Ought
This is my question though. Why object saying "might makes right" as if it isn't moral when you have no objective moral standard?
Again, I'm not making a moral judgment on the claim that "might makes right," I'm just saying that that's what your view seems to in fact boil down to: God is right because he is ultimately powerful. I don't have a problem with that statement per se, I'm just pointing out that if might does indeed make right, then "right" doesn't really mean what we think it does. It means that God doesn't do something because it is right, but that it is right because God does it.
An objective ought is an obligation that cannot be surmounted. None can surmount their moral duty.
I'm not sure what you mean by surmount here. If you mean that none of us can escape a sense of moral obligation, I think you're absolutely right, with the possible exception of truly psychopathic people.
Warrant.
Evolutionary explanation is inherently ad hoc. One believes in evolution and creates a story for why something is so. Whether or not that story is reasonable depends on it's level of ad hocness. All you are doing is taking what you observe from reality and stating that is the way things happen on evolution, however little of what we observe is what we should expect on evolution.
I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on that. The more I learn about evolution the more sense it makes to me. Without faith in God, I admit the options for explaining the universe are more limited. But it's not like evolution is the only view that can be attacked for being ad hoc.
Your preposition is that God exists, and hence you will tend to try to find justifications for his existence in nature.
What we should expect from evolution is Genghis Khan
And that's what we got. But it's not the ONLY thing we got. It's obvious when we look at history, or even society today, that on the grand scheme of things, rape is generally not the best way to propagate genes. The fact that a few people have had "success" with it doesn't mean our species as a whole would prosper better with such behaviour.
Moral Faith.
Sure compassion and art are abstract objects, but they aren't real. They don't stand in causal relations. Reality is that which when you look away is still there, these aren't real. In my world view they are real. The reason you won't beat your kids is because you have more faith in in your moral faculties than your intellectual faculties which tell you it isn't real. It's not contradictory to find something beautiful, it's contradictory to act upon it's beauty.
I don't know what that means, to "act upon its beauty." I still don't see how I'm acting contrary to my worldview just because I value things.
Anyway I think we actually agree here, we've just been talking past each other. I assume you find your family to be more valuable than, say, mine. Or that you find value in some sort of art. And I'm pretty sure you agree with me that a painting or a sunset doesn't have objective value, like the value is inherent in it. Right? So are you acting "contrary to your worldview" when you enjoy something? Of course not. The fact that we value things isn't contrary to anything. It's just how we are. I've never suggested that just because value isn't intrinsic/fundamental/objective, that it's therefore somehow unreasonable to value anything (or to detest other things, for that matter).
You clearly do act according your moral faculties rather than you intellectual ones. So you live contrary to your world view
No, because again my worldview doesn't mean that we should, or should be expected to, act like machines.
Genocide, Morals, and consistency.
Whenever you act morally, in direct contradiction to your intellectual faculties you are acting contrary to your world view. That is more so the case when you bring up your subjective morals as if it were a standard for God to accord to. You aren't basing God on His own standard, you are judging Him according to your own.
No, what I'm doing when I mention genocide etc, is to point out that
God doesn't seem to act according to
his own moral values. This of course depends on how we interpret the bible, but it doesn't make sense to say for example like many Christians do, that God is both a righteous judge AND that he's right to torture people for eternity. I know this may not be your personal conviction, it's just an example.
If my morality is given by God, then I guess whatever he does should appear to me, instinctively, to be right and good and justified. Unless, as you propose, my morality is tainted or damaged - but in that case, how would I even know which of my moral judgments are in line with God's?
If you were basing it on God's own standard you would represent that standard in scripture.
That is supposing the scriptures are in fact the word of God and that our interpretation of them is trustworthy.
Secret laws.
Quoting the bible should be of great value to an unbeliever asking questions about God like you are Holo. It's deeply concerning that you would ask so many questions of God, and yet find the theology that describes Him to be of limited value.
