The dunghill origins of morality
Updated
While vast numbers of people across the world (and Australia) continue to equate godlessness with a lack of morality, unbelievers can feel confident in their virtues, writes Michael Collett.
Is it necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values?
The answer seems obvious, at least to this nonbeliever: of course not. After all, this isn't a question about where morality ultimately derives - whether it is innately "God given" or borrowed from religious tradition. This isn't even a question about who is more moral - Muslims or agnostics, Hindus or atheists. No, this is about whether nonbelievers even have the capacity to be moral or have good values.
As someone who is on the organ donation register and abstains as best he can from war crimes, I'm rather convinced we do. To suggest otherwise would seem to demonstrate a profound lack of empathy towards a significant proportion of mankind.
Nevertheless, the idea that morality is the exclusive preserve of the religious is quite pervasive, and dates back to at least the Old Testament:
The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.
In case you thought religious people had moved on from this view, a report released this month by the Pew Research Centre suggests otherwise. Indeed, it remains the majority opinion in poorer countries (with the exception of China) and is also shared by large numbers of people in richer countries (53 per cent in America and 23 per cent in Australia).
It's worth considering exactly what the participants in the survey were asked:
Which one of these comes closest to your opinion?
1) It is not necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values; or
2) It is necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values
Note that respondents were asked to identify which of these diametrically opposed propositions came closest to their opinion. It's possible then that at least some of the people who responded "it is" actually have slightly more nuanced views - for instance, maybe they believe it is necessary to believe in God in order to be moral as a general rule, or that nonbelievers can be moral in their own way, but not in the correct way prescribed by their religion.
But whatever way you carve it, vast numbers of people around the world - and in Australia - continue to equate godlessness with either immorality or amorality.
As far as Christianity is concerned, not everyone thinks so simplistically. Consider Paul's letter to the Romans in the New Testament:
Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them. [emphasis added]
In this understanding, all humans share a sense of right and wrong. CS Lewis used this universal "Law of Right and Wrong" as his first argument for faith in his seminal work Mere Christianity. While he argued that Christianity makes adherents more moral than they otherwise would be, he didn't believe it followed that any given Christian would be more virtuous than any given atheist.
Separate from this Christian idea of a shared "innate morality", there's also a popular view that says that Western unbelievers continue to borrow the basic morality and values of the Judeo-Christian tradition even as they deny belief in the God who gave rise to them.
Is belief in God essential to morality?
Highest yes response (percentage):
- Indonesia: 99
- Ghana: 99
- Pakistan: 98
- Egypt: 95
Lowest yes response:
- China: 14
- France: 15
- Spain: 19
- Czech Republic: 19
These understandings of morality at least take into account the fact that when they're not pillaging and coveting each other's wives, nonbelievers at least occasionally donate to charity and treat each other with something approaching compassion. But do we need to bring God into it at all?
At first glance, Darwinism, with its associations to terms like the "struggle for survival" and the "selfish gene", might not seem like the obvious place to look for an explanation of human morality. But it's actually possible to describe how morality could have initially evolved from self-interest.
Philosopher Galen Strawson points to the development of honesty as one example. There are obvious advantages that come from cooperation between humans, he explained on the BBC radio show In Our Time. The problem is, you can't just cooperate with others when it benefits you and cheat when it doesn't, because soon those others will stop trusting you and will shut you out. Instead, you must deceive others that you are honest. The most reliable and economical way of deceiving others is to deceive yourself; and the most reliable way of deceiving yourself is to actually be honest.
The idea that virtues may have arisen from this sort of evolutionary "cost-benefit analysis" might not seem very romantic, but that isn't to say that this would render morality a mere illusion, as Strawson explains:
That would be like saying that diamonds are really coal, or that a rose that grows on a dunghill isn't as beautiful as a rose that grows in a golden pot. They really are genuinely felt: desire to cooperate, loyalty, fidelity, and so on. They have this curious ancestry, but that doesn't mean that they aren't what they seem to be. They really are.
After morality evolved, it took on a life of its own, such that it no longer makes sense to see human behaviour as solely being guided by the self-interest of the individual.
This view makes sense of the fact that our conception of morality hasn't remained static; that the morality of the Old Testament looks quite different to the morality of modern society. It also makes sense of the fact that variants of the "golden rule" - do unto others as you would have them do to you - can be found across a disparate array of religions and ethical traditions, from Confucianism to Humanism.
In the end, it seems it's not belief in the same god or gods that good people have had in common - it's humanity.
Michael Collett is a journalist and producer for ABC's The Drum. View his full profile here.
Topics: atheism, religion-and-beliefs, ethics
First posted
Comments (343)
Comments for this story are closed.
The Jones Crusher:
25 Mar 2014 4:21:04pm
The Greek philosophers had done a pretty job of exploring human values and morality thousands of years before Jesus Christ was dreamed of.
Furthermore, Scott Morrison and Tony Abbott claim to be "Christians" but the the moral values on display from those two when it comes to desperate strangers in need of succour is simply despicable! They are certainly not qualified to lecture this here atheist on human kindness or charity!
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Jay Somasundaram:
25 Mar 2014 6:23:57pm
Religions and atheism are ideologies. And ideologies are like clothes, we change them to suit the occasion. A common example is the very different behaviours and belief systems people exhibit at work and at home. We can have a very catholic PM on Sundays, and a neo-con capitalist on weekdays.
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The Jones Crusher:
25 Mar 2014 7:50:07pm
"Religions and atheism are ideologies. And ideologies are like clothes, we change them to suit the occasion"
Really? "We"? Not me, mate! I'm the same atheist on any and every occasion!
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Jay Somasundaram:
26 Mar 2014 8:28:30am
Ahh, the righteousness of all ideologies.
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Aussie Sutra:
26 Mar 2014 9:31:28am
I didn't take Crusher's comment to be one of ideology, but rather of consistency.
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David Kay:
25 Mar 2014 9:35:24pm
Really? Is your non-belief in Zeus an "ideology"? What about your atheism regarding Shiva? Is that an ideology, too?
Religions are ideologies - adherence to the idea is more important than anything else, including a complete lack of empirical evidence. In contrast, Atheism is merely a recognition of the need for evidence.
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My Pet Dog:
26 Mar 2014 2:25:11pm
I like to think of religion as fairytales for grown ups.
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Pert:
25 Mar 2014 11:26:33pm
Atheism is NOT a system of beliefs, it is simply non-belief in supernatural entities.
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Aussie Sutra:
26 Mar 2014 9:33:13am
I agree with Jay on this point. Atheism is most definitely an ideology.
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graazt:
26 Mar 2014 9:47:41am
Yeah, in the same way that not believing in aliens or vampires is an ideology.
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Stuffed Olive:
26 Mar 2014 3:57:27pm
It is not and it makes absolutely no sense to say it is an ideology thing.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 12:10:08am
Atheism isn't an ideology, any more than not swimming is a sport.
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Alex:
26 Mar 2014 8:05:02am
I would say that atheism CAN be an ideology for some, if in addition to the absence of belief in god/s, there is supplimentation drawing in scientific method, empiricism, Darwinism, cost-benefit analysis, humanism, game theory etc. Atheists still have to explain the world around themselves in the absence of the god myth.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 9:02:47am
"Atheists still have to explain the world around themselves in the absence of the god myth."
Says who? They could simply say they don't know. The god myth isn't proven by the absence of an alternative. The flat earth was incorrect nonsense even before we knew it was a spheroid.
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Aussie Sutra:
26 Mar 2014 9:34:17am
You're probably talking more about agnostics than atheists there.
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mike:
26 Mar 2014 3:35:01pm
No, if Thor suddenly appeared in front of an atheist and proved his god status, the atheist would no longer be an atheist.
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hph:
26 Mar 2014 9:38:48am
"I would say that atheism CAN be an ideology for some, [...] Atheists still have to explain the world around themselves in the absence of the god myth."
Preposterous Statement.
[The] Atheists do not need to explain anything.
One should have a firm grasp of the basic definitions of "theism" and "religion" before jumping into a philosophical discussion.
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Homer:
26 Mar 2014 10:06:54am
Excellent. Please tell Richard Dawkins that.
One ideologist I'd be happy to see the back of. He's as big a religious nut as I've ever come across.
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ingenuous:
26 Mar 2014 10:37:40am
Perhaps those here who think atheism is an ideology are instead thinking of antitheism, which is active opposition to religion and belief in deities.
Most of the time I'm an atheist (i.e. the idea that a god or gods exist has no bearing on my life but if you asked me I'd say "show me proof") but I've been an antitheist on occasions (when religious people do or say something particularly egregious and I feel I have to act to balance this out).
Antitheism probably counts as an ideology. Dawkins could be classified as an antitheist, at least in some of his work.
I think antitheism should be supported by government grants just as theism is supported by the tax system. However I think it will be several generations before we see such a thing.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 12:03:26pm
Dawkins is as non-religious a commentator as I've read. How on earth is someone who dismisses assertions without evidence 'religious'? I think you are misunderstanding the terms you are using.
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James:
26 Mar 2014 12:32:04pm
Misunderstanding the terms you are using... so often the case in religous discussions. Words like 'theory' and 'evidence' and 'proof'.
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Homer:
26 Mar 2014 3:13:29pm
He is religious in as much as he's a zealot, which is just as bad. He has theories, well grounded and thought out obviously, but there is an element of belief required.
I don't believe in an omnipotent sky fairy or my own personal cloud to live on forever after I die. But I do believe that human knowledge is not complete. Absolutists like Dawkins do not allow for the unknown, a fault which has brought many scholars undone.
Anyone who has to adopt a dogmatic approach to sell their ideas should be regarded with some degree of skepticism. At least until you can rationalize these things for yourself with logic and experience or surrender it to something beyond current levels of human understanding.
Scientists should be open minded should they not? Isn't that a prerequisite for discovery?
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GraemeF:
26 Mar 2014 4:03:35pm
Collecting stamps is a hobby. If I don't collect stamps then 'not collecting stamps' doesn't become my hobby.
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DannyS:
25 Mar 2014 6:35:21pm
"Ministers have an enviable intellectual suppleness and moral maneuverability. Translation: You can't trust them further than you can throw them."
Courtesy of Sir Humphrey, well Jonathan Lynn actually.
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The Blue Smurf:
25 Mar 2014 6:38:09pm
And yet the Greeks were quick to be converted to Christianity. What were they missing or searching for?
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The Jones Crusher:
25 Mar 2014 7:55:16pm
"What were they missing or searching for?"
they were missing enlightenment and searching for true knowledge. Once they converted to Christianity they were still missing and searching for those things!
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John Thomas:
25 Mar 2014 10:18:55pm
A way to stay alive? Christianity was spread by the sword from Constantine onwards.
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sdrawkcaB:
25 Mar 2014 10:38:46pm
I believe the Greeks put all faith in their political system.
When Athens fell, they lost their system and so lost their core belief structure.
So they were searching for a core belief structure. Just because they took on Christianity does not mean they found it.
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Steve_C:
26 Mar 2014 11:54:03am
"When Athens fell, they lost their system and so lost their core belief structure."
So which one of the many times that "Athens fell" are you referring to?
And what about the other Greek city states eh?
Corinth, Thebes, Sparta... were they all just lackeys to Athens dominance?
Some versions of history - especially the one's that see the modern setup as being what must have been there in ancient times; need some serious revision!!!
No wonder young people haven't got a clue! They'd read stuff like this and think "it's got to be right"... YIKES!!
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 12:10:58am
"And yet the Greeks were quick to be converted to Christianity."
Violent coercion will do that.
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casewithscience:
26 Mar 2014 10:23:42am
When the Roman empire made Christianity the State Religion, it passed the Justinian Code which required the closing of all the Greek Schools of philosophy, and which was enforced by violent means. This is why the greek texts that we have are almost exclusively sourced from the Syrian line (as it was outside the Byzantine Roman empire's control at the time).
It is insulting to history when you suggest the Greeks converted from their intellectual ways. They did not. They were violently oppressed until their knowledge was wiped from the west, something that would only return with the conquest of Cordoba in the 1200s, thus sparking the rennaisance and the re-establishment of the western world.
The tragedy of christianity was to set the world back 1000 years.
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The Blue Smurf:
26 Mar 2014 3:44:06pm
My apologies, I was referring to the faith communities set up by St Paul, long before the Romans enforced a state religion.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 3:59:54pm
The Blue Smurf,
It is interesting that you attempt to dodge the bullet by now suggesting it was the fault of the Romans that Greeks were forced to become Christians.
Nothing to do the with the Christian religious leadership you say? ... ah yeah.... good one!
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casewithscience:
26 Mar 2014 4:08:06pm
Those communities were small and they did not run into the educated classes.
Though it is noted they were burning books (see Paul).
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barneseye:
25 Mar 2014 6:50:07pm
And the greek philosophers appealed to a pantheon of God's to shape their morality ... your point?
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The Jones Crusher:
25 Mar 2014 7:48:53pm
"And the greek philosophers appealed to a pantheon of God's to shape their morality ... your point?"
Actually, my point was NOT that the gods were involved. From one of the dialogues written by Plato, Socrates asks Phaedrus "And what is good, Phaedrus, and what is not good, need we ask anyone to tell us these things?". Which has been interpreted since as a statement that we all inherently know the difference between good and evil without needing to be told or by way of divine guidance.
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John Thomas:
25 Mar 2014 10:20:19pm
That a certain being which decided to manifest itself to an illiterate tribe of sheep farmers isn't the ultimate source of moral truth.
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Miowarra:
26 Mar 2014 6:38:24am
That's *IF* you actually, really believe that the event reported happened and wasn't a tale told around a campfire to embellish an existing folk tale.
I think it's highly unlikely.
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casewithscience:
26 Mar 2014 10:41:08am
The pantheon (of Gods) was not a worship, so much as a de facto psychological exercise. Each god representing a virtue or vice, the language of the gods used to describe the inner workings of the mind. To hear the story of the immortals would be to give a rough working around how emotions and actions work, and the consequences of them.
That is a very different approach than the direct statement of morality by the christians. I would suggest the greek approach is superior.
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stalga:
25 Mar 2014 11:55:25pm
Plato would have labelled them as Sophists. To proclaim to uphold religious values but to act as a Sophist clearly is hypocrisy. The Sophists were derided by the Greek philosophers as their purpose was to teach upper/middle class youths how to 'get ahead'. Christian values are the bedrock of our society, political sophistry corrupts this foundation. Contemporary Australian politics adheres primarily to economic theory and nothing else. However, I personally believe in pragmatism. I pray to Good that we will soon have a much less perverted political culture in our Lucky country.
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Aussie Sutra:
26 Mar 2014 9:36:21am
"Economic theory"....yet another religion.
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anarcho-syndiclist:
26 Mar 2014 9:47:45am
Rubbish! Plato was in the minority in his opposition to the Sophists in ancient Athenian democracy.
The sophists believed that it was not only every citizens right, but their duty to articulately get their opinion across. This has 2 benefits; the citizen was able to effectively be heard and society was enriched by their opinion. Sophism was a serious, popular school of philosophy born from democratic principles, Plato's attitude to democracy was sketchy at best (he favoured benevolent tyrants as an ideal). The word sophism has been slandered in modern times.
The trouble with pragmatism (at least through the spectrum of Greek philosophy) is that it is pure expedience. Aristotles "On Rhetoric" exhorted the reader to compare the expedient with the true. So a pure pragmatist only addresses the best thing to do (expedience) with the right thing to do (truth). Pure expedience makes things like the murder and beating of asylum seekers possible, but once you introduce truth (read morality) such horrors become impossible.
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H K WHitton:
26 Mar 2014 12:05:02am
@ The Jones Crusher - the Greek philosophers who concerned themselves with such things were actually only a couple of hundred years earlier. But as Jesus was a Jew, and probably raised and trained as an Essene, the 'philosophical' and religious traditions he came out of coincided with the Greek (and Roman) philosophers of the second half of the last century BC.
But dates aside, what was your point?
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The Jones Crusher:
26 Mar 2014 10:03:14am
"But dates aside, what was your point?"
simply that what is good, Phaedrus, and what is not good, need we ask anyone to tell us these things?
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Norman Wisdom:
26 Mar 2014 8:49:30am
Um, I think you mean HUNDREDS of years BC, not thousands. Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, for example, lived in the era referred to as 'Classical Greece' - 5th to 4th centuries BC.
Apart from that, your argument is logically sound and morally and ethically valid.
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John:
26 Mar 2014 12:40:42pm
You're clutching at a very flimsy (and dishonest) straw to bolster that argument, Jones Crusher.
Neither Morrison nor Abbott has shown despicable attitudes towards people in need of succour.
What they have done is show a strong moral fibre by distinguishing between those in need and those who seek to impose themselves on us for material gain to the detriment of those in need of succour.
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GJA:
25 Mar 2014 4:21:10pm
It's always been humanity, though, hasn't it? Belief in spirits, ghosts, elves, gods, and devils - whatever - has always been just a way of imposing order on perception and then on social interactions. God's just an excuse.
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whogoesthere:
25 Mar 2014 5:46:38pm
Religion serves two very important purposes
1. Explain what you don't understand.
2. Provide a way to control people's behaviour.
Given science can explain much (we know the sun isn't the wheel of a chariot for eg), the need for 1. has diminished. It is hanging in there with 'what happens when you die', as thinking your just stop existing isn't very palatable.
Given we now live in secular societies with a police force and justice system we don't need religion for 2.
I'm agnostic, and I don't care if people believe in gods. But in a modern society, the need for religion to be anything other than a personal beleief has gone. And the sooner that process continues, the better.
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The Blue Smurf:
25 Mar 2014 6:40:55pm
People tend to congregate with others who share the same or similar beliefs. Are you advocating a ban on such discussions and gatherings?
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Aria:
25 Mar 2014 8:18:20pm
Clearly not. That is one of the biggest misrepresentations of someone else's point of view I have ever seen.
And also, religious beliefs are only a small subset of "beliefs" in general. If I may make a pointed statement, they are in fact also a subset of those beliefs that are illogical and/or improbable.
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Miowarra:
26 Mar 2014 6:40:50am
Big misrepresentations are religion's strongest point, Aria.
You could even consider them its (their - they all do it) raison d'etre.
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no offence but:
25 Mar 2014 6:46:18pm
Couldn't agree more.
I'm an acolyte of the "believe in whatever you like but leave me out of it" sect.
Religion, while offering some form of succour to the less fortunate, has ultimately been corrupted by those who wish to control others.
Uganda, anyone?
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Gigaboomer:
25 Mar 2014 7:58:45pm
Or perhaps the Soviet Union, or communist China......atheist regimes were the masters of this in the 20th century. Human sin is what causes these abuses, not what god one believes (or doesn't) in.
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Zing:
25 Mar 2014 10:12:03pm
Giga is correct that those brutal regimes were atheist.
But what Giga fails to recognise is that the reason these regimes are bad is because they resembled the worst parts of religion. Restricted thought. Nonbelievers punished. Obedience demanded.
