Towards a Common Ethic

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Sair said:
I think I have finally found a question that I can legitimately and in honest curiosity pose to both Catholics and atheists alike (and anyone in between).

To give a bit of background - realising that our base assumptions and our perceptions of how the world works are (perhaps) fairly irreconcilable, I think most of us would agree that there is a certain virtue - honesty, if nothing else - to acting according to our personal convictions. I am in the middle of reading an overview of ethical philosophies, and a concept I stumbled across this morning got me thinking. The suggestion - raised in relation to the 17th-century philosopher Hugo Grotius, and his work On The Law of War and Peace, is that while theists may not deny that atheists can tell right from wrong, they are still concerned that without a belief in God, one has insufficient motive for doing what one sees as right.

So here’s my question: What motivates you to act according to your own ethical principles? For Catholics, to what extent does your personal awareness of God compel you to do what is right? Do you feel a sense of personal ownership over the ethical principles taught through the Church? For atheists, what do you hope to achieve by what you believe to be right actions, if not unity with God?
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my motivation is an eye on salvation, to what purpose the world, if not that? if i am only an accident than i should return to my youth, to the satiation of my flesh in drugs, loose women, gambling, they gave me the barest illusion of happiness and freedom, that in no way can compare with my current contentment.

ive never felt an intrinsic need for the golden rule, i have always been capable of taking what i want, failing that, i could bribe, or con what i wanted. in my life, might always equalled right, the natural order of things, the lion can always eat the lamb.

so i find subjective reasons to act morally to be flimsy, weak, providing no real, lasting motivation. its no more than trusting how someone feels today, its a sunshine policy that cant withstand the rain, so to speak.
Ever since I was a child, I have struggled with the belief that I am essentially a selfish person. Despite assurances to the contrary from others, I maintained that they could not see inside my head, therefore could not see the duplicity of my motives.
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we are all selfish, its the basic state of humanity, i sometimes wonder at the selfishness of seeking salvation? the thread about loving G-d if there were no heaven really struck me, i dont know if i would, how much of my desire for salvation is selfish? i dont know but ki do know that at heart we are grabby, grubby little things. thats the natural state.
As I have grown up (I’m now on the wrong side of 30 - or the right side, depending on your perspective!) I have gradually become reconciled to the idea that it’s okay to do good things because doing so makes you feel good. I don’t think it’s an accident that altruistic actions tend to make us feel happy, even if only for a brief moment.
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it always made me happy to do what made me feel good, regardless of the surrounding factors. ‘feels good’ would be a poor standard for many people.
I find that for me, happiness is a strong motivating factor. By happiness I don’t just mean pleasure, although of course pleasure has its place. The way I conceive of happiness is as an overall feeling of wellbeing, of being at rights with one’s own nature and the world around us. What I want to achieve is a measure of happiness that is not undermined by the knowledge that I have achieved it at the expense of another’s happiness. It is my firm belief that the kind of happiness I seek cannot be achieved in isolation, therefore in order to achieve my own happiness, I must work towards the happiness of others also, especially those with whom I share my life - family and friends.
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and what if those relationships dissappear? not everyone has those, and many who do, lose them.
Ultimately, to answer a question posed by JDaniel in another thread, what I hope for, as an atheist, is to know contentment at the end of my life. If I can look back and honestly say that I made others happy as well as myself, I believe I will be content.
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that sounds great, but what will you do when the rain comes? when what you found your happiness on washes away? neither you nor i have any right to happiness, the universe cares not. it can come or go as easily as the wind. what then?

G-d forbid, but what if you lost your family to an accident or disease? what if the chinese decide australia looks like a good place to colonize? could you be as happy in the labor camps, alone, bereft of those relationships?

i think real suffering would quickly wash away the foundations of your happiness, what then? for me, its Christ, my faith that i have a purpose beyond satisfying myself. that is a rock that the storms of life cannot move.
 
Oreoracle
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It just upsets me when Christians look at subjectivists as though we prefer the subjectivity of morals. We don’t; we find it logically impossible for them to be otherwise. *

O.K. Here’s a question.

When someone says taking the life of a fetus is wrong because the fetus is a human being, and someone else says it’s o.k. because it’s not a human being, are both people subjective?

In other words, is it possible that both are “subjectively” right or both are “subjectively” wrong; or is one “objectively” right and the other one “subjectively” wrong?

They can’t both be right or both be wrong, can they?

If you say they can … then you have solved the problem of moral consensus: just agree to have moral chaos!
 
