That is correct, god does not decide what is good
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How can morality exist without god?
- Thread starter Polarbear
- Start date
That is correct, god does not decide what is good
Gjallarhorn
N'yog-Sothep
Then once again, this question has no bearing on theism. In both cases, it comes down to the individual.
McBell
Unbound
what is under the individuals control?
your definition is not very clear or concise...
says who?
Since when?
punkdbass
I will be what I will be
I actually created a similar thread like this a while ago, and the solution I found to the question was moral relativism.
Without God, objective morals wouldn't exist. Moral relativism provides a solution that says if John kills little children for fun, and Bob saves lives every single day, that both of these acts are not equally justified, but rather John's act is uniquely justified relative to his beliefs and values, and Bob's act is uniquely justified relative to his beliefs and values.
Thus acts like murder and rape would not be EQUAL to acts like saving a life, and giving charity, but rather would be differently justified and relative to the beliefs and values of the person doing the act. And sense human beings, in our nature, have a need and desire to preserve social order, certain acts are seen as more justifiable(but the majority of society) than others.
Without God, objective morals wouldn't exist. Moral relativism provides a solution that says if John kills little children for fun, and Bob saves lives every single day, that both of these acts are not equally justified, but rather John's act is uniquely justified relative to his beliefs and values, and Bob's act is uniquely justified relative to his beliefs and values.
Thus acts like murder and rape would not be EQUAL to acts like saving a life, and giving charity, but rather would be differently justified and relative to the beliefs and values of the person doing the act. And sense human beings, in our nature, have a need and desire to preserve social order, certain acts are seen as more justifiable(but the majority of society) than others.
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Caladan
Agnostic Pantheist
The fact that you want a universal justice system where everyone are held accountable for their actions doesn't mean there is one.
I would much rather people act right because they have maturity and understanding instead of acting right because of fear in retribution.
Sir Doom
Cooler than most of you
I'm not convinced that objective morality can only stem from god.
In the example you use, the victims of Johns murderous rampage are not likely to follow his example and become murderous rampagers themselves. In fact, they can't as dead babies. In the case of Bob, the victims of his charity (notice the word usage
) are at least capable of agreeing that his acts were moral even though they are not bound by anything to do so. They even have the ability to reciprocate his actions given the right circumstances. The victims of the first action don't have this luxury. This demonstrates that the moral choice of Bob can perpetuate itself, while the moral choice of John cannot. This is regardless of whether or not it actually does perpetuate itself. That suggests to me that there is something fundamentally "better" about John's morals than Bob's.
A bit of a backdoor into objectivity, but its my best shot.
EDIT: I thought of something else. The outside observers who neither committed the act nor were recipients of it. This throws a bit of a monkey into my wrench. I would conjecture that its more likely for an outside observer to agree with Bob's morality over John's, but I don't think that speaks to objectivity at all. I'll have to think about this more.
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Alceste
Vagabond
Can you elaborate on your reasoning? Why would causality require one possible course of action? Evolution - a purely naturalistic mode of causality - has produced millions of distinct species from a single ancestor. Does that not prove that in a naturalistic system, from any given point of departure, there are potentially infinite directions in which life could travel?
Even the simplest living organisms have to choose whether to fight or fly, who to mate with, where to live, what to eat. Their choices determine their future prospects in a very meaningful way - the wrong choice of mate may result in the inability to produce offspring. The wrong choice of when to fight or fly may result in death. The wrong choice of where to live might result in predators carrying off your inadequately sheltered young. Etc.
I think it is the religious who preach predestination, not those of us who subscribe to a naturalistic world view.
Alceste
Vagabond
These sorts of arguments always start from the assumption there actually IS such a thing as "objective morality". There isn't. If there were, we would all share it (you know, because it is OBJECTIVE, not SUBJECTIVE). Moral relativists simply accept and try to accommodate the fact that there are a LOT of different opinions on what is or isn't moral. I'd never chop off part of an infant's penis, for example, because I view it as wrong to cause unnecessary pain to helpless infants.
