Is Morality possible without God

[o_mlly]

Actually, if morality is truly objective then every human act is either moral or immoral. It’s not subject to anyone’s personal conscience. It either is or it isn’t. It’s always black and white. You can’t have an objective morality and have it any other way.

That’s correct. But it appears you still do not understand the difference between a human act and an act, the former has moral content, the latter none.

But in the case of eating bacon and eggs for breakfast we have the rare circumstance where doing so falls into more than one definition of being immoral. It’s immoral for some, because God says it is.

You confuse eternal laws of God with the temporal laws of humans.

So, is eating bacon and eggs for breakfast immoral, or isn’t it? Black and white, yes or no?

And then you mingle the two. Let me once again separate them for you: Choosing to eat falls under the eternal law. Choosing what to eat, e.g. bacon and eggs, does not.

 

[o_mlly]

First, you still can’t seem to answer the question. Even though for some people it absolutely, unequivocally is a moral question. So you, the one who believes in an objective morality, should be able to give us an objective answer, is it moral or not?

Not rocket science. Not a philosophical question. An objective, black and white question. Is it moral or not?

The act is not intrinsically evil, that is the act is not evil in its object. However, the act may be evil depending on intention or circumstance. See the Catechism.

 

[PickyPicky]

Actually it is straightforward. For me, eating bacon and eggs is not immoral. For a religious Jew or Muslim, eating bacon and eggs is immoral. Morality, you see, is subjective.

 

[Bradskii]

Actually it is straightforward. For me, eating bacon and eggs is not immoral. For a religious Jew or Muslim, eating bacon and eggs is immoral. Morality, you see, is subjective.

The opposite of ‘immoral’ is not ‘not immoral’. There’s a categorical error there.

You eating bacon is not a moral act. Morality doesn’t concern us whether you are eating bacon or a pizza. But it does become relevant if you are a Muslim.

That said, you are right that for the Muslim it’s a subjective decision. Is eating pork morally wrong? It’s not a question that concerns you, but she has to make the call.

 

[o_mlly]

Actually it is straightforward. For me, eating bacon and eggs is not immoral. For a religious Jew or Muslim, eating bacon and eggs is immoral. Morality, you see, is subjective.

No. the morality of the act is objectively knowable as the circumstance of the actor is objectively known. The act is not a malum in se but, for the Jew or Muslim, a malum prohibitum.

 

[PickyPicky]

The opposite of ‘immoral’ is not ‘not immoral’. There’s a categorical error there.

You eating bacon is not a moral act. Morality doesn’t concern us whether you are eating bacon or a pizza. But it does become relevant if you are a Muslim

No error, I think, but I’ll put it this way. For a Jew or Muslim, eating bacon and eggs is immoral. For me it is not. Morality is subjective.

 

[PickyPicky]

But then we’re left to wonder…how do I know what’s immoral if I can’t trust my conscience to tell me what’s immoral?

You can trust your conscience. It’s other people who might not be able to trust your conscience. That’s not a neat arrangement, but it’s how it is.

 

[Elf01]

For a Jew or Muslim, eating bacon and eggs is immoral. For me it is not. Morality is subjective

For you killing Jews is wrong. For the Nazi’s it isn’t. Morality is subjective.

 

[Bradskii]

Bradskii:

The opposite of ‘immoral’ is not ‘not immoral’. There’s a categorical error there.

You eating bacon is not a moral act. Morality doesn’t concern us whether you are eating bacon or a pizza. But it does become relevant if you are a Muslim

No error, I think, but I’ll put it this way. For a Jew or Muslim, eating bacon and eggs is immoral. For me it is not. Morality is subjective.

I agree with your conclusion, but not with your premise.

You can’t compare your decision with a Muslim’s because you are not making a moral decision. Eating a piece of pig is not a moral problem for you (and personally speaking, it shouldn’t be a problem for anyone). But it is for some people depending upon, relative to the beliefs of, their religion. So by definition, it is in this case relative.

 

[Vonsalza]

You are talking about acts not moral decisions.

I think the difference is arbitrary. The decision precipitates the act.