The history of the creation of laws shows human beings trying to come up with all sorts of ways to have all humans live as peacefully as possible with each other, define what is lawful and what is not. Atheists can certainly do good works, and there is no reason why atheists and theists cannot work together toward common goals in good will.

But, throughout history, people have looked at laws and thought, for example: Hey. Why don’t we just invade that country over there and take their resouces? I know it’s against the rules but might makes right… or something.

If each individual is ultimately only answerable to himself or herself then what is stoppong anyone from robbing their neighbor or doing anything else that they think might be a legitimate thing to do at any given time? Then there is also exploitation by others. There is real evil out there and there are people who will exploit others for their own gain.

One could look at all problems between people as requiring only a mathematical type solution, i.e. plug in this law and the problem is solved. But we know that individual people will still break the law.

It would be nice if everyone could agree on most things but motivations need to be looked at. Too often, the advice gurus of today are only out to sell your their book, and then another self-help title is published with “breakthrough,” “new,” “modern” research that holds the key ™ to whatever…

We live in a time when more and more people want to sell you ideas about how to live: do this, eat this, believe this, try this… and you’ll be thinner, happier, wealthier.

If we are going to have a common ethic then we need a common foundation. A common standard.

Hope this helps,
Ed
 
edwest2 said:
The history of the creation of laws shows human beings trying to come up with all sorts of ways to have all humans live as peacefully as possible with each other, define what is lawful and what is not. Atheists can certainly do good works, and there is no reason why atheists and theists cannot work together toward common goals in good will.

But, throughout history, people have looked at laws and thought, for example: Hey. Why don’t we just invade that country over there and take their resouces? I know it’s against the rules but might makes right… or something.

If each individual is ultimately only answerable to himself or herself then what is stoppong anyone from robbing their neighbor or doing anything else that they think might be a legitimate thing to do at any given time? Then there is also exploitation by others. There is real evil out there and there are people who will exploit others for their own gain.

One could look at all problems between people as requiring only a mathematical type solution, i.e. plug in this law and the problem is solved. But we know that individual people will still break the law.

It would be nice if everyone could agree on most things but motivations need to be looked at. Too often, the advice gurus of today are only out to sell your their book, and then another self-help title is published with “breakthrough,” “new,” “modern” research that holds the key ™ to whatever…

We live in a time when more and more people want to sell you ideas about how to live: do this, eat this, believe this, try this… and you’ll be thinner, happier, wealthier.

If we are going to have a common ethic then we need a common foundation. A common standard.
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We have such a common standard. It’s called “the law.” And if people break the law, we have a justice system to enforce it.
 
granny

Sorry I missed your post.

*So what is meant by “but the decision we make can be objectively true or subjectively false” (from above quote.) when a subjective decision can be either right or wrong etc.?

Objectivism and subjectivism are thorny questions. Many people use them in different ways, which can produce enormous confusion.

Here are the guidelines I go by. I think they are fairly standard. I learned them a long time ago so I can’t give you the source.

A. Objective mean that a thing appears to us as it truly is (a calm lake, a high mountain).

B. Subjective means we see a thing as it appears to be (or as we’d want it to be - or as it pleases us to be - granny’s grandchild is always an angel, even when she isn’t).

If objective, then we see it truly (even though we are still seeing it as it appears to be, a straight stick on the ground). Objective truth.

If subjective, then then we are seeing it as it appears to be, but we are not seeing it truly (the bent stick half under water). Subjective falsehood.

When someone says, “Some religions are more uplifting than others,” this is in all likelihood an objective statement (only if you have observed it to be so).

When someone else says “All religions are equally good (or equally bad),” most people will call this a subjective statement, even if all religions are to be equally tolerated (or are they?)

Or, when someone says the fetus is a human being (it really is, look at the pictures) that is an objective truth. When someone else says it is not a human being (let’s say because he is making big money by killing the unborn) he is imposing on the fetus a false status.

But we could go on forever playing these word games. O.K. One more.

It may be said that in art there are objective and subjective standards.

DaVinci’s painting could be called objective (true to its subject, yet subjectively slanted by DaVinci’s own imagination).

Picasso’s art could be called subjective (false to its object, yet slanted to hint at it).

I’ll take DaVinci every time … and also the babe in the womb.*
 
Leela said:
No, it will always be part of society’s responsibility to teach good behavior and punish bad behavior since people are not born knowing what is right and wrong.
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But everyone is born with a conscience.

Peace,
Ed
 
warpspeedpetey said:
that sounds great, but what will you do when the rain comes? when what you found your happiness on washes away? neither you nor i have any right to happiness, the universe cares not. it can come or go as easily as the wind. what then?

