Atheist Morality

[Patzak]

Note: in writing this I'll be making some generalizations and doing some guesswork - I cannot be sure whether atheists, much less christians, actually think the way that I propose they do. So if you think that the following doesn't apply to you, feel free to correct me.

Many christians propose that without an absolute authority to define good and evil, morality isn't possible or at least cannot be trusted - that atheists are only constrained by laws and if it weren't for those, we should be going on killing sprees all the time.

This is, in my opinion, incorrect, in that it understands morality as an exclusively rational thing. It supposes that ethical decisions are made by consulting checklists and counting reasons for and against. This, however, isn't how we make our moral decisions at all. When faced with a certain situation (for example someone killing someone else for no apparent reason), a christian doesn't think to the ten commandments, check whether any of these apply and only then come to a rational conclusion, that the murder being commited is wrong. Instead, they immeadiately perceive the murder to be wrong, because they have a sense of right and wrong, because they have a conscience. Conscience might be a spiritual thing or it might be natural (although it isn't completely analogous, it's still close to what Freud called the super-ego), but in this case that's pretty irrelevant. The point is, the christian witnessing a murder will see it as wrong not because of the ten commandments but because of their moral sense. Indeed, I would very much question the moral integrity of anybody who didn't have such a moral sense and would act morally only after checking with a list of laws or commandments.

And the point is, the moral sense is in no way exclusive to christians or religious people in general. Again, for christians, conscience is a spiritual thing - but I don't think God only bestowed it on those who accept him. For atheists (at least myself) it's an evolutionary advantage which is likewise universal.

Now, one's moral sense might be influenced by a number of things. For many christians it's influenced by the Bible, for others by the specific teachings of their church or religion. In every case it's certainly strongly influenced by the society (the ancient societies honestly didn't see anything wrong with slavery, nor did many Americans in the previous centuries). The only difference between christian and atheist morality is thus that the christian's moral sense is influenced by one additional factor, which is, in my opinion, not the dominant one anyway.

True, I have only focused on simple moral decisions and not on complex ones such as abortion (on which we have our differences). However, if you look at abortion, you will likewise see the atheist (let's assume they're pro-choice, though there are probably some who aren't) making a moral decision based on their sense of right and wrong. The only difference is, they will emphasize a certain aspect (the woman's right to her body) over the other. You might not agree with it, but it's still an ethical decision which the atheist is able to make because he is not amoral any more than a christian is.

 

[JBrian]

Instead, they immeadiately perceive the murder to be wrong, because they have a sense of right and wrong, because they have a conscience.

Yes, but this still proves an absolute, objective moral law. This is exactly what Paul meant in Romans 2 when he said that God's laws were written on our heart.

 

[tocis]

Many "rules" very similar to the ten commandments have been in effect in ancient non-christian civilizations too, without them ever having heard the gospel et cetera. In some cases, the ethics of these people were even superior to the judeo-christian ones. I remember having read about a Chinese example... Confucius (if memory serves) stated that leaders are responsible for acting in the best interest of the led, something I didn't find in the bible so far.
Now if the bible is the ultimate source of morality (as many christians like to claim), how comes that these people who never heard of Jehova or Jesus had pretty much the same rules?

 

[FSTDT]

Despite what I wrote in my sig, I'm tempted to think that talking about "atheist morality" is a conflation of an issue that doesnt really exist. Atheism only has to do with whether people believe in a god or not, it says nothing about the nature of morality. That means it is wholly inappropriate to talk about atheists and morality as a whole, but its much better to talk about atheists and morality as individuals - there is no debate that atheists as individuals can be moral or amoral, value or disvalue things, or agree or disagree about the way that people ought to behave.

In any case, there are plenty of moral traditions that can be upheld without having to observe the existence of any gods, such as utilitarianism, categorical imperatives, ideal observer, hedonisms, social contractarianisms, or good ol' fashioned pragmatism.

