It's a feature.

It's an organizing principle meant to benefit the in group in any number of ways.


Christianity directly outcompeted (and physically destroyed) any number of other religious movements that lacked this feature...and was especially interested in eradicating those that rejected their claim to divine exclusivity.

Bad actors have an inherent advantage in the religious marketplace.


They offer products and services that other market actors will not, do not, or could not.

Tamaratonye1:
I'm eliding the difference between Christian behavior as practiced by individuals with that which the religion of Christianity itself is responsible for enabling, but that's to a point. It's said that one should not judge a philosophy by its abuse, and that's certainly a valid point, but said in defense of Christian bigotry it implicitly asserts that such behavior represents an abuse of the philosophy advocated instead of a true expression of it, and while either might be the case, the question is not settled by merely asserting your chosen answer, implicitly or explicitly.

So my question is - is bigotry in its followers a bug, a feature, or simply incidental to Christianity?

-and before you posted the bolded, people would have simply assumed you understood the difference between employment and property.

Just think, you'll never get that back again.

It will color everyones perception of you, and harm whatever very important message you came here to deliver..which doesn't appear to have anything to do with morality.

Think that might be bad?

Dtruthspeaker:


Immaterial! As long as you are raising the issue from a publicly known document generally called the Bible which has both the good and bad one.



I deny what you and your bible said



Every one of us have a house where a certain houseboy/housegirl has been serving the owner of the house and his family and even the children of the servant continue in it. And all visitors thought that they were family members for they were treated very well, as God Commanded

So, nothing here.



Because you atheist are void of good (morals) you can not see good. Which is why you do not see that Exodus 21 is the same normal contract of domestic service we all have today. A houseboy comes in alone and goes out alone. If he marries in the house, then he and his wife go out etc

But as you people are void of morals, you can not see this is the very we all do, whether the Bible said so or not!



From the beginning I did say Labour Law.



See your evil mind? Isn't this devil speaking? Do we not say atheists are evil?



And yet you willingly offer yourself up to be possessed by another person like a property everyday even joyfully too eg by offering yourself to slave for NNPC, Chevron, Davido's house etc, never thinking for a microsecond that this was immoral.

Do you see now that your morality button does not work?

Isn't that just another opportunity to ask the same question?

You prefer an interpretation because it is good, but what does that mean? Good by reference to what? Is god subject to some fact or reality of what is good?

-In answer to your question, you'd have to be more specific. There are lots of laws, not all of them are good laws, so, conceivably a law being applied to me could go either way.

I don;t..for example, believe that not all contracts must be can be or even should be upheld. Neitherdo our legal systems.

There's a category called unenforceables.

You can't..for example, sell yourself into slavery, and no court here will hear any garbage from a man coming to them with such a contract seeking redress from you to that effect.

Dtruthspeaker:


Simple!

If The Law was applied to you, would you call it good!

Eg The Law on Contracts says all agreements must be upheld (pacta sunt servanda), so do you think good that your boss or customer should not pay you for work done?

That's what you think it -should- be.....but...you may not be quite as ethnocentric in your pronouncements as those authors were.

Let's explore that. Why do you think it should be your interpretation of that verse, rather than sociopolitical reality of that verse, or some possibility where god itself said it and meant it in explicitly ethnocentric terms?

Why, further down, should we not oppress each other -or- anyone else? Is there something wrong with oppressing people, any people? What?

Dtruthspeaker:


Which Verse 17?

This one says "ye shall not oppress one another"; Leviticus 25:17

And this is not for Hebrews alone but for everyone in the land of Israel

It may not be a kindness. Have you considered the possibility that you are both wrong?

We don't accept that a thing is objectively true just because people agree....right?

YOU SAID: Why then, would you disagree with objective morals?

Can't speak for Tamaratonye1, but I don't disagree that there are objective morals.

Perhaps, though, you could explain why you think the existence or nonexistence of any god would be relevant to whether a moral statement accurately reported a fact about a matter x?

Endtimer:


This is pathetic. I mean that in the most utmost sense of the word.

I stated that objective morals cannot exist in God’s absence and people here rush to support me so quickly that I’m left blushing at their kindness.

If objective morals exist, then so do objective ”immorals”. The reason everyone here is rightly angered by abuses committed by some professed Christians is that they perceive those crimes as immoral. I’m stating that the reason you all perceive those crimes as evil is because you are culturally Christian. If you were Mongols, you’d revel in the destruction and subjugation of enemies. War history would be a matter of pride. If you were samurai, you’d see defiling pre-adolescent boys as normal.

The things you see as good and bad are the result of Christianity because you are in a predominantly Christian culture. It isn’t your nature or evolution. Christianity has major bearings on what you believe good and bad to be, which is why we can agree that these wars are silly and those boys should’ve been protected from those men.

Don’t you truly believe that your moral values are superior to those of others (homosexual predators for instance)? You certainly seem to believe they are superior to mine. Why then, would you disagree with objective morals?

Agreed at bolded..but how do you, or we, know which laws are the good laws?

Dtruthspeaker:


Off Point. The issue is not that whether the Romans participated in slavery.



We already know that people are not good and will disobey a good Law

You don't get appointed a judge in an objective moral system, anyway. You either can or can't observe a fact. That's all that matters.

Do you think you can observe a fact?

People do change, let's not be hyperbolic. There's nothing in your comments about why theft is wrong?

I guess you were asking an open ended question.

YOU SAID: You know this does not cut it. Giving a judgement setting a person free is not the same as lobbying.

.....I actually can't make heads or tails of this one, perhaps you could rephrase?

As for me...I would break down peoples doors - and have, to stop them from doing horrid things and to stop them from hurting other people.


People are different, I get that things like that aren't for everyone, but there are other ways to help...and I would like to explore the moral angle of this.