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 10:34:47pm
I've never heard of murder being made in the name of rational thought. Have you any examples of people screaming "evidence and knowledge" before detonating themselves? How about people being denied access to contraception in the name of the Big Bang theory? Marriage forbidden for gay people because Darwin thinks it's an abomination? No?
Faith is a killer.
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Boutros :
26 Mar 2014 10:33:35am
French revolution = murderous rampages while praising Reason
Tamil Tigers = atheistic suicide bombers
Secular states always regulate marriage in discriminatory ways - homosexual marriage just happens to be the current rallying point for rights activists.
What about racial discrimination that Darwinism helped prop up for years?
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 11:06:33am
Boutros,
French revolution = muderous rampages that saw on elite replaced by another arguably more lethal elite (the peasant saw no difference to their lives).
Tamil religious beliefs = 88% of the population in Tamil Nadu are Saivam, Vainavam, Ayya Vazhi & Non believers, 6% are Christians, 5.57% are Muslims and the rest consists of different religions including Buddhists. Try not to confuse their attempt an reasserting their political control over Sri Lankas population as something atheistic, it is purely about control in that instance.
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Boutros :
26 Mar 2014 11:25:04am
Actually, it just seems to me that when bloody or oppressive acts are committed by atheists, "rational thinkers" etc; that there's always a "get out clause" that is supposed to vindicate atheism.
But the simple fact is, humanity is guilty of horrific and immoral acts.
If you implicate all faith because of the actions of a few "believers", you implicate atheism etc; for actions of non-believers and rationalists.
If you acquit atheism/atheists, you should also acquit "faith" and "believers."
Yet I doubt this blatant inconsistency will die out any time soon.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 2:27:51pm
Boutros,
"hat there's always a "get out clause" that is supposed to vindicate atheism." - most likely because athesim, unlike thesim, doesn't have a leadership. Who is the leader of athesim? who is the leader of the catholic theists?
"But the simple fact is, humanity is guilty of horrific and immoral acts" - I agree completely, that is humanity for you.
"implicate all faith because of the actions of a few believers" - Not so, I directly point my finger at the leadership of the faith in question, be it the pope and his vatican advisory team advocating and sanctioning the wanton slaughter of europeans during the Reformation, or cardinal pell and his legal team stomping metaphorically upon sexual abuse victims seeking a minimum of recompense for their suffering.
What I don't do is suggest that nice folks like Gigaboomer are the problem, instead I suggest the leadership of the religious faiths are the problem, along with the fundamental concepts they created.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 12:06:26pm
"What about racial discrimination that Darwinism helped prop up for years?"
Darwinism is a religious beat-up. Darwin proposed evolution by natural selection. Any '..isms' associated with him are from religious people who don't like the idea that the facts he discovered contradict their faith.
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one off:
26 Mar 2014 9:01:05am
Wrong as usual Gb, the regimes that you mention were communist - many religions existed in USSR and China and continue to do so
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Politically Incorrect:
26 Mar 2014 9:11:52am
What does Stalinism and Christianity have in common? The word you are looking for is 'dogma'. When dogma becomes powerful is when attrocities have always happened.
Unshakable unchangable belief (weather religious, economic or political) is when things turn bad for humanity. This is not a matter of opinion but of track record.
Weather it was nationalist ideologies like Stalinism, Christianity and Islam that made a habbit of mass genocide during their major growth years, or even when the two combined. It's almost like Stalin & Mao read a how to guide from Constatine and Mohammed on how to get rid of competitors.
Lets not forget the Catholic Church preached antisemetism as OFFICIAL church doctorine until 1964 and Catholics think that has nothing to do with the holocaust?
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graazt:
26 Mar 2014 9:54:44am
Not just dogma, but a promise of utopia if some "obstacle" is overcome. Whether the reward is heaven or a proletariat heaven on earth. Premised on overcoming the devil or the bourgeoisie respectively.
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Bemused:
25 Mar 2014 7:56:28pm
Spot on, my friend; they are the only two uses for religion, and none of those are relevant to our era. Religion has become a blight more so than a benefit to our society in recent generations. I don't support a ban on anything, but a suppression to the point where it's reach extends no further than the family home would be nice . A separation between church and state has long been fantasised, but seldom the case. Now , more than ever, does it need to realise .
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SVJ:
26 Mar 2014 6:06:42am
So don't legislate against religious beliefs, just crush anyone who has a different view. I don't like atheists can I sanction them!
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The Jones Crusher:
25 Mar 2014 7:56:54pm
"Religion serves two very important purposes
1. Explain what you don't understand.
2. Provide a way to control people's behaviour."
Now that role is fulfilled by the Murdoch press! Just look around you and look at what people believe and how they behave!
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sdrawkcaB:
25 Mar 2014 10:43:22pm
The great opinion former of the past was religion.
In modern times that has been replaced by media.
Media is not quite like religion though. Religion tells you what to think. Media does not do that. It does set the agenda on what you think about. It also puts the same thing in front of you day after day. With the mind the way it is, unless you make a concerted effort, you end up accepting the status quo.
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Pert:
25 Mar 2014 11:41:41pm
Actually religion can (and should) be viewed as an important form of social capital.
While I don't agree with making the price of a sandwich a sermon, religion does provide benefits across society, not only to parishioners, but also to the little people who would otherwise fall through the cracks.
There are plenty of religious organisations out there that take up the slack in inadequate (or non existent) government services.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 12:20:34am
"I'm agnostic...."
You either believe in the supernatural or you don't. Stating that you could be convinced with the right evidence is stating the obvious. I don't understand how anyone could not know what they think about a subject they have clearly pondered at length. Surely you've thought enough about the supernatural to declare whether you believe it to be true or not. So which is it?
I know a lot of 'agnostics' who are simply fearful atheists - their religious upbringings have left scars of god-fear, the afterlife and all that that they're afraid to renounce entirely even though they have zero faith.
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pigman:
26 Mar 2014 7:03:48am
Its because their still unsure, and thats ok.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 7:36:01am
"Its because their still unsure, and thats ok."
Unsure about what? Unsure about what they believe? That doesn't make sense. No one has perfect knowledge, but I wasn't asking what they knew, just what they believed. Agnosticism is irrational.
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 8:39:19am
"but I wasn't asking what they knew, just what they believed"
If knowledge is irrelevant to belief then your atheist position that belief in a deity without evidence is irrational, no longer is.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 9:27:51am
"If knowledge is irrelevant to belief then your atheist position that belief in a deity without evidence is irrational, no longer is."
I agree. But in the absence if any knowledge (ie evidence) of a deity, but plenty of evidence that contradicts all supernatural accounts for the universe, then where is the justification to suspend a belief in the non-existence of a deity? I suspect agnostics are believers embarrassed by the irrationality of their shameful beliefs.
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Applaudanum:
26 Mar 2014 8:21:51am
A tad black and white there, Mitor.
What if one believed that 'nothing' (as an abstract, entity that is purely absent of something) was the 'extra-natural'?
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 9:06:04am
An entity, by definition, is something. Nothing is
And even in that example it is empty space, which is something. Agnosticism is a cowardly cop out.
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Applaudanum:
26 Mar 2014 11:04:51am
That's why I said 'abstract', Mitor. A mental frame around which one can house such a nothing, even if that frame exists like the gap between Adam's finger and the 'god' of nothing. Have you considered that nothing is something because as 'somethings' ourselves, we only see things as something?
I still think you're being unfair to agnostics who are still searching, yet still avoiding the mainstream religions. What if one had a belief, yet not thoroughly confirmed, that the ergot fungus was the pathway to god? One is prevented by law from reaching such a communion on a regular basis because of various laws of the land. Such a person then has little choice but to keep searching.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 11:53:43am
"Such a person then has little choice but to keep searching."
Do such people keep searching for the idea of gravity, which after all is 'only' a scientific theory, or for Atlantis, which has been proposed and not disproved and is therefore the equivalent of god? I think there's more going on with agnostics than absolute confirmation by incontrovertible evidence.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 10:18:48am
"I'm agnostic"
Mitor, in economic terms it is called "hedging".
ie. I think this will occur, but just in case i'm wrong i'll take out a 'hedge' (ie. a belief in one or more dieties).
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 12:07:34pm
I agree - it's not rational, it's cowardly.
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RollyW:
26 Mar 2014 2:54:10pm
Wrong!
Certainly in my case.
I simply do not know what to believe.
There is so much new knowledge being acquired that indicated to me that is is not possible to know whether certain things are, or are not.
I do not have that knowledge.
Therefore, I am agnostic: I do not know.
Your "black and white" assertion is pure, unadulterated and arrogant nonsense.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 4:12:40pm
Hello RollyW,
You say "I simply do not know what to believe"
Would you be offended if I suggested you are being intellectually lazy in this regard?
Can you honestly say that there is insufficient evidence to be able to refute the claim made that Yahweh, the bronze age canaanite demi god son of El & Asherah (one of 60 demi god children) is the one and only true god? The historical literature that shows the retelling of his characters story line as just one of 60 demi gods to the one and only god is for many people sufficient evidence of his creation at the hands of human minds.
ps. Yahweh's dad (El) is a real character in the old texts, a real drunken larrikin. It is worth reading about, very entertaining... an informative.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:41:33am
No. People have experiences they label 'god'.
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graazt:
25 Mar 2014 4:28:23pm
Just for the record but the "golden rule" was first scribed by Confucius. More than 500 years before the New Testament recorded JC's "silver rule".
So to the extent western atheists are borrowing from their "Judeo-Christian" religion (warming their hands on God's still-warm corpse to paraphrase Nietzsche in Thus Spoke Zarathustra), it seems the Christian ethic has borrowed plenty from preceding moral systems as well.
As for morality as an evolutionary feature, makes sense but it's difficult to prove. Selfishness is essential to ensuring the "best" specimens in the species procreate. On the other hand, it wasn't the ubermensch that forced the lions off the prairie and put us on top of the food chain, but rather humans co-operating in groups.
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sdrawkcaB:
25 Mar 2014 10:45:56pm
I read that early Christianity was largely Stoicism but with faith and an eternal life attached which meant slaves could no longer suicide but had to serve their master for the full term.
The issue was masters losing their good slaves to suicide. The solution was Christianity.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 5:09:28am
"As for morality as an evolutionary feature, makes sense but it's difficult to prove."
What else could it be? That's like saying that we cannot be sure that arms are an evolutionary feature - where else could they have come from?
Cats licking their kittens, monkeys grooming each other, birds migrating en masse - these are all evolutionary features. Dogs that protect their puppies is not a sign that Labradors have taken morality from doggy-god - it's a sign that this behaviour has conferred a survival advantage over evolutionary time.
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graazt:
26 Mar 2014 10:22:38am
Sure, but do we need to differentiate between instinctive behaviours and volitional ones when discussing morality (assuming that "free will" isn't an illusion)?
We instinctively protect our kids as well. Unless perhaps they're surplus to requirements (the same with dogs). And instinctively value the regard of those that are close to us.
Whereas our attitudes to human sacrifice, slavery and minority rights for example has changed a lot - at least in western culture.
Perhaps we can call the changes that have occurred over the last 4000 years in our moral systems cultural evolution rather than the traditional gene recombination variety?
Is that splitting hairs?
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 11:56:53am
"Is that splitting hairs?"
I don't know, but does it disprove the point that if morals are god-given then they should be immutable and static. Our (and our religious interpreters') attitudes have changed on this. So, where did these morals come from if not from the god of the bible/koran etc?
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graazt:
26 Mar 2014 12:48:32pm
All I can suggest is that a number of fundamentalist theists would argue that those of faith that pick and choose their scriptures; or interpret them too figuratively are indeed deviating from an immutable and static moral scheme.
Others might argue that interpretation of texts etc needs to be done in a nuanced and figurative fashion and much of it was never intended to be taken literally in the first place.
Conceivably, God could be sitting up on some cloud planning another big flood as punishment for all the heresy going on.
I'm not sure your point can be disproved. Is it falsifiable? :)
But I'm not apologist and obviously not very good at it.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:42:49am
You don't know much history do you?
But borrowing isn't a problem. Not being able to give an account of what you are seeking to promote is a problem.
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Skeptic:
25 Mar 2014 4:31:51pm
It amazes me that there are so many who claim to hold to a faith, including the upright ethics and values of that faith, whose actions are completely at odds with they say they believe. The term for this in my dictionary is "hypocrite". Our current federal government is full of them.
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Ted:
25 Mar 2014 10:09:24pm
We must have the greatest t examples of hypocrisy we have ever seen in politics in this country with Abbot, Morrison ,Andrews et al professing Christian beliefs while doing the exact opposite.
I hope the Australian people can demonstrate they are better than that.
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Morality and survival:
25 Mar 2014 4:34:29pm
Good article but I'd dispute the simplified view of evolution that sees us doing things for our gain. I think the majority of the time we are not even aware that we are doing things that benefit our survival, it just happens that they are. So moralities motives may not be at all selfish even if they are, without us having realised it, beneficial to our survival.
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Alpo:
25 Mar 2014 4:36:17pm
"Is it necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values?"... No, because morality (the rules of "appropriate" behaviour) is a biological characteristic of humans as social animals. All social animals are moral, social mammals have a specially complex morality, and humans add additional complexity to it thanks to our fascinating brain. God just comes from there, but it's not needed.
We truly need to come back to the basic biological reality of morality, to cleanse it from the often confusing and unnecessary complications of religions. After that, we will better able to appreciate the fundamental unity of humanity.
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Jason:
25 Mar 2014 6:49:59pm
The fundamental unity of humanity?
You don't watch the news much, do you?
The only thing that unifies humans is our innate desire to kill each other in ever more inventive ways.
We know there is a moral code: we fail to keep to it, either individually or collectively.
That was the essence of Lewis's work Mere Christianity - and he went on from there to discuss theism.
I've got no time for religion per se - much less for those who put churches above people - but atheists who genuinely believe in the goodness of humanity are in my humble opinion, sincerely deluded.
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Alpo:
25 Mar 2014 7:23:43pm
"You don't watch the news much, do you?"... Dig deeper, Jason. Of course there is diversity, especially cultural diversity but also biological diversity, in our species. But if you dig deeper you will see our fundamental similarity. When I write about the fundamental unity of humanity I am not suggesting that humans are fundamentally "good" or fundamentally "bad". Aggressiveness is intrinsic to us, but so is cooperation, that's a common characteristics of all human societies and more, it's a common characteristics of all social animals.
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 7:39:55pm
"atheists who genuinely believe in the goodness of humanity are in my humble opinion, sincerely deluded."
Atheists tend to 'believe' what the evidence leads them to believe. Humans cooperate, have empathy and have a strong sense of fair play. That's not to say that they are not capable of bad things too - we are evolved from baser creatures than those we strive to be. The old thought experiment illustrates it pretty well: imagine a long haul jumbo full of humans arriving at Heathrow; now imagine the same jumbo full of monkeys.
On a good day we rub along pretty well, we just have to learn to manage the not-so-good days a little better. One thing is certain, though; faith is an impediment to this. It is the one reliable way to ensure good, well-intentioned people do bad things.
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Dunghills happen:
25 Mar 2014 6:54:07pm
This "basis biological reality of morality", it would be the "dunghill origins of morality", yeah?
If reason has the same beginnings (pretty much in dunghills?) how can it explain anything?
Why should we listen to it?
The fact that reason does explain so much and that it is very sensible to listen to reason suggests that if it does not originate just in a "dunghill".
BTW - Even the maladorous, crappy metaphor of a dunghill supposes that "the dunghill origins of morality" are in fact not really an origin - dung comes from animals. I guess this is the atheist/agnostic view of God, isn't it? Not exactly hitting the heights that believers like Newton, Einstein Michelangelo and many others saw.
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graazt:
25 Mar 2014 7:56:58pm
Einstein wasn't a theist
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Dunghills happen:
26 Mar 2014 12:57:32am
Perhaps.
"I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings."
Oops. Sounds like a "believer" to me.
And he certainly frowned on "professional atheists" like Dawkins and co (even before they started making the kind of money that Dawkins and co. make):
"You may call me an agnostic, but I do not share the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is mostly due to a painful act of liberation from the fetters of religious indoctrination received in youth. I prefer an attitude of humility corresponding to the weakness of our intellectual understanding of nature and of our own being."
The point stands. Dunghills are a waste product from something greater, but the reductionists are interested only in the dung. Not the grandest world-view, really.
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Crow:
26 Mar 2014 7:14:33am
"It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it."
Einstein 1954
doesnt sound like a believer to me....
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one off:
26 Mar 2014 10:06:13am
"And he certainly frowned on "professional atheists" like Dawkins and co (even before they started making the kind of money that Dawkins and co. make):"
What rubbish, Dawkins was 14 when Einstein died, he published his first book 21 years after Einstein's death
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graazt:
26 Mar 2014 2:37:49pm
Spinoza wasn't a theist either. A deist rather who had no regard for our behaviour and morality or lack thereof
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 10:39:25pm
Einstein was an atheist in the mould of Richard Dawkins. You slur him with your claim of faith. Newton also believed in alchemy, so his judgement on anything outside of physics is to be dismissed out of hand.
Ask about what Hawkins or Feynman or indeed 99% of physicists today think about god. In the absence of knowledge faith might be forgivable - but in the age of reason it is a morally bankrupt perversion of the rational faculties evolution has given us.
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Mr Zeitgeist:
25 Mar 2014 6:56:42pm
Well put, Alpo.
Too often, this discussion only recognises the "abrahamic" religions in their discourse and forgets the tribal, shamanic religions which still dot the planet.
Their religious practices, though not always acceptable to the white-bread morality of the contemporary atheist, are certainly closer to the 'social animal' order which is rapidly becoming a footnote to history for a culture long subservient the the religion of economic rationalism.
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firthy:
25 Mar 2014 7:50:21pm
Totally agree Alpo - Richard Dawkins provides a fantastic analysis of this in the Selfish Gene and follows it up in the Blind Watchmaker. Genetics can explain many things...
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Gigaboomer:
25 Mar 2014 8:01:16pm
Alpo, how do you define 'appropriate'? What if your definition is different to someone else? Who is right? If we are nothing more than highly evolved animals your answer is no more right than Pol Pot's.
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 10:41:29pm
"Alpo, how do you define 'appropriate'?"
Most certainly not with reference to the opinions of Bronze-Age goat herders from the Middle East. I think evolution has provided us with a moral compass that faith struggles to match. Old Testament morality is nothing to be either proud of or to adhere to.
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Alpo:
25 Mar 2014 10:50:02pm
Hi Gigaboomer, "appropriate" is necessarily defined in a pragmatic sense. Some of the details may change over time, but in the end it all boils down to social cohesion. We are fundamentally social animals.
I believe in Democracy, and I am also aware that there is diversity of opinions, this simply derives from the fact that we are not clones of each other; and so I am happy to engage those who think differently in a rational debate.
