Is an atheist worldview compatible with a belief in absolute moral values?

[columbus]

the screaming, clawing scrambles that sometimes happened when a man died, when the prisoners fought like ravenous dogs to gorge themselves on the corpse before the Germans could drag it away.’ (from The Silence of Animals - John Gray)

Eewwwww!
I just called the library to see if my copy of this book is in yet. It's not.
Now I'm not sure I want it.
Tom

 

[Unveiled Artist]

Why is it wrong to interrupt nature's plan?

If I am meant to die at 8pm (say karma dictate) and someone shoots me, they interupted nature's plan. If I tried killing myself, by body will fight against itself. Its not at the set age where I am becoming to weak physically to live. So its unnatural for me to take my life even if I dont have a mental illness. But most docs associate suicide with a form of mental illness.

And what defines a full life if life is impermanent anyways? T

From one transition (birth or death) to the next. Whatever we do affects how we go through trasmission. That, and its not smooth sailing. We are always trying to free ourselves of birth and death so we Can be impermenant in mindfulness not just in body.

Who defines what one has rights to do and what one has no right to do

Oneself and no one else. (You could excuse that children need parents. But CPS usually take children from abuse parents, so children have rights)

This too is at fault of emotions. When one is mentally brought down into the darkest shades of the mind, they are often blinded by their own feelings and cannot see that there is a way out.

Not all the time. Im not suffering from clinical depression but i want to jump out my window and just leave. I talked with my doc he said there is a difference between what we feel and what we will do. Not all feelings are mental depressive symptoms. Others just jump without symptoms. Again, we associate suicide with mental mishaps.

Another thing is, terminal pain patients that request suicide aren't going off their own opinion, doctors and professionals in the medical/health field determine whether or not it is terminal or treatable. Someone cannot just ask for suicide because of a physical pain doctors never looked into.

I never knew that. Scratch my comment. I dont know about it personlly. I just dont agree with assistant suicide regardless if my emotions overide my morals.

 

[icehorse]

This *might* be seen to be slightly off topic, but I think it's in the spirit of the OP:

On the one hand, I could agree that from the perspective of pure philosophy there is no objective morality. That said, from a pragmatic perspective, I think we can derive a set of universal morals that are so close to being objective that any difference would be hair-splitting.

Basically, I think San Harris is *right* when he claims that we can base morality on the "well being of conscious creatures" (WBCC). Virtually every moral question that comes up, does so when we're considering WBCC. It even stretches into those creatures whose consciousness is unclear. Our intuition is to worry more about the well being of our cat, then we do about the well being of the mosquito we're about to slap. In the realm of human interactions, this leads to one of the bedrock conclusions that every human life has equal value. (I will admit that questions of aggregate WBCC can be difficult to sort out.)

This is one reason why I'm such an outspoken advocate for the UN Declaration on Human Rights. It's universal!

As for how this ties to the OP, well strictly speaking atheism isn't the same as humanism or secularism, but they tend to correlate, and WBCC seems to me to be very in keeping with humanism and secularism.

Here's a link to a TED talk by Sam Harris, doing a far, far better job of explaining this than I am:

 

[columbus]

Most people, regardless of their worldview, believe that murder is wrong. However, how do people justify that murder is wrong? Some people may argue that murder is wrong because we feel that it is wrong.

This is a good illustration of why morals are subjective.
Most everyone agrees that murder is wrong. What they don't agree about is what constitutes murder. Killing is pretty easy to define, but murder is not. And murder is nearly always "killing that I personally disapprove". Even when people think that they have a more objective meaning for the word it's usually something like "extralegal" killing. Then the definition becomes dependent on whose laws are in place.
There are, for instance, "law and order" Christians who assert that an elective abortion is murder, despite the fact that there is no scripture on the subject and RvW is the law in the USA. They just feel that it's wrong so they call it murder. Similarly, ISIS has tied gay men's hands behind their backs and thrown them headfirst off buildings. They seem to be the law there and it's in accord with the OT, but lots of people still call it murder.
There just isn't an objective definition for murder.
The best we can do is to figure out what works best for everyone and try to do that. That is a messy and subjective method and goal, but it's the best we've got.
Tom

 

[Valjean]

Why is it wrong to interrupt nature's plan?

Also how can natural beings interrupt nature plan?

"Plan" might be a bit misleading, as it implies intentionality, but the smooth functioning of natural systems gets interrupted all the time. Epidemics of natural germs wipe out whole populations, as do natural invasive species.