G-d forbid, but what if you lost your family to an accident or disease? what if the chinese decide australia looks like a good place to colonize? could you be as happy in the labor camps, alone, bereft of those relationships?

i think real suffering would quickly wash away the foundations of your happiness, what then? for me, its Christ, my faith that i have a purpose beyond satisfying myself. that is a rock that the storms of life cannot move.
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What will I do when the rain comes? Find what shelter I can, and keep working towards the ultimate goal of achieving happiness. Giving in to despair doesn’t help anyone - I know this because I’ve been there, and it took a lot of hard work to pick myself up again. But I eventually found my way back to the path I wanted to be on, so I firmly believe that happiness is achieveable if you honestly seek it. If we live not in hope, then for what do we live?

I’m not about to claim that I’ve “found the answers”, or anything like the market-friendly malarkey spouted by the self-help mob. The point of the second half of my post was simply to give a brief description of what works for me. Can’t really speak for anyone else, since I can’t see inside anyone else’s head, which I guess is why I posed the question in the first place.

As for objective truths, or objective morals, I do believe that there are certain concepts which are self-evidently “good”, at least in a general way, such as love, honesty, justice etc, and I believe it is right to act in ways that demonstrate these concepts. What I don’t believe in is a rigid adherence to principle when such adherence would very likely cause more harm than good. We have seen examples of this in every age: religious persecution, politically-motivated massacres, terrorism - all are the result of rigid adherence to principle.

Happiness, I believe, is an objective good; or, to put it another way, a good objective! But how each person defines happiness for themselves will be different. That is why flexibility is important, because as the old saying goes, we either bend with the wind or we break.
 
Ender said:
How do you know which things are good if goodness itself is subjective? You have used the word as if it has objective meaning but it is not clear this is what you intended. Further, if goodness is subjective then is there any difference between the sentence you used and the same sentence with the word “good” removed?
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The more I think about it, the more I doubt that defining goodness is an either-or proposition between subjective and objective. I think our understanding of the nature of ‘goodness’ must be derived from both objective knowledge and subjective experience. Here’s my personal theory. I think that we are all born with an inbuilt ability to sense when things are ‘right’ - call it a moral intuition, which will serve for the purposes of explanation. This intuition is fragile, however, and it can be either shaped and strengthened or weakened and deformed by our experiences.

When it comes to ‘objective’ goodness or rightness, we can be told what is meant by words such as ‘justice’, ‘honesty’, ‘charity’, ‘love’, ‘happiness’, but essentially, they are still just words. I think human reason alone is insufficient for understanding any concept of virtue. To really comprehend what is meant by such things as ‘love’ and ‘happiness’, and to know that they are good, we must be able to anchor the words to subjective experience. Ask any philosopher to define love in rational terms and you’ll end up with a whole lot of words that tell you nothing. A scientist might be able to tell you about the electrical signals and hormones at work in your brain and body when you experience love or happiness. So why is love ‘good’? Anyone who has ever known love will tell you - it just is.
If God does not exist then right and wrong are concepts empty of meaning and the belief that one can “do good” is as foolish as believing that praying to a non-existent god can be beneficial. In such a universe actions can be helpful or harmful but they cannot be right or wrong. In fact, I’m not even sure the word moral could be uniquely defined. (I’ll just point out that you have again used a moral term as if it had objective meaning.)
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Ender
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In objective terms, ‘Morality’ (as I believe it has been defined in other posts on other threads) derives its meaning from mores (note the etymological connection here), norms, customs, and patterns of behaviour, so I think defining it purely in spiritual or religious terms at once elevates and reduces its original meaning. ‘Morality’, as a word, can refer to the specific set of behaviours expected of persons in a given society, or it can refer to a much less concrete notion of what is generally believed to be ‘right’ and ‘wrong’.

Right and wrong are terms that have meaning only in relation to the morality of any given society, in its specific time and place. They are only objective in relation to the collective values expressed by the society’s morals. You say that morality and ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ are meaningless without God, because the morality that you have learned and absorbed is based upon belief in God. Your moral intuition has been shaped and strengthened by your belief in God, so your understanding of morality is anchored by your experiences, understood on a personal level and made part of who you are.
 
A couple of thoughts to provide some clarification of previously expressed ideas.