Who is right? It depends on the question, I guess. Was Pol Pot right? If the question is: Did Pol Pot achieve stable social cohesion? The answer is no, he didn't. Why couldn't he achieve social cohesion? Simply because our sociality is not like that one which you can find in a beehive. Our sociality, the sociality of all primates, is much more fluid, flexible, dynamic; human social cohesion is therefore also dynamic. That's why the concept of "freedom" is so recurrent in the history of humankind, even the Christian religions have to confront the issue of the freedom of humans (to commit sin, for instance). If we were honey bees, our concept of individual freedom would be far more limited.... their biology is different. Pol Pot, Hitler, many Popes and, more subtly, Rupert Murdoch, have tried to make humans behave like honeybees... but in the end they failed, and will continue to fail.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 10:21:47am
Gigaboomer you say "your answer is no more right than Pol Pot's"
Now you are really learning! Spot on!
Though with hindsight we are able to see that Pol Pots answer was incorrect as his society failed, his genetic lineage was a relative failure, and this concepts failed.
That is all it really comes down to.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:44:30am
No, social animals do (some) pro-social things. The judgement that this is moral is what is needing to be specified.
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Alpo:
26 Mar 2014 2:51:41pm
Evan, read this bit of my post again: "morality (the rules of "appropriate" behaviour)".... Social animals establish their own rules of appropriate behaviour (= morality), according to their evolutionary background and, for those who have got the capacity, some brain flexibility expressed in learning.
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Applaudanum:
26 Mar 2014 11:19:50am
It is indeed encouraging to see many on here pointing to the seemingly moral behaviours observed in the animal kingdom. It bears the mark of the scientific approach, which should be applauded here.
I say take it one step further. What has been observed of animal groups, who ordinarily practice these seemingly moral behaviours, when they are provided shelter and food without having to 'work' (hunt, build, contribute etc) for the social good for their own survival? What happens in these small prototypes/examples of human behaviour when they are provided welfare without responsibilities?
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Alpo:
26 Mar 2014 1:40:46pm
"What happens in these small prototypes/examples of human behaviour when they are provided welfare without responsibilities?"... In good quality modern zoos and animal sanctuaries, animals live a pretty happy life without the stresses of the wild and the diseases, predators, famine. In human terms, zoos are equivalent to our cities. Good quality, humane cities, in countries that care for social justice, are pretty nice "human zoos" to live in, don't you think?
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Applaudanum:
26 Mar 2014 3:20:42pm
Zoos and, to a lesser extent, animal sanctuaries are mere approximations of the natural world. The animals that ordinarily practice what we might call moral behaviour are kept in much smaller groups than would naturally occur. This is a clever way of minimising the problems uncovered when 'responsibility to the group' is no longer required.
By all means, caring about social justice is a wonderful thing. It's also 'value adding' (for people who are interested in such things) because the provision of some needs is better delivered and administered in bulk. Yet, as can be found in study after study of the animal kingdom, having a responsibility to assist in the group's survival, even if that responsibility is imposed, is a requirement for social cohesion. Those that don't have responsibilities, or don't care, act out time and again against the best interests of the group because they (the acting out individual) does not feel the ramifications of their actions directly.
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Tim:
25 Mar 2014 4:36:22pm
"Is it necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values"
This is misleading and presumes a certain belief. Which "God" do you mean? Morality transcends all cultures with different monotheistic and polytheistic religions, those with strong secular beliefs and, most importantly, countries where spiritual beliefs reject the existence of a creator-deity.
A more accurate introduction would be "is it necessary to believe in a god or gods in order to be moral and have good values?" to which the answer is quite clearly no. Any sane, educated person in a modern society can tell right from wrong without believing bronze age superstition.
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sdrawkcaB:
25 Mar 2014 10:49:36pm
I feel you need to be corrected.
I would suggest its an Iron Age superstition.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:46:38am
I think you need to read some history to find what people in the past regarded as moral. It is quite different to what we do.
Unless you mean morality is just fashion - what we (civilised and superior, of course, people) believe at the moment.
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JoeBloggs:
25 Mar 2014 4:46:00pm
All morality is entirely subjective and relative to the observer.
It really is that simple.
No gods required thank you.
(For those that would like to dispute that concept please feel free to frame your response in relation to the, god given, morality of an inquistor torturing an unbeliever or heretic to purify them before they are burnt at the stake for their henious crime of not believing in a bronze age demi god called Yahweh.....amen)
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Gigaboomer:
25 Mar 2014 6:13:07pm
Who is right then Joe? If one person says it's ok to murder how does another say they are wrong? An authority is absolutely required....the problem is most of us want that authority to be ourselves.
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General Disarray:
25 Mar 2014 6:42:42pm
The problem is that most of us have created this authority ourselves.
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Gigaboomer:
25 Mar 2014 7:48:23pm
If we have created this authority ourselves then there can be no such thing as universal right and wrong, and if that is the case on what basis do you claim anything? How then can you claim it is morally wrong to deny a women an abortion for example, or a same sex couple the right to marry? Every time the atheist is morally outraged over any issue they are simply being inconsistent with the world view they claim to believe.
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General Disarray:
25 Mar 2014 8:57:59pm
Call me crazy but I 'believe' Yahweh has some personal issues with women
when 'He' advocates the public stoning of my daughter if her husband discovers she is not a virgin
and she can't prove otherwise. Or perhaps the bible was written by mere mortals?
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whogoesthere:
25 Mar 2014 10:16:23pm
The golden rule. Humans are pack animals. For a pack to work it has to co-operate. If you don't want to be killed, don't kill someone in your pack. If you want your pack to protect you, you need to protect them. If you want to share someone elses food, you have to share your own.
It's quite simple really. Treat others as you would like to be treated. If Jesus said that, he was one smart guy. The rest of religion isn't necessary, except to provide comfort.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 5:16:33am
"Every time the atheist is morally outraged over any issue they are simply being inconsistent with the world view they claim to believe."
No they're not - they're just claiming to observe a moral order that is predicated on an evolved sense of right and wrong. There are absolutes and they are innate. No bible required.
If Christianity is the source of our morals how do we know that slavery is morally wrong? How do we know that stoning apostates to death is morally wrong if the bible didn't tell us so?
I'll tell you the answer - it's because we have evolved morals that have nothing to do with old lies dressed up as truth. The bible is 'The Secret' of its day.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 9:40:45am
Gigaboomer you say "there can be no such thing as universal right and wrong". Glad to see you are learning and understand the reality we live in.
You also ask "on what basis do you claim anything?" - simply on the basis of subjective morality that the observer deems to be good, bad, or indifferent and the society they live within agree with the observer (more or less).
It is morally wrong to deny a woman an abortion because society holds the subjective morality that a women has a right to self determination like menfolk.
Similarly it is seen be some societies to be morally wrong to deny a same sex couple the right to marry because those societies hold the subjective morality that all human beings above the age of consent, with the ability to provide informed consent should be allowed to marry the person they love regardless of what sexuality they are.
Morality being subjective is constantly evolving along with the general thinking of the population.
See, it isn't so hard is it.
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The Jones Crusher:
25 Mar 2014 8:01:17pm
"Who is right then Joe? If one person says it's ok to murder how does another say they are wrong? An authority is absolutely required'
Well, somebody saying it's OK to murder is not far removed from somebody saying it's OK to abuse children, and I certainly would not respect a person fronting up to the current Royal Commission on Child Abuse as a "Moral Authority" on such matters! Would you?
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 8:06:23pm
"Who is right then Joe?"
Good question Giga - who is right? Islam? Hinduism? Voodoo?
Morality isn't relative - it derives from the same evolved empathy that enables cooperation amongst us. Interpretations might differ but things like murder are universally condemned, even in places where religion is absent. One exception is those places where religion supports the death penalty, in which places it appears to be god's will that humans murder each other.
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Barcoo:
25 Mar 2014 9:53:04pm
Not disagreeing with most of your comment Mitor, but have you ever considered that for many people, the death penalty is by far kinder than a long period in prison. Life is only precious if one is doing well.
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Gigaboomer:
25 Mar 2014 9:55:15pm
G'day Mitor. What has multiple religions got to do with anything? Just because there are lots of false religions it does not logically follow that therefore there is no true religion.
Why is empathy a good thing? Based on your world view there is no purpose or reason for our existence so why should empathy be a good thing? Why is human co-operation or flourishing a good thing? You are making a value statement and in the process contradicting your own world view.
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Crow:
26 Mar 2014 7:16:40am
and you make your usual value statements and simply state your own religion to be self obviously correct. without the slightest reason or evidence to do so.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 7:42:39am
"Why is empathy a good thing?"
Did I say it was a good thing? It is an observed thing, and a thing that has evolved to spawn morals. I don't think I said anything about 'good'. That value statement was all your own.
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 7:56:32am
"Why is human co-operation... a good thing?"
2 people can lift things that one person can't.
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hph:
26 Mar 2014 9:50:53am
But, Jimmy, this is mutual aid, help, support, communism. Not individualism as defined in Libertarianism.
Are you changing faith, Jimmy?
:)
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 10:47:53am
not at all hph. There is nothing saying Libertarians or anyone else can't enter into mutually agreeable cooperation (it is often a very sensible and beneficial thing to do), or indeed give away all their money if moved to do so. Libertarianism simply means the choice is your own.
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The Jones Crusher:
26 Mar 2014 11:40:06am
" Libertarianism simply means the choice is your own."
Having benefited from a civilisation established by way of enforced collectivism, Libertarians can now choose to go it alone!
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 12:15:59pm
"a civilisation established by way of enforced collectivism"
I don't remember ever living in such a place.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 9:49:23am
Gigaboomer you claim "Just because there are lots of false religions it does not logically follow that therefore there is no true religion" - actually that is the logical consequence of realising that the claim that all but one of the 38,000 christian denominations are wrong (plus all other religions) is itself wrong.
Empathy is only good in that it enables co-operative societies to develop from essentially very individualistic creatures (humans). The good is not a universal good, just a simple selfish one, whereby empathy and co-operation simply provide an evolutionary advantage for those with those genetic traits who are more likely to survive due to their ability to empathise and co-operate with other humans thus forming a more powerful organism (a society).
The flourishing of our species is only good in so far as we subjectively view our genetic lineage to be good, it is not necessarily good for all other genetic lines, though it has been for many, ie. certain wheat/grasses, livestock/animals, fruits/ veges.
By pointing out that Mitor has made a 'value statement' you actually accidentially realise that Mitor's morality is subjective and utterly and only reletive to the observer. Consider it 'relativity for morality' much in the same way space/time is only relative to the observer.
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Jimmy Necktie:
25 Mar 2014 8:15:33pm
"If one person says it's ok to murder how does another say they are wrong?"
That's why you have to forget morality and concentrate on rights. To murder somone is to deprive them their right to life, liberty and PoH.
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 10:44:58pm
"That's why you have to forget morality and concentrate on rights."
That's just semantics - how do we decide what constitutes a 'right'? Surely with reference to morality. Or are you suggesting that if a society agrees that parents have the right to marry their 12-year old daughters off en masse to rich old men then we should accept that without question?
Moral relativism is almost as bad as religious moral certainty.
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 7:27:11am
"what constitutes a 'right'?" I just said - Life, liberty, POH.
"if a society agrees that parents have the right to marry their 12-year old daughters off"
It has been morally acceptable in the past. If society wanted it again then it would once again be morally acceptable. However I'd argue this is contrary to the rights of the person being married to choose their own destiny. That definition does not change with societal whims.
What do you propose instead? Mitor's Big Book of Morals?
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 9:14:35am
"What do you propose instead? Mitor's Big Book of Morals?"
No, although I would enjoy the challenge. I think that moral right and wrong can be empirically measured. I think 'the greatest good for the greatest number of individuals' can be derived without reference to either me or god. I think human contentment, happiness or utility can be understood and measured; and therefore maximised. But not by applying arbitrary rules from holy books or by simply accepting traditional or cultural practice. But no one's talking about this while faith still claims the right to define morality for all of us.
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 10:50:18am
"I think that moral right and wrong can be empirically measured"
Of course it can't. "Morality" is just as vaporous as "arbitrary rules from holy books or by simply accepting traditional or cultural practice"
Rights, I tells ya. They don't change.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 12:00:23pm
Rights change all the time. Women have the right to vote. Back in the day women didn't have the right to vote. What determined their 'rights'? Rights are not obvious, otherwise gay people would have the right to marry. Morals define rights, and evolutionary intuitions define morals. But not while the church tells us what is good and bad.
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 2:26:51pm
those sorts of rights (eg voting) are not universal, fundamental rights. They can be considered to be privileges of citizenship. Children are not allowed to vote, neither am I (being a non-citizen), neither are people in jail. However I can vote in Canada and you can't. Privilege of citizenship.
or you could look at voting as a form of self determination. In that case women always had this right however it was kept from them on moral grounds. And then given to them on moral grounds. Here it is the morality which changed not the right.
We may use "morals [to] define rights" but they are not, as you claimed, the same thing.
But I am curious how you can "empirically measure right and wrong". If you can tell me, maybe I'll feel differently.
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graazt:
26 Mar 2014 2:54:36pm
Perhaps rights are discovered rather than invented? They existed all along. Just like the Earth was roundish all along prior to us recognising it to be so...
Not saying I personally endorse that position, but I think this is the Objectivist take on rights. They are definitely not consequentialist / utilitarian artefacts.
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Real Skeptic:
25 Mar 2014 8:53:20pm
The only authority that's required is the combined application of reason and empathy. Ie. something is wrong/bad/immoral if it causes unnecessary harm to another living creature. Therefore things like murder and theft will always be considered wrong across all cultures. Child/female/animal abuse would also be considered wrong in all societies if the people who made up social/religious rules weren't usually self-centred men. These values are instead the recent products of empathy and reason in the western world. It's very telling that the Abrahamic god never bothered to denounce domestic violence in any of his handbooks for living a virtuous life.
Other "morals" involving innocuous things that harm nobody like sexual preferences, "unclean" foods, and clothing choices are nothing but relics from outdated systems of control commonly called religions.
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 8:02:26am
"the Abrahamic god never bothered to denounce domestic violence in any of his handbooks "
I'm no scholar but I think you will find plenty of such advice in at least the Bible (honour, love and cherish) and probably most other similar texts. You will also find plenty of apparently conflicting advice...
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Politically Incorrect:
26 Mar 2014 9:29:30am
Someone obviously hasn't read the bible. Women are property in the bible: from Genesis to Revelation.
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 10:53:25am
as I said "You will also find plenty of apparently conflicting advice..." Why do you choose to focus on the negative alone?
The point is religion's purpose is not about men keeping women down. They could do that without religion.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 9:58:53am
Jimmy Necktie,
To honour, love and cherish doesn't by itself preclude the beating or sale of your wife or child, things sanctioned by the bible.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 9:57:30am
Real Skeptic,
You suggest "Therefore things like murder and theft will always be considered wrong across all cultures."
Not so. Many societies including our own sanction murder, ie. during war it is ok to murder the opponent, we also sanction the right of our police to kill if sufficiently threatened. Our society also sanctions the theft of information by our security apperatus.
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Real Skeptic:
26 Mar 2014 2:51:31pm
"something is wrong/bad/immoral if it causes unnecessary harm"
Murder is usually considered the unnecessary and intentional killing of another person. If you kill in self defence or defence of another, then it would be considered necessary. Which situations are believed to make killing necessary will simply vary between societies and circumstances. Indiscriminate killing is universally considered wrong.
Just because our government condones (thinks it necessary) widespread spying, doesn't mean that our society in general believes it is necessary and therefore moral.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 4:23:16pm
"Indiscriminate killing is universally considered wrong"
Not at all.
It was sanctioned and supported heavily by the population during the last world war and in subsequent conflicts.
There still are many proponents of strategic bombing that causes the indiscriminate killing of humans, some even advocated the strategic bombing of Ireland during the troubles. Note too the concept called M.A.D. is based on the premise of a sanctioned indiscriminate killing of a population.
On a more technical issue, why exactly do you believe it is morally right for a person to able to kill another person when they feel threatened (aka Self Defence)? Surely subdueing them is sufficient? perhaps an incapacitation would be appropriate instead of death? also why should the defender get to live? these are all just subjective moral judgements made by the observer and by the society they live in.
In relation to spying you just applied your own subjective morality that is relative to you (the observer) while at the same time recognising that other observers hold differing subjective morality on the same issue,.... thanks for helping to demonstrate what i'm saying.
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Zing:
26 Mar 2014 3:10:45pm
Murder and theft is generally considered wrong in society. But society's definitions of these terms vary from culture to culture.
In one country, taking property is theft from the tribe. In another country, taking property is theft from the individual. Perhaps theft is physical use without permission. Or perhaps theft is only when you deprive something from the owner.
The Jewish commandment was "thou shalt not murder". Killing was fine in itself. The issue is whether the killing was allowable under the laws, or whether the killing was unlawful and hence constituted murder.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 4:28:05pm
Great points Zing.
In the west we even regard the watching of something without holding the appropriate licence (duly paid for) a theft. The use of others ideas is also theft to us (be it I.P. theft or plain old plagiarism). Yet these are not universal views and are entire subjective concepts of morality.
As you point out the definition of murder has been, and is, a purely subjective moral judgement, regardless of whom is doing the deciding.
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sdrawkcaB:
25 Mar 2014 10:54:48pm
If an authority is required then don?t spend too much time with the bible.
Exodus 32.26 God has people killing each other.
Exodus 20.13 is the famous thall shall not kill.
The point here is the bible has its feet in both camps as it does on over 400 other occasions.
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Zing:
25 Mar 2014 10:55:17pm
Laws are simply the strong controlling the weak.
Murder isn't considered wrong because of the bible, the Koran or some inherent quality of man. Murder is considered wrong because societies all over the world want a safe environment to live and they're willing to punish people whose conduct compromises this.
Raise a group of people away from society and religion. Put them in a situation where there's only enough food for one person to survive and see what happens. Morality depends on the person and the situation. Where there is no law, there can be no murder.
Giga would argue that their god must exist, or there is no universal rules to live our life. It seems like a foolish argument. If I'm in an empty room, I can't just say "there must be an invisible person in this room, because I can't accept the possibility of being alone". There are plenty of bad arguments for religion, but appeal to consequence is the worst.
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Politically Incorrect:
26 Mar 2014 9:26:30am
According to the bible, genocide is OK, as long as you have a cosmic stamp of approval.
If you believe the bible is literal, then you have to believe your god has murdered more people than Stalin, Pol Pot & Hitler put together.
How on earth can you say that is OK if you think murder is wrong? That's highly hypocritical.
Our morality is based on suffering and happiness, we are social animals that need eachother. Wars are a consequence of our tribal history, evolving in a world of scarcity has serious drawbacks when living in a world of plenty.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 9:34:58am
Hi Gigaboomer,
Who is right you ask?
Not the inquistor in this case, the 'righteousness' belongs squarely to the victim.
Though I'm disappointed that wasn't evidently clear to you.
The reality remains that morality is entirely subjective. Who is to say any murder is right? How can any murder be morally sanctioned (be it in war, criminal punishment, religious punishment, criminal activity, or 'for love')? Yet we do by agreement within societies (each society holding their subjective view on the matter).
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Zing:
25 Mar 2014 6:15:58pm
Theists base all their actions on the promise of supernatural reward, or the fear of supernatural punishment.
