The Moral Argument

[(° ͡ ͜ ͡ʖ ͡ °) (ᵔᴥᵔʋ)]

Off Topic: Is anyone else having issues with the Tapatalk app on CF? I am hardly ever in front of a computer and rely heavily on my Tapatalk app. Hence why I have been so quiet lately.

 

[Sapiens]

Sapiens and Jason are. Jason did offer cookies, though.

The subject is intellectual integrity. Do you not have personal experience with having this?

Hmm. That is true. Sorry about that. How about ice cream?

 

[Oncedeceived]

Off Topic: Is anyone else having issues with the Tapatalk app on CF? I am hardly ever in front of a computer and rely heavily on my Tapatalk app. Hence why I have been so quiet lately.

So is this the reason you haven't answered my question?

 

[bhsmte]

Oncedecieved was asked a question that was totally irrelevant to the moral argument.

If he answers it he is doing something a defense of the moral argument does not require.

So if he does not answer, his reluctance to answer in no way reflects negatively on the moral argument.

If so, it is likewise for her question.

 

[anonymous person]

To say that something is quantifiable and demonstrable is to speak about how we come to know something about whatever it is we are referring to.

This deals with epistemology, something totally irrelevant to the first premise of the moral argument we have put to you.

Telling me that you can show or see something is objectively bad is not telling me what grounds the value. It tells me how you know something is bad.

I repeat, premise 1 states that:

If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.

The bold words speak to the existence of said values and duties, not how we come to know them.

 

[anonymous person]

And the angels rejoiced. I am closing in on twenty years of this. Wow. I just didn't even realize that until just now.

That's amazing ain't it?

 

[Oncedeceived]

That's amazing ain't it?

It really is. I am always amazed at how God works through these people for me. I do take breaks from it though from time to time.

 

[anonymous person]

It really is. I am always amazed at how God works through these people for me. I do take breaks from it though from time to time.

Yes me too.

Lately, I would say for the past several weeks, God has really been working in me to just seek Him and He has put a hunger and a thirst in me to walk in His presence before Him moment by moment and I can see how it has affected how I relate to others.

I see now that the Holy Spirit does not want me to rely on the gifts and talents He has given me to relate to others, but to rely totally on Him so that He can direct me and guide me. This is important for everyone called into apologetics because the temptation for us is to try and do this while leaning on our own understanding. But God knows better than we, what it is that people really need.

 

[Oncedeceived]

Yes me too.

Lately, I would say for the past several weeks, God has really been working in me to just seek Him and He has put a hunger and a thirst in me to walk in His presence before Him moment by moment and I can see how it has affected how I relate to others.

I see now that the Holy Spirit does not want me to rely on the gifts and talents He has given me to relate to others, but to rely totally on Him so that He can direct me and guide me. This is important for everyone called into apologetics because the temptation for us is to try and do this while leaning on our own understanding. But God knows better than we, what it is that people really need.

I completely agree.

 

[anonymous person]

Telling me you see a tree in my backyard and that you can take me out to it and show it to me is to tell me how you know a tree is in my backyard.

It is to tell me nothing about the grounds for the existence of the tree.

The former would be an epistemological thesis. The latter an ontological.

We are concerned with the latter, not the former.

 

[quatona]

Davian, if the Nazis had won the war and saw to it that everyone who disagreed with their "final solution" was done away with, so that the only people alive were those who thought the "final solution" was good and ought to have been done, would the systematic extermination of people for being what they could not help being (mentally and physically disabled, a certain ethnicity etc.) be something that was bad and ought not to be done?

Since - according to your repeated appeals - epistemology is irrelevant for the issue at hand: Why would you expect anyone to be able to answer such a question?

If, as you yourself do, we can disregard epistemological problems, everyone can easily say something like "Yes, it was wrong (or right) on basis of e.g. nature." Your follow-up question "How do you know that?" can then be disregarded as an irrelevant epistemological issue, by your own line of reasoning.

 

[anonymous person]

Since - according to your repeated appeals - epistemology is irrelevant for the issue at hand: Why would you expect anyone to be able to answer such a question?

Because the question is with regards to his view of the ontology of moral values and duties.

