There are a number of professed atheists in this forum. I was curious as to what sort of moral imperative atheists are beholden to when presumably no one is looking. Speaking as a theist, I am constantly cognizant that there is a God who considers what I do and is aware of what I do, even though that awareness on my part may not always result in the moral behavior which I aspire to. But let’s take a fairly mundane example — say theft. We’re talking about blatant theft in a context where one could plausibly or even likely get away with it. I affirm to you that as a Christian, or more relevantly possibly, as a theist, I would never do that. Possibly it has just as much to do with my consideration for the feelings and rights of some other individual, who has “legal” possession of said items, as it has to do with my awareness of an omniscient creator who is aware of what I’m doing and who would presumably not bless me if I violated his laws. I mean, I care about the rights of other people. And, considering other moral tableaus, those of a sexual nature for example — I would personally never consider going to a prostitute for example, in that I feel empathy for that person, and how they are degrading themselves in the sight of God, and how I would not want to contribute to their degradation, so that my own human lust would never result in me victimizing another human being in that way. So in summary, there are all sorts of constraints on my personal behavior that stem directly from my belief in God, and I am honestly curious about the inner life of professed atheists in such matters. In other words, do atheists for example, in such junctures of moral decision, only consider whether they can get away with it, i.e escape the detection of human authorities? I am just honestly curious about the inner life of atheists in such matters.
692 thoughts on “What is the moral calculus of atheists”
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JT,
Regarding theft, you wrote:
That’s exactly how it is for most atheists. We care about other people and don’t wish to harm them. If we do harm them, we feel bad about it and wish that we hadn’t.
That’s a myth. Dostoevsky said “If God does not exist, then everything is pernissible”, but that is complete bullshit. Most of us (whether theists or atheists) have consciences, and so we (ideally) do what our consciences tell us.
I’m sure there are some atheists who do whatever they can get away with, just as there are some theists who act that way. Christianity perversely encourages this in a sense by offering total forgiveness for (almost) any sin, provided that the sinner repents before death. It’s a get-out-of-jail-free card.
What’s really interesting is that believers act no more morally on average than nonbelievers, despite the fact that they think — or supposedly think — that God is watching them.
I can dig up a reference for that if you’d like.
Right, I’ve seen that before, and think its maybe true. Certainly, theism was the norm for most of the history of the world, a lot of good it did. As far as the moral calculus of individuals, its probably ad hoc a lot of times, and people feel that they can adjudicate their personal situation better than remote faceless authoritarian bureaucrats, for example in reference to “murder”. Who better than an individual can determine that someone “had it coming”, and often times that person did have it coming. In the case of murder anyway, it does seem hypocritical for the State to say, “We have a corner on killing, no one else can.” Otoh, there are things that people do that I know I could never ever do personally. I’m a little bit drunk, btw.
JT,
Here’s a comment I posted at UD on this topic:
keiths,
I appreciate that long post from “Losing My Religion” and do not discount it. And yet, my query from the OP, was focused more on the inner life of professed atheists, as to what was the moral calculus they employed personally in making decisions. For example in my case, I can look to admonitions of scripture, regarding being “longsuffering” or patient or loving or what have you, to mitigate inherent human impulses of mine to anger, impatience, selfishness, etc. And I see those admonitions of scripture as transcendent, as truth emanating from an eternal God, which give them inherent authority to me, which may be the only thing even remotely capable to counteract my own selfish human impulses. Its a pretty clear moral framework I have as a reference, and even then, I don’t always succeed in adhering to it. I was just wondering how self-professed atheists navigate the moral landscape personally, given that they believe that nothing ultimately (except for other fallible human beings) are holding them to account. When you’re all alone, and no other person can hold you to account, who are you accountable to.
JT,
Yourself, your conscience, and your concern for your fellow creatures.
You may think that your morality depends on God or scripture, but I think you are underestimating the strength of your own conscience.
Imagine you wake up in the morning with incontrovertible evidence that God doesn’t exist. Will you really start raping and pillaging if you think you can get away with it? I doubt it. And if not, then why would atheists?
I think that atheism has made me a better person, because my morality is now based on how my actions affect others, not on whether they conform to the sometimes arbitrary and senseless moral rules of Christianity.
For example, I’m ashamed that I ever thought of homosexuality as a moral failing. All I can say in my defense is that I was just a kid, foolish enough to accept the Bible as a trustworthy moral guidebook.
Fortunately I started asking questions as I got older.
