The Bible, Creationism, and Prophecy (part 1)

Zombrex

wolfsbane wrote: »

Sam Vimes said:

So if they agree that enslaving everyone other than themselves is a good thing, it is a good thing?

It is according to them

Again you guys throw out the universal standard and then expect us to assess something based on the universal standard.

Is White Chicks a good movie Wolfsbane?

Turtwig

wolfsbane wrote: »

I did not mean he was emotionally free - rather, rationally free. Sure, the non-intellectual will mostly not reason through to amorality from materialism - but the enlightened materialist will. While the little people agonise over their consciences, he is able to exploit them to the full.

Of course, for practical reasons he may live according to their morals, but if the circumstances permit no retribution he can happily live like a devil. And you have no grounds to say he should not.

All I'm wanting you to face up to is the fact that, for the materialist, the serial sex-killer is no worse than the serial philantrophist.

Sigh, we're going in circles here (wish they were squares),

Enlightened materialist, what in the heck do you mean by that?
Someone who has the ability to override their conscience completely is refered to as a psychopath. Someone who gains pleasure (typically their heart rate goes down) when others would normally be conflicted (panicked/scared/troubled causes increased heart rate)is an extreme psychopath.
Psychopaths, are products of nature they do not answer to ANY moral code.

How many times, honestly will I have to say that the majority of people CANNOT ignore their conscience by rationality be they materialist or not! It is in the neurological wiring of our brain that emotion produces the first response - not rationality. Unless they can change brain wiring it is very very HARD. Unless of course they've been wired like a psychopath.

All I want is for you to face up the idea that morality is a product of human nature : it is innate within us. Our conscience makes it difficult to ignore even if our rationality dictates that we should, we still may not be able to do so.
Ask yourself why would a friend who knows that they can't swim, jump in to save a friend who is drowning, only for them both have to be saved by someone else. It's usually after jumping (yes, they're still in the air!) when the rational side kicks in but it CANNOT override the conscience emotion. In fact some people remark that they didn't want to do it but their body did it anyway!
It is not easy,so even realising that morality is derived from biology is NOT enough to ignore it.

Interestingly, there is another way to trick the conscience:
It becomes easier to ignore morality when emotion is involved. If a person is blinded by emotional beliefs then morality is far easier to override than by rational means.
I could stretch that to imply that a religious person (or anyone with a passionate belief) is the most vulnerable but I won't because it hasn't yet been proven - though it is speculated.* Unlike you, I follow evidence I don't accuse a type of human of being defunct if I believe them to be so.

So, in a way I guess you are sort of right it is possible for a materialist to ignore morality, but it isn't usually achieved by rationality.Likewise you can replace 'materialist' with 'non materialist' it makes no difference : Emotion conquers all, even the religious
Blinded by belief is the easiest way to defy morality.


*Current thinking is that ANYONE (with typical brain chemistry) is just as likely at ANY POINT to be blinded by emotion and ignore morality. [well d'uh:)]

Sam Vimes

wolfsbane wrote: »

Sam Vimes said:

So if they agree that enslaving everyone other than themselves is a good thing, it is a good thing? And your idea that the next tribe ought to be respected and loved - that is an immoral thing?

Society is everyone, not just one subset deciding to enforce themselves on another. If one subset decided to enslave another they would object. They do not want to be enslaved but people are forcing them to be, therefore it is immoral. Societal consensus comes in in cases where there is disagreement. Someone could misinterpret the rules just as can happen with religious morality and think something is acceptable when it's not. In that case you need the collective will of society to explain to them that they've done wrong, usually through prison. And they can do it because they can point out that the person would not like it done to them, therefore they should not to it to others. No God required

wolfsbane wrote: »

Sam Vimes said:

It is - but that is not my argument. I'm not debating the merits of our respective moralities - I'm pointing out that the materialist has no grounds for saying any behaviour is any better or worse than another, much less expressing moral indignation at the offender. The murderer is doing nothing essentially different than the gardener or the mechanic - he is merely rearranging matter.


I agree. But my point is that the materialist should not consider himself bound by the morality we have. He may rightly pick and choose what pleases him.

