Is divine command ethics demonstrable/falsifiable?

[Lobster Johnson]

Now people can - out of pure self-interest - discover how to be "good" because "bad" behavior has consequences. It won't get them to heaven though. If you care about that, you've got to go to the word of the creator of the universe.

Is getting to heaven 'good' or 'bad?' Would caring about getting to heaven be about of self-interest, or not?

 

[variant]

I think this is a good reply. Indeed, premising a position on the ability to redefine a word is chimerical. If goodness means something then it can't be arbitrarily changed.

If the creature "thrives by x," then x is good for the creature. The presence of antifragility wouldn't change the meaning of goodness. All you've really said is, "But consider the possibility in which what is good is counter-intuitive." The basic definition remains intact, and is related to thriving.

No, what I am saying is that God can do whatever it wishes. If God decides that a species purpose is X he can create conditions for X to be the good, even ultimately if this means nothing to their thriving.

So, if humanity's ultimate purpose is to irradiate the earths crust, and God has deemed it will happen it will happen. Good in this case has nothing to do with what humanity wants (or even it's thriving) but ultimately humanity is designed to do it.

Sure such a God is quite evil from our perspective, but I don't see why that matters.

So the guy with the most power; the guy with the biggest club is the guy who gets to decide what is good?

Yes, ultimately God deciding what is Good Via divine command is a "might makes right" proposition.

If God ultimately were good (in the sense that it agreed with human thriving as a goal) this is a cherished part of theologies around the world. There would be an absolute and all powerful defender of the morality of believers. It's a selling point.

However, the theology generally also claims that God is "all powerful". So, If it has the power to dictate the "good" then it has the power to do so.

My position is that there isn't any reason to think that a God powerful enough to dictate the conditions of the universe can't ultimately arbitrate what the good is.

The opposed position is that the folks here seem to think that good needs to mean something relative to the living thing, but i am unconvinced because the I find it hard to imagine that all possible universal setups and Gods would necessarily be held to the perspective of one of their creations.

That rule that is being proposed here seems to be unlikely in that we would have to apply it to all possible Gods in all possible universes and all possible creations..

To me that just seems like the self centered thinking of a rather self important creation.

While I as a biological being freely admit that my view of "the good" has to do with survival and thriving, and that makes perfect sense to me, why should I assume God ultimately agrees with my position?

The yeast brewing wine for me in my carboy downstairs might imagine me to be a beneficent being too, giving them all the sugar they could ever desire, it doesn't mean that I value the yeast for the sake of the yeasts thriving rather than valuing wine.

The gap between me and some yeast is probably lower than the gap between me and A God that can do whatever it wishes.

 

[Al Touthentop]

Is getting to heaven 'good' or 'bad?' Would caring about getting to heaven be about of self-interest, or not?

I was talking about the sort of good and bad which man can discern for himself. Caring about heaven is probably good but not all religions teach it and it isn't a prerequisite for acting "good" because it results in better consequences than "bad" acts.

 

[muichimotsu]

Yet I stick with my comment, death bad, you diecide what it is to you.

Having had to euthanize 2 cats I deeply appreciated in my life, I can understand that it felt bad, but by your own Christian perspective, can you not simultaneously mourn the death of a faithful believer, but ALSO be happy they are in heaven (assuming that's even remotely the exact afterlife model that is in the Bible, it seems to vary)?

 

[muichimotsu]

That wasn't my cause at all. For one I don't think the bible requires defending. It can defend itself fine if only people read it. Most people present their apologetic without regard for the scripture.

I was presenting my own personal opinion as that seemed the appropriate thing for this topic.

Why even bother trying to elaborate in any sense to seem substantive when your standard is effectively shifting any burden away from yourself onto a book as if it's somehow self evident when by your own admission people can mistakenly interpret it, but also YOUR interpretation is the right one because...Holy Spirit ad hoc rationalization?

 

[muichimotsu]

Funny thing how they have no explanation for life but they are sure God is superstition. That type illogical view screams, "In the end I'm just here to say God doesn't exist"

I didn't expect you to make my point so perfectly, and with the first reply.