I think I’d take issue with the word ‘calculus’. I don’t tend to calculate my options any more than i calculate the trajectory of a ball when attempting to catch it, or my fork as it heads mouthwards. I value exactly the same kind of things as the average theist – honesty, integrity, fairness. I pass these values on to my kids, without any religious wrapping. I feel good when I do ‘the right thing’ and bad when I do ‘the wrong thing’. I value the good opinion of my peers and my family, but also the good opinion of myself.
There are, I am sure, theists lurking not a million miles from here who will jump up and say “aha! You choose your moral options like you choose your favourite ice cream. You are thus no better than someone who regards rape as good”. But … I don’t choose my favourite ice cream either. It’s definitely not cabbage, or haddock, or soil. And if there really are people who get the same warm fuzzy feeling from rape as I get from helping someone in distress (I really, really doubt that) … so what? How can the grounding of my morality – “Trust Your Conscience” vs “Don’t Piss Off God” – be influenced either way by the possibility that people may differ?
I think a more illustrative example would be the moral calculus of priests who abuse. Seems to me they would be less likely to offend, not more. Yet as recent events have shown….
As noted in one of the first posts, perhaps it’s because the “sin then forgive” cycle is really believed that they think they’ll be able to get away with it in the “long term”, so to speak?
Seems atheists know that is nonsense and are perhaps less likely therefore to behave in such ways as they know their “sins” cannot just be washed away in the blood of another’s sacrifice. Are there figures?
“Can we be good without God?” – a dialogue that might save people some time
No need. The answer is simply “yes, of course”.
And in fact, many, many people are.
JT, Socrates asks Euthyphro, Are actions good because the gods command them or do the gods command them because they’re good? I think that’s something you should think about. (I think it’s something C.S. Lewis should have thought a bit more about, too–so you’re in good company!)
Gregory,
A hundred-odd page dialogue saves time?
Same title, different book
I agree with Allan Miller,
Although I am not an atheist, for the purposes of this conversation I am functionally equivalent to one. As Allan put it, I have a conscience, and I value my opinion of myself.
I have a couple of questions for adherents of the “Because God is watching” school:
I am motivated by my desire to have a good opinion of myself. On the rare occasions when I pause to ‘calculate’, I ask myself “What would I do if X were watching me now?” As a child, I believe X was my parents; as a young adult, it was my good friends. For the past 20 years, it has been my children.
All I have to do is imagine that my daughters are watching, and the right course of action becomes clear. There is no requirement that any person or God is actually watching, nor that there be any negative consequences.
How does it deal with Euthyphro? I ran out of pages Google preview would let me read and I did not find any reference to the dilemma in skimming what I could see.
Any hints or further links?
I don’t have any problem with rejecting moral subjectivity and the parts of the book I could see were mostly about why one should do that.
I think there are many separate issues which need to be disentangled.
1. How do we behave. I think science is the best way to answer this question and the answers require an analysis of evolution and culture (including family upbringing.)
2. How should we behave? Answering this requires philosophy informed by science. I think it is possible for an atheist to argue that we can have knowledge, not just opinions, about what is the right thing to do, basically for the same reasons that KN has given in arguing the point with WJM.
3, 4: The same questions as 1, 2 but at the level of societies. I also believe that some societies operate on better moral principles than others and hence that there is moral progress, not just moral change, since I believe there can be moral knowledge.
Other questions that need to be considered to fully respond to the issues in the post.
5. If a person disagrees with the morals of his or her society, what should that person do?
6. Why should you do what you have reasoned to be the right thing in a difficult moral situation?
It was in high school. It was probably my second week in high school.
A paper airplane went flying toward the teacher. The teacher asked “who did that?”. A student raised his hand.
At the time, I found that example of honesty and accceptance of responsibility quite inspiring. I had never seen that sort of honesty in elementary school or in Church.
The only authority you cannot escape detection from is you. That you need something else as well….
From the theistic perspective, atheists would have the same functioning moral compass as anyone else. The question isn’t if they actually behave morally, but rather why should they. Answering that question with “I care about the feelings of others” begs the question why should you care about the feelings of others. Their answer is often “empathy”, but that still doesn’t answer the question. People often must temper their empathy or retrain it so they can do things their empathy would prefer they not do – like become soldiers, defend themselves, refuse to give in to their young children, dispense tough love to family members.
