Atheism more moral?

[Charlemagne_II]

Leela

Why would you think that someone could not learn “do unto others…” in the course of ordinary experience?

Why would you suppose that everyone would learn it in the course of ordinary experience? I know plenty of people who have learned just the opposite. “Take care of #1!”

 

[o_mlly]

You want to say that these concepts represent something that is there independent of humanity. That is a common sense notion, but there is no way to weed out the human contribution from some nonhuman aspect of our concepts. “We carve out everything,” James states, “just as we carve out constellations, to serve our human purposes."

What contribution did man make to the law of gravity?

The “feelings” bit is your thing. I never promoted any view that our emotions should dominate our rational activity.

Sorry, I thought “feelings” were your premise for determining morality.

…How do we get them to evolve? By fosterring that empathy by what ever means we have. …

em·pa·thy (mp-th)
n.

1. Identification with and understanding of another’s situation, feelings, and motives.

And it is you who has Einstein wrong on objective truth as something independent of what anyone thinks. For Einstein, objective truth is the concept of supposing that there is an “ideal limit of knowledge and that it is approached by the human mind. He may call this ideal limit the objective truth.” His “objective truth” is the limit of human thought, not the absence of the human contribution to concepts.

As a goal of inquiry such a notion of “objective truth” is even only tangentially relevent. That is why “He [the scientist] may have” it, and he may not. An increase in knowledge–scientific progress–is defined as creating a better “picture of reality” where progress in creating better pictures means making ones that are “simpler and simpler and will explain a wider and wider range of his sensuous impressions.” A scientist measures her progress in this way rather than as getting “closer to the truth.” “Closer to the truth” could only serve as means for measuring rogress if we knew what the truth was in advance of inquiry, and if we knew that we would not need to inquire to begin with. The practical goal of inquiry then is only ever to create new better beliefs and to assuage our doubts about existing beliefs rather than to successfully uncover some pre-existing Truth imagined as transcending human practice.

best,
Leela

You are my superior as to interpreting the great scientist’s quotes. But if you are right – Einstein believed truth to be subjective – then I think Einstein a better scientist than philosopher.

 

[Leela]

Leela

Why would you think that someone could not learn “do unto others…” in the course of ordinary experience?

Why would you suppose that everyone would learn it in the course of ordinary experience? I know plenty of people who have learned just the opposite. “Take care of #1!”

Of course it is also true that we should take care of ourselves. If we did not, how could we possibly take care of others?

But the fact that there are lots and lots of truths that we can come to know through ordinary experience and the fact that there are some people who never learn these things have nothing to do with the issue at hand.

Are you conceding at this point that “do unto others…” is no truth that is only realized throught the divine revellation of Christianity?–that it is not, as you have claimed, a uniquely “Christian truth”?

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Leela
*
But the fact that there are lots and lots of truths that we can come to know through ordinary experience and the fact that there are some people who never learn these things have nothing to do with the issue at hand.*

Has everything to do with it. If everyone had to learn this truth on his own, and hardly anyone learned it, wouldn’t we be in a pickle?

*Are you conceding at this point that “do unto others…” is no truth that is only realized throught the divine revellation of Christianity?–that it is not, as you have claimed, a uniquely “Christian truth”? *

It is a uniquely Christian truth because all truth comes to us from God. If the truth was first discovered by ancient Hebrews or a variation of it by Confucius and others, that does not mean that it didn’t come to them first from God … Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

You forget, the Jews were also Christians … they just didn’t know it. The Old Testament prefigures in many ways the coming of a Messiah. The Jews were expecting him when he arrived. They just didn’t recognize God in Christ because they did not expect one who would be knocking over tables in the temple and lashing the moneychangers with whips for the blasphemers they were.

 

[Leela]

It is a uniquely Christian truth because all truth comes to us from God. If the truth was first discovered by ancient Hebrews or a variation of it by Confucius and others, that does not mean that it didn’t come to them first from God … Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

You forget, the Jews were also Christians … they just didn’t know it. The Old Testament prefigures in many ways the coming of a Messiah. The Jews were expecting him when he arrived. They just didn’t recognize God in Christ because they did not expect one who would be knocking over tables in the temple and lashing the moneychangers with whips for the blasphemers they were.

Yeah but then all you are saying when you say that this is a uniquely Christian truth is that you think that God created the universe, but we already knew that you think that, and there is no point in arguing about that matter.

Before it seemed clear to me that you wanted to argue that there is some other justification for your claim that “do unto others…” is a Christian idea beyond yor belief that if the Christian God created the universe. On that premise then every idea is a Christian idea. But if I don’t accept that premise, can you give me any reason to think that “do unto others…” is a “Christian idea”? If the above is your only remaining argument then it seems this conversatio is at an end since we both know by now to not bother arguing about the existence of the Christian God.

