Do atheists have any kind of moral compass?

Question

I'm not trying to be rude but i want to know what reason does an atheist have to be kind or charitable or any other "good" quality? It seems like they could do whatever they want with no consequences.

Answer 1

being atheist is not moral, what good comes from sons of the devil?

Answer 2

No consequences? I don't think so. Everything has consequences. It is called causality. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Besides, doing what is right and good, just for the sake of doing it is much more noble than doing it to gain brownie points with "god" or to escape punishment. I personally live a life that is far above "christian" standards. I want to feel good about who I am and what I do, but most importantly I want to make the world a better place because I was here.

Answer 3

I can only answer for myself ok. I am have never met or talked with another atheists.Nor do I subscribe to any atheists magazines or read any books about it.
I simply treat others with the same respect ,decency, kindness I want given to me.I don't need the fear of " consequences " to treat others in charitable ,kind,decent,respect full ways.I have found in my life that people will always surprise you with their kindness or with their cruelness. I have personally witnessed a many "godly" person commit terrible acts of cruelness as well as great acts kindness. A person being religious does not guarantee that they will have "good" qualities and be kind.

Answer 4

I could be wrong(I'm not an aeithiest), but I've known one for a while. I think they follow the golden rule. Treat others as u'd like to be treated. If u think about it, that rule really covers it all. It's basically #2 on the commandment list, and it envelopes almost all of the commandments on that list, which is why the Lord only said that in reality, the tablets could contain only two commandments, and still be ok in God's eyes. Athiests do have morals and ethics; they do know right from wrong. They obey the laws set by our "God believing" society, and then they just think a bit and see if they'd want someone to treat them the way they're about to treat others; and that's their moral compass. This is my opinion.

Answer 5

You know what freaks me out about this question? Not that it's been asked a zillion times. But that if so many believers are puzzled as to why an atheist has morals, it means these believers draw all of their moral sense from their belief (the only difference between them and an atheist). If those believers ever lost their faith... well, would they become serial killers?

So, again. No, morality does not necessarily come from god. It comes from your sense of what's right and wrong. And you don't need to go to mass every Sunday to know that killing, robbing, raping, or even lying (in this last case, if this is for a bad purpose), are morally wrong.

Answer 6

ok, I'm not an Atheist, but seriously....is the only reason you do good and avoid bad because you think you are being watched? Are you the type of person who only obeys the law when the police are around? You are not truly law-abiding if this is the case. You just don't want to get caught. That is not morality but cowardice.

Answer 7

The human sense of morality arises from logical thinking. What we call "moral" behavior is what we do if we understand that we must share the world with others, and so need to care for them as we would have them care for us.

It should be obvious that (with notable exceptions) few "religious" people do that kind of thinking, and that, in fact, most religious "morality" is part of a system that justifies hatred and oppression.

Basing one's morality on belief in a god who will set your pants on fire if you don't behave to suit your grandmother is a major cause of everyday mental illness. Clearly mental illness does not lead to the kind of logical thinking that leads people to live in a morally sound way.

So you just have to think it through and do what is best for as much of humankind and your neighbors as you can contrive to do.

And don't go pestering people about religion. It's immoral.

Answer 8

Every society, community, and family has set standards for what is right and what is wrong. It doesn't have to come from religion, those outside of that get it from their environment. After all, I'm sitting at home this evening playing on this site rather then going out and acting like a "heathen" and terrorizing my area. We have laws, communities, friends, and families to answer to if we were to be in a way that is less then how we should be.

Answer 9

I'm athiest, and my suprevisor wrote in a review that I had a high moral character. We've never talked about religion.

There are consequences to every act either for oneself or for others. It's not hard to understand that one's environment, if not the world, will be better off if we treat eachother better.

Answer 10

The consequences anybody, religious or not faces will happen mostly during life. Like if you're mean to someone, you can't just ask them for ten bucks.
I know a few atheists that are good people, here's what they tell me.

They treat others as they would like to be treated.

Answer 11

From the purely greedy point of view, it is in my best interests to behave myself. If I decide to go murdering people, it won't be long before the law catches up with me and I am put in prison or put to death.

But humans evolved with two interesting qualities -- empathy and altruism. These can be nicely summed up in words as, "Do not do to others what you would not want done to you." So evolution has set the core thought of morality in most humans. When empathy fails but altruism does not, you have sociopathy. When altruism fails but empathy does not, you have psychopathy. When both fail, wellllll... you've got a life-long prison goer on your hands.