If you can do a good thing, or stop a bad thing...why wait for someone else, or something else, to do it?

YOU SAID: Following his inability to supply places where stealing is approved and honoured, it clearly proves beyond doubt that one Mighty some where, DID WRAP UP THE WORLD WITH THE SAME MORALS, whether they have heard of Him or not, which was my point.

-and I'm trying to explore that point with you.

I agree that there is a source for human morality. Everyone agrees with that statement, to put it bluntly, people simple disagree on what that source is.


Is the source of morality what some subject says, what some society says,


Or facts about a matter under consideration?

What do you think?

Dtruthspeaker:


You just had to give a low blow when all I have said is that no one appointed me Judge



No matter how good an argument is people never change. So to a thief, all I would tell him is that, it ends in death either by prison stabbings or by mobbing or by shooting.



You know this does not cut it. Giving a judgement setting a person free is not the same as lobbying.



True! But are you breaking down people's doors and offices judging them for keeping slaves at home or in the office? No.

We need The Creator and Owner of man. It is He Who the Power to break down all doors and no one will be able to stop Him.

So, I prefer to wait for Him.

YOU SAID: First, this is called a loaded question. Like, have you stopped beating your wife? It is quite obviously a setup, but it touches on the point of what we are talking about. The reason you are concerned with what I'd do is that you believe that killing someone is objectively wrong. As a true Nigerian, I'll redirect the question to gain a more thorough understanding of your meta ethics. Why is robbing people wrong (for example)? I've told you that it is wrong theistically because it isn't imitative of God's nature. Anticipating the obvious atheist response, I should point out that this is a singular example of a larger position, stated thusly: good is a term used to describe God's nature. I've asked two questions now:

- Why is robbing people wrong?
-What is "good" itself?

That's not actually a loaded question


I think you mean that it's a -psychologically- loaded question..and perhaps it is, for you - but not for me.

The reason that I think anything is wrong, is down to harm.

You could ask about any number of specific and different things, items of a moral import, but I will always begin a moral calculus with determining whether or not a thing is harmful.

YOU SAID: This is an extremely important point but your response isn't a counterpoint to something I said. I didn't say we decide what harm is. I said we cannot decide that something is bad because it causes harm. That would be an arbitrary definition of bad. We might as well define bad as anything that makes people happy. I define bad as a term used to describe a set of values antithetical to God's nature. How do you define bad?

As above, I always begin by seeing if we can determine harm.

You could, of course, decide to call anything that makes people happy bad..


But then..of course, you and I would not be talking about the same thing, would we?

Do you, btw, think that this is what bad is?

Anything that makes people happy?

I don't mind that you define bad as whatever is against whatever a gods nature is, it's certainly up to you to do so - but I can point out that such a definition is a metaethically subjective or even noncognitive position.


It's also completely arbitrary in ways that defining bad as -either- harmful things or things that make people happy isn't.

YOU SAID: Alright then, tell me what intrinsic fact of rape, murder, theft or any other crimes that make them bad. It is not illogical to assert that actions have moral contingence on things beyond them. That is, in fact, the conventional view rather than yours. It is also simpler and more tenable than yours. Your meta ethics seems to introduce unnecessary complexity to explain away simple things; in the same manner that one could to explain that the sun orbits the earth. In the end you are left with no basis for moral belief and a dangerous arbitrariness.

Presupposing God's existence we have reason to continue believing all we do. In the absence of that, we do not. A foolish person might ignore that I just said presupposing and ask me to prove that God exists. To be clear, what I am saying is if God exists we have reason to hold first principles for morality. If He doesn't we do not. You believe He doesn't so you will have to provide a basis for morality as I have

...as above..again, whether or not an act is harmful.

YOU SAID: I am a moral objectivist so you this doesn't apply to me.

You may be, but you've been arguing as and for moral subjectivism.


Perhaps, if you mean to argue as and for objectivism, you could take an assist from another objectivist, like myself, who's spent some time learning how to accurately and cogently communicate that position to other people?

YOU SAID: Obviously because you are equating the agents and I am not. Think of it like class struggle. You assume discrimination on the grounds that both classes are functionally equal but a disparity in result persists. I point out that differences in the classes manifest differences in result. The morals agents in the first part of the sentence are you and I; functional equals. You can't tell a bomber he is wrong because you say so. You aren't the boss of him and you lack moral authority. The moral agent in the second part of the sentence is the tradition concept of God: omni-benevolent, omniscient, omnipotent and the creator of all. There is a difference between the agents and an obvious difference between the results.

Well...I -could- tell a bomber that he's wrong because I say so..but I wouldn't.

I would explain to that bomber the harm his actions will cause.

Then..in the likely event that he poo poos all that and says his god wills it - I'd shoot him twice in the chest and once in the head.

YOU SAID: Objectivism is saying that x is always bad. Relativism is saying that the morality of x depends on the context. Subjectivism is saying that morals depend on personal taste.


No, objectivism doesn't say that.

Objetivism is, very simply, the idea that a moral statement reports a fact of a matter. Facts of matters can change, therefore objective moral statements can change.

Are you..in light of this, actually a moral objectivist, or do you think there might be a more accurate term for what you're describing?

YOU SAID: This, I believe is the whole point of your post (although I couldn't resist rebutting it entirely, which I'll refrain from in future). What you have is a false dichotomy where information about something is only true when we derive that information intrinsically; failing that it is false. This is an absurd position because we deal with contingence and relativity everyday. Attributes like being tall or fat depend on the heights and weights of others in a similar class (like the species for example). There is nothing intrinsic in 6ft that makes it tall; likewise there is nothing intrinsic in rape that makes it bad. Its morality is contingent on God. Since you don't believe in God, you will have to explain why rape is truly bad without appealing to baseless first principles.

