This post is long overdue.
One doesn’t have to look far to find examples of moral outrage aimed towards theists in general and Christians in particular here at The Skeptical Zone.
Judgmentalism, oddly enough, is prevalent. A pungent odor of opprobrium frequently wafts its way forth from the atheist trenches, and it stinks.
Are we all moral realists after all? Do we all now agree on the existence of objective moral values? If so, what are they and what makes them objective?
As for you moral relativists, are there any of you left? Why ought anyone (including especially Erik, Gregory, myself, fifth, William) be subject to the vagaries of what you moral relativists think others ought to be doing or ought not be doing?
Such opprobrium. Based on what, exactly?
If you are going to claim that we have some moral obligation towards you, you really ought to support that claim or retract it.
After all, that’s the intellectually honest thing to do.
So, what punishment does *your* god demand for immoral behaviour?
Then why the fuck didn’t you also move this post Alan??
Do you think my post wasn’t written in good faith?
See why more people from UD don’t agree that this site is a better one for discussion?
Sod off with your rude behavior.
You think you have an excuse. I tell you you are without excuse.
What the fuck are you on about then?
You’ve told me what I’m thinking several times now. You can hardly complain at this point. And anyway, it’s actually a fact that you have no idea if any “divinely inspired” work was actually so inspired. And so you are happy to take it on trust! Just facts.
I’m sure they’ll see the meltdown you’ve just had and try to avoid going that way.
Nonsense.
You’d have to have read my posts to understand that. But that’s OK.
I’ll make it real simple. First we had morals. Then we had law. Then morality changed. Then we changed the laws to accommodate those changes. Then morality changed.
Then we changed the laws to accommodate those changes.
Then morality changed. Then we changed the laws to accommodate those changes. Then morality changed. Then we changed the laws to accommodate those changes. etc etc
Therefore law != morals.
As it happens, I don’t know that the universe began in a big bang, though that’s a belief that some have.
Neither of those.
OMagain,
So Sharia law is moral?
Wrong. That’s not the belief of the theist. It may be your personal belief, and you may sincerely think it arises out of your theism, but you’re wrong.
Too bad for you that your own bible commands rape whenever it suits god to rule on the subject.
So, you can be a decent human being and decide not to rape — which is great, thank you! — but you don’t get away with claiming that it’s some kind of objective morality which exists only because it;s handed down by your tyrant.
QFMFT
Neil Rickert,
Cat got your tongue? Then where Neil??
According to me some parts are not, no.
But if you were to ask somebody else, you might get a different answer. And they’ll believe it just as much as you or I believe our respective answers.
This is making no sense, Phoodoo.
People can, and do, differ wildly as to what they think is moral. Some people think it is immoral to stone adulterers. Others think it is moral to do so.
So clearly you cannot rely on what people think is moral to know what God thinks is moral.
Nor can you rely on it by first weeding out the “brain damaged”.
Which means you have no way of telling, other than what “feels” moral, right? If not, what method DO you use?
Easy. If it harms someone else, it’s immoral.
Allan Miller,
And I have never said it was a problem for a functioning society either Allan, I didn’t think that was the question. Perhaps it is your who can’t step outside their own programming.
Is Sharia Law immoral, and if so, why?
They’ll believe it a lot more if they feel god is telling them to believe it.
Which is exactly why theists can never be genuinely moral persons.
Even when they happen to get it right, they get it right for the wrong reasons, and can’t be trusted not to start raping when they read the bible or the koran or hear their preacher or their mullah telling them so.
Does it cause people to be harmed? That’s why.
Physically or emotionally? Who decided this?
I don’t rely on what people think is moral. Why would I have to?I already know the morality exists inside me. And inside you.
My idea of morality has a basis of logic behind it. Your doesn’t, I don’t know why you can’t admit that.
That is not a cope out it is reality, Objective morality requires omniscience
Who said it was unavailable? Your example is hypothetical and incomplete you chose to not provide enough information to answer. If you want an answer provide the information necessary.
I am confident that if this were an actual moral dilemma I would have enough information to make the correct decision. Whether I choose to make the correct choice is another matter.
peace
OMagain,
Why the fuck is that the standard for morality, in a Godless world?
hotshoe_,
You don’t know what anyone else believes in their heart, so your points are meaningless.
fifthmonarchyman,
Exactly
If you want a response I’ll need a little elaboration.
peace
phoodoo,
I never said you did. It is possible for someone to make a statement which is not directly responsive to something you have said.
That is far too general a category. An entire body of prescriptions and proscriptions can be neither moral nor immoral taken as a whole. I do think it a shit idea to base law on religion, but that’s another debate.
Pick something and I’ll tell you whether I think it’s right or wrong. And why.
Don’t be more of an idiot than you have to be. I never said that I know what anyone else believes in their heart.
So your reply is idiotic. Quelle surprise.
How can you possibly know that?
peace
Humans evolved to be a social species. We all have in our innate behavioral patters a version of the Golden Rule; some more, some less. Over time this innate behavior was codified into both religions and secular laws. What was “moral” was then judged to be any action which followed those religious tenets or laws. Now we get some religious folks who are ignorant of the history of mankind claiming those “morals” come exclusively from the teachings of their particular religion. It would be funny if it weren’t so sad.
Good question. That’s why figuring out ethics is so hard. So often we have to decide between the lesser of two evils.
I think humanity is getting better at it, though, largely because we base our ethical decisions on good evidence, rather than religious dogma.
