TheVillageAtheist

Some religious people would say non-religious ideology is more dangerous.

They'd be wrong.

Religious ideology, more than any other kind, breeds violence because of the grand claims it makes for itself. It positions God as the creator, the source of all life, and makes him the ultimate moral authority. And adherence to his creeds promises the ultimate reward, while the ultimate punishment is meted out to those who do not. No non-religious ideology could possibly make such claims, and without such claims there are--as history has proven--far fewer people willing to sacrifice their integrity and common sense. Yes, non-religious ideologies can and do lead to violence and other ills, but not with the rate or consistency of religion.

With the mention of correlation ≠ causation, I was suggesting that people with certain violent proclivities may be more attracted to or more attached to religions or ideologies.

If most people came to their religion by choice, I might agree. But the vast majority of people who belong to a given sect do so because they were born into it, so it's difficult to say that violent people are more prone to religion when it in fact was not violence that lead them there but chance.

And we have plenty of evidence of otherwise normal, well-adjusted people killing themselves and others in the name of their faith.These two Boston bombers, for example. One was a boxer, but he was by most accounts a pretty normal guy. He wasn't torturing cats, or fitting the profile of the kind of person you're imagining would be drawn to violent ideologies. It's going to turn out that he did this for Allah.

How many of the 9/11 hijackers were otherwise normal people? Many had college degrees and careers. So I'm not buying that religious violence is perpetrated even predominantly by crazy people. History shows us again and again that religious ideology is a powerful influence on the human psyche, and makes even normal, peaceful people do terrible things. No other ideology that I can think of is capable of such a thing.

Anyway, what about the Soviets? Does irreligion necessarily make things better?

 

Correlations between ideologies/behaviors mustn't suggest a causal relationship

Ideology can be dangerous regardless of the brand. However, religious ideology tends to be dangerous with more frequency than non-religious ideology.

I also would hesitate to classify the soviets as irreligious. Yes, atheism was a bit of a prerequisite for Stalinism, but Stalinism was also something of a pseudo-religion. North Korea is a more crystalline example of this: A non-theistic nation that has simply replaced traditional gods with the Dear Leader.

There is no end to the questions but in the bottom line, the question is: If there is a God and like it's written, God is love then why does God allow all the suffering in the world to exist? Why did God allow the Holocaust to happen or the Rwandan genocide or the civil unrest in Syria which killed thousands of people? And why are there so many poor people in the world? Why are there disasters like Hurricanes, Tornados, earthquakes, droughts, heat waves, famines, diseases and disabilities, road accidents, all of which claim thousands of lives in each year.

 

My suspicion is that perhaps God is not so good (or maybe he is just corrupt) because if he was good then he would have done everything he can to stop all the suffering in the world. But the fact is, he doesn't do that.

If you're going to break rank and assume God isn't so good after all, why not just go all the way and assume he doesn't exist?

Half-believe is NOT a technical term.

 

I argue that religious people do have it in them that their faith is not as real as they tell it to be, that their faith is not as real as reality is real. Committing a sin which damns a person to hell for all eternity is a bit low priority from any other type of (physical) harm. Hey, we panic more from someone breaking something in their body than seeing somebody on an all-out sinning-spree.

 

At least, I haven't met anyone who actually behaves as though divine punishment is as good as any, even trivial, real world dangers/pain/harm. Even my extra religious friends whom I've seen cry and be emotional in church (the whole shebang).

 

I started out religious, though maybe not as extreme in practice as other people but I've taken the whole ideology seriously (academically, even), so no free will, 'let god decide', or 'it tears me inside to see' crap because that was never the first thing that came to my head when things happened.

 

I don't mean to offend or flame, if I come off that way. It's just a thought that came to me in the shower.

This is an interesting observation, and I think you're right. At least in the west, where adhering to religious practice is impractical, we see few strict observers. I think that's why some of them have trouble believing that religion is the chief cause of unrest in areas like the middle east. After all, it isn't a chief cause of anything in their own lives, so how could it possibly be the cause of something like deadly violence?

Real belief is pretty serious business, particularly in the Abrahamic faiths, where there exists strict dietary and social restrictions.

Is the belief of a god important? does it really matter if a person believes in a higher power or not? How does that belief impact our world? Why should people debate whether or not god exists, can't it be a simple case of 'live and let live'?

Yes, religion is extremely important in our world. It is a motivator for good and bad behavior, sometimes exceptionally good or bad behavior. It colors our language and our culture. It is the hinge of hugely consequential social and political debates.

The reason we should debate the merits of religion or the existence of God is that, like any philosophy, it has real consequences. A thousand years ago, when Islam was inclusive and promoting art and science, you would hope that people continue believing to foster the atmosphere of discovery and scholarship. Today, with terrorism and poverty and oppression perpetrated and perpetuated by Islamic fundamentalists, you might want to convince people to leave the faith.