Well, there you have it - you are not an objectivist at all.

You do not believe that there's something -about rape- that makes it bad. I do. Harm.

Your morality..if it even makes sense to call it a morality... may be contingent upon a god, but mine..as a moral objectivist... is not.

Endtimer:


First, this is called a loaded question. Like, have you stopped beating your wife? It is quite obviously a setup, but it touches on the point of what we are talking about. The reason you are concerned with what I'd do is that you believe that killing someone is objectively wrong. As a true Nigerian, I'll redirect the question to gain a more thorough understanding of your meta ethics. Why is robbing people wrong (for example)? I've told you that it is wrong theistically because it isn't imitative of God's nature. Anticipating the obvious atheist response, I should point out that this is a singular example of a larger position, stated thusly: good is a term used to describe God's nature. I've asked two questions now:

- Why is robbing people wrong?
-What is "good" itself?



This is an extremely important point but your response isn't a counterpoint to something I said. I didn't say we decide what harm is. I said we cannot decide that something is bad because it causes harm. That would be an arbitrary definition of bad. We might as well define bad as anything that makes people happy. I define bad as a term used to describe a set of values antithetical to God's nature. How do you define bad?



I agree. But our belief in these principles must be justified. The first principles you appealed to are without basis atheistically: you cannot appeal to harm as bad without telling us what makes harm bad. You have to give reasons why something is bad.



Alright then, tell me what intrinsic fact of rape, murder, theft or any other crimes that make them bad. It is not illogical to assert that actions have moral contingence on things beyond them. That is, in fact, the conventional view rather than yours. It is also simpler and more tenable than yours. Your meta ethics seems to introduce unnecessary complexity to explain away simple things; in the same manner that one could to explain that the sun orbits the earth. In the end you are left with no basis for moral belief and a dangerous arbitrariness.

Presupposing God's existence we have reason to continue believing all we do. In the absence of that, we do not. A foolish person might ignore that I just said presupposing and ask me to prove that God exists. To be clear, what I am saying is if God exists we have reason to hold first principles for morality. If He doesn't we do not. You believe He doesn't so you will have to provide a basis for morality as I have.



I am a moral objectivist so you this doesn't apply to me.



Obviously because you are equating the agents and I am not. Think of it like class struggle. You assume discrimination on the grounds that both classes are functionally equal but a disparity in result persists. I point out that differences in the classes manifest differences in result. The morals agents in the first part of the sentence are you and I; functional equals. You can't tell a bomber he is wrong because you say so. You aren't the boss of him and you lack moral authority. The moral agent in the second part of the sentence is the tradition concept of God: omni-benevolent, omniscient, omnipotent and the creator of all. There is a difference between the agents and an obvious difference between the results.



Objectivism is saying that x is always bad. Relativism is saying that the morality of x depends on the context. Subjectivism is saying that morals depend on personal taste.



This, I believe is the whole point of your post (although I couldn't resist rebutting it entirely, which I'll refrain from in future). What you have is a false dichotomy where information about something is only true when we derive that information intrinsically; failing that it is false. This is an absurd position because we deal with contingence and relativity everyday. Attributes like being tall or fat depend on the heights and weights of others in a similar class (like the species for example). There is nothing intrinsic in 6ft that makes it tall; likewise there is nothing intrinsic in rape that makes it bad. Its morality is contingent on God. Since you don't believe in God, you will have to explain why rape is truly bad without appealing to baseless first principles.

YOU SAID: Of what effect is my judgement? Nil.

You seem to have a low opinion of your faculties.

YOU SAID: Would it stop you from being who you are and want to be? No.

Sure, I've been talked into and out of things - not always because the other person makes good arguments...but it definitely helps when they do.

What argument would -you- make..to stop a person from stealing? Tell them that someone else said not to do it?

YOU SAID: Would it release or chain a slave? No.

Yes, actually....history is full of people getting others to pursue or forego acquiring human property.


I think the latter cause was greatly effected by it's ability to make good arguments on factual premises about the nature and inevitable ends of slavery.

You might notice that people telling other people that someone else said to do it or not do it...even a god..was pretty spotty.

YOU SAID: Therefore, let Those who can set the captives free come and Judge.

The fate of a slave being left with their master is a complete dereliction and perversion of anything that could be credibly called an objective moral position.

That's not a system of right or wrong at all

It's a system of protecting the financial interests of people who own human property.

Do you really believe this would be a good thing to do?

Dtruthspeaker:


Of what effect is my judgement? Nil.

Would it stop you from being who you are and want to be? No.

Would it release or chain a slave? No.

Therefore, let Those who can set the captives free come and Judge.

YOU SAID: See, you could not name a few places were stealing was a Law in force were In fact if you are not a thief, they would punish you, but if you were a thief, they honoured you.

-And why do you think that is?

Because one god somewhere, that none of them had ever heard of, is said to have said something...


Or because there's something -about stealing- that people, anywhere, whether they've heard from this god or not, might notice?

What is that thing? That..would be the grounds of an -objective- moral code.

How about you?


Can you think of anything -about stealing- that might be bad, other than what a god might have said about it?

Dtruthspeaker:


See, you could not name a few places were stealing was a Law in force were In fact if you are not a thief, they would punish you, but if you were a thief, they honoured you.



I did not ask whether many cultures made laws.



I did not ask if they had their own cultures.



In other words, you refuse to answer the questions since you see it implicates you, so you decided to commit the fallacy of Changing Post and Switching the burden of Proof.



Change of Post/Off point. I did not say humans did not exist more than 10, 000yrs.



Change of Post Didn't ask you whether human legal system evolved.



All I said is right in your Google. So Google them.

