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Richard Dawkins and Alister McGrath
Root of All Evil? Uncut Interviews
From "Root of All Evil? The Uncut Interviews" 3-DVD Set
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This interview was filmed for the TV documentary "Root of All Evil?" but was left out of the final version. Time restrictions dictated that not all interviews filmed could be used. This was especially regrettable in the case of the McGrath interview, which is therefore offered here now, unedited.
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Buy it now
This interview was filmed for the TV documentary "Root of All Evil?" but was left out of the final version. Time restrictions dictated that not all interviews filmed could be used. This was especially regrettable in the case of the McGrath interview, which is therefore offered here now, unedited.
Click here to play video
Old Google video version
Click here for the QuickTime version
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Posted: Thursday, May 31, 2007 | PermalinkComments 1801 - 1850 of 2523 |
Reload Comments | Back to Top | Page Numbers1802. Comment #61972 by _J_ on August 7, 2007 at 4:55 pm
Hey, Dianelos,I think you should write the book! Don't be daunted - I reckon you'd make a good job of it. And I'd be really interested to see how it's received in the wider world.
I've not really been keeping up with this of late, just reading the odd bit here and there. (Thanks for your last substantial post to me, by the way.) Whenever I think of something to say, I'm pretty convinced that it's stuff I've already said long, long ago. So I'm trying not to just push on a roundabout.
I did take a quick look at The Hard Problem of Consciousness and the zombie thought experiment via google today, though. I'm at present pretty convinced that it's a non-argument based on a failure of conception and a mix-up between physicalism and description - but I'm still not well enough informed to argue that at any degree of detail. (However, Chalmers' zombie argument does appear to reduce to 'Physicalism is inadequate if physicalism is inadequate; and physicalism is inadequate' backed up purely with 'I think I can imagine what I'm talking about, therefore it's true' - which still doesn't impress me much. Oh, and Mary's Room seems vulnerable to several objections that make sense to me. But still, I'm not well read in this.)
Your argument still overall seems as it did when I was last posting. Though I'm behind with the details, an overall analogy for how it all feels to me could be:
It's a court case (always an obvious choice). Someone's on trial for murder. The prosecution's case is sorely short on evidence. The defence's case seems more than a decent match for it. But it's not iron clad. There are gaps in the defence. It's still just possible that the accused is guilty, but to believe as much would require a leap of imagination on the part of the jury. Sensibly, they have to conclude that the man is innocent.
But the prosecution makes an appeal along these lines. She says:
Our case works much better. You've heard the evidence for both sides. Now, if you find the accused innocent, they'll walk free. You'll know there's still a guilty party, out there somewhere. And you won't really know what the accused did on the night in question, either. All you'll have is a dead body, the knowledge that the killer is still at large and a heap of uncertainty.
But, if you find him guilty, everything then makes sense. The gaps in the evidence on both sides vanish - suddenly you know exactly what the accused was doing on the night in question. You've got one corpse and one murderer - there's no-one else out there stalking the streets. And justice will have been done, not thwarted. You can go home satisfied and peaceful.
So: find him guilty. Our case makes a coherent story with no gaps out of the evidence, whilst an innocent verdict leaves a massive gap where a murderer should be. Obviously a guilty verdict works better. And that's the most important thing.
That's pretty much how your claims for idealistic theism sound to me, and have sounded for a long time. It 'works better' in the sense that it tells a story you'd like to be true and it ties up all the loose ends in the evidence. But clearly in the above analogy the man must be found innocent. In future, more evidence my emerge that either shows him to be actually guilty and occasions a retrial (if the nation's legal system allows that!), or that shows someone else to be guilty. But on the basis of current evidence, a guilty verdict would be unwarranted. There's much too great a risk of locking up the wrong man - and leaving a guilty one free of the ongoing investigation that could catch him.
That was a very long-winded way of saying 'I'm not trying to re-enter the debate'! Take care,
J
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1803. Comment #61974 by Dianelos Georgoudis on August 7, 2007 at 5:22 pm
Phil Rimmer (post 1798, or #61954):Does my inability to see these truths condemn me to a lesser existence in some way?No, not at all. See post 1225 (or #55260) about my eschatological beliefs. I may be wrong in this or that of course, but the point is this: If I am right in my primary belief that reality consists of a perfectly good person then there is nothing to worry about :-) I can imagine some of the readers here thinking "oh, here comes Dianelos with his wishful thinking again" but, surely we agree that if reality consists of a perfectly good person then there is nothing to worry about.
