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Leela
Guest
Then it would seem that we also do not need an object of perfect goodness to know what good is?
Best,
Leela
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Best,
Leela
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ghostranch
Guest
Outstanding post. I have long viewed Atheism not only as a religion, but .an intolerant, fundamentalist religion. You perfectly exposed this dogmatic belief system for what it is. Thank you
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eddydenton
Guest
Morality without God is totally arbitrary. You could have it perhaps purely to maintain order in society but it is ultimately valueless. Which is why the prospect of an existentialist society would be frightening (see *The Dark Night *(2008)) for an idea of what I mean.
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warpspeedpetey
Guest
you said it brother, but even arguing about a morality without G-d is meaningless in the practical sense unless one first establishes the existence of a G-d, or non existence.
other wise one is simply arguing about nothing that could ever matter.
one might else well just quack like a duck at the other person because that is the practical value of such arguments
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Leela
Guest
Hi Eddy,
From my perspective, moralities based on religious dogma rather than reason are somewhat arbitrary cultural constructs that vary from religion to religion. Morality based on human solidarity and studying and reasoning about the ways to alleviate suffering and promote human flourishing is far from arbitrary. It is possible to know that slavery is immoral as well as it can be known that a certain virus causes a certain illness–not by reading about it in the Bible but by studying the issue rationally.
Best,
Leela
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warpspeedpetey
Guest
how exactly is it possible to know anything if one doesn’t know if a god is existent, seems like that might be the real game changer.
until that fact is properly examined then all other knowledge would seem to be just so much smoke.
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crowonsnow
Guest
“Good” and ‘bad” are subjective. I’m not a semantics or word lawyer. Falling off a bridge is bad. Having food is good. Etc.
No, there is no objective goodness or badness. They’re just labels. Calling a god good is labeling a label actually.
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crowonsnow
Guest
I would say that morality with gods is totally arbitrary. The Christian god commits genocide in the Noah story, for example, but believers in this god claim that it is still the seat of morality. Genocide is good if a god does it, which is to say that evil is good if a god does it. That’s arbitrary.
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warpspeedpetey
Guest
if there were no G-d, maybe that would make a twisted sense, but what is moral, or not moral, is a matter for him.
(go ahead and say there is no G-d, i dare ya)
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christcnection1
Guest
Obviously we disagree on the heart of what you’re saying, but to further your perspective, the same could be said of a happy death or the birth of a beautiful new life.
If God exists, then death itself is allowed by God. Humans are certainly free to believe that allowing any kind of death is subjectively wrong. Likewise, we are also free to subjectively believe that bringing life into the world is subjectively evil. Who’s to say?
As Christians, we believe the very one who makes the rules and enables life to exist knows better than we do. We do not believe morality is above God, but that the essence of moral truths come from God. If there is no God, there are no objective moral truths.
So essentially yes, if God does exist, it’s His right and there is no higher authority to say He is wrong. If it’s arbitrary, so be it. God is the final Arbiter, and this is something we accept. If you believe He is wrong, we believe He gives you the freedom to do that.
From a personal note, as someone who was once a nonbeliever, I appreciate where you are coming from and would have reasoned similarly in my former way of life. In other words, I believe your perspective is not unreasonable. Additionally, a lot in my faith makes sense from personal experience and history, but a lot of it does not. Faith is a mystery - something that challenges us to trust in something without having all the answers, even when it comes to God’s arbitration.
That said, I have to come to deep confidence in Divine Providence, something that has never been easy for me to accept and has taken many years and trials to embrace.
Peace be with you…
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eddydenton
Guest
Assuming God does exist then yes, it is fair enough to say He can make, change or abolish any rule He wants - He made the world. But my argument is not in the making of the rules but the way they are given to us and interpreted. Sure I can except that the rules given to us by Jesus are solid - He was God. But every rule that the Catholic Church teaches was not given directly by Jesus. Relatively few in fact were. Some general principles were given and humans interpreted them into what is now cannon law. Human’s are inherently flawed. We misinterpret, forget, overlook information, miscalculate and are subconsciously influenced by the world around us. Even our powers of reason are not necessarily flawless. Thus we shouldn’t assume to know the will of God. Even though the bishops and scholars who wrote cannon law claim to be guided by the Holy Spirit, this is itself open to deception. How is one to know that as they are receiving spiritual inspiration it is coming from God and not another spirit, even the devil? Clerics would claim to be be able to know God from other spirits but how do they know that they know? There is way too much assumed knowledge in society and particularly religion. Be more like Socrates, perhaps the greatest thinker of all time, who said, “there is one thing only I know, and that is that I know nothing”.
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MindOverMatter
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The problem with your arguements is that you take things for granted.