Arguably, the inquisitorial torturer was more moral than the typical theist. Why? Because they were willing to risk the damnation of their own soul for the possibility of "redeeming" their torture victims. Most theists would never be so selfless.
On the other hand, perhaps they just enjoyed hurting people? It's hard to say with catholic inquisitors. They wear hoods, so you can never tell which ones are smiling.
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Gigaboomer:
25 Mar 2014 6:50:25pm
As a Christian Zing I try, although often fail, to do right because of what Christ has already done for me. In other words it's not for some reward, it's out of thankfulness for what has already been freely given.
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 8:08:29pm
"it's not for some reward, it's out of thankfulness for what has already been freely given."
And by implication you do this only because of this delusion about christ. If you stopped believing then are we to presume you'd rape, pillage and murder? Is your 'goodness' not innate, like mine?
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Aria:
25 Mar 2014 8:21:28pm
A few questions: where did you learn that being thankful was the right/moral thing to do? Why did you believe the source of that information?
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 10:04:06am
Gigaboomer,
That is nice that you try to be good, for what ever reason.
For that you should be applauded.
I only hope that your view of good is not limited by your own biblical view of the world and that you are prepared to accept that there are other types of good that are not aways specifically sanctioned by religious authorities.
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Gigaboomer:
25 Mar 2014 6:50:56pm
As a Christian Zing I try, although often fail, to do right because of what Christ has already done for me. In other words it's not for some reward, it's out of thankfulness for what has already been freely given.
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Gone to the races:
26 Mar 2014 2:12:52am
@Giga you stated, "thankfulness for what has already been freely given" when referring to Jesus. Forgive me if I'm wrong but do you mean Jesus dying on the Cross, his sacrifice for your sins?
Let's assume for a moment that Jesus really was the son of God. Something that has always troubled me about this sacrifice was that 3 days later Jesus is alive again. How does that constitute a sacrifice? That's a get out of sacrifice free card.
Being alive again 3 days later makes a mockery of what real sacrifice actually means.
Storming the beaches on D-day I'd call that a sacrifice. Jesus had a 3 day hiatus and was back among his pals, please explain to me how that can possibly constitute a sacrifice of anything.
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Pythinia:
26 Mar 2014 8:46:52am
You can't dismiss Jesus he's still running the show, what is it that this dead man has survived two thousand years and still folk bend to his will, built monuments to him, compose music, visit him every week, cling to a morality he preached .etc etc.. a mystery....think about it.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 10:08:55am
Pythinia,
Since when did the illegitimate son of Yahweh (from his adulterous affair with the human woman Mary) run the show?
He is only alleged to be the son of Yahweh, subject to Yahwehs whimsical behaviours, vices and vengance.
Or did Jesus Christ he kill or bannish Yahweh at some point, and if so how and when?
Now that is a lovely rewrite of the 3,000+ year old Yahweh story line, first just a demi-god son of El & Asherah (the leaders of the Canaanite pathenon of gods), then later the one and only after his followers got beaten in war... now surplanted by Jesus Christ?
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graazt:
26 Mar 2014 10:47:17am
Get out of sacrifice free card. lol. It always troubled me also.
Right up there with the "leave your kids with a dodgy, articulate snake then kick them out of the house when they go for the forbidden fruit" move. Bad parenting imho.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 10:01:29am
Zing you claim that "Because they were willing to risk the damnation of their own soul for the possibility of "redeeming" their torture victims" the inquistor was more moral.
Not so. As the inquistor was doing "gods work" by torturing and murdering in the name of god there was no risk to his soul, if fact quite the opposite he would have been earning some really good brownie points for his hoped for journey to the magical cloud land.
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Zing:
26 Mar 2014 1:29:42pm
I'm sure the church assured the inquisitors that they were only torturing the guilty and thus their conduct was absolved.
But I'm equally sure that at least some inquisitors were wondering if they'd killed innocent people and if so, whether they'd be called to account by some supernatural judge. Irrespective of the Pope's assurances.
The point I was trying to make is that if you do good based on the assumption that a deity will reward you, your conduct can't really be said to be selfless. If a Christian decided to do the right thing even though they thought it would result in their damnation, I'd have more respect for their actions.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 2:38:35pm
"If a Christian decided to do the right thing even though they thought it would result in their damnation, I'd have more respect for their actions"
Wise words indeed Zing.
ps. thanks for the clarrification of your post too, though you'd be a brave inquisitor to openly express your doubt in whether the Pope was really telling the truth and was in fact Yahweh's earthly representative.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:47:38am
You seem quite confident that your entirely subjective assertions seem to apply to the rest of us. How is this possible?
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 2:48:49pm
Great point Evan.
You seem to indicate that my view that morality is entirely subjective and relative only to the observer is a subjective assertion and entirely relative to the observer.
I guess this can only be possible if a theory of 'moral relativity' is accurate (in the same way space/time is only relative to the observer).
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Brian Francis:
25 Mar 2014 4:46:18pm
Congratulations Michael on producing a thoughtful piece of writing that not only presents a point of view but seemingly avoids the messy 'hurtful' words that so imbue our public discourse. This is truly how Australia should begin to have what is now deemed 'A Conversation' and promotes dignity without having laws to guide us.
As for morality, I don't need to understand your own religious bent to assess that you have morality by your writing, which in turn is a mirror on character.
Religion will always be taken up by anyone seeking to express their own Faith. They will do so for their own reasons and understand that they would not be able to fool themselves. Ultimately each of us needs to answer to ourselves before we answer to any particular God.
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sdrawkcaB:
25 Mar 2014 11:13:14pm
The main thing we need to answer is faith.
The problem with faith is its infectious. Once you are prepared to turn something over to faith, it escalates and you become willing to turn other things over to faith.
Once something becomes too hard it then becomes ok to believe. The hard road is scepticism as in conclusion based on the scientific method.
Whilst the scientific method does not hold all answers, its weaknesses are not nearly as bad as those deriving from faith. Scepticism is a far better method.
That said, it is perfectly reasonable to apply the scientific method and arrive at the God concept.
I think the main thing society needs to do is try and get its citizenry to stop and think about it. Just following along because Grandpappy says so is not a good method.
For myself, I was quite warm to the idea of a biblical God up until my late teens. Upon spasmodic investigation over my life, I found the God idea less and less creditable. The issue is not what I found. The issue is I did find and so I have a strong conviction and upon that its easy to build a foundation of morals and ethics. It just so happens that most of mine come from the Ancient Greeks with a bit of Buddhism and Humanism thrown in.
To me, Christianity is far too random and contradictory to be of use.
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Monty B:
25 Mar 2014 4:46:42pm
Take god out of the picture and morality becomes clearer, not harder.
The only moral question is the question of suffering, and atheist/humanistic ethics is precisely about reducing suffering. Without God we are able to consider ways of managing animals as to reduce their suffering;- not killing them in accordance with Iron Age customs and superstitions than allow needless suffering.
We can respect woman?s right to choose without annoying some fictitious superintendent who considers every sperm sacred.
We can tackle the spread of AIDS in places like Africa. We can treat same sex couples with respect and compassion. We could even do without religious fanatics who think their God wants them to blow people up or crash plane into buildings of all things.
We can also intervene to place paedophile priests before the courts like any other predator and not allow them special status or special treatment to further enable them.
Imagine no religion.
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Closet Romantic:
25 Mar 2014 7:59:08pm
Just a clarification
Are you equating humanism with atheism?
They are not necessarily the same thing there would be by definition no unifying moral code of atheists
This is not to say that to be an atheist is to be immoral that would be like saying to be religious is too be moral and we all know that's not true.
A moral code is an intellectual construct no matter who you are.
For example satanists have a different morality which to most of us is immoral but to them makes perfect sense.
Other people might know and something that I feel the article didn't deal with is to those who lack empathy to a dangerous degree, psychopaths etc those who by definition have no morality other than self service where do they fit in this argument?
Empathy, shame, the need to belong might all be evolutionary developments but not everyone got it and you only have to look at the media to see prime examples of individuals whose entire idea of morality is basically self service and don't get caught.
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Adam:
26 Mar 2014 1:22:19am
I suspect you'll find that most people equating morality with theism do so not because they think you need to believe in God to be moral, but that if God does not exist, there is no basis for morality. It becomes difficult to be anything other than an anti-realist when it comes to morality; how exactly do you claim that your own moral views (you should not murder, you should respect human rights, child abuse is wrong etc.) should be shared by all others? Indeed, it becomes simply a case of stating your opinion which you have no basis for imposing on anyone else. An evolutionary explanation for morality merely tells us how our current behaviour developed, but gives no reason to suppose that these herd instincts constitute any sort of morality than should be imposed on other (it simply becomes an "is-ought fallacy"). Se be careful; it may well be true that there is no God, but if that is so then you also have to be prepared to deal with the delusion that is morality.
What does Richard Dawkins say? Faith is belief without evidence. Surely morality, and in particular insisting that others should respect your own morality (women's rights, as you said, could be an example) is nothing more than blind faith in an objective morality that you can appeal to when it suits you.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:48:37am
But why is it good to reduce suffering? Evolution doesn't care.
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TedB:
25 Mar 2014 4:48:50pm
Suggest Jonathan Haidt's recent book "The Righteous Mind ? Why Good people are Divided by Politics and Religion" for an excellent background to this. Morality has evolutionary bases and religions came from these evolutionary background. Religions had the benefit of keeping their believers to their own moral code and so their group had the ability to bind the group, but also the drawback of blinding its members to excesses of the leaders of the group
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Adam:
26 Mar 2014 1:16:14am
While an interesting enough hypothesis, I have to say that most of the sociobiological explanations of the origin of religion and morality in humans lack the slightest bit of scientific credibility. One of the first things scientists are taught is that their hypotheses must be falsifiable; tell me how what you have just stated in any way meets that criteria. It is exactly one of those "Just so" stories that those of us who study evolution are told to avoid when developing ideas.
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whogoesthere:
25 Mar 2014 4:51:44pm
To have a religious belief (in the major religions) you have to
1) decide a supernatural being exists
2) decide he is known to us
3) pick which one is the correct one
4) pick which interpretation you wish to follow
Therefore your belief is just your own world view no more intinsically right or wrong than a humanistic one. Even if there is a omnipotent being that created the Universe the 'God' you pick is most likely a human construct.
Personally I believe that 'goodness' does come out of self interest. We are pack animals so we have to fit in with our pack. Everything stems from there.
The funny thing about this is that it is bascially the good old 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you'. If everyone did that, religious or non-religious alike, the world would be a far better place. It seems our more primitive unreasonable crocodile brain is still well and truly hanging in there.
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General Disarray:
25 Mar 2014 6:25:57pm
'do unto others as you would have them do unto you'.
Somehow I think this maxim would cause endless bloodshed.
Better to 'turn the other cheek', or was it 'a tooth for a tooth'?
Now I'm confused. I'd better stick to self-righteousness.
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Zing:
25 Mar 2014 7:48:04pm
If I was caught robbing a house, I'd want the owner to let me leave with the stolen property. And possibly make me a decent sandwich for the trip home.
So according to the bible, I'm supposed to treat burglars the same way. Under that kind of system, it would seem that the only people who benefit from the rules are the ones who break them. That might be telling us something.
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leafygreens:
26 Mar 2014 12:05:24pm
You've got it the wrong way round
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
Treat others as you want them to treat you..
...if YOU caught someone stealing YOUR stuff YOU would YOU let them keep it and make them a sandwich?
No. You don't want them nicking your stuff. So stealing is wrong.
If you object to be killed, stolen from, abused, etc by a random person at anytime, you shouldn't do that to anyone else becasue they will object to it, too.
Its about tempering self interest with empathy to make for a cooperative community, because we do better living in a cooperative group vs being outcast to survive on our own.
The New Testament is about loving and caring. The Old Testament is far more brutal and is full of God intervening and smiting rule breakers, and ordering the killing of the not-chosen.. Other cultures were espousing the Golden Rule long before Jesus was reputed to have said it.
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 8:11:45pm
"do unto others as you would have them do unto you"
I think that is an unrealistic goal. I would have others shower me with riches, but I'm not going to do that for them. It is a more realistic aspiration to 'Don't do to others what you wouldn't have them do to you'. I think that's a better reflection of how most of us live most of the time.
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Mike:
26 Mar 2014 2:38:44am
"Do unto others as you would have others do unto you" would be far more fitting to the human condition if it was rephrased to be;
"Cause less suffering to others than you think others would get upset enough about to retaliate."
Self-interest generally does cause suffering to others to some extent, this world is a zero sum game. More for me means less for you, the question then becomes how much can I take and how can I take it, that will not cause others to shun me.
Of course, all of these considerations can be made without factoring in what a make believe omniscient being would want of you, indeed these considerations were being taken into account long before any one deity was imagined into existence.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:50:06am
Can you give an account of where your idea of 'good' comes from?
Simply your opinion?
Pragmatism? This has thorny issues to sort out.
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Jimmy Necktie:
25 Mar 2014 5:14:05pm
"Is it necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values?"
No but it might be necessary to define "good values". I don't know anyone who considers themselves to have "bad values".
There is no yardstick for "values". The only logical recourse is to deal with rights. Does the action violate anyone's rights? If not then it's none of our business.
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naughtee:
25 Mar 2014 6:39:32pm
"I don't know anyone who considers themselves to have "bad values"."
yes but if 80% of your clan decide you have bad values (say for indiscriminately killing others, or stealing etc) then they may just knock you on your head when you're asleep... or force you out of the group (not a good proposition for survival).
those who behave get to contribute and survive, those who like to behave... we'll they're even better suited.
so the "yardstick" for a social animals' behavior is ultimately their peers, this is borne out by similar social animals, other apes for instance will reprimand badly behaving individuals, even banishment or death will be dealt out.
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Jimmy Necktie:
25 Mar 2014 8:23:00pm
Does the threat of a knock on the head make it moral? Are you claiming apes act from a sense of morality?
Social rules are not necessarily the same as 'morals'. As I said we can work out perfectly good social rules like not stealing or indiscriminately (does it matter if one discriminates??) killing without resorting to some arbitrary, subjective and fluid moral code. Rights will do the job neatly and unambiguously.
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naughtee:
26 Mar 2014 8:21:00am
hi jimmy, other apes possess similar mechanisms that we would term "morals", i think what we're discussing here is the ability to feel what other animals in our group are feeling, apes also have the ability to "model" what the other animal is thinking, "is that individual angry with me, how should i behave to modify that to my advantage" etc. however if you do not possess these abilities or ignore them to the extent of hurting / killing others, then yes, there are other measures a successful social group will enforce to remove you (and your genes), which will improve the groups ability to survive, weather this be considered a moral manoeuvre or not is irrelevant.
it is not a long pull of the bow to suggest animals that live in social groups will do better if they remove violent individuals and reward cooperative ones (something our legal system achieves today), i believe there is a whole research area known as "game theory" which looks at the tolerances and conflict between "intelligent rational decision-makers".
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 9:14:07am
"other apes possess similar mechanisms that we would term "morals"
Well that's where we seem to disagree. While the result (harmony within the group) may be the same I don't think behaving under threat of punishment is necessarily moral behaviour, it is sensible behaviour. Moral behaviour would be more like *refusing* to obey a rule and copping the punishment because you think obeying the rule is immoral.
From the little I know of game theory, morals don't come into it. It is based on each agent doing what is ultimately most to their own benefit, whether that be cooperation or otherwise.
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naughtee:
26 Mar 2014 11:06:37am
"Moral behaviour would be more like *refusing* to obey a rule and copping the punishment because you think obeying the rule is immoral."
a good point jimmy, although i doubt other apes don't possess that level of interaction (as you say this is where we disagree). other apes have been observed, lying, cheating as well as hiding food for other disadvantaged individuals in the same group etc...
you seem to grant humans another level where we can choose how to act, or override our programming, i argue other apes do exactly that and the option of "choice" is one that has evolved.
let's keep the game theory discussion for another time ;)
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 11:35:33am
"other apes have been observed, lying, cheating as well as hiding food for other disadvantaged individuals in the same group etc..."
Putting aside my disagreement for a moment, it's clearly against the rules of the group (hence the subterfuge). How then can societal rules and morals be the same thing?
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naughtee:
26 Mar 2014 12:46:54pm
"How then can societal rules and morals be the same thing?"
i guess they are not the same thing, however they are connected, societal rules outline a preferred behaviour (or moral response) aligned for the group's success.
if an individual's moral outlook does not align with societal rules they either get away with it or don't, however what i'm advocating is that societal rules feed off our own innate sense of what is 'right and wrong', which we are granted by our evolutionary background.
my "knock on the head" comment was attempting to show how certain behaviour (or moral outlook) is removed by competing interests in the group... i don't doubt particular behaviour patterns are inherited. behaviour patterns that are not inherited can be modified by culture, language and rules. these things also evolve but in the format of culture not no much as genetics.
i guess our main disagreement is how much control we attribute to the individual, with my position being very little and yours somewhat more generous.
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Adam:
26 Mar 2014 1:25:13am
Interesting you say that; would you consider that a culture that endorses child sacrifice (and there certainly have been enough of those!) is worth respecting, simply because most people in that culture consider the practise good? Or would you want to impose your own Western values on them?
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:51:04am
But which rights are moral? Are they moral? Why or why not?
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Victor :
25 Mar 2014 5:15:36pm
Well, I wouldn't say that moraility is an illusion, but the brand of morality that we practice emanates from the brand of religion that has attached itself to our culture. And religion and culture must go together in a symbiotic, 'incestuous' arrangement....a religion must be a 'fit' to the culture it shares.
Ever noticed that Christianity hasn't made much headway in most of Asia? Granted, it has a foothold in Africa and South America but outside of Europe and it's offshoots, the main religions are those that settle in to Asian cultures. Christianity made it's mark in Africa because most Africans had/have a form of animism and usually this has less formal structure than, for example, Buddhism, Hinduism, Daoism, Shintoism and Islam or Christianity. In South America Christianity was introduced at the point of a sword.
Morality, ethics, empathy, sympathy, a sense of justice and even our sense of logic all spring in part from our religion which acts in concert with our culture. So all of these attributes that we have can be said to be culturally based, as is our religion.
Regardless of our belief or non belief in a religion, if that religion has superimposed itself on our culture then it has a significant influence on the way we conduct our lives.
It is probably not wise to cite examples as there are those who will jump on them with glee ..... take for example the 'code' of 'road courtesy' that we adhere to in Australia. Much of it stems from the 'others first' that is a basic tenet of Christianity, and it is not often that we see much "Christianity" on our roads.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:52:26am
Christianity is hugely popular in parts of Asia. Even where people were killed for being adherents.
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MJLC:
25 Mar 2014 5:16:05pm
Non-believers like Mr Collett shouldn't lose too much sleep over the numbers.
If you want to watch the fun kick off, ask the "Yep, I agree" mob whether anybody else's God qualifies for the gold star and elephant stamp of moral purity and niceness and watch them wriggle.
Non-believers may or may not be on the same fast-track to nirvana as God-botherers, but the one thing you can say is that they're a damned sight better at pointing out hypocrisy than those spending all their time on their knees.