Don't give me that arrogant stuff you just gave Dr.B. on how you can see it and we can't...I never said or implied that you can't see it (see post 1795). If I am right then of course you can – it's all there in everyone's normal experience of life. I don't have any special privileges.
Well of course the issue is not so much access but using that access to study that knowledge. A problem in this context is overspecialization. Another is the tendency to trivialize the ideas of others. For example you can't really say that Dawkins has studied theology, after all he ridicules the idea: "Meanwhile, we should devote as much time to studying serious theology as we devote to studying serious fairies and serious unicorns", see http://richarddawkins.net/quotes ). I do think a major problem is that people in general don't study enough, and especially both science and philosophy (including ontology).The advantage I have is access to more knowledge.Some people here probably have access to more knowledge than you and still think you're wrong.
But let's take Sam Harris: He is an academic philosopher, has studied a lot of science (is doing a PhD in science I understand), is very intelligent, and I think is an honest person who tells it as he sees it. I must say I find it surprising and a little dispiriting that people like him can get it so wrong. But then again, who knows, I might have gotten it so wrong myself. Future will tell; I trust in peoples' cognitive capacity, so if I am right humanity as a whole will move towards a theistic understanding of reality.
Other Comments by Dianelos Georgoudis
1804. Comment #61980 by Lauregon on August 7, 2007 at 5:57 pm
By "perfect memory" I meant the kind of memory a perfect person would have; hmm maybe I should have written "ideal memory" rather than "perfect memory". (Here is the original context of our discussion about God's memory from post 1749, or #61352: By knowing oneself and considering what is ideal one comes to know God, and hence reality. Take any other bit of your structure as a person, say your memory. [and so on]) - Dianelos
Premise rejected. Memory is memory. If you want to talk about not remembering what you choose to forget, please find a different term. "Memory" doesn't work.
As for the natural evils (such as natural catastrophes, illness etc) they are not individually "crafted" by God. Rather these happen within the mechanical and effectively random physical environment we experience. That environment is caused by God for a good reason, namely to give as the opportunity to grow in virtue... - Dianelos
That's a bit like a nutcase parent deliberately leaving loaded guns around in order teach his children to not play with them.
Further, the context of our discussion is how reality is, and to offer as an argument that the other party tries "to avoid facing the reality" as you understand it – is of course begging the question.- Dianelos
Assuming "God" and then proceeding with the debate positing that "God" and "God's" goals are as YOU subjectively define it and them, is interminably begging the question.
As for my dealing with psychology, you are quite right: If reality is personal then of course psychological thought is the way to understand it. - Dianelos
The common physical "reality" we live in is shared, not personal. Fruit is fruit, trees are trees, cows are cows, gravity is gravity. Psychological reality is personal. Insane people have personal realities. That doesn't mean everyone else should adopt their realities.
You insist there's a personal "God" who is a person, who has given us an environment from which we are to learn lessons "he" wants us to learn to the end of acquiring virtue (but to what ultimate end?). That is YOUR reality. You believe that holding those beliefs makes your life better than it otherwise would be. Because you think it does, you seem to believe we should adopt your reality. You are, in effect, telling us our "reality" isn't real, but that yours is. Example: Here in the US, a Bush spokesperson boasted to a journalist a few years ago that while most people live in "the reality based community," the (supposedly God-led) BA creates it own reality and the rest of America had better just accept it. We see where that has led us both globally and domestically. Understandably, private realities can be understood to be problematic.
Seems to me that if a Supreme personal "God" person existed and wanted to be known and worshipped, "God" would be clearly obvious to all without the convoluted subjective contraption (s) you (and others before you) have constructed.
Other Comments by Lauregon
1805. Comment #61981 by Dianelos Georgoudis on August 7, 2007 at 6:02 pm
_J_ (post 1802, or #61972):Interesting analogy, but I would like to suggest that a better analogy is this:
A detective must decide who did it, and there only two possible suspects, Mr M. and Mr T. After studying all available evidence the hypothesis that Mr M. did it is full of holes, hard problems still to be solved, and paradoxes, while the hypothesis that Mr. T did it exactly fits and is free of any holes, problems, or paradoxes. But Mr M. fits much better a jury's preconceptions of how who did it should look like; he is a rough, worldly, no-nonsense type of guy, whereas Mr T. is kind of a gentle Buddha who smiles all the time and likes to recite poetry. Surely our reasonable detective must conclude that Mr T. did it –notwithstanding the jury's preconceptions.