If, as you yourself do, we can disregard epistemological problems, everyone can easily say something like "Yes, it was wrong (or right) on basis of e.g. nature." Your follow-up question "How do you know that?" can then be disregarded as an irrelevant epistemological issue, by your own line of reasoning.

I have never asked anyone how they "know" objective moral values and duties are grounded in nature.

So far, I am not aware of anyone in this thread appealing to "nature" as the grounds for objective moral values and duties anyway.

I have seen mostly attempts to turn the issue into an epistemological discussion which is not something that is even relevant to the moral argument as presented.

 

[quatona]

Because the question is with regards to his view of the ontology of moral values and duties.

No. It just asks for the result. Neither for ontology nor epistemology.

I have never asked anyone how they "know" objective moral values and duties are grounded in nature.

Good.

So far, I am not aware of anyone in this thread appealing to "nature" as the grounds for objective moral values and duties anyway.

It was just an example to demonstrate that - if disregarding epistemology as irrelevant - everyone can appeal to pretty much anything as the basis of morality the same way you do.
But if it helps: I will claim it, for the sake of the argument.

I have seen mostly attempts to turn the issue into an epistemological discussion which is not something that is even relevant to the moral argument as presented.

But for some strange reasons you yourself came up with an equally irrelevant question.
Plus, you came up with an irrelevant epistemological question when someone appealed to well-being as the ground for morality.

 

[anonymous person]

No. It just asks for the result. Neither for ontology nor epistemology.




Good.


It was just an example to demonstrate that - if disregarding epistemology as irrelevant - everyone can appeal to pretty much anything as the basis of morality the same way you do.


But for some strange reasons you yourself came up with an equally irrelevant question.

The question was relevant because his response will show me whether or not he believes objective moral values exist. That is why I asked it.

If he answers yes, then he will deny premise 1.

 

[quatona]

The question was relevant because his response will show me whether or not he believes objective moral values exist. That is why I asked it.

You could have asked that straight away.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

Ok, how? According to the naturalistic view, my brain predestines me to think what I think about the sentence I just read. Correct?

The premise of your question presumes that there is a single uniform view on free will that can be properly called "the naturalistic view." That is far from true. In any case, it has little bearing on my point, which is that everything you do results in changes to your brain's wiring.

 

[Oncedeceived]

The premise of your question presumes that there is a single uniform view on free will that can be properly called "the naturalistic view." That is far from true. In any case, it has little bearing on my point, which is that everything you do results in changes to your brain's wiring.

Does it change the wiring or just add to it?

 

[Archaeopteryx]

To say that something is quantifiable and demonstrable is to speak about how we come to know something about whatever it is we are referring to.

This deals with epistemology, something totally irrelevant to the first premise of the moral argument we have put to you.

Telling me that you can show or see something is objectively bad is not telling me what grounds the value. It tells me how you know something is bad.

I repeat, premise 1 states that:

If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.

The bold words speak to the existence of said values and duties, not how we come to know them.

Already addressed this. The way you've defined these terms makes the first premise a tautology.

 

[Davian]

Is the quote button broken?

Davian, if the Nazis had won the war and saw to it that everyone who disagreed with their "final solution" was done away with, so that the only people alive were those who thought the "final solution" was good and ought to have been done, would the systematic extermination of people for being what they could not help being (mentally and physically disabled, a certain ethnicity etc.) be something that was bad and ought not to be done?

Assuming that they were able to determine what others thought with greater accuracy than you have had with your mind-reading hat, I would have to assume that those that [hypothetically] carried out this task would have thought it good. From the perspective I have at this moment, I would say it would be 'bad', in the context of human wellness and empathy.

Can you list those "objective moral values" that you speak of, and how you made that determination?

 

[Davian]

Davian, if the Nazis had won the war and saw to it that everyone who disagreed with their "final solution" was done away with, so that the only people alive were those who thought the "final solution" was good and ought to have been done, would the systematic extermination of people for being what they could not help being (mentally and physically disabled, a certain ethnicity etc.) be something that was bad and ought not to be done?

Excellent point.

Can you point out his point? I don't see it.