I did define it. A gave a definition of what i mean by moral rights. You chose to respond to that by asking me to prove the existence of objective moral values. But that question is not consistent with the nature of this topic, and neither is it relevant to whether or not the OP is correct.
This is a philosophy forum on which everyone is welcome to express and justify their beliefs and opinions…
Every idea is a human idea - within our limited experience of reality.
If God created us in His image it is reasonable to believe we resemble God within our human limitations. It is far more reasonable than the belief that we are created by purposeless processes…
Atrocities are not confined to those with religious beliefs.
If morality is a human construct your moral judgments are arbitrary!
In an amoral universe humanity consists of biological machines which have no rights whatsoever!
You are attempting to derive meaning, value and purpose from that which is **essentially **meaningless, valueless and purposeless… A forlorn enterprise!
Rights are fictitious if they do not correspond to reality.
The recognition of a human proposition by some or even all members of society does not constitute **a binding and lasting obligation **for them to abide by that proposition. It is merely an amoral device to obtain an advantage for oneself which amounts to a form of blackmail!
“I won’t harm you if you don’t harm me” is not based on a belief in the value of everyone’s life but motivated by a cynical fear of being harmed or killed - as befits a person who regards human beings as animals which exist for no reason whatsoever.
“whilst” is the key word which reveals the inadequacy of the “rights = human conventions” hypothesis. If empathy ceases to exist rights no longer exist! This interpretation of human rights is conspicuous by the absence of any genuine concern for the welfare of others and it explains why rights are so widely disregarded in our secular society. They are no more than the rules of a game one can choose not to play when they can be safely ignored. The bloodstained history of the human race makes it clear that murderous rampages are rampant even in societies in which the so-called “chains” of religion are present. The only difference is that the threat to keep them on the straight and narrow is restricted to punishment in this world - and not the next…
So much for the effectiveness of your faith in empathy as a basis for peace and harmony! At least the religious interpretation of human rights is realistic in its appeal to reason and conscience in that it is based on the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity - which are intelligible only if we are all members of a family created by God rather than strange freaks of nature which exist by chance and are intent mainly on saving their own skins regardless of what happens to everyone else. Ironically the myth of the noble savage has been exploded by the myth of natural selection…
Both are false!
I was just confussed by the fact that this is under “Apologetics” which i don’t see how this is.
As long as the subject matter doesn’t include the common sense of atheism or the fact of evolution. Which have been “temporarily” banned for nearly two years now… (and the mods have never 'fessed up to the REAL reason for banning these topics either).
Okay, whatever. But I answered your question - an atheist has the same “moral rights” as a theist, unless you can offer a convincing reason to the contrary. Your attempt in post#5 is garbled and fallacious, so fails in this regard.
Good point, and according to the stickies threads discussing atheism are banned here anyway.
Religion is no less an amoral device for imposing an arbitrarily constructed will upon the general population - pick your ancient text and attempt to enforce it, based on the desires of the ruling class.
It’s based on the value each individual holds for his or her own life. We infer that others hold the same value for their lives, so we treat them as we wish to be treated by them.
When empathy, which is a deeply ingrained quality of the human species, ceases to exist, all human morality will cease to exist. It will then be something else entirely. You might claim a universal morality, but I’ve yet to hear of a man-eating lion who upholds any mere human notion of a right to life.
Rights are disregarded by those who don’t understand the nature of the social contract. Mostly by those who think they’re serving a ‘higher’ purpose by meeting the wishes of an imaginary deity, for example, by blowing up innocent civilians in the name of Jihad - much the way medieval religious types thought they were doing humanity a service by burning ‘witches’ under the auspices of the same ‘objective’ morality you claim to uphold.
And your morality is nothing more than an academic expansion of a set of ancient texts. How are they binding in any way, shape or form upon contemporary human life?
I could rest my case here.
On the contrary - when a majority of the population is convinced that their eternal fate rests upon the behaviour of those in their community, they will applaud those fanatics who persecute the nonconformists. You forget how deeply the notion of the scapegoat is embedded in religious morality. If you have your eyes on the heavenly prize, it’s all too easy to forget the here and now.
It’s a good basis if it’s not corrupted by irrationality and supernatural paranoia.
Actually, human rights are a myth if they are based on mythology. They are real only if they are based upon the way we live our lives in everyday reality. The concepts of liberty, equality and fraternity are meaningless without the behaviours that uphold them, no matter how many pages of philosophy are written in their defence. If our value is based only upon undetectable and indefinable spiritual kinship, it is readily ignorable; we may be freaks of nature, but at least we are freaks of nature that can recognise common interests. That is the basis of all human morality.
Natural selection works on populations, not individuals. You have read too many Chick Tracts, obviously…Ironically the myth of the noble savage has been exploded by the myth of natural selection…
Both are false!
I believe that an Eternal God has made not only Himself known to mankind, but also He has made known to mankind His moral truths. For instance, the Seventh Commandment “Thou shall not steal (Exodus 20:15),” is not only an objective moral truth but also a moral absolute, since it is a manifestation of God’s moral nature, which is by definition absolute and immutable. And, therefore, asserting the existence of objective, moral absolutes from the Christian point of view is natural because these moral absolutes are founded upon the morally absolute creator God.
Oh ok. Sometimes people use the term objective as synonymous with absolute.
We tend to recognise others’ interests in as far as that recognition advances our own interests. However in a world of limited resources (finite lives, finite productive lives, finite sexual lives, finite attractiveness, finite material and energy resources etc) and societal hierarchy (which so far has been shown to be unavoidable) we find these concerns inadequate. If being compassionate or following the Golden Rule is costing me more than it is worth, I may ignore it outright or curtail it or restrict it to only those interactions when I am interacting with a stronger or equal party or where an enforcer (law or fear of embarrassment is a motivator) is present. These are just empirical facts. You should see how compassionate nursing staff are in some countries to people of their own ethnic and language group. Of course once a patient-friendly boss appears on the scene their attitude changes.
Yet secular laws exist and in situations where the law breaks down or strong leadership is lacking we find that people often do go on murderous rampages. (Sometimes we don’t, like in the Touhoku Tsunami in Japan but there other transcendent factors occur such as belief in the nation or the spirit of the nation or similar ethical implications not dependent on pure recognition of others’ interests). We also find that when the authorities are immoral, murderous rampages do follow. Such rampages still occur in North Korea for instance which is an officially atheist nation. They occurred in mostly atheist nations such as Cambodia, USSR, Eastern Europe, PRC and so forth. I would say it was not atheism which made them so but a lack of belief in that divine enforcer. People recognised that the Party or State was the ultimate authority based on the assumption that pure reason (Marx) is the ultimate authority.
Yet we need laws, constitutions, ethics codes (such as the ones used in research) and enforcers (police, courts etc). A government-less Communist utopia has never been able to get off the ground. Empathy is not enough and it can be misdirected or overruled when it is present anyway. We found compassionate, empathetic scientists experimenting on people frequently and breaking ethics standards, hence the requirements for things such as the Helsinki Declaration or university ethics review boards. Most violations are nowadays minor but as any researcher will tell you, ethics boards are a pain in the behind.
Yet rights did not exist for more than half of the world’s population in the 20th century where rulers had absolute authority over the lives of their subjects. In many countries rights still don’t exist and people are still the same people universally.