But since you want to be spoon fed here is the Google reference

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ius_naturale&ved=2ahUKEwiAmrqHs8L6AhUdQ_EDHYpGAx0QmhN6BAgIEAI&usg=AOvVaw2pJ2v_sAJTVScEMa6I2wkV

"Romans gave to Natural law a great importance in their daily lives . They mentioned once "ius naturale est quod natura omnia animalia docuit", which means the right that nature gave to all living things.[citation needed]


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Tables

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_law&ved=2ahUKEwjPmtKd5cH6AhVRg_0HHZCvDOYQFnoECA8QAQ&usg=AOvVaw3pTie3dFe1salTe6jKt4K-

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_English_criminal_law

And besides this request for reference, you said nothing in counter. ALL YOUR RESPONSES ARE OFF POINT, A DEPARTURE FROM ISSUE, A DODGING OF POINT AND FALLACY AD HOMINEM. ALL BECAUSE YOU CAN NOT PROVIDE A REASONABLE AND VALID COUNTER

Ostensibly, sure...though I'm not sure gods many allegedly moral proclamations speak to it's moral competence....


But the question merely repeats itself with both of us as the subject.

How is it that this god of morals, or I, know which is which? Perhaps I should be more explicit.

Are there things that are good or bad as a fact, so that we can know what is good, and what is bad?


Or, more accurately, is gods commandment not fact based at all, and adjusted for accuracy, would read something more like

"Do whatever I tell you to do, and don't do whatever I tell you not to"
Or
"Do what I like, don't do what I hate"

..........?

Dtruthspeaker:


If you can tell which things are good from those things which are evil, then He Too can.

The Creator and Giver of Discernment must surely have plenty of Discernment in Store, exactly like a jobless man cannot give you a job!

Cool...and how did this god of morals know which was which?

Dtruthspeaker:


That is for The God of Moral to Judge! But it is sufficient to know that The God of Morals did command that "that which is good, should be done and that which is not good/evil, should not be done"

And we all know those things which are good to do or not do as separate from those things which are not good/evil, to do or not do.

So knowing this, "We each walk the path, that we've chosen" Dmx. (And shall be judged by it)

YOU SAID: Good of you to explain what you mean when you use the term meta ethics. Maybe we can come to understand one another and have a discussion. Understanding one another is the entire point of these things.

First, I do not want to harm or kill anyone. That is just absurd: this is the internet so I can’t and more importantly, I don’t want to.

You're right there in the same boat with the vast majority of the rest of us.

However...there are any number of things we might believe we have a moral duty to act on, that we may not -want- to act on.


Insomuch as a persons "moral" system is satisfying the whims of a command issuer, if they're truly committed to that, it's unclear whether their wants will be operative.

Go kill all the fuckin amalekites you scrubs! "Well..shit, I'd rather not..but if you say so G-man". etc.

Amusingly, we find it related to us in magic book that some people did fail with respect to this command issuers orders..that they may have felt obligated towards...just couldn't pull the trigger.

They failed to kill, or failed to kill every single x..and for this...they were punished.

Do you imagine you'd have been one of those people, on account of how you don;t want to harm or kill anyone?

As another poster has asked, would you have the courage to tell a god no? I'd add another question.

Would you feel like a -bad- person if you refused to kill a man or a woman or a child on the whims of some god?

YOU SAID: Concerning what you wrote, the important part is that “we” decided that harm arbitrarily constitutes immorality. There is nothing intrinsic in harm that can make it bad without appealing to unspoken first principles. We could have as well decided that anything that doesn’t cause harm is immoral and that harm is the highest good.

Well, IDK if that's true.

If it were up to us to decide what's harmful... then..self interested creatures that we are, we'd decide that nothing would be harmful to us.


That's not the world we appear to live in, we don't appear to have any such power or ability.


As far as principles..there's nothing we can say about anything..logically, without employing principles.

We could have decided that anything that doesn't cause harm is what we'll call immoral, but we'd clearly be talking about something else if we did so.

YOU SAID: I also agree that if x is good, then it is good. In addition to that I only believe that x is good because it is in God’s nature. That it is imitative of God’s nature makes it moral. From what I can tell meta ethics simply decides that something is good or bad based on personal taste. For instance, harm is bad because we the people say it is; while it was good to vikings as they said it wasn’t. I’m not endorsing their terrorism, but it was also personal taste that flew those planes into those buildings back in 2001.

All well and good..but that's not an objective morality.

That's subjective (or even noncognitive) morality.


The good or bad making properties are not accurately reported facts of the properties of x, but asserted properties of some gods particular nature.

Metaethics is just how we classify the nature of morality under different understandings.

Is it based on reporting facts about a matter x? Is it based on reporting facts about a society x? Is it based on reporting facts about a subject x? These are the cognitive positions. Objectivism, relativism, subjectivism.

Then there are non cognitives like being based on a persons emotional response. On their sense of taste.

Hovering all around all of these things is error theory - which comes in as many flavors as there are metaethical theories. My favorite being the notion that there is an objective moral truth, but human beings always get it wrong for some or no reason.

Your own position falls into a metaethical camp....and I do have to point out that it's odd to see a person who thinks that morality is subjective, (inaccurately) criticizing metaethics....for being subjective. Is subjectivism a problem?


YOU SAID: I believe I started this discussion by stating that most here are making the mistake of looking at our ultra-civilized Christianish world and concluding that if we decide to make up good and bad as we go it’ll be alright. Perhaps those people would like to read about the ancient samurai tradition to sodomize little boys (and only little boys) to see what happens in the absence of the Christian morals they think are natural.

I probably wouldn't put christianity and sodomizing little boys in the same sentence..if I was trying to criticize some -other- thing.

Any rate, I don't think that it would be good if we just made up good and bad as we went along either

And that's why this christian "morality" of yours fails, in point of fact.