Sorry it took so long to get back here for a response. Maybe this post or this conversation should be moved. Sorry for the long post as well. Please feel no rush to respond. I may not be able to get back in quite a while.

 

 

I was cryptic before. My point is like Poincare said, "no geometry is more true than another, it is only more useful".

 

If usefulness is the only thing that lets us pick one geometry over another it doesn't make geometry subjective (I'm sure we can agree geometry isn't subjective)... and so the same should follow for morality. Having to judge it by usefulness wouldn't be a reason to call it subjective.

How could geometry be subjective or objective without making some statement about it? I mean, are you saying that morality is objective just because it exists as a concept? And anyway, to say that one morality is more true than the other, or that the more useful morality should be applied is a subjective statement, even if the usefulness of said morality is objective.

I'm sure it's fine to disagree with Sam's postulate. You would end up with two versions of your statement,

 

• This ethical code is objectively morally good according to Sam's model of morality
• This ethical code is objectively morally bad according to my model of morality

and we've established: even if the only thing offering us a choice between your model and Sam's is their relative usefulness that doesn't make the thing being modeled subjective. Both statements can be true and both models objective. Continuing the planet size analogy, both of these statements could be true:

 

• That planet is objectively 2500 km in diameter according to classical mechanics
• That planet is objectively 2490 km in diameter according to general relativity

Both classical mechanics and general relativity are objective -- they are just built on different postulates. You are free to disagree with Sam's postulate or to disagree with the postulates of classical mechanics without making either resulting model subjective.

But the valuation you give to each of the items in your code of morality is subjective, even if you are basing it its usefulness to the human race, because you must apply a subjective value to whatever end you are attempting to reach through this code. For example, if your morality states that harming children is bad, and you base this on a study that finds children who have been abused are 70% more likely to commit a violent crime, you are placing a subjective value on the decrease of violent crime. So it may be "objectively" immoral according to your code, your code itself is subjective. This is not like saying geometry is subjective, it's like saying that your preference for this particular geometry is subjective.

So, again, it appears to me that disagreeing with the core principle of a model wouldn't be a reason to call it subjective.

Of course it would, because morality is not the measure of a planet, but the proposition that one planet is better than the other.

They would know morality without empathy because a person can know something without having an emotional affinity for it. Sociopaths are usually quite good a mimicking normal moral behavior when they want. I'm sure they couldn't do that if morals appeared arbitrary to them.

Your use of the word "mimicking" does my work for me on this one, but I'll go ahead and sum it up anyway: People who feel no empathy only know right from wrong based on what they've learned from society. A sociopath blends well (or doesn't) because they're good at copying what they see. A sociopath in Qatar is quite likely to answer the question of "What is right?" differently than a sociopath in Idaho.

In other words, a sociopath would know that a ponzi scheme is morally wrong even when first learning what a ponzi scheme is... not because they once memorized a list of every conceivable morally wrong action, but because ponzi schemes cause suffering and devalue others. From first principles it is simple to rationally deduce that it is morally wrong. They don't need to flip a coin when confronted with previously unconsidered moral dilemmas as if moral rights and wrongs appear arbitrary... as if randomly picked out of a hat.

I disagree. They may see it as suckers with money getting what they deserve for being stupid. By your logic, they would also see prison as immoral, since prison almost by its definition devalues others while causing their suffering. You could argue that people in prison are there for doing something stupid, but you could say the same thing about the victims of a Ponzi scheme. Had they been more thorough, they could have avoided their loss. The point is, no action is objectively wrong; it all depends on where the individual places their values.

Empathy is actually a very unreliable way of identifying morals.

Yet without it, we have no basis for avoiding things like the causing of suffering, and no drive to alleviate it. There would be no such thing as charity if not for empathy, no orphanages or hospices.

I'm not sure about how you're using the term objective. When I say objective I mean that the statement doesn't rely on personal perspective and emotional bias. If we can logically put "a study of cultural and archaeological anthropology determines that..." before those statements then they should be objective.

I'm using the word "objective" to mean how everyone means it in this context: That there are inherent and definitive "good" and "bad" acts in this world, that there is some cosmic rightness and wrongess, independent of what anyone believes. Like, a morality mathematics. And it doesn't exist.

I mean them in the usual sense. As part of a complete and balanced breakfast the national institute of health has determined through exhaustive research that cheerios are of better value and greater benefit than cyanide.

 

 

Compassion... let's see... sharing the spoils of a hunt with our neighbors rather than hunting our neighbors for their spoils.

 

Thrive... being more and more able to control our own fate while our ancestors were more at fate's mercy.

 

If every word in a statement needs to mean the same thing to everyone for it to be objective then no statement would ever be objective.

Exactly! What you call compassion is not what I call compassion, and even if we agree on the definition we almost certainly won't to which degree we should be compassionate. In other words, subjective valuations.