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Desert Woman:
25 Mar 2014 5:23:50pm
It has been shown that very young children and all animals tested so far display a sense of fairness. It seems to be developed so early that it is probably innate. If fairness to all, that is a form of equality, 'do unto others...', is so ubiquitous, then it doesn't really matter if you believe in one or more gods later in your life. The real question then becomes what do we do to some people to wipe out this morality? And how do we stop it?
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:54:02am
No but it matters for giving an account of whether this inborn trait is good or bad. Children can be viciously punishing of others who get in their way. Does this have equal moral status with their sense of fairness?
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Dave:
25 Mar 2014 5:25:29pm
I cracked up when the Pope announced recently that atheists can get themselves to heaven by doing good works, and a bunch of cardinals (seeing their business model start to crumble in front of their eyes) had to announce that the Pope had been misunderstood.
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David Kay:
26 Mar 2014 9:44:56am
I try not to like the current Pope, because he is head of an church that is, amongst other things, perhaps the largest organized criminal child-abuse network in human history.
But I just can't help it.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 2:57:10pm
This new pope is a real cracker.
I personally loved how he recently announced that he had a discussion with Yahweh (using the special red telephone) and they agreed that if you follow the pope on twitter and other forms of social media you can bypass purgatory when you die (or at least get a hearty discount on time to be spent there).
What a guy!
So believable too!
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Ataraxia:
25 Mar 2014 5:26:19pm
Silly survey. It assumes an absoluteness of belief (whatever that is) in God (whatever is meant by that) that coheres to an individual. Most people I know go through periods of spiritual doubt and uncertainty. The question seems designed to create division by inappropriately applying the law of the excluded middle. The question is meaningless and so also are the results.
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 8:16:49pm
"The question is meaningless and so also are the results."
The question is predicated on the authority the religions claim over public morality. Next time Cardinal Pell tells Parliament how to vote in such as gay marriage, stem cell research or abortion rights - and parliamentarians take heed of his warnings about where they're going in the afterlife - then think again about this question.
If more people agreed that public morality and private religion were separate entities questions like this would not be necessary. However, we're a long way from that.
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The Jones Crusher:
25 Mar 2014 8:38:26pm
"The question is meaningless and so also are the results."
Agree 100%, especially in the absence of a clear definition of "moral".
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Artful Dodger:
25 Mar 2014 5:31:14pm
Those who do not believe in or practice humanity need a God to believe in.Those who believe in and practice humanity probably have God believing in them.
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Zing:
25 Mar 2014 5:32:51pm
It simply comes down to incredulity.
Christians are raised with the belief that humans are inherently corrupt, fallen from grace and only through belief in a deity will their sinful souls be cleaned. Every good action they take is made with the belief that they'll be rewarded in the next life. Every sin they avoid is through fear of eternal damnation.
Sinners are easy to explain to the theist. They're evil, greedy or self centred. Their presence just confirms to the theist that people who don't live according to the dogma are evil and/or the source of the world's misery.
But then we add the charitable unbeliever into the mix. An atheist who does good deeds and helps others without any belief of natural or supernatural reward. It's just something that theists can't understand. So they come up with an excuse.
It must be the person's inherent faith. Or some kind of possession by the holy spirit. Or a fluke. Or a hidden agenda. Because the idea that a person can be genuinely good is just incompatible with everything the Christian faith assumes about human nature.
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Jason:
25 Mar 2014 6:56:25pm
Not quite. The doctrine of grace is clear about the fact that we are all sinners - and the "good deeds" that we do are precisely beside the point.
We are all greedy and evil - our status as believers or otherwise is irrelevant.
If you have trouble "believing" that, read the newspapers.
We are all evil - and we need a Saviour. It's to the everlasting shame of organised religion, however, that it fails to practice what it preaches.
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Zing:
25 Mar 2014 7:38:49pm
Thanks. You've pretty much provided a working example of what I just mentioned.
So consider the case of the charitable atheist. Someone who helps someone for no reward, and believes they won't be rewarded after they die.
How do you explain their charity? Hidden faith? Holy possession? Or the idea that maybe morality doesn't need religion?
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Rob:
25 Mar 2014 7:47:20pm
"read the newspapers" - the common refrain presented as evidence (usually by the faithful) that the human race is irretrievably evil and corrupt.
The fact that newspapers are inexorably drawn to reporting bad news where perpetrators represent a minimal fraction of the population is ignored.
Meanwhile the vast majority of us continue leading "good" lives generally with consideration for others, regardless of belief in one deity or the other.
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Lydia:
25 Mar 2014 7:49:24pm
I agree 100%, Jason, especially but sadly with the last sentence.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:55:06am
This misrepresents both christians and Christianity.
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Zing:
26 Mar 2014 1:39:02pm
I'm sure you'd like to think so.
Unfortunately, you'll find plenty of theists who agree with every word I've written and have no problem with it. In fact, two of them already replied to my post.
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Zing:
26 Mar 2014 1:46:46pm
I'm sure you'd like to think so.
Unfortunately, you'll find plenty of theists who agree with every word I've written and have no problem with it. In fact, two of them already replied to my post.
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Colmery:
25 Mar 2014 5:34:46pm
This is a bloody good article Michael. If only the ABC used more like you and fewer of those who write populist crap aimed at eliciting outrage from the more feral of us in the audience.
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Mentat Render:
25 Mar 2014 5:52:52pm
Perhaps what is more worrying is that a portion of the population only have some moral ground because of some fictional being (of which we have several flavours), a promise of an afterlife or the threat of equally real damnation!
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Gigaboomer:
25 Mar 2014 6:00:55pm
Of course you don't need to be religious to behave in a morally 'good' way.......in fact an unbeliever can act any way he or she chooses and this is precisely the problem. Without a moral law giver in authority above all human kind morality just becomes a matter of opinion. This opinion might be good, depending of course on one's definition of 'good', or it can be otherwise. And citing evolution is no help either, at best evolution simply describes the how, but morality is about the 'ought'.....a very big difference.
At the end of the day to have a basis for morality you absolutely need an authority above all people, and only religious systems do this. In fact the obvious universal nature of much of human morality is very powerful evidence for the existence of God.
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Zing:
25 Mar 2014 6:47:02pm
"In fact the obvious universal nature of much of human morality is very powerful evidence for the existence of God."
Actually, it's proof of the opposite.
Human society has common factors that they share in all their moral beliefs. Yet the entire planet doesn't believe in the catholic God (or in some cases, don't believe in any god at all). So clearly, morality is a product of humanity. Much like a religion is a product of a particular human society.
You can't really argue "there is a god, because otherwise there's no such thing as objective morality". It would be as silly as arguing "my car will start, because otherwise I'll be late to the party".
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Gigaboomer:
25 Mar 2014 7:53:36pm
Zing, simply not true, at least not according to the bible. All humanity was created perfect in the beginning in God's image and this is where that intrinsic knowledge of right and wrong comes from. But what most people ignore is the fall which then separated us from that relationship with God we had in the beginning. Over the centuries people created their own gods because deep down they know the true God exists, but couldn't know the details due to sin. So the many gods are the product of humanity, not morality. It simply does not logically follow that just because there are many false gods there is therefore no true God.
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rob1966:
25 Mar 2014 10:17:25pm
@Giga .. you are not seriously claiming that your religion, and the religious text that it is based on, provides a solid grounding for morality?!
A religious text that portrays a "god" who advocates and demands genocide, the murder of innocents and non-believers, the stoning to death of disobedient children, and women? That is the basis of your morality!?
How ludicrous that you claim religion is required for a person to be moral, when the religion you espouse - as do many of the others - advocates slaughter, rape, pillage!
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Zing:
25 Mar 2014 10:44:05pm
Your argument is circular.
You assume that a deity exists because you believe we have an intrinsic knowledge of right and wrong. You assume that we have an intrinsic knowledge of right and wrong because you believe a deity gave it to us. All assumptions and no proof, with each assumption feeding into each other.
And while you'll accept that every other religion is a human invention without a second thought, you can't accept the same about your own faith. When you analyse the world, you seem to apply different standards.
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Mike:
26 Mar 2014 2:55:09am
Yes, how dare Zing go against the word of God....that was written by dozens of different people, often 200 or more years after Jesus died and then translated and rewritten 100s of times more over 2 centuries all the while being warped to the whims of the clergy who wanted nothing but to keep their flock (of sheep) controlled and docile with the fear that if they went against the word of the church (faceless men wielding the power) they would burn in hell for eternity!
Those words claiming to be the only true word of the one true god. Those words which contradict the words of every other religion who's god(s) is/are also the only true god(s). But hey having faith in God means you KNOW those other heathens are wrong and you are right, right?
You'd hope so or the afterlife in the Islamic paradise won't include you, which would be a shame would it not? All those years saving non christian souls from your version of hell, all for naught. What a horrible prospect! But that's OK, you have faith, you are right and everyone else is wrong! Praise the lord!
Gigaboomer, you'd better make sure to say a few extra hail-mary's before bed time to make certain.
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Cafe:
26 Mar 2014 3:54:01am
Wow! What a self-referential moebius strip of justification and rationalization that is Giga!
If you'd been born in Rijad, you would feel the same way about Islam, or in Mumbai about Hinduism.
Your religion is an accident of birth and upbringing.
Doesn't this say more than anything, that religion is a human derived cultural product? Open your eyes for goodness sake.
Or do you derive your righteousness from flying in the face of the obvious? Perhaps you are using that as a mechanism to further your faith? Such circular reasoning is certainly evident in your post.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 10:34:52am
"at least not according to the bible."
which bits of the bible though Gigaboomer? the ones that allow you to do 'X' or the passages that specifically forbid 'X'?
Now as far as "God's image" is concerned the bible specifically states that humanity was create in "our image", .....plural.
Which would be El & Asherah, the original leaders of the canaanite pathenon of gods according to the written mythology of this religion of which your 'god' Yahweh was merely a demi-god child of El & Asherah and one of 60 demi-god brothers and sisters.
So you and your bible claim that humanity is in the image of two canaanite gods (male & female) who you and your bible have written out of the newer canaanite mythology known generally as the Abrahamic faiths and in your case one of the 38,000 christian sects that follows a strict literal interpretation of the biblical account of creation.
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whogoesthere:
25 Mar 2014 7:26:30pm
'in fact an unbeliever can act any way he or she chooses and this is precisely the problem.'
So can a believer. God (whichever one) has chosen to remain hidden. People with religious beliefs selectively pick which bits of religious texts suit them. They can claim they have a higher authority that validates their beliefs, but it's still just humans deciding what's moral.
Some Christians think gay people will burn in hell, others believe they are perfectly fine. Both pick bits of religious text (written by humans) to 'prove' they are right. It's quite ridiculous really.
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Theos:
25 Mar 2014 8:01:31pm
"At the end of the day to have a basis for morality you absolutely need an authority above all people, and only religious systems do this."
Wrong ... wrong ... wrong ...
To have a basis of morality, or you need is a rational mind, the ability to observe and empathy. The Golden Rule was determined centuries before any of the biblical authors "invented" it.
And to be sure, religious systems do NOT provide an authority above all people. Many of them may assert that they do, but I could also assert that I'm a teapot. Like every social behaviour in every species on the planet, "morality", "ethics" etc evolved because they benefit the species (or more correctly, they benefited those set of genes responsible for that advantageous behaviour).
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naughtee:
25 Mar 2014 8:11:44pm
"At the end of the day to have a basis for morality you absolutely need an authority above all people, and only religious systems do this."
we call that authority our legal system, which is above all people (in theory), it is not perfect but it's a hell of a lot better than the justice dealt out in the bible.
if your gods' law are the multitude found within the various books that make up the bible then they are also human derived (unless you can prove otherwise). those particular ones are a nasty violent, unfair mess that we've left behind, thank zeus.
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Cafe:
26 Mar 2014 3:59:18am
The advantage of the law, as in a societal legal system, is that it also recognizes the fact that as humans we create our morality and codify it. Which means it is under our control and generally derived by consensus.
Such a system also has the flexibility to recognize changes in our cultural and societal norms and reflect these by creating new laws and discarding laws which may no longer be relevant.
This is the antithesis of "divine" law which is unquestionable, inflexible and provides a haven for human bigotry. Furthermore it doesn't recognize the evolution of our civilization, society and culture.
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 8:25:20pm
"in fact an unbeliever can act any way he or she chooses"
Same goes for a believer. They might convince themselves that their 'bad deeds' are OK with god. Every believer in a war situation believes this. Hangmen in theocracies believe this. Believers who bomb abortion clinics believe this. The Westboro people picketing soldiers' funeral believe this (they're one of yours, aren't they?).
Good people do good things, bad people do bad things - but only faith makes good people do bad things.
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David Kay:
25 Mar 2014 9:48:46pm
In the actual world, most people's moral development moves beyond that of an infant and they don't require the threat of eternal torture in order to act decently. In fact, this describes pretty much everyone except two groups - craven ideologues and sociopaths. If you want to learn about this, try reading more than one book.
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JoeBloggs:
26 Mar 2014 10:28:44am
Gigaboomer,
You suggest "In fact the obvious universal nature of much of human morality is very powerful evidence for the existence of God"
Yet as you have demonstrated yourself, and your christian brethern have demonstated over thousands of years, morality is purely subjective and relative to the observer. Be it the acts found in the crusades, the inquistion period, the Reformation period or the more recent revelations relating to the treatment of the weak, poor and vulnerable members of society (in particular children in the care of the churches).
Which therefore provides powerful evidence of the non existence of a universal authority, aka god(s).
Morality is relative to evolution in the extent that the morality provides for the continuation of a genetic lineage, ie. morality that allows for co-operation within human societies has allowed those genetic lineages within those co-operative societies to continue on.
That is it,... there is nothing else really to it.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:56:42am
Not only above all people but also involved with all people.
Some moral rules aren't universal. So I'm not so sure about this as an argument for god.
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Brian Magrath:
25 Mar 2014 6:07:34pm
In considering the uniquely human aspect of "morality" it seems to be important to maintain a simplistic approach to its necessity. "Morality" has been a tool of governance and religion since the recorded history of human societies began. However, the religious view of morality resides in "what god wants us to do". Last week the Pope warned criminal elements of society that they risked going to hell if they failed change their ways, and a little while ago an eminent, educated and intelligent theologian pronounced that "god does not wish us to watch these kinds of television programmes".
Now these pronouncements could be taken out of context, yet remain founded in their belief that we humans have some communication or connection with whatever lies "beyond". Perhaps it is time for us all to adopt a belief that there never has been or ever will be any communication with the "next world", and that we are here on our own, and have to grow up and sort things for ourselves. If a belief in a god is espoused by an individual, unenforced and uncriticised by others, perhaps it should be on the basis of "I believe in god, but don't care whether he, she, it, or they, exist".
Morality then, becomes a simple matter of whatever is "best" for all the members of human society to survive in peace and happiness. If, as some people believe, there is a divine "plan", then there is no such thing as "hell", "good" "bad" "evil" beyond a description of an activity or outcome to an activity impacting upon human society, in whatever form that takes.
Fifty thousand years ago, human societies presumably, acted in ways which suited their simple survival in a world unforgiving of inattention to the essentials of survival, air, water, food, and shelter, and had little time to devote to goodness and otherwise.
In many ways, our contemporary directions of living may be leading us toward a time when those elements again become motivational to all humans.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:59:07am
But the question is; What is best?
Out of all the possible things we can do which to choose?
Maximise shareholder value?
Make a more convivial and healthy planet?
Provide enough resources for each to be an artist? Or teacher? Or mine owner?
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Kevin52:
25 Mar 2014 6:11:32pm
It seems quite simple to me.
A person who believes in a god or gods may do the right thing because he/she fears punishment by this god or gods.
Because they believe strongly, it is only their belief in this god or gods that convinces them that it is right to do the right thing.
On the other hand an atheist believes in doing the right thing, simply because it is the right thing to do.
Murders, persecutions and even wars have occurred when believers have believed their particular religion has been threatened or insulted in some minor or major way.
However, atheists have never banded together to murder, persecute or start a war to defend their non-belief.
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theologin1:
26 Mar 2014 2:16:26am
Actually only about 5% of known wars were caused by Christians, mainly with the Crusades and they were asked by the inhabitants of the Holy Land for help from the marauding tribes of Muslims. However Atheists and socialists make up the bulk of those responsible.
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one off:
26 Mar 2014 1:48:31pm
Come on the theolgin1, let's see the research that gets to the figure of 5% for the christians? Oh and while you're at you might like to give us the numbers on socialist catholics and perhaps socialist muslims. Of course you won't because you made it up.
Oh and Kevin's comment was on the religious generally, he didn't pick on the Christians but you couldn't help having a go at those nasty muslims could you
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 11:01:00am
That 'simply' is not so simple. It evades the debate.
Is there a reason that it is the right thing? Individual preference? Pragmatism?
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Gordon:
25 Mar 2014 6:15:54pm
It is surprising to read that 99% of Indonesians equate morality with belief in God. in 1965 they slaughtered 500,000 of their own people, often neighbours and colleagues, for no just cause. They have never had a reconciliation process for this terrible crime. Our history shows that many have died in religious wars, thus proving that morality and God are not closely related.
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carbon-based lifeform:
25 Mar 2014 6:17:10pm
A great quote:
Morality is doing what is right regardless of what you are told.
Religion is doing what you are told, regardless of whether it is right or not.
Religion was made by man, for man, to keep women downtrodden and in their place.
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Alpo:
25 Mar 2014 7:43:57pm
"Religion was made by man, for man, to keep women downtrodden and in their place.".... That's why the Virgin Mary is such a controversial figure in Christian religions: Is she important, is she not, how important is she exactly? A lot, so-so, only a tiny bit?
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Jimmy Necktie:
25 Mar 2014 8:49:09pm
"to keep women downtrodden and in their place."
gaaawwd, did you have to throw that in? Religion rose out of early society realising they needed rules to keep order. It was the precurser to laws.
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stephen s:
25 Mar 2014 6:23:07pm
On this topic, do read the illuminating discussion on Christian 'ethics' in Paul Verhaeghe's 'What About Me?'
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anote:
25 Mar 2014 6:25:41pm
As someone strongly of the view that a belief in God is irrelevant to being moral and having good values I am not going to let that get in the way of pointing out that:
"As someone who is on the organ donation register and abstains as best he can from war crimes, I'm rather convinced we do. To suggest otherwise would seem to demonstrate a profound lack of empathy towards a significant proportion of mankind."
... ignores the likelihood that it would probably be very easy to find someone in the same or similar predicament as convinced of the opposite.
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Theos:
25 Mar 2014 6:29:21pm
The view that you need to accept particular Bronze age writings in order to be moral is obviously false. In fact, I would argue that if you follow the suggestions / commandments in the anthology of bronze age writings commonly referred to the "bible", then it would be impossible to be moral. Slavery ... genocide ... child murder ... child rape ... to cherry pick some of the worst ones. A quick internet search will provide the verses for those interested.