No he may not pick and choose what pleases him. He is bound by the rules of social animals, that he must treat others as he would like to be treated. I honestly don't understand why you lot can't grasp that you don't need a big scary man in the sky to tell someone that they've done wrong because they hurt someone. As Malty_T says the world you describe where people have no concept of right and wrong is a world full of psychopaths, of people with mental illnesses. Those are the people that behave as you think an atheist should, the people who have faults in the morality centre of their brain. They do not get a rush of pleasurable chemicals when they do good so they go out and murder indiscriminately. There have even been cases where people had brain injuries and their entire personalities changed, including their moral behaviour, which pretty much proves its a function of the brain

You lot have such strong faith in God but I actually feel sorry for you tbh. You think that the whole of humanity would behave like murderous psychopaths if it wasn't for the bible. I couldn't get out of bed in the morning if I had as little faith in humanity as you do. How can you even be in the same room as a non-believer without fear that he's going to rape and murder you?

Soul Winner

Sam Vimes wrote: »

You lot have such strong faith in God but I actually feel sorry for you tbh. You think that the whole of humanity would behave like murderous psychopaths if it wasn't for the bible. I couldn't get out of bed in the morning if I had as little faith in humanity as you do. How can you even be in the same room as a non-believer without fear that he's going to rape and murder you?

Oh my LORD how many more times??? How could you possibly read into what we have been debating about for the last few pages and come to that conclusion? It must be going in one side of your brain getting translated into gobbledygook by you’re a-prior unbending view of the world translator and coming out in mumbo jumbo sentences like what you said above. We are not saying that without God you cannot be moral. We are saying that without God there are no objective moral values, only subjective ones and that has been made pretty clear even by you lot. I for one would have more faith in the morals of some non believers (because I know many) than I would some Christians (so called), but that has nothing to do with what we are talking about. You're just a straw-man basher Sam that is all that you are if the above is all you can come out with after all we’ve been stating in the previous few pages of text, which is totally not saying what you wish it was saying. You come in here under the pretense of seriously debating the topics only to end up straw-man bashing and trolling. Sad really, you seemed liked a smart kind of chappy

Sam Vimes

Soul Winner wrote: »

Oh my LORD how many more times??? How could you possibly read into what we have been debating about for the last few pages and come to that conclusion? It must be going in one side of your brain getting translated into gobbledygook by you’re a-prior unbending view of the world translator and coming out in mumbo jumbo sentences like what you said above. We are not saying that without God you cannot be moral. We are saying that without God there are no objective moral values, only subjective ones and that has been made pretty clear even by you lot. I for one would have more faith in the morals of some non believers (because I know many) than I would some Christians (so called), but that has nothing to do with what we are talking about. You're just a straw-man basher Sam that is all that you are if the above is all you can come out with after all we’ve been stating in the previous few pages of text, which is totally not saying what you wish it was saying. You come in here under the pretense of seriously debating the topics only to end up straw-man bashing and trolling. Sad really, you seemed liked a smart kind of chappy

I read that into the statement that if I murdered you I would just be rearranging matter and that for the materialist (ie me) the serial sex killer is no worse than the serial philanthropist. I apologise for the ridiculous straw man :rolleyes: Personally I think the above statement is a ridiculous straw man because it ignores our repeated assertions that I can tell someone they've done wrong on the basis that they wouldn't like it done to them

What exactly are you saying? That even though everyone already knows right from wrong, for some reason I cannot appeal to this knowledge that I know they have when telling them they've done wrong unless I mention the creator of the universe too? Since we both acknowledge that there are things that everyone will agree are wrong, what's stopping me from using this fact? We both know this similar morality exists, we just disagree on the source of it.

The only point you seem to be making here is "there is no objective morality without God. There is objective morality. Therefore there is a God" but all that shows is you don't understand evolution because a similar moral sense is no more miraculous than the fact that we all have noses. Our brains evolved along with our bodies

The reason there are things that are "always wrong" is that there are things that are "always harmful to others" and we are genetically programmed so see things that are harmful to others as wrong because our ancestors who did not have this instinct were promptly killed or shunned by the pack. The standard for whether something is right or not is if it would hurt others and I don't have to mention a God to appeal to that standard. Saying "there is no right and wrong without God" makes no more sense than "there is no left and right without God", as if you can't tell someone left from right without pointing to the bit of the bible that says it

There are two things that you fail to grasp beyond your repeated refusal to acknowledge that I have fully explained why there is right and wrong without God.

