Are Morals Relative, Progressive, Objective, Absolute, Other?

[cvanwey]

1. Please define morality
2. If something is absolutely 'right' or 'wrong', why?

Thank you?

 

[Kevin Snow]

The righteousness of God is unchanging and is the standard. The righteousness of man is called morality and it grows weaker through each generation. As Christ said:

And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. ~Matthew 24:12

Morality is therefore local, based on culture and depends on the strength of man to effect his righteousness. We are growing weaker through each generation to effect God's righteousness which does not change, as it says here:

Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.” ~Matthew 12:45

Each time that we clean up, we don't do it with God's help and so the evil spirits that made our life worse are able to come back and make us go through the mud all over again.

So the morality of man is man's effected righteousness that he is able to do in the present time. This morality grows weaker through each generation until it becomes completely devoid of any of the qualities it once tried to emulate. Those qualities which are never changing is God's righteousness.

 

[Serving Zion]

1. Please define morality
2. If something is absolutely 'right' or 'wrong', why?

Thank you?

morality
[muh-ral-i-tee, maw-]
See more synonyms on Thesaurus.com
noun, plural mo·ral·i·ties for 4–6.

1. conformity to the rules of right conduct; moral or virtuous conduct.
2. moral quality or character.
3. virtue in sexual matters; chastity.
4. a doctrine or system of morals.
5. moral instruction; a moral lesson, precept, discourse, or utterance.
6. morality play.

moral
[mawr-uh l, mor-]
See more synonyms on Thesaurus.com
adjective

1. of, relating to, or concerned with the principles or rules of right conduct or the distinction between right and wrong; ethical:moral attitudes.
2. expressing or conveying truths or counsel as to right conduct, as a speaker or a literary work.
3. founded on the fundamental principles of right conduct rather than on legalities, enactment, or custom:moral obligations.capable of conforming to the rules of right conduct:a moral being.
4. conforming to the rules of right conduct (opposed to immoral):a moral man.
5. virtuous in sexual matters; chaste.
6. of, relating to, or acting on the mind, feelings, will, or character:moral support.
7. resting upon convincing grounds of probability; virtual:a moral certainty.

noun

1. the moral teaching or practical lesson contained in a fable, tale, experience, etc.
2. the embodiment or type of something.
3. morals, principles or habits with respect to right or wrong conduct.

.. so it is about right and wrong, which is all to do with judgement in response to a complaint brought against someone who has caused grievance.

Morality therefore is a code for adjudicating complaints against improper conduct - where it must always demonstrate grievance.

Without grievance, (and intrinsically, a person to blame for it), there would be no need for the code that we call morality.

Given this definition, it cannot be said that morality is relative, because it wouldn't necessarily be morality - a grievance of injustice could exist when the roles are reversed.

Therefore, true morality is objective and perfect for the purpose of defining conduct that does not produce grievance.

Jesus said that there are two primary commandments, according to the Jewish discipline:

“‘You shall love Adonai your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire Torah and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
Matthew 22:37-40

In making a statement such as this, Jesus is saying that love is the essence of morality - so that a person who truly is exercising love does not conduct himself in such a way that causes grievance.

It is interesting that He said a similar thing in Matthew 7:12, though in a slightly different form:

So in all things, do to others what you would want them to do to you—for this is the Torah and the Prophets.

I often quote that verse when I am explaining the ultimate definition of morality, and that leads to a conversation where we begin to identify that morality breaks down when a person does not give proper recognition to the value of another's perspective (such as the lawyer of Luke 10:29), so that a person does not give sufficient regard to another's perspective to have considered that what they are doing to that one should not be done. This is the result of culture, essentially, where for instance racism, sexism, ageism has led to immorality being commonplace and even enforced by law, but where an acknowledgement of fundamentally universal human rights is bringing about greater equity of justice - and this is even being extended beyond the human species as we see that the recognition that other species' also have a perspective (and therefore a potential to suffer), is trending among growing vegetarian communities.

 

[Anguspure]

1. Please define morality
2. If something is absolutely 'right' or 'wrong', why?

Thank you?

Morality is relative and subject to the value that God puts on His creation.

In this sense, because God is the Absolute, they are objective.

 

[Inkfingers]

1. Please define morality

Morality is discerning and categorising behaviour into that which deserves penalty and that which deserves reward. Ethics is the study of the theories by which people attempt to do so.

2. If something is absolutely 'right' or 'wrong', why?

For something to be absolutely wrong it would have to refer to an absolute authority. Without such an absolute authority, any and all attempts at morality are just the presentation of personal bias.

 

[cvanwey]

For something to be absolutely wrong it would have to refer to an absolute authority. Without such an absolute authority, any and all attempts at morality are just the presentation of personal bias.

Now all one needs to do is actually demonstrate the existence of this "absolute authority", then we can hash out the details from there.

 

[cvanwey]

Morality is relative and subject to the value that God puts on His creation.

In this sense, because God is the Absolute, they are objective.

Which God? Furthermore, what if there's more than one? And once this God or these Gods are verified, how does one then discern these moral dictates are actually objective?

 

[cvanwey]

The righteousness of God is unchanging and is the standard. The righteousness of man is called morality and it grows weaker through each generation. As Christ said:

And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. ~Matthew 24:12

Morality is therefore local, based on culture and depends on the strength of man to effect his righteousness. We are growing weaker through each generation to effect God's righteousness which does not change, as it says here:

Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.” ~Matthew 12:45

Each time that we clean up, we don't do it with God's help and so the evil spirits that made our life worse are able to come back and make us go through the mud all over again.

So the morality of man is man's effected righteousness that he is able to do in the present time. This morality grows weaker through each generation until it becomes completely devoid of any of the qualities it once tried to emulate. Those qualities which are never changing is God's righteousness.