We have explanations for life, you finding them insufficient is based on faulty reasoning that life must be eternal to have value

And also, even if we didn't have an explanation for life, that doesn't validate your explanation, that's textbook argument from ignorance

It can appear that way when you presuppose God's existence as a self evident fact, but that's not how a rational argument works

If you want to mischaracterize me as absolutely certain rather than making a demonstration, then you're proving how disingenuous your discussions have been, not caring about truth, merely dogma

 

[muichimotsu]

We have scientific laws stating that some effect must have a cause.
And we have scientific observation confirming this.

To claim that something exists without a primary cause is religion
because it has no scientific basis.

[/QUOTE]
Religion is making a claim that's unfalsifiable, science is not making a claim that the universe exists without a cause, it merely says we cannot get to an absolute answer, because we don't have sufficient evidence to conclude anything like that, the Big Bang effectively our stopping point for now and technically a cause for the universe as we observe it, but not necessarily the universe in its entirety as a sequence.

Existence is good. Destruction is bad.

You can keep asserting that, you haven't backed it up, while I've brought examples that show destruction can and is beneficial, even if sometimes, I will admit it can be damaging, but that's not a conclusion that it is ALWAYS bad, only that depending on circumstances, it has bad effects. You know how our hands are formed in the womb? Apoptosis, selective destruction of cells to form the digits, destruction even by scientific observations, is not innately damaging, because it demonstrably is involved in the process that allows us to have fingers.

Existence does not always have consciousness behind it and thus not even intent, so our perception is all we'd have in regards to assessing something like the weather, which can destroy, but also encourage generation of life. Your specific claim should be something more like generation/creation is good, destruction is bad, but you're still not offering evidence for it, just the bald assertion, which is intellectually lazy

 

[muichimotsu]

They are both good. Existence and the process of creation.
Destruction is bad as is the result, also bad.

Existence necessitates creation and destruction, the latter is not antithetical or its own thing, you're still creating standards that are neither realistic nor demonstrable.

Destruction is not universally bad, I've demonstrated as such, you're making a hasty generalization fallacy of composition, as if the parts must reflect the whole

Destruction (Satan) cannot even exist without good (creation) to work with.
Satan must have something to corrupt because he has no powers to create.

Never claimed destruction exists in itself, I'm working on dialectical monism as a framework, where destruction and generation/creation complement each other in a cycle of balance, whereas you're falsely polarizing the situation as if destruction is just innately wrong with no evidence

I glad I could help! What you got?

I clearly have more intellectual honesty when I'm not making dogmatic claims of truth, whereas that's all you seem to have, based in presuppositions that you haven't supported

 

[muichimotsu]

Why did you capitalize God in your post?

I don't pretend to have consistency in regards to referring to a deity, sometimes it's a force of habit in regards to context, but that doesn't mean I afford the Christian deity more respect or whatever else you may insinuate

 

[muichimotsu]

Not really. My faith is just as unprovable as yours. You attempt to defend the so-called rational based on hand-wavy standards of truth. Unless you're Socrates or Aristotle, I doubt you are going to properly defend your own philosophy to any standard that hasn't already been done first and generally better.

I didn't say I could prove my claims, that's a mathematical constraint, I'm saying I can demonstrate it, the words don't mean the same thing with proper context applied

And now you're just appealing to authority, as if they are remotely correct because of who they are rather than the merit of their arguments

So you already admit then that your belief is just as unsupportable as mine and because yours is without proof just as mine is. However, I think my "truth" has evidence. Mine is backed by eyewitness testimony of a risen Christ. There's more evidence that Christ lived and was crucified and resurrected than your (probable) belief that Pythagoras lived. You accept his existence (I do too) on far less evidence than the evidence that Jesus lived and was resurrected.

Again, not claiming proof, that's not something I use outside of the proper context where it actually has specific meaning instead of unrealistic standards applied to things we cannot be absolutely certain on

Funny you put truth in quotations, as if you implicitly acknowledge it's not demonstrable, just "reasonable" in your perspective.

Eyewitness testimony of people talked about by those that already were convinced of the claims, and with no independent corroboration historically.

