The Evolution of Morality

[Oncedeceived]

The same way any other trait arises - by being refined through selection pressure. Just like speed, physical prowess, potent venom, etc. Having some smarts is useful for survival - having lots of smarts is very useful for survival.

Sorry this doesn't cut it. You can't have smarts until something gives rise to it. You can't refine something that doesn't exist. You can't get intelligence from speed, physical prowess or potent venom. Survival does not create intelligence.

Like I've shown, the basis for a form of morality can be seen in the behavior that animals living in large groups must develop towards one-another to maintain those groups.

Those types of behavior alone might not produce what you or I would regard as moral behavior. But it is not the only type of behavior that living creatures exhibit. Again I think you're assuming what you regard as morality is the intended outcome - it isn't, so you can't regard behavior inconsistent with your view of morality as examples of how it isn't possible.

So I am seeing a pattern in your view that is pointing to morality being a construct of man.

Group behavior is seen throughout the animal kingdom. Even fish and insects do it.

We see behavior in all life forms, bear in mind we often look at it through the lens of our own experiences and our own ideas about morality.

That's about the size of it. Ideas and concepts can't exist until they're invented. I don't regard morality has having some substantive existence independent of the minds of humans.

So morality is a human construct, is what I am getting here from our conversation. I am right?

Any living creature that puts itself between others and danger is showing a willingness to sacrifice its own safety for others. Like that video I showed you - only two of those buffaloes needed to come if it was purely familial self-interest, but the entire herd showed up.

It doesn't need to the way you're describing. But there are absolute truths - the math I posted. A is A. These are true independent of any naturalistic processes, so they don't need explaining by evolution or anything. There will always be some truths about how we interact.

Bravo! I totally agree, there are truths that are absolute that are independent of any naturalistic processes! Those things that are absolute are engrained within the very fabric of the cosmos. Our universe is evidence of intelligence. The fine tuning of the parameters that allow life even to exist on this earth are testament to the fact that there are those true independent elements that defy natural processes to explain them.

Dunno. Maybe the earliest life didn't have it at all and was just one of many species that simply got lucky. Really primitive stuff might have relied purely on chemical reactions to take them towards sunlight, away from predatory cells, etc. The building blocks of survival behavior. It would have become more complex as life did.

Do you honestly feel that luck is the foundation of life, intelligence, morality, and love?

The former first.

Dunno. Some monkeys lie for their own benefit - they'll call out a snake warning to the rest of the group and then steal all the food that's left behind when they make for the trees. Though if they get caught they get beat up. Crime and punishment. So even at that level, living creatures can understand that bending the rules can benefit them, if they're willing to take the risk.

And maybe they were just really angry or frightened that their food was taken?

I hope I've been more clear with my thoughts with this post - I see morality as a set of ideas that humans invented, over a great deal of time, based on their group behavior and interactions with one-another.

However, if this is true, then morality is in the eye of the beholder and subjective to ones own set of morals that may not be to another. We see this isn't true, because people all over the world think certain things are universally wrong.

I understand that position. Question - assuming that's actually correct, where did God get this morality he engrained into life from?

From His own Character.

No reason why we couldn't, as I said.

I see natural explanations as more reasonable and more plausible than supernatural ones. I've seen plenty of natural explanations for the world around us verified, but I've yet to see any example of the supernatural at work. If you feel they're equivalent though, or that the supernatural is more likely than the natural, then we're probably stuck here - we each have explanations for morality that we think are more likely than the others.

That might be true. However, we still have to determine how intelligence which gives rise to your view of morality exists by naturalistic processes.

When behavior that benefits the species takes precedence over behavior that benefits the individual. At its core it's still a survival strategy, it just operates above the level of the individual.

Like I said, I think humans have added ideas and concepts to basic behavior to develop our morality - this is something that would have taken place over the course of our entire existence.

However, we have to go deeper in my opinion.

How do I know my view of the world doesn't require the supernatural? Because it operates under the premise that the supernatural does not exist. I've never encountered any compelling reason to think it does.

Yet.

 

[Ginger123]

You can't have smarts until something gives rise to it. You can't refine something that doesn't exist. You can't get intelligence from speed, physical prowess or potent venom. Survival does not create intelligence.

How does a craftsman teach an apprentice? how were you taught to speak English? bears teach it's young to catch fish,
were you born with a skill and speaking English? each generation learns from the last, if it doesn't it will not survive.