First of all, we do not know and cannot possibly prove that Beauty is an objective reality. We sense it, and therefore accept that it exists; but we cannot measure it according to scientific principles. We can see that there are things and people that appear less or more bueatifull then others. But why something should be objectivley more bueatiful then others, cannot be explained by the laws of physics, since value transcends the reality of spin, motion, and dimension; Beauty is therefore not a product of natural causes, but instead accompanies the natural world.
There are two types of qualities.
- “Shallow Qualities”; Geometic qualities such as shape structure and pattern which are caused by natural forces, the shifting tide of change, and enviroment. these can sometimes give rise to shallow functions, like a cog wheel turning another cog weel.
- “Deep Qualities”. The quality of deep functions. Qualities which emerge according to patterns in the natural order, but which have no casual link with physical events. They arrive by fiat.
Niether does Nature determine the nature of an atom or a quark or the reality of space and time. Nature does not cause everything. There are deep qualities that accompany nature which emerge acording to patterns and structure, but cannot logcally be accounted for by the pattern involved in its emergence. The structure or pattern merely signifys its existence. In otherwords, nature cannot explain why it has any specific nature according to any specific shape pattern or structure. Neither can nature expain its own existence since it needs to first exist before it can give an explanation to something; therefore it is neccesary to transcend nature for an ultimatle explanation.
The “Aesthetic Arguement” is often used as a proof that beauty is not, and cannot be the work of nature, but instead points ultimatley to a Creator as the best explanation.
Back to morality; We sense moral good as oppossed to moral evil, and so we know that it exists, but evil cannot be ultimately reduced to physical things, and therefore it is not reasonable to think that physics is root of moral values. Good behavior supposes that there is a way things ought to be, that you ought to be good rather then bad. This reveals that there is a plan behind nature. If there is a plan behind nature, then that plan trancsends nature–so far as space time energy/matter is concerned–and gorvens it accordingly. Since we cannot deductively or inductively determine what is good by studying the behavior of atoms, we can only assume that apart from the universe, there exists, and has always existed, a perfect good(God) which brought all things into being. Otherwise the word good has no objective meaning.
It is a logical neccesity. Whether or not an atheist thinks he or she can regognise good or be good is irellevent to the true nature of good. It either exists or it does not. It seems to me that good exists. Therefore there is a God.
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eddydenton
Guest
You argue your point well. I would enjoy debating with you in the future.
Don’t discount this possibility. Always question everything. Even the sanity of the world.
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MindOverMatter
Guest
My mum often resorts to the idea that our world is fundmentally irrational. But the problem with this arguement is that it is not based on our experiences, but it is instead based on a desire to escape any logical inference of Gods existence. If somebody wants to believe that the world just magically appeared with all its qualities and emergent properties, without an ultimate cause, then they are nolonger doing philosophy but are instead dictating what they would like reality to be. Being an honest person i cannot allow myself such a belief. And I refuse to believe that the world is insane. If that is the case, then what is the point of my existence in this sharade you call reality? The world around me strikes me as rational and meaningfull. Pehaps a little too rational. Rational enough that i think it was created.
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reggieM
Guest
This is a great explanation. Thanks.
Beauty cannot be measured by scientific principles. It is measured by other methods of human thought. Therfore, science cannot be the only means that we have to understand the universe.
The Aesthetic Arguement is very powerful.
As you point out, it’s very similar to arguments for the supernatural origins of morality.
“Goodness” is very similar to what we call “beauty”. Both are realities that cannot be understood by science, but which are essential to human life.
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reggieM
Guest
Exactly right. The very exercise you are engaged in is an expression of rationality. To determine that the universe is irrational is to hold the universe up to a standard that we possess (somehow) but which the universe doesn’t possess.
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JDaniel
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I was simply extending your conundrum. You were asked by another poster how you would know what is good if there was no God. You replied, “from your ‘innate’ goodness.”
Are you a lawyer?
JD
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Fran65
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So Crow, where does this “innate” goodness come from?
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JDaniel
Guest
Leela:
I wonder . . . if you and I were well known, and were commissioned to provide argument as to why an extant group of enslaved people should be set free, but, the slaves had to choose between us, which one’s argument would they choose? Your argument, based upon reason alone, or mine, based upon knowledge of God, of tradition, and of reason?
JD
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JDaniel
Guest
Possibly. If I fell of a bridge into clean, cool water, I might just take off swimming like a kid at a favorite watering hole. However, if I ate too much, the result might just be unhealthy. Irrelevant “smoke”.
I assert that you are wrong.
How clever! What else would I “call” Him? Hmmm? “Bad”? I hardly think so. Either He is called from abjectly meaningless smoke or He is called by His well-known attributes.
JD
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