1. While there are some things that are (almost) universally considered wrong, there are millions of things that are not. If morality was objective and instilled in us by God there would be no differences. As christians usually do you have pointed to the few things that are the same and ignored the vast number of things that are different, it's confirmation bias. This objective morality you talk about where everyone has the same moral standards because they were given by God is a myth. There are some basic similarities that are shared by most people but there are lots of difference too, which is what you'd expect if it had evolved
2. If objective morality requires a God as you say then currently there is no objective morality because you cannot prove the existence of the thing that is required to make it objective. All you have is the subjective morality of primitive Israelis masquerading as objective and it's no more binding on me than the qur'an

Sam Vimes

Soul Winner, do you acknowledge that if you kill someone I can explain to you why its wrong by pointing out that you would not like to be killed?

marco_polo

Soul Winner wrote: »

Assume God exists for one second, then assume that He gave this command to these people for another second, that means the carrying out of this command was a moral obligation on the part of the people to whom He commanded it. And interestingly enough they never actually carried out this command. This command was directed at a people who were chosen by God to be His oracle people, that through them the Messiah would come and provide the door of salvation for the world. The people of Edom who were to be destroyed were the Israelites enemies. They were descended from Amaleck who was descended from Esau the brother of Jacob. Going out the gate they stood against the people of God and would have wiped them out only for the protection of God. It was this people who wouldn't allow the Israelites to pass through their land as a shortcut to safety from other enemies, and it was from this people that Herod the baby killer was from descended and it is this people who right up to the end will be against God. God will wipe them out Himself then.

But if God doesn't exist then I agree the acts you outline are wrong but again that is just my subjective opinion. And in the absence of a divine command from God (assuming He exists) then again the acts would be considered wrong. You just have to remember that God was protecting the people through whom He promised to bless the whole world and as others have pointed out there are times when killing is necessary. This was one of those times. And sure even if God doesn't exist then by the standards of some just in here would have allowed these Israelites to wipe out this people just on self defense grounds alone. Why isn't God allowed to this? After all as the giver of life it is His prerogative to take life again no?

So there is no absolute unchanging moral value that killing is always wrong, just wrong unless God commands it? Seems pretty relative to me.

Out of curiousity what would the self defense argument be in terms of slaughtering the male children?

Sam Vimes

And I have to wonder, if God loved the Israelites and wanted them to kill their enemies, why didn't he just do it himself as he did with Sodom? That way his command would be carried out without any risk to his chosen people.


Now this is an outlandish theory but hear me out:

1. God had nothing to do with it
2. One of the Israelites claimed God commanded it to motivate people to do something they wouldn't normally do

:eek: Shocking I know. My theory reminds me of something but I can't quite put my finger on what

Zombrex

Soul Winner wrote: »

Oh my LORD how many more times???
....
We are saying that without God there are no objective moral values, only subjective ones and that has been made pretty clear even by you lot.

Oh your Lord how many more times

With God there is still only subjective morality. All God does is introduce a call to authority.

philologos

Wicknight wrote: »

Oh your Lord how many more times

With God there is still only subjective morality. All God does is introduce a call to authority.

Just run us through how again. I'm curious to hear your understanding on this.

I had always thought that if God exists, and if the world is His creation, and if He has dominion over us that it would work something like this.

1. God created the world.
2. God is omniscient and omnipotent.
3. By extension God knows everything about what He has created.
4. Therefore He knows how best to live in it, and has laid down commandments.
5. If God has set standards of goodness about how best to live in the world, God's standard is the standard we use to compare between what is good and what is bad.

If God knows best about how to live in the world, nobody knows any better than God. Therefore God's standard is the objective best standard and indeed is binding on all of us due to His authority as Creator of the universe.

I don't understand your reasoning about how it is still subjective if God exists. If it is binding on all people, you can be pretty sure it is objective.

Run it through me again, I really want to understand where you're coming from here.

Turtwig

Therefore God's standard is the objective best standard and indeed is binding on all of us due to His authority as Creator of the universe.

How did God 'tell' us those standards??
If by conscience then conscience is subjective.
If by the Bible, the bible is subjective.