 

[Oncedeceived]

How does a craftsman teach an apprentice? how were you taught to speak English? bears teach it's young to catch fish,
were you born with a skill and speaking English? each generation learns from the last, if it doesn't it will not survive.

In each of these examples intelligence is present.

 

[ThinkForYourself]

...
However, if this is true, then morality is in the eye of the beholder and subjective to ones own set of morals that may not be to another. We see this isn't true, because people all over the world think certain things are universally wrong.
...

You are proof that morality is in the eye of the beholder.

The Old Testament is full of God performing or condoning what I would consider to be immoral acts, such as genocide, slavery, and misogyny.

Yet you claim that God is moral.

 

[Golden Yak]

Sorry this doesn't cut it. You can't have smarts until something gives rise to it. You can't refine something that doesn't exist. You can't get intelligence from speed, physical prowess or potent venom. Survival does not create intelligence.

Intelligence comes from the brain, a physical structure that can be refined like any other trait.

So I am seeing a pattern in your view that is pointing to morality being a construct of man.
So morality is a human construct, is what I am getting here from our conversation. I am right?

So it would seem.

Bravo! I totally agree, there are truths that are absolute that are independent of any naturalistic processes! Those things that are absolute are engrained within the very fabric of the cosmos. Our universe is evidence of intelligence. The fine tuning of the parameters that allow life even to exist on this earth are testament to the fact that there are those true independent elements that defy natural processes to explain them.

Hold your horses, you went off on some crazy tangents here. 'A' is what it is and is not what it is not - this doesn't call for a supernatural origin, it's true regardless of how it came to pass.

Switching over to the universe argument - natural processes exist to explain formation of stars and planets. In a universe of umpteeen zillion stars, there are some with worlds where the chemical reaction called life can take place.

You might be able to point out some things about physics we (or certainly me) don't understand sure, but just because we lack the capacity to explain them at present, and even if we can never explain them, there's no reason to jump to the idea of a supernatural being - it could simply be an element of nature we haven't yet explored.

Personally, the fine tuning argument doesn't do it for me - a supernatural creator wouldn't care about how strict the odds against life existing are or how the natural laws are stacked against it. An all-powerful creator could create people of living stone on planets of glass so far from the sun that hydrogen would freeze but have everything 'work', all in defiance of physical laws.

The balance in nature that allows for life as we understand to exist, with all of its intrict organic components operating in accordance with natural law, is exactly the way it would need to be if there were no supernatural being involved.

Do you honestly feel that luck is the foundation of life, intelligence, morality, and love?

If that's how it happened, that's how it happened - doesn't matter how anyone 'feels.'

And maybe they were just really angry or frightened that their food was taken?

Which is an incentive to punish behavior that causes those feelings. The foundations of justice!

However, if this is true, then morality is in the eye of the beholder and subjective to ones own set of morals that may not be to another. We see this isn't true, because people all over the world think certain things are universally wrong.

Like I said earlier, there are certain truths about how we interact - life is generally preferable to death, safety is preferable to stress, etc. It's not surprising that certain patterns of behavior would crop up. And all human nations are descended from a single source, so it stands to reason that certain shared behaviors and ideas that allowed those first people to thrive would be passed along to their descendants.

From His own Character.

So He invented it from Himself, without any outside source.

That might be true. However, we still have to determine how intelligence which gives rise to your view of morality exists by naturalistic processes.

I don't think the supernatural is any more necessary to explain intelligence than it is to explain the other traits I mentioned earlier.

However, we have to go deeper in my opinion.

Why?

Yet.

Sure. It's really easy to change my mind - I just need some examples of the supernatural that cannot be misconstrued as human ignorance, wishful thinking, or superstition. Then I would change my views.

What would it take for you to change your view?

 

[Ginger123]

How does a craftsman teach an apprentice? how were you taught to speak English? bears teach it's young to catch fish,
were you born with a skill and speaking English? each generation learns from the last, if it doesn't it will not survive.

In each of these examples intelligence is present.

What language would you speak if you were locked in a room and no one spoke to you for the first ten years of your life if all they did was feed and clean you?

 

[Oncedeceived]

Once wrote:

No, as stated above, I concluded that because you don't understand the basic mechanisms proposed, in addition to having little interest in a book explaining them, nor in other sources explaining them (such as the montly journals).




