I think it would be a major slight to get with a friend's ex if they aren't entirely over that person. That's a recipe for jealousy. You said "former friend", though, implying contact has been cut, so it shouldn't be a cause for complaint in that case.

But we're talking about serial monogamy and/or casual sex, so no one should be doing that sort of thing on the first place. 

It goes like this:

1. Objective values contradict philosophical naturalism.
2. I (Mackie) am committed to naturalism.
3. Therefore I (Mackie) am justified in not believing in objective values.

Jeremy Taylor wrote:

I must say I'm very much in the camp that sees the divisions between Oriental Orthodoxy (and the Church of the East) and the Eastern Orthodox/Western Church as mostly a matter of terminology and emphasis. But, yes, I would probably prefer Eastern Orthodoxy.

 
It's a good deal more complicated than that, as shown by a recent move against the doctrine of theosis among the Copts, including by the last Pope, and, at the same time many Orthodox are extremely positive about closeness with the Copts, the Copts in the main appear to prefer to move towards Rome.

Greg wrote:

Well, I think that the context 'pro-X' is ambiguous. The naive reading (which culture warriors sometimes tendentiously adopt even though it's clearly wrong) is that someone who is pro-X thinks X is unqualifiedly good and worth promoting all the time. Generally the terms don't mean that. Pro-lifers don't think there is an obligation to increase the population size as much as possible; they also don't think that all lives (like beetle lives, say) have to be protected the way human lives are. Similarly for pro-choicers: they don't think anything that is a choice is good and beyond critique; perhaps some would say that all choices, qua choices, are good, but I doubt many would say even that.

There's no rule for how someone who is pro-X regards X; 'pro-X' will just be a label that identifies people as subscribing to some set of principles and bearing such and such commitments. Once we know what X is, we might be able to generalize a bit about what those principles and commitments are, but the relationship will be culturally relative, since 'pro-X' is a label of convenience.

Yes, you're right.

Greg wrote:

People who are pro-choice are pro-a-certain-kind-of-choice. 'Pro-abortion' is an appropriate label, I think, even for those who regard abortions as a somewhat unfortunate thing; they do favor permitting abortion when there are others who would like to see it eliminated. I don't think 'pro-abortion' is really a pejorative label, though, because I don't think the context 'pro-X' has any consistent set of rules associated with it. In other words, it is not necessarily the case that X is to pro-X as Y is to pro-Y.

 
In theory, no, it isn't a pejorative, and yet, it is, so much so that very few people are willing to apply it to themselves, and they'll get offended if you do so. That ought to be a clue as to the moral status of abortion, eh?

DanielCC wrote:

Does not the term 'Pro-Life' have associations with the idea of the sanctity of Life, that is Life having absolute as opposed to consequentialy relative value? Hence a general ‘Pro-Life’ position tends to imply certain stances in bioethics, warfare and legal theory re capital punishment as well as being anti-abortion.

A fair number of people take that stance, yes. It seems to me to be a deeply mistaken one, because it means they've taken "pro-life" to be a dogma of the faith and then reasoned out its implications, when this is an error.