Indeed so. Even if I imagined no problem with my girlfriend cheating on me (it wouldn't bother me at all) I should still know not to cheat on her because it will cause her great emotional pain. Thick skinned people know that causing emotional harm is morally wrong even if they themselves can't imagine being so harmed. It would be a very different world otherwise.

You could only know this from experience; ie You've hurt someone before. Or you've read about it, or heard second-hand stories. Without empathy, there is no intellectual reason to assume that others feel pain unless you have experienced that they do. And even then, a thick-skinned person is more likely to say blunt, hurtful things, because they don't have that hitch in their throat to stop them that someone more sensitive might. Couples get into arguments about this sort of thing all the time, where one is called "thoughtless" for not doing something amazing on an anniversary. It's not that the thoughtless person didn't care, it's just that they never would have expected or needed some kind of hubbub made over the occasion, so they had no reason to expect that the other would. Unless, of course, the other said something beforehand.

Similarly, a high school jock should know that it is morally wrong to give a nerd a wedgie even if they feel no empathy for the nerd and no remorse for having done it. Empathy is clearly an unreliable push toward morality rather than being the only means of identifying it.

Why would they know?

It's like a bird's emotional need to migrate north in spring. Each bird could be drawn to fly in a slightly different northerly direction. This doesn't make the concept "north" subjective.

This analogy requires there to be some kind of over-arching truth to morality, as in "this concept is good always, even if it takes slightly different forms." But this is inaccurate. There is no moral statement that can be shown to be true as a concept always, even if it varies slightly from time to time. Not rape, not killing, not theft. There are no objective moral truths.

Keep in mind, however, that I do not disagree with Sam's general assessment of science and how it can relate to morality. But even he does not maintain that morality is objective. He says that science is capable of having its own say in the realm of morality by adopting a particular worldview--ie That we are to avoid the greatest possible suffering--but he never asserts that this is more correct than any other moral code, only that it is a moral code that can be derived from science.

my bad for the presentation of the last question.. i shouldn't use the word "agree"..

let me try in another way..

 

Couldn't objective morality still be operating in the background of the world's system.. despite people being able to form their own standards of right and wrong?

No. Even if we were the product of a supreme creator, the mandates of that creator must still be given a subjective value by its subjects (i.e. "us"). Without that valuation, even the words of a god are empty.

As mentioned earlier.. the best we could conclude from observation is that we are free to choose our beliefs...

but not enough to conclude morality is objective or truly subjective...

We can say much more than that. It is a fact that morality is subjective. It's entirely up to the individual to decide for itself what constitutes "right" and "wrong." We can intellectualize these opinions and make compelling, logical arguments for one code over another, but the strength of our position ultimately lies in our ability to build consensus. In other words, morality's strength is in its numbers.

Wrong. There is a commom knowledge, that all humans have, even aboriginies, indians etc. that kill, steal, cheat, betray etc. is wrong, and love, help, altruism etc. is good.

Um, no. First and foremost, not everyone agrees that killing, cheating, and stealing is wrong, and not everyone believes that altruism is good. Many people think charity is counter-productive, for example. So your assertion is incorrect right from the start. But what I'm curious about is why "even aboriginies, indians etc." are treated as something other than people in your post? What do you mean "even" they have morality?

Indeed, if God does not exist, than there is no basis for objective morality, and so being, nobody can say, Hitler was wrong, for example to exterminate the jews. Without a moral giver, morals become subjective, and are just based on different opinions. Therefore, no good, and bad really exists.

This is incorrect. I can say with confidence that Adolph Hitler was wrong, and I can give you an reasonable, rational explanation for why. Just because there is no cosmic "correctness" to behavior, it does not mean that all opinions are therefore correct.

Flood myths exist in most cultures because people tend to settle around bodies of water. If you live near a river now, you see how flooding even today can be a major problem, and major flooding can be catastrophic, so imagine how even a mild flood thousands of years ago could totally turn civilization on its ear. That said, the Biblical flood story isn't necessarily based on a real flood.

First of all, Noah's flood story is based on the flood story from the epic of Gilgamesh, and the flood part of that story may itself be a late addition based on the flood myth from the epic of Atra-Hasis, so it's unlikely that there was any singular event that triggered the Noah flood myth. Instead, there probably were several floods that ingrained themselves into the culture, and became a popular backdrop for morality and hero stories. A modern example would be counter-terrorism/special ops/black ops books/movies/games that pit heroes against forces of radical political or religious ideologies. Now, we can't say any one particular terrorist attack served as a catalyst for this kind of story, but their ever-present threat make them fertile ground for such stories.

I think so. I'm agnostic being open to the concept of god but skeptical of their being one.

 

Although if their is a god, I'm sure its something a lot more sophisticated than our brains are able to comprehend

 

 

 

 

Could god be everything together in the universe acted together as a collective conscious?

 

Quantum physics shows us that particles can retain information.

