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Hoosier_Daddy
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??? I’m confused
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Bradski
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Returning the money felt right. My friend felt a sense of obligation to find the owner. And most people would say that that is because it was the morally right thing to do and doing the morally right thing makes us feel good.
But the cart is before the horse. It felt good because, as a requirement to propogate the species, it is inbuilt within us. Just like a taste for sweet things. So we call it moral behaviour, because it is, literally, the right thing to do.
And as I said, it occurs throughout nature, so if you want to say that human beings are obligated to do certain things, then it is equally applicable to apes, bats, chickens etc. And I wouldn’t call a bat a moral agent.
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Vera_Ljuba
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If you don’t understand, then it would be a waste of my time to try to convince you otherwise. Even non-rational animals will reciprocate the way they are being treated. Treat them nicely, and they will act accordingly. Treat them in a hostile manner, and they will turn on you.
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Vera_Ljuba
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You expect too much.
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Hoosier_Daddy
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I’m out
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Bradski
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I’m an optimist, Vera.You expect too much.
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EasterJoy
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You are making this way too hard.
Your nom de plume says, “All I want is God.”
It is impossible for a Christian to evade the plain truth that God has forbidden sexual relations outside of marriage–before marriage, after marriage, everywhere outside of marriage. Does God forgive those who fall and repent? Yes. Does Our Lord ever say, “well, hey, it is hard, don’t worry about it?” No.
Every time Holy Scriptures takes up this topic, it is made abundantly clear that God considers sex outside of marriage to be contrary to love of God and love of neighbor. Those who engage in this are sinning. There is just no question about that. It doesn’t matter what you do, there is no way to rationalize your way out of that. If you look at Our Lord’s words, you should avoid even *thinking about *committing this kind of sin and you ought to be willing to go to great lengths to avoid those things that would lead you into it.
If all you want is God, then of course you need to avoid this sin. If you fall into it, repent and avoid it in the future. If you find some situation presents a near occasion of this sin, avoid that situation. If someone tries to talk you out of this intention, don’t listen to them. They are leading you away from the plain meaning of every instruction we have on this topic in the Bible and in the deposit of faith, from Day One to present, cover to cover. Run fast the other way. If you find you fall repeatedly and are tempted to give in to despair, resist that, as well. God will not give up on you, if only you resolve to conform yourself to God’s will. You can’t make yourself perfect or pure, but God can, and God wants to do it.
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EasterJoy
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We know what natural law is. The natural law visible to the person who cannot see the existence of God and the reality of eternal life does not encompass all that is revealed in divine law. If you are saying that the realities that translate into divine law are apparent to anyone to see, you may as well say that someone subject to gravity and the laws of physics is a physicist, even if the person is denied both a formal education and the use of the majority of their sense perception. It simply is not so.
It is possible that an atheist afflicted with invincible ignorance–that is, someone who seeks the truth sincerely but denied the grace of faith for reasons known to God alone–might be judged solely according to the light of truth that the person was given to see, which God can judge. That is not our business to concern ourselves with.
The Christian, however, must realize that we who have been given divine law will be held to adhere to it as well as we are able and to repent and seek pardon when we fail to do so. We will not have the defense that we were doing the best we could see to do, as a sincere atheist might have.
On that account, it does us a disservice to imply that we ought to form our consciences as if we were ignorant of divine revelation. We are not, and we should not pretend we are. We may have to accept that some others, in spite of their sincere wish to do only what is true and right, may not accept divine law. That does not let us off from following what we have been given to know and the direction we have been given for our benefit.
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EasterJoy
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What law obliges the organic sociopath, a person who thorough their mental makeup has no emotional conscience and who experiences no good feelings to serve as consolations for doing the “morally right” thing?
Is the person who is organically unable to experience good feelings as a reward for following moral law excused from any obligation to follow it?
Such a person is rewarded emotionally when they find a way to be the center of attention, when they engage in high risk activities, and so on. Does that make those things their moral absolutes? If not, how is your moral code fair to them? By what reasoning can you convince such a person to follow moral law (since it is true that a small fraction of humanity can actually act as they do without crashing the species or civilization).
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Rau
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Reciprocal altruism (at least in human society) would likely sustain a course of action when it’s clear one has a lot to lose, or little to gain, from a more exclusively self-serving course. In a society absent a sense of the morally good, I suspect it more often surfaces when the power imbalance is not too great.
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Rau
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All good. And it’s true that we would want someone else to return us our lost money too! But what chance the man to whom we returned the money would likely ever find something of ours? Close to ZERO. It would not be rational to return the money simply in the hope or expectation that he might.
