Atheistic Morality

[Tiberius]

As an atheist, I get my morality from two simple rules. Now, I'm not saying that all atheists get their morality like this, but this is how I get mine:

1. If it hurts someone or disadvantages someone, then it is immoral (unless it is to save a person from greater harm, such as breaking someone's arm to get them out of a crashed car that's about to explode).
2. if it involves someone without their permission, then it is immoral (again, unless it is for the greater good, like giving an unconscious person a drug that can save their life).

So far I have not encountered a situation that I haven't been able to handle according to these rules.

Is this a valid way to determine morality?

 

[SeraphymCrashing]

It's funny how so many people want a black and white system that tells you what to do in every situation, when really just a little bit of thought and a few simple rules almost always suffice.

That isn't to say that there aren't difficult moral questions, but rather that its better to personally think out and wrestle those questions then to rely on some hardcoded set of rules that may not have even been written with said situation in mind.

I pretty much base my morality on the same set of questions, with an additional guideline: People should be judged individually and not based on any preconcieved notion. Gender, race, hair color, determine less then simple individuality, and therefore we should approach each new person as a blank slate until we can fill in more from personal experience.

 

[quatona]

What do you mean - "valid"?

One major problem :
You have hidden the actual issue (the underlying value system) into categories like "greater good" and "greater harm". Without knowing your ideas as to what constitutes greater good or harm, and without having information how exactly you measure the greatness of harm and of good, your rules (though in their general abstract approach reasonable) are practically meaningless.
I don´t doubt that you haven´t encountered a situation that you couldn´t handle according to those rules. In view of their vagueness this tells me that you must have silently added further rules, paradigms, value charts (i.e. moral categories) or even ad hoc priorities for arriving at your decisions, though.

 

[Tiberius]

true, I do have to weigh up options to determine which is the greater good, but that kind of thing is specific to each circumstance, and thus can't be defined by a simple rule.

 

[quatona]

true, I do have to weigh up options to determine which is the greater good, but that kind of thing is specific to each circumstance, and thus can't be defined by a simple rule.

Yup.
The problem, however, (and that is not your problem specifically, but a systemic one): A "circumstance" is a way of selecting certain aspects and defining those as the "situation", furthermore selecting from these aspects those that we regard relevant. Even if - after having done that - we come to a reasonable ethical conclusion what to do, the question remains: Based on what did we do these selections (and - even more important - are we even aware that and how we do it)?

 

[Tiberius]

I generally do that based on how much of an effect they can have on the outcome.

For instance, the example I used about a crashed car and the person trapped inside. I have the choice of injuring them (breaking an arm to free them) or not injuring them (leaving them in the car). However, if the car is about to blow up, then not breaking their arm will probably mean their deaths. I (and most other people) would agree that death is a worse outcome than a broken arm, so the moral decision in this particular instance would be for me to break the arm in order to save their life.

Doctors do it all the time in triage.

 

[quatona]

I generally do that based on how much of an effect they can have on the outcome.

I guess I wasn´t clear. Where are we looking when determining the outcome? At what point in time do we measure the outcome?
(And, on another note, to which degree are the outcomes of an action predictable, anyways?).

Doctors do it all the time in triage.

Sure, everybody does it all the time. I didn´t mean to single you out or something.

 

[Tiberius]

When determining the outcome, we are extrapolating possibilities based on the evidence we have access to and making educated guesses about the likelihood of different outcomes based on that evidence.

For example, if I see a car with aleaking fuel tank and sparking wires, I'm going to guess that explosion is a much more likely outcome than the car being trampled by an African elephant that recently escaped from a circus.

 

[quatona]

When determining the outcome, we are extrapolating possibilities based on the evidence we have access to and making educated guesses about the likelihood of different outcomes based on that evidence.

We are still focussing on selected aspects. Not that I know an alternative to doing so, but unlike you I find this method not completely satisfactory, and I can´t say I am able to solve all ethical questions simply by thinking in terms of greater harm or good.

For example, if I see a car with aleaking fuel tank and sparking wires, I'm going to guess that explosion is a much more likely outcome than the car being trampled by an African elephant that recently escaped from a circus.

Yes, of course, we can come up with completely unrelated issues that are unlikely to have any ad hoc relevance on a certain question. That´s not really a good argument against there being issues that are indeed interconnected, against there being potential effects that we simply ignore or can´t even conceive of at that moment.

 

[MarcusHill]

There is no absolute way to quantify the "harm" of an action. What if various options in a given situation would inflict varying degrees of physical, psychological and social harm on someone? How do you decide which is "most harmful"? It's entirely subjective, and in some cases not to a trivial degree. For example, I would regard someone losing their belief in the supernatural as being a great benefit. Many Christians would consider such loss of faith as harmful.

 

[jayem]

As an atheist, I get my morality from two simple rules. Now, I'm not saying that all atheists get their morality like this, but this is how I get mine:

1. If it hurts someone or disadvantages someone, then it is immoral (unless it is to save a person from greater harm, such as breaking someone's arm to get them out of a crashed car that's about to explode).
2. if it involves someone without their permission, then it is immoral (again, unless it is for the greater good, like giving an unconscious person a drug that can save their life).

So far I have not encountered a situation that I haven't been able to handle according to these rules.

Is this a valid way to determine morality?

Technically, you seem to be a deontologist, in that you have rules. But your rules have a utilitarian base, since you will determine the greater good. And operationally, you care a casuist, in that you recognize the necessity of making moral decisions on a case by case basis. Which I totally agree with.

Though your two rules, as written, seem only to deal with situations involving persons. Moral dilemmas can involve other entities, i.e., the environment. Suppose a technology was found to greatly increase the power of batteries. Vehicles, and even factories could be completely powered without petroleum fuels. But the technology required a rare-earth element, the mining of which would destroy the habitats of many plant and animal species. How would you decide the "greater good?"

 

[The Nihilist]

As an atheist, I get my morality from two simple rules. Now, I'm not saying that all atheists get their morality like this, but this is how I get mine:

1. If it hurts someone or disadvantages someone, then it is immoral (unless it is to save a person from greater harm, such as breaking someone's arm to get them out of a crashed car that's about to explode).
2. if it involves someone without their permission, then it is immoral (again, unless it is for the greater good, like giving an unconscious person a drug that can save their life).

So far I have not encountered a situation that I haven't been able to handle according to these rules.

Is this a valid way to determine morality?

The problem is that you've told a nice story about what not to do, but you haven't explained why this system is any more valid than mine, which is everything is permissible that can be gotten away with.

 

[Isambard]

As an atheist, I get my morality from two simple rules. Now, I'm not saying that all atheists get their morality like this, but this is how I get mine:

1. If it hurts someone or disadvantages someone, then it is immoral (unless it is to save a person from greater harm, such as breaking someone's arm to get them out of a crashed car that's about to explode).
2. if it involves someone without their permission, then it is immoral (again, unless it is for the greater good, like giving an unconscious person a drug that can save their life).

So far I have not encountered a situation that I haven't been able to handle according to these rules.

Is this a valid way to determine morality?

Externalities de-bunk your arguement