You have your opinion, I have mine. Part of your opinion rests on the assumption that your personal opinion is actually God's opinion, not yours. I don't see the point of that. Lots of other people also believe their personal opinions are actually God's opinion, and they're not the same as yours. What's to be gained by such a pointless projection?
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Me Myself
Back to my username
This means that even with God you have the same problem.
Morality is not objective.
Thanks for your responses everyone!
Agreed, however I do not believe in an omnipotent or omniscient god.
I agree that humans care about what is right and wrong, it's in our nature. We are just a small piece of the universe, yet we are incredibly distinct from the rest of it. Even animals whom are living , concious beings are very different from us. A fact that is very strange unless we were created by god. I mean how could an amoral, unintelligent and unempathic universe? Create beings that are moral, thinking and empathic? What is it that makes us so different from everything else? Is is almost like we have a soul, a spark from a transcendental being isn't it?
Anyway, your argument doesn't account for objective morality. What you are saying is that humans feel that something is moral, but if all that exists is the natural world then that feeling is just a chemical reaction not a moral compass.
Sorry, english is not my native language maybe I should have said accountability or liability instead. Those terms imply some moral blameworthiness. Again your model only explains how the sosial order is maintained, it has nothing to do with guilt, neither do i understand how you establish that a subjects mind-body not "screwing up" is good/beneficial? Doesn't that imply that there is something objectivly good?
Maybe I should clearify my definition of morality, by morality I mean what is right and wrong. Perhaps these links will help you out: Morality | Define Morality at Dictionary.com (definition 4) and Morality | Define Morality at Dictionary.com (definition 11)
You are correct, it does say something about free will, but it doesn't disprove it.
My point isn't that god is neccesary for morality because he decides what is right or wrong, but because naturalism can't account for free will and without god the world can't be anything else than natural.
You are right, I should have spent more time defining my terms right from the start, I should also have put more thought into them before I opened this thread.
True, but I am not talking about a divine justice system in the form of karma or damnation where god punishes ous for out actions, but a system of establish good and bad actions and our liability for them.
I should have brought up my view of causality earlier, anyway there are two types of causality: event-event causality and agent causality. Both forms of causality asserts a relationship between the first event (the cause) and the second event (the effect). In both cases the effect is entirely determined by the nature of it's cause. (The event that lead to the effect)
Now let us look at event-event causality specifically. Say that the big bang is the first cause, that would mean that every subsequent event was decided by the big bang as the event following it (the effect) would be the cause of the next event, and that event the cause of the next event and so on, implying that once the nature of the first cause has been determined there is only on possible sequence of events. You know like with falling domino bricks.
In my view everything in determined by event-event causality, except human actions. They are determined by agent causality, which means that an agent (in this case a human being) is the cause of their own actions and that this cause is not entirely determined by external causes. In a sense you are the first cause of your actions. I am sorry if this was bad and confusing explanation, but then again this is a complicated topic, maybe these links will make things clearer:
Causality - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Daniel Dennett | Ayn Rand, Objectivism, and Individualism | The Atlas Society
A single ancestor turning into multiple species does not prove that there are/were potentially infinite directions the world could take. Because as long as the world is deterministic how many and what species that ancestor would produce was entirely determined by the first cause. The ancestor did not have the ability to choose to produce fewer or more species than it did, neither could it have produced any other species than it did.
Agreed, however I do not believe in an omnipotent or omniscient god.
I agree that humans care about what is right and wrong, it's in our nature. We are just a small piece of the universe, yet we are incredibly distinct from the rest of it. Even animals whom are living , concious beings are very different from us. A fact that is very strange unless we were created by god. I mean how could an amoral, unintelligent and unempathic universe? Create beings that are moral, thinking and empathic? What is it that makes us so different from everything else? Is is almost like we have a soul, a spark from a transcendental being isn't it?
Anyway, your argument doesn't account for objective morality. What you are saying is that humans feel that something is moral, but if all that exists is the natural world then that feeling is just a chemical reaction not a moral compass.