 

What if everything together right down to quarks, energy, radiation, etc is collectively god?

 

I'm not saying their is a god, or even if their is one I doubt we could even grasp the slightest notion of what god is. I just don't think mixing god with science is out of the answer and wanted to throw this out their

If you're just going to call the laws of the universe "God," then what's the point? It's theoretically possible, but there's no evidence to suggest it and the concept doesn't provide a better understanding of the universe.

The better, broader question is whether or not science is compatible with religion, and as we've seen, it very much is. Catholicism is already fully on board, and others are going to have to follow if they want to remain viable in the West as time goes on. Science isn't going away, in other words, and as we continue to shed light on the truth in ways that nakedly contradict literal interpretations of popular monotheistic texts, the big players will have to adapt or face extinction. That isn't to say religion will disappear, of course; rather, old religions will likely lose out to newer variations that do not oppose modern understandings of the world.

No doubt math is the very model of objectivity. Godel's incompleteness theorem is good on showing that some axioms must remain unproven by a math theorem.

 

Come to think of it, I hope I don't imply that a theory explaining morality would be as objective as a math theorem. No hope of that. It's just that they have in common the idea that first principles are judged by their usefulness rather than the ability to prove them true.

Fair enough, but usefulness is a subjective quality as well.

I may be unfamiliar with how you're using the term. There is, to my knowledge, no requirement that objective quantities be constant.

 

Planetary mass is objective because different astronomers independently find the same mass for any given planet -- that is to say, because the method of finding mass doesn't depend on the astronomer's subjective interpretation of personal experience it is an objective matter. The same could be said for tailors measuring a person for a suit. The tailor could be a computer devoid of subjectivity and the arm could belong to a dead person for whom all subjectivity is lost and the result would be the same as anyone could predict. That is my understanding of something that is entirely objective... even if it is a body part

Okay, it was admittedly a poor example. But morality isn't something you can measure. You can look at a planet and say "That planet is objectively this size," but you can't say "This ethical code is objectively good." It all depends on what you consider "good" to be. You've proposed Sam Harris' "Avoid the worst possible suffering," which is noble, but not one I agree with.

If you ask a psychopath which is the greater moral good: giving blood at the blood bank or mocking the mentally handicapped, they know the answer. They recognize morality without feeling empathy.

You're making two huge assumptions here. First, that they agree with the concept of charity, and secondly, that they find no humor in making fun of those with diseases. And in either case, it's only because of social conditioning. There is nothing inherently good or bad about either of those items. For instance, people have contracted diseases through tainted blood transfusions, and making fun of disability can help people coping with it...well, cope with it.

Yeah, I agree there is no true morality, but truth and objectivity are different beasts altogether. Newtonian mechanics (for example) is objective, and it was objectively derived, but it isn't true. Objectivity makes a well marked path that anyone can follow regardless of how their personal perspective is colored by their feelings, but... right, it doesn't guarantee the truth of the destination.

But again, morality can't be measured in such a way.

To be fair to psychopaths I would doubt the law's ability to inform anyone of morality. Although... thinking about it... that might explain why there are so many sociopaths in congress. They tried looking into the law to sharpen their skills in faking morality and almost all of the legal statutes ended up being a long ongoing story of political hackery that taught our young sociopaths to be politicians.

How else would they know? Because they do not feel empathy or remorse, the societal restrictions put upon them appear arbitrary.

It suddenly makes perfect sense

 

Seriously though, psychopaths certainly aren't like replicants from Blade Runner where a few questions from an empathy test reveals them for what they are. They know moral right from wrong. Even when considering a unique moral dilemma previously unconsidered, morality isn't so hard to reason -- even without the feeling of empathy pulling them toward morality they can still find it and recognize it by reasoning out a concept which isn't overly complicated.

I don't agree with that at all. Without empathy, much of our moral consciousness is not intuitive. Solidarity with strangers is not intuitive. Sharing resources is not intuitive. Are the morals of Wahabi Islam intuitive? Would you know instinctively that you should remain faithful to your partner without an intuitive understanding of what it might feel like to be cheated on? Of course not.

When I say objective quality I mean that we know enough to objectively say,

 

• Humans do better with a drive towards solidarity.
• We benefit from our tendency to value others.
• We thrive when compassion strengthens our connection to others.

But none of these are actually objective qualities. What does "better" mean? What does "benefit" mean? How do you mean "value others?" Even "compassion" doesn't mean the same thing to everyone. Does "thrive" simply refer to how many people there are in the world, or to the extreme level of comfort available only in a few places in the world? You may value population growth, but all that really means is that there are more people suffering from illness, hunger, and poverty than at any time in history. Is that really something worth valuing, or is it just a part of existence that is neither inherently good or bad? And going to the other extreme, all of our success through cooperation might just lead to our destruction. People are only now starting to realize just how badly we have damaged our environment since the beginning of the industrial revolution, and we be approaching a point where the damage is irreversible. That's what our progress has wrought. I'm not saying it's a bad thing objectively, I'm just saying that things you're tempted to call objectively good are actually very bad by the same logic in the long run.

and to say, even, that our drive toward morality owes its existence to the objective value of those qualities.

