Sade vs Rand: thoughts on atheism and morality

[Freddy]

Freddy:

But the flip side of that position is that if someone were to act on any command that they think God (or Allah) has given them, then we get planes being flown into buildings.

That is true. There used to be a Franciscan monk here who told me something I’ve never forgotten. He said if you felt something was right and just couldn’t understand how it was wrong, God would understand and appreciate your honesty. I think if I felt God was telling me something and I just couldn’t square it with my sense of morality, I’d have to decline. And I trust God would accept my honesty.

Exactly my position. If it turns out I’m wrong and He does exist then I would trust the same. But as I intimated, for a Christian, it’s a narrow path with a slippery slope on both sides.

 

[christismylord]

If your sense of morality trumps God’s then…where do you go from there.

Then you are wrong. It’s not possible for God to be anything less than perfect. The devil may try to convince us we can be “more righteous” than God but there is absolutely no such thing, the very idea is, by nature, impossible.

 

[Hume]

Freddy:

So no need to question it. You would do whatever you think God wants you to do even if you think it’s wrong. Fair enough…

It’s weird. I remember running across Penn Jilette’s book God, No! In it he says that if God asked you to sacrifice your son, he trusts you’d be moral enough to not do it. But at the same time as a believer, it’s difficult. I need to read Kierkegaard on this.

The binding of Isaac - I’ve had trouble with that one my whole life. Even had issue with it when I was young and religiously devoted and active.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

If your sense of morality trumps God’s then…where do you go from there.

Then you are wrong. It’s not possible for God to be anything less than perfect. The devil may try to convince us we can be “more righteous” than God but there is absolutely no such thing, the very idea is, by nature, impossible.

If God tells you to bludgeon my grandaughter to death with a brick, what should you do?

 

[christismylord]

This is absolutely ridiculous because God is holy and righteous. God desires that your granddaughter be loved by Him and believe in Him and trust Him and love Him and serve Him. As in John 4:8 “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” God is love, there is no evil in Him. As 1 John 1:5 says, “This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.” You propose a situation that is not plausible.

 

[Freddy]

This is absolutely ridiculous because God is holy and righteous. God desires that your granddaughter be loved by Him and believe in Him and trust Him and love Him and serve Him. As in John 4:8 “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” God is love, there is no evil in Him. As 1 John 1:5 says, “This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.” You propose a situation that is not plausible.

You think this situation is ‘not plausible’. So you have a personal opion on what you think is reasonable or not for God to do. Is that right?

 

[christismylord]

Ah, you are very right, no, we should not have an opinion on what God should do. We must have faith and trust because we are certain that He is perfect. To think he “would do” something or “wouldn’t do” something is terrible thinking because as Isaiah 40:28 says, “his understanding no one can fathom.“ We cannot fathom or know completely the ways of God until Heaven. Regardless of our opinion, He is Perfect Love, and He will do what is perfect.

 

[Freddy]

Ah, you are very right, no, we should not have an opinion on what God should do. We must have faith and trust because we are certain that He is perfect.

So my grandaughter could be in some trouble.

 

[christismylord]

God would not do something unless He has a perfect reason to do so. I cannot predict or know what God wants to do.

You are intentionally creating situations in which the actions of God would be questionable in your eyes. (This does not make them unjust, because God is perfect regardless of human opinion.) He didn’t say that, why the hypotheticals?

 

[StudentMI]

Found this in the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church today, #396:

Authority must be guided by the moral law. All of its dignity derives from its being exercised within the context of the moral order ,[804] “which in turn has God for its first source and final end” .[805] Because of its necessary reference to the moral order, which precedes it and is its basis, and because of its purpose and the people to whom it is directed, authority cannot be understood as a power determined by criteria of a solely sociological or historical character. “There are some indeed who go so far as to deny the existence of a moral order which is transcendent, absolute, universal and equally binding upon all. And where the same law of justice is not adhered to by all, men cannot hope to come to open and full agreement on vital issues”.[806] This order “has no existence except in God; cut off from God it must necessarily disintegrate”.[807]

http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/p...peace_doc_20060526_compendio-dott-soc_en.html

 

[RogueSemicolon]

This order “has no existence except in God; cut off from God it must necessarily disintegrate”.