 

[FSTDT]

Yes, but this still proves an absolute, objective moral law. This is exactly what Paul meant in Romans 2 when he said that God's laws were written on our heart.

Have you considered that it is extremely practical for a society, if it was going to survive, should not casually kill off its own members, and that you dont need to observe the existence of any gods to see its practicality? If that is the case, then its a presumption to say that general agreement among societies about the right way to behave implies that "God's laws were written on our heart", or even that morality has anything to do with God in the first place.

 

[Arkanin]

Yes, but this still proves an absolute, objective moral law. This is exactly what Paul meant in Romans 2 when he said that God's laws were written on our heart.

It proves no such thing, if morality evolved, and there are good reasons why it would benefit the species for it to exist.

 

[Patzak]

Yes, but this still proves an absolute, objective moral law. This is exactly what Paul meant in Romans 2 when he said that God's laws were written on our heart.

Maybe so, but this wasn't my point at all. It doesn't matter how the moral sense came about - whether it's god-given or evolved has no bearing on its universality.

 

[Patzak]

Despite what I wrote in my sig, I'm tempted to think that talking about "atheist morality" is a conflation of an issue that doesnt really exist. Atheism only has to do with whether people believe in a god or not, it says nothing about the nature of morality. That means it is wholly inappropriate to talk about atheists and morality as a whole, but its much better to talk about atheists and morality as individuals - there is no debate that atheists as individuals can be moral or amoral, value or disvalue things, or agree or disagree about the way that people ought to behave.

In any case, there are plenty of moral traditions that can be upheld without having to observe the existence of any gods, such as utilitarianism, categorical imperatives, ideal observer, hedonisms, social contractarianisms, or good ol' fashioned pragmatism.

I agree. I wouldn't actually call my own system of ethics an "atheist system". But it's quite a common conviction among the religious that atheists (no matter what their actual moral code is) are not to be trusted because "if there's no God, then everything is permitted".

 

[sk8Joyful]

Many "rules" very similar to the ten commandments have been in effect in ancient non-christian civilizations too, without them ever having heard the gospel et cetera. In some cases, the ethics of these people were even superior to the judeo-christian ones.
Now if the bible is the ultimate source of morality (as many christians like to claim), how comes these people who never heard of Jehova or Jesus had pretty much the same rules?

That is a good point, demonstrating:
GOD/Christ wrote in each soul PRIOR to us being born 'His ethical laws'. iow, each human is born with these 'pre-programmed', if you will.
Once born - our blessed INternal guidance-systems, are commonly OVER-ruled via conscious ignorance- resulting in diverse challenges. For instance here in CF, 2 erroneous Christian beliefs abound, with many people needlessly continuing suffering. GOD/Christ isn't happy about that, but
He won't interfere with *free will*.

Evidently, merely 'possessing/reading' GOD/Christ's bible, is not necessarily synonymous with understanding via GOD/Christ's Spirit. Many Christians, sadly, relinguish this *Spirit*, in favor of following 'men/science theories'.

 

[Cleany]

Note: in writing this I'll be making some generalizations and doing some guesswork - I cannot be sure whether atheists, much less christians, actually think the way that I propose they do. So if you think that the following doesn't apply to you, feel free to correct me.

Many christians propose that without an absolute authority to define good and evil, morality isn't possible or at least cannot be trusted - that atheists are only constrained by laws and if it weren't for those, we should be going on killing sprees all the time.

This is, in my opinion, incorrect, in that it understands morality as an exclusively rational thing. It supposes that ethical decisions are made by consulting checklists and counting reasons for and against. This, however, isn't how we make our moral decisions at all. When faced with a certain situation (for example someone killing someone else for no apparent reason), a christian doesn't think to the ten commandments, check whether any of these apply and only then come to a rational conclusion, that the murder being commited is wrong. Instead, they immeadiately perceive the murder to be wrong, because they have a sense of right and wrong, because they have a conscience. Conscience might be a spiritual thing or it might be natural (although it isn't completely analogous, it's still close to what Freud called the super-ego), but in this case that's pretty irrelevant. The point is, the christian witnessing a murder will see it as wrong not because of the ten commandments but because of their moral sense. Indeed, I would very much question the moral integrity of anybody who didn't have such a moral sense and would act morally only after checking with a list of laws or commandments.

