Can there be morality without God?

[BucksWordBearer]

An entire universe of energy has erupted into space and time and changed form through eternal processes incalculable times in incalculable space through incalculable individual occurrences, through the births and deaths of stars to give rise to sapient conscious beings that can articulate and define the parameters of their own existence through the interaction of various chemical forms and the exchanges of energy that will never cease to be but sill simply move to a form that no longer supports that conscious viewing of the universe by itself. My right eye and left eye are made of the particles of separate stars, and you can't muster the emotion to understand why that's valuable?

Sorry I'm not going to lie an emotionless star isn't going to care how it's "energy" is being used nor does anything other than humans care for the birth and existence of "life". Why is non life not valuable?

I'm sorry if I can't understand but regardless even if I did I'm not careless enough to think my petty emotions SHOULD drive my morality. Ever heard of stoic philosophy? Emotions hinder logical thought.

To you. What is ''God's will'' to you is different than what is ''God's will' to others. And you have no real measuring stick against which to compare and contrast and deduce which morality truly is cosmically correct. That's because the APPLICATION of faux-objectivity to what is essentially subjective and interpreted by you in subjective ways is just that; exchanging ''my morality says'' for ''God's morality says''

Okay I'm going to say this one last time. Irrelevant of if my interpretation (Which I think with average research into the Greek and Hebrew languages and a good lexicon you can arrive at with ease) there still exists the correct one and even with this my God's will still exists and even if not one human can reach that correct interpretation (Or even bothers to interpret God's will) morality is still objective and universal since God's will is equal to morality essentially.

About your little comment "Then you don't listen to the bible you profess to follow." I think you got confused here. Empathy exists in the bible and it definitely is considered a good thing from a biblical eye piece BUT the thing is my justification for morality does not lay in empathy. Empathy is good BECAUSE God wills it to be good. You're saying empathy is good because you like empathy personally and it FEELS good.

"If people can't grasp it or identify it then its existence is irrelevant in real world APPLICABILITY" I'm not saying people can't I'm saying if people cannot comprehend the word of God morality still exists regardless if it "APPLICABLE" to the real world. This is beyond the scope of the argument that is being had and morality will be very much "APPLICABLE" in judgement times in the Christian standpoint if that was to happen.

"Yet you don't know what God's will objectively is, nor does any other Christian for that matter." How do you KNOW (100% certainty) that I do not or ANYONE in this world does not know what God's will is? You've made quite a claim which will require great proof.

"Because moral nihilism asserts life is meaningless. I don't believe that's true. You seem to believe that life has no meaning without God. I disagree with that in its entireity." Not exactly, moral nihilism asserts that there is no meaning in the scope of morality, not everything itself.

"We, as humans, look up to the cosmos and in having the ability for self realization, an evolutionary trait that allows us to survive, a somewhat cruel price to pay for survival I must say, we cannot often stand the idea that the universe doesn't care about us. I simply don't believe it has to. The universe is indifferent to us, it's big and bad and harsh, and there is no God." Not going to lie I, as a human do not care for the cosmos itself. There is no realization, there is no meaning to live or die you simply live. The only meaning that exists by your standards is self made and by my definition of meaning would mean that it in itself is meaningless since it didn't exist before your existence. The universe isn't conscious or at least I believe that, I couldn't go out and say I know that for certain since I also cannot prove that my keyboard doesn't have a conscious.

"You can't handle that, so you grasp to the idea of some benevolent loving creator God who's going to make it all okay. I don't. That doesn't mean I have no purpose. Purpose has never been offered to me in some confession chamber. In realizing the universe is utterly indifferent to me, I realize it all the more truly and vividly that from it I forge my own purpose. I realize that the universe pays no attention to me, thus those living upon this world are all that matter within it."

It is not my preference but God's preference the only preference that should matter. If purpose is self made then I wouldn't call it purpose. The "stardust" as you would call it does not care nor has any will when you were created from it. It exists because it exists. I don't think you should really care if you have a purpose or not from you point of view, there are no shackles after all, you're not restricted to a purpose.

Sorry for my layout I'm not use to debating in forums.

Cheers.

 

[ThinkForYourself]

God's will equals What is right, the rejection of Gods will is wrong. Therefore in a Christians eyes you cannot have morality since without God there exists no such thing as 'morality'.