 

As far as first principles go, those don't appear half bad.

To you and me, perhaps. Others may not agree. Humans don't need to live in cities to survive. We don't need to cooperate beyond our family unit. We can, and we do, but it's not necessary, so in order to call those things "good," you have to apply our own subjective valuation of those other items.

No, you implied the Judeo-Christian creation myth didn't belong in this conversation. As this is the Religion forum, this is exactly where it belongs.

 

No, I did not. What I said was that I had a problem that he included the Judeo-Christian myth because of this specific reason. I made this plain in my post; I am not responsible for your reading comprehension level.

And I ask again: Do you plan on adding to this conversation, or are you just here to troll?

Dude chill. Attack less, discuss more.

Excuse you? I'm the one being attacked here. I'm simply defending myself.

At the foundation of every science, and I imagine every human idea, there are premises. They are the axioms of math, the first principles of philosophy, and the postulates of physics. They can't be proven true. They're arbitrary, and not everyone agrees with them.

 

If morality is subjective for this first reason you give then I'm positive nothing would not be.

I'm no mathematician, but I have heard that proof only exists in math, so I would assume that if there was any place one could find true objectivity, it's there. As for your overall point, I was say that you're right.

No doubt there is a big difference between those things, but you've got the cart before the horse. Empathy evolved into a human characteristic because animals -- particularly our primate ancestors -- which made certain choices were, on average, more successful than animals making different choices. Before humans defined morality and decided to call these decisions moral choices, and before human empathy ever existed, solidarity amongst group animals could still be recognized by the force of natural selection as an asset.

 

Empathy only exists because our ancestors made moral choices and they were rewarded for doing so. Empathy is absolutely rooted in morality and not the other way around.

I hadn't thought of it that way, but now it seems obvious. You learn something new every day, I suppose!

If the length of an arm is subjective then there would be no aspect or quality of any person that could be called objective. As it is, I think the length of body parts can safely be described as objective.

Unless your arms and mine are the same length, then arm length is not objective. Even your own arms are of different lengths, same goes for your legs. There is no objective mold from which a person comes from. Not liking the implications of something is certainly not a good enough reason to disbelieve.

Indeed. Moreover, if feeling empathy were the only way to recognize an act as moral then morality would be 100% subjective. I don't believe and I'm sure I never said "because we feel empathy morality is therefore objective". I meant to give the example of the psychopath who doesn't feel empathy but can recognize morality to dispel that idea.

What do you mean "recognize" morality? There is no true, objective morality for them to recognize, so if they in fact do intellectually understand that they have done wrong, it is only because they are aware of what the law says. There is no "true' morality. Anything you think is objective requires a subjective valuation of that principal.

I wonder about morality though. If you start by defining morality in terms of solidarity and compassion and recognize the premise "solidarity and compassion are good for humanity" it should be possible to deductively and objectively sort moral choices from immoral ones, and even assert that we should make the moral choices.

But solidarity and compassion aren't always good for humanity. Sometimes cruelty is required. Or if not required, at least you can achieve the same goals using different methods. That isn't to say there aren't some things that most people would agree upon, or that you can't make a reasoned argument for the rightness of something, but at the end of the day you still have to make a value judgment, and value judgments are subjective.

I think this is good because it gives a person an objective leg to stand on when hearing that someone else's idea of morality is just as valid in terms of that person's subjugation of women, or child abuse, or whatever it might be.

You don't need moral objectivity to argue against Bronze Age ethics. Hitchens liked to point to the fact that the liberation of women was one of the few things we know works as a cure for poverty. This is a sound argument that makes no reference to the moral rightness of the liberation of women. But if that's not enough, you can make intellectual arguments that are stronger than "God says so," without the need for an objective basis.

I can't objectively tell someone to stop eating ice cream because it is disgusting, but I should be able to objectively tell them to stop being cruel to their children because it is morally wrong. It is certainly good that there is far more objective quality in the latter.

And what exactly is this objective quality? I'm curious.

Lighten up. It belongs in this conversation because it is his thread and it is in the Religion forum. It is not up to you what can and cannot be discussed.

What the hell are you talking about? I never said the conversation didn't belong in the religion forum, and I never tried to lay out the parameters for what can and cannot be discussed. How about you actually contribute something to the discussion? Or are you contended in being a troll?

I wonder, though, if it might be possible to say that morality is objective. I think Sam Harris has made a good case for it. The way I look at it to convince myself is that psychopaths who are devoid of feelings of morality could, nonetheless, determine a morally good action and distinguish it from a morally bad action. They may not act on that information, or have the drive to act on it, but determining its truth from simple principles is possible. So, morality would have an objective basis.