Those are all interesting, but few of them seem to be explaining the question of how morality evolved. Look, how about this, I'll take the time to explain some of them in greater detail, but first could you help me see exactly where you are by explaining the mechanism, as you see it, by which evolution is proposed to have given us morality?


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I already gave you some links (didn't those include some peer-reviewed references?), in addition to all the peer-reviewed work in the footnotes of the book. Let's see how the previous paragraph goes, and then go from there?

​

No problem. Let me know if there are other points, especially those in the Nicene Creed, that could use similar clarification.



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I certainly am not. I see deism as simple heresy, in direct contradiction to Jesus' own words in John 5:17.

​

It sounds like we agree on that.


​

Neither we theists nor the atheists have an explanation for free will. We simply rename the problem "soul", but that doesn't explain how a soul has freewill.


​

It may or may not be possible, but that's a moot point for you and I anyway, since we both see God's input as being real (though we may see the exact nature of that input differently).

Blessings-

Papias

I did totally miss this post! Sorry.

I am going to go back and look for the link that you gave me. I thought it was just to the book.

So we are disagreeing on one issue and that is whether or not evolution by naturalistic processes gave rise to morality. I say that these processes are not adequate to explain them on their own.

 

[Oncedeceived]

What language would you speak if you were locked in a room and no one spoke to you for the first ten years of your life if all they did was feed and clean you?

And what difference does than make?

 

[Oncedeceived]

You are proof that morality is in the eye of the beholder.

The Old Testament is full of God performing or condoning what I would consider to be immoral acts, such as genocide, slavery, and misogyny.

Yet you claim that God is moral.

So if morality is subjective and I think that God is moral and you think that He is immoral, there is no actual right or wrong. You are no more moral or right than I.

 

[ThinkForYourself]

So if morality is subjective and I think that God is moral and you think that He is immoral, there is no actual right or wrong. You are no more moral or right than I.

Clearly anyone can claim any action is moral. I certainly can't deny that.

How can God be moral when he commits and condones immoral acts such as Genocide, Slavery, Misogyny?

Or do you think Genocide, Slavery, and Misogyny are moral acts?

 

[Oncedeceived]

Clearly anyone can claim any action is moral. I certainly can't deny that.

How can God be moral when he commits and condones immoral acts such as Genocide, Slavery, Misogyny?

Or do you think Genocide, Slavery, and Misogyny are moral acts?

What difference does it make if morality is subjective?

 

[Oncedeceived]

Intelligence comes from the brain, a physical structure that can be refined like any other trait.

Go to the beginning GYak. There was a time when there was no brain. So where did intelligence arise?

So it would seem.

Ok.

Hold your horses, you went off on some crazy tangents here. 'A' is what it is and is not what it is not - this doesn't call for a supernatural origin, it's true regardless of how it came to pass.

We know that things can not exist as something other than what they are. However we can not just observe that because we can only observe a phenomena that does exist but not one that doesn't. If something is something and not something else, we do not observe that something else because it doesn't exist. Therefore we can not claim that logic is by observation.

Switching over to the universe argument - natural processes exist to explain formation of stars and planets. In a universe of umpteeen zillion stars, there are some with worlds where the chemical reaction called life can take place.

Natural processes do not explain the universe coming into existence. We have theories for how the formation of stars and planets are formed.

You might be able to point out some things about physics we (or certainly me) don't understand sure, but just because we lack the capacity to explain them at present, and even if we can never explain them, there's no reason to jump to the idea of a supernatural being - it could simply be an element of nature we haven't yet explored.

There is more to it than that. Faith in something that might explain it shows us that you hold to your position even when there is an unexplained phenomena which fits with your own presuppositions. Which is fine, we all do it, but to claim that a theist is wrong for doing the same thing creates a double standard.

Personally, the fine tuning argument doesn't do it for me - a supernatural creator wouldn't care about how strict the odds against life existing are or how the natural laws are stacked against it. An all-powerful creator could create people of living stone on planets of glass so far from the sun that hydrogen would freeze but have everything 'work', all in defiance of physical laws.

This is based on conjecture only.

The balance in nature that allows for life as we understand to exist, with all of its intrict organic components operating in accordance with natural law, is exactly the way it would need to be if there were no supernatural being involved.

Except to have the fine tuning apparent in the universe a mindless chance event is not an explanation.