If a god/leader says: ‘Kill these people’ then you have 3 choices:

1. You can think it’s the right thing to do.
2. You can think it’s the wrong thing to do.
3. You don’t think at all and just follow orders (god/leader must be right).

Sure. I’m as big a fan of free will as anyone.

But that doesn’t frame it morally. Jaguar god or Yahweh God does that, thus the objectivity.

We can skip 3. There was no moral decision made. But in the other two cases, whether people were killed or not, personal moral decisions were made.

Personal decisions were made.
Whether or.not they were moral is another question and depends on the standard you measure them with.

At this point you might cry “But Vons! You chose the standard! Thus it makes it subjective!”

To which I reply “No it doesn’t. You might choose the standard, but the contents of the standard itself isn’t yours to decide.”
What Yahweh desires is delivered by the priests of Yahweh. What Jaguar god decides is delivered by the priests of Jaguar god.

You can choose the code you want (religious conversion), but you don’t personally determine the code. You can’t. It becomes non-objective and thus non-functioning as a moral basis.

Again morality isn’t personal. Its social. No one cares what a random individual thinks. They care what their God thinks - be that Yahweh, Jaguar god, the State, ect.

 

[Ender]

We don’t make moral rules to form societies. Societies only form under certain conditions. And those conditions include what we class as moral rules such as ‘don’t kill’ and ‘don’t steal’. Because those ‘rules’ have got us to where we are, we class them as good.

This says nothing more than what is moral is whatever is legal, which means that what is moral today may be immoral tomorrow. What kind of morality is it that changes depending on which party gains political advantage? Yes, societies have to figure out some way to live productively, but it is a poor excuse for morality that is nothing more than what the majority of people decide to do.

 

[Bradskii]

Somebody saying ‘this is so’ doesn’t make it so. Whether it’s God or Dear Leader or the guy wearing the headress next to the sacrificial alter. It isn’t objective because they say so. Someone else’s god or leader or the next in line to wear the feathers might determine otherwise.

What we individually determine is whether any of those guys have got it right - as far as we are concerned. And we are back to the three options.

Put it this way: If there IS an objective morality then someone has to declare it (THIS is right and THAT is wrong). And what do all honest people do at that point? They make a decision as to whether that declaration itself is right or wrong.

Otherwise the only other choice is: ‘It must be right because the guy wearing the feathers says so’.

 

[Bradskii]

Bradskii:

We don’t make moral rules to form societies. Societies only form under certain conditions. And those conditions include what we class as moral rules such as ‘don’t kill’ and ‘don’t steal’. Because those ‘rules’ have got us to where we are, we class them as good.

This says nothing more than what is moral is whatever is legal, which means that what is moral today may be immoral tomorrow. What kind of morality is it that changes depending on which party gains political advantage? Yes, societies have to figure out some way to live productively, but it is a poor excuse for morality that is nothing more than what the majority of people decide to do.

When I say ‘societies’, I mean our original societies. The groups and tribes that led to civilisation with its formal laws and regulations and rules. The moral codes that led to that couldn’t have been any different. It was simply that which worked. Whereas now…we can pick and choose.

 

[Vonsalza]

Somebody saying ‘this is so’ doesn’t make it so. Whether it’s God or Dear Leader or the guy wearing the headress next to the sacrificial alter. It isn’t objective because they say so.

If they’re the head of the college of cardinals in unison with that college, or the head of the priests of the jaguar in unison with those priests, or the head of the politburo with the rest of their party at their back-

-oh yes it does. You can run afoul of it, but before the relatively novel separation of church and state, your decision would turn out very bad for you and you’d be remembered as an amoral boogeyman.

Someone else’s god or leader or the next in line to wear the feathers might determine otherwise.

If it was that fluid, you’d probably be right. But it’s not and I kinda think you know that.

It’s like papal infallibility. It becomes more damaged every time a Pope actually invokes it. It’s only pristine as an idea, not an actual practice.

What we individually determine is whether any of those guys have got it right - as far as we are concerned. And we are back to the three options.

And, for good or bad, your claim is defeated by the reasonable suggestion of “why should I give one flip about what you think”.

