Morality: Do you agree

[Heyo]

Have diseases disappeared? Has hunger disappeared? Have wars been eliminated? Have they managed to prevent and avoid violence?

Nope, but these have significantly decreased.

 

[Nimos]

My question is: What is the distinction between a regular human being decreeing what is the objective morality and God doing the same?

I see no distinction. It is just an arbitrary set of rules created by someone.

The objective morality would be from God. That would be the claim that God created the "rules" of what is right and wrong. So whatever is considered so, would be so even if humans did not exist, because God said so.

 

[Nimos]

What does the word 'invalid' mean on this context?

Meaning that there is no merit to it, because it is not founded in anything. So an atheist saying that killing is morally wrong, might equally say that killing is right. His claim is that there is no value in subjective morality as it is not based on anything and therefore it is merely an opinion.

 

[Trailblazer]

living forever is only possible with magic.

Living forever in the physical body is not even possible with magic, since the physical body is mortal.

 

[Nimos]

Just because there is a law or a rule, that doesn't imply a law giver. We have natural laws in science. We also have laws of logic. We discover these laws (or rules) via inquiries into math and science. Some might postulate that the same sort of discoveries might be made from our inquiries into ethics.

But in that case, morality would be predetermined right? Like water freezing when the temperature gets below a certain threshold etc.

 

[Nimos]

1. Without God there is no moral foundation.
and
2. People are capable of moral judgment.

are not mutually exclusive.

Perhaps this is a false dichotomy?

It's not about whether they are capable of making a moral judgement, but whether said judgement is worth anything because it is not founded in objective morality, such as God, it is merely your opinion.

 

[Nimos]

If morality depends on God's opinion at the time, it's not objective by any stretch of the imagination.

It would be if God knows what is right and wrong at all times. If God says it is good then it is and if he says it is bad then it is bad. It is not to be compared to a parent telling their kid they did something bad, because the parent thinks so. God in this scenario, I assume, is that he can't be wrong, that is the claim of believers when talking about objective morality.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Was watching a debate between a Muslim and an atheist. And the Muslim make the argument that people that believe in subjective morality have no foundation for making moral judgements and are therefore not valid. Whereas people with a foundation in objective morality, meaning God as the moral judge are because this gives them a foundation for their morality.

Do you agree with this, that without God there is no moral foundation for judging right from wrong? And therefore people not believing in objective morality is not allowed or invalid when judging others?

Those two questions you're asking don't seem to follow from one another.
To keep things simple, let's assume objective morality is morality derived from a perfectly moral God. I have lots of questions about how we could even know God is perfectly moral, so the premise seems flawed, but let's put that aside for now.

If God exists, then there is an objective moral basis, and those not adhering to it completely, are acting immoral to some degree. And on their death, they will be judged for it (according to most of the religions believing a single God is the very definition of morality). So great.

If God doesn't exist...and as an atheist, clearly that is where both I and the atheist speaker from the OP are are...then there is no objective morality. What there is are lots of people who falsely believe they have objective morality sorted, that have a perfect understanding of what a being so different and grander than us expects of us that they can adhere to it, and who are willing to judge other people despite the fact that this God they purportedly believe in will judge us on death anyway. It's somewhat laughable when you look at it from that point of view.
The 'objective morals' the Muslim claims provides meaning to his life, and are superior to anything subjectively available or created by man are...from my point of view...subjective morals created by man.

Apart from which, if the only thing stopping this Muslim from murdering and raping is the fact that his religion tells him 'Don't murder and don't rape' then perhaps he should stay away from people. God help us (pun intended) should he ever have a crisis of faith.

 

[Nimos]

I don't believe in objective morality, meaning: a mind independent standard of right and wrong. That doesn't mean one can not have a foundation of morality. On the contrary. It's just means that the foundation self is subjective.

My foundation of morality is the value of well being of sentient beings that can experience pain and pleausure (for example: humans). My goal is to enhance well being, not jus for me but also for my family and friends and the rest of society. It turns out that most people have this goal (I've never met someone who didn't value human well being).
From there one we can make objective assessments whether somehting is moral right or moral wrong.

There is no problem for me to say that murder or rape a person is morally wrong. I'm not a moral relativist. It's doesn't depend on the culture or the time. It depends on my view of morality.

I do agree with most of what you say, I personally do not see any evidence for objective morality at all. And I do agree that well-being, despite how vague of a term it is, is to some degree what morality is based on. However, I think well-being is far more egoistic than one would assume. For instance, it is difficult to argue that a person like Putin, Hitler or Stalin etc. is especially concerned about the well-being of other humans. These are obviously extreme examples, but a person choosing to drive drunk, too fast etc. knowing the potential risk of doing so, is not having the well-being of other humans at heart. So in the greater scheme of things, I think that well-being as far as it benefits oneself is probably accurate.