Even if God's morality is itself 'objective' the very fact it is passed to humans makes it subjective - You will agree that no two individuals are the same?

philologos

Malty_T wrote: »

How did God 'tell' us those standards??
If by conscience then conscience is subjective.
If by the Bible, the bible is subjective.

Even if God's morality is itself 'objective' the very fact it is passed to humans makes it subjective - You will agree that no two individuals are the same?

I'm still not understanding you. Just because people disagree with divine revelation doesn't make it any less objective. Certainly not if people will be judged by it at the end of time.

Turtwig

Jakkass wrote: »

I'm still not understanding you. Just because people disagree with divine revelation doesn't make it any less objective. Certainly not if people will be judged by it at the end of time.

Let's say you are right then,

God's morality is objective. If as you just said that people disagree over it then our* argument that atheism can be just as valid is equally right then?
Even if God is objective, the flaw created by Adam and Eve has made our** view of morality subjective - perhaps that's the key to understanding salvation?

Yet again, we are in semantics, if by definition God is defined to have objective morality then of course he has. However, we are talking about the fact that it makes no different if atheists can't have objective morals, when you Jakkass just agreed that Christians can't have them either - thanks:)

*Atheists
**Theists

philologos

Let me make my position more simply:

Assuming God exists, and God has revealed His moral law to us in the Biblical text:

If we are ultimately going to be assessed by God's standard, does the standard of man matter a damn?

I.E There is only one real assessment of morality, one that is binding on all. The rest are merely false.

Turtwig

Ahh but now you're changing the original motion.

The motion was that an atheistic society could not be as moral as one followed by a theistic one. You just agreed that both can only be subjectively moral.
It is only when we pass from this life that we face the objective morality. Correct?

Mark Hamill

Jakkass wrote: »

Just run us through how again. I'm curious to hear your understanding on this.

I had always thought that if God exists, and if the world is His creation, and if He has dominion over us that it would work something like this.

1. God created the world.
2. God is omniscient and omnipotent.
3. By extension God knows everything about what He has created.
4. Therefore He knows how best to live in it, and has laid down commandments.
5. If God has set standards of goodness about how best to live in the world, God's standard is the standard we use to compare between what is good and what is bad.

If God knows best about how to live in the world, nobody knows any better than God. Therefore God's standard is the objective best standard and indeed is binding on all of us due to His authority as Creator of the universe.

I don't understand your reasoning about how it is still subjective if God exists. If it is binding on all people, you can be pretty sure it is objective.

Run it through me again, I really want to understand where you're coming from here.

Your proposition is flawed. Its not just that god knows best about how to live in the world, god has actually decided how best to life in the world and he did this when he created it. The creation of this universe (and its limits) were subjectively decided on by god (assuming he was omnipowerful, he could have created the universe in any form, so the form he chose must have been chosen subject to some reason or requirement). As what constitutes a moral act was also subjectively decided on by god when he created the whole notion of morality, this makes all morality subjective to the way he created the universe.

lugha

wolfsbane wrote: »

lugha said:
What has that got to do with my argument for honesty in atheists about morality? If our morality is biological conditioning, let us admit we may properly pick and chose which we wish to observe, instead of pretending that it really is wrong to do some things.

Nothing in short. It was a point about a flaw in the Christian morality framework which would be a fair diversion if we were comparing the relative merits of atheists V Christian moralities. But I accept we are discussing an unrelated matter, a logical difficulty in the former.

My view on your question would differ somewhat from my fellow godless friends. I do not believe in absolute right and wrong. Several posters seem to suggest (apologies if I misunderstood) that the golden rule can help us identify the latter. But it is important to remember that the altruistic trait is a trait that happened to evolve. If life survives on earth for a few more million years it might well be the case that in a much more crowded world, this trait will not prove to be as beneficial as it has in the past. Perhaps not, perhaps it could be argued using some kind of mathematical model that altruism would prosper in all scenarios. It doesn’t matter. The fact is that it did in the past. Not by design or some forward thinking by the different species. There is no place for such possibilities in evolution. Altruism happens to be a trait which led to a greater propensity for different species to survive.

