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tonyrey
Guest
In an amoral universe morals are manmade myths!
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tonyrey
Guest
How can they when they think they are products of inert chemicals? You have to believe you are in control in order to be in control!
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AntiTheist
Guest
JackVk:
Inocente:
tonyrey:
Jack Again:
Other atheists think that morality is a rough social convention that is based on values derived from instinct, reason, and tradition (the codification of behaviors that have “worked” for societies in various ways), among other sources.
Personally, I’m a moral nihilist, but I think that, given the standard definition of “moral behavior” that the majority of people in our culture would be willing to accept (where “bad” can be equated with a measurable harm of some kind), I submit that blind faith can be very harmful and very “bad,” and that it can only benefit people to think through the reasons for their actions apart from ridiculous supernatural value claims derived from the Bronze Age.
Yes. I don’t employ arguments from ignorance and false dichotomies.
Inocente:
Leaving aside the weirdness of calling something “pure” atheism (as opposed to what? “Impure” atheism? You either believe in gods or you don’t), atheists are more than capable of both not thinking that there are gods and acknowledging that most humans do think that there are gods (and, that most people, thanks to societal training are likely to continue thinking that there are gods).
tonyrey:
And matter is something that we know to exist, so it is far more likely to have “done it” than some supernatural being that no one can demonstrate the existence of. Thanks for playing.
Jack Again:
Depends on how you’re defining “morality,” of course. Some atheists believe that an objective morality exists in a metaphysical sense, along the lines of a Kantian categorical imperative.
Other atheists think that morality is a rough social convention that is based on values derived from instinct, reason, and tradition (the codification of behaviors that have “worked” for societies in various ways), among other sources.
Personally, I’m a moral nihilist, but I think that, given the standard definition of “moral behavior” that the majority of people in our culture would be willing to accept (where “bad” can be equated with a measurable harm of some kind), I submit that blind faith can be very harmful and very “bad,” and that it can only benefit people to think through the reasons for their actions apart from ridiculous supernatural value claims derived from the Bronze Age.
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kumarei
Guest
- By economical I’m guessing you mean under Occam’s Razor? Not entirely sure, since you didn’t specify. The problem is that in doing so, you accept an explanation about which we can have no information, and thus a divine being has an infinite information cost. The simplest explanation for a rock moving involves laws that we have experimentally determined to exist, saying that God did it makes the explanation infinitely complex, because God is infinitely complex.
- I don’t even know what this means.
- How does this follow from the original two statements?
- Premisses
- Arguments from those premisses, each of which follows directly from the premisses or from other arguments, and which lead directly to
- Conclusion: There is a god.
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Craig_W
Guest
Kumarei
Absolute truth is something that is true independent of any observer. That is, it is true on its own, and does not depend upon the perspective or views of the person who claims the truth.
Does absolute truth exist?
Absolute truth is something that is true independent of any observer. That is, it is true on its own, and does not depend upon the perspective or views of the person who claims the truth.
Does absolute truth exist?
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The_Exodus
Guest
You seem to habitually make bald assertions like the one above. “Might makes right” is a perfectly sound interpretation of Nietzsche’s philosophy, i.e. his will to power. Many professional philosophers agree.
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The_Exodus
Guest
Therefore,
AntiTheist “XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX”
Thank you for your view, but as you can see, it doesn’t make any sense.
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JackVk
Guest
So why do you live in an organized society if you are a moral nihilist? If you lived up to what you truly believe, you would go aroud killing, stealing, and raping. According to you, animal instincts are the judge, jury and executioner of decisions. But you wreak havoc on society because deep down, you believe in morality. I’m not saying you are a criminal, just a hypocrite.
If you’re trying to convert me to atheism, you might as well go punch a brick wall. At least if you break your hand, you’ll know you made some progress.
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Touchstone
Guest
This is childlike reasoning. To say that a “Supreme Being” is the most economical explanation of reality can only be defended in child-like terms: I only used two words – “Supreme Being” – and that’s pretty economical, doncha think. The positing of such a supreme being is the LEAST economical explanation available. It’s the theoretical worst one can do in terms of reasoning from the evidence, as it uses none of it, and, throwing up one’s hands in frustration at the challenges of ignorance makes the maximally magical and unaccountable answer the “adequate” one.