I noticed you quoted the Bible. If the Bible was written by none other than humans, and not inspired by any God, aren't you only appealing to ancient human opinion?

 

[Inkfingers]

Now all one needs to do is actually demonstrate the existence of this "absolute authority", then we can hash out the details from there.

If you yourself doubt the existence of such an absolute authority it means (by definition) that your own 'morals' are resting only upon your relativistic desires and feelings.

 

[Serving Zion]

If you yourself doubt the existence of such an absolute authority it means (by definition) that your own 'morals' are resting only upon your relativistic desires and feelings.

I agree. Truth would be a sufficient absolute authority to prove the point.

 

[Noxot]

1. since we share an objective world there are probably a lot of rules that work out better and some that work out worse. what your moral goals are will help to judge what your morals will look like. so if you base your morality on the character of your eternal soul and on God the goals might look a bit different than if all you had to go on was evolutionary survival.

certainly morality should hold all of humanity in a very high regard. since the world and humans are complex a simple objectivity might not always be possible. thus things like wisdom and reason must be utilized. but wisdom and reason require goodness. from my theistic perspective morality comes from a relationship between a soul and God.

for the most part sane things like "don't steal" are pretty solid and can be applied to many facets of morality. though most humans tend to break or accept people breaking that rule all the time and they call it other things like "taxation".


2. hmm right now the only thing I can think of that is absolutely right would be something like divine love or goodness or truth. something like the lack of those things could sink deep enough to being absolutely wrong. don't know how anyone could ever say that certain kinds of utterly bad deeds which I don't want to make mention of could ever be right or good.

why? because goodness is good and evil is bad. why is evil bad and why is good good? because when evil affects goodness it makes goodness less than what it otherwise could be and what is not good is not good for humans. goodness might be somewhat of a mystery but the reality of it is something that all people can taste of. and in the same way evil can be felt as something that is plainly wrong even though evil doers might become so evil that they lose their ability to distinguish between good and evil.

 

[cvanwey]

If you yourself doubt the existence of such an absolute authority it means (by definition) that your own 'morals' are resting only upon your relativistic desires and feelings.

You could not be more correct! But all you are left to do now, is actually demonstrate that some 'absolute moral agent' actually exists; verses just pretending or inventing one exists.

Just because one can conjure up an 'absolute authority', does not there-go conclude it must exist

So now all we need is the 'smoking gun' proof, or overwhelming evidence, and then the roughly 7 billion people on the planet can then choose whether or not to actually follow this 'absolute moral agent's' commanding dictates.

 

[Serving Zion]

and then the roughly 7 billion people on the planet can then choose whether or not to actually follow

Why do you suppose they would rather wait though? Why wouldn't they just do it because it is the moral thing to do? What does it say about a person whose moral conviction depends not upon their regard for the code itself but their regard for the one who issued it?

 

[cvanwey]

Why do you suppose they would rather wait though? Why wouldn't they just do it because it is the moral thing to do? What does it say about a person whose moral conviction depends not upon their regard for the code itself but their regard for the one who issued it?

Good question... Is murder actually truly wrong because your opinion or intuition tells you so, or because most of society agrees with you, or because it says so in an book, or because consequentialism is antithetical to moral realism?

 

[cvanwey]

The righteousness of God is unchanging and is the standard. The righteousness of man is called morality and it grows weaker through each generation. As Christ said:

And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. ~Matthew 24:12

Morality is therefore local, based on culture and depends on the strength of man to effect his righteousness. We are growing weaker through each generation to effect God's righteousness which does not change, as it says here:

Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.” ~Matthew 12:45

Each time that we clean up, we don't do it with God's help and so the evil spirits that made our life worse are able to come back and make us go through the mud all over again.

So the morality of man is man's effected righteousness that he is able to do in the present time. This morality grows weaker through each generation until it becomes completely devoid of any of the qualities it once tried to emulate. Those qualities which are never changing is God's righteousness.

But if the Bible was a man written book, just like any other claimed holy book, and not actually inspired by any God, then wouldn't you merely be appealing to the author's opinions, whom is passing these instructions off as absolute truth?

 

[Inkfingers]

You could not be more correct! But all you are left to do now, is actually demonstrate that some 'absolute moral agent' actually exists; verses just pretending or inventing one exists.

Well, why are you acting as if one does exist rather than throwing yourself off a cliff in despair at a universe without moral absolutes?

 

[Noxot]

anyone who can't see that goodness is an actual reality won't see God, since they are the same.

 

[cvanwey]

Well, why are you acting as if one does exist rather than throwing yourself off a cliff in despair at a universe without moral absolutes?

Well, because I have one life to live, and I choose to live it as long as possible and hope that all the 'good/pleasurable' times outweigh the 'bad/not pleasurable'. Otherwise, okay

But rather than give me the answer everyone else does (which does not justify absolute morals in the slightest), why not actually demonstrate that your specific God actually, at least exists, so then I know [which] God is the real God Because, you know there is more than one claimed God whom claims absolute moral dictates, right?

I already 'believe' many other things exist. However, I simply do not know if/which God exists??? Would you care to enlighten me, using your best piece of evidence? This way, I can at least know God exists....

 

[cvanwey]

anyone who can't see that goodness is an actual reality won't see God, since they are the same.

I have a simple task for you, if you would not mind...?

1. Please name one absolute moral value or duty.
2. Prove it

Thank you

 

[Noxot]

I have a simple task for you, if you would not mind...?

1. Please name one absolute moral value or duty.
2. Prove it

Thank you

1. love is the highest thing
2. i'm gonna be doing that forever