Humans are in a whole different category, though. We may have started out as a "natural species," but we don't play by the rules. We came up with schemes to evade Nature's checks and balances and multiply unchecked, with devastating and global effects on every natural system.
We're a planetary infection poised to kill its host. Our cleverness and industry have the Earth on the verge of a 6th mass extinction.

 

[Crypto2015]

You are begging the question, I am afraid. First prove that there is a God before justifying right or wrong because He exists. Pending this evidence of His existence, your justification of right or wrong is pulled out of thin air, too.

Or are you selling the idea that since objective morality "obviously" exists, then there must be a God that justifies their objective character? See the circularity of the argument?

To make it more explicit: I think gay marriages are a good thing. Prove me wrong, objectively.

Ciao

- viole

God says that gay marriage is wrong. That's enough to prove that Gay marriage is wrong. If you believe that God does not exist, you are unable to prove that gay marriage is right. It is your opinion against mine. You may impose your opinion on me if you are more powerful than me or if you find a group of people that is more powerful or more numerous than the group of people that supports my view, but you cannot prove that you are right and I am wrong. So, I can prove that something is wrong because my moral principles are based on an immutable and all-powerful being, whereas you cannot prove what is right and what is wrong. This is the fundamental problem that Western Societies that have rejected Christianity are facing. These societies have no way to prove that the things in which they believe are right or wrong. Their vision of the world is self-contradictory because it erodes itself.

As far as the replies to other posters are concerned, most of you believe that feelings (compassion, empathy, etc.) are sufficient to prove that something is right. This is simply false. Feelings are just feelings. They don't prove anything. Also, I don't need to prove God's existence to prove that absolute moral values can only exist if God exists, just as I don't need to prove that the number two exists in order to demonstrate that two plus two is four.

 

[Crypto2015]

Atheism has little to do with values really.
Atheism does not really imply anything about ones beliefs other than they don't believe in a deity.
Atheists can have virtually any set of morals.

But they can't justify their set of morals.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

God says that gay marriage is wrong. That's enough to prove that Gay marriage is wrong. If you believe that God does not exist, you are unable to prove that gay marriage is right. It is your opinion against mine. You may impose your opinion on me if you are more powerful than me or if you find a group of people that is more powerful or more numerous than the group of people that supports my view, but you cannot prove that you are right and I am wrong. So, I can prove that something is wrong because my moral principles are based on an immutable and all-powerful being, whereas you cannot prove what is right and what is wrong. This is the fundamental problem that Western Societies that have rejected Christianity are facing. These societies have no way to prove that the things in which they believe are right or wrong. Their vision of the world is self-contradictory because it erodes itself.

As far as the replies to other posters are concerned, most of you believe that feelings (compassion, empathy, etc.) are sufficient to prove that something is right. This is simply false. Feelings are just feelings. They don't prove anything. Also, I don't need to prove God's existence to prove that absolute moral values can only exist if God exists, just as I don't need to prove that the number two exists in order to demonstrate that two plus two is four.

That's just a bunch of crap. "God" in this case is just a rhetorical device that you use to ground your argument in some perceived authority. However, there's no reason why anyone has to accept the existence of this "god" or to believe that this "god" is nothing more than a mouthpiece for your own viewpoints. "God said so" is not an answer to anything and has no place in rational discourse. Even if some literal divine being does exist outside of ourselves, that still doesn't mean it's the "supreme being" or that a supreme being would have anything to do with human religions, especially ones that are filled with petty stupidity (i.e. pretty much all the mainstream ones with their "holy books").

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

But they can't justify their set of morals.

Neither can you.

 

[Demonslayer]

God says that gay marriage is wrong. That's enough to prove that Gay marriage is wrong.

In the same book, God said slavery is right. Is that enough to prove slavery is right?

And don't give me any lip about New Testament. All the anti-gay stuff is in the Old Testament.

So tell me, should women shut up and wear hats in church?

 

[jonathan180iq]

So tell me, should women shut up and wear hats in church?

Oh course they should...I mean, it says so right there in the Bible! Who are we are we to question to the objective morality of the Word of God?

Deuteronomy 25:11-12 "When men fight with one another, and the wife of the one draws near to rescue her husband from the hand of him who is beating him, and puts out her hand and seizes him by the private parts, then you shall cut off her hand."

Leviticus 25:44 "Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves."

Deuteronomy 13:12-15, "if you find that the people in the city you're visiting worship another god, you have to kill them all."

Leviticus 20:10 "If a man cheats on his wife, or vise versa, both the man and the woman must die."

1 Corinthians 14:34-35 "Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law."

Matthew 5:32 Whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

Praise the Lord!