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peter:
25 Mar 2014 6:42:46pm
If I were to ask was is moral and what isn't I would get a million different answers. Who is to say you are right in your morals or I am right in mine. If we are left to decide moral standards then they will be continually changing to what ever the next person decides, which actually describes our current state as a society.
We are continually changing the rules to suit our own selfish desires.
I don't know if you have noticed but our world is in a pretty big mess because of it. But we shut our eyes to it, or just ignore it.
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GrumpiSkeptic:
25 Mar 2014 6:49:55pm
The responses from the following question...
"Is belief in God essential to morality?"
tell much about God and morality, or more precisely, the inter-connectivity between the two.
The counties that believed God has much to do, or a hell of a lot to do with morality, are also the counties with a lot of problems! In fact, one would even go a far as saying under-developed.
Take Pakistan for example, suicide bombings and outwardly stupid religious rage seemed to be quite acceptable. Shooting a young girl because she championed for better education, especially for females, was a death sentence for her.
Africa used to be called an uncomplimentary name: "The dark continent". That was a long time ago during the colonial days. Yet, today, many of the nations in Africa are still stuck in the ways of superstitions, and irrational believes. It is my understanding that Africans are taking up Christianity while other developed nations are less enthusiastic about it. Wars are waged between different faiths, and nations are being divided along religious lines.
Morality? Not while they are busy fighting with each other. It can wait.
The pedophilia behaviours being exposed by the royal commission, and the fact the the religious establishments are actively attempting to cover their asses to minimise financial liabilities, is just one good example that God and morality are in fact, disconnected.
Mind you, we human beings had done quite nicely some 2,000 years ago, before some clever yarn spinners dreamed up Jesus Christ and the many incredible miracles that were supposedly to have occurred. Did our ancestors rape and pillage, being incestuous, killed and maimed ? Of course they did. Well, some of them anyway. However, the same is happening nowadays, perhaps on a smaller scale.
What this tells us is that, within each one of us, there are both good and evil. Being able to suppress or overcome the evilness means one is a good citizen in a pool of humanity. Those who actually carried out the nasty deeds, are hopefully, happily locked up.
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Not such a Golden Oldie:
25 Mar 2014 6:59:41pm
The "Prisoners' Dilemma" and other games theory experiments have tended to show that it usually in our own best interests to have some form of cooperation between close family or clan members. It can be conjectured that this would lead to some form of morality (do unto others).
From there the growth of morality is hard to plot, but it would be a brave person that would say that those with a religious belief behave in a more "moral" way than those without a religious belief.
If morality is a result of evolution, we still have along way to go. Again the Prisoners' Dilemma and similar games theory experiments would suggest that we should have reached the conclusion by this stage of evolution that War is not only an abomination, but history would suggest that it is counterproductive. The unintended consequences are just too numerous to be accidental and if "our side" wins the war, there is likely to be a pay-back from the defeated side sometime in the future and also it is very likely to reduce beneficial cooperation.
I would suggest that this lesson may be just beginning to show signs of some evolving. It is significant that since the end of the Second World War, the Europeans have shown considerably more reluctance to go to war than Americans or Australians, who have less experience of the dire consequences of war.
Unfortunately I don't think that the evolution of humans towards a consensus that war itself is immoral is likely to occur in the lifetimes of any existing humans, it would take a lot longer than that and a lot more suffering to come. However if evolution is the reason for "morality", then it is not just idealism to say that it should happen at some time in the future.
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barneseye:
25 Mar 2014 7:07:15pm
Michael thanks for your interesting article. But I need to point out that you conflate two very different things.
You ask the question several different times: "Can a non-believer be moral?". And you make a good case that they indeed can. But a different question (worded differently) is "Is the best explanation of morality found in theism?". The two are definitely related, but to say that a non-believer can be moral offers little evidence as to whether morality finds it's most solid grounding in theism.
Whilst it is *possible* to construct what looks like an argument for 'morality' from naturalistic causes, it fails to be the most plausible or robust explanation. And the effects of accepting such and explanation are profound. For the 'morality' that emanates from natural causes is not itself a 'thing' - it is merely the random movement of meaningless atoms in my brain and nervous system. To act morally or immorally actually means nothing - other than that some atoms moved differently in one act than in another. So it turns out, as you say "in the end ...", that the 'morality' that comes from non-theism is not morality, and so there is nothing to explain, and your argument becomes pointless. (This is compounded by the fact your thoughts themselves are random and meaningless actions ...)
Whereas if there is a being who is themselves a moral being, who in turn created beings that in some way reflect the nature of that creator being, then you would expect to find echoes of that morality across all areas of those created beings' lives and society. 'Morality' would be an actual thing - and to speak of morality and immorality. Moral acts would be considered moral in so far as they reflect the creator being's morality. I would expect that beings could act morally or immorally regardless of whether they acknowledge the existence of the creator being - because the shape of morality is a real thing and universally recognised. This is by far the most robust and acceptable explanation.
Unless of-course you have a reason for wishing that there was not a god...
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The Jones Crusher:
25 Mar 2014 8:11:31pm
"Whereas if there is a being who is themselves a moral being, who in turn created beings that in some way reflect the nature of that creator being, then you would expect to find echoes of that morality across all areas of those created beings' lives and society. '"
To quote Frank Zappa...
"Well let's get serious, god knows what he's doin'
He wrote this book here and the book says, "He made us all to be just like him"
So, if we're dumb, then god is dumb and maybe even a little ugly on the side "
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Theos:
25 Mar 2014 8:40:57pm
So, to summarise, naturalistic explanations for morality aren't really arguments and therefore morality is not really a thing. But if you have an imaginary friend, then morality is a thing.
You have a different understanding of the phrase "robust and acceptable explanation" than I do.
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barneseye:
26 Mar 2014 10:53:45am
:) Thanks theos - not a particular accurate or generous summary, but amusing if true.
If the being called 'God' is truly imaginary, then morality definitely does not come from it/him/her - and believers are to be pitied.
And if that being doesn't exist, then the morality we have is purely arbitrary and subjective - WE get to define what is considered moral and immoral. In that sense it is not a 'thing' (I didn't define this well) ... by which I mean a tangible / appreciable reality that exists regardless of whether I agree with it or not.
So if that being doesn't exist, and morality is defined by us, it makes no sense to say "that was wrong" or "that was a truly evil act" (which we hear quite often). It could make sense to say those things if you allow yourself to pretend that they are an actual 'thing' whilst you make those statements. Or, you could be just saying that "wrong" things are a collection of behaviours you dislike - but all the while knowing they are not really wrong.
On the other hand, if there is a God, and if there is good evidence to believe so, then (as I said before) you have good grounds to believe is a real morality. Morality is a thing that exists regardless of whether I agree with it or not. Certain actions are indeed 'wrong'.
So, on this view, it turns out that the naturalist / materialist perspective of morality does more pretending than the theistic perspective.
Hope that helps.
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C.Collett:
25 Mar 2014 7:08:28pm
Some basic Christian beliefs -
-all humans are sinful
-the worst sin is pride ie living as though one knows the best way to live without any reference to God, thereby rejecting God
-to become Christlike is part of the Christian journey but is not accomplished in this earthly life
-doing good works is the result of being saved by Christ's sacrifice - not to gain a reward
-doing good works does not make someone good
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Azrael:
25 Mar 2014 7:08:28pm
The notion of morality is as presposterous as that of religion, for mostly the same reasons.
Yes, we no doubt have evolved certain ways of classifying behaviour, and some codes of behaviour are more conducive to happiness or group survival than others. But that only goes to what we DO - it doesn't establish any kind of 'ought'.
The best one can have is a purely descriptive code, like 'IF you want to be happy, THEN help others', or 'IF you want social harmony, THEN avoid racism'. But again, that's just a contingent description - there's absolutely no reason why we ought to value happiness, or social harmony, or the survival of the human race. There's no reason why we shouldn't actively promote racism, sexism or torture. Sure, it might be that acting selflessly makes us happier than going out of our way to promote racism, but that's just naked self-interest - again, it's merely descriptive, not normative.
Do you seriously believe the atoms of the universe care that our neural function uses certain reward mechanisms to encourage certain behaviours and discourage others? Even if we all agreed on what we 'should' do, that wouldn't make it normative - the mandates of our psychology carry no more moral weight than the software we enter into a computer.
Belief in morality is the belief that there is such a thing as 'should' - i.e. that there is a correct way for things to act and be. This is tantamount to saying that the universe has a purpose, wherein things can be 'bad' if they act contrary to that purpose, and 'good' if they act in accordance with it.
Nietzsche skewered this absurdity long ago, in his devastating critique of the way that fools pretend to themselves that they recognise the atheist reality of the world, yet still cling to judeo-christian fairytales of right and wrong. There is no purpose in the universe, and human happiness/prosperity has no greater value than misery and extinction.
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General Disarray:
25 Mar 2014 7:57:56pm
For someone who wished to go beyond good and evil Nietzsche sure had a long list of evils to condemn.
He sounded like any evangelist on a crusade against things he found wrong with the world.
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Ursus Augustus:
25 Mar 2014 8:07:47pm
How I would exptress it is that ultimately society is about self interest. Not the one step, linear, short term self interest of selfishness or greed or thuggery or other aggression upon neighbours and starnagers but the considered , layered, higher order, social investment oriented sef interest that is perhaps encaspulated by the notion that if my neighbours and community are better off, ultimately I am too. The rest flows from that incentive and the social order that is required to produce that outcome.
No need for shamans, gods, gurus or ideologues to act as commission agents.
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stephen:
25 Mar 2014 8:10:05pm
You've described belief as normative, yet, you have ignored behaviour as means to nothing, as if those atoms are ignorant of us because they have not a conscious, and neither do we, and behaviour, then, is only response to an inorganic substance and free will goes round in circles to confusion.
Morality is not foisted upon us, we can choose to be moral, and Christianity and Islam (the latter, emphasizing right conduct over right belief) can offer people who wish to realize things that not is apparent in another, a virtual experience.
Facts have nothing to do with reality.
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graazt:
25 Mar 2014 11:06:46pm
We tend to seek meaning in the most unlikely of places if that spares us nihilism.
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Closet Romantic:
25 Mar 2014 8:17:43pm
Errrr the if you want social harmony avoid racism comment
Societies that are homogenous that is the individuals are most alike tend to be the most harmonious
They also tend to be the most inbred ignorant and stunted but they tend to be harmonious.
So you could argue the reverse if you want social harmony be incredibly racist.
If you want a growing society genetic diversity greater choice and more information and harmony between societies then it's a great idea to avoid racism.
But I guess that's your real point morality is pointless in an uncaring universe and since no matter how we try to define it every human belief is a philosophy that the individual imposes on the universe.
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Real Skeptic:
25 Mar 2014 9:38:50pm
"There is no purpose in the universe, and human happiness/prosperity has no greater value than misery and extinction."
The first part of your statement is correct, but that doesn't follow onto the second part. It doesn't matter if the universe doesn't care about our happiness and prosperity, because we obviously do care. We are empathic creatures that wish to enjoy our short lives and have the ability to affect the enjoyment of the people around us. That's all that matters. The lack of purpose in the universe is irrelevant.
If you disagree then you're suggesting that you might as well wallow in misery and never try to live a full, interesting, meaningful (to people) life because the universe won't lose any "value". The universe couldn't care less, but your life and those you influence would still lose "value".
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Rod:
25 Mar 2014 7:31:12pm
An interesting article that deals, somewhat briefly with a very interesting subject.
Good to see some discussion of it though and I'm quite impressed to see from the comments that many people are already there on this one.
I define these terms slightly differently and use morality solely for behaviour deriving from social mores, ie inherently religious, and use the term ethical to describe responsible, considerate behaviour. My own version of semantics, certainly, but it does allow me to explain the behaviour of many of the most pious conservatives as being very moral, very typical of christianity and very unethical. If you think, for example that it's unchristian to discriminate (and worse) against gay people you probably should borrow a bible and learn why fundamentalists are given that name. It's because they know their book much better than the apologists. They know, verbatim, what their god really says about homosexuality and they're quite prepared to behave in extremely unethical ways to see his will done. That's morality! Hence the reason why I claim that the more religious someone is, the less likely it is that they will behave ethically.
It never ceases to amaze me how profoundly ignorant theists are when they claim that morality (ethics) couldn't evolve. Jonathan Sacks did so recently on the drum and offered no supporting explanation at all. Just a glib statement of fact. As if he's an authority on biology.
Any biologist worthy of the name could explain why ethics is highly likely to evolve in social animals to some extent and could then point to quite a few studies that demonstrate that this has already been found to have happened in many different species, including H sapiens.
It may have laboured the point a bit but if Michael had added a few such examples, a good article would have been and excellent one.
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Hudson Godfrey:
25 Mar 2014 8:20:19pm
On a more simplistic view of the moral landscape if we did just make the whole thing up then we're moral because we're human and pretty much for no other apparent reason. The uncertain notion that it is because it is falls in line with a modest amount of humility, seeming somewhat appropriate to fallible human beings. Once we accept that concepts of good and bad have meaning in ways no more controversial than conceiving of mathematics is then we can develop a philosophy of science that will naturally gravitate towards theories like evolution. We'll agree that reality exists, we can know something about it, and that knowledge of reproducible phenomena has the greatest utility.
Granted by "reality" we mean how we understand our own existence to the limits of our present human knowledge. There may well be in the vastness of the universe and beyond any number of other realities that are for the moment not part of the human experience. But our values, virtuous or otherwise, and sense of moral agency are clearly limited to constructing our ethics as they relate to the human experience. It's not that the possibilities aren't infinite it's that our morality necessarily only works within the finite limits of our rationality.
In that sense believing our morality to be based in anything too far beyond the human experience is bound to be so extraordinarily jarring that its wonder that fewer people either don't recognise the problem or choose to overlook it.
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Eastern European:
25 Mar 2014 9:12:17pm
I cannot take seriously any attempt at having a discussion around morality, religion and darwinism which does not mention at all Evolutionary Psychology.
One cannot look at the world the same way after being acquainted with the theories of this interdiscipline.
Evolutionary Psychology is for Darwinism what the Theory of Relativity is for the Newtonian Laws.
I recommend to all of those who have existential dilemmas which are not satisfied by faith or science to read at least these 2 books
"Religione e potere (chiesa sotto inchiesta)" by Gianpaolo Romanato which basically shows how religions are attempts to monopolize and capitalize an universal human right to spirituality. You need to be fluent in italian though.
"The Moral animal" by Robert Wright which will teach you about the limitations of darwinism when it comes to explain the human behaviour and how evolutionary psychology can fill that gap. A light and incredibly entertaining lecture.
Or to sum up the essence of our real and imagined existential struggles in the modern society:
"We are all stoneagers leaving in the fast lane"
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Erik:
25 Mar 2014 9:26:17pm
Atheism explains that morality is a social obligation but not a passport to heaven and salvation. The theistic belief in divine retribution sidetracked moral behaviour. Believers were more prone to please the god of their imagination by prayer and ritual than to conform to rules of moral conduct ... - Gora, Note on Atheism
We need look no further than the belief of one religion that explosive suicide attacks are morally acceptable, and another whose priests feel entitled to rape small boys. Voltaire said "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities." The behaviour of believers in various brands of sky fairy show that believers need no one else to make them commit atrocities, and in fact confirm that all religion is merely politics, with an infantile sense of entitlement.
If we really wish to understand the root of morality, then an article in "Scientific American", many years ago, lights the way. In a mathematical model, traders operated within a chessboard-like array, trading with their neighbours. If all trusted, and none cheated, the population thrived, whereas one in which all cheated did not. When a few cheaters were admitted to the first community, they thrived at the other's expense. But when the trusting traders were switched to trust each trading partner only until cheated, their community again thrived.
I submit therefore, that morality is a necessity amongst neighbours of equal power, and a choice for those with power over others. Belief in a delusional dogma is a predictor for making irrational decisions, whereas a rational world view improves awareness of social responsibility.
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Conrad:
25 Mar 2014 9:30:20pm
The countries that equate god with morality also tend to have poor levels of insitutional and community trust. So of course you are only going to be moral if you think god is watching you. In countries with higher quality insitutions you dont have to believe in god to do the right thing, you can trust others to do the right thing because its right.
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David Kay:
25 Mar 2014 9:38:18pm
If the only reason someone is nice to other people is because they don't want to go to Hell, then they may be behaving appropriately, but they are still sociopaths.
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YB:
25 Mar 2014 10:46:05pm
There's a lot to be said for a morality that doesn't attach to religion. A nonbeliever who abides by a moral code has probably spent a good amount of time thinking about that moral code. That person has ownership over their morality, they are responsible for it. Not only is this an effective way to develop one's ability to think critically about the world, I imagine it is more likely that person will stick to their morals.
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Jimmy Necktie:
26 Mar 2014 8:12:00am
"I imagine it is more likely that person will stick to their morals"
The problem arises when my morals differ from yours yet we both "stick to them".
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Terry from Melbourne:
25 Mar 2014 10:50:23pm
Interesting viewpoint. The best case of the differences between a country that believes in God vs. one that does not, is South and North Korea. One is prosperous, safe and free. The other is poor, dangerous and oppressed. One embraced the teachings of Christianity, the other rejected it. When people live by morals of biblical teaching, they will live in peace and care for others. When people believe in human morality, then selfishness and self-interest prevails as they have no high purpose to live by.
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Theos:
26 Mar 2014 8:24:25am
"When people live by morals of biblical teaching, they will live in peace and care for others."
So, if you example, the bible commanded you to kill a person who picks up some sticks on a Saturday, you would do that? And this would perhaps demonstrate "peace and care for others".
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David Kay:
26 Mar 2014 9:17:15am
"When people live by morals of biblical teaching, they will live in peace and care for others"
You really should read the Bible one day. Read what the words actually say. Try Leviticus. Only a psychopath would live by the "morals" of that nasty little book.
Living by the morals of the Christian churches would probably be no better.
But if they lived their lives according to the teachings of Christ, that would be a different matter. What a shame that most Christians don't.
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Mitor the Bold:
25 Mar 2014 10:55:44pm
Faith and morality are almost antonyms - morality that is not based on evolved behaviours and human reason is simply a set of meaningless and arbitrary rules, rather like the rules imposed by other arbitrary deities like Stalin, Pol Pot and the Third Reich.
Only in places where the clear thought of human beings is reflected in laws that mirror people's natural inclinations do we find peaceful, harmonious societies; places like Scandinavia and other parts of Europe.
Contrast this with places that apply arbitrary rules from a holy book - places like Iran, Saudi, Pakistan, Uganda, Nigeria - to see how stark the differences are.
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Pert:
25 Mar 2014 11:08:51pm
Morals support our biological imperative to breed, by giving social prescriptions for behaviour so that we don't kill each other in the process.
Morals have been around since us hominids began living in groups.
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stalga:
25 Mar 2014 11:29:20pm
I would like to roughly quote the psychoanalist Alice Miller. In a foreword to one of of her bestselling books she stated that "Evil is not the opposite of good, evil is what happens to us after we are born". This woman made her profession realise and accept that some of Freuds' theories were erroneous. As a matter of expediency I simply wish to state that almost all humans are born with a moral compass and a healthy degree of empathy, but this can be corrupted during upbringing and/or culture, even by religious doctrine.
