Atheists the existence of moral absolutes (such as justice, truth, good, etc.) can only be?

Question

explained by an infinite Moral Lawgiver, or God.Ethics are not merely a matter of convention, agreement, intuition, or genetic programming, but instead reveal the existence of a Moral Lawgiver whose ethical nature provides an adequate foundation for moral absolutes in human society.for example, the Nazi Holocaust against the Jews was not merely subjectively wrong or evil, but objectively and absolutely evil.individuals might consider it evil through intuition, societies might judge it by its social destructiveness, and communities might agree that it is evil because the majority of people agree; but none of those subjective, human-based ethics can adequately account for the absolute ethic that it is always and absolutely wrong to do these things - or, for example, to torture innocent children. Such absolute ethics are not dependent on human thought or conscience, but on the Moral Lawgiver who is beyond the limits of the universe in which we live, RIGHT???

Answer 1

Darwinian thoughts on survival of the fittest certainly does nothing to explain the development of empathy, conscience, or even consciousness. These things cannot be explained by Freud's notion of the superego either. We see empathy in several parts of the animal kingdom as well. An atheist typically reaches for Jeremy Bentham's notion of "utilitarianism" as an exxplanation for morals. However, as yet another irrefutable philosophical concept, it cannot be further studied by science or philosophy. You can take it on faith or not, but not on logic. It takes just as much faith to be an atheist as it does to adhere to any other notion on the beginning of the universe.

If a person maintains that they do not understand creation and cannot rule out intelligent design that is one thing. Denying intelligent design, however is an affirmatin which demands proof as surely as those who deny chance circumstance as an origin. Both are equally matters of faith.

Empathy, disgust at the thought of killing humans, stealing, lying, etc. all indicate a human nature which cannot be sensibly explained by a "survival of the fittest" paradigm. Philosophers like to call this "natural law," but without a Lawgiver, they are at a loss to explain it. I believe in a moral Lawgiver. Not only is it a reasonable line of thought, but experientially, it is proven to my satisfaction. If only I had some way to share the revelation with those unwilling to attempt to discern. Yet, it is not a matter of intellect alone, but also of gratitude, selflessness, and love.

Answer 2

Why would you think that?

I'm an atheist and a moral absolutist. I also believe in physical absolutes, such as the speed of light in a vacuum, the magnitude of the gravitational constant, the Ideal Gas Law, etc. None of those is dependent on either human convention or some outside "thing".

Respectfully, you have been the victim here of your limited imagination. Absolute morality does not depend on the existence of a "Moral Lawgiver". Good thing - such a morality would be terribly shallow and frankly infantile. I expect far stronger foundations for morality.

Answer 3

There are no moral absolutes, and I challenge anyone to come up with an example. @INNOCENT VICTIM "Here's a moral absolute for you. There is no situation in which it is moral to cause harm to a child" It is harmful to a child to amputate a limb. A child has a leg inoperably infused with gangrene. What is your "absolute moral" solution? Here is a classic "ethics" dilemma: You are a railroad switchman. A train full of home-bound passengers and children returning from a class daytrip is hurtling down a track toward a switch between 2 tracks. On the default track "A", you see a child step onto the track and start walking down it. On the other track "B", a workcrew is doing track repair. A rail is missing and others are loosened. You have no ability to sound an alarm or to halt the train - only the ability to choose a track for the train to follow. Which track do you choose?

Answer 4

There are no moral absolutes. Even Hitler believed he was doing something beneficial. If anything was absolute, there would be complete agreement among everyone, and there never is.

"Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. The truly civilized man is always skeptical and tolerant.

H. L. Mencken, Minority Report (1956)


"Whenever morality is based on theology, whenever right is made dependent on divine authority, the most immoral, unjust, infamous things can be justified and established.

Ludwig Feuerbach (1804-1872)
German philosopher

Answer 5

You'r getting quite a reaction, LOL but you are right.
So far the points against you have been (broadly classed)
1 it is good for society to have morals
2 we evolved morals like other animals
3 there is no such thing

#1
We know that it is a good thing for society to have morals, society cannot exist without morals. But like any law there needs to be a law-giver. if every one defines there own morals there is no meaning to the word moral. This ties into my answer for point

#2
Herd instinct and morals are two separate things. Animals flock together for safety, possibly companionship, but they don't have a sense of fairness, ..., right, wrong. Humans have morals instilled in them from birth.
#3
Then you won't mind if I decide to kill you, right?