It’s only adequate because the magical answer is NOT accountable to the evidence or derived from it, and thus is not challenged or constrained by it. It literally cannot be wrong, or corrected. And that, seen as its strength in child-like modes of thought, is actually the mark of its utter poverty as an explanation.
If this kind of thinking has any value at all, if it carries any weight whatsoever intellectual, rather than just being child-like naïveté creeping into what is ostensibly a point of serious pondering, then natural answers have no currency. They will never be adequate in comparison to superstitions, because superstition has dual overwhelming advantaages – 1) it’s not accountable to the facts, and therefore is maximally adequate in light of them, and 2) it’s intuitively/psychologically appealing in its own right, as this is how we came to this faux-reasoning in the first place.
If this is the best argument for God’s existence, it’s an utter fail.
-TS
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The_Exodus
Guest
Actually… real atheism does not acknowledge reality, because such an acknowledgement leads to a first cause, a supreme being, who is all act and has no potency, a necessary being, an efficient cause, a final cause which moves all things by its working, an enormously powerful being who sustains the entire universe, and a tremendously gifted artisan who has created unimaginable beauty and unsurpassing harmony.
Real atheism must deny the most obvious facts about existence.
Furthermore, as Calvin said, the proofs of God can be 100% true, even overwhelmingly so, but that doesn’t mean they are convincing. This is because people don’t want God in their thinking. They don’t want to be called to judgment. They reject his natural revelation and go after wickedness. After a while, as the Scripture says, God will give them over to a debased mind, trading in truth for a lie.
Of course, no amount of wishful thinking is going to change the fact of the matter, when we all have to stand before almighty God and give an account.
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kumarei
Guest
I am not completely sure. It seems to, but that could conceivably be an illusion.
Also, I don’t necessarily believe that everything has a cause, so even if it were to be given that absolute truth exists (as in logical truth), I’m not sure that would necessitate a cause (which I’m guessing is what you’re driving at?).
I could be misinterpreting your argument here, since it was left to me to fill in the middle bits and conclusion. If I am, please correct me.
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Touchstone
Guest
I happen to agree with the soundness of reading Nietzsche as confirming that “might makes right”; I think that term is problematic, as “right” is precisely the concept Nietzsche was rejecting, so in the technical sense, AntiTheist makes a point you should concede. But Nietzsche’s concept of “will to power”, central to much of his philosophy, can be loosely understood as "right makes [as close as we might get to ‘right’ if there is no such thing as ‘right’].
But the kind of behavior you are talking about is anti-social behavior. We certainly do have anti-social individuals, born and bred, in our communities, but man’s evolved nature and psychology are socially tuned. The behavior you cite are disruptive and destablizing such that society implements sanctions and penalties such that it is counterproductive for people to engage in them.
There’s nothing nihilistic or theistic about that grounding. It’s just the habits honed by evolution into human biology that optimize the beast for his survival as a species. Man has the instinct to rape, to spread his DNA in as many and diverse contexts as possible to promote propagation. But that interest is not unchecked, The urge to preserve one’s one progeny drives the same man who has rape as a visceral impulse to protect his mate, and females in his family circle from rape and violent assault.
It’s a fantastically complicated set of variables and interactions, but the summary is that man is moral because it is a biological imperative; if man does not engage in reciprocal social contracts and collective agreements, enforced through laws, mores, taboos, and the threat of punitive violence toward offenders, he will die as a species. The fact that man is here to talk about the issue is testament to the value of those social imperatives. Man is born with them wired into his brain. Mileage varies, because individuals vary, and there are many cases where individuals work against the social structures in ways that are flagrantly destructive. But it’s game-theoretic; we are gene machines that are all trying to game the system as efficiently as possible. A chronic thief may succeed and be successful in terms of offspring as a result of such efforts, but he may well be banished by the society he tries to cheat, and dies without progeny, a pariah who cannot survive and reproduce as such.