It's not based on facts of these matters.

It's based on fairy tales we come up with about what god says or does

I understand that you really super duper believe in gods, but that won't rescue the ethical system even so.


If we don't think it's good to base our morals off what all moral agents are making up, why would it be any better to base our morals off of what a single moral agent made up?

Why not facts, instead?

Endtimer:
Good of you to explain what you mean when you use the term meta ethics. Maybe we can come to understand one another and have a discussion. Understanding one another is the entire point of these things.

First, I do not want to harm or kill anyone. That is just absurd: this is the internet so I can’t and more importantly, I don’t want to.

Concerning what you wrote, the important part is that “we” decided that harm arbitrarily constitutes immorality. There is nothing intrinsic in harm that can make it bad without appealing to unspoken first principles. We could have as well decided that anything that doesn’t cause harm is immoral and that harm is the highest good.

I also agree that if x is good, then it is good. In addition to that I only believe that x is good because it is in God’s nature. That it is imitative of God’s nature makes it moral. From what I can tell meta ethics simply decides that something is good or bad based on personal taste. For instance, harm is bad because we the people say it is; while it was good to vikings as they said it wasn’t. I’m not endorsing their terrorism, but it was also personal taste that flew those planes into those buildings back in 2001.

I believe I started this discussion by stating that most here are making the mistake of looking at our ultra-civilized Christianish world and concluding that if we decide to make up good and bad as we go it’ll be alright. Perhaps those people would like to read about the ancient samurai tradition to sodomize little boys (and only little boys) to see what happens in the absence of the Christian morals they think are natural.

I look forward to your response.

Objective morality doesn't depend on any novel set of premises, let alone the novelty of a singular and cosmic being.

-it depends on the same set of premises we use to make any number of (purportedly) factual statements all day every day - which we appear to believe to be reasonable premises, that lead to statements we then affirm as both truth apt and either true or false.


Even arguing that a moral statement is untrue and thus not objective......explicitly accepts and leverages those same premises.


Objectivists will simply tell you that..surprise, those moral statements are wrong, inaccurate, non facts - as a fact.


I would argue, though, whether naturalism stretchs ethics by anyones accounting. The (nutbar)faithful say god decreed x y or z and this is morality - but they still give naturalists reasons for -why- it did that.

Is homosex bad because god said so, full stop (and did god say so.....)?


Or is it bad because it -harms society and destroys the family, etc etc etc...and that's why god said nyet?


The trouble with our historic godly moralities..from the point of view of contemporary moral realism..is not that they got the truth aptness wrong, they just got the specific facts wrong. Their harms fail to be present or materialize.


Gods have had a nasty habit of knowing less about reality than we do - or maybe people are just bullshitting each other about what gods are saying?

A real stumper.

Tamaratonye1:

I'm a bit tied up, so I'll whip up a relatively short rebuttal to this cute little spiel here. I might add more when I've got more time to spare.

Meta-ethical frameworks based in naturalism may stretch the boundaries of what is commonly conceived of as ethics, but then so does error theory, and even divine command theory has its issues. The nutshell version is that no specific meta-ethical position has been demonstrated to be necessarily inconsistent with ethics and morals as they exist in the real world. As always, it's useful to keep the Duhem-Quine thesis in mind, to wit, any system can be made consistent in its major premises by an adjustment of its minor or tertiary premises.

As a consequence, where you end up on morals depends to a large extent upon where you began, being limited more by the assumptions you conceive as reasonable in the beginning than any of the chess moves that you make further down the line. You have certain requirements and propositions that you hold true, some of which, if questioned, lead to other equitably reasonable meta-ethical stances. That you are unwilling to enlarge your mind to entertain the larger domain of meta-ethics, and not just solely with regard to naturalism, is a you problem, not a me problem, or a them problem, lol.

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I was going to post a variant of the trolley problem meme attached just below, but am limited in my tools atm, so I'll just describe it. Instead of the trolley being diverted to either a single person or multiple persons, it would include a third path that runs headlong into a church. "Problem solved!", lol

A moral statement either is or is not true (can or cannot be true), no matter who utters it, or whether anyone is motivated or compelled to adhere to it.


You might not be accounting for the difference between metaethical statements, and statements of practical motivation..and, similarly, between descriptive subjectivity or relativity and metaethical relativity and subjectivity.

Adding or removing gods does not alter or effect any objective metaethical conclusion. It can..however, alter descriptively subjective or relative moral conclusions.

Would you -like- to understand these things? So that you might, for example, understand why an atheist might adhere to an objective moral sytem..and why..for example, your system of favor seeking is not a moral system at all..objective or otherwise?



The short version of a long story, is that moral realism or objectivism is so incredibly simple and intuitive to us, and we're so completely dedicated to acting it out all day every day, that it's surprises me when the faithful or the faithless fail to understand it (regardless of whether they agree with it).



If we understand badness to have -anything- to do with harm, for example, then the statement x is bad purports to report a fact about that act - not about someone's motivation, or some gods decrees.


It either does or does not cause the specified harm. That's it, that's all.

You might notice that god based moralities hijack this? That it's insisted by the faithful that there is some specific harm to the bad x's - the problem being how often they either fail to report facts accurately..or, indeed, invent non facts whole cloth.


You might not think that your god or your religion does that, but I assume you're at least vaguely aware of when other god based..supposedly moral..supposedly objective...systems do so?


You might also notice (either in your own or others) that gods are said to dislike things or make prohibitions against things with no moral import whatsoever. Items like ritual construction and purity. Dietary restrictions?

Now, to sum it all up..it actually would be a pretty safe bet that a person who genuinely believes that that no moral statement has any objective warrant is sick, and prone to do terrible shit - but, in mere reality..no one believes you when you say this. They think that you're adding dishonesty to ignorance.


