This post is a challenge to evangelicals (and non-evangelicals) everywhere.
I am tired of hearing day-after-day that "atheists don't have a source for morality". It gets repeated endlessly on the internet. I am told repeatedly that Dostoevsky destroyed atheism when he said "If God does not exist, everything is permitted." (Even though he apparently never said that.)
I have yet to see a debate ANYWHERE in ANY FORMAT where the "defender of religion" did not bring up this argument.
Stop.
Stop it now.
You're making yourself look ridiculous.
Let me explain why. Your argument is that morals derive from religion. By accepting the Bible as true, you are given an absolute set of morals. Without this, there is only moral relativism. Sure, an atheist may be able to fashion a system of morals, but you will never be able to explain why that system should be followed.
This is stupid.
I've heard several responses to this argument, all of them devastating. I think Richard Dawkins is unanswerable when he points out that you do not, in fact, accept the Bible as absolute. You do not burn witches, or stone people who work on the sabbath, or kill homosexuals as the Bible commands. (Although, to be fair, your religion certainly used to do these things.) In modern times, however, you view these ideas as immoral - and you use some outside system of morals to make that assessment.
But I'm not going to rely on that.
My argument is this. By your own argument, atheists have no grounded system of morals and religious people do. Your system of morals is contained in the Bible. Once you accept the Bible, all else flows and moral relativism is avoided.
Now, remember, as an outsider I can't be convinced by arguments of good and bad because (according to you) I don't understand those things.
This question is unanswerable.
It destroys the atheist=immoral framework you have tried to build. No one is born believing the Bible to be true. At some point, each believer must accept the Bible as True. Why not accept utilitarianism, or humanism, or Buddhism, or Islam at that point? Sure, I may have an "absolute system of morals" once I accept the Bible, but the initial requirement of choice makes this system just as "arbitrary" as any other.
I personally believe that our morals come from our personal emotions, our parents, our society, and our experiences - but I don't have to justify that right now. All I am saying is that you are just as arbitrary in choosing your system of beliefs as an atheist. Stop pretending otherwise.
(There. Now I can just link to this post each time I hear this stupid, stupid argument.)
I am tired of hearing day-after-day that "atheists don't have a source for morality". It gets repeated endlessly on the internet. I am told repeatedly that Dostoevsky destroyed atheism when he said "If God does not exist, everything is permitted." (Even though he apparently never said that.)
I have yet to see a debate ANYWHERE in ANY FORMAT where the "defender of religion" did not bring up this argument.
Stop.
Stop it now.
You're making yourself look ridiculous.
Let me explain why. Your argument is that morals derive from religion. By accepting the Bible as true, you are given an absolute set of morals. Without this, there is only moral relativism. Sure, an atheist may be able to fashion a system of morals, but you will never be able to explain why that system should be followed.
This is stupid.
I've heard several responses to this argument, all of them devastating. I think Richard Dawkins is unanswerable when he points out that you do not, in fact, accept the Bible as absolute. You do not burn witches, or stone people who work on the sabbath, or kill homosexuals as the Bible commands. (Although, to be fair, your religion certainly used to do these things.) In modern times, however, you view these ideas as immoral - and you use some outside system of morals to make that assessment.
But I'm not going to rely on that.
My argument is this. By your own argument, atheists have no grounded system of morals and religious people do. Your system of morals is contained in the Bible. Once you accept the Bible, all else flows and moral relativism is avoided.
But why should I choose to believe in the Bible?
Now, remember, as an outsider I can't be convinced by arguments of good and bad because (according to you) I don't understand those things.
This question is unanswerable.
It destroys the atheist=immoral framework you have tried to build. No one is born believing the Bible to be true. At some point, each believer must accept the Bible as True. Why not accept utilitarianism, or humanism, or Buddhism, or Islam at that point? Sure, I may have an "absolute system of morals" once I accept the Bible, but the initial requirement of choice makes this system just as "arbitrary" as any other.
I personally believe that our morals come from our personal emotions, our parents, our society, and our experiences - but I don't have to justify that right now. All I am saying is that you are just as arbitrary in choosing your system of beliefs as an atheist. Stop pretending otherwise.
(There. Now I can just link to this post each time I hear this stupid, stupid argument.)
10 comments:
I think I had a pretty crack take at this issue a while back. The bottom line is that no factual state of the world: even the fact of there being a god or not, can make something moral or immoral. All moral values have to start from some arbitrary assumption.
