The Existence of Objective Morality

[Charlemagne_II]

atheistgirl

**Can you point me to some reading on this - studies that show atheists do not have a common human morality? **

Studies are not necessary. Obviously atheists are free to craft their own individual morality. Can you show us any studies that suggest atheists have a common human morality. In the absence of studies either way, you have to go with common sense.

All the atheists I know deny the existence of an objective morality because they deny the existence of an objective God who would establish that objective morality. They are free to decide for themselves what is right and what is wrong … subjective morality.

As Dostoevsky said: “If there is no God, everything is permitted.”

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Centrist
**
It is not necessary to discuss atheism to address this problem. It is sufficient to say that atheistic concepts of morality and theistic concepts of morality enjoy equal legitimacy because they are both created from a subjective view of the world. For religious people, morality is validated by their faith. Atheistic moral systems are similarly evaluated, but they do it more directly: “I have faith that my moral system is accurate and complete.” **

I don’t follow this. If contradictory moral systems are equally valid, how do you decide between a Stalin (atheist) and a Mother Teresa (Catholic)? They are “equally legitimate”?

 

[TheTrueCentrist]

atheistgirl

I looked at studies on prison populations and atheists are right down low on the figures. Given that crimes are generally in tow with immoral acts, I found that interesting, because from what you say, I would have expected the prisons to be full of atheists. Not people of various faiths.

It happens that I am in the prison ministry. Never look at statistics about prisoners until you have been in the ministry. The simple fact is that very few prisoners in any prison go to weekly chapel. Out of a state prison of 2,000 inmates, The maximum number of Catholics attending weekly services was fifty. Same for Protestants. The people who enter prison are asked to designate religious preference. All that means is that they routinely jot down the name of their parents’ religion. Thus it appears that most of them have religious affiliation, whereas the statistics you cite will never tell you the percent of prisoners who attended church regularly before they were incarcerated. Very few, based on the number that end up in weekly attendance at chapel services.

Religions should not be blamed for the crimes of those who have abandoned their religions or only pay lip service to them. Just keep counting the number of prisoners who rarely attend services. About 90%?

Then tell us that religious people are more criminal than atheists.

Wow, look at that bar move! Suddenly the discussion is not about religious beliefs but the practices. Next you’re going to say that religious people who do immoral things don’t count either, because if they were really religious they wouldn’t have done their particular immoral thing.

Its like when discussing birth control, all the anti-birth control people always want to compare perfect-use abstinence to imperfect-use birth control as if it proves something. You have to compare perfect use to perfect use or real world to real world.

 

[shoe]

It is not necessary to discuss atheism to address this problem. It is sufficient to say that atheistic concepts of morality and theistic concepts of morality enjoy equal legitimacy because they are both created from a subjective view of the world. For religious people, morality is validated by their faith. Atheistic moral systems are similarly evaluated, but they do it more directly: “I have faith that my moral system is accurate and complete.”

If morals were subjective, that is to say if morals were dependent upon personal beliefs, physical properties, or socio-biological conditioning, then things like murder, for instance, would be considered either right or wrong, depending on a person’s personal view or what a particular society thinks at the moment. A person who thinks his morals are relative cannot possibly condemn a murderer because the murderer was doing only what was morally “accurate and complete” for him. A person who thinks morals are subjective, and not universally objective, can say only that in his or her opinion (like someone preferring chocolate ice cream to vanilla) that murder might be considered evil - but then again it might not.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Centrist

Wow, look at that bar move! Suddenly the discussion is not about religious beliefs but the practices. Next you’re going to say that religious people who do immoral things don’t count either, because if they were really religious they wouldn’t have done their particular immoral thing.

Next thing you’ll be saying is that Catholicism didn’t motivate Mother Teresa and atheism didn’t influence Stalin’s atrocities. Well, I guess atheism would influence a man’s excuse to be cruel if he believed he could get away from the final judgment. Why not?

What, me worry?!

Are you going to answer the question in post # 82?

 

[atheistgirl]

Studies are not necessary.

That’s ok. I wasnt the one to make the claim, you were.

As Dostoevsky said: “If there is no God, everything is permitted.”

So much for going with common sense.

Sarah x

 

[atheistgirl]

Then tell us that religious people are more criminal than atheists.