Functionally, morality is not an individual concept. It’s a social concept. It governs how we play with others, not how we play by ourselves.

Put it this way: If there IS an objective morality then someone has to declare it (THIS is right and THAT is wrong). And what do all honest people do at that point? They make a decision as to whether that declaration itself is right or wrong.

No, whether it’s right or wrong has been decided. You just have to decide if you submit to rules of your society. If you don’t, you get spat out by it.

Otherwise the only other choice is: ‘It must be right because the guy wearing the feathers says so’.

That’s it. The guy wearing the feathers is much more than a guy. He’s the just the latest vessel carrying the will of God.

If you didn’t like the rules of Aztec society as an Aztec, brace yourself for some hardship.

 

[Bradskii]

If the guy wearing the feathers says we’ve got to sacrifice a few people because it will improve the harvest, then that is not morally objective. We know it won’t improve anything so he’s wrong in the first instance. And from what I know, the Mexicans gave up the practice some time ago. So human sacrifice varies depending on who has the feathers and the general population being in a position to say - ‘Hang on, that can’t be right’.

So by any possible criteria, human sacrifice was morally relative. Morally objective means (obviously) that it is a concept that is right or wrong at all times. Period.

And these concepts are both objective AND relative. We class cheating is morally objective because society would not have arisen if it was OK. So it’s almost part of our dna (those who thought it was wrong survived better than thos who didn’t). It’s not objective because it’s The Truth. It’s objective because it worked at a societal level. No more, no less.

And it’s relative on a personal level. It’s not either/or.

 

[o_mlly]

No error, I think, but I’ll put it this way. For a Jew or Muslim, eating bacon and eggs is immoral. For me it is not. Morality is subjective.

Morality is objective. The oversight in above is to neglect the creation of obligations to which we become morally responsible. Morality is about the rights that others must respect and obligations that we must honor. Natural rights create natural obligations. But our promises to others also create other rights and obligations. The publicly professed Catholic who eats meat on Friday in Lent against the rules of his bishop commits a moral evil. Those objective circumstances – Catholic, Friday, Lent, the Bishop rules – are not relative but fixed.

 

[PickyPicky]

I agree with your conclusion, but not with your premise

Just to clear up, and clear away, my sense of this matter:

If my moral sense — that largely instinctive set of reactions we call a conscience — tells me something is immoral, then to me that something is immoral. If it doesn’t, then to me that something is moral. To say something is moral does not, to me, in this context, imply necessarily some positive good, or some conscious choice, simply the absence of any immorality.

Sometimes, of course, some choice is involved, where we examine a potential course of action and consciously determine whether it fails the test of our conscience and, very occasionally, whether our moral sense, the precepts of our conscience, needs adjustment.

The eggs and bacon question actually falls both within and without the category requiring choice. Like most people, I would guess, I have pondered the morality of eating animals, and made the choice that it does not fail my conscience’s moral test. That done, I can now eat bacon without my conscience nagging me: my instinctive reactions are not now fired, and no conscious choice is now necessary. Eating bacon is, to me, moral.

 

[PickyPicky]

For you killing Jews is wrong. For the Nazi’s it isn’t. Morality is subjective

Well, same caveat as with the Good Samaritan example. You are assuming the Nazis are not acting contrary to their consciences.

But yes, if for the Nazis killing Jews is not wrong, then your example is an example of why, as you say, morality is subjective.

 

[o_mlly]

If my moral sense — that largely instinctive set of reactions we call a conscience — tells me something is immoral, then to me that something is immoral. If it doesn’t, then to me that something is moral. To say something is moral does not, to me, in this context, imply necessarily some positive good, or some conscious choice, simply the absence of any immorality.

In Catholic moral theology, evil and sin are separate concepts. Sinful acts are always evil but evil acts are not always sinful. Sin is always subjective. But the evil in the concrete act is always objective. That is an act that is objectively evil is not always sinful as we must always follow our own conscience whether it is misinformed or malformed (but not willfully so).

 

[PickyPicky]

Yes, I understand that. Thank you. If morality is objective then the situation must be as you describe.