That means Christians are the equivalent of dogs. They don't jump on the chesterfield because they're told not to, but they have no idea why. So, how can you judge God to be moral, when you admit you don't know what is moral and what is not?

This is one of the main reasons Secular Morality is superior to biblical morality. I've used reason and evidence to create a moral system. I can judge if God is moral.

 

[BucksWordBearer]

I don't jump on the chesterfield because of various circumstantial reasons, this isn't a moral question though and these reasons would be mostly up to my feelings or what I myself wanted to achieve by not jumping on said field. There are two types of right and wrong. One is moral. The other is amoral and is simply the right move in a game of chess. I KNOW what morality is like I've told the other person. I define morality as the will of God (Divine command theory). So I haven't admitted that I don't know what morality is. I cannot judge God since God is inherently moral by this definition it is logically incoherent to say God is evil by using this definition.

There is no clear justification for Secular morality. Moral nihilism is the most objective ethical view an secular person can adopt. Moral systems are not created from reason and especially not evidence they are meant to be axiomatic. They are self evident.

 

[ethicsguy]

I don't jump on the chesterfield because of various circumstantial reasons, this isn't a moral question though and these reasons would be mostly up to my feelings or what I myself wanted to achieve by not jumping on said field. There are two types of right and wrong. One is moral. The other is amoral and is simply the right move in a game of chess. I KNOW what morality is like I've told the other person. I define morality as the will of God (Divine command theory). So I haven't admitted that I don't know what morality is. I cannot judge God since God is inherently moral by this definition it is logically incoherent to say God is evil by using this definition.

There is no clear justification for Secular morality. Moral nihilism is the most objective ethical view an secular person can adopt. Moral systems are not created from reason and especially not evidence they are meant to be axiomatic. They are self evident.

You cannot blatently ignore half of the planet's population simply because you are not aware of its existence. As stated, there IS JUSTIFICATION for secular morality. Look up the ethical system found within Confucianism [not a religion, a way to live life]. Their moral system IS BASED ON REASON. Your ethnocentric beliefs does not simply make morality based on reason disappear from the populations of the world.

 

[ThinkForYourself]

... I KNOW what morality is like I've told the other person. I define morality as the will of God (Divine command theory).

So, you blindly accept some other entities moral judgement. You accept it without evidence and without question, based on what an ignorant goat herder (no slight intended, just the fact of the matter) wrote in a book 2000 years ago.

Surely you can see how ridiculous that sounds.

So I haven't admitted that I don't know what morality is. I cannot judge God since God is inherently moral by this definition it is logically incoherent to say God is evil by using this definition.

You have no idea if something is moral. You've already admitted that you have to ask your God.

Anything you claim is immoral, your God can override, and then you will say it is moral.

There is no clear justification for Secular morality. Moral nihilism is the most objective ethical view an secular person can adopt. Moral systems are not created from reason and especially not evidence they are meant to be axiomatic. They are self evident.

Secular morality allows me to judge if a given action is moral, and helps me decide on the most moral action in a given situation.

With your system, by your own admission, you have to ask your God if something is moral, or what the moral thing to do is. And no matter what he says, no matter how immoral his advice, you have to accept is as moral.

Secular morality is plainly superior.

 

[BucksWordBearer]

" The story goes that if a child were to fall into a well would not your first thought to be to go to assist that child? He concludes therefore that this empathetic thought is instinct. If it is instinct than the human being is born "good." He concludes than that evil comes into our lives from us not being deligent about staying and cultivating this good."

I've never looked into Confucianism but from what you've told me I can tell you it's not a justification in your secular eye piece for morality. Empathy isn't universal and you're concluding that empathy is basically morality. A socio-path does not experience empathy, many are born that way. Also on instinct we also have a lot of other instincts that are actually quite horrid, there's a reason there's been a vast amount of wars in our small history, instincts are ALL survival mechanisms they've got nothing to do with being "moral".

 

[BucksWordBearer]

"So, you blindly accept some other entities moral judgement. You accept it without evidence and without question, based on what an ignorant goat herder (no slight intended, just the fact of the matter) wrote in a book 2000 years ago.

Surely you can see how ridiculous that sounds."

It requires no evidence it is inherently by definition moral. Not everything uses induction my friend. Also the bible is a collection of multiple texts with multiple manuscripts behind every text it's not a singular book.