Here is a quote from the dialogues of Plato to add further food for thought on this. " And what is good and what is not good Phaedrus, and do we need people to tell us this?"
I assert that most people have an instinct for what is right or wrong. Religious ideology is not superior to this.
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Bill Daley:
25 Mar 2014 11:52:44pm
Makes you wonder doesn't it? I had an acquaintance years ago. Lovely bloke, funny, friendly, reliable. He was a devoted Christian. Pastor of his church. Learned Latin and Hebrew to better study the bible.
One day I called to see him and he was in his garage. He had a wonderful range of tool and equipment. Strange thing though, every single item I looked at, from hand tools to extension cords, was marked with the letters "A.I.S." ( Australian Iron & Steel), his employer.
My respect for the religious plummeted and has never recovered.
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Matt:
26 Mar 2014 12:09:32am
Each and every human on this planet will find out if God is real, once their last breath has exhaled. Thats one life time guarantee you can take to the grave with you.
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leafygreens:
26 Mar 2014 12:43:33pm
Which God, Matt?
If I pick the wrong one I'm still in trouble.
What about all those redundant Gods? What happened to their followers.; I like what I read about Thoth, Maat and Osiris.. seems like pleasing them was a good thing, but Yaweh said they are false, and over the other side of the world Inti got wacked by the Catholics doing false conversions?? ..
Even the three faiths of the same book can't agree how its done.. stand on Mt Nebo and lament the suffering done in the name of its followers as you gaze the horizon. The cradle of civilisation also gave us religious wars.
So hedging your bets and believing in 'God' is still a poor option, unless you are versed in appeasment of multiple entities, past and present.
Dave Allen had it right.. the afterlife as a place of many walls, each religion in its own bit thinking they were the only ones there..
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H K Whitton:
26 Mar 2014 12:30:42am
ABC - a ridiculously sloppy article: philosphically confused, wrong on important facts and ideas, ignorant of historical context, logically sloppy, and above all, wholly misleading.
Just one example will suffice: "After morality evolved, it took on a life of its own, such that it no longer makes sense to see human behaviour as solely being guided by the self-interest of the individual." I can only guess at what the author thought he was saying here.
As to sloppy, I need help with this: "...the basic morality and values of the Judeo-Christianity tradition..." Any clues?
For The Drum, which we know can do (much) better, this sort of pop philosophising scores a Fail.
HW
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Michael Collett:
26 Mar 2014 8:49:49am
When I wrote that morality "took on a life of its own", I meant that it became separated from its initial evolutionary "purpose" or reason for being. I should have been clearer.
In your second example, "Judeo-Christianity" should be "Judeo-Christian". I'll get this fixed.
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Mitor the Bold:
26 Mar 2014 9:35:23am
You have just been bullied. And worse, outed yourself as a victim. The content is what's important, not the style. I thought it was interesting and stimulating and am glad to have read it. Don't be cowed by contrarians hiding behind pedantry.
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IB:
26 Mar 2014 12:45:14am
The primary purpose of organised religion is to enslave the women. Morality is dealt with by empty rhetoric. "Thou shalt not kill" has become one of those meaningless phrases like "Give peace a chance".
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Chuckles:
26 Mar 2014 12:58:42am
Actually I liked what the author of The God Part of the Brain said: that the belief in Religion (and thus God), was hard wired into humans by evolution when they became sapient, to accept their own mortality.
Of course he gave the example of the USA with it's religious beliefs....
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God and Cat:
26 Mar 2014 1:21:53am
It's only the concept of time that allows us to divide now into possibilities. Are we improved by this concept? I debate only if now is untraded. There lies the dispute, truth or it's denial. Origin is within or...... without, so it's it's Gods fault. Either way. pain is an refusal to love, live truthfully.
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aussieinjapan:
26 Mar 2014 2:22:49am
Do gooders have been around for thousands of years peddling there "expertise". Even now we fall for it all hook line and sinker.
We all know in our hearts what is good and it doesn't take some rambling fool too tell us.
To often it has been religion which has dragged us down to the gutters rather than pulling us out of it with a list as long as your arm and longer of atrocities which have been committed in the name of god.
It is becoming more and more accepted that we each have our own god or should I say set of beliefs and it is the common parts which put us together rather than some imaginary spirit.
May be this is really the "spirit" which guides us all, that of being together while also being separate- no trinity here!
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David Wilkie:
26 Mar 2014 2:44:28am
It would seem after 2000 years we still have a herd mentality, in or out, off or on, right ot wrong etc. Why can't we move past this and be judged (if we must) by our actions alone, and not exclusively on what we think! Saying you care or love thy neighbour matters little if there is no positive action/s that follow.
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theologin1:
26 Mar 2014 3:22:16am
Regarding an earlier post, you will find that only about 5% of wars were caused by Christians. (You really can't include the Crusades, as they were asked by the desperate inhabitants of Jerusalem for protection from the many marauding Muslim tribes pillaging the area). With a little research you would find that the majority of wars have been caused by socialists and Atheists etc As for morality, I believe that all people regardless of faith whether it be Atheism or Christianity, all have a sense of morality, the only difference is how passionate they pursue it. Around 400 ad when Rome was "Christianized", Christian moral law had begun to set in. For the first time Women were given status, Infanticide was abolished, widows and orphans were shown compassion etc. In more recent times people like William Wilberforce championed against slavery, and William Carey in the 1800's fought to abolish child marriages and wife burning ceremonies in India (Sati- When the Husband dies, the wife whether it be a young girl or lady is subsequently burned to death as well) among many other injustices. Australia was raised with the Judea Christian moral code, which birthed one of our greatest advancements yet. Free Speech.
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graazt:
26 Mar 2014 11:14:35am
I agree that religion is rarely the root cause of conflict (including the Crusades) but it's a great justification for it. You might also include the suppression of the Cathars and the Huegonots. Or the recurring pogroms conducted against the Jews.
By "religion" I also include other utopian belief systems like Communism. Promising paradise if certain rules are followed and certain enemies overcome...
Atheism is not the epistomological counterpoint to Christianity. You'd need to select a specific atheist ideology for this purpose. The communists have a far better track record of violent anti-theism than the Epicurans, Taoists and secular humanists do; for example.
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Living in Narnia:
26 Mar 2014 5:32:27am
Strange it is that when perhaps 100 million people have been murdered by their own atheist governments, (check out Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's first hand evidence) the silence of the atheists is deafening. I have never heard anyone say,"Because atheists have killed so many people, I could not be an atheist!" Yet when some denominations betray their very core values and attempt to cover up for pedophile priests and their contemptible behavior, completely at odds with the teaching of Christ, this most obvious of hypocrisies is presented as evidence as to why Christ and Christianity are bankrupt. I will not defend Theism as I am currently living in the Middle East.
I will not defend Catholicism either, yet even as a non-catholic follower of Jesus, I know that you can travel to the worst hell holes in this world and there you will find catholic priests honorably serving the poor. Increasingly you find people from my own "abomination" also serving the poor. Not an atheist within a 1000 kms of where I am at the moment though. And where on earth is there but one eye hospital dedicated to Saint Richard Dawkins, hah, you know full well the answer to that.
You atheists sitting in the cosy cafes of Melbourne, proudly displaying your ignorance, ought to put up or shut up.
Get off your pretentious wide bottoms, get some useful skills in public health, agriculture, education etc and come and meet me in ....... and after you have cried your eyes out like I have, again and again I might tell you, and have come to end of your arrogance, (not there yet myself) and stayed for years, with diarrhea every other weekend, a salary only to live on and nothing more, watched people die of aids or go blind for lack of a 5 dollar tube of antibiotic cream, then and only then will I have time to listen to your illogical and historically incorrect drivel.
In any case by that time, if you have been able to cut it, learn one or two new languages, survived attempts on your life, you will no doubt have long since realised that without a living relationship with God, you will certainly fall apart.
If you think you can make it on the strength of your fine characters without Jesus walking beside you, give it a shot.
Again I say, put up or shut up.
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Crow:
26 Mar 2014 7:34:55am
I will not defend Theism as I am currently living in the Middle East.
you will not defend anything it seems, as long as any faction has ever committed any crime anywhere.
what you also fail to do it make any connection from a laudable job in helping people in some third world area to having a 'living relationship with god'.
where did that come from? why? what evidence or thought process was required for that?
hopefully more than just sanctimoniousness that there have been atheists on this planet that havent lived up to any ideals...
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prey:
26 Mar 2014 8:41:19am
"you will no doubt have long since realised that without a living relationship with God, you will certainly fall apart."
Casting quite a wide aspersion there youself.
So does this mentality of yours extend to the poor people in the 'hell holes' you frequent? Is that why they are in the position they are in? Do they need to accept and live a life with (your) God to escape this 'hell hole?'
If they keep their own beliefs and reject praying with you, will you still pour your energies into their wellbeing? If they reject (your) God, do you spend time, money and effort helping these poor people?
If you provide them with a tube of antibiotic cream, are they expected to pray and thank (your) Lord for His mercy? Is there a price for that tube of antibiotics? What is the price?
If they don't accept The Word Of (Your) Lord, well, no wonder they're in the position they're in, right?
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Jay Somasundaram:
26 Mar 2014 7:33:45am
Religions and atheism are ideologies. And ideologies are like clothes, we change them to suit the occasion. A common example is the very different behaviours and belief systems people exhibit at work and at home. We can have a very catholic PM on Sundays, and a neo-con capitalist on weekdays.
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Theos:
26 Mar 2014 8:33:12am
"Religions and atheism are ideologies"
Atheism is NOT an ideology. It is a position on one specific question - are there any gods? An Atheist is not convinced that any gods exist. That is all.
To suggest that atheism is an ideology is equivalent to saying that not believing in Santa Clause is an ideology.
To change a (rational) atheist's opinion, all that is needed is compelling evidence that a god exists.
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Brian:
26 Mar 2014 9:39:12am
I thought an Athiest believes there is no God and an Agnostic believes there is no way of knowing as yet.
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Theos:
26 Mar 2014 12:32:43pm
This is how the terms are used by most atheists:
The terms "Atheist" and "Agnostic" address different things. "Atheist" means "not-Theist". Therefore, anyone who is not a theist, is by definition an atheist. I know of no atheist who goes as far as to assert that they know for certain that no gods exist. The problem of course, is that once you make a positive assertion (such as "no gods exist"), then the burden of proof shifts to you.
"Agnostic" means "not-knowledge", or simply, "you do not know", or do not claim to know that a god exists.
Most atheists that I have interacted with Agnostic Atheists. That is, they do not believe in a god, but do not claim to know for certain that no god exists. Most liberal or cultural Christians would be Agnostic Theists - they believe in a god, but do not claim to know with certainty that the god exists. Many fundamentalist Christians would be Gnostic Theists - they believe in a god and also claim to know that a god exists.
Hope that helps.
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D R Frenkel:
26 Mar 2014 8:40:31am
This is a no-brainer. The religious certainly don't have a mortgage of morality, spirituality or even 'good news'. It's all about control and mis-information. In addition priests that eat meat lose the intrinsic right to moralise.
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Dean:
26 Mar 2014 8:53:05am
Many people practicing permaculture are not religious, including Holmgren and Mollison themselves, yet those two people have managed to develop a highly ethical design practice for living without the assistance of any belief in a God.
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Steven:
26 Mar 2014 8:54:48am
As the various inquiries into child abuse are showing, being religious certainly doesn't guarantee strong morals. Anyway, religions are just creations of man, and so the morality systems that result from religions are creations of man (and nearly always of men).
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Jocks Trap:
26 Mar 2014 9:06:35am
When a religious person leads a moral and good life he does so for the promised reward in the after life or in fear of eternal damnation, so if a non believer (atheist) leads a moral and good life why do they do it if there is no gain/no pain, perhaps because it is just the right thing to do.
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Mark1:
26 Mar 2014 9:08:15am
I always seem to have known what is fair and what isn't and what is love and compassion and what isn't and what is right and what is wrong.
I'm not saying I'm perfect, but I have always deep inside known and assume most people also do.
When I do wrong and look deep inside myself I know the truth.
I don't need religion to teach me that, it's just there already.
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Kent Kingston:
26 Mar 2014 9:09:57am
It's great to see the debate removed from polemic, ridicule and personal attacks. It's a very carefully reasoned and nuanced article.
But while, as Collett points out, there's clear evolutionary logic behind morals such as honesty, it gets a bit harder to find a clear path with other morals. For example, what is the evolutionary benefit of keeping the dementing elderly alive, or other severely disabled people? Why do we cringe at Peter Singer's suggestion that killing a newborn baby is defensible? Why are we uncomfortable with the elimination of a "weaker" ethnic group? Is it just the vestiges of our Judaeo-Christian heritage holding us back from the cold logic of "survival of the fittest", or are there deeper reasons?
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Breach of peace:
26 Mar 2014 9:11:43am
What you and other non-believers are forgetting... is it is not what believers think about what non-believers think or don't think about in the area of morals or morality. What really matters is what God thinks and what He has already said and written for mankind as a witness or testimony to them in a book called the Bible. Our mere opinions are twaddle compared to our Creator who has set down standards to take notice of and to follow them for our best interests, for the best interest of others and for society at large.
It is interesting that you ponder the phrase, "After all, this isn't a question about where morality ultimately derives - whether it is innately "God given" or borrowed from religious tradition." This is typical 'rationalist' thinking that asks more questions than it answers. Of course morals, morality or one's own conscience was God-given at Creation and it still exists today. You have to have created beings first as religious traditions are simply 'traditions' and many of them are simply 'human traditions' that have been concocted by males and have nothing to do about worshipping or praising God or are in the 'conscience' bracket, it is human tradition or religious tradition that Jesus often corrected the religious leaders as they were setting themselves up higher than God or their activities (or works) were more important than accepting Jesus as the Messiah.
From day one God gave mankind a free will to choose and it was always conditional not unconditional. Children learn what is right and wrong and their conscience is developed through their parents, through life's experience and their own maturing in age first before they even enter a church if they do at all. It is already in our genetics and we can choose standards at our own choice. It is not up to us to judge as God already knows what is in the heart of His Creation. Morality is not the exclusive preserve of the religious it is the exclusive preserve from God. Remember God chose certain people to write down His principles not theirs! They were free to write them down as they described them not dictated to.
You seem to generalise with blanket statements instead of being more specific and you are assuming far too much instead of being more objective in all due respect.
In Romans 2:15 They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.
There is a wealth of wisdom in the Bible for those that seek knowledge, wisdom and Eternal Salvation or to live with their Creator for all of eternity through the only Person or God-man Jesus Christ. He is the only living God that came down from heaven to sacrifice Himself for us. Christianity is a life-style to live by faith not a man-made religion of rules and laws to conform to.
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Theos:
26 Mar 2014 9:44:53am
"What really matters is what God thinks ..."
Which god?
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Gemma:
26 Mar 2014 9:59:36am
The bible was constructed by man for a way to have law and order in an ancient land/desert for a society that had no order.
It's not meant to be taken literally as Christians now do.
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Brian:
26 Mar 2014 9:20:15am
The Bible is the word of MAN not God.
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Anne L Plurabelle:
26 Mar 2014 9:29:58am
Morality is not a function of religion. go back and read your Bible.
The Book of Job is an outstanding example of the amorality inherent in the construction of "God". God and his mate Satan play a betting game which tortures God's faithful Job and murders his family and destroys his property for a laugh. Religion is about obedience and punishment not morality. It is a type of social order not a type of goodness.
When Christianity impregnated itself with gnosticism and Satan became the second deity in the competition, morality becomes a matter of choice which God do you obey, which set of imagined edicts? Then morality entered into the choice because God edicts had to have a quality above simple autocracy and main force to justify them.
The Pew Research centre is well aware that Atheists are better educated, less likely to commit crimes and less likely to get divorced than fundamentalist Christians, in the USA at least.
Morality is demonstrably utterly divorced from religion. This attempt to pretend that Christianity is a bulwark against anarchy and decadence is rubbish. Look at the highly moral reasoning taken in Female liberation, Womans right to bodily integrity and privacy and Marriage equality by the secularists and the primitive opposition arguments from superstition raised by the religionists.
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Maru:
26 Mar 2014 10:21:50am
It's funny though - when you actually get into what makes a person "good" you get many wide and disparate answers - what constitutes "good" is subjective, so what's the point in trying to prove one is "good" when it merely proves the subjectivity of your thinking.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 10:40:26am
If Michael reads the OT he will find that wisdom isn't exactly the same thing as morality.
There are different views of morality. The evolution based one argues for a utilitarian one - what is good is what 'benefits' you. This can't give much account of altruism and would seem to see it as morally doubtful; many of us think altruism quite moral. And evolution can't give any way out of moral dilemmas where the consequences are few (they simply don't matter). And as all our behaviour has evolved equally it is hard to see how one kind is better than another.
With consequences as the judge it would be moral for politicians to lie in order to win elections.
Someone who did their best to think about morality apart from God read Nietzsche. For all his grandiosity he did try to be clear eyed about the consequences of atheism.
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Living in Narnia:
26 Mar 2014 11:00:11am
I note that no atheist has yet addressed the problem of the mass murders committed by atheists. Just a small problem is it that 100 million were murdered alone last century directly as a result of the atheist philosophy they believed.
I note that instead of committing on how the arm-chair atheist pontificating about religion could commit meaningfully to the lives of the poor, the response has been more trivial philosophising. Indeed, I am intentional in my work with the poor. I do want poor people and rich people to give up the pretence that they do not need God, the real God. Yet my merge contribution is not conditional on being agreed with or accepted. Still you talkers, where are the atheist hospitals? Surely you self-good and self-sufficient atheist folk can name one. Fred Hollows, a great man who somewhere along his journey, lost his faith, is the closest I can think of.
As for rewards and punishments as motivators, you talk ignorant arm-chair bunk. I and all those I have worked for find their greatest reward in seeing lives transformed, bodies healed, marriages restored, work skills gained. My greatest joy is listening to the stories of people from this region telling how they have met Jesus and the changes He has made to the way they treat their wives and daughters, or seeing kids faces, glowing faces because they have been taught to read. Never met an atheist here or elsewhere teaching kids doing for free but I would welcome the opportunity to met one, or to visit a school or eye clinic or hospital staffed and self- funded by atheists.
As for rewards, I and my co-workers couldn't care less, as far as I can tell. Besides I deserve no reward. I am simply a beggar who found food and I am looking for other beggars who also hunger and thirst after righteousness. I deserve no reward for stumbling across the free gift of life and for entreating others to join me.
Finally, we're I an atheist who claimed to have prayed and never met God, my personal experience experience would be touted as proof of God's non-existence.
But my experience is the opposite, I have met and continue to meet God.
Look, try this. Give you life to Jesus for a week. Really. "If you are there reveal yourself to me and I will submit to Your rule over my life."