But there is an obvious problem with this in that it seems wrong. If I murder my neighbour and rape and impregnate his wife, then an naïve analyses would suggest that people like me (and my genes) would survive longer. Of course this proved not to be the case, so evolution had to come up with something to get a member of a species to refrain from doing something which is personally beneficial but which is (unknown to the member!) detrimental to the survival of the species. Of course evolution is blind, so an arrangement like that that prevailed during the cold war were either side refrained from attacking because they reasoned it would lead to their own destruction could not be deployed. And so what we got with altruism was a trait which impedes us from rationalising that our selfish interests are served by exploiting the altruism of others*. We call this morality. Those both of faith and without genuinely do believe that murder and rape and the like are absolutely wrong. But they do so because we evolved to think that. Many of us have no qualms about killing animals for food or even for sport. I have no great difficulty in imagining an alternative evolution where we might be as appalled at the notion of killing an animal as we are at killing a human. Of course humans have the intelligence to reason as I have done and thus threaten the vital altruism trait. So evolution had to turn another trick and evolve a trait which dealt with this. In this context it is not difficult to see how God and absolute morality came in to the mix.

* I recall reading somewhere that an optimal species (in terms of propensity to survive) is not one which is entirely altruistic but one where there is a certain proportion of selfish members. Which is why our evolved morality does not suffice and why we need civil laws.

Sam Vimes

lugha wrote: »

My view on your question would differ somewhat from my fellow godless friends. I do not believe in absolute right and wrong. Several posters seem to suggest (apologies if I misunderstood) that the golden rule can help us identify the latter. But it is important to remember that the altruistic trait is a trait that happened to evolve. If life survives on earth for a few more million years it might well be the case that in a much more crowded world, this trait will not prove to be as beneficial as it has in the past.

Don't get me wrong here. I know that what's considered right and wrong can change with societies. I was just trying to point out that we have an evolved altruism trait so what's right and wrong can be reasoned instead of just saying "it's wrong cos God said so". Animals have to adapt their behaviour in order to live in groups so if this altruistic trait did diminish we'd have to go back to living alone or just with family or we'd all kill each other off. The world would be very different without it

Now, I would argue that non-religious morality is superior to religious because where we are free to reason what's right and wrong based on whether an action hurts others and can overrule parts of the book if we feel they are outdated*, christians are bound to abiding by the moral law that's written down in a book that is in all likelihood just the personal biases of ancient Israelites pretending to be objective morality. They think they have absolute right and wrong in their hands but so do the followers of lots of other religions and they may very well all be wrong. This would mean we have a load of people who think they know better than everyone else trying to force ancient subjective opinions of what's right and wrong on the world as if these ancient subjective opinions are absolute truth. A disaster I'm sure you'll agree. I think you'd be better off keeping your morality to yourselves until your God's existence is proven just in case

*Theoretically. In reality most religious people do it too but like to think they don't.

Zombrex

Jakkass wrote: »

If God knows best about how to live in the world, nobody knows any better than God. Therefore God's standard is the objective best standard

Why?

There is no connection between those two things. It is still simply God's opinion. it is not a force of nature, a property of nature (nature being all of existence, not simply the universe but everything including what God himself is in). Morality makes no sense divorced of the judgement of someone of something. If God didn't exist then his opinion on morality wouldn't exist so how can it be objective?

2+2=4 is true even if no one is around to determine that. White Chicks is a bad movie doesn't make sense divorced from the person making that judgement. One is objective, a fact, the other is subjective, an opinion.

How "best" to live a persons life is a judgement based on what priorities a person has. God may have his priorities as well of how best we should live our lives, but it is still just God's opinion. There is no "best" way to live as a fact of nature, such a concept doesn't make sense.

Again what you call objective morality is just a call to authority. God knows best is not the same as saying God's morality is objective and universality. It is simply saying that God's opinion means more than anyone elses. But it is still just an opinion.

Zombrex

Jakkass wrote: »

Let me make my position more simply:

Assuming God exists, and God has revealed His moral law to us in the Biblical text:

If we are ultimately going to be assessed by God's standard, does the standard of man matter a damn?

It does if you don't agree with God's standard.

There is no logical argument that prevents God from being a tyrant. You guys all just assume that a) he won't be, he has to be moral even if moral is defined by what he is or b) if he is that is his right as creator of us, he can do what he likes with us

philologos

Wicknight wrote: »

It does if you don't agree with God's standard.