How do you decide? Or don’t you?
OK, then tell me how you figure out whether it is right or wrong to murder an abortion provider.
You haven’t provided any logic at all. Please do so now.
Please link to where this was claimed in this thread. It it possible that you are attacking a strawman?
peace
Mung:
I’ll answer that.
There is no objective moral obligation to answer questions at TSZ, just as there is no objective moral obligation in U.S. football not to hold. There is an obligation of another kind not to hold in football, however, established in the rules of the game, rules that themselves originated through social processes, not objective moral absolutes. Stakeholders in the game become rightly upset, sometimes outraged, when the rules are violated and/or penalties for same are not properly enforced. No resort to objective morality, yet perfectly comprehensible and appropriate opprobrium.
Participation at this site entails obligations similar to those that attend playing a game. While there is no objective moral obligation to answer questions, the site has aims, rules and informal stakeholders, just as football has same. When violations of those aims and rules are perceived and/or the enforcement of same is seen as arbitrary or inconsistent, differences and conflicts arise. No resort to objective morality, yet perfectly comprehensible and appropriate opprobrium.
Because we know how human beings work, fairly well. Through observation. We know that most human beings have “theory of mind” capacity – can figure out what something might look or feel like from an another person’s point of view – “cognitive empathy”. Most people also have “emotional empathy” – they literally “feel your pain” – wince when you cut your finger, become upset and concerned when another person is upset or concerned. We also know that these capacities develop through childhood, and can be stunted in an adverse environment – and that whether they are stunted may be in part genetic.
We also know that a few people have very low levels of empathy, and when that is combined with a tendency to find pleasure in the suffering of others, can form what is called the “Dark Triad” of psychopathy, and result in really dangerous behaviour. We are getting a little better at detecting that.
But normal human development tends to result in the capacity for both cognitive and emotional empathy, and the ability to choose between actions that produce short-term reward for the actor and rewards, short and long term, for themselves and others.
It’s basic developmental psychology, in other words.
Yes. Thank you for saying this so clearly.
I don’t know what it is about the moral sense that leads people to think there should be some ‘logic’ behind it, when the same is not expected to be true of a sense of beauty or humour.
All we have been given are some kind of attempted groundings for the possession of a moral sense. Which anyone can do. But it is neither more nor less ‘logical’ to say that we are possessed of a moral sense because God talks to us through it, than to argue it has a genetic basis in sociality and a cultural basis in learned norms.
The sensation described is the same, regardless of its cause.
I wonder if, at bottom, what is bugging the theists here is that atheists do not believe that our actions are celestially monitored and that we will be called to account at our deaths.
You are assuming that other minds exist. That other people are conscious agents. How could you possibly know that?
peace
Elizabeth,
Lizzie, this is not a discussion about HOW to deicde what is moral and what isn’t. If that is your argument, have it with someone other than me. This is a philosophical discussion about the existence of a sense of morality.
I have told you very explicitly that I believe all people have morals built into them, that has been given divinely. THAT is my logic. You may not believe it, but it is a valid explanation for how people came to have morality, and why moral imperatives exists.
You have nothing, other than saying you believe your way of deciding how to rule society is a good one. So what, I am not asking or debating this. Where did your morals come from?? If they are not an accident of DNA in a Godless world, then what? What is left? No more BS about emergence please.
Some works of music and paintings are (objectively) more beautiful than others. Some comedians and movies are objectively funnier than others. Sorry, folks, but no God is required for either of those.
Elizabeth,
What in the world makes you think ANYTHING here is bugging the theists? What a dumb comment. Go back and read some of the comments. The atheists here look pretty bothered.
No we know that you know this is the case.
What “bugs” us is the inconsistency of moral outrage in a world supposedly without objective morality.
No one is outraged that I prefer pumpkin to pecan pie. I can’t see how subjective morality is any different.
peace
The claim that something is bugging either the atheists or the theists is ad hom, and thus violative of the (silly) rules here. Get that stuff to Guano, admins!
au contraire
peace
Sorry, but you’re just wrong, FMM. I know you don’t like hearing that kind of thing, but truth is better than illusion.
What do you mean by “objective morality”, then fifth? Can you give me a clear definition?
What’s bugging theists is the nagging doubt that others can be just as happy and as moral as they are without believing in their particular flavor of religion. This causes cognitive dissonance since the theists have been taught since birth their God is the basis for every last little thing.
Not in the sense in which I intended it, Walto. It may need rephrasing.
Allan Miller,
Allan there is a huge fundamental difference. I can say unequivocally that I believe Sharia law is immoral, and I was given this knowledge that it is immoral from a higher being when I was created.
You can not say anything definitely about why you think aspects of Sharia Law might be immoral. As OMagain said, morality equals law. That’s about all you got.
Oh, plus that nagging feeling inside you (that you can’t say where it came from) that it is immoral. Its just how you feel, but you don’t know why.
But I do know why.
The fact that people like you, and fifth, and Mung seem to think that atheists have no right to express moral outrage.
There is a huge literature on both the evolution of theory of mind and its developmental emergence of same in children. Do we “know” that others are conscious agents – is there response to “philosopher’s doubt” about same? Doesn’t matter. Evolution has equipped us to construe others in those terms, our neurobiology compels experience of the foundations of theory of mind (e.g. understanding that others see) as automatically as it delivers the visual experience of an external world, and those in whom expression of that adaptation is diminished or absent are quite impaired wrt day to human social interaction (such as the “mind blindness” of autism.)