 

[Demonslayer]

Oh course they should...I mean, it says so right there in the Bible! Who are we are we to question to the objective morality of the Word of God?

That's what I don't get about folks like Crypto who make a statement like "God says that gay marriage is wrong. That's enough to prove that Gay marriage is wrong."

How can they not apply consistent reasoning to all the other things "God says?" God said to beat slaves so they don't die within three days, that's enough to prove it's OK to beat slaves as long as they don't die in three days."

And if you try to wiggle around stuff like "God said to beat slaves," using the typical New Testament excuse, then why can't we also wiggle around the "God said gay marriage is wrong" using the same New Testament excuse?

 

[viole]

God says that gay marriage is wrong. That's enough to prove that Gay marriage is wrong. If you believe that God does not exist, you are unable to prove that gay marriage is right. It is your opinion against mine. You may impose your opinion on me if you are more powerful than me or if you find a group of people that is more powerful or more numerous than the group of people that supports my view, but you cannot prove that you are right and I am wrong. So, I can prove that something is wrong because my moral principles are based on an immutable and all-powerful being, whereas you cannot prove what is right and what is wrong. This is the fundamental problem that Western Societies that have rejected Christianity are facing. These societies have no way to prove that the things in which they believe are right or wrong. Their vision of the world is self-contradictory because it erodes itself.

You can prove that something is wrong because your moral principles are based on an immutable and all-powerful being,...., whose existence you cannot prove? How does it work? It look like you cannot prove anything, either.

What prevents me from starting having faith in a God that supports gay marriage? Would I also be able to prove to you that my position about gay marriage is now, magically, objectively and truthfully justified by my faith in that God? You will probably say that this God is not true, but then I will say the same about your God. Now what? Did we both prove that something is right and wrong at the same time?

Pending additional and independent evidence of the existence of the source of morality you believe in, it is entirely possible that people made Him up or chose Him so that He shares what they think is right and wrong. Setting you, de-facto, on square one.

Ciao

- viole

 

[jonathan180iq]

That's what I don't get about folks like Crypto who make a statement like "God says that gay marriage is wrong. That's enough to prove that Gay marriage is wrong."

How can they not apply consistent reasoning to all the other things "God says?" God said to beat slaves so they don't die within three days, that's enough to prove it's OK to beat slaves as long as they don't die in three days."

And if you try to wiggle around stuff like "God said to beat slaves," using the typical New Testament excuse, then why can't we also wiggle around the "God said gay marriage is wrong" using the same New Testament excuse?

Because they aren't actually using reason - they're simply attempting to justify their dislike for homosexuality with cherry-picked passages from their religious book of choice...

Look, I won't even deny that the Bible is pretty specific about homosexuality, even in parts of the New Testament... But so what? The New Testament also explicitly tells believers and followers of Christ to deny all of their worldly possessions and to give them to the poor, because their riches lie in heaven and not are not of this Earth...

So why aren't there yearly marches against commercialism and capitalism? Why aren't there thousands of people lined up outside lawyer's offices protesting lying. Why aren't all divorced couples stoned to death before their congregation? Why aren't there angry mobs of protesters outside the walls of the US Mint? With a population that is at least 70% Christian in some regard, why do inequality and severe poverty exist at all?

Those problems still ail this "christian nation" because Christians are too busy concerning themselves with the color of Christmas-themed coffee cups at an openly secular institution.
They're too busy NOT actually doing what their Bible tells them to do unless it's convenient, or unless it justifies their preconceived prejudices.

 

[viole]

Because they aren't actually using reason - they're simply attempting to justify their dislike for homosexuality with cherry-picked passages from their religious book of choice...

Look, I won't even deny that the Bible is pretty specific about homosexuality, even in parts of the New Testament... But so what? The New Testament also explicitly tells believers and followers of Christ to deny all of their worldly possessions and to give them to the poor, because their riches lie in heaven and not are not of this Earth...

So why aren't there yearly marches against commercialism and capitalism? Why aren't there thousands of people lined up outside lawyer's offices protesting lying. Why aren't all divorced couples stoned to death before their congregation? Why aren't there angry mobs of protesters outside the walls of the US Mint? With a population that is at least 70% Christian in some regard, why do inequality and severe poverty exist at all?

Those problems still ail this "christian nation" because Christians are too busy concerning themselves with the color of Christmas-themed coffee cups at an openly secular institution.
They're too busy NOT actually doing what their Bible tells them to do unless it's convenient, or unless it justifies their preconceived prejudices.

