Following this guideline, there are no such thing as morals, as we are each free to interpret them in any way we see fit.

I couldn't have said it better myself. However, I would have placed exactly the opposite meaning on it that you did! (You meant it as a demonstration of just how preposterous such a situation would be; I would mean it as an example of demonstrable fact.)

Let's try a few examples of just how grey an area morality can be.

We'll start out nice and easy... am I being immoral by eating sausage and eggs for breakfast? I have a friend of Jewish faith who would think so, and he is a person whose intelligence and education is beyond reproach, and his standards of morality are impeccable by virtually any standards.

Or... do you allow your wife to leave the house with her face uncovered? If so, I can show you a highly intelligent, educated man whose culture and code of behavior dates back thousands of years, who will condemn both you and your wife as being grossly immoral.

Now, let's turn it around. Do you think that man is being immoral by forcing his wife to dress in a manner she might well dislike? Chances are that neither he nor his wife would think so.

But most frightening of all... that same man will believe with an absolute conviction far beyond anything your Judeo-Christian beliefs about killing can provide you with, that not only is it acceptable to bar the doors of a burning dormitory in a girls school preventing the occupants from escaping (because they were not properly dressed) but his beliefs, religious teachings, and sense of morality absolutely demand it!

This is a man just as intelligent and well educated as you are, with just as strong a sense of morality and right and wrong as you have -- and yet his morals are diametrically opposed to yours, and no amount of discourse between you would change either one of your opinions.

Still think that morality is absolute?

tanstaafl.