There is no logical argument that prevents God from being a tyrant. You guys all just assume that a) he won't be, he has to be moral even if moral is defined by what he is or b) if he is that is his right as creator of us, he can do what he likes with us

Thanks for this.

Just curious, if people are before a court guilty of a crime, is it tyranny to hold that person to justice according to the law?

I would see it as being similar in relation to God. Nothing to do with tyranny, everything to do with justice. There are consequences for how we act in this life for the Christian, and there will be justice.

Sam Vimes

What if God decided tomorrow that the enslaving of black people was the right and moral thing to do, and he communicated this to us directly? Such a thing is within his power after all since apparently things are only wrong because he says they are and he can make the universe any way he pleases. Or possibly he has considered it moral all along and we have simply misinterpreted his edicts. Maybe his rules were never meant to apply to black people and they were meant to be one of the things we have dominion over. Would you update your understanding and take a slave, secure in the knowledge that it was perfectly moral?

Zombrex

Jakkass wrote: »

Thanks for this.

Just curious, if people are before a court guilty of a crime, is it tyranny to hold that person to justice according to the law?

No. It might be tyrannical to execute his children though :rolleyes:

This is another problem with the notion of God's morality. When he does something we consider just you guys go Look,see God is just!

When he does something that we would consider unjust, such as killing children, you guys go Well who are we to judge God

Well, we were judging him 5 minutes ago, so why can't we judge him now.

Jakkass wrote: »

I would see it as being similar in relation to God. Nothing to do with tyranny, everything to do with justice.

The tyrant always believes he is acting in the interests of justice.

When Pol Pot become convinced that his second in command, Son Sen, had betrayed him he ordered his execution. He also ordered the execution of his wife and children, under the grounds that if Son Sen had betrayed the party it was likely that his wife and children had as well. In Pot's head that probably made perfect sense. To agree that Pot was not a tyrant you have to agree with that he did.

You have to agree with the "justice" in order to determine that God is not an immoral tyrant. And if you agree with what took place in the Old Testament, the genocide and slavery, I would consider you yourself immoral and evil.

If on the other hand you don't agree with it but say you have faith that God did what was right then you cannot determine he is not actually a tyrant, you can only hope he isn't.

kiffer

Jakkass wrote: »

Thanks for this.

Just curious, if people are before a court guilty of a crime, is it tyranny to hold that person to justice according to the law?

that depends on the court and the crime

Is the crime kiddknapping and murdering a child? Or is it suggesting that living in a facist dictator ship might not be all that great?

I would see it as being similar in relation to God. Nothing to do with tyranny, everything to do with justice. There are consequences for how we act in this life for the Christian, and there will be justice.

justice? Or retribution? Punishments should either reform or if that's not possible remove the danger to others in the most compassionate/humane way possible... Being tortured in hell for ever does neither of these two things ... All it does is make you feel better now because others are suffering (or will suffer).

wolfsbane

lugha wrote: »

Nothing in short. It was a point about a flaw in the Christian morality framework which would be a fair diversion if we were comparing the relative merits of atheists V Christian moralities. But I accept we are discussing an unrelated matter, a logical difficulty in the former.

My view on your question would differ somewhat from my fellow godless friends. I do not believe in absolute right and wrong. Several posters seem to suggest (apologies if I misunderstood) that the golden rule can help us identify the latter. But it is important to remember that the altruistic trait is a trait that happened to evolve. If life survives on earth for a few more million years it might well be the case that in a much more crowded world, this trait will not prove to be as beneficial as it has in the past. Perhaps not, perhaps it could be argued using some kind of mathematical model that altruism would prosper in all scenarios. It doesn’t matter. The fact is that it did in the past. Not by design or some forward thinking by the different species. There is no place for such possibilities in evolution. Altruism happens to be a trait which led to a greater propensity for different species to survive.