Other Comments by Dianelos Georgoudis
1806. Comment #61983 by Dianelos Georgoudis on August 7, 2007 at 6:06 pm
Well, once more I must bid everyone here good-bye. This thread kind of manages to keep being interesting, but I shall do my best not to post anymore as I have other things to attend. And please don't tempt me by asking me questions :-)But feel free to email me if you wish. My email address is my name at gmail dot com.
Fare well.
Other Comments by Dianelos Georgoudis
1807. Comment #61993 by USA_Limey on August 7, 2007 at 7:05 pm
Dianelos Georgoudis: "Fare well"{ACTION: Disappears up own ass}
... Well, if this was a movie script it would go something like that.
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1808. Comment #61996 by Dr Benway on August 7, 2007 at 7:32 pm
Dianelos:Well it's pretty clear what the scientific method is, but "ordinary rules of evidence and argument" is quite a elastic concept, isn't it? After all the use of intuition as a premise is valid in the ordinary rules of argument, but when discussing naturalism ...Stop jumping to metaphysical debate. Stop it. I'm not debating naturalism vs. idealism. How many friggin' times do I have to say? At this point, I've no respect for you, pulling the same deceptive shit for the umpteenth time.
If I told you your wife was having an affair, wouldn't you ask for evidence? Or would you say, "but what is evidence really?"
You challenge the notion of evidence, because you haven't got any.
Meaning you agree, OT god=lawgiver, not "truth"; Islamic god same, not "beauty."Benway: I agree that "God is love" is a major Christian theme. But "God is lawgiver; God is just and righteous" dominates "God is truth" in the Old Testament. In fact, I can't think of a memorable OT verse that proclaims "God is truth." Islam like Judaism is a revelation of law and justice; beauty gets less airtime. Seek and ye shall find. And that's the problem.Dianelos: Fair enough.
I still find it quite remarkable that the scripture of the three great monotheistic religions would contain phrases which according to my worldview exactly describe the three hypostases of God, but maybe it's a coincidence.You just reversed your agreement with me. How do you function?
Other Comments by Dr Benway
1809. Comment #62007 by BMMcArdle on August 7, 2007 at 10:41 pm
The ease at which DG can whip up an essay is to me impressive, but for all of his apparent intelligence, he allows his imagination to get the best of him.Kudos to Dr Benway, _J_, steve99, Alvorin, Lauregon, SharonMcT and many others for their eloquent and articulate rebuttal.
Other Comments by BMMcArdle
1810. Comment #62122 by Dr Benway on August 8, 2007 at 8:42 am
Dianelos:Only if you have adopted a naturalistic understanding of reality. If you adopt idealistic theism the famous paradoxes of quantum mechanics kind of disappear. That's why I have argued that idealistic theism works better than naturalism even in the context of science (see posts 1535 or #57571, and 1566 or #57761).This is bullshit. No matter what metaphysical model you pick, you've still got the same phenomenological world to explain. "God did it" is not a mechanism, unless you can explain how God did it, in a manner that's predictive and repeatable.
Next time you say that theism explains QM better than naturalism, I'm gonna point out that your pants are on fire.
Other Comments by Dr Benway
1811. Comment #62227 by bouwe on August 9, 2007 at 1:55 am
Comment #61903 by Dianelos Georgoudis:...must decide by themselves, as really all ethical questions must be decided.But I thought child torture was supposed to be "OBJECTIVELY wrong"?
(That'll get him back, Dr.B -- B for Bowie, I see. You can zap his pants on fire with those laser beams.)
Other Comments by bouwe
1812. Comment #62230 by steve99 on August 9, 2007 at 2:16 am
This is bullshit. No matter what metaphysical model you pick, you've still got the same phenomenological world to explain. "God did it" is not a mechanism, unless you can explain how God did it, in a manner that's predictive and repeatable.
There is one metaphysical model that fits - perfect determinism, where everything we experience is precisely determined across all time. That way, God could make it appear like QM was operating. However, this would wreck another aspect of DG's fragile worldview - the existence of at least some free will.
Other Comments by steve99
1813. Comment #62438 by PaulEmecz on August 9, 2007 at 6:01 pm
I'm back from holiday, and Dianelos has left - farewell. And bouwe (not to be confused with Dr B - it's very odd looking back at the old contributions and expecting to see a bird's bottom. Let's hope he keeps the Bowie image for a bit, or this bit of the post will be nonsensical) seems to have totally misunderstood what 'objective' might mean. Dianelos said this:
I find nothing unethical in laws that allow abortion in the first trimester. Which is not the same as saying that I find abortion in the first trimester to be ethical: Whether to seek an abortion or not is an ethical question that the people concerned (i.e. mainly the pregnant woman) must decide by themselves, as really all ethical questions must be decided. But if they decide for abortion then I think society is ethically obliged to offer safe means to do so.