Sorry, english is not my native language maybe I should have said accountability or liability instead. Those terms imply some moral blameworthiness. Again your model only explains how the sosial order is maintained, it has nothing to do with guilt, neither do i understand how you establish that a subjects mind-body not "screwing up" is good/beneficial? Doesn't that imply that there is something objectivly good?
About objective right and wrong, no, nothing is 100% objective technically speaking (I can back it up with oxford dictionary
That is not going to get objective any time soon.
Maybe I should clearify my definition of morality, by morality I mean what is right and wrong. Perhaps these links will help you out: Morality | Define Morality at Dictionary.com (definition 4) and Morality | Define Morality at Dictionary.com (definition 11)
You are correct, it does say something about free will, but it doesn't disprove it.
My point isn't that god is neccesary for morality because he decides what is right or wrong, but because naturalism can't account for free will and without god the world can't be anything else than natural.
You are right, I should have spent more time defining my terms right from the start, I should also have put more thought into them before I opened this thread.
True, but I am not talking about a divine justice system in the form of karma or damnation where god punishes ous for out actions, but a system of establish good and bad actions and our liability for them.
I should have brought up my view of causality earlier, anyway there are two types of causality: event-event causality and agent causality. Both forms of causality asserts a relationship between the first event (the cause) and the second event (the effect). In both cases the effect is entirely determined by the nature of it's cause. (The event that lead to the effect)
Now let us look at event-event causality specifically. Say that the big bang is the first cause, that would mean that every subsequent event was decided by the big bang as the event following it (the effect) would be the cause of the next event, and that event the cause of the next event and so on, implying that once the nature of the first cause has been determined there is only on possible sequence of events. You know like with falling domino bricks.
In my view everything in determined by event-event causality, except human actions. They are determined by agent causality, which means that an agent (in this case a human being) is the cause of their own actions and that this cause is not entirely determined by external causes. In a sense you are the first cause of your actions. I am sorry if this was bad and confusing explanation, but then again this is a complicated topic, maybe these links will make things clearer:
Causality - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Daniel Dennett | Ayn Rand, Objectivism, and Individualism | The Atlas Society
A single ancestor turning into multiple species does not prove that there are/were potentially infinite directions the world could take. Because as long as the world is deterministic how many and what species that ancestor would produce was entirely determined by the first cause. The ancestor did not have the ability to choose to produce fewer or more species than it did, neither could it have produced any other species than it did.
punkdbass
I will be what I will be
I'm not convinced that objective morality can only stem from god.
In the example you use, the victims of Johns murderous rampage are not likely to follow his example and become murderous rampagers themselves. In fact, they can't as dead babies. In the case of Bob, the victims of his charity (notice the word usage
This demonstrates that the moral choice of Bob can perpetuate itself, while the moral choice of John cannot. This is regardless of whether or not it actually does perpetuate itself. That suggests to me that there is something fundamentally "better" about John's morals than Bob's.
A bit of a backdoor into objectivity, but its my best shot.
EDIT: I thought of something else. The outside observers who neither committed the act nor were recipients of it. This throws a bit of a monkey into my wrench. I would conjecture that its more likely for an outside observer to agree with Bob's morality over John's, but I don't think that speaks to objectivity at all. I'll have to think about this more.
I like your thinking but honestly I dont think your logic supports the existence of objective moral values. Sure, the victims of John's act can't "perpetuate" the act, while the victims of Bob's can. This is a difference, I agree, but to say that the difference makes Bob's actions better is a subjective assertion.
Alceste said:
This isnt even true. People who claim that objective morality exists, dont have to claim that we would all share it. Surely you agree that truth exists? That in theory objective truth exists a.k.a reality, but that there may be an unbridgeable gap between our ability to know(with 100% certainty) things about reality(objective truth), and rather we are only left with approximations and idealizations. People can assert the existence of objective truth(reality), and not have to claim that we must all share the same exact knowledge of it...
And stop putting words in my mouth, where in my post did I defend the idea of objective morality?