Would that be bad..do you think? Howsabout your god? Got a position on dishonesty? Your comments themselves are evidence of your compulsion to do so...so, it seems like we have a little microcosm for testing all your questions about objectivity, warrant, motivation, and it's relationship to the real or hypothetical divine...just in that.

Endtimer:


Since I've come to understand your point, I can't say this discussion has been fruitless; painful perhaps, but far from fruitless. I'll use your post to illustrate something to someone who thinks. Wilgrea7, this woman has demonstrated exactly what we've been talking about for a while now, so I'm going to demonstrate the untenability of Godless morality using her ideas as a foil. That way something sensible can result from my interaction with her and perhaps objective third parties can come to see what I'm talking about.

She starts her reply by indicating that morality is sourced from individual wants. She quickly refutes herself, but I'll stick to debunking her claims for now (you might want to read the quoted text in its entirety for context). If morals really did come from what people want, then the Holocaust would certainly be the greatest moral accomplishment in the history of the world as it fulfilled Hitler's desires admirably.

She undoes herself by following her first point with a short paragraph where she struggles to demonstrate innate human goodness through evolutionary appeal. I'm not one to reference Richard Dawkins but she might want to read The Selfish Gene. Contrary to her Powerpuff Girls influenced fantasy, humans are demonstrably bad. We've been at war throughout our existence and when we take time off from that, it's to enjoy the spoils of battles won: captive women, slaves, stolen goods and property. If her argument here is that we naturally manifest (what her Christianity-influenced mind considers) moral sentiment it is only because we live in a civilization only 3% as old as the time we've spent on this earth. Furthermore, her point about survival being contingent on empathy is as ludicrous as it is absurd. Empathy is hardly an important trait in determining the survival of a species; not to mention that survival cannot be seen as determinant of morality because it often involves killing (another thing most Christian-influenced atheist minds consider bad). If that was the case anything required for survival (essentially doing your part in perpetuating your genetic heritage) would be moral. Things like killing, stealing, rape, theft, and most of the other things constitutions ban would be alright depending on the situation.

Next, is another short paragraph where she states that her happiness about the wellbeing of others is enough to bring about morality. If people should do good things only because they make us happy, then the same can be said about bad things. No sensible person can honestly believe this (as we'll see at the end of her post). Once again she fails to grasp that some people do not think like she does and solipsistically declares that people will be good little boys and behave in the absence of objective morals because it makes her happy to see others happy. It also made Nazis happy to throw people in gas chambers and Bin Laden happy when the second plane hit the building. Furthermore, no adult should believe that goodness is contingent on our happiness because happiness is a flimsy emotion. One moment we wish to be alone in the world and the next to be surrounded by friends and family. Emotional transience would render all morals super-arbitrary as they not only change when one person's happiness fades but were never even in place as different people are made happy by different things. Some people would be happy if we all died so they could claim our land.

She says something about Saudi's.

Then, she assumes the ironic position of the holier-than-thou atheist by borrowing my morals and attacking me for believing in a God that commands the "suffering of innocents"; all this despite having stated her disbelief in objective morality elsewhere. How can I be bad, if good and bad are matters of personal taste. Isn't that just her isolated, valueless opinion.

Finally, she proves my point by accusing me of evil and demanding my immediate arrest and imprisonment without the possibility of bail and without a fair trial, all because I, the Christian, am a mass shooter and arsonist (I'm as shocked as you are, as I was just informed). Her last paragraph is proof of what I've been saying all along: she wants me locked up for not believing what she believes. The significance of this is that atheist morality is dependent on personal opinion. Our laws are codified morals and would-be tyrants would have me (and all other believers) locked up for believing a logically unassailable position (moral contingence on deity). Ironically, from her post history she feels oppressed as an atheist in Nigeria, but finds it within herself to call for the arrest of someone for believing in God. I'm curious as to whose morals would inevitably lead to totalitarianism as they aren't morals at all; just what she woke up feeling.

Sorry for the long text. I'm tired so I'll post my proposed solution to Christian antinomianism some other day. Happy independence.

Would it matter what anyone's argument actually was if you couldn't do simple logic, and was bad at words as well?

You need to start over, lol.

TenQ:

Is your argument that complexity is not relative!?

I'm asking you what -you- think, lol. Do I..in fact, have a FREEWILL?

If so, not only is gods moral code not objective - according to you, it is also unbinding, and not a law (objective or otherwise) to me...a man - also according to you.

So, yet again, which of you two assholes has it right?

And by the way, I'm surprised you even know what the word "coherent" means because you have been anything but coherent thus far...

TenQ:

So you have only conscience but no freewill?

Yes, those are the questions. On the one hand, you claim that complex things require a designer- an intelligence.

On the other, you claim that complex things like ant hills and bee hives -do not- require a designer, an intelligence.

Which one of those two assholes has it right?


Just as I wonder which of you two assholes that tell us gods moral code is subjective...and that tell us gods moral code is objective..has it right.

At some point, you have to pick a lane, I'm afraid.


You think one or the other contradictory thing which you've said - and I don't think there's any point in continuing until you can decide for yourself which one it is..in this, and other, contexts.


Or, I can remain silent, and allow you to continue to make a fool of yourself. Never got resolution on that one.

TenQ:

So, the environment is intelligent!?

And ants and bees are not intelligent!?

SMH!!

Are we abandoning morality and biology for FREEWILL?

TenQ:

Since you have a conscience, has your conscience EVER forced you to do anything against your FREEWILL?

Next time, Analyse your thoughts before posting!

Excellent, so you don't believe that processes are necessarily intelligent.

Heredity is a biological process.

Another item on the list checked off.

Do you believe in FREEWILL though?