You can claim such a thing about Jesus, but historical evidence in regards to someone's existence is not the same as philosophical demonstration that events attributed to their lives or positions they held are actually true, that stands on its own merit

I'm not arguing any doctrine. He was crucified and over 500 witnesses saw him alive after having witnessed him die on a cross. For the purpose of this discussion, fling out all religious doctrines. Doesn't matter to me. He lived, he was prophesied to arrive in the time of the Roman Empire over 500 years before there was a Roman empire and those texts are verified to have been written long before Jesus was born. Those texts also tell us what he would say when he got here. That cannot be explained by any earthly, rational standard other than somebody was able to see the future and write it down. Compared to modern so-called climate experts, I'd say we can assert that the bible is far more reliable than any scientific text.

That's one source claiming the 500 witnesses and none are remotely named, it's just a big number, seemingly just to puff up the authority rather than substantiating it in any way, even naming a few of the witnesses

If you're invoking prophecy, you're necessarily invoking a religious perspective in interpreting it as something true and conveyed by the divine. Demonstrating something's truth shouldn't rely on superstition and faulty inference based on irrational conflation rather than demonstrating causation.

The reliability of something is not based on how you can interpret it to fit a convenient conclusion that requires more unfalsifiable claims of inspiration and the divine, but whether it's self correcting, falsifiable and demonstrable in the model it proposes. Expertise does not indicate the claims are unassailably true, you're still making appeal to authority instead of the merits of teh arguments themselves, among other fallacies, like ad populum

It's my argument and its my opinion. I get to present it however I'd like. It was my infallibility that I laid out there, not yours.

You didn't lay out infallibility, you didn't even support your claims, you just claimed they are fact based on limited information and faulty inferences therein.

You don't have a stable basis anyway. Your texts, your philosophies, your beliefs have so far been unable to provide any empirical evidence which is why you object to my reliance on the Bible. But I think I have the evidence on my side of the argument. When you can show me any "rational" evidence that your side of the argument has presented, showing that adherence to it gives me assurance of my "righteousness," I will consider it. Your "side," and forgive me for the convenient use of that word merely for the sake of this argument, cannot present any consistent list of what is good.

The Bible is not historically reliable except incidentally, we have examples where it directly contradicts secular history we can demonstrate through corroborated texts, particularly Herod's presence relative to the census of Quirinius (when Herod would've already been dead, historically speaking).

You can think you have the evidence, you have to first demonstrate it and not just in a fallacious conflation of incidental connections, but demonstrate a valid connection with sound facts.

Okay, pretty sure you just said you'd only acknowledge evidence that fits your preconception of good as righteousness, which is shifting the goalposts (if you even understand any of the fallacies I've presented as what your arguments consist of )

Goodness is not a substantive thing we can demonstrate like the weather, it's a property we ascribe to actions and effects, it's not going to be absolutely the case to conclude something is good in every context when it would be contradictory to suggest such things (it is not good that someone gets cancer, it can be good that they stop suffering when they die, even if death by trauma and murder is demonstrably bad rather than good)

Just take a look at foreign policy for instance. In many cases, the general proscription against murder is completely disregarded for the sake of "safety and security." Where a reasonable person would demand due process before people are murdered, governments (groups of so-called rational men) relax these standards because due process is determined to be inconvenient. If your side's philosophy were even remotely consistent, this would not be allowed.

I'm not saying I support any particular foreign policy, that's hardly germane to the topic at hand. People can be fallible, I never suggested otherwise, you're expecting perfection, unrealistic (see my signature for explanation further)

You're right. People can wrongly interpret the bible. But biblical prophecy is not vague. For instance, the Daniel prophecies which describe 500 years before there was a Roman empire, the Roman empire and its exact succession - ie; what empires would come before it and where their power centers would be.

Show me anywhere in the so-called rational world that we can find so accurate a prediction of geo-political changes. The rational world predicted that Hillary would be president in 2016.

Pretty sure scholarship disagrees with your claims, because the dating suggests Daniel is roughly from 200 BC, which is a little over a century before the Roman Empire historically came to be.

If you're just going to assume from information that already fits your preconception that the prophecy must be true, then you're being intellectually dishonest and lazy in saying that the prophecy is not vague and mistakenly claiming a date no one takes seriously. Also, pretty sure Daniel works in metaphorical language, which is not subject to some absolute interpretation, only working on particular assumptions within the framework.