Under atheism, conscience and empathy are just personal, subjective feelings – nothing more. A person can desensitize and/or control their conscience and/or empathy if they so choose. So, the answer of “empathy” becomes just another begged question; why should the atheist allow their empathy to prevent them from, say, stealing a bag of money when they are pretty certain they will not be caught?
It’s my view that a lot of western atheists become atheists because of empathy and a strong moral compass which guides them to reject what they consider to be the unacceptable morality of the available god figure in their culture and to actually become angry with and reject those that would follow & worship what is, in their mind, a morally reprehensible god. They often consider themselves morally superior to those who believe that morality is objective and comes from a god.
But the question becomes, if there is no god, and no necessary consequences to moral/immoral behavior, who cares? What does “moral” mean under atheism, other than a set of personal feelings about what behaviors one likes and dislikes?
If that is all that morality is under atheism – personal, subjective likes and dislikes – then all behavior is ultimately permissible. Keiths and other atheists here might not like, say, torturing young children for personal pleasure, but so what? By the same principle that they condemn it as immoral or wrong (personal preference & feeling), it is morally permissible for those that enjoy it.
The issue has never been whether or not most atheists behave morally – of course they do. The issue is about how they justify it and whether or not those justifications ultimately justify any behavior (all things are permissible). The question is also how they justify moral interventions and judgements other than “because I feel like it”, which also – simultaneously – justifies anything they disagree with.
JT,
To turn the question around, suppose sometime in the future you become an atheist. Do you think your behavior would change a great deal? Specifically, would you be more inclined to perform acts which could harm others if you believed you were not going to get caught?
Evolution. The people who did not care were killed by those who did. It all sorts itself out.
Yes, that’s right. However we have to share this world with others.
Some people eat the brains of the dead, at the funeral.
Do you find that ‘acceptable’?
Prisons are full of people who behave however they see fit, until other people see fit to put them in prison.
This is not complex.
It means “getting along with people”. There “moral” means “behaving in such a way so that people do not want to imprison or kill me”.
The golden rule etc. And this all happened a long time ago, and we’re left now with a population that can mostly get along with each other. Not all, but mostly.
I can answer this without speculation. I was a rather devout Methodist in my youth. I left for other spiritualities and then became an atheist. Becoming an atheist didn’t by itself change my behavior – what changed it was thinking the ramifications through towards the necessary logical conclusions regarding morality.
That was when I started desensitizing my empathy and conscience in order to free myself up to a wider range of options in my day to day life. Other people essentially became my prey. I used them for my own ends.
If I were to become an atheist again, yes, I would behave quite differently.
I can’t see how morality can stem from belief, since I don’t share your belief, but have the same aversions to hurting or cheating other people.
I have met people who have no qualms about hurting others. Some of them are churchgoers. I never noticed that churchgoing inhibited their behavior. In fact, I have met people (and read about people) who justify hurting others in the name of their religion.
What were you doing? Selling time share?
Yes it does.
It answers the question just as much as saying “believing god wants it to be so” answers why you should care about what god wants.
Why should you care about what god wants? Reward and punishment. It makes you feel good, which makes you want to do it. You can see that it works when everyone adheres to roughly the same moral system etc. etc.
Theistic morality ultimately reduce to the same personal impulses as atheistic morality, appeals to personal emotions (I want to feel good, I don’t want to suffer, I want people I care about to feel good and I don’t want them to suffer) and reasoning about the longterm wellbeing of other human beings.
On theism, the reasoning basically goes that we should act according to god’s moral laws because it is in our own best self-interest. Because if we do not, we do not get a heavenly reward but instead get punished in the worst way imaginable. So on theism, the basis of morality is ultimately “what would be best for us”.
It’s actually the exact same on atheistic morality, here god is simply not part of the equation. But the underlying calculus is the same, we can see that acting moral towards each other is in the long term, in our own best self-interests. It gives us the same joys, we can see that it works, life becomes easier when we help each other.
That also means we don’t need the god factor in the equation to produce just as functional moral results, if not sometimes outright superior.
The same underlying pitfalls also threaten to undermine both theistic and atheistic moral systems. On the one hand, atheistic moral systems are vulnerable to madmen with delusions of grandeur who think they can skewer the system to work entirely for themselves, theistic moral systems are vulnerable to madmen with delusions of grandeur who think they are god’s chosen policemen, who in some way or other delude themselves into thinking they hear the voice of god, which makes them think they have the right and authority to tell other people how they should live their lives.
No moral system is perfect or invulnerable to such individuals.