At least atheists, when they start simply with empathy for other human beings, are getting right to the point. Theists have to start with the idea that they should value what God wants, then they have to figure out what God wants, and then FINALLY maybe get to the idea that maybe rape is a bad thing (though you won't hear that mentioned in the Bible: only endorsed as a sometimes practice of the Israelites conquering other people and saving the virgins as spoils)
Bad, if one were to accept the idea of God as omnipotent then it must be the case that he can create objective moral truths. The big problem is that there are really no argument that I should or shouldn't do something absent the existence of objective moral truths. The argument, which I used to make quite often, that atheists get their morality from empathy is simply not true. We get our impetus to act as we do from our empathy, but that is not morality, it is in fact the opposite.
That said: yes, theists are in fact picky about which biblical morals they accept, which makes them no "better" than atheists insofar as an objective basis for their morality is concerned.
you use some outside system of morals to make that assessment
The best and oldest response -- it comes from Plato's Euthyphro. If God holds something to be good if and only if it is good, then there is some standard of good external to God. And if something is good if and only if God holds it to be good, then "good" is completely arbitrary, and rape, murder, theft, blasphemy, genocide, lying, necrophilia, coprophagia, etc. would be good if God favored them, which is absurd.
By your own argument, atheists have no grounded system of morals and religious people do. Your system of morals is contained in the Bible.
That's not their claim; their claim is that morals come from God.
Now, remember, as an outsider I can't be convinced by arguments of good and bad because (according to you) I don't understand those things.
So what? That you can't be convinced that something is bad doesn't mean it isn't bad.
Sure, I may have an "absolute system of morals" once I accept the Bible, but the initial requirement of choice makes this system just as "arbitrary" as any other....All I am saying is that you are just as arbitrary in choosing your system of beliefs as an atheist.
So you claim, but they disagree. This is mere question begging. They claim that morality comes from God; saying that morality is arbitrary is mere naysaying. You have no argument here, certainly not an unanswerable one. You have to show why their claim is invalid, which the Euthryphro argument does. No atheist philosopher has ever put forth your argument because it's a crappy one.
Bad, if one were to accept the idea of God as omnipotent then it must be the case that he can create objective moral truths.
Only if objective moral truths are the sort of thing that can be created. Even an omnipotent God could not create a coat made of prime numbers.
I think I had a pretty crack take at this issue a while back.
Yes, I agree, and have long argued along these lines. "life's purpose", when no agent having that purpose for life is identified, and "objective moral truth", are semantically incoherent; no meaning can be attached to them. And thus coathangrrr's "he can create objective moral truths" is likewise semantically incoherent and thus meaningless. But I've found that, alas, most people are incapable of comprehending this objection.
jgb: I thought I would hear your response, and I almost put a note about it in my post.
I am NOT responding to the argument that says "morals come from God." I've heard Plato's response before, and I like it. I am responding to a different argument - the argument that absolute morality comes from accepting God.
Notice the difference. Under the argument you're discussing, atheists are still able to recognize right and wrong (although they apparently can't identify the source) under my argument an atheist is supposedly more likely to be a bad person.
I hear both arguments often. (For example, I heard my version just two days ago.) But I am only responding to my version.
Now if you want to explain why my response to the actual question I posed is "crappy" - go ahead.
Only if objective moral truths are the sort of thing that can be created. Even an omnipotent God could not create a coat made of prime numbers.
Who is begging the question now? If there were a God, he could, by definition, create objective moral truths. That is to say, objective moral truths are not logically impossible, merely non-existence. It isn't an argument to simply wave your hand and say "that's incoherent and impossible."
the argument that absolute morality comes from accepting God.
That just makes no sense. Absolute morality can come from God, but to say that absolute morality comes from accepting God means that I control whether or not there is absolute morality. What they generally say is that atheists have no basis for absolute morality. Or that atheists don't act moral because they don't accept God. The thing is, I agree. I don't see a basis for objective morality without God. Just because they don't actually uphold their objective morals doesn't mean that there is a theoretical problem with objective morals.
Let me put it simply. How people act has no effect whatsoever on whether or not there are objective moral truths.
oops, I didn't mean that I agree that atheists don't act moral.
That just makes no sense. Absolute morality can come from God, but to say that absolute morality comes from accepting God means that I control whether or not there is absolute morality.
Coathangrrr, I agree completely. That is what I was trying to convey with this post. The idea of an absolute that you can choose just doesn't work.
Yet I still hear it. A lot.
I hear the argument that you and others have mentioned as well (God as the source of absolute morals). But I mostly hear the one I brought up, which is normally phrased as "If you don't accept God then you won't have a set moral code to follow (the Bible) and then you will descend into moral relativism and chaos."
I was more worried about the version I responded to because it implies that Christians are more moral than atheists. The "God is the source of absolute morality" argument - while also being stupid - at least admits that everyone recognize morals.
Which version do you hear more often?
- Atheism is stupid because atheists are unable to explain some fact about the world (namely, the source of morality).
- Atheism is stupid because if everyone was atheist there would be widespread immorality.
I hear both often, but I think #2 is more dangerous and bigoted.
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