"You have no idea if something is moral. You've already admitted that you have to ask your God.

Anything you claim is immoral, your God can override, and then you will say it is moral."

I don't have to ask my God, there is already enough moral law covered in the bible. His will in unchanging. Morality is reflected in the nature of God himself.

"Secular morality allows me to judge if a given action is moral, and helps me decide on the most moral action in a given situation.

With your system, by your own admission, you have to ask your God if something is moral, or what the moral thing to do is. And no matter what he says, no matter how immoral his advice, you have to accept is as moral.

Secular morality is plainly superior." Again by definition God cannot will anything that is immoral because his will itself is what is moral and of course you don't have to ask God because it's just your own inner personal preferences not anything of actual value. No wonder you think secular "morality" is superior anything that goes against your feelings is "evil" it's all up to you you're right, all up to emotionally charged you.

 

[True Scotsman]

Without God people are left to decide what is wrong or right. That sounds great to many people because they know what is wrong and right. Oddly, people seldom agree on this. Furthermore, when people gain power over others their view of right and wrong tends to change to right being whatever protects their power or grants them more power. Historical cases of this are:

Ukraine Famine | United Human Rights Council

and

Chronology of Mass Killings during the Chinese Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) - Online Encyclopedia of Mass Violence

Religious death tolls happen, but they tend to be relatively small and with good reason, ie crusades to kick out foreign invaders from Europe or the inquisition to root out subversive elements of society ie Kabbalists who were accused of sacrificing Christian children.

Can people have a code of values to guide their actions and choices without a god. Why yes they can and not only that, such a thing is a necessity whether there is a god or not. And if their purpose is living on this Earth then it had better be an objective one.

 

[ThinkForYourself]

It requires no evidence it is inherently by definition moral.

So if someone defines the holocaust as moral, it is moral? That makes no sense.

I don't have to ask my God, there is already enough moral law covered in the bible. His will in unchanging. Morality is reflected in the nature of God himself.

My point stands. You have said your God decides what is moral or immoral, and that you blindly accept that.

That means you can tell me something is immoral, God then tell's you it's moral, and your opinion on that moral issue will swing 180 degrees. Whether God actually tells you to change your mind about a moral issue is immaterial.

You can dress it up however you want, but by your own words your moral system is blind obedience, with no more understanding than a dog who is told not jump on the chesterfield.

Again by definition God cannot will anything that is immoral because his will itself is what is moral and of course you don't have to ask God because it's just your own inner personal preferences not anything of actual value.

You can't just define what is moral and that makes it so. Does that mean if someone defines the holocaust as moral, it is moral?

No wonder you think secular "morality" is superior anything that goes against your feelings is "evil" it's all up to you you're right, all up to emotionally charged you.

That's what I would expect you to think. Your lack of a moral system, other than blind obedience, makes it difficult for you to understand what an actual moral system is, and how it is used.

Here are some links that will help you:

Easy to watch video. This presentation is conducted in a Church, and being presented to Christians.:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjbdWGre370


And The Moral Landscape

 

[stevevw]

The JudeoChristian God, or any God or religion for that matter, has never had a monopoly on morality. Morality predates religion, most definitely.

The point is the bible states that all people have the law of God written on their hearts. So no matter who may have attempted to come up with some form of moral code this was just playing around with Gods laws and changing them to suit their situation.

The earliest records of people come from around the middle east so this is where the bible starts anyway. The bible states that the 10 commandments were around before they were handed down to Moses. But the 10 commandments were directly given by God to Moses and written in stone as a way to say they are forever.

As for wrong and right changing, even the Christian ideals of right and wrong have changed. At one point it was acceptable to stone a witch; beat your wife; have concubines as well as a wife; to torture heretics.

The Christian laws have not been changed. The stoning of a witch was a sentence of death for the belief that witches cast spells to kill people. So the moral was thou shall not kill which is the same today. Even if there were some who tortured people wrongly they didn't represent the actual law of God. They took things into their own hands and added man made interpretations of what was right and wrong. A bit like subjective morality today. Just because religion is linked to wrong acts to justify it being right doesn't mean it is truly right and comes from God.

Christian morality is by no means unchanging or objective, no more so than any other form of morality. in fact, although Christians often assert biblical morality as objective because it comes from God, what it actually comes from is the individual renderings of a text written and compiled and chosen from various texts, all themselves written by men.

