someone of a different sex. I think it's dishonest to say that gays have "fewer" rights than straight people."

Jerkface... that was very thought I've never thought of it like that before. Thanks.

@Tetra0
Prior to modern scientific means, one reason for the state to deny marriage rights to homosexuals would be the lack of the ability to procreate. The state has a very keen interest for a vast number of reasons for controlling/encouraging the growth of its population.

@valoishapsburg
I would argue that all morals and ethics have their foundation in religion, unless they are derived from the only other source, might makes right/survival of the fittest line of reasoning.

Could you tell me which religion then?

I certainly hope the state would not deny marriage to couples that could not reproduce. Reproduction is not always the reason to get married, some people get married and never have kids, some do, and some can't. While the state has an interest in this, I find it absurd that this should be used in creating conditions on who can marry whom.

@valoishapsburg
No specific religion. I am hinting that man did not become moral on his own but through the fear of higher powers.

@valoishapsburg
It may indeed be absurd, or not. I was commenting on the foundations and concepts of marriage, and the state's interests in such.

@ TheMasterGamer: That might have been the 'State's' reasons 500 years ago, but certainly not now. Since, as valoishapsburg pointed out, even couples who cannot reproduce can still get married. Right now the gays are suffering from the baggage of our more Christian fundamentalist past.

@Tetra0
Christian fundamentalist? or just fundamentalist? While I am sure there are some, I cannot think of any orthodox religions off the top of my head that support the concept of gay marriage.

Let me ask, what is the purpose of marriage? Or maybe I should ask, what would you have as the purpose of marriage?

What other religions would you say majorly influenced our founding fathers? I'm pretty sure there weren't too many fundamentalist Muslims or Hindus around in the 13 colonies. So yes, I meant Christian fundamentalist

From a legal standpoint, the purpose of marriage is to obtain the joint financial rights, and other next-of-kin privileges that come with being married. It doesn't really matter (or shouldn't matter to the gov't), what religious reasons there are.

Not all of the Founding fathers were christian, many were deist, but certainly society was influenced by christianity.

The idea of morals comes down to whether you believe a deity gave them to man through some fashion, or if you believe that man created morals because they created more stable societies, etc. Not all cultures have higher powers in the way many of us think about them, so it becomes harder to say that morals are a result of our fear of higher powers. I would say this plays into society later, but the absense of religion does not mean the absence of Morals.

Marriage is a union of people, for various reasons, social, economic, political. Marriage certainly has not always been in the form we understand it, and so the concepts and implications of marriage are fluid when viewed throughout history. From a social stand point, barring class, Marriage is a union of two people to show the presence of the relationship, in which they become a family. (Not to make a family, as 2 married people with no kids are still a family, just a small one) This is often expressed by living in the same residence, having an intimate and sexual relationship, sharing lives together...

Buddhism doesn't have a problem with homosexuality. I don't know if that extends to gay marriages though. From what I understand of Buddhist philosophy there wouldn't be much of a clash as long as the motives aren't sinister.

According to the Bible, homosexuality is a terrible act and such couples should be stoned to death.

it also says you shouldnt eat certain things and also suggest that theres nothing wrong with incest, its a book of fairy tales you can use it as a jusdification for predudice laws now

and @ gobbledydook being stoned does help just not to death :p

The State's interest in marriage: http://marriagelawfoundation.org/mlf/publications/Ave%20Maria%201.pdf

@trim, it depends on which parts of the bible you read when it comes to Incest. The part that mentions homosexuality (only between males if you read it correctly) does have commandments against incest, but in other parts the act is condoned.

@Gobbledygook
You should read the bible a little more carefully. Leviticus states that men having sex with men is an abomination, along with having sex with mentrating women and eating shellfish and pork. However, most christian dismiss those other things by citing Jesus' new covenant with man. Interestingly enough, the part about male homosexuality isnt void under this new covenant, but the majority of the other commandments are. Why do you think that is?

What I'm gathering is:
girl-on-girl=okay
boy-on-boy= forbidden

nowhere in the bible does it mention female homosexuality. At least, not anywhere I've found.

@TheMasterGamer - You mention the states interest in encouraging procreation through marriage, but I don't really see how that changes anything if you allow same-sex marriage. The people interested in entering into same-sex marriages are fairly unlikely to reproduce anyway, and their unions will in no way prevent other people from entering into unions and procreating.

The difference between laws against pedophilia and incest and laws barring same-sex marriage is that both pedophilia and incest have tangible negative effects, while same sex marriage has no easily defined negative effects, and indeed I think could very plausibly be argued would have a number of positive effects, like an increase in the number of stable households and relationships within a community.

Finally, as you yourself have pointed out, recent changes in technology, (and from the start adoption, and children from previous relationships) more or less make that point moot anyway, as same-sex couples can now have and raise children anyway.

Sorry, wrote that kind of out of order, in the final paragraph "that point" is (obviously I hope) referring to procreation as an argument for not allowing same-sex marriage.