 

[MindOverMatter2]

On that premise then every idea is a Christian idea. But if I don’t accept that premise, can you give me any reason to think that “do unto others…” is a “Christian idea”?

If the God of Christianity is truth, then all moral truth, at root, is a Christian truth regardless of what religion is expressing it. The point is, the concept or reality that is the God of Abraham, by nature provides the metaphysical ground of morality; and this is on the basis that God is the ground of all potential beings and is the root of all Good, and is the being by which there is such a thing as objective good. This is so because God is by nature perfect being and perfect good, having no moral imperfections. On the basis of this kind of being, we have justification for making moral claims, since, ultimately speaking, we exist in a being that is fundamentally intrinsically and objectively good. Any other revelation of God, that doesn’t stay true to Abraham’s revelation of God, removes the rational justification for making moral claims about people’s behavior. That Jesus as lord, word of God made flesh, came down and sacrificed his life for our salvation, is an existential expression of Gods love for the human race and his nature as good.

That we find moral or theological truths concerning God in other religions or philosophies is merely revelation of the fact that other people, outside of Christianity, can recognize objective moral truth, even though they mix it with error or myth. Religion or not, we all have what you might call the “divine spark” in our nature; and so, that we might develop theological or moral truths independent of the Christian religion, ought not to come as a surprise if we all in fact came from God in the first place.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Before it seemed clear to me that you wanted to argue that there is some other justification for your claim that “do unto others…” is a Christian idea beyond yor belief that if the Christian God created the universe.

You were willing to say that perhaps the Jews got it from the Egyptians. You need more proof than a feeble perhaps to make the doctrine a purely human one.

You apparently cannot abide the Christian God; you still shouldn’t be surprised or disappointed to hear Christians argue that “Do unto others” comes from their God. What forum do you think you are visiting … an atheist one?

Christians believe that God planted in all of us the natural law to do good and avoid evil. Not only that simple law, but any of its variations, such as “Do unto others.” We therefore are not at all surprised to hear other cultures mouthing the same tenet as if it were theirs, when it really belongs to all of us, but more especially ours because Christ verified it in his life and death and made sure to leave behind an institution (the Catholic Church) that would preach it forever so that we could not forget it and have to start from scratch to learn it all over again; and maybe even fail by learning corruptions of it, as have been learned by many, such as “Do unto others before they do it unto you.”

Anyway, when you can show me that it has been the centerpiece teaching of any other world philosopher or spiritual leader, as opposed to merely one out of a hundred various and sundry teachings of Confucius (and only the negative form of it at that), maybe we can begin to talk again.

Adios!

 

[o_mlly]

…Are you conceding at this point that “do unto others…” is no truth that is only realized throught the divine revellation of Christianity?–that it is not, as you have claimed, a uniquely “Christian truth”?

As a moral law, “do unto others …” is as empty as Kant’s purely rational categorical imperative (or the pagan Justin’s definition of justice – give to each his due) for neither tells us what we ought to and not to do to our neighbor. What it does tell us is the limit reason has in defining moral laws. For substance we must look elsewhere.

Far richer in substance is Matthew 5 which comes to us from as a book in the New Testament from the Christian religion.

 

[Betterave]

I understand completely that what is moral may often coincide with what is prudent, but we were talking about moral deliberation. If such deliberation is to be moral it must set asside considerations of punishments and rewards or it would be a consideration of prudence instead of morality.

I think we were talking about moral motivation, not moral deliberation. We were discussing what kinds of factors, in general, are legitimate moral motivators, not what kinds of reasons we ought to deploy in particular cases.

Regardless, what if prudence is a part of morality? Aren’t you just begging the question (again)?

I think maybe you’re confusing *prudence *(at the very least *open *to having a good connotation) with base self-interest (i.e., bad-connotation selfishness). You’ve said yourself that there is nothing wrong with self-interest. You haven’t explained why it should be excluded from moral deliberation or how it is excluded on your version thereof.

 

[Mystic_Banana]

I don’t think we should look to any other foundation for morality than what behaviors, intentions, and uses of attention actually do contribute to the wellbeing of conscious creatures.

But actually how is the wellbeing of conscious creatures best served? That is ultimately the bone of contention, and much affected by understanding and belief regarding the nature of reality. Although I can’t see, from an physicalistic atheist view, given the finity of such existence from such a belief, how you don’t just disappear into nihlism, if you approach it logically - can you come up with one?