So what you are saying if I understand you is 90% of the prison population are in fact atheists, since they dont go to church? But they have a nominal faith they were baptised in? If that’s what you’re saying then I guess it has serious implications for the actual numbers of any faith or religion, since a lot of catholics, protestants and others dont actually go to church outside of prison either. This was the first result that came up when I searched: churchsociety.org/issues_new/church/stats/iss_church_stats_attendance.asp

Sarah x

 

[atheistgirl]

If morals were subjective, that is to say if morals were dependent upon personal beliefs, physical properties, or socio-biological conditioning, then things like murder, for instance, would be considered either right or wrong, depending on a person’s personal view or what a particular society thinks at the moment. A person who thinks his morals are relative cannot possibly condemn a murderer because the murderer was doing only what was morally “accurate and complete” for him. A person who thinks morals are subjective, and not universally objective, can say only that in his or her opinion (like someone preferring chocolate ice cream to vanilla) that murder might be considered evil - but then again it might not.

I dont know of any society anywhere that thinks, collectively, murder is ok. But the punishment is certainly relative. The guy who murders an old lady for her purse gets the death penalty while the battered wife who murders her husband in his sleep gets 5 years.
There are univerally accepted morals that existed before the commandments were handed down - they came about through the evolution of our collective wellbeing, I dont believe we needed them to be written on stone.

Sarah x

 

[TheTrueCentrist]

Centrist
**
It is not necessary to discuss atheism to address this problem. It is sufficient to say that atheistic concepts of morality and theistic concepts of morality enjoy equal legitimacy **because they are both created from a subjective view of the world. For religious people, morality is validated by their faith. Atheistic moral systems are similarly evaluated, but they do it more directly: “I have faith that my moral system is accurate and complete.”

I don’t follow this. If contradictory moral systems are equally valid, how do you decide between a Stalin (atheist) and a Mother Teresa (Catholic)? They are “equally legitimate”?

Lets start with something less incendiary. What if I asked you to chose between the morality of the Pentecostals and the Episcopalians? You would probably do this: pick out a few important moral issues (e.g. abortion, gay marriage, etc) and see what their respective positions were. If you found one of the groups deviated from your position on more issues than the other, you would judge it to be an inferior moral system. You can evaluate Stalin and Mother Teresa in exactly the same way, and the comparison would likely be easier because of the high contrast.

Now lets consider how someone might choose a morality “from scratch,” or starting with no preconceived ideology. They could look at the world and decide that a particular religion is compelling and join. I think of this as a morality “package deal;” along with religious beliefs they get a well defined moral system. Alternatively, they may simply build up a library of experiences that will inform their concept of morality. Maybe they get bullied in school and they decide “bullying is immoral, I should never do this to other people.” Maybe their spouse cheats on them, or they get their car stolen and decide these things are also immoral. I suppose that most people do a little bit of both, their morality is informed both by their experiences and religious persuasion.

How can you be sure the people who don’t join a religion won’t end up like Stalin? How can you be sure that the people who do join a religion don’t join violent fundamentalist groups? You can’t, however so long as the people that do are in the minority, society should be able to function just fine.

 

[TheTrueCentrist]

If morals were subjective, that is to say if morals were dependent upon personal beliefs, physical properties, or socio-biological conditioning, then things like murder, for instance, would be considered either right or wrong, depending on a person’s personal view or what a particular society thinks at the moment. A person who thinks his morals are relative cannot possibly condemn a murderer because the murderer was doing only what was morally “accurate and complete” for him. A person who thinks morals are subjective, and not universally objective, can say only that in his or her opinion (like someone preferring chocolate ice cream to vanilla) that murder might be considered evil - but then again it might not.

That is silly. Of course someone who thinks morality is subjective can condemn people.

Observe:
“I know you believe murder is acceptable, but I do not, therefore condemn your actions.”

Would murder be punished in a society based entirely on subjective morals? It would depend on whether the “anti-murder” crowd had enough of a majority to enact punishments.

 

[meltzerboy]

Lets start with something less incendiary. What if I asked you to chose between the morality of the Pentecostals and the Episcopalians? You would probably do this: pick out a few important moral issues (e.g. abortion, gay marriage, etc) and see what their respective positions were. If you found one of the groups deviated from your position on more issues than the other, you would judge it to be an inferior moral system. You can evaluate Stalin and Mother Teresa in exactly the same way, and the comparison would likely be easier because of the high contrast.

Now lets consider how someone might choose a morality “from scratch,” or starting with no preconceived ideology. They could look at the world and decide that a particular religion is compelling and join. I think of this as a morality “package deal;” along with religious beliefs they get a well defined moral system. Alternatively, they may simply build up a library of experiences that will inform their concept of morality. Maybe they get bullied in school and they decide “bullying is immoral, I should never do this to other people.” Maybe their spouse cheats on them, or they get their car stolen and decide these things are also immoral. I suppose that most people do a little bit of both, their morality is informed both by their experiences and religious persuasion.