And the point is, the moral sense is in no way exclusive to christians or religious people in general. Again, for christians, conscience is a spiritual thing - but I don't think God only bestowed it on those who accept him. For atheists (at least myself) it's an evolutionary advantage which is likewise universal.

Now, one's moral sense might be influenced by a number of things. For many christians it's influenced by the Bible, for others by the specific teachings of their church or religion. In every case it's certainly strongly influenced by the society (the ancient societies honestly didn't see anything wrong with slavery, nor did many Americans in the previous centuries). The only difference between christian and atheist morality is thus that the christian's moral sense is influenced by one additional factor, which is, in my opinion, not the dominant one anyway.

True, I have only focused on simple moral decisions and not on complex ones such as abortion (on which we have our differences). However, if you look at abortion, you will likewise see the atheist (let's assume they're pro-choice, though there are probably some who aren't) making a moral decision based on their sense of right and wrong. The only difference is, they will emphasize a certain aspect (the woman's right to her body) over the other. You might not agree with it, but it's still an ethical decision which the atheist is able to make because he is not amoral any more than a christian is.

this is a tough one and i am in 2 minds at the moment, some points:

1. christian morality tends to rely on culturally out of date doctrine which sometimes leads to apparently uninformed and sometimes uncaring positions held on moral issues.

2. some christians believe that reasoning should be absent from moral decision making, to be removed in the place of scripture. this presents obvious problems.

3. it can be reasoned that the origin of "conscience" is god himself and that peoples individual consciences are only a shadow of the true conscience that is a part of god.

4. you cannot deny the good that christian morals have done for western society (yes there is some bad too).


c.s. lewis best book in my opinion (i have read nearly all of them) addresses the issues of absolute and individual morality in the most incredibly remarkable way. it is called "the abolition of man". it is a short book, i recommend anyone interested in this topic to read it.

 

[LOVEthroughINTELLECT]

Note: in writing this I'll be making some generalizations and doing some guesswork - I cannot be sure whether atheists, much less christians, actually think the way that I propose they do. So if you think that the following doesn't apply to you, feel free to correct me.

Many christians propose that without an absolute authority to define good and evil, morality isn't possible or at least cannot be trusted - that atheists are only constrained by laws and if it weren't for those, we should be going on killing sprees all the time.

This is, in my opinion, incorrect, in that it understands morality as an exclusively rational thing. It supposes that ethical decisions are made by consulting checklists and counting reasons for and against. This, however, isn't how we make our moral decisions at all. When faced with a certain situation (for example someone killing someone else for no apparent reason), a christian doesn't think to the ten commandments, check whether any of these apply and only then come to a rational conclusion, that the murder being commited is wrong. Instead, they immeadiately perceive the murder to be wrong, because they have a sense of right and wrong, because they have a conscience. Conscience might be a spiritual thing or it might be natural (although it isn't completely analogous, it's still close to what Freud called the super-ego), but in this case that's pretty irrelevant. The point is, the christian witnessing a murder will see it as wrong not because of the ten commandments but because of their moral sense. Indeed, I would very much question the moral integrity of anybody who didn't have such a moral sense and would act morally only after checking with a list of laws or commandments.

And the point is, the moral sense is in no way exclusive to christians or religious people in general. Again, for christians, conscience is a spiritual thing - but I don't think God only bestowed it on those who accept him. For atheists (at least myself) it's an evolutionary advantage which is likewise universal.