 

I think this is a good thing because I want to object to morally disgusting acts that another culture may be comfortable with on something like objective moral reasons. I still think an important argument would be..

Sam Harris' argument still begins with a subjectively valued premise: We should try to avoid the worst possible suffering. While this is a noble thought, it's not something everyone agrees with. And of there is a difference between morality being innate--which it is, as it arises from and is rooted in our ability to feel empathy--and morality being objective. Arms and legs are innate, yet their lengths and specific measurements are subjective. In other words, just because we feel empathy doesn't mean that morality is therefore objective. It doesn't take a psychopath to feel less empathy for a serial killer on death row than, say, me. I imagine empathy is as subjective as anything else.

No one is giving it preference except you. Somecallmegenius mentions four options and specifically said "I also welcome any other theories of creation you may have".

I could care less what lip-services he gives to being all-inclusive; I'm concerned with the point he actually attempts to make, which is that the Judeo-Christian creation myth belongs in the conversation because, as he rhetorically asks:

Can the mud or clay or dust mentioned in the holy books be montmorillonite?

So "Divine Creation," at least to him, appears to mean specifically the Biblical myth.

I think dragonstar made some good points:

-the non belief in an all powerful creator does not preclude the belief in other supernatural powers ex fate, ghosts, spirits, etc

-you don't have to have someone to blame to feel anger about a situation

-one does not have to have an entity to blame to have feelings of injustice and no one would ever stop and think "my emotions are just social conditioning and governed by majority choice"

-they could simply accept that bad things happen and move on without needing an object to direct their indignation at.

they are reflective of the observable world we live in and we can certainly find people like that around us..i stand corrected that it "must" follow the conclusions i stated previously...

 

Subjective morality seems a reasonable concept when we consider how people could conclude their own rules to living.. give/create meaning of life for themselves..

However, that does not mean Absolute morality cannot exist alongside too..(absolute in the sense the laws to right and wrong is beyond our own creation..and pre-existed before us)...

It could be there all the while, but just that people didn't choose it or recognize it...(no one could empirically prove it doesn't exist ya.. since this scope is "subjective")

Thus at best, it could only show we are free to choose our paths concerning right and wrong..(not enough to conclude morality is subjective or absolute..)

 

 

To moontanman's question..

i'm in the group that believes in a designed universe.. thus the relevance for seeing there exists an intended way of living with regards to the design intention..

How about you?

 

 

 

with design, there will be an intention..

The whole case against there being objective morality is the evidence for morality's subjectivity. You couldn't therefore say that "Okay, well morality is subjective after all. But it still could be objective, and you can't prove it isn't." If it is subjective than it cannot be objective, and yes we did just prove it.

We are not limited to those stories. You are welcome to add more...

Okay, how about the Makiritare myth, which is that the world is just a god's dream? Or how part of the world is made from concentrated butter, as in the Hindu creation story? Why give the Judeo-Christian myth preference?

And to mooeypoo, yeah I can't read Hebrew. I am planning to learn it.

But as I do read Arabic, I am sure of the accuracy of the translation of the Quran version.

And the Quran was first written reasonably closely to when it was first read by Prophet Mohammad.

And it has been the same ever since. Quran was first read around 600 AD if I'm not mistaken.

Montmorillonite Abiogenesis theory did not come about until the 19th century..

 

So that verse of the Quran could not have possibly been modified after the Abiogenesis theory was first postulated...

The passages in the Bible about clay are metaphorical, not literal. Clay was the most popular and useful crafting material at the time, so invoking it in the holy literature would have made perfect sense to the people for whom the message was intended. It would be like today if you say that television is a black hole of culture, you don't literally mean that television is a black hole, you mean that television kills culture. The term "black hole" makes you think of destruction, of an inescapable force. The image of god forming man out of clay is exactly the same idea.

And if I'm not mistaken, man is created from a clot of blood in the Quran. In any event, even it they were literal, you'll notice that only man is created from clay, not all of life. If God were truly just dumbing-down the scientific explanation of abiogensis, he wouldn't have excluded animals from the process. Of course, clay isn't the only model; we still don't know how life started here.

Oh, and as for the compiling of the Quran, supposedly the process began immediately following the prophet's death, so it's easily a more historically-correct document (in the sense of being the actual words spoken by the actual person) than anything else in the Abrahamic faiths. Well, at least prior to the Book of Mormon.

Why exactly are we limiting ourselves to the Abrahamic creation stories? Why not the thousands of other creation stories?

The Bible, is what your making out to be black and white. I'm not defending it because i hate the freaking bible. Although I fear the christian who fallows everything in the bible, I understand the christian who picks and chooses what to fallow in the Bible.