How can you be sure the people who don’t join a religion won’t end up like Stalin? How can you be sure that the people who do join a religion don’t join violent fundamentalist groups? You can’t, however so long as the people that do are in the minority, society should be able to function just fine.

Interesting argument. In psychological language, you’re saying that we use a combination of bottom-up cognitive processing (based on the events we actively encounter in our lives) and top-down cognitive processing (based on our prior religious beliefs) to shape our morality. Our prior religious beliefs also probably inform our experiences, while our experiences may change our interpretation of the religious beliefs. I like it!

 

[OrdinaryMelkite]

I believe you need to go and do a whole lot more reading on this subject. Utilitarianism rests on moral relativity and the subjectivity of what constitutes ‘happiness’. It is an utterly discredited philosophical approach to morality and ethics.

It’s basically another form of Pragmatism------------“what works is what is good.”

 

[Filippo_Bruno]

There is a recent phenomenon in moral philosophy called the aretaic turn, which largely recalls Aristotle’s Ethics. In Modern Moral Philosophy, Anscombe calls for abandoning the philosophical concepts of duty (as in Kantian ethics) and of quantifiable pleasure (as in utilitarianism). In their place, she suggests deeper inquiry into human psychology, the nature of virtue, and eudaimonia.

I feel that virtue ethics will largely supplant the other ethical systems, outside of those that are divine command theories of one sort or another.

 

[abucs]

If there is no God then we are simply made up of atoms following natural law. This is just like the ocean or a volcano or a tree. Just as the ocean, the volcano and the tree do not have morality, neither do we if we are simply made up of atoms following natural and necessary physical laws. Any ideas of morality that we do have, would therefore be only an illusion, or delusion or not even a delusion as there would be no independent ‘us’ to delude - just like the volcano.

Morality, just like intelligence, love and existance can only truely exist if these things are the basis of fundamental reality (i.e. God). Otherwise they are an illusion and so are we.

Likewise any independent objective ‘measuring’ of morality we might think we can do would not just be impractical but subject to the necessary natural laws of gravity, electromagnetism and weak/strong nuclear forces between atoms presenting the illusion of knowledge.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

meltzerboy

**BTW, let’s refrain from talking about atheism as, if I recall correctly, it is a forbidden topic on this Forum. **

The ban is on threads dedicated specifically to atheism, as I understand it. To say that religious systems of morality can be attacked in this thread, but that we cannot contrast them with atheist systems of morality, is not kosher in my book.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

atheistgirl

**Most atheists I know are not remotely interested in religion, religious discussion or anything else and certainly have not ‘‘hate’’ for it - for that would mean actually caring about it. **

This has not been my experience. Almost all the books out today written by atheists are virulently hateful toward religion. As Pascal said: “They hate it but fear that it may be true.”

Go to any atheist website and you will find again the most hateful and contemptuous things said about religion and religious people. These web sites will even lie and tout non-atheists (Thomas Jefferson, Voltaire, etc.) as atheists like themselves, when they were demonstrably opposed to atheistm.

Atheism is not the subject of this thread, but since you have attacked religious morality by putting most criminals in the category of religious people (which most of them certainly are not, based on my experience with prisoners), and since you have used the atheist Christopher Hitchens to slam Mother Teresa, I have to say that you have demonstrated some contempt of your own for religious morality in this very thread.

You should not act surprised to be found with your hand in that cookie jar!

 

[levinas12]

If there is no God then we are simply made up of atoms following natural law. This is just like the ocean or a volcano or a tree. Just as the ocean, the volcano and the tree do not have morality, neither do we if we are simply made up of atoms following natural and necessary physical laws. Any ideas of morality that we do have, would therefore be only an illusion, or delusion or not even a delusion as there would be no independent ‘us’ to delude - just like the volcano.

Morality, just like intelligence, love and existance can only truely exist if these things are the basis of fundamental reality (i.e. God). Otherwise they are an illusion and so are we.

Likewise any independent objective ‘measuring’ of morality we might think we can do would not just be impractical but subject to the necessary natural laws of gravity, electromagnetism and weak/strong nuclear forces between atoms presenting the illusion of knowledge.