Now, one's moral sense might be influenced by a number of things. For many christians it's influenced by the Bible, for others by the specific teachings of their church or religion. In every case it's certainly strongly influenced by the society (the ancient societies honestly didn't see anything wrong with slavery, nor did many Americans in the previous centuries). The only difference between christian and atheist morality is thus that the christian's moral sense is influenced by one additional factor, which is, in my opinion, not the dominant one anyway.

True, I have only focused on simple moral decisions and not on complex ones such as abortion (on which we have our differences). However, if you look at abortion, you will likewise see the atheist (let's assume they're pro-choice, though there are probably some who aren't) making a moral decision based on their sense of right and wrong. The only difference is, they will emphasize a certain aspect (the woman's right to her body) over the other. You might not agree with it, but it's still an ethical decision which the atheist is able to make because he is not amoral any more than a christian is.

Why do people always use extreme, rare situations to argue their moral philosophy? If aliens from another galaxy visited Earth for the first time they would likely get the impression that moral philosophy means the philosophy of murder. And if it isn't murder it is rape, abortion, euthanasia, recreational drugs and other divisive, highly politicized issues. If those extreme situations were really all that there is to morality, life would be 100 times easier.

And why do people always argue with negative morality? There is more to morality than what one should not do. The question of what one should do still needs to be answered. The question of what constitutes a good life remains unanswered.

Moral philosophy seems to depend on hypothetical situations such as The Prisoner's Dilemma. Real life experience doesn't set things up so neatly for moral decision making, however. Focusing on whether or not one has or uses conscience, "checklists", utility, etc. to choose the right course or to get the best outcome is probably a narrow, distorted view of moral agency and moral life. Most of moral life is probably reflection and introspection to learn from experience and then developing character from that self-examination. I don't know about other people, but I don't look for moral guidance by thinking about situations that I have never been in and that I have no reason to believe I will ever be in, such as having to choose whether or not to murder somebody, and then asking what I ought to do in those situations and how I know that is what I ought to do. Instead, I work on what I have experienced (reflection, introspection) and what I am presently experiencing. I would say that one ends up in the extreme situations because his/her character is neglected and poorly developed.

In other words, morality is hard work. And a lot of it.

Imagining hypothetical scenarios is useful as an intellectual tool and for teaching philosophical and theological concepts and ideas, but it is not a good guide for living a moral life.

We can argue all day about the metaethics of conscience vs. divine command and get nowhere. It is hard enough taking care of my own normative ethics without worrying about other people's metaethics. If people could prove that there can't be morality without God, what would that accomplish with respect to how one ought to live? If people could prove that there can be morality without God, what would that accomplish with respect to how one ought to live? If some computer program using complex mathematical models proved that morality can exist only if God exists, would atheists then suddenly convert to some form of theism? Since they would already be living according to a lot of the normative ethics that Christians say the Bible reveals and commands, it's not like their newfound metaethical knowledge would dramatically change anything with respect to morality. They would still have to work hard to live a moral life.

It seems that people who are arguing over the existence of God have hijacked and distorted metaethics to try to advance their positions. There's a lot more to God than the existence of and nature of morality. I'm not a theologian, but I wouldn't be surprised if a strong case could be made that metaethics is totally irrelevant to God. I suggest giving metaethics a break and diversifying and expanding the inquiry.

 

[Multi-Elis]

For atheists (at least myself) it's an evolutionary advantage which is likewise universal.

I am really interested in what you are saying here because once and a while you get an atheist who defends meaness, unkindness, actions that derive from anger, hate, and so on as things that are good because they "give us an evolutionary advantage", and it seems to me it gives us a poor evolutionary advantage: killing the other in wars, fights and disputes so that you and your offspring, will survive and not those of your fellow homo sapients sapients.
Actually, I have a question about morality in general, do you consider unkindness, lack of respect, being mean, acting recklessly out of anger and the such to be immoral? I'm not sure about this.