It may be that the terrain (me) is faulty here, but it's also possible that it's the map (the bible).
I can't really make claims about God's nature because I don't think I can really know. But when someone does make those claims, I have to ask if they make sense, are backed by some evidence or logic, if they're internally consistent etc.
That gives me great doubts about your sincerity in this discussion and I wonder if your intent is just to reject and question everything I have to say while stating nothing in support of your own world view.
I've said quite a lot in support of my view. You may disagree with it or dismiss it, but you can't say I haven't supported it.
Moral reliability.
Paul says in Romans 1:20 that Gods invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world. Mankind has constructed religion upon those attributes of God that he has perceived along with culture, knowledge, and personal nature.
Yes, and I think that's the case when it comes to Christianity just like all the other religions.
Inconsistency of world view.
I am saying you are inconsistent when you bring up moral standards as if they are objective
That would be inconsistent of me, yes. But I haven't brought up moral standards as if they are objective. I've repeatedly said that I don't believe such a thing exists, it just feels that way to us.
Whenever your words do not match your claims I have brought that up, but in every case you have retroactively changed your intent even though such changes make no sense of your prior statements.
Not true. What I have done, or at least tried to, is to correct your misinterpretation of my intent. I'm not saying that's all your fault, I'm sure I could get better at getting my points across.
Intuitive Theism.
There is no reason to expect our faculties to lead us to an explicit view of God.
I agree
That is not required for salvation. If you had valued that verse I quoted earlier rather than dismiss it's value, you would know that what is required on our part is how we respond to the revelation we have.
But I can't just choose to value some bible verse, or choose to believe it's true.
You are absolutely right. Religion would make sense under evolution. But that becomes particularly problematic for you to admit, because you adhere to your moral intuitions above your intellect in many cases. You claim your moral and intellectual faculties came from evolution, and seem to conform your life toward those ends, and yet prefer you intellect to absolve you from participation in religion.
I don't see why I should be obliged to participate in any particular religion.
That said, ideas like humanism are basically just as religious as Christianity. Like other religions it's based on metaphysical (or at best philosophical) claims like people have human rights. "Rights? Says who?" Well, we do. And personally I think it's a great idea and I believe humanism and related concepts will turn out to be better for us than (other) religions.
This isn't so much as a world view as adhering to whatever is convenient and enjoyable to you. That really isn't much of a foundation to make truth claim on.
If I'm reading you right you're suggesting I'm no longer a believer because it was a chore. I can assure you that's not the case. I lost faith against my will. I fought to keep it for years, using every option I could find in prayer, support from other believers, apologetics and even the sheer desperate
will to believe. Life without faith in God seemed like death to me. And for a long while, it was. Still, I lost my Christian faith. I couldn't deceive myself any longer, I had to admit that I didn't have sufficient reason to believe. Now maybe you do - I'm not really in a position to be the judge of that. But I honestly don't.
Thankfully and amazingly, I have found that it's very possible to find all the meaning, comfort and hope I need, apart from believing in God. I believe the universe and human life is ultimately meaningless. Yet we create all this meaning, all this goodness and charity, music and dancing, in spite of that (maybe even in
response to that), and I think that's absolutely beautiful, magical, miraculous.
We're all victims of cognitive bias. I know from experience that that's at least as true for Christians as for atheists.
Evolutionary morality.
Saying a sociopath serial rapist who doesn't care about neither his woman nor his children will be outcompeted is just that same ad hoc conforming of observation with the evolutionary paradigm through just so explanation. Genghis Khan didn't care about his women, and no one out competed with him. In fact both of are more likely to be related to him than any other person in history. You can't out compete Genghis Khan.
But he was outcompeted in the end. He was an outlier. Even though he got to spread his genes far and wide, even among his "children" it's evident that there are better ways to go about it. It's not enough to be a sociopathic narcissistic rapist, there are lot of things that need to be in place to produce a Genghis. A tribe of narcissists won't last very long in history even if they rape a lot of women.