TenQ:

Ands are NOT intelligent!
Bees are NOT intelligent !!
Governments are not intelligent!!!

Which school did you attend please, maybe I should transfer my studentship. They are doing a good job with you.

Khai:
Wannabe Atheist reasoning at its best!

If you believe that dna requires a coder or programmer..you're in luck.

In a naturalistic world, the environment codes and programs dna.

In fairness..in a god-breathed world..the environment is -still- the thing that codes and programs dna...in much the same way that people use computers, in mere reality, to write code for us.

Do you think that the environment is intelligent?

Do you think that code generating computers are intelligent?

TenQ:

Does the DNA contain data?
Does the DNA contain information?
Does the DNA contain instructions?

If you don't understand the above, where does the information regarding the color of your eyes, hair type and color, etc located. In your spleen!? LOL!

Even though no where have I said the DNA is a code in this thread, but it is.

Intact if you know anything about OOP in computer science you will understand why it is a strong PARALLEL between computer code and the DNA.

Not in point of fact, and certainly not morally...lol.


He can suggest whatever he likes, and stomp his foot when people do otherwise..like inventing biofuels that work with standard combustion engines..but something tells me you want more than that, for your god?


More than a small minded engineer who could never comprehend what other and even more brilliant uses people might come up for his invention...

throwing a fit, and threatening people who won't friend him.

I'll say this, you won't listen, and your own posts will be a shitshow forever...but. You need to start over.


None of whatever you've been ingesting works.

TenQ:

Does the maker of an internal combustion engine reserve the right to specify the fuel that it should be powered with?

YOU SAID: "You still don't get itnas you are so naive. Ice crystals not water I presume you mean to say is NOT a system. If it is what are the functionalities?"



I'm not asking you anything about systems, I'm suggesting that there's something between intelligently designed and random..and..from this response, it looks like you're fully aware that there is.

So I don't need to argue anything. QED, your logic was hot garbage.

It's not actually the case, even according to you, that things are either intelligently created or random.


YOU SAID:
"Why don't you respond to my questions?"


Is lying wrong subjectively..or objectively? I think the better questions for you to be asking are:

A: Who told you any of this stuff you've told us, and why do they think so little of you?

B: Why did you believe them?

C: Why are you so ill-prepared for the many answers to your inane questions that you have demonstrably received?

You can't do anything about A. Other people do what they do, think of you what they do..in the end.

You can't do anything about B, it's in the past, already happened.

You could, though, do something about C. You could pay attention, you could learn. In some future conversation, you could represent your beliefs well..instead of...whatever this has been.

TenQ:

You still don't get itnas you are so naive. Ice crystals not water I presume you mean to say is NOT a system. If it is what are the functionalities?

Why didn't you respond to my questions?
When you see a house, you don't assume it built itself
When you see a helicopter, you don't assume metals just randomly glued themselves together
When you see a computer, you doesn't ever thing itself assembled itself.

All these are systems any one can say the function of their components.

@bold You can feel sorry for whomever you like, but feeling sorry for people is non-cognitive..and you're..ostensibly, having some disagreement over facts, not your feels.

TenQ:


You fall my hands again big time.

Water molecules now a system!?

Do you understand what you are even writing?

Let me ask you, what is the function of the water system (for every system has a purpose)?
To help you;
A House is a very SIMPLISTIC system!
It has a roof to protect against sun and rain
It has windows for visibility and ventilation .
It has doors for security
It may have specialised compartments as sleeping rooms, kitchen, latest rooms etc

What is the function of "water system"?


You've said nothing here!

You are a system consisting of eyes for navigation, limbs for mobility, nostrils for perception of smell, ears for hearing etc. A wonder of God.

A bacteria is a system consisting of every part to inject food, to reproduce, to move, irritability, respiration, excretion etc

It still doesn't dawn on you that these are SYSTEMS and as such could not be a product of random collection of atoms!?

SMH!
I'm so so sorry for you!

You may accept it as the truth. The rest of us do not. Therefore it is subjective truth: things true or false with respect to whether or not a person holds to them, not true or false with respect to whether or not they accurately report the facts they purport to report.


That's actually why I don't find your lines of questioning/argument credible.

We're all very aware of the difference...by personal experience. That you feel compelled to go out and say these things..anyway, is nothing more than a product of shamans and witchdoctors telling people who they don't respect silly things..


and you people then go out into the world to show other people who don't listen to their shamans and witchdoctors... just how little their own religious betters think of them.


It's disrespectful, and bad....objectively.

Many of your arguments are based on contemporary apologism, which is geared towards the assumption of subjective and relativistic values in it's audience. It's a cold call script.

Nothing new to see here

TenQ:

Do you need to accept anything!?
No!

As it doesn't change the truth.

It is called "evolution" for a reason. Species "evolved" to eat or be eaten and protected themselves. Not that it happened overnight, but the idea is that small mutations/advantages matter.


Be just 1% faster and you don't get eaten. A bit of scaley shell might save your life. No real eye, but a slight perception of light means a predator. A bigger tail means a bit more escape.

It doesn't take much advantage to pass your genes on. A .001% advantage works just fine in the long run. Evolution is just a matter of small changes over time.

Consider the eye (a favorite of "intellegent design". No fish ever woke up and thought "wow, I have an eye and I can see". First, there were light-detecting cells. Then some sea-creatures had a DNA change that focussed cupped the light slightly. It went on from there.

All evolution is, is the slight advantage of minor physical variations among individuals. Most variations are not beneficial and so are not passed along to offspring. Some are neutral. A very few are beneficial and give an advantage to the offspring.


Regarding your specific question, once intelligence evolved among humans for the same advantageous reasons, group competition favored those who could gain favor with others.