If that's how it happened, that's how it happened - doesn't matter how anyone 'feels.'

That includes whether God created it?

Which is an incentive to punish behavior that causes those feelings. The foundations of justice!

Justice for a subjective code that is not really right or wrong?

Like I said earlier, there are certain truths about how we interact - life is generally preferable to death, safety is preferable to stress, etc. It's not surprising that certain patterns of behavior would crop up. And all human nations are descended from a single source, so it stands to reason that certain shared behaviors and ideas that allowed those first people to thrive would be passed along to their descendants.

So on one hand you want to use evolved morality and on the other a man made construct. This is somewhat contradictory.

So He invented it from Himself, without any outside source.

Yes.

I don't think the supernatural is any more necessary to explain intelligence than it is to explain the other traits I mentioned earlier.

That doesn't mean you are correct in that opinion though does it?

Why?

Because what you are claiming needs to start from the beginning and with intelligence.

Sure. It's really easy to change my mind - I just need some examples of the supernatural that cannot be misconstrued as human ignorance, wishful thinking, or superstition. Then I would change my views.

I believe that you might think that you would change your mind but your mindset is already set against that.

What would it take for you to change your view?

God revealing Himself to me, which He did and I changed my view.

 

[Ginger123]

God revealing Himself to me, which He did and I changed my view.

Did you see into the supernatural or did God come out of the supernatural so you could see? or did you just imagine it?

 

[biggles53]

Hope for what?

The hope that skepticism may become part of your method for forming a world view. Doubts are a good first step for this. The problem with forming a world view on faith is that you "pretend to know what you don't know", to be certain that you have the 'truth' and that you know that you will always act in accordance with your god's wishes......this is how we end up with people wanting to strap explosives to themselves in a mall, or flying planes into a building....their faith informs them that their god wanted them to do these things. Had they experienced some moments of doubt, as you seem to, the world may have been spared some very nasty disasters...

So, doubt is good.....shows you're using your rational skills, rather than blindly following what you believe to be the wishes of 'another'.......

In your opinion of course. Don't get me wrong, when I am following God's directives in my life, it is so much more beneficial to me. It is amazing. However, in something that would cause me to do something that goes against all the Christ teaches and what I know of my loving and merciful God; I would question my own lack in misunderstanding or questioning the directive in this case. Abraham's experience even has some of that in it, he thought he might have to help things along since God was not bringing him the son that he expected when he expected it. It brought to fruit a chain of calamity that we are still dealing with it today.

More importantly, it goes against what your own humanity teaches......!

 

[Oncedeceived]

Did you see into the supernatural or did God come out of the supernatural so you could see? or did you just imagine it?

No matter what way He revealed Himself you would remain unmoved by it. So why ask?

 

[biggles53]

Your position seems to be an ignorance of the scriptures, the time period and what a slave is. By your definition anyone that applies for a job, sells themselves to get hired and then is subject to most of the whims of the company are slaves.

You are confusing what I have said with what YOU would like us to believe...! YOU are the one that paints the rosy picture of ALL of the slavery practised by the Jews as being nothing more than employees in debt working that debt off...! You simply IGNORE the section of that verse which deals SPECIFICALLY with the buying and keeping of slaves who do NOT fall under the category of people in debt....these were people who were "foreign" to the Jews and who your god said could be BOUGHT by the Jews and kept as PROPERTY WHICH THEY COULD PASS ON TO THEIR OWN CHILDREN...!

For Pete's sake......read the damn verse...!

Are you holding onto your position because it's a way to discredit Christians or are you actually looking for the truth and to learn something?

Are you wearing those blinders because you simply do not want to face anything which contravenes your pre-formed conclusion....!?

 

[Oncedeceived]

The hope that skepticism may become part of your method for forming a world view. Doubts are a good first step for this. The problem with forming a world view on faith is that you "pretend to know what you don't know", to be certain that you have the 'truth' and that you know that you will always act in accordance with your god's wishes......this is how we end up with people wanting to strap explosives to themselves in a mall, or flying planes into a building....their faith informs them that their god wanted them to do these things. Had they experienced some moments of doubt, as you seem to, the world may have been spared some very nasty disasters...

Please do not equate Christians with suicide bombers. That offends me to the greatest degree and I will discontinue our conversation immediately.

So, doubt is good.....shows you're using your rational skills, rather than blindly following what you believe to be the wishes of 'another'.......