It’s obvious to me that morality has an evolutionary element. Social living would break down if the majority in any group tried to exploit each other rather than cooperate.
I see OM makes the same point.
Were we solitary beasts, we’d hardly need a code of ethics.
ETA
and Rumraket, whose comment I didn’t see till after adding mine!
Thanks, William, however I think it’s fair to say you are a bit of an outlier, no disrespect intended.
Haven’t you stated that you were very unhappy as an atheist? If so, could this have been connected to your choice, if we call it that, to desensitize your conscience and empathy, and to use others to achieve your own ends?
That saves even more time. I find it surprising that this topic requires any time at all.
I anyone is truly interested in evolutionary precursors to moral behavior, one merely has to observe other animals, particularly birds and mammals.
I’d propose that WJM would reject any idea that evolutionary filters/history have or could shape his behaviour in any way. After all, the place where his “free will” is instantiated is not susceptible to evolutionary adjustment.
So what say you WJM, do you accept that some/all of your behaviour is constrained by the millions of ancestors you’ve had and what happened to them?
Or do you outright reject any implications evolutionary history may have had on current behaviours?
That it is not alwayd true, the best self interest of Putin it is not the best self interest of Ukranian people, and he is not going to help them. Is he acting inmoral?
William,
How sad.
Unlike you, most atheists see empathy and conscience as valuable and worthy of nurture, not as nuisances that we need to “desensitize” ourselves to.
In working through all these issues (and others), it’s important to distinguish between rational justification, causal explanation, and subjective motivation. Confusing these three projects will lead to endless miscommunication and bickering. (Which is no guarantee that drawing the right distinctions will avoid miscommunication and bickering.)
Here would be some of the relevant questions:
(1) how do atheists describe their subjective motivations for acting in morally acceptable ways?
(2) what sorts of rational justifications are available to atheists for justifying their actions as morally acceptable?
(3) what sorts of causal explanations do atheists appeal to for explaining how it came about that either particular individuals, or humanity in general, is able to appreciate the moral perspective?
Whatever you believe, you can ignore your conscience just like you can ignore chest pains, major or minor. Eventually, it’s going to catch up with you.
IIRC, 90% of people have a conscience and life is a whole lot easier when our actions acknowledge our moral intuitions. The other 10% are a worry, but a proportion of them act morally because it is the perfect disguise, or just the best way to get what they want from others in most situations.
Moral reasoning can be consequentialist or deontic. Rather than talk about the moral reasoning of theists and atheists, those two categories are much more fruitful to learn about. A more sophisticated ingrained prejudice about atheists and moral reasoning (and in some countries and/or communities these prejudices must be hard to resist) might be the idea that all atheist moral reasoning is consequentialist. This is not so. For example, I think there is never a good reason for torture.
1. Subjectively I find hurting people (and animals) abhorrent. Extreme cases make me physically ill. Lesser cases make me uncomfortable. I am still haunted by some childhood instances where I was cruel or thoughtless.
2. Rationally, I want to live in a world where i am not in constant fear of being abused by other people. Rationally I support reinforcing good social behavior in children. From my own family, I find teaching by example to be the most effective method. I also want my descendants to prosper, and since I don’t know who they might be or what their station in life might be, I support generalized systems of justice and fairness.
3. I think populations support a wide variety of tendencies, from individuals having extreme levels of empathy to individuals having none. Human societies have prospered in all kinds of situations ranging from constant tribal warfare to long stretches of peace. There have been legalistic societies and societies where morality is enforced by social pressure. It seems obvious to me that many animals are cooperative, and that this adds to the viability of the population.
4. For those who have no inner tendency to be cooperative or law abiding, we have laws and police. Most societies have some enforcement mechanism. Formal laws and punishment. Banishment. Shunning.
5. Theists have always found ways to circumvent the watchful eye of God. There are people who believe that as long as they repent in time, their past is forgiven. There are those who find justification for cruelty within the scripture. There are those who think the parable of Talents justifies sharp business practices. There are thos who have found support in scripture for the institution of slavery. And Honor Killing. Etc.
Good questions.
(1) How the motivations feel? Like those of anyone else. Although I was very young for the short time I believed in a god, I’m sure I didn’t feel any different about my motivations. Moral reasoning comes before god or doctrine, otherwise the acceptance of any religion or doctrine is an amoral decision at best. In fact it was the immorality of the concept of hell that led me to leave that church. That moral reasoning trumps doctrine is obviously true of most modern Christians.