He could equally have said
I find nothing unethical in laws that allow the use of cannabis. Which is not the same as saying that I find the use of cannabis to be ethical... etc.
Having worked for a couple of years with drug abusers, I am convinced that decriminalising cannabis, cocaine, heroine et al would be the right course of action, at least here in the UK. It would help us get on top of the drug problem, and remove a large amount of secondary crime. However, it wouldn't make the use of cannabis ethical in all instances. There are certainly some cases where the harm done by cannabis use is easily out-weighed by the benefits, but certainly not in all cases.
The point is that there are objective facts about the damage done by cannabis use, and the benefits of cannabis use. However, just because there is an objective reality, that doesn't mean we'll all agree on what that reality is.
The same is true in science. There are a number of bands of colour in a rainbow. I've seen one (and, more helpfully, I've seen light pass through a glass prism, which is a clearer image). I've counted. I have to say, I think there are only 6 'colours in the rainbow' (by which we commonly mean something like 'identifiable bands of colour'). You'd be surprised how many people would claim the number is 7. They don't check, they just believe what everyone else believes, on the assumption that someone is bound to have checked and they would have said if it there were only 6.
Believing that objective morality exists does not mean that we can say "and all people will agree about morality" in much the same way as believing that rainbows exist would mean that everyone would agree about rainbows. Even if someone points out the objective truth, and provides evidence, there will still be some people who revert to "But most people believe there are 7".
Incidentally, the law on abortion in the UK is inconsistent, allowing abortion at the very latest stages if the foetus has severe disabilities.
Is that last sentence objectively true?
By the way, why is child torture worse than adult torture?
Other Comments by PaulEmecz
1814. Comment #62526 by yyuryyub on August 10, 2007 at 3:21 am
Forgive me for not reading almost 2000 comments -in case this has been raised before- but this seems like almost every single argument I've had with 'post-modernist' undergrads... "I concede your point about science, though let me twaddle on for five minutes making absolutely no sense and raving about oppression etc." Post-mods are a little easier to bring-around I've found...Other Comments by yyuryyub
1815. Comment #62637 by Corylus on August 10, 2007 at 1:54 pm
Paul Welcome back from your hols :)
Teachers eh? One holiday after another in that profession...
(Ducks)
Other Comments by Corylus
1816. Comment #62744 by bouwe on August 11, 2007 at 5:22 am
1813. Comment #62438 by PaulEmecz: asked:By the way, why is child torture worse than adult torture?You should be directing that question to DG if he were still here. One of the reasons DG came to this thread was to support his proposition that "the gratuitous torture of a child is objectively wrong" -- why a child and why he had to add "gratuitous", only he could answer. The extra caveats seem to me rather, um... gratuitous? I'm sure if he were still active on this thread he would be able to supply the comment number(s) where you can find his reasons. I didn't misunderstand his point, the only reason I made my post was to bait DG to come back (in which case he would be able to quote his post for you which attempt to explain his views on "objective morality"). He hasn't come back but it hooked you instead.
Naturally, if someone thinks a certain moral point is somehow "objectively true" they can still recognize that others don't agree with them and leave it to the conscience of the individual. Is that what you think I don't get? I was just trying to get a rise out of him and get him back into therapy with the good Dr.B.
But all ethical questions aren't decided by the individual, are they? Some are, as in the case of abortion in some countries. We don't stone adulterers to death anymore either (in most countries!!). But murder and child torture are ethical questions, no?* Society has laws which cover these ethical questions and (obviously) they are not left up to the individual. But really, to say that all ethical questions must be decided by the individual underlines the point that morality is not "objective," even though we would dearly like it to be so.
Those ethical precepts which are encoded by law in society -- even if they have been borrowed from or directly reflect certain precepts which can be found in scriptures from holy books -- are there because the majority of individuals of that society agreed that it was a good thing. Perhaps they reached an agreement because they have an understanding of the Golden Rule ? Then they probably pointed to the scriptures from the Holy Book and told each other that they were "objectively true" because "god says so" while at the same time they ignored the nasty things they didn't like that "god said so" in the same book.
