Morality without God?

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I also know that Pascal’s wager is a logical fallacy and extremely not Biblical.
Suppose I said," Their is an elf that lives under the Washington monument. If you believe and the elf exists you will be infinitely rewarded. If the elf does not exist nothing bad will happen to you, therefore it is logical to believe that the elf exists. Pascal’s wager applies to every proposition and therefore is meaningless. Pascal’s wager is evil because it puts truth in second place,under practical consequences.
 
Charlemagne_II said:
I have been to Sweden several times to visit relatives. There is no God there except the State. They are not a happy people.
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They’re an extremely happy people:

*Concerning the public sphere, there is a strong sense of community and high levels of civic participation in Sweden, where 92% of people believe that they know someone they could rely on in time of need, slightly higher than the OECD average of 91%. Voter turnout, a measure of public trust in government and of citizens’ participation in the political process, was 82% during recent elections. This figure is higher than the OECD average of 73%. There is little difference in voting levels across society; voter turnout for the top 20% of the population is 86% and for the bottom 20% it is 80%, narrower than the OECD average gap of 7% and suggesting there is broad social inclusion in Sweden’s democratic institutions

In general, Swedes are more satisfied with their lives than the OECD average, with 85% of people saying they have more positive experiences in an average day (feelings of rest, pride in accomplishment, enjoyment, etc) than negative ones (pain, worry, sadness, boredom, etc). This figure is higher than the OECD average of 80%.*

oecdbetterlifeindex.org/countries/sweden/

Sarah x 🙂
 
PRmerger said:
But the portrait needs an Artist, does it not?
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It needs the artist in order to exist as a matter of causal history, but given that it exists it has the appearance that it does independently of whether anyone else exists. If the artist dies, it still looks the way it does. And, in fact, if the paint were to randomly fall into this arrangement, it would still look like the Queen.
 
wittgenstein said:
I also know that Pascal’s wager is a logical fallacy and extremely not Biblical.
Suppose I said," Their is an elf that lives under the Washington monument. If you believe and the elf exists you will be infinitely rewarded. If the elf does not exist nothing bad will happen to you, therefore it is logical to believe that the elf exists. Pascal’s wager applies to every proposition and therefore is meaningless. Pascal’s wager is evil because it puts truth in second place,under practical consequences.
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Except that such an elf has no moral authority precisely because it is an inhabitant of the universe and not the Creator of it. If you could make a plausible case for the elf being the source of all that exists and therefore having the right to decide on the nature of truth and to define the moral landscape, you would have a stronger case, but since there is no reason to think this elf has any such role to play, your argument has the strength of wet tissue.
 
Eleve said:
It needs the artist in order to exist as a matter of causal history, but given that it exists it has the appearance that it does independently of whether anyone else exists. If the artist dies, it still looks the way it does.
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Certainly. If the artist dies.

Except, we would agree, of course, that if God exists, he as The Artist, could not die.

So I am confused by your argument. :confused:
And, in fact, if the paint were to randomly fall into this arrangement, it would still look like the Queen.
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A random arrangement of paint could create a likeness of the Queen, eh?

elisakreisinger.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/eyeroll.gif
 
Look, the complexity of the portrait isn’t important. The point is just that the arrangement of the paint is intrinsic to the painting. It’s not a relationship between the painter and the painting. It’s just a fact about the canvas itself.

Let me use a more clear example. Surely you’ll agree that if I take five cards and shuffle them, one possible arrangement is that they’ll end up in the order Ace, King, Jack, Nine, Queen. Now this arrangement would come about completely at random. But I could also put them in that order deliberately. And there’s nothing about me that’s necessary for the cards to be in that order. Once they’re in that order, I can go eat a sandwich, move to England, or die and the cards will still be in that order.

The point of this is not to say that God can also die. The point is that the arrangement of the cards is intrinsic. Sure, maybe the cards depend on God in order to exist. But, given their existence, their arrangement is a property of the cards, and not a property of the cards and God. Does that make sense?
 
