“God exists.” They are antithetical claims, both of which need reasoned arguments to support them, otherwise you are being irrational believing one or the other. The “burden of providing support” is on whomever is making the claim
Exactly! You even gave a biconditional in bold here. You just said that “God exists if and only if objective morality exists.” And further, you even want everyone to suppose that God does not exist. But when we suppose that, then the the logical conclusion is
I’m just trying to understand what the heck you are looking for. The topic of the post, yes, is “where does morality comes from?” And every theist believes morality comes from God. I haven’t offered any arguments for this claim (yet), but everyone else has. So what are your disagreements to everyone else’s arguments exactly? And more importantly, how are you, Ender, formulating the problem to begin with? You need to articulate how exactly YOU see the problem so that people know what you are asking before they attempt to provide solutions. Some of us are simply confused about what it is that you’re even asking because you’re being very vague and difficult to understand about how you construe the REAL problem at stake. So please clearly articulate how you see the problem here.
I’ll just ask again:
Hmmm… relevant? Do you think that the sun doesn’t go around the Earth? I’ve got news for you: if you take an appropriate frame of reference, it does!
So you believe! But they actually mean a whole lot more than you imagine! Your problem is that you don’t see what your own claims mean, what implications they have. Further, you can’t even respond in a constructive way when someone points out these implications to you. You need to try to see why I’m telling you that these positions follow (why they are implied) from what you’ve stated and either agree with me, or disagree and tell me why they don’t follow!
If you knew what morality was, I wouldn’t need to explain this to you. Many habits, such as your exercise habits, your meal routines, the way you brush your teeth, where you sit in a movie theatre or on the bus, are (probably) not related to promoting or undermining the human good. Therefore such habits do not pertain to morality.
Of course you do? Why not answer the questions I asked then?
Can you possibly not understand? I am looking for you to answer the question asked by the OP. How else can this be said? Answer … the … question.
We cannot start until you*** answer the question***. I refuse to believe that you cannot understand this request:*** answer the question***. I could, however, believe that you are unwilling to.
Well, I guess I’d say the problem is that you won’t answer the question.
No. This is flat wrong. Again, your misconception is caused because you won’t limit yourself to responding only to what I say.
Syntax understands; ask him.
Oh, swell. Another debate where words have no fixed meaning.
You’re right, it doesn’t follow … but since that’s your point and not mine I don’t really care.
No, I don’t think I’ll accept the task of trying to clear up your assumptions since they are not based on anything I’ve actually said. If you want me to reply to your objections then quote me exactly and tailor your comment to what you quoted. Otherwise I’ll respond as you did: “if you knew …, I wouldn’t need to explain it to you.”
Post #9? The one where you attempted to explain what Aquinas believed about a different question? I guess I missed the relevance.
You share Syntax’s penchant for invalid assumptions.
Since neither you nor Syntax have yet done so your assertion may turn out to be overly optimistic.
This thread already takes it as given that morality exists. The question is where does it come from. Answer: from God. And I (like Betterave) find Aquinas’ position a nicely articulated answer.
It is no coincidence, Ender, that more than one person will consistently get confused about what your position and pre-defined self-made parameters actually are. They are either poorly expressed or continue to beg the question. So be careful where you put the blame. I would suggest picking up more philosophical literature to assist your understanding of how the study of ethics is actually approached and undertaken.
I had no pre-defined self-made parameters in this thread so it can hardly be my fault that you misunderstood what I didn’t say. As for getting confused about what I did say, I take no responsibility for that either. Here is my comment from post #52: I believe that God is the source of morality. I just don’t find it convincing that someone could misunderstand this, nor that a simple declarative statement could be considered poorly worded. You misunderstood me because you were interpreting what I said to fit your assumptions rather than adjusting your understanding to fit my words.
The confusion here has nothing to do with ethics; it has to do with the nature of debate. It seems you formed an early opinion of my position, put me in a box labeled “Oh, this old theory”, and then interpreted everything I said from that perspective. As I suggested earlier, if you quote the specific comment you disagree with and respond directly to that we might avoid this confusion in the future.
Morality comes from decision making choosing between right and wrong. Particularly in the psychology of judgement.
Yes, because God’s own existence is the very source of morality. You (presumably) believe this too if you think morality cannot exist unless God exists.
I am talking about the discussion on here between you and Betterave that was carried over from the last thread.
I implied neither. With respect to the previous thread, I am suggesting that if you took a little time to understand how these ethical questions are actually approached in philosophical circles all of us would be on the same page with respect to the actual problem at stake in any future discussions, since our miscommunication here has always been due to how the problem is actually formulated.
Yes, because God’s own existence is the very source of morality.
Syntax? Do you understand this guy? What does he mean when he talks about “If morality exists…” as if there were reason for there being doubt about the matter?
This is where a polite person who was interested in constructive dialogue would say something like, “I don’t see why you think, based on what I’ve said, that I would have to hold that view; here’s the point I was trying to make: …” But I guess that’s not going to happen with you! Yeah, obviously! Thankfully, not everyone did.lol!..I don’t know, man. I’m completely lost. And believe me, I’ve seriously, charitably, and wholeheartedly tried to understand what Ender is saying by continually attempting to give Ender the benefit of the doubt…but every time I provide an interpretation of my own, I get berated for it. I’m just trying to understand; and I *still *don’t.
Absolutely, I explicitly said: "If God exists then morality objectively exists; if God does not exist then morality does not objectively exist." Is there any difference in our positions on this question? They seem to me to be identical.
There is doubt about the matter. I believe, as Syntax said, that morality comes from God. If there were no God then neither would there be morality and since there are a lot of people who doubt whether God exists there ought to be a lot of doubt that morality exists.
Okay, thanks: you’ve given us an answer. (Not to the OP’s question, but that’s okay.) Now let’s see whether it’s a good answer.
Yes. But we never actually had a dispute here.
Give it a rest; I answered that question the same way Syntax did: God is the source of morality. I said that in post #52 and reiterated it in #107
Could you try to find something a little more substantial to object to? My point was clear: morality exists only if it is objectively true; if beliefs are only subjectively valid to the individual who holds them then what is held to be morality is little different than habit.
What morality “actually” means … yes, that would be useful to agree on. That’s why I explained how I was using it, an explanation I’m pretty sure you understood. You obviously understood it well enough to disagree with it.
You answered the question that *you *asked: “Where does morality come from?” The OP asked a different question that you did not answer.
You don’t think my pointing out that your definition is circular is a substantive objection? Great! So in your opinion ‘morality’ actually means ‘moral principles that are objectively true regardless of what individuals believe about them.’ And you have nothing to say about what makes such a principle a **moral **principle? The only thing you can tell us about morality is that it consists of ‘principles that are objectively true regardless of what individuals believe about them’? … Wow! Are you sure you know what **morality **is?