Must one, inevitably, ask what purpose there is for morality absent an absolute moral order grounded in God? Does it give way to egalitarianism or utilitarianism? Or does it descend into an authoritarianism, as competing systems of beliefs battle for supremacy amidst a pluralistic society, and one becomes the victor?

 

[IWantGod]

Is moral philosophy possible under atheism?

It depends on what you mean by morality. Can a group of people conclude that it’s more beneficial to work together in peace in-order to obtain creature comforts and achieve the goal of survival, and that murdering, raping, and giving into aggression and violence would not be beneficial to the collective goals of a group? Of course they can. If somebody wants to propose that this is the same thing as moral-truth that is up to them, but it would ultimately be misleading.

Most people are not just pragmatists about their morality, but rather they think and feel that some actions are truly wrong and not just practically unsound, and that there is a moral truth that describes some human behaviours. It’s not just unpleasant to see a baby murdered, but rather the action itself truly represents something objectively disordered and immoral; that it ought not to happen. People recognise it almost instinctively, and when they say that something is wrong they believe it’s the truth.

Now some people can say that morality has no objective truth, that it doesn’t pertain to a moral law given by God, that it’s just an evolutionary trait that makes people feel that way about certain human actions. But there are certain metaphysical consequences if we choose to go down that road. If there is no objective moral law, then it is simply irrational to claim that it is wrong to murder children; and it really does not matter how we feel about it.

Some people have a hard time being both an atheist and accepting that consequence; but that’s their problem. Unless there is something wrong with you we all know in our hearts that it is truly wrong, not just practically unsound.

 

[Freddy]

If there is no objective moral law, then it is simply irrational to claim that it is wrong to murder children; and it really does not matter how we feel about it.

Yet your argument boils down to telling me that it’s wrong because someone told you that it was wrong.

 

[Freddy]

You are intentionally creating situations in which the actions of God would be questionable in your eyes. (This does not make them unjust, because God is perfect regardless of human opinion)

No. I’m trying to see if there would be situations where you would think them questionable. I think it was @StudentMI who said that he/she would not necessarily do what he thought might be God’s will if he thought it was immoral (killing my grandaughter perhaps) but then ask for God’s mercy if he was wrong.

 

[StudentMI]

Correct. If God asked me to do such a thing I would decline saying I didn’t think it was right.

 

[IWantGod]

Found this in the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church today, #396:

Our dignity cannot be fulfilled without God’s Moral Law. In fact there is no such thing as dignity if God doesn’t exist. It’s meaningless.

 

[Freddy]

StudentMI:

Found this in the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church today, #396:

In fact there is no such thing as dignity if God doesn’t exist. It’s meaningless.

So someone does something obviously undignified. And you tell a friend: ‘How undignified is that’. And he replies that he’s not sure because he’s not sure if God exists or not. When he comes to a decision he’ll be able to tell.

Does that make sense?

 

[IWantGod]

Does that make sense?

Describing something as dignified or undignified makes sense if God and moral truth exists; that is, if you intend it to be a statement that reflects objectively reality. If there is a way things ought to be then you have a standard by which such statements take on a legitimate reference to reality and are not just extensions of some subjective preference. But if only physical reality exists then no physical event, situation, or otherwise can be meaningfully described in that way because physical objects and events by themselves have no objective meaning. Only physical descriptions apply; the rest is just an illusion in your mind, whatever that is.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

Does that make sense?

Describing something as dignified or undignified makes sense if God and moral truth exists; that is, if you intend it to be a statement that reflects objectively reality. If there is a way things ought to be then you have a standard by which such statements take on a legitimate reference to reality and are not just extensions of some subjective preference. But if only physical reality exists then no physical event, situation, or otherwise can be meaningfully described in that way. Only physical descriptions apply; the rest is just an illusion in your mind, whatever that is.

So something doesn’t look undignified to me because I don’t believe in God but does to you because you do?

 

[IWantGod]

So something doesn’t look undignified to me because I don’t believe in God but does to you because you do?

I am sure that you correctly identify some events or situations as truly undignified. However, whether or not it’s rational for you to think that something is truly undignified while being an atheist at the same time is a different question entirely.