In my most recent post, I spoke of a moral intuition that people are born with. I’ve done a bit more thinking about this, and I suspect it can probably be explained in biological terms. All sentient creatures can sense pleasure and pain, can feel safe or insecure. A human infant experiences pleasure and security when being held and fed by mother; alternatively, the baby can feel pain and insecurity when suffering from colic and there is no-one in the immediate vicinity who can pick him up and soothe him. He is already wired to respond to pleasant and unpleasant stimuli, even though he can’t think about it yet.

As humans grow up as part of a family and community, they learn to associate pleasant and unpleasant sensations with certain behaviours. We learn to think of certain things as ‘good’ and ‘bad’ and generally we find that ‘good’ things correspond to pleasant stimuli and ‘bad’ things correspond to unpleasant stimuli. How does a 3-year-old child know that it’s ‘bad’ when mummy and daddy are fighting? She can’t articulate an explanation of why it’s bad, but she knows it is because it undermines her sense of security. Through accumulated experience, we hone our instincts for what will make us feel pleasant and unpleasant sensations, and eventually we rationalise this into a sense of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’. How far our individual sense of right and wrong corresponds to social norms depends largely upon the qualities of our experiences - to put it crudely, how ‘normal’ our upbringing has been.

The other thing I wanted to clarify was my explanation of what I understand by the term ‘happiness’ (note that I do not say anything about defining happiness here!) Within the bounds of overall human nature, everyone has their own ‘nature’ - a conglomeration of disposition, talents, tastes, basically all the qualities that make up each individual. Fighting against one’s own nature tends to cause tension and discontentment, whereas going with the flow and following one’s instincts and inclinations tends to yield contentment. This is not to imply that one should just submit blindly to whatever one feels driven to do - that approach is usually counterproductive, especially if your inclinations run counter to the accepted standards of your society. What is needed is a ‘best fit’ - a way to stay true to yourself while maintaining harmonious (or at least benign) relationships with others. I don’t claim that pursuit of happiness in this manner is easy - it requires constant thought, assessment and evaluation - but thus far, I have found it to be a most rewarding endeavour.
 
Sair said:
I think I have finally found a question that I can legitimately and in honest curiosity pose to both Catholics and atheists alike (and anyone in between).

So here’s my question: What motivates you to act according to your own ethical principles? For Catholics, to what extent does your personal awareness of God compel you to do what is right? Do you feel a sense of personal ownership over the ethical principles taught through the Church? For atheists, what do you hope to achieve by what you believe to be right actions, if not unity with God?
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What motivates you to act according to your own ethical principles?

These are the three things which have motivated me since childhood.
  1. carpe diem in the meaning of “seize the opportunity”
  2. the impossible is possible
  3. responsibility
For Catholics, to what extent does your personal awareness of God compel you to do what is right?

With some exceptions, I normally do not feel “compelled” to do what is right. Examples of my being “compelled” to do what is right are: having my mouth washed out with soap, meeting the requirements for my degree, and writing for two people who had high ethical standards.

As for my personal awareness of God, as a cradle Catholic, I attended a Catholic K-8 grade school, Catholic high school, and an old-time Jesuit University which provided an in-depth education in Catholicism. However, to me personally, awareness of God and knowing God are two stages in one’s approach to loving God. I had been aware of God, etc. from day one until the day in high school when I stomped my foot, looked up at the sky, and said I want to know right now if God is really real. I had to prove God’s existence in the next 30 seconds! The way I proved God’s existence is so irrational you all would be rolling on the floor laughing for 20 minutes. It worked for me.

Starting from my acceptance of God being really real, I concluded that Jesus Christ was really God and He really did established the Catholic Church. From then on, in essence, I was choosing Catholicism with its Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, its Sacraments, its moral code, its teachings, its spirituality, its answers to basic life questions, and its goal for life after death. Knowing that God existed became loving God because He existed. When I follow my ethical principles, it is because of freedom and not because I am being "compelled to do right.

Do you feel a sense of personal ownership over the ethical principles taught through the Church?

No. It is obvious to me that the ethical principles taught through the Catholic Church are universal and belong to all humanity, for example, all human life is sacred.

For atheists, what do you hope to achieve by what you believe to be right actions, if not unity with God?

Last summer, in Quebec, I was inches away from denying God’s existence which meant losing my faith and all. Carpe diem. I saw someone walking ahead of me who has a common sense view of life, While I didn’t outright tackle this person, I did seize the opportunity to catch up to my friend so we could talk in a calm manner.

As I look back, I would have been a decent atheist. At my age, right actions are more like a habit or comfy old shoes. Since unity with a non-existent God is not an option, I would hope to achieve unity with the nature and purpose of universal humanity.