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Rau
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“But Jeez Brad, keep it, it’s a $grand!” We see this thinking all the time…
A rule that says theft is contrary to love of God and love of neighbour (i.e. morally wrong) seems somehow more altruistic than one that says “whatever comes around goes around”.
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Vera_Ljuba
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What measuring stick do you use to decide that one rule is better than the other one? But that is not the point. The ever-recurring assertion on the board is that there is no rational reason for an atheist to conduct a kind and helpful life. After all if one does not believe in God, there is no reason to be altruistic, kind, loving, helpful.“But Jeez Brad, keep it, it’s a $grand!” We see this thinking all the time…
A rule that says theft is contrary to love of God and love of neighbour (i.e. morally wrong) seems somehow more altruistic than one that says “whatever comes around goes around”.
One can be selfish, mean, unhelpful… whatever. (As if there would be no believers like that. )Your error is that you discount the effect of behavior in a society. One does not need to “fear God” to cultivate a good, mutually beneficial environment. It is obvious to reasonable people. There are others, psychopaths, sociopaths, greedy and antisocial people. They can be ostracized, or even put in jail if necessary.
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goout
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I don’t think anyone claims this.
The rational reason for an atheist to conduct a moral life is that a moral life “works”. It’s effective.
So the paradox is, that while rejecting the measuring stick as you call it, and while not understanding the underpinnings and motivations of morality, a person might still desire the effects of a moral life. That’s a good thing. Morality is designed to enable people to make good decisions. The problem with just following the crowd in altruism is that a poorly formed morality does not always stand up against tests. (And so we have societies that are superficially loving and tolerant while murdering millions of children).
The case could even be made the we are wired to seek things like truth, order, peace, joy.
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BlueEyedLady
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This is all very alarming. To start off with, it sounds like you’re one crisis of faith away from a killing spree.
Obviously, I don’t believe this is what you’re saying nor do I think it’s what’s in your heart. But I could arrogantly ascribe that viewpoint to you, just as you ascribe the above to nonbelievers. Just as I don’t think you want to harm people but are restrained by a fear of god, I hope you don’t truly believe what you wrote above about nonbelievers. It’s a very uncharitable and bigoted outlook that starts with the premise that you can know someone’s heart, rather than asking questions in hopes of opening a positive dialogue.
For what it’s worth, atheism isn’t a nefarious choice made by bad people to annoy you. It’s simply a lack of belief in god. I spent years trying to believe, but with no convincing evidence and no sort of religious experience or feeling, it’s just never been possible for me. I have a lot of very wonderful friends and family in the same boat. Interestingly, they all have a much different view of morality than you’ve outlined for them.
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PRmerger
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That would seem to be the coherent position of the atheist.
Fortunately, most atheists borrow, without acknowledging, from the Believer’s Model.
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BlueEyedLady
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You do realize that wasnt my position, right? Or did you just cut off the rest of my explanation because it would be harder for you to sneer down at me if you left it? Its always easier to tell someone who they are and what they believe than it is to ask questions and try to really understand, but it’s nowhere near as accurate.
Regardless, I don’t think there’s any way for your assertion to be true. Certainly religious principles have been absorbed into culture and the thought processes of those who live in them - that’s a given. But there’s also a strong biological element at work that plays out similarly with higher primates. There are also moral outlooks that don’t start off with the inherent value of human life (which is largely a judeo-christian belief) that have guided successful societies before. Dividing morality into believers vs not fails to consider all of the nuances that have existed between thousands of conceptions of god throughout human history.
Human morality is extremely complex, and it’s interesting to see how ideas have moved over the globe, evolved, and changed. Saying “believers good, atheists evil” may make you feel good about yourself, but it really isn’t supported by history and most of the world’s philosophers would disagree with your classification. Its somewhere between lazy and dishonest, depending on your motive.
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PRmerger
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I do understand, of course, that you don’t concede my point.
But, it remains: any atheist who is moral is simply borrowing from the worldview of the Believer.
There is no coherent reason any atheist should tell another atheist: you have a moral obligation to do A, B and C and not do C, D and E.
She can, of course, identify A, B and C as moral actions and C, D and E as immoral actions, by the light of human reason (infused, of course, by God), but, again, when she says to another person: you have some moral obligations…
it is an incoherent position for the atheist.
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SusanneT
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To take this back to the OP - whether or not one is a believer, there are surely numerous sensible practical and societal reasons why sex before marriage is bad. Then for us that word bad becomes sin.
Conversely there is only one justification for sex before marriage and that is simply pleasure seeking self indulgence irrespective of the consequences.
Conversely there is only one justification for sex before marriage and that is simply pleasure seeking self indulgence irrespective of the consequences.
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