This is a very deep question to be online, you need a whole book to work this out, a good one is "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis, he answers this question very specifically.

Answer 6

Wrong, so naively and utterly wrong

There has been much written about how a sense of morality may have evolved, and how it was beneficial to survival of both individuals with altruistic genes surviving and being passed on, similarly with beneficial memes in groups. Religious beliefs are actually a collection of memes that likely had survival benefits when man was evolving. I suggest Richard Dawkins most recent book (The God Delusion), and as well as Michael Shermer's "The Science of Good and Evil"

I'm not going to try and summarize it all in a sentence or two, as it would give short shrift to the ideas, and I think you should do the reading yourself. Christians are often quite lazy when it comes to actually researching the "other sides" point of view. You tend to get your science, archeology and history in small easily digestible distorted chunks from sites like Dr Dino or Answers in Genesis which you then regurgitate without actually understanding. It is so painfully obvious you don't understand the science. If you REALLY want to have an intelligent conversation with non-believers, you have to read books OTHER than the bible.

Secondly it is quite clear that morals derived from scripture are culturally based. Holding up the bible as the inerrant word of god, and as the guide book for human morality is fraught with problems. Yes there are some moral lessons....The Golden Rule, don't kill, don't lie etc. ( There are some nice moral lessons in Harry Potter, too.) But since bible believers clearly pick and choose which biblical moral standards to follow, it can't be held up as a repository of moral absolutes. You are actually deciding on your own instinctively which biblical morals feel right, and which ones you pretend aren't there....those instincts have shifted with mans social evolution.

For example, the bible says to stone to death a disobedient child. The bible says it is okay to beat your slaves as long as you don't kill them. The bible holds Lot to be a "just and righteous" man, even though he offers his virgin daughters up to be gangbanged, and later gets drunk and impregnates them. Those are just 3 examples, there are dozens of appalling and disgusting examples of biblical "morality" that modern christians simply ignore, so clearly, morality is not god-given, it is a human imperative.

As a society we know longer think taking other people as slaves is moral, yet slavery is assumed in the bible....and NOT just the OT, Jesus makes reference to slaves and how they should obey their masters, and makes no comments on the immorality of such practices. We don't think of women as chattel anymore (well, most of us) though clearly in the bible, males are dominant and females are possessions. Look at the commandment to not covet your neighbours wife, ox, donkey or other possessions.

The bible clearly espouses many acts and beliefs that modern man considers immoral. It is a faulty reference for moral absolutes, and shows the writer to be a cruel, vindictive, vicious, capricious, jealous, evil and repulsive being. If that is your "infinite moral lawgiver"....frankly, you can have him/it. What you are saying in effect is, the only thing that keeps YOU personally from running wild raping and killing, is the fear of god's punishment...I feel very sad for you.

God IS imaginary.
Belief in gods IS delusional

Answer 7

Nothing sillier than christians trying to use logic

Stick to faith, you look less sillier.

Morals are found in cultures that have never had any outside contact. If people are going to live in groups they are going to have to have a set of rules that are fair to everyone and in those situations they will all come up with the same basic principles.

If you can't decide it's wrong to torture innocent children without your god telling you it's wrong, I pity you, beacuse you would be a pathetic human being.

Answer 8

Nope.

Among the many myths associated with religion, none is more widespread - or more disastrous in its effects - than the myth that moral values cannot be divorced from the belief in a god. Perhaps the most common criticism of atheism is the claim that it leads inevitably to moral bankruptcy; and perhaps the strongest psychological bond to religion is the conviction, held implicitly by many people, that to abandon theism is to abandon morality as well.

This identification of ethics with religion has no basis in fact, and few theologians care to defend such a position explicitly. It functions, instead, as a kind of underlying assumption, apparently in the hope that if it goes unstated, it will also go unchallenged. However, not only are religion and ethics distinct spheres, but a theological approach to ethics, a moral theory based on divine will, is inimical to human life and happiness - and thus negates the foundation of rational ethics.

Answer 9

well that is a matter of opinion now isn't it? since there is no proof either way I guess those of us who have faith will just have to wait and see, and those of us who don't will also find out one way or another now won't we? I personally do not believe that it takes a god for us to have morals and a conscience and have decent morals and standards at that

Answer 10

You don't have very much faith in mankind do you? That's like saying we're all stupid and evil just because your god gave us morals. Without him. Why. We might just be killing, raping, abusing and torturing one another. Oh wait. We are.