This is a glaring, stark weakness in Nietzsche’s thinking as well — theists join him (oddly) in seeing humans as “biologically immoral or amoral”. That’s nonsense in light of the facts of biology. Humans are as natural moral by their nature as they are two-legged.
-TS
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AntiTheist
Guest
It’s not a sound interpretation. “Will to power” in Nietzsche refers primarily to one’s power over oneself and one’s instincts and drives – it refers to the sublimation of the passions, and, more broadly, to the practice of philosophy in order to gain “power” over reality by classifying it and achieving knowledge.
It only seems like I’m making “bald assertions” because I don’t have the time or space to teach a philosophy course on here. I’m not just pulling this stuff out of a tophat – I’ve read all of Nietzsche’s important works and many scholarly texts concerning them as well.
I would recommend reading Walter Kaufmann’s excellent biography of Nietzsche for more information.
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The_Exodus
Guest
“One’s power over oneself”; “one’s instincts and drives” “sublimination of passions” etc. are all instances of “might makes right” (i.e. your might makes you right) - if there is no God or source of eternal Good.
This system of thinking can be seen in Stalin, Hitler, etc; and is a consequence of Social Darwinian philosophy.
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AntiTheist
Guest
Because it’s really convenient to live in an organized society – for example, when I cooperate with other people, it provides me with means of obtaining food without spending the time and energy on hunting, growing, and killing the food myself.
The advantages of society give me good reason to cooperate with others.
Um, no. In the first place, I have no desire to do any of those things, but more to the point, even if I did, I am capable of determining that it is far more to my advantage not to engage in those behaviors in order to reap the benefits of living in an organized society. [see above]
Well, I’m not trying to “convert” anyone, but I think “talking to a brick wall” is the cliche you’re going for here. And yes, with you it indeed seems apt.
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AntiTheist
Guest
You’re confused. When people say “might makes right,” they’re typically talking about using brute force to justify modern political regimes. This idea is absent from Nietzsche’s philosophy – further, many of his writings are extremely critical of ideas of German nationalism and “the state.”
I say this with the best of intentions: You need to read and think more, rather than just jump to conclusions all the time.
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JDaniel
Guest
Well, if you are going to retaliate to each by making baseless criticisms immediately after an argument is presented, then what’s the use? I, for one, am not at all interested in taking this bait. Anyway,
God bless,
jd
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Craig_W
Guest
Kumarei
Craig
I am neither a scientist nor a philosopher; just a very common and ordinary man, but I believe that absolute truth does exist and that the universe is real.
So, how do you decide whether the universe is real or an illusion?
Craig
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Betterave
Guest
Speaking of eejits, how about this Moran fellow? Here’s what he writes:
“I don’t care where they post the argument, just get on with it. I’m not interested in any other details about theology. Those points only become relevant once you’ve convinced this atheist that you have a rational argument for the existence of God.”
So God exists (E) or not (N); if you can’t prove E, then I will act as if N has been proved… (though I won’t actually assert N, just so my a** is covered).
Yeah, that’s real smart!
Then, after telling us he’s not a “know-nothing”, he insults our intelligence with a bunch of baloney about angels and pins, wine and chocolate, while telling us not to insult *his *intelligence? Gimme a break, what a joke!
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kumarei
Guest
I didn’t say that the universe was an illusion, I said that the concept of binary logic as applied to our universe could be. Not all arithmetics have a mapping to the real world, and it’s possible that binary arithmetic does not map to the world as we believe it does.
I don’t think that’s true, but it’s possible.
For the sake of all arguments, I will obviously grant that binary arithmetic, and even some modal arithmetics, map to our world in obvious ways. You asked me for an opinion on whether truth “exists”, which I interpret to mean “is a valid concept in the universe”, and I answered that I can’t be completely sure.
That said, there is no reason to believe it isn’t. All evidence points to a direct and obvious mapping, and as such I would say that I believe in the relationship, but without 100% certainty, since I don’t believe in anything with 100% certainty.
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