If someone claims they never doubt I would be very skeptical of such a claim. I don't mean about the existence of God however. I have no doubt that God exists and that He is the Christian God. No doubt whatsoever.

More importantly, it goes against what your own humanity teaches......!

Our own humanity can not judge God who created humanity.

 

[Golden Yak]

Go to the beginning GYak. There was a time when there was no brain. So where did intelligence arise?

From the brain when it became complex enough to generate it.

We know that things can not exist as something other than what they are. However we can not just observe that because we can only observe a phenomena that does exist but not one that doesn't. If something is something and not something else, we do not observe that something else because it doesn't exist. Therefore we can not claim that logic is by observation.

I don't see that it needs to be observed, but I'd agree - you can't observe something that does not exist.

Natural processes do not explain the universe coming into existence.

Not yet. *Return Wink!* Seriously though, morality from evolution doesn't actually require a purely naturalistic origin for all things, or even for life. Just no supernatural insertion of pre-made morality.

There is more to it than that. Faith in something that might explain it shows us that you hold to your position even when there is an unexplained phenomena which fits with your own presuppositions. Which is fine, we all do it, but to claim that a theist is wrong for doing the same thing creates a double standard.

That's not my position though - I don't hold that all phenomenon will be explained as natural eventually. I accept that there might be supernatural explanations or that there might never be any explanations for certain things. I am more inclined to think that an unexplained phenomenon has a natural explanation, but only because those are the only kind I've ever seen.

This is based on conjecture only.

It's not impossible for an all-powerful God who is unrestricted by physical laws. The universe we see so far appears to be exactly as it would need to in the absence of such a being.

Except to have the fine tuning apparent in the universe a mindless chance event is not an explanation.

'It got that way by accident' is an explanation, actually. Not say it's quite as simple as that - a rock can roll down a hill randomly, but there are natural forces acting upon it to ensure that it won't randomly roll up, or turn into a fruit salad.

That includes whether God created it?

Sure - I could 'feel' that it isn't the case, that wouldn't make the feeling correct.

Justice for a subjective code that is not really right or wrong?

Does 2 + 2 really equal 4? If someone says it really equals 5, do we have to accept that, or can we tell them they're wrong?

So on one hand you want to use evolved morality and on the other a man made construct. This is somewhat contradictory.

Not for me - I see man as a creature that has evolved.

So He invented it from Himself, without any outside source.

Yes.

Any reason a person couldn't do the same?

That doesn't mean you are correct in that opinion though does it?

No. I could be wrong - I haven't seen any reason to think I am though.

Because what you are claiming needs to start from the beginning and with intelligence.

I really think I've covered a plausible path that evolved morality could have taken, no supernatural interference required.

I believe that you might think that you would change your mind but your mindset is already set against that.

Trust me, it's not. I am very concerned about believing things that are not true though, so I'm cautious about accepting superstition or personal testimony that I cannot verify or experience for myself. An all-knowing deity would certainly know how to convince me, however.

God revealing Himself to me, which He did and I changed my view.

Well then, it would seem the ball's in His court.

 

[biggles53]

Please do not equate Christians with suicide bombers. That offends me to the greatest degree and I will discontinue our conversation immediately.

Anger's a good sign....it frequently is being fuelled by your own doubts...

It was not a direct link. Faith, however, is a common factor....that people will claim to know things that they don't know causes problems..

This may anger you a little less...." Pretending to know" is what drives creationists to want to have the teaching of evolution driven from our schools and replace it with mythism....

If someone claims they never doubt I would be very skeptical of such a claim. I don't mean about the existence of God however. I have no doubt that God exists and that He is the Christian God. No doubt whatsoever.

I see it as a loose thread.......and I'm hoping you'll keep pulling at that thread.....who knows what you may unravel.....

Our own humanity can not judge God who created humanity.

Really....? How did you come to the conclusion that your god was 'good', if it wasn't through you applying some form of human values...?

Or did you just drink the kool aid......?

 

[Ginger123]

Did you see into the supernatural or did God come out of the supernatural so you could see? or did you just imagine it?

No matter what way He revealed Himself you would remain unmoved by it. So why ask?

As you are not sure I can take it you imagined it, feelings can sometimes be very wonderful, don't you think?
some music does it for me the feelings it induces can be almost heavenly, my imagined heaven of course.