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crow:
26 Mar 2014 3:51:07pm
I really dont see your point. even if you were correct that 'atheists' murdered 100 million people directly because of atheist philosophy (which boils down to 'theres no evidence to believe in god') what is the small problem you think cant be answered.
and do we have a similar problem if we can find murders committed by the religious directly because of religion? (heresy, apostasy, sectarianism etc).
my answer is simple. show some evidence. anything. not circular arguments, not appeals to authority or meaningless 'problems' you think prove your case. evidence and Ill believe in your God. I doubt Ill worship it, since Ive read your bible and find your deity to be rather vile, but thats another issue altogether I guess.
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Living in Narnia:
26 Mar 2014 11:00:11am
I note that no atheist has yet addressed the problem of the mass murders committed by atheists. Just a small problem is it that 100 million were murdered alone last century directly as a result of the atheist philosophy they believed.
I note that instead of committing on how the arm-chair atheist pontificating about religion could commit meaningfully to the lives of the poor, the response has been more trivial philosophising. Indeed, I am intentional in my work with the poor. I do want poor people and rich people to give up the pretence that they do not need God, the real God. Yet my merge contribution is not conditional on being agreed with or accepted. Still you talkers, where are the atheist hospitals? Surely you self-good and self-sufficient atheist folk can name one. Fred Hollows, a great man who somewhere along his journey, lost his faith, is the closest I can think of.
As for rewards and punishments as motivators, you talk ignorant arm-chair bunk. I and all those I have worked for find their greatest reward in seeing lives transformed, bodies healed, marriages restored, work skills gained. My greatest joy is listening to the stories of people from this region telling how they have met Jesus and the changes He has made to the way they treat their wives and daughters, or seeing kids faces, glowing faces because they have been taught to read. Never met an atheist here or elsewhere teaching kids doing for free but I would welcome the opportunity to met one, or to visit a school or eye clinic or hospital staffed and self- funded by atheists.
As for rewards, I and my co-workers couldn't care less, as far as I can tell. Besides I deserve no reward. I am simply a beggar who found food and I am looking for other beggars who also hunger and thirst after righteousness. I deserve no reward for stumbling across the free gift of life and for entreating others to join me.
Finally, we're I an atheist who claimed to have prayed and never met God, my personal experience experience would be touted as proof of God's non-existence.
But my experience is the opposite, I have met and continue to meet God.
Look, try this. Give you life to Jesus for a week. Really. "If you are there reveal yourself to me and I will submit to Your rule over my life."
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Jackie:
26 Mar 2014 11:23:42am
As long as your faith makes you feel good about yourself and your helping others then go for it.
I just don't like the idea that you have to follow your chosen belief/faith in Jesus/God to get a reward when you die. And I certainly don't like the sadistic and brutal consequences offered by your God if you don't.
That's not the sort of choozy nasty God I want or believe in.
I'm sure God is all loving.
Just remember the bible was written by us, not God.
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Evan:
26 Mar 2014 11:04:45am
A good book on this, from a European point of view, is Terry Eagleton's Culture and the Death of God.
He does try to take Nietzsche seriously, which is excellent I think.
His line is that Nietzsche saw that, (paraphrasing) if god's gotta go then so does 'man' and 'meaning' and such.
He is very readable and does try to go deep. I found it well worth reading.
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talleyrand:
26 Mar 2014 11:07:31am
Socrates, indubitably smarter than any commentator here, relied on humanity's innate sense of right and wrong as evidence of the existence of God.
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Steve_C:
26 Mar 2014 11:59:14am
"Socrates... relied on humanity's innate sense of right and wrong as evidence of the existence of God."
Yeah - and look where that got him!!
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Kagey One:
26 Mar 2014 11:11:48am
A longish life has convinced me that any social phenomenon that claims to be associated with benevolence and is widely recognised as having justice and selflessness among its major tenets, is eagerly seized by those without social conscience, the dishonest, the self-serving, self-aggrandising, and those lacking any concern for others, as a tool by which to cover or even justify their reprehensible behaviour.
A religion such as Christianity is absolutely ripe for this type of abuse because, in our society, it is seen as the very definition of goodness.
The most humane, caring, ethically and socially responsible people I know include a scattering of self-defined christians and a significantly greater number of atheists.
To suggest that any theistic belief is even desirable, let alone essential, to ensure goodness, responsibility, or a social conscience is naive in the extreme.
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WD:
26 Mar 2014 11:15:47am
The principle of religious morality has its foundation in a consciousness that has no foundation other than the religious dogma passed from one deluded generation to another. WD
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Zathras:
26 Mar 2014 11:34:06am
Morailty has always been a socially agreed set of standards to ensure stability and has never come "from on high".
The same set of "rules" we live by today previously made witch-burning and slavery acceptable standards. Those things were not short-term aberrations, they lasted centuries.
Religious documents are constantly re-interpreted to align themselves with whatever morality is agreed at any particular time and despite them all, we still have killings and wars.
The essence of religion is ultimately about the salvation of the self and how to achieve that result and so can be seen as actually amoral.
The use of the carrot-and-stick is not the same as doing good for its own sake and without reward.
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MD:
26 Mar 2014 4:24:05pm
"The essence of religion is ultimately about the salvation of the self and how to achieve that result and so can be seen as actually amoral."
Agree! I remember watching the original film of "Bedazzled" and considering the Faust story. In both, Satan is posed as the "bad" choice. He uses bribery and trickery to obtain a soul. The Abrahamic God also bribes, in offering "eternal life" to believers, but conventional notions of preeminence assert that that bribery is moral, apparently because of the conviction that the reward is better than the alternative, in other words it's an "honest" deal. In Faust, and "Bedazzled", Satan is "demonised" not because of the terms of negotiation, but because it's he cannot be satisfied with the deal, and is always portrayed as using deceit to improve his outcome, although why an ultimate being would even concern itself with mercantile considerations is beyond comprehension, although that leads me to reason that a mercantile understanding of good and evil is literally good for business.
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Gumbus:
26 Mar 2014 11:57:06am
You can rationalise morality as self interest, but it need not be explained solely on that basis. All you need is sympathy/empathy to understand the basis for morality.
Once a person understands that other people can hurt and be hurt, and the person understands how it would feel if it happened to them, an innate basis for morality and "the golden rule" presents itself.
You don't need to apply rationality or religion to form a moral code. You just need to understand humanity. Morality is instinctive once you accept that other humans experience pain and pleasure the same way you do.
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HC:
26 Mar 2014 12:14:23pm
Secularism, elevates the secular to the point where it is believed that nothing exists beyond that which we can see. Accordingly, secularism says there is nothing beyond this life. It denies the church a voice in society, and even if God is not denied explicitly, the secularized culture operates as if He does not exist. There is nothing transcendent to which the secular is accountable.
The Christian worldview emphatically holds that all of reality centers around the existence of a personal, holy, and transcendent Creator. As you quoted, only fools deny the Lord?s existence (Ps. 14), for He holds eternity in His hands.
As you mentioned, the Apostle Paul's discusses the existence of a moral "conscience", often denied by secularist as a social construct, or as you infer can develop into one which is influenced b culture etc.
However, the intent of Paul's argument differs from your usage of his words, in that Paul posits this inbuilt worldwide basic knowledge of right and wrong is not the basis to build morals but will be the basis for God's future judgement especially for those not exposed to either Old or New Testament moral teaching, and God's existence through nature.
You are correct that there are a range of social moral constructs that differ from culture, religion and time period. But scriptural moral law is a reflection of the intent of God for both secular and sacred, for God's purpose and for humanity. If you remove God's intent and purpose, they are no different than any other man made moral system.
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MD:
26 Mar 2014 12:31:49pm
It follows that people who are religiously devout will tend to believe that they're more moral, or that religious devotion can inspire a higher morality, because that would be a natural self-justification for their faith. It's puzzling, then, that purportedly devout people can find room, within what they might consider to be "absolute" morality, to justify crusades, jihad, murdering abortion doctors, slavery, vilification of other faiths, and the admonishment that a just God will condemn anyone not of a belief set to be forever beyond favour. If there's a God, and it's absolute, it's reasonable to expect consistency in its works, since, in its capacity as Creator, the universe works because of that. Consider if everyone had to offer up a prayer to get their cars to start in the morning, that there was no guarantee that the engine would start, and in fact, most likely wouldn't. That's a God that's less than absolute.
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MD:
26 Mar 2014 12:32:07pm
It follows that people who are religiously devout will tend to believe that they're more moral, or that religious devotion can inspire a higher morality, because that would be a natural self-justification for their faith. It's puzzling, then, that purportedly devout people can find room, within what they might consider to be "absolute" morality, to justify crusades, jihad, murdering abortion doctors, slavery, vilification of other faiths, and the admonishment that a just God will condemn anyone not of a belief set to be forever beyond favour. If there's a God, and it's absolute, it's reasonable to expect consistency in its works, since, in its capacity as Creator, the universe works because of that. Consider if everyone had to offer up a prayer to get their cars to start in the morning, that there was no guarantee that the engine would start, and in fact, most likely wouldn't. That's a God that's less than absolute.
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Gordon:
26 Mar 2014 12:38:49pm
As with everything , the question is not as simple as it seems. Religion is two things: firstly it is a form of tribalism: it provides the necessary shorthand means to separate "us" (trustworthy) from "them" (not so much).
but secondly it is a convenient form of a "higher power".
The hard question is really: "can someone be moral who puts themselves as the final arbiter of morality."
Higher powers can be quite non-religious: the greater good for the greater number; traditional or written Law; how you wuz brung up; etc. If put on the spot as an atheist, I would appeal to some combination of the above for guidance, but these are all still external to the person.
Is there a purely self-defined way of knowing right from wrong - if not- who decides?
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Paul:
26 Mar 2014 3:07:44pm
"can someone be moral who puts themselves as the final arbiter of morality."
If you were perfect in knowledge and power and goodness you'd be silly not to wouldn't you?
"it provides the necessary shorthand means to separate "us" (trustworthy) from "them" (not so much)."
Christians also say that their own "righteousness is as filthy rags" before God and that they need the salvation of God, unlike many others believe. There are of course legalistic "holier than thou" relegious people but the message of the bible is of us all needing salvation equally.
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conservative:
26 Mar 2014 1:09:15pm
God gave even the atheists morality.
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Alpo:
26 Mar 2014 1:47:21pm
... Big mistake! By doing so, he became irrelevant.
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trabbers:
26 Mar 2014 4:15:42pm
Which god would that be, and can you offer any proof of its existence?
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bill anderson:
26 Mar 2014 1:42:00pm
atheism is not an ideology. It is a scientific approach to a lack of evidence. A belief based on facts rather on faith. Sure, their are pretend christians. After all, you can get preferential treatment based on your religion. But there is only descrimination waiting for the pretend atheists
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Edwin No NSA Spying:
26 Mar 2014 2:14:21pm
"The problem is, you can't just cooperate with others when it benefits you and cheat when it doesn't, because soon those others will stop trusting you and will shut you out"
Except that you are the part of elite ruling class (corporate executives, bankers, politicians), since you have privilege use of force (gun and money) to make people cooperate with you
Another point is that even unethical people preserve honesty to cooperate among themselves to reach their desired outcome, such as drug dealers, gangsters, and even politicians but they cooperate to lie to outsider.
So probably the question is that why should we be honest to everybody instead of our own group of community?
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lilly:
26 Mar 2014 2:19:31pm
At its core, the religous experience begins and ends with the self. Its not about belief as belief requires the creation of conceptual constructs and the constructs used by each person will be different. For example, describe a Rolls Royce to 5 people who've never seen one before and then get them to draw a picture of what you've described. The result will be 5 different pictures none of which match the real thing. The same principle applies to God.
It has been demonstrated throughout all human experience that the way people behave impacts upon their happiness and the happiness of others. This is a consequence of human nature and the source from which societal laws developed. What most religions have in common is the mode of behaviour that is prescribed. Simplistically, the injunction not to lie, steal, kill, rape etc... are rules found across most religions.
Following these laws will take people to a certain point but will not lead to that experience which is commonly described as spiritual. The step beyond that is alluded to in many religions. My personal view however is that Buddhism targets it most directly. This is the refinement of the self. Essentially, examing the contents of the mental closet and discarding all items that are found to be perishable (don't shoot me for being simplistic on this one - its hard to sum up Buddhist philosophy in one line). The theory here is that it is the contents of the mental closet that dictates our behaviour. For example, if the mental closet of a neurotic person were compared to that of a "free spirit", you would find one was cluttered whilst the other was rather more on the empty side.
The experience of the divine is found in an empty closet. The experience is without description and requires no belief, no prayer and no church. Its attainment however requires, in part, the conduct of one's life in accordance with a moral code as to do otherwise is counterproductive.
When Jesus said that the kingdom of heaven is within you, I think he was referring to an empty closet.
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MD:
26 Mar 2014 2:27:38pm
It follows that people who are religiously devout will tend to believe that they're more moral, or that religious devotion can inspire a higher morality, because that would be a natural self-justification for their faith. It's puzzling, then, that purportedly devout people can find room, within what they might consider to be "absolute" morality, to justify crusades, jihad, murdering abortion doctors, slavery, vilification of other faiths, and the admonishment that a just God will condemn anyone not of a belief set to be forever beyond favour. If there's a God, and it's absolute, it's reasonable to expect consistency in its works, since, in its capacity as Creator, the universe works because of that. Consider if everyone had to offer up a prayer to get their cars to start in the morning, that there was no guarantee that the engine would start, and in fact, most likely wouldn't. That's a God that's less than absolute. So, if morality is absolute, and we recognize that the behavior of the physical systems that constitute our universe has to be consistent, why do the devout expect that praying to the creator of these absolutes for arbitrary exception from them is likely to be successful. Some might say that prayer to benefit someone suffering from illness isn't an exemption from the moral absolute, but that's exactly what it is. The expectation that the sufferer will be set higher than other sufferers is irreconcilable with moral absolutism.
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Amethyst:
26 Mar 2014 2:38:49pm
Those who believe in God will condemn the lack of morality in those who do not yet, they believe their own morality is unquestionable. Such a stance, in itself, is hypocritical and immoral.
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Paul:
26 Mar 2014 3:03:29pm
What I think the author has missed here (as has all of the comments I've read) is that Christians such as myself will argue that all morality comes from God - but they will not argue that you need to be religious or have a relationship with God to be morale.
Its very obvious to any logical person that there are moral athiests and immoral Christians of varying degrees.
The bible says that God made us in His own image and that He is good. So Christians believe that our sense of right and wrong etc does come from our good creator. We would of course claim that being in a relationship with God (being Born Again, obeying God, praying, worshipping etc) will result in us being more like God (taking on His values etc) and also that the opposite is true. That is, distancing yourself from God, will result in you having less morales - especially in the long run.
Of course this would vary from individuals and circumstances and across generations. The God-haters will say that they can't wait for a world where religion is hardly heard of, I however fear what the world will be like then if it is allowed to continue that far. They will see how pitiful we are are clinging to our God derived morales without God. It will be a scary world indeed.
When you weigh up Christianity don't look at the religions of the world and the very imperfect Christians, look at Christ. Not many historians claim that He didn't exist. Its simple really, He said "I am the way, the truth and the life" and much more. I have chosen to believe Him. As simple as that.
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crow:
26 Mar 2014 3:52:52pm
Not many historians claim that He didn't exist.
a few do. they've yet to be proven wrong either
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James:
26 Mar 2014 4:01:28pm
Jesus may have existed, but my questioin is was he really the son of God?
How many people of the centuries have run around saying that.
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Mohammad Islam:
26 Mar 2014 3:51:45pm
As a Muslim, I personally believe that people who FOLLOW one of the three monotheistic religions (i.e. Judaism, Christianity and Islam) are more trustworthy than people who are godless.
My belief is based on the following facts:
1. Jewish, Canon and Sharia law are OBJECTIVE laws that have been prescribed by God (through translation of the scriptures) rather than mankind;
2. the moral code followed by godless people is a SUBJECTIVE code that has been set by the particular individual (or group) according to his/her level of education, wisdon, knowledge and
personal valued judgements. This code is commonly set independent of reference to "Godly" material such as the scriptures;
3. unlike scriptured law, SUBJECTIVE laws are prone to change over time as the person (or group) becomes more knowledgeable, wiser or a shift occurs in what is in their interest. This fluidity is,
in my opinion, is what makes the man-made subjective laws dubious. This is because the level of morality will fluctuate in accordance to what is convenient at the time. This means that there
will never be an incentive to 'improve' our moral welbeing because it is simply easier to unilaterally lower the level of morality we prescribe for ourselves.
Having said all of that, scriptured laws are only useful to man IF, and only if, they are observed. Conequently, people who call themselves Muslims" but commit acts of terrorism are NOT moral beings. Similarly, people who call themselves Jews but commit acts of aggression against others are NOT moral being. And, finally, people who describe themselves as Christians but sexually assault children in their care are also NOT moral being.
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lilly:
26 Mar 2014 4:29:27pm
Ambrose Bierce gave a cynical definition of a christian in his Devils Dictionary. It reads in part:
"One who follows the teachings of Christ in so far as they are not inconsistent with a life of sin."
I think many politicians who proclaim a Christian faith prefer to cherry pick which parts of the teaching of christ they will follow. The one about loving thy neighbour doesn't sit very well with current asylum seeker policy or in parliament. The requirement to forgive those who sin against us should probably be left out when getting tough on crime.
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GraemeF:
26 Mar 2014 4:01:01pm
I am an atheist and I say that I am not a 'moral' person. I say that I am an ethical person.
To me, morals are preset 'laws' handed down by religion of the 'thou shalt not' variety. Ethics requires a questioning of each situation to decide as to what is the best course 'in this situation'.
Look at one of the top ten for Christianity 'thou shalt not kill'. I agree with that as a general rule but if someone was attacking me or someone near me with the intent to kill then I would not be ethically challenged if I clocked them first. On the other hand while supporting killing a person in that situation, I don't think we should just jaunt off across the other side of the world to invade other countries and blow up their civilians that are no threat to us whatsoever. Yet most of the people who organised the invasion of Iraq based on a thin tissue of lies, claimed to be Christians.
The trouble with 'moral' people is that they think that going to church and believing in God makes them a better person so that when they make a decision then naturally 'God' is communicating directly with them and supports everything they do. They have no messy ethical discussions with themselves about the 'greater good' etc, they have the 'moral' high ground and just do it. Even if that results in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent people.
We have so many people in the federal parliament that claim to be Christians yet hold not charity in their hearts. They do not follow the standard 'do unto others' creed, they operate by the position of 'get in first and go in hard' before they know what hits them. They do not operate under the concept of 'if you have two coats then give one away' they say that the person with the most coats should be given more just in case one day they might get bored with one and give it away. Their idea of 'charity' is to donate to an organisation that is trying to genetically modify camels to shrink them to nano-scale. They do not overturn the tables of the money lenders, they give them a government guarantee and allow them to secretly reap usurious fees in perpetuity.
Basically too many of the 'moral' believe that their every thought is supported by God but the ethically minded like myself think over every problem and try to do the right thing. More Christians should ask themselves What Would Jesus Do if he was alive today (if the CIA didn't hunt him down and shoot him for being a radical lefty agitator) and take a more ethical approach to their religion.
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