Don't get me wrong, it would be nice if morality were objective. It just seems to me that it isn't the case. It certainly would make life a lot simpler if it were true. One thing I do think is that saying "God commands it" does not make it objective and neither does it become "objective" through introspection or intuition (which was what DG seems to have suggested in his posts way back).
Perhaps you are like Dianelos and also think that some moral propostions are objectively true? I would like it to be the case that "child torture is objectively wrong," but the fact that my own intuition tells me so doesn't really prove the case. Unfortunately there are people in the world right now who have a different intuition and act upon it.
I hasten to add however that just because morality doesn't seem (to me) to be objective does not mean that "anything goes" -- so long as we agree on the golden rule we can work out a decent humanistic morality. I suspect you might disagree.
---------------------------------------------------------------
* I also suspect that when DG posed his questions in the rhetorical negative that quite a few of his readers were exclaiming "YES!" as in "Yes you are right in that no you are wrong," and replacing the question mark with an exclamation point as to render it with the --- NOT.
Other Comments by bouwe
1817. Comment #62814 by PaulEmecz on August 11, 2007 at 4:14 pm
to say that all ethical questions must be decided by the individual underlines the point that morality is not "objective," even though we would dearly like it to be so.
That's the bit I disagree with. I think that every individual has to decide for themselves what to believe about all aspects of the world we live in. How old is the universe? What is the world around us made of? Is it possible for our actions now to influence the past? Can we change the future? What is the best way to protect the many species of the world? We have to decide what to do based on our best understanding of the way the world is.
The way the world is, this is what I mean by objective reality. You and I may disagree about the age of the universe, but there is an objective truth. We may disagree about the point at which human personhood begins, but it is not merely a semantic issue. I cannot redefine personhood in such a way that I am no longer to be considered a person - I am a person, and there was a time when I was not a person, and these are facts. We may disagree about the transition, but it happened.
I do think some moral propositions are objectively true. I think there is a reality. It is not merely coincidence that you mention the Golden Rule. Just as people will tend towards a more accurate scientific understanding of the world through observation (most people now believe the Earth to be something near spherical), it is natural that people will tend towards a more accurate understanding of what is objectively true about morals. It does not surprise me that most people agree with some form of the Golden Rule.
I hasten to add however that just because morality doesn't seem (to me) to be objective does not mean that "anything goes"
On the contrary, that's exactly what it means. Morality either is or is not objective. If it is not, then it doesn't exist. What you have is a bunch of behaviours - some people may agree to "I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine", but there is nothing to stop people from breaking their promises if it suits them. Rather than a 'decent humanistic morality', you're describing essentially selfish behaviour. Unselfishness would occur, but we cannot say that it is good when it does, as nothing is objectively valuable or good. We could explain how unselfish behaviour might come about, and be genetically advantageous, but this doesn't get us anywhere near the point where we can use words like 'decent'. Decent implies some standard that is objective, something next to which we can measure a thing. Humanistic morality cannot be decent unless morality is objective. Humanistic morality can be pragmatic, but I'm not sure that even makes it morality, let alone 'decent'.
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1818. Comment #63155 by slinky6 on August 13, 2007 at 9:25 am
Arguing with Alister Mcgrath must be like playing ping pong with someone who sucks at ping pong.Other Comments by slinky6
1819. Comment #63159 by USA_Limey on August 13, 2007 at 9:42 am
Ah... I've been waiting for this:Comment #62122 by Dr Benway:
"This is bullshit"
Brother, I welcome you.
Other Comments by USA_Limey
1820. Comment #63160 by Northern Bright on August 13, 2007 at 9:54 am
There's a Christian Beliefs forum I occasionally look into when I don't feel my life has enough humour in it, and I was amused to see that one of the contributors there - a pastor - was encouraging other Christians to watch this interview as an example of a "reasonable debate between two academics". Needless to say, I hastened to add my encouragement for his suggestion, and posted the link to this site ... :-)
(He'd also claimed that the interview had been left out of The Root of All Evil - and omitted the question mark too - simply because McGrath didn't come across as the ranting, mad, loony that Dawkins wanted to portray him as; thus demonstrating the Christian lack of rigour in the search for truth that we have all come to expect.)
Other Comments by Northern Bright
1821. Comment #63163 by USA_Limey on August 13, 2007 at 10:21 am
Comment #63160 by Northern Bright :"There's a Christian Beliefs forum I occasionally look into when I don't feel my life has enough humour in it"
... Sounds like fun but if you are really up for it I recommend this; go to the the Christian section of your local bookstore and just pull out books at random and have a read. It won't take long to find something absurdly funny.