 

Regardless of whether or not Jesus ever existed their was a point in time when people started believing in something other than what their church officials told them, this was before the printing press and before Martin Luther. They started believing in something other than what they were raised to believe. Maybe it was one person who got christened the name "Christ" or maybe it was a group of people. Either way, it happened.

 

I still don't know what you mean by "black and white." You contrast my position with a Christian who cherry-picks what to believe, which seems to suggest that you think I'm someone who believes everything. I assure you, this is not the case. We have plenty of evidence to suggest that most of the key events didn't happen, and enough common sense to know that the magical stuff is bogus. So I'm not really sure where this charge of seeing the Bible in "black and white" comes from or refers to.

As to Jesus getting people to think differently about the "church" (it would have been a temple, not a church) Jesus certainly wasn't the first radical rabbi, and we know he wasn't the last. In fact, Jesus, (or the character/characters he was based on) is not even the most influential person in Christianity's history. That honor belongs to Constantine I, whose conversion is likely the reason the faith exists today as anything other than the obscure Jewish cult it began as, and was destined to remain. And since Judaism does not represent the first organized religion, I'm not sure why you see Jesus' influence as being some kind of--forgive the term--revelation. He certainly wasn't the first person to challenge establishment. He's just the most popular, which again isn't even his doing; if not for Constantine as well as the appropriation of Pagan myths and rituals, then there's every chance you never would have heard of it.

The Bible is full of contradictions, I don't give things that contradict themselves full authority.

 

Everything is an interpretation, your reality is far different than mine. Mine is different than yours, some are alike. None the same. Do I need to emphasize special relativity?

 

Book of the time? I'm sure things have changed about Jesus at least one of the times the bible was rewritten. For good or for bad, I don't know but either way i'm sure things have changed.

 

Theirs other books Jesus appears in as a prophet.

 

 

 

Moontanman - It doesn't matter if your christian, muslim, asian, black. Theirs people with your label who will lie for support of something.

 

 

 

I talk about my views on Jesus of Nazareth, maybe he existed or maybe not. My point being that something whether it was Jesus the person, a small group of people, or a public outcry caused disruption in the church. I understand where you all are coming from and you all have valid arguments but i'm wondering if your seeing the point in my argument or are you just choose to not acknowledge it?

 

Something shook the grounds of the Hebrew sanctioned church. Christianity stems from it.

I have not read the entire bible but I do have a family friend who's in his 70's and has been preaching since he was 16 years old. He has been on television preaching and has a college degree education in the Bible. Although we disagree more than we agree, he is a devout christian and agrees with my views a little bit.

 

Jesus' actual effect on the temple was far, far less than that. He was a pesky apocalyptic rabbi who was arrested and crucified (if the story is true). The Jewish faith carried on, and still does to this day. All that changed was that there began another new branch of Judaism (which is what Christianity is) that eventually (hundreds of years later) became the largest religion in the world.

I suggest reading the Bible. Your second-hand information isn't helping you.

Everything isn't black and white. Only when you make it that way.

Sounds like an evasion tactic to me. What exactly have I made black-and-white, and what nuance am I missing out on?

The only image I have in my head is a man defying the church. That is what he did and why he was crucified.

And where did this image come from, exactly? You've admittedly read very little of the Bible, so I'm curious as to how you've reached your conclusion with such conviction. It seems to me that you began this experiment with a preconception of Jesus in mind, and ignored everything that might contradict it. That's not something an intelligent or intellectually honest person would do.

For those who say morality (the good and bad of things) is subjective...

Consider human trafficking (or slavery)... or the concept that the guy with the bigger stick rules (think big time mafia bosses, tyrannical dicatators etc)...

If we were to be truly objective and think in terms of 'survival of the fittest, big fish eats small fish' , then the 2 above-mentioned examples seems legit and no one should have a problem with it..

After all, this line of thought is logical, natural and also works fine in the animal kingdom..

Promiscuity is also logical, natural, and works fine in the animal kingdom, yet we humans tie ourselves up in monogamous relationships all the time. This has nothing to do with morality, yet we go against our natural inclination to bang everything that moves. Why? Social pressures, of course.

The point is, just because something can be viewed as acceptable in evolutionary terms doesn't mean that humans would or should be okay with it. On the other hand, there are plenty of people who believe in exactly that, or some variation on it.

Thus it should be more likely man took the path of armament (nature's arms race) to stay at the top of the food chain..

than to have the awareness to exercise restraint and value peace observing rules we have now as the "correct" direction to go...

For the oppressors, they would think it is their entitlement for they hold the power.. for the weak, they would think they have no choice but to be trampled on or have to find better ways to fend for themselves.

and so we should expect things to stay status quo for good because it is "naturalistic" of the world.. (until perhaps 1 day the weak become strong.. but ironically that too..still follows the rule of the "bigger stick")

I'm sorry, since when does subjective morality equate to Social Darwinism? I mean, people can believe the above is the right way to do things, but I have no idea what makes you think this should be the prevailing opinion. What about subjective morality makes you believe that it must be dominated by slavery?