(2) Much of human moral reasoning is utilitarian. Some is deontic. I think it is folly to try to subscribe to any one moral system. We were not made that way. Decide which lines should not be crossed (and those lines are informed by both the innate and the rational assessment of what is unacceptable suffering and minimal freedom for one individual), and the rest is utilitarian calculation.
(3) Successful stable strategies for living in social groups. The Selfish Gene has a good chapter on this. At least, later editions.
ETA: Stable.
I should add that probably the most difficult part of ethical behaviour is how far to extend empathy. Outgroups? Animals? For a surprisingly large number of people, trees.
That’s a much more interesting way to look at ethical calculations to me than the theist vs atheist dichotomy. I can think of a number of instants where atheists are likely engaging in consequentialist reasoning.
I do not consider myself an atheist per se, but I do not believe in a god with the capacity for cogent thinking, let alone judgement. As such, I don’t worry about or even think about what my God thinks about my behavior; as far as I can tell It could care less what I do in any given situation. Yet, I refuse to “cheat” and get into the HOV lane on my way home at night. For me, it’s a matter of fairness vis-a-vis my fellow man; there are rules about who is allowed to use the HOV and I adhere to that because I feel it is fair. OTOH, I feel that speed limits are asinine, so I drive whatever speed I feel comfortable at.
That is not a rationale for act morally. That is a ratinale to promote laws that defend you from others not acting morally with you.
I`m sure you are better than an utilitarian person. I´msure you are going to help a person that will not reward you any utility.
Putin is known to be orthodox christian. Why doesn’t his theistic morality fix him?
I already told you neither moral system is perfect, and both are vulnerable to people with delusions of grandeur. Either because they want to exploit the system, or because they believe they’re acting with god’s blessing and authority. Some people simply don’t care about either moral system because they are psychopaths, Putin is probably a psychopath. That doesn’t in itself mean that either theistic or atheistic moral systems are intrinsically flawed to the extend they are doomed to failure, it just means that neither of them are perfect.
We don’t need to have a perfect moral system to have a moral system. I don’t believe either atheistic or theistic moral systems are immune to a Putin-like problem.
I thought that the argument of the post were which the rationale (calculus) of atheist morality, not his perfection or how it compare with a theist morality.
You tried to explain that atheist morality is based on self interest, I mentioned an example where it is impossible to act in the self interest just to show that that rationale is flawed.
The rationale is vulnerable to people who want to exploit the system, but all moral systems suffer that vulnerability, so there’s no use pointing out the system has such a flaw, since all systems do.
What is your point with poiting it out? Do you think this should lead us to conclude something about atheistic moral systems that theistic moral systems don’t also suffer from, if so, what?
I was as unhappy before I was an atheist when I was a Methodist and then a Satsangi. What atheism offered – if you follow the logic – was a rational justification for desensitizing my conscience and empathy and to open up my behavioral options. No god, no necessary consequences, no reason to carry around the moral baggage that basically made me miserable when looking at what I considered a corrupt and unjust world.
People were just fancy animals doing whatever evolution programmed into them. I transformed myself from the sheep (prey) to the wolf (predator). Why be a sheep when there’s absolutely nothing intrinsically wrong with being a wolf? Why be sad that the wolf has eaten your offspring when you can be happy as the wolf finding a good meal? Under atheism, it’s just a matter of personal feelings – of perspective – so, I changed my perspective.
Yes, the atheist morality is irrational with or without God, theistic morality is rational if God exists.
“Theistic morality is rational if God exists.” Not only that, but I’m gonna get to play in the NBA!
In what way is it irrational?
Why’s that?
First, I doubt you speak for “most atheists” on any subject. Second, so what? What difference does it make if you subjectively feel one way about things, and I feel another? Is it also “sad” that I don’t like certain flavors of ice cream, or that I’ve desensitized myself to certain gag-reflexes and negative emotional reactions I have in certain situations so that I can take care of my mother, who has Alzheimers, without being physically disgusted by some of the things I have to endure and without becoming an emotional wreck?
Under atheism, that’s all conscience and empathy are – emotional gag-reflexes, so to speak. Emotional reactions. Feelings. Under atheism, they are not set in stone and there’s no reason not to desensitize aspects of them if they become disabling in your life.
That’s actually some of the good that came from my stint as an atheist; I developed conceptual tools that allowed me to free myself from certain psychological issues and limitations.