 

[gwenmead]

<snipped a bit>

Actually, I have a question about morality in general, do you consider unkindness, lack of respect, being mean, acting recklessly out of anger and the such to be immoral? I'm not sure about this.

Hi Multi-Elis - This is a very interesting question. I can't answer for the OP, but if you feel like reading on, I have a few thoughts of my own on this. (And on morality in general.)

I suppose that the kind of behavior you're describing (meanness, lack of respect, etc.) might be summed up as generally aggressive behavior. I don't know if acting that way offers an "evolutionary advantage" in terms of truly advancing the human species in a biological sense; but you mention it in connection with things like war - and it could certainly be said that having an overall aggressive outlook might preserve one particular group of humans over others.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, though, I remember a convo I had ages ago with some friend or other, in which they pointed out that it isn't in humanity's best interest to be entirely driven by aggression, because we'd likely wipe each other out in the long run. They suggested that humanity is best benefited by a balance of aggressive types and peaceable types because they can kind of keep each other in check, so to speak.

As to whether being mean, rude, and so on is moral or not - well, hmm. I suppose it is, in that an aggressive attitude or outlook might comprise a code of morality in and of itself. But it isn't a morality I'd choose. Most aggressive people I've known are either total jerks or scary, and I don't want to be like that. (Or be around people who are.)

I guess the way I look at it is that every culture across the planet has just one purpose: to preserve itself by making more people. Humans are just like any other living organism, in that we want to keep the species going. I had an anthropology prof once make the argument that if a society keeps going, it's successful, even though the manner in which it accomplishes that might vary from any other society or culture - and morality certainly plays a huge part of that. If we consider that morality is a measure of how members of a culture behave, then morals are going to vary across cultures bigtime. I might point out here that a culture can form its own morality entirely aside from any book or religion or whatnot, and I see no reason why an individual might not do so as well.

I might add that I kind of dislike the word "moral", mostly because I've so often seen it refer to exclusively sexual behavior, when really the word covers a broad range of behaviors and ethics and so on. But by now I'm rambling, so I'll stop.

Thanks for reading.

 

[AtheistPerson]

I can't say anything was wrong with what you said.

 

[tocis]

GOD/Christ wrote in each soul PRIOR to us being born 'His ethical laws'. iow, each human is born with these 'pre-programmed', if you will.
Once born - our blessed INternal guidance-systems, are commonly OVER-ruled via conscious ignorance- resulting in diverse challenges.

Do you want to say, then, that god/jesus didn't do his job too well? After all, if these "internal guidance systems" can be overcome so easily, are they well-designed from the start?
Kind of conflicts with the common claim christians often make that their god is perfect...

(See also the related question: If this world is so thoroughly in the grip of satan, does it not follow logically, then, that satan is more powerful than god?)

 

[CSMR]

The point is, the christian witnessing a murder will see it as wrong not because of the ten commandments but because of their moral sense.

Maybe, but that doesn't mean that his moral sense and the ten commandments are in conflict. Actually Christian behaviour insofar as it is faithful is not based on consulting law but is done out of a good spirit, which may be something like what you are saying.

, for christians, conscience is a spiritual thing - but I don't think God only bestowed it on those who accept him. For atheists (at least myself) it's an evolutionary advantage which is likewise universal.

What has biology have to do with morality? (That is what relation do they have in what you have just said?)

In every case it's certainly strongly influenced by the society (the ancient societies honestly didn't see anything wrong with slavery, nor did many Americans in the previous centuries). The only difference between christian and atheist morality is thus that the christian's moral sense is influenced by one additional factor, which is, in my opinion, not the dominant one anyway.

I assume you mean God. Actually that is not the Christian view. There are two views of a Christian person, firstly the worldly in which he is entirely influenced by natural factors, of the same nature as every other person, and under sin, as regarded by the second spiritual view in which he is declared forgiven by God and endued with knowledge of God which is entirely spiritual and not involving any natural factors.
Also, I would ask this: can your morality be wrong? If so, why don't you ascribe God as the author of the right morality? Why (if so) do you make the semantic decision not to?