But there is an obvious problem with this in that it seems wrong. If I murder my neighbour and rape and impregnate his wife, then an naïve analyses would suggest that people like me (and my genes) would survive longer. Of course this proved not to be the case, so evolution had to come up with something to get a member of a species to refrain from doing something which is personally beneficial but which is (unknown to the member!) detrimental to the survival of the species. Of course evolution is blind, so an arrangement like that that prevailed during the cold war were either side refrained from attacking because they reasoned it would lead to their own destruction could not be deployed. And so what we got with altruism was a trait which impedes us from rationalising that our selfish interests are served by exploiting the altruism of others*. We call this morality. Those both of faith and without genuinely do believe that murder and rape and the like are absolutely wrong. But they do so because we evolved to think that. Many of us have no qualms about killing animals for food or even for sport. I have no great difficulty in imagining an alternative evolution where we might be as appalled at the notion of killing an animal as we are at killing a human. Of course humans have the intelligence to reason as I have done and thus threaten the vital altruism trait. So evolution had to turn another trick and evolve a trait which dealt with this. In this context it is not difficult to see how God and absolute morality came in to the mix.

* I recall reading somewhere that an optimal species (in terms of propensity to survive) is not one which is entirely altruistic but one where there is a certain proportion of selfish members. Which is why our evolved morality does not suffice and why we need civil laws.

Thank you, lugha, for a direct and honest answer. That's all I was looking for. For the materialist, morality is merely a biological conditioning which he as a rational being may properly choose to ignore or not.

I do of course reject the biological origin of morality, but you have made a case for it consistent with your materialist beliefs.

Turtwig

wolfsbane wrote: »

Thank you, lugha, for a direct and honest answer. That's all I was looking for. For the materialist, morality is merely a biological conditioning which he as a rational being may properly choose to ignore or not.

I do of course reject the biological origin of morality, but you have made a case for it consistent with your materialist beliefs.

Ehh confirmation bias....are you just going to gloss over what everyone else said???

wolfsbane

Sam Vimes wrote: »

What if God decided tomorrow that the enslaving of black people was the right and moral thing to do, and he communicated this to us directly? Such a thing is within his power after all since apparently things are only wrong because he says they are and he can make the universe any way he pleases. Or possibly he has considered it moral all along and we have simply misinterpreted his edicts. Maybe his rules were never meant to apply to black people and they were meant to be one of the things we have dominion over. Would you update your understanding and take a slave, secure in the knowledge that it was perfectly moral?

No, God is not free to do anything. He cannot act against His nature. HE is infinitely holy and UNABLE to sin. He cannot lie. He cannot make oppression of the innocent good.

Zombrex

wolfsbane wrote: »

Thank you, lugha, for a direct and honest answer. That's all I was looking for. For the materialist, morality is merely a biological conditioning which he as a rational being may properly choose to ignore or not.

As opposed to what Wolfsbane?

Are you saying Christians never choose to ignore morality?

Zombrex

wolfsbane wrote: »

No, God is not free to do anything. He cannot act against His nature. HE is infinitely holy and UNABLE to sin.

That is some what of a pointless requirement since "His nature" is what ever he wants it to be, and sin is simply going against his will, which he would obviously never do, but it places no requirement on what his will actually is.

All you are really saying here is that God must do what he wants to do, not anything else. Well d'uh :pac:

wolfsbane

Sam Vimes wrote: »

Don't get me wrong here. I know that what's considered right and wrong can change with societies. I was just trying to point out that we have an evolved altruism trait so what's right and wrong can be reasoned instead of just saying "it's wrong cos God said so". Animals have to adapt their behaviour in order to live in groups so if this altruistic trait did diminish we'd have to go back to living alone or just with family or we'd all kill each other off. The world would be very different without it

Now, I would argue that non-religious morality is superior to religious because where we are free to reason what's right and wrong based on whether an action hurts others and can overrule parts of the book if we feel they are outdated*, christians are bound to abiding by the moral law that's written down in a book that is in all likelihood just the personal biases of ancient Israelites pretending to be objective morality. They think they have absolute right and wrong in their hands but so do the followers of lots of other religions and they may very well all be wrong. This would mean we have a load of people who think they know better than everyone else trying to force ancient subjective opinions of what's right and wrong on the world as if these ancient subjective opinions are absolute truth. A disaster I'm sure you'll agree. I think you'd be better off keeping your morality to yourselves until your God's existence is proven just in case

*Theoretically. In reality most religious people do it too but like to think they don't.

Yes, I know you were making the case for why we have morals, but lugha actually answered the question as to whether materialists are properly obliged to observe any morality.

If you'll just give a simple Yes or No.