The bible are a set of writings from the early church. The old testament are written before Christ and are even regarded as good historical texts that can be used to learn about our early history. The things written in the bible have been verified by archeology. People places and things that were regarded as myth have been found and have proven what the bible has said were true. The new testament are the writings about Jesus and the early church which much has also been verified by discoveries of artifacts and other non biblical writings and archeological finds. The supernatural things that Jesus did cannot be proven directly but we can have some circumstantial and indirect evidence to give it some credence.

So, if God does give doen moralities, they can never be objective and unchanging because the interpreter will always colour the text with his or her own perception. That's why some Christian sects believe in self-flaggelation, while some don't. That's why some believe contraception is okay, and others don't. That's why some believed in leading Crusades and Inquisitions, and some didn't.

The bible itself and the teachings of Christ which is the fullfillment of all the laws and morals in the bible are consistent and have neevr changed. Anything like self-flaggelation is an addition which has been added by people based on their interpretation and not Gods. In other words its not in the bible under Gods law. So even if you regard the bible to come from man it hasn't changed anyway.

 

[only a sojourner]

For the atheists: If you are truly honest doesn't atheism lead to nihilism? How can there be any objective moraility? You and various others may come to some consensus that you would prefer to live under some form of "humanism" but even here there is wide diversity among atheists as to what this means in practical application. A Marxist and a follower of Ayn Rand would come to very different conclusions on many aspects of how society should be arranged and how people should treat each other. But behind it all there is absolutely nothing extrinsically wrong with cutting a persons throat for the sheer pleasure and exhileration of doing so.

 

[Kiritsugu Emiyah]

For the atheists: If you are truly honest doesn't atheism lead to nihilism. How can there be any objective moraility? You and various others may come to some consensus that you would prefer to live under some form of "humanism" but even here there is wide diversity among atheists as to what this means in practical application. A Marxist and a follower of Ayn Rand would come to very different conclusions on many aspects of how society should be arranged and how people should treat each other. But behind it all there is absolutely nothing extrinsically wrong with cutting a persons throat for the sheer pleasure and exhileration of doing so.

I am an atheist, there is no such thing as objective morality and I agree with MORAL nihilism (that is to say that morality is a human construct and nothing is inherently right or wrong).

None of these conclusions need to be avoided, they are not an obvious dilemma that needs to be answered. Would I cut someones throat? No I would not and do I want my throat cut? No I do not... does that make it inhherently right or wrong? Only if my desires establish those things and they do not.

Morality posits thats there is some inherent right or wrong quality to an action when the truth is we just dont like those things and because we simply do not like those things... morality is not what it presents itself to be. Morality is a false endeavor that leads you to think that your desires and feelings are proof of how everyone else should act and only because its what you want. Is that frightening? It can be, but that doesn't change that that's all it is.

Your fears don't prove anything except what you want and that shouldnt be proof of right and wrong. It's not. We made up those words so that people would stop hurting us and to make ourselves happy. We should acknowledge what we did. Morality is fake.

 

[GrimKingGrim]

For the atheists: If you are truly honest doesn't atheism lead to nihilism.

No.

How can there be any objective moraility?

There isn't.

You and various others may come to some consensus that you would prefer to live under some form of "humanism" but even here there is wide diversity in what this means in practical application.

Because growth in a social structure demands cooperation with one another for growth. This includes humans.

A Marxist and a follower of Ayn Rand would come to very different conclusions on many aspects of how society should be arranged and how people should treat each other.

Who's on record of being both of those?

But behind it all there is absolutely nothing extrinsically wrong with cutting a persons throat for the sheer pleasure and exhilaration of doing so

You're seriously starting to sound like William Lane Craig. We as a society deemed it wrong to do that because having people think that that is an unpunishable offense is a recipe for chaos.

We established laws very early on in order to help build a structure. One of the earliest known is the Code of Hammurabi and SURPRISE it doesn't say "meh, whatever. There's no god anyway. Do as you please" It has rules and code in order to foster structure and order. We established a hierachy because amongst any group there's someone who's very intelligent and is capable of leading.

This type of hierachal structure is displayed in the animal kingdom as well. Animals travel in packs together and there is generally a leader and hierarchy.