You’ve now entered the house of philosophy. How do we account for our sense of moral obligation? At least in the everyday world, we generally do not perform scientific experiments or formulate mathematical equations to find out what is morally binding. Nor will sociology or anthropology or evolutionary biology help us out here. These disciplines are couched in terms of “means and ends”. But where do the “ends” come from? For example, why “ought” survival or “human solidarity” to be promoted? You might cite common sense but this is a conversation stopper. Philosophy thrives on quandaries, e.g., that the “ought” is distinct from the “is”. And this distinction is situated in a larger context of other “necessities” which are all philosophically interesting (e.g., logical, mathematical, physical). The “must” questions, in a way, are the basis of philosophy.

 

[Ender]

Camus’ humanism incorporates objective moral values, which all people regard as moral, so that morality is crafted by the solidarity of human beings. Its objectivity is based on mutual human perception.

There are no values which all people have always regarded as moral except within clans, but not between competing clans. There is no more reason to think that common beliefs about what is moral makes those beliefs objectively true than common beliefs about the solar system made those beliefs true … otherwise we should expect to see the sun revolving around the earth since that’s what everyone believed. There was a world wide belief that slavery was acceptable. The tables have turned only in the last 200 years, so which position is the objectively moral one and how could we possibly know?

If there is any fault in this philosophy, the fault is no more apparent (according to humanists) than the multiple beliefs, perceptions, dogmas, and doctrines of diverse religions (monotheistic, polytheistic, and so on) as they are interpreted from both within and without.

The existence of multiple religious beliefs is often brought up as if this alone constituted a significant argument that none of them could be true. Given that there are even more examples of philosophical beliefs, surely that argument would apply to them as well, so, given that no religion could be right (because there are so many of them) and that no philosophy could be right (for exactly the same reason), it must be that truth in this area cannot exist … either that or the objection from multiplicity is invalid.

Ender

 

[Charlemagne_II]

ender

The existence of multiple religious beliefs is often brought up as if this alone constituted a significant argument that none of them could be true. Given that there are even more examples of philosophical beliefs, surely that argument would apply to them as well, so, given that no religion could be right (because there are so many of them) and that no philosophy could be right (for exactly the same reason), it must be that truth in this area cannot exist … either that or the objection from multiplicity is invalid.

Add to your examples:

Because there were several different theories of evolution in 1850, that does not mean they were all false, or that one was not closer to the truth than another. This is the fundamental fallacy of moral and epistemologicall subjectivism: the view that there cannot be a single truth that is true because there are so many “truths” that contradict each other.

 

[fhansen]

But we can set up a system that measures morality objectively. I proposed one: minimization of suffering, and I’m sure there are others. Does morality exist? Does temperature exist? Temperature is not some fundamental physical property in the same way mass is. It is a useful statistical average of kinetic energy; it is an artificial man-made index. Likewise morality does not have to correspond to some fundamental property of the universe. It just has to be a useful way of describing our behavior.

The original question is ill posed. What he really meant to ask is: in the absence of God, is it possible to empirically determine a definition of morality. Basically, Christians are confidant in their concept of morality because they believe it comes from God. They believe that if there were no God, no moral system would have legitimacy. They feel that the number of people that agree on a particular definition is inadequate measure of legitimacy.

Unfortunately for Christian thinkers, their morality suffers from the same problem. Their definitions of morality stem from their religious beliefs which are based on faith. Essentially this means that their moral beliefs are transitively predicated on faith. Why should a religious person’s faith in one particular moral system trump a non-religious persons moral definitions?

I don’t know. Temperature is a means of measuring a fundamental property-heart energy. Temperature should correspond to your model of measuring morality; heat would correspond to morality, itself. But I doubt it matters much here. Getting back to my post, morality is a meaningful term only ***if ***there’s a God or some such authority. Proving the existence of such an authority, let alone its will in terms of human morality, is an obviously related but different question altogether.

All I’m saying is that, if there is no God, then, whether or not we can find a “morality gene”/natural law in humans, there’s no compelling reason for us to follow it anyway, as we have free will. And, in fact, no matter where morality comes from, there’s no compelling reason to follow it, in fact, unless we believe that some fundamental justice requires it-and then consciously choose to “obey”.

Yes, Christians would define objective morality as existing within mans conscience prior to any reflection on the matter, but that man has the capability-with reason and free will- to override this faculty, thereby essentially changing human morality from objective to subjective-or relative- for all practical purposes. I’d believe it’d be safe to say that where we observe consistencies in basic human morality, the universal, objective aspect of morality is reflected. Where we see inconsistencies, the relative aspect of morality is shown. Otherwise, when history tells us that large numbers of people in a given society have decided that child sacrifice is good, we might have to accept that such behavior is normal for humans.