This required cooperation. "Conscience" probably came from a need to understand what others were thinking and how to get along with them best. As in "if I don't steal their fruit, maybe they won't steal mine".


I'm not saying that is proven. It is just a best understanding at the moment. That can be debated. But the general idea of evolution cannot. It seems pretty solid.

TenQ:

Can you please show the Evidence to prove that conscience EVOLVED and from what?

LOL!

YOU SAID: "So why are you commenting on morality and the subject of subjectivity or objectivity?"


So I should not have said anything, and let you continue to make a fool of yourself?


YOU SAID:
"When did I post this?"


It's possible that I've misunderstood you, especially since you're committed to novel uses of the terms.


I guess I could always ask again: Do you believe that gods moral code is subjective? That there's nothing really wrong with x, y, or z. That right and wrong are -whatever- god decides they are?

If so, it would be incorrect to state that something was really right or really wrong with x y or z.

If so, it would be delusional to believe as much.

Do you think that incorrect and delusional beliefs are warranted?

TenQ:

So why are you commenting on morality and the subject of subjectivity or objectivity?

When did I post this?


Like their father, always lying!

Does your god hand craft every single snowflake..or is there something..even in your own beliefs..between intelligently created, and random?


I only ask because..whenever I see something that is meaningfully complex but not man made..I think it's that thing in the middle.


One of the many instances of things which were not created by any intelligent being, but also not random.

If I saw my name written in the sand in the beach..I;d assume some guy named DJ wrote his name in the sand in the beach before I got there.


Crazy I know! It must be an all powerful magician what scribbled two letters in the sand..obviously

Not waterbugs. Not Some Guy, not me in a weird instance of forgetting things or just flat out seeing things..even though we do that, alot....


Nope. The omnipresent master of the universe. Must be that, because the only other thing it could be..is Random™....and it just can't be random.........

TenQ:

DNA is now evolution!?

You must have mixed me up with someone as I did not use your examples for anything nor did you even present any credible examples!

DNA is a library of DATA and INSTRUCTIONS for the growing, building, maintenance and sustenance of cells in an organism. It is an example of a Complex System.

The question I asked you which you've been dodging is:

Whenever you see a complex system or meaningful interaction of data and instructions, do you assume it happened by accident or that a non-intelligent source made it?

Yes, logic is very simple..and you've routinely contradicted your own

Even gone sofar as to cover god with your own logical missteps

Is that a problem for you, or for a god?

TenQ:

Thanks for the observation: corrected!

Logic is very simple
If A>B (Postulate 1)
and
If B>C (Postulate 2)
THEN
A>C (Conclusion)

Is your faith in god based on misunderstanding morality and rejecting biology, TenQ?

Yes? Then lol

No? Then why would the answers to any moral or biological questions be relevant?

You're not just wasting other peoples time, you're wasting your own. Or, if you prefer, you're wasting the time god gave us all.

What do you think he thinks about that?

No, the question of moral objectivity doesn't have anything to do with subjective plans or designs or how any subject..including gods... want things to go.

Crazy ex-girlfriends who stalk or slash tires also have plans, also have designs, also want things to go a certain way.

The question of moral objectivity is whether or not there's something about an act or deed, the object..rather than the person doing it or watching it, the subject, that is wrong as a matter of fact, not wrong as a matter of being counter to their opinions or wishes.

Do you believe that there's really something wrong with things like incest or rape or murder..or are these things only bad insomuch as god has other plans?


If an ideology proposing a subjective moral code is a bad thing, and that's one of the problems with atheism as you see it, and as you've said in thread...then wouldn't this also mean that it's a problem with your god beliefs, which you have categorized as subjective.... as well?

As far as missed oppurtunities..and taking the time to familiarize yourself with moral objectivity....a gods moral statement could be objective insomuch as it purports to report a fact, and accurately reports that fact. If a god says that something is A Bad Thing™, but what it means is that this thing is not according their silly plan..the issuer has misreported a purported fact.


This is all a fancy way of saying..in short..that god bullshitted you...according to you.


That's why I keep trying to point you to the offramp. I'm fairly certain you don't want to suggest or imply that your own god is a shameless lying piece of shit whose only metrics for proper snd improper acts are base self interest and the minutiae of some opaque and personal plan.


In between moments of claiming that gods morality is subjective, and that god-subjective is man-objective, you also babble about god having REASONS, and those REASONS being beneficial to us somehow..etc.

Well..that's not subjectivity. That's objective utilitarianism.


Of course, god can't actually change the outcomes of objective utilitarianism at a whim....so that's a problem for some of the other things you've been calling gods subjectivity.

TenQ:

You are making no sense here.

However about if an objective law can be wrong (if I get you correctly).

It's all about Design and Purpose of the Custodian/Owner/Manufacturer of the people concerned.
Example:
The maker of an internal combustion engine says use Petrol Only as fuel?

Is he (the manufacturer) wrong?

Does it mean that one cannot use other fuel type such as Butane, Alcohol or Kerosene?

The question truely is:
Was the engine designed to use alternate fuel? And
Is it in the best interest of the engine to use alternate fuel?

The manufacturer cannot in that sense be wrong!

Can the Government be wrong in giving objective laws to the people?

Crystal clear


I'm not interested in laws like that - moral or legal

And you've already explained that the assumption of such laws is unwarranted, delusional, and incorrect.

TenQ:

I believe I am not making myself clear and explicit.

1. God's moral laws for man is Objective for man.
The implication:
We can't modify God's law, not explain it away. God's law of morality binds us absolutely

2. God's moral law for man is Subjective to God.
The implication:
God can modify the laws he gives you man (even though He seldom does that). God has every right to change His law to man. God is NOT subject to His own laws.
As an example:
A Miracle is the suspension of the Natural laws set by God for a purpose.

I hope I've made myself clearer now!