Thanks for the stab at circumcision as well. Pretty much everyone gets circumcised in America get over it.
FlyingTeaPot
Irrational Rationalist. Educated Fool.
How do YOU account for your morals? If morals are god given, how come they change all the time?
Personally, I think evolution is a very good source for morality.
1) What is right and wrong can be established through reason. For example pain is bad and pleasure is good.
2) I don't think morals are god given, but they can't exist without free will. Something god gave us.
3) Morals don't change, they are constant
What do you mean by evolution, the scientific theory or the process of natural selection? How is either a source for morality?
tumbleweed41
Resident Liberal Hippie
From a previous thread of mine.
Ethics and morals are, on the greater scale, simply societal norms. What is believed to be for the greater good of a society, is ethical and moral. The reason there is a version of the Golden Rule in nearly every culture in history is that humans do not want harm to come to themselves, therefore they restrain from doing harm to others within their society.
As our world has become more socially interconnected, ethical norms have crossed the boundaries of distance and have become somewhat homogenized. (Although cultural differences in morality and ethics still linger.)
Like all human efforts, ethics and morality must constantly change and evolve to fit current societal evolution. To rigidly and dogmatically adhere to a set of ethical standards over 4000 years out of date is as foolhardy as insisting that one must use an ox-driven cart for the transport of goods in the age of trains and semi-trucks.
There is no need for a hope of paradise, or a fear of eternal punishment in the enforcement of morality.
There is only a need for the hope of mankinds continued and successful existence as a whole.
http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/general-religious-debates/128848-morality-without-god.html
Ethics and morals are, on the greater scale, simply societal norms. What is believed to be for the greater good of a society, is ethical and moral. The reason there is a version of the Golden Rule in nearly every culture in history is that humans do not want harm to come to themselves, therefore they restrain from doing harm to others within their society.
As our world has become more socially interconnected, ethical norms have crossed the boundaries of distance and have become somewhat homogenized. (Although cultural differences in morality and ethics still linger.)
Like all human efforts, ethics and morality must constantly change and evolve to fit current societal evolution. To rigidly and dogmatically adhere to a set of ethical standards over 4000 years out of date is as foolhardy as insisting that one must use an ox-driven cart for the transport of goods in the age of trains and semi-trucks.
There is no need for a hope of paradise, or a fear of eternal punishment in the enforcement of morality.
There is only a need for the hope of mankinds continued and successful existence as a whole.
http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/general-religious-debates/128848-morality-without-god.html
Gjallarhorn
N'yog-Sothep
Has nothing to do with gods.
Of course they can, because they do.
How are your slaves doing? Have you killed a gay couple yet?
You might want to check post thirty were I explain what I mean by morality. Your response doesn't account for that at all. You just describe how humans feel about right and wrong and how that preception evolves, not how we determine what is objectivly right or wrong.
No it's not, anyway what does this have to do with my response?
You claim morality can't change, that's how. An absolutely ridiculous contention.
This is false. Many people quite enjoy pain. Also, pain and pleasure are subjective and so we could not set up a moral system. As stated before, we can only set up one for the society we are in. We can set up things on a grand scale based on genocide perhaps, crimes against humanity. But something as vague as pain or pleasure will not work. Taking the ability to choose might be better. That is something that everyone shares; we want the ability to choose. Murder takes away someone's choice. Rape does as well. Other things also, but compared to our current system it is not nearly as complex or illogical.
Free will does not really exist in the way we think it. On a smaller level, the way the world is, events around us, biological interaction in your head, etc, there is really no room for much choice. Time is also a problem, it does not work as we think it does, we do not understand it. Chances are that future events are already happening. Right now, in the future, you are responding to this quote. Right now, in the past, you are staring the thread.
They change from generation to generation, from society to society, from one culture to another. There is nothing constant about morality.
I agree, it terrifies me. Especially when you are standing talking to someone and realize the only reason they are not bashing your skull in for disagreeing is because of a divine being that may not even exist. That is a thin line to walk.