This was evident even before us as homosapians we've found primitive pre humans who buried their dead and built small societies together.

My favorite example of this are Ants. They are the most well organized militia based society you'll ever see outside of humanity. They all know their role and work in order to build the colony and a home for their people. And it's a strict hierarchy too. They know how to treat their own. They know distinct military tactics in order to fight off enemies or go get food. They have order.

We're just like every other animal with a social structure. We as a collective have established what WE think is harmful to our society and what WE think is beneficial to our society. Some want to pin the credit on holy books that were made far after. But it is just instinctive in a social animal. If we didn't act as a collective to establish order we'd all die against the elements.

Or in short: United we stand; Divided we fall.

 

[SteveB28]

For the atheists: If you are truly honest doesn't atheism lead to nihilism.

Why should it? Atheism is simply the rejection of other people's claims. And those claims are made entirely in an unsupported fashion. How does the atheist's position, then, lead to a philosophy of dictating that life has no meaning?

How can there be any objective moraility?

This is now a separate question.

 

[Kiritsugu Emiyah]

Why should it? Atheism is simply the rejection of other people's claims. And those claims are made entirely in an unsupported fashion. How does the atheist's position, then, lead to a philosophy of dictating that life has no meaning?



This is now a separate question.

Well I do think my lack of belief in authoritative and designing deities coaxed me along to concluding that I don't really have a purpose for being here, that none of this was really designed or destined and there was no intent involved, any intent or purpose we had to create ourselves and since that's the case... how can we assert that anything really is really right or wrong? We're using our own fears, desires and needs to establish that and should we? I don't think so.

I do think MORAL Nihilism is a predictable outcome of atheism, though moral nihilism is not the conclusion that life has no meaning and that we won't have any concern over what we do or do to others. I desire to take care of myself and I desire to take care of my loved ones... that puts me in the same place as everyone else and I didn't need morality in order to get there.

 

[only a sojourner]

Obviously GrimkingGrim social cohesion or some form of social contract appeals to you. You could however chose not value social cohesion or adopt a morality of selfishly exploiting other people to enhance your own personal interests or your could decide to become a philanthropist selflessly giving to others even at the expense of your own comfort and wellbeing, An atheist it seems to me must create value and meaning since there is no extrinsic value or meaning. Basically anything and everything is allowed. An atheist can construct whatever moral systems appeals to them or strikes their fancy.

 

[GrimKingGrim]

Obviously GrimkingGrim social cohesion or some form of social contract appeals to you. You could however chose not value social cohesion or adopt a morality of selfishly exploiting other people to enhance your own personal interests or your could decide to become a philanthropist selflessly giving to others even at the expense of your own comfort and wellbeing, An atheist it seems to me must create value and meaning since there is no extrinsic value or meaning. Basically anything and everything is allowed. An atheist can construct whatever moral systems appeals to them or strikes their fancy.

You're right. You're right. What's wrong with that? Please, enlighten me.

There are people who haven't given much to charity and chooses to work on themselves like myself. I don't have money to give so I keep it to me. I work and pay bills and get taxes taken outta my check.

 

[Kiritsugu Emiyah]

Obviously GrimkingGrim social cohesion or some form of social contract appeals to you. You could however chose not value social cohesion or adopt a morality of selfishly exploiting other people to enhance your own personal interests or your could decide to become a philanthropist selflessly giving to others even at the expense of your own comfort and wellbeing, An atheist it seems to me must create value and meaning since there is no extrinsic value or meaning. Basically anything and everything is allowed. An atheist can construct whatever moral systems appeals to them or strikes their fancy.

as frightening as that may seem, there is no alternative. Time to come to grips

 

[only a sojourner]

I was once close to being an atheist and plumbed the depths of nihilism and existentialism. I t was through God's mercy, love and miraculous intervention that I am where I am today. Knowing what I know it would extemely foolish to turn my back on God's grace. Truth will not be found or comprehended through argument. I could debate these topics ad infinitum. Understanding comes through revelation and a personal experience of God's grace and power. My purpose here was to show the lack of foundation behind humanism and how atheism devolves into moral nihilism. Seek God with your whole heart and I believe you will find him.

 

[GrimKingGrim]

My purpose here was to show the lack of foundation behind humanism and how atheism devolves into moral nihilism.

You did a poor job presenting that argument.