 

[LOVEthroughINTELLECT]

Actually, I have a question about morality in general, do you consider unkindness, lack of respect, being mean, acting recklessly out of anger and the such to be immoral? I'm not sure about this.

If you were angry all of the time, would you consider your life to be a good life?

If you were in constant conflict, would you consider your life to be a good life?

Think about it.

 

[RationalThought]

I just posted this on another thread, but it seems even more appropriate here.

Here's a book which I found gives a very good analysis of the relationship between morality and evolution:The Science of Good and Evil : Why People Cheat, Gossip, Care, Share, and Follow the Golden Rule by Michael Shermer. Here is a review by Publishers Weekly:

Drawing on evolutionary psychology, Skeptic publisher and Scientific American contributor Shermer (Why People Believe Weird Things) argues that the sources of moral behavior can be traced scientifically to humanity's evolutionary origins. He contends that human morality evolved as first an individual and then a species-wide mechanism for survival. As society evolved, humans needed rules governing behavior-e.g., altruism, sympathy, reciprocity and community concern-in order to ensure survival. Shermer says that some form of the Golden Rule-"Do unto others as you would have others do unto you"-provides the foundation of morality in human societies. Out of this, he develops the principles of what he calls a "provisional ethics" that "is neither absolute nor relative," that applies to most people most of the time, while allowing for "tolerance and diversity." According to the "ask-first" principle, for instance, the performer of an act simply asks its intended receiver whether the act is right or wrong. Other principles include the "happiness" principle ("always seek happiness with someone else's happiness in mind"), the liberty principle ("always seek liberty with someone else's liberty in mind") and the moderation principle ("when innocent people die, extremism in the defense of anything is no virtue, and moderation in the protection of everything is no vice"). Shermer's provisional ethics might reflect the messy ways that human moral behavior developed, but his simplistic principles establish a utilitarian calculus that not everyone will find acceptable. 35 b&w illus.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Hope that helps everyone.


RationalThought

 

[Phred]

When most Christians talk about an absolute morality they aren't referring to human beings at all. They're suggesting that whatever God has defined as right and wrong is indeed right or wrong no matter what we as men think. They suggest that if we as mere mortals should go against this deity's wishes then we are immoral no matter what the situation may be. This deity supposedly told us not to kill (later retranslated by some as "murder") yet then directs others to kill, and murder. It even murders people itself (just ask the first-born of Egypt).

However, if we look at morality as human beings, which is all we can really ever do, it's quite clear there is no absolute morality. The concept is only used by those trying to declare a divine mandate for their personal opinions.

.
​

 

[Patzak]

I am really interested in what you are saying here because once and a while you get an atheist who defends meaness, unkindness, actions that derive from anger, hate, and so on as things that are good because they "give us an evolutionary advantage", and it seems to me it gives us a poor evolutionary advantage: killing the other in wars, fights and disputes so that you and your offspring, will survive and not those of your fellow homo sapients sapients.
Actually, I have a question about morality in general, do you consider unkindness, lack of respect, being mean, acting recklessly out of anger and the such to be immoral? I'm not sure about this.

As to your first point, I can only think of Friedrich Nietzsche who claimed something like that - that the survival of the fittest was an actual ethical principle, a means to the end of improving the human race. When considering ethics and evolution today, we take evolution as a natural explanation of the origin of morality, not in the way Nietzsche did - as a guiding principle. And anyway, RationalThought already outlined it better than I could.

About your question, I'm really not sure myself. I wouldn't go as far as to call unkindness and the rest immoral or evil, but neither can I call it good or morally neutral. I would say that their opposites are good though (when done without a selfish reason). But considering recklesness, I'd say that's more of a personality trait than a question of ethics.