People can be predictable, maybe. But this is putting the cart before the horse. You haven't read the bible and thus you assert that it was the later generations who made up the idea of the Messiah somehow conforming to the prior writings in a vague sense.

The description of the Messiah from a Jewish perspective was vastly different from the Christian one, but that doesn't lend more credence to the Christian one, because they're working on one interpretation. Also, yes, I have read the bible, you have no basis to conclude I haven't from a limited conversation

That is not what the bible describes at all. And it was so predictive that it even was able to remark on the soldiers who cast lots for Jesus' garments ~300 years or so before this happened. If it was only a year prior to the events, this would be astounding. It predicted that Jesus would be crucified before there was even such a thing as crucifixion.

As if casting lots for a dead person's garments was a new thing. And no, it isn't nearly so specific as saying crucifixion, that's a post hoc interpretation of the language to suggest that, but it doesn't necessarily claim anything as specific as crucifixion

That is your opinion, based on ignorance. I don't mean that to be insulting, but you haven't read the bible as is obvious by your characterization of it. I'm not saying this negates your arguments in general, just the ones which assert things about the bible.

Not agreeing with your biased characterization in no way means I have not read the bible, it means I'm not so credulous to just take particular preconceptions as true without questioning the validity of their reasoning, unlike yourself. If you could remotely demonstrate that your framework of interpretation is valid in itself rather than just being internally consistent to Christian presuppositionalism, then maybe I'd take it seriously, but you haven't done so

Actually, Jesus was happy to have people believe out of mere self-interest as long as they obeyed the commands he gave them. So it would seem he's more rational than most modern philosophers.

If anything, you've just admitted Jesus was effectively a totalitarian despot who didn't care about the merit of his arguments, only that people obeyed him, even if he knew some would just be selfish. And apparently, you're just dismissing Paul out of hand when it doesn't fit a notion that would make Jesus seem as authoritative as you want him to be

 

[muichimotsu]

I was talking about the sort of good and bad which man can discern for himself. Caring about heaven is probably good but not all religions teach it and it isn't a prerequisite for acting "good" because it results in better consequences than "bad" acts.

That's all we have, there is no way for us to determine some noumenon of goodness and badness, they're not concepts that subsist in themselves in nature, they're based on conception of a mind that can assess them

Not that you'd care about goodness and badness as anything more than an incidental means that aligns with the end of salvation, being in the right group rather than being right in itself

 

[Al Touthentop]

That's all we have, there is no way for us to determine some noumenon of goodness and badness, they're not concepts that subsist in themselves in nature, they're based on conception of a mind that can assess them

Not that you'd care about goodness and badness as anything more than an incidental means that aligns with the end of salvation, being in the right group rather than being right in itself

Your use of the term "accidental" is only appropriate for your side of the equation.

 

[muichimotsu]

Your use of the term "accidental" is only appropriate for your side of the equation.

Incidental was clearly what I said, not accidental, that's a difference of 2 letters and fairly distinct phonemes.

Not sure what you think my side of the equation is, but you've made plenty of assumptions already without substantiating them, why stop now?

 

[Al Touthentop]

Incidental was clearly what I said, not accidental, that's a difference of 2 letters and fairly distinct phonemes.

Not sure what you think my side of the equation is, but you've made plenty of assumptions already without substantiating them, why stop now?

Old man eyes. Apologies. That wasn't intentional and I don't really get the snarkiness. Why do you think that's necessary?

 

[muichimotsu]

Old man eyes. Apologies. That wasn't intentional and I don't really get the snarkiness. Why do you think that's necessary?

You've spoken as if you remotely understand where I'm coming from instead of actually asking because you're apparently so used to engaging with "atheists" based on preconceptions that doing otherwise messes with whatever tactics you use to shut them down in terms of having a reasonable discussion.

You're utterly convinced of your position and based on what you admit can be seen as, to paraphrase, insane, yet that's all that seems to matter, any critical thinking is seemingly out the window because that's not as important as whatever standard you're using to determine the Bible's accuracy in any way that isn't purely subjective

When the common attitude of Christians is condescension, one tends to develop some method of dealing with it and that can come out as such in my posts, because I rarely see someone that's willing to be intellectually honest and not work in assumptions to make excuses for why their faith has to work on different rules that necessarily exclude any other worldview. And you seem remarkably similar in the fundamentalist angle of the bible being true because of some notion that it "makes sense to you" and other people just "don't get it"

 

[Al Touthentop]

You've spoken as if you remotely understand where I'm coming from instead of actually asking because you're apparently so used to engaging with "atheists" based on preconceptions that doing otherwise messes with whatever tactics you use to shut them down in terms of having a reasonable discussion.