Not to speak of the clear command that Christians should not marry unbelievers. Not a lot of rallies about these issue, for some reason.

Ciao

- viole

 

[Koldo]

It seems to me that only the existence of God provides a sound foundation for our moral principles. An eternal and fair judge, who can reward us or punish us even beyond the grave, is the only true justification for the existence of firm moral principles. What do you think?

How is that a sound foundation ?
How do we determine this is a fair judge ? How do we determine what is his view ?

 

[bluegoo300]

There is a big difference between feeling that something is right and justifying why something is right. Most people, regardless of their worldview, believe that murder is wrong. However, how do people justify that murder is wrong? Some people may argue that murder is wrong because we feel that it is wrong. These people are implicitly asserting that moral principles are subjective. In other words, they are asserting that moral principles are opinions or, in the best-case scenario, human conventions. The problem with such a stance is that different people may hold different opinions on the value of human life. For instance, the Nazis believed that the lives of the Jews were less valuable than the lives of other human beings. The Nazis were consistent with their own moral conventions when they proceeded to organize the mass murder of millions of civilians. How can we prove that they were wrong if we believe that right and wrong are just feelings? We probably feel that they were wrong, but they could have argued that they felt that they were right. It follows that when moral principles are nothing but social conventions, human life has no intrinsic value. When moral principles are simply social conventions, human rights are alienable rights that are bestowed upon the citizen by the state. Hence, the state has the power to deprive its citizens of these rights. Other people may argue that murder is wrong because it is detrimental for our species. However, what makes what is detrimental for our species wrong? Our species destroys the planet and has caused the extinction of countless other species. We must not confuse what is in our best interest with what is right. Finally, someone may posit that murder is wrong because evolution has programmed our brain to believe that murder is wrong. Nevertheless, this position, instead of proving that murder is wrong, proves that murder is actually not wrong, since if this position were the right one, morality would be nothing but a self-delusion, an instinct with which rational beings are not forced to comply. It seems to me that only the existence of God provides a sound foundation for our moral principles. An eternal and fair judge, who can reward us or punish us even beyond the grave, is the only true justification for the existence of firm moral principles. What do you think?

There is a theory in human nature that uses the word PAIN to define morals, at the moment I can’t remember it exactly but basically it’s our key to who we are. For example P is personal survival which is upmost in importance to us. I can’t remember the rest however I is for immoral acts our brain is programed to determine right and wrong acts for us. My point is this I believe that everyone not just religious or non-religious people have moral boundaries however they are bound only to what their brain thinks is immoral. take for example a murderer someone who's moral boundaries allowed him to kill someone, however this same person may be incapable of raping someone based on his morals, his religion did not dictate this his brain did this is why Hitler was able to have an entire country brain washed into killing millions of innocent people because he justified it in their minds not the religions. My second point is this: if you have ever read the book "The Shack" you would know the religion does not play into morals. In the book a man's child is kidnapped and killed in the book he struggles with his religious views however he overcomes this. But from beginning to end he always said he would kill whoever did this to his child. Even though in his religion this is considered immoral yet he would do this against his god? This is because morals are in human nature and not religion, please feel free to respond.

 

[Ouroboros]

It seems to me that only the existence of God provides a sound foundation for our moral principles. An eternal and fair judge, who can reward us or punish us even beyond the grave, is the only true justification for the existence of firm moral principles. What do you think?

Even if it was true, how can we have your God, Jewish God, Muslim God, and all other gods fight it out who is the one who gives us the absolute and objective moral code, and which one of them who has the right to judge us and punish us eternally? How can we objectively find out and know which one? And how can we objectively find out what that particular God who wins thinks and wants? Through human prophets who add their own interests and subjective views or per internal contemplation and insight? If it's per subjective prophets, then it's not objective. If it's by internal insights, then trust people (and God's will) to find it on their own and don't push your favorite religion on them. Faith and belief comes form inside. It doesn't come through hammering books with moral codes over other people's heads. The only moral code we can get from God is ultimately the one he gives us in our hearts, and mostly through reasoning and contemplation. Also, it comes from human society and culture evolving, which, if God exists, you also have to allow God to direct instead of using an ancient code written by a subjective prophet. It all comes back to the same, morality is based on culture, sociological ideas, values, reasoning, etc, with or without God.

 

[Demonslayer]

how can we have your God, Jewish God, Muslim God, and all other gods fight it out

I don't know...but it would make a kickass Marvel movie.

 

[Ouroboros]

I don't know...but it would make a kickass Marvel movie.

Totally.