And also why I say that "well-being" is a muddy term, and have heard other atheists like Sam Harris etc. use it as a foundation for a "created" objective morality. But well-being can mean a lot of things, depending on whose perspective we look at it from.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

So if god decides that genocide is moral, then it is.
If god decides that infanticide is moral, then it is.
If god decides homophobia is moral, then it is.
If god decides that slavery is moral, then it is.

But God did not decide those things.

Perhaps, @Trailblazer, you are less familiar with the Bible than you suggest? Because the Bible says, as @TagliatelliMonster suggests, that God does approve of all of those things. And in the case of the first two, is Himself guilty of them.

 

[Nimos]

It is not so simplistic as you let is seem. If they both have the same foundation of morality, then it would not be invalid. It certainly would not invalid to people who have the same foundation.

It was his claim, not mine

I think he reached the wrong conclusion and as you say it is too simplified, and in my opinion straight-up wrong.

 

[Nimos]

You (and those you watched debating) are missing a key point. If there is a God, you still need some way of knowing that what you are TOLD this God says and wants is ACTUALLY what this God says and wants. And you only have another human telling you so.

Without knowing that, it probably more likely that the "objective morality" is what some human says it is -- his subjective opinion.

Morality is what you know to be right by simply considering other people are much like you -- what hurts you probably hurts them, and what helps you probably helps them, and learning to understand when others are happy or unhappy. And that latter is really a basic capacity of human nature.

I completely disagree with the argument, I don't think objective morality exists at all. But the person is religious, so the assumption that God is real is his starting point and a given in this debate, as it weren't in regards to whether God exist or not.

I as you say, would make the same argument, that because something is written down and passed amongst people for generations, doesn't give a foundation for objective morality. Only the proof of God's existence would start to give a foundation for such an argument to begin with.

But in these debates, often the assumption is that God exists.

 

[Koldo]

The objective morality would be from God. That would be the claim that God created the "rules" of what is right and wrong. So whatever is considered so, would be so even if humans did not exist, because God said so.

But what exactly about God saying so makes it so?

 

[Viker]

Do you agree with this, that without God there is no moral foundation for judging right from wrong?

No. The foundation is from empathy and a need for social cooperation and our survival. Gods aren't entirely necessary and do not establish objectivity. Someone's belief in any god is purely subjective, allowing for not so objective stipulation and conditions into a moral framework.

Morality is about you and me...it comes from you and me.

 

[Koldo]

Meaning that there is no merit to it, because it is not founded in anything. So an atheist saying that killing is morally wrong, might equally say that killing is right. His claim is that there is no value in subjective morality as it is not based on anything and therefore it is merely an opinion.

But what sort of thing would grant merit to morality?

 

[Nimos]

But what exactly about God saying so makes it so?

Because the claim is that he created everything, including morality. That is where objectivity comes in. Sort of like saying that God created the physical laws and they follow these rules because God made it so.

 

[Koldo]

Because the claim is that he created everything, including morality. That is where objectivity comes in. Sort of like saying that God created the physical laws and they follow these rules because God made it so.

But what does it mean to create morality?
How would you figure, at least in principle, if I have (or haven't) just now created a new moral rule?

 

[Nimos]

If God doesn't exist...and as an atheist, clearly that is where both I and the atheist speaker from the OP are are...then there is no objective morality. What there is are lots of people who falsely believe they have objective morality sorted, that have a perfect understanding of what a being so different and grander than us expects of us that they can adhere to it, and who are willing to judge other people despite the fact that this God they purportedly believe in will judge us on death anyway. It's somewhat laughable when you look at it from that point of view.

Agree, being an atheist myself, it's obviously not easy to follow the logic of the Muslim speaker. But from his perfective, not accepting God is a sin and atheists are like rebels against God in that sense. And therefore our subjective morality, which a lot of atheists believe is true has no foundation from his point of view.

Personally, I think there is far more foundation for subjective morality than that of objective morality, God or no God.

 

[Nimos]

But what does it mean to create morality?
How would you figure, at least in principle, if I have (or haven't) just now created a new moral rule?

Well God was so nice to share it with a few people that could write them down, but he kind of forgot to keep them up to date

I think that is a reasonable question for believers, I would have no answer to that.

But essentially it just means that things are right or wrong because God says so. You are not supposed to question God like that, if there is something you don't understand then the problem is with you and not God, that is basically it. If you were to question the morality of God, then it would be subjective and God pointless in that regard.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

I completely disagree with the argument, I don't think objective morality exists at all. But the person is religious, so the assumption that God is real is his starting point and a given in this debate, as it weren't in regards to whether God exist or not.

I as you say, would make the same argument, that because something is written down and passed amongst people for generations, doesn't give a foundation for objective morality. Only the proof of God's existence would start to give a foundation for such an argument to begin with.

But in these debates, often the assumption is that God exists.

Well there you go! Anyone willing to undertake a debate where premises must be accepted as true -- is doomed to either triumph or failure, depending on whether he decides yes or no. But in spite of the triumph of one side and failure of another, absolutely nothing will have been decided.

Seems like a pretty pathetic argument, to me.