Response to post 364
The truthfulness of the proposition is superfluous. Pascal’s "argument " only made the proposition that God desires faith ( an unproven hypothesis.) any unproven hypothesis works in his syllogism.
Pascal believed his argument was valid. However, when any statement can be substituted, his “argument” becomes invalid. When “X” can be defined as anything , validity goes out the window. His “argument” is silly and evil.
Most academically validated philosophers use Pascal’s wager as an example of how a very brilliant man can say really stupid and immoral things.
 
Eleve said:
Look, the complexity of the portrait isn’t important. The point is just that the arrangement of the paint is intrinsic to the painting. It’s not a relationship between the painter and the painting. It’s just a fact about the canvas itself.
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Sure. That the human person has inherent dignity because of being made in God’s image is not a statement whatsoever about a relationship between us and God. 🤷

Regardless, the fact remains that unless there is a God, there cannot be an image and likeness of Him.
 
PRmerger said:
Sure. That the human person has inherent dignity because of being made in God’s image is not a statement whatsoever about a relationship between us and God. 🤷

Regardless, the fact remains that unless there is a God, there cannot be an image and likeness of Him.
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Your argument is incomplete. Why does being made in the image of something mean that you have inherent dignity?
 
Linux said:
Your argument is incomplete. Why does being made in the image of something mean that you have inherent dignity?
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The argument is not that we are made in the image of something. But that we are made in the image of Someone.
*
That’s* what gives us dignity. Nothing more and nothing less.:yup:
 
PRmerger said:
The argument is not that we are made in the image of something. But that we are made in the image of Someone.
*
That’s* what gives us dignity. Nothing more and nothing less.:yup:
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No it does not. You are just asserting that such gives us moral dignity.
 
Just a crazy speculation. (which I will ponder). Perhaps God is the signified and we are mere signifiers. We are only real (meaningful ) when we refer to ultimate reality?
 
Linux said:
No it does not. You are just asserting that such gives us moral dignity.
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It’s just basic logic, Linux.

Let’s say that we value gold.
And we find something that has the image of gold in it.
We therefore value that something because it has that which we value.
 
wittgenstein

**His “argument” is silly and evil.
Most academically validated philosophers use Pascal’s wager as an example of how a very brilliant man can say really stupid and immoral things. **

Pascal was neither wicked nor dumb. He sincerely believed in his argument, which atheists never really find daunting until they are on their deathbeds.😉
 
PRmerger said:
It’s just basic logic, Linux.

Let’s say that we value gold.
And we find something that has the image of gold in it.
We therefore value that something because it has that which we value.
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Thats subjective pragmatic value. The thing itself has no objective value. That is basic logic.
 
I love argumentative atheists! Reminds me of a parable. An atheist woke up and said,“their is no God.” At noon he said the same thing and at night. This went on for 50 years. The atheist died and went straight to heaven! He asked God,“why am I here? I never believed in you”! God answers,“because not even for a moment did you stop thinking of me.”
What I do not respect is theists that believe the Bible is the word of God and do not take the time (are they that busy) to read every word. An omniscient being is talking to you directly and you do not have the time to read every word because you are more concerned about practical considerations such as the price of toilet paper??!!!
 
PRmerger said:
Sure. That the human person has inherent dignity because of being made in God’s image is not a statement whatsoever about a relationship between us and God. 🤷

Regardless, the fact remains that unless there is a God, there cannot be an image and likeness of Him.
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If the Cosmological Argument is sound, then, no, you’re right. But then in that case, it seems like even though it would be true that “There cannot be morality without God,” this would be because God must exist, and not because morality depends on God.

Similarly, it seems that there need to be composers in order for there to be beautiful music, but only because there need to be composers in order for there to be music at all, not because a composer needs to impart beauty into music above and beyond the actual arranging of the notes, dynamics, etc.
 
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