Blessings and good thoughts,
granny

All human beings are worthy of profound respect from the moment of conception.
 
grannymh said:
As I look back, I would have been a decent atheist. At my age, right actions are more like a habit or comfy old shoes. Since unity with a non-existent God is not an option, I would hope to achieve unity with the nature and purpose of universal humanity.
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Great post, Granny - and I felt a particular personal resonance with your last paragraph above. As far as morality is concerned, in a way I guess I had a head start on some other atheists in the self-reflective stakes, as I was, like you, a cradle Catholic. My tendency to analyse right and wrong was born within the Church, and it’s something I’ve definitely carried over into my post-faith life.

Then again, I could be wrong there. My experience has been that atheists and agnostics generally tend to fall into two distinct categories: there are those who don’t particularly care about ethics and tend to take a sceptical view of everything, including morality; then there are those who rise to the challenge and seriously take on the task of discovering how they may construct a personal code of ethics and live by their own principles.

I like the idea of achieving unity with nature and humanity. I believe in balance, and I am firmly of the opinion that humans are essentially part of the rest of nature, much as many would like to convince us that we stand apart from it. I think that the humility of accepting our origins and our animal nature is perhaps akin to the humility of accepting God as the ultimate owner of our lives.
 
Sair said:
To really comprehend what is meant by such things as ‘love’ and ‘happiness’, and to know that they are good, we must be able to anchor the words to subjective experience.
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Empathy for the poor may be necessary for us to fully understand why it is good to give but it is not necessary for us to accept that it is good to give. Acceptance does not require understanding.
In objective terms, ‘Morality’ (as I believe it has been defined in other posts on other threads) derives its meaning from mores (note the etymological connection here), norms, customs, and patterns of behaviour
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It appears to me that what you have said is that objectively, morality is subjective. Morality based on the customs of different cultures is by definition subjective.
You say that morality and ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ are meaningless without God, because the morality that you have learned and absorbed is based upon belief in God.
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I challenged you to give a unique definition for morality. What you have done is to make morality synonymous with custom (so the definition is clearly not unique), which basically means that any behavior can be moral so long as enough people do it. Morality is by consensus. Cheating on a test, for example, would be wrong only if fewer than half the class cheated. Is this really your view of morality?
Your moral intuition has been shaped and strengthened by your belief in God, so your understanding of morality is anchored by your experiences, understood on a personal level and made part of who you are.
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I have made specific arguments which cannot be refuted by speculation as to why I make them. What I say is either right or wrong and why I say what I do is irrelevant.

Ender
 
When someone says taking the life of a fetus is wrong because the fetus is a human being, and someone else says it’s o.k. because it’s not a human being, are both people subjective?
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In other words, is it possible that both are “subjectively” right or both are “subjectively” wrong; or is one “objectively” right and the other one “subjectively” wrong?
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They can’t both be right or both be wrong, can they?
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Let me try to make it clearer with an example. Do you think that a necessity can exist without a goal? We consider drinking water a necessity, but only because our goal is to live. The value we place in living is an emotional one, thus making ethics that assume life as a goal subjective. You could say that nature works so as to make us live, but again, the value involved in making conformity to nature a goal is an emotional one.

You cannot remove the ethic from its goal. My ultimate goal is happiness for all, your ultimate goal is holiness for all. Do you see how our judgments differ due to our subjective values?
 
SAIR
*
I think that the humility of accepting our origins and our animal nature is perhaps akin to the humility of accepting God as the ultimate owner of our lives.*

The rejection of God is not any kind of humility.

If you are an apostate Catholic, please don’t pretend to be a saint.
 
Oreoracle said:
Let me try to make it clearer with an example. Do you think that a necessity can exist without a goal? We consider drinking water a necessity, but only because our goal is to live. The value we place in living is an emotional one, thus making ethics that assume life as a goal subjective. You could say that nature works so as to make us live, but again, the value involved in making conformity to nature a goal is an emotional one.

Oreoracle, would you mind looking over my post 111? What I would say is that if the goal to live has all the conditions which make it true-- if the goal exists independently of your individual living or dying,-- it would be considered as being objective because it exists externally and can be applied universally.

The value you place on the goal and your emotional responses are not intrinsically part of the goal itself. Your friend reading or hearing about the goal to live would not immediately know how much value you place on the goal nor your emotions. You would have to speak about these because they come directly from you as a person. In other words your values and emotions are subject to your choice and usage.
You cannot remove the ethic from its goal. My ultimate goal is happiness for all, your ultimate goal is holiness for all. Do you see how our judgments differ due to our subjective values?
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