So with things being so, and if social governing laws were truly a result of culture, why was it at a certain point of time, the strong (slavery example) would suddenly realise "right from wrong" ..and decide to change tack to start consider protecting the weak?

Where could the strong find such sense of "right and wrong" from this cold and brutal environment to make him determined enough to change the laws of the world to what we know of today?

There was nothing sudden about it, and as I said above, slavery is still practiced in parts of the world. To that end, the premise of your question is flawed. We didn't simply flip a switch and decide not be to slavers. Some cultures abandoned it before others, as well, and the people behind these abolitionist movements were great moralists and philosophers. You seem to be American--have you not studied how slaves came to be free in our country?

Jesus didn't write the bible bro.

Obviously. But if we're simply going to ignore the words attributed to him, how is it that you draw your conclusion that he was the "Einstein of his time," (which isn't even remotely accurate, by the way)? You base your opinion of this character one way or the other on his teachings. There are no other sources. He didn't write a memoir, and there is no archival footage of him.

What you're doing is engaging in the same kind of delusion religious people do. The difference is simply in the details. But at least Christians actually base their opinions of Jesus on the things he said. You, meanwhile, have simply created an imaginary vision of him in your head.

why take the Bible so literal?

In what way does "I have not come to abolish the law of the prophets" work as a metaphor?

But that brings us to the next questions:

1) when we say something or someone is good or bad.. who's standard do we refer to?

if we say the standard just comes directly from the society we live in.. and is purely (100%) subjective...

then we should also be able to say our tolerance and standard to define injustice and sufferings are purely subjective too...

its just takes a matter of conditioning or shrewd reasoning to allow ourselves to change our mindset on them to say "there is nothing wrong actually"....

However, in reality, despite coming from different cultures or backgrounds, people are still able to discern what is good and what is "evil"..

Well, cultures always define codes of law and ethics, but that's simply a function of survival. Without them, society couldn't exist. You'll notice that no two cultures can ever seem to agree on just what constitutes "good" and "evil." But just think about how it works on smaller scales, like in a classroom. You walk into a classroom, and your teacher is going to lay out the ground rules. Is this because there are objective rules to classroom etiquette? No, they do it because without rules, the class couldn't function. Nobody would learn anything if they were allowed to chat and play on their phones or make out with their girlfriends or boyfriends.

Of course some may argue and say "well there are those terrorists who believe strongly in their actions and visions too and say their brand of right and wrong is correct and true.."

so does it mean at the end of the day...we must conclude indeed.. there is actually no true right and wrong after all? but just a matter of perspective?

Yes. Even seemingly objective moral statements like "Do not hurt children" relies on a subjective value being placed on children. I think most people tend to agree with statements like this because most people feel empathy for children, but there are those who don't. And there are also those who believe that hurting a child can be beneficial to the child. The fact that sweatshops exist should give you some clue as to the nature of morality.

2) and from 1), if we were the group to say "there has to be a true version of right and wrong"....so where does that standard of right and wrong come from?

Because if it is not subjective anymore (but absolute..) then it wouldn't have come from society...but has to be beyond us..

and that implies we are operating against some invisible rules that governs our "spirituality".

Not necessarily. Everyone has to pee, too. Does the universality of peeing signify our divine origins?

But even before we get to that point, you'd have to assume that there are objective rights and wrongs, and you simply can't do that. There are no universal rights and wrongs, not even within a single society.

Consider the function for morality.. does the animal kingdom need that? Are they surviving properly even without it?

To practice morality requires a conscious effort and much hard work. Why is it man wilfully choose to do it, if we are but just another form of animals on this planet?

Well, if I'm not mistaken, either apes or chimps (or possibly both) have displayed proto-moral traits (they've even shown signs of culture, where apes in one part of a country use stone to crack open walnuts, and apes in another part use wood even though stone is available), so morality as a concept doesn't seem to be entirely unique to humans. Our morality is certainly more complex than any other animal, but it needs to be, because our behavior in general is more complex than any other animal. I won't say humans would entirely die out without morality, but you couldn't live in a city without law or ethics. There needs to be some kind of guiding influence.

My points here are:

1) can we truly absolve ourselves to say there isn't this invisible law that shows us right from wrong? --> and thus the need a religion to explain what it is

Yes, and thus no religion is required to explain it. Though it is obvious that religion was perhaps our first proto-philosophical attempt at such an influence. You'll notice that the Bible, Torah, and Quran all not only cover spiritual matters, but day-to-day matters, from what clothes to wear to how to prepare your food.

2) which is the religion that proves itself to be true?

None of them.

By the way.. sorry if i got it wrong but can anyone share if Atheism equates to no religion too?

I don't understand the question. Atheism is not a religion, if that's what you're asking.