Morality without God?

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This conversation about morality makes me think of that movie,“The Watchmen”. Anyone ever seen it?
 
It seems very hypocritical that those who do not live as God intends us to use his word both for and against matters of the present and the past. They will do the same in the future as well, I believe. People also try to use his name as a defense, all the while not upholding God. They even try to hold others as holy, such as leaders of countries. I do not believe this is the definition of morality. God should be “the Most High.”
 
Peter_Plato said:
In a sense, this is the “shadowy” meaning of obligatory. If things are obligatory merely because they are demanded of us or are punishable, that fails to answer what obligatory means. The answer begs the question because, essentially, obligatory means what is obligatory (demanded).

In my two previous posts I tried to show that what is obligatory is tied essentially to the teleological moral goal. What is obligatory are those acts that are necessary or sufficient (or both) towards bringing about the end good.

If the end good is contingent upon the will of a contingent being, for example a human will, then there is only a contingent relationship between the good (for me as identified by me) and the means to attain it. If I want to be healthy, I should …

However, if the final good is an objective aspect of reality, then the means to attain the good are obligatory because, in a sense, reality mandates the connection to the good. It is not a matter of “if you personally desire the good,” but more like “this is the good that you are to desire because of the nature of what you are.” The connection to the good is not an optional one, but an actual and logical one. Denying the connection does not make it less real or arbitrary.
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👍

That is pretty good. I will make note of your intelligent remarks for future reference.
 
Bradski said:
So increasing the standard of living would be a bad thing for Christianity? I’ll be interested to see where this goes…
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Non sequitur! There is a difference between having one of the highest standards of living and having a higher standard of living…
 
Bradski said:
As do I. So there’s no difference between your sense of obligation and mine.
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So we can both be moral people and the sense of obligation that we feel to those morals is the same. So I see no difference between Christian and atheists in regard to morality other than this:
Peter_Plato said:
The argument is that if there is no purpose to the universe then, morally speaking, there is no qualitative difference between teaching your children to act criminally and teaching them to act morally because, in the end, it makes absolutely no difference.
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Either Peter and other Christians literally do not see that there is value in life for an atheist, which I find just about impossible to accept, or the above statement and variations on that theme are mantras that are repeated because they feel that it’s almost unfair that the atheist can feel life is abundantly rich, rewarding and meaningful. Surely, the argument seems to go, that is what we get when we’re Christians. That God gives us that rich, rewarding and meaningful life. He gives us purpose.

Therefore…someone who isn’t a Christian, almost by definition, cannot have access to that. That for the atheist surely there cannot be any richness. No rewards. No meaning. No purpose. They’re just purposeless particles. In fact, as an example, I defy anyone to find more than 5 consecutive posts by Tonyrey where he doesn’t mention them:
tonyrey said:
The Godless are not necessarily ungrateful but it doesn’t make sense to express gratitude to purposeless particles!
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I’m really not sure who you are trying to convince. But I have an awful feeling it might be yourself.
 
Bradski said:
So we can both be moral people and the sense of obligation that we feel to those morals is the same. So I see no difference between Christian and atheists in regard to morality other than this:
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Where atheism fails is that it makes any attempt at moral dialogue inutile.

When you intend to intervene in an immoral action, the immoral agent need only say, “Why, Bradski, I am an atheist just like you. And I appeal to my own sense of obligation and I feel bound to torture this kitty cat.”

And you, as an atheist, will be otiose in responding to any argument that points to a different “good” than what you have discerned.
 
Bradski said:
Therefore…someone who isn’t a Christian, almost by definition, cannot have access to that. That for the atheist surely there cannot be any richness. No rewards. No meaning. No purpose. They’re just purposeless particles. In fact, as an example, I defy anyone to find more than 5 consecutive posts by Tonyrey where he doesn’t mention them:
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I think I understand the logic of the theist argument quite well, Bradski – “if there were no God, human life could be subjectively purposeful and meaningful, but it would be objectively purposeless and meaningless.” Subjective has to do with human feelings and experiences. Objective has to do with that which exists independently of human feelings and experiences, just as time and space are objective facts, irrespective of my feelings about it.

And they define truth as that which is objectively the case, not subjectively.

I grant all this, this distinction between subjectively experienced purpose, versus objective purpose. I think it is logically sound.

The difference of opinion is when they say that the subjective *experience *of meaning and purpose is itself vain and purposeless – no reason to have that subjective experience, if there is no God to back it up.

This is itself an emotional reaction, ultimately a subjective viewpoint. It says that there’s no subjective point in loving life – for example – if life is objectively neither lovable nor unlovable.

And that’s where I think the non-believer ultimately disagrees, and expresses puzzlement – in the idea that there is no subjective reason to love one’s life (for example), just because there is no objective reason to do so.

Of course, there is no “objective” reason to drink water instead of poison, either, but how few of us are interested in drinking poison?

When we stay close to human experience, it is easy – our subjective experiences are objectively conditioned, insofar as it is not arbirtrary that humans eat, sleep, have friendships, form emotional attachments, etc. This is universal, if you will.

So you are saying, I think, that there are subjective reasons to love your life (for example), that are compelling to you. They are not objective reasons in the way that the theist defines objective. But they are strangely compelling (if someone yells “Fire” in a crowded theater, everyone can strangely agree on the “subjective” response to get the heck out of there).

You could even take it a step farther by saying that loving one’s child – for example – is in accordance with one’s objective nature as a human being. It is the rule, rather than the exception (if I would ever have the idea to try to hurt someone’s child, I would be in for something unpleasant). So, again, this subjective response to life is objectively conditioned. People really wouldn’t much care about arguments about there being no “objective” reasons to love one’s child, or one’s own life. It would be as compelling – to me, at least – as saying that there is no objective reason that humans communicate to each other through language, as opposed to speaking gibberish.
 
Thread is over 1000 posts. Its time to close. Feel free to begin a new thread.
 
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