You asked. I never said a thing expecting you to conform to my thinking. I just explained my thinking. I didn't shut you down, call you stupid for what you believe, or try to coerce you to think like I think. I just explained why I decided to believe what I believe. I think there is enough internal evidence in the bible itself to prove that it is from God. You're trying to justify your antagonism by attributing to me things other people have done in conversations with you.

You're utterly convinced of your position and based on what you admit can be seen as, to paraphrase, insane, yet that's all that seems to matter, any critical thinking is seemingly out the window because that's not as important as whatever standard you're using to determine the Bible's accuracy in any way that isn't purely subjective

Now who is trying to force their point of view? I don't think my beliefs are without solid merit. I think that other people may call me crazy for what I believe. The point in making that statement (twice) was to let you know that I don't care how it makes me look to other people. That you reject what I consider obvious evidence, doesn't matter to me. I'm not here to convince you and never came into this thread to convince you. All I was attempting to do was point out my reasons for believing the word, knowing that you might mock these reasons and telling you that I didn't mind if you did. I still don't.

When the common attitude of Christians is condescension, one tends to develop some method of dealing with it and that can come out as such in my posts, because I rarely see someone that's willing to be intellectually honest and not work in assumptions to make excuses for why their faith has to work on different rules that necessarily exclude any other worldview. And you seem remarkably similar in the fundamentalist angle of the bible being true because of some notion that it "makes sense to you" and other people just "don't get it"

Condescension ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Just trying to help you out in recognizing it.

 

[muichimotsu]

You asked. I never said a thing expecting you to conform to my thinking. I just explained my thinking. I didn't shut you down, call you stupid for what you believe, or try to coerce you to think like I think. I just explained why I decided to believe what I believe. I think there is enough internal evidence in the bible itself to prove that it is from God. You're trying to justify your antagonism by attributing to me things other people have done in conversations with you.

You can think it, that isn't the same as substantiating it. Would you just think there's enough evidence for a barely tested drug and take that on the same standard as you do the bible? I somewhat doubt it

Now who is trying to force their point of view? I don't think my beliefs are without solid merit. I think that other people may call me crazy for what I believe. The point in making that statement (twice) was to let you know that I don't care how it makes me look to other people. That you reject what I consider obvious evidence, doesn't matter to me. I'm not here to convince you and never came into this thread to convince you. All I was attempting to do was point out my reasons for believing the word, knowing that you might mock these reasons and telling you that I didn't mind if you did. I still don't.

Again, your credulity is not evidence of the truth of the claims anymore than being convinced of any conclusion by rhetoric and fallacy means it's actually justified to be true.

The old evangelical route then? Expecting your god to change my heart by planting figurative seeds? Am I getting warmer?

 

[Al Touthentop]

You can think it, that isn't the same as substantiating it. Would you just think there's enough evidence for a barely tested drug and take that on the same standard as you do the bible? I somewhat doubt it

The prophecies in the bible are enough empirical evidence for me. That it isn't for you is alright with me. Why would I waste time continuing to point out what I've already pointed out.

Again, your credulity is not evidence of the truth of the claims anymore than being convinced of any conclusion by rhetoric and fallacy means it's actually justified to be true.

The old evangelical route then? Expecting your god to change my heart by planting figurative seeds? Am I getting warmer?

All you're doing is trying to bait me. Why, I don't know. Night.

 

[Kenny'sID]

Having had to euthanize 2 cats I deeply appreciated in my life, I can understand that it felt bad, but by your own Christian perspective, can you not simultaneously mourn the death of a faithful believer, but ALSO be happy they are in heaven (assuming that's even remotely the exact afterlife model that is in the Bible, it seems to vary)?

I do, but that doesn't make death good. It was intended a bad thing and it is just that.

 

[Kenny'sID]

We have explanations for life,

I'm listening.