Don't force anything - trust me you won't have to; but when the laughs come just go with the flow and let the laughter come out. This is best done when there are others in the aisle studiously and seriously making their selection. I've had some looks that would kill I can tell you.
Oh, I also like to take copies of the bible and file them in the fantasy fiction section. At least one per trip to the bookstore. I figure the odds are someone will find it and if they are likeminded will get the joke.
:-)
Other Comments by USA_Limey
1822. Comment #63169 by Dr Benway on August 13, 2007 at 10:46 am
PaulEmecz:I do think some moral propositions are objectively true.Paul, you are a broken record going round and round. Yet one more time:
You claim that some ethical imperatives are "objective." Yet you are aware that we can't derive imperatives from objective facts - the old "is/ought" problem.
You seem to believe that if we can determine God's wishes, the is/ought problem is solved. If God is against murder, murder becomes "objectively" wrong. But don't you see that you still need a bridge from the "is" concerning God's will to the "ought" of the rules we accept for ourselves?
Your apparent bridge: we ought to do what God wants. Well, why is that?
Because God is big and powerful? Same might be said for a mafia don.
Because God will torture us if we don't do as He commands? Same might be said for Uday Hussein.
Because we'll be cast from His loving presence? Same might be said for a manipulative lover.
So why?
Other Comments by Dr Benway
1823. Comment #63502 by PaulEmecz on August 14, 2007 at 3:36 pm
Dr B, the reason for the 'stuck record' is that no decent response is ever given. Imagine if I did that with belief in God, saying that the (sociological) fact that the majority of people believe in God somehow shows that God exists. That would be even weaker than traditional proofs of God's existence. However, it's fine for bouwe to claim that belief in the Golden Rule somehow means that morality exists. This is an ontological question - belief in morality doesn't mean morality exists.And then you go on to misrepresent (deliberately or ignorantly - I wonder which...) my argument! Did I say we ought to do what God wants, that whatever God wants is good? That's not the point - swot up on the Euthyphro dilemma and you'll see that Plato had seen the flaw in that reasoning millennia ago.
The question is, how could morality exist? Once answer is given by Utilitarians: people desire pleasure and the avoidance of pain, therefore pleasure is good, pain bad, therefore we ought to bring about the greatest good for the greatest number. However flawed the reasoning is, there is a greater error - if the universe is an isolated system, entropy always increases and the universe has a limited life-span - no-one is going to survive the universe, so whatever we do ultimately makes no difference.
This is such a simple point that I get surprised when atheists argue so much around it. A few agree - there cannot be morality without God. They say "and there is no good reason to believe in God, so there is no good reason to believe in morality". It is the vast majority of the others, who say daft things like asking "Why should we do what God wants?" who have missed the point and failed to respond adequately.
Either admit that there can be no such thing as morality, or give some justification for believing in it!
Incidentally, my argument is fairly clear. I believe that the universe was designed by God in such a way that intelligent life could evolve in it (and I can't see any decent scientific explanation for the existence of the necessary conditions for the evolution of intelligent life in the universe that explains this rather unlikely phenomenon better than an intelligent designer of the universe).
I believe that the ability to reason and have experiences (and again, I feel science is lacking in being able to explain how having any experience is possible) are therefore 'God-given' (in the sense that God intended these abilities to evolve, and made it possible for them to do so). I think we can use reason, and our ability to experience, to discover the objective moral truths that I believe to exist in this universe. I think that's what we do, and I think that explains why the Golden Rule is so prominent. However, it also explains how the Golden Rule might actually be RIGHT rather than merely popular. Without the existence of God and some form of afterlife, how could morality, ontologically, exist?
Other Comments by PaulEmecz
1824. Comment #63520 by BMMcArdle on August 14, 2007 at 4:32 pm
So, in a nutshell, yours is a god of the gaps.Other Comments by BMMcArdle
1825. Comment #63529 by Lauregon on August 14, 2007 at 5:22 pm
However flawed the reasoning is, there is a greater error - if the universe is an isolated system, entropy always increases and the universe has a limited life-span - no-one is going to survive the universe, so whatever we do ultimately makes no difference. - Paul Emecsz
So what? While we're here, we're here.
I think we can use reason, and our ability to experience, to discover the objective moral truths that I believe to exist in this universe. I think that's what we do, and I think that explains why the Golden Rule is so prominent. However, it also explains how the Golden Rule might actually be RIGHT rather than merely popular. Without the existence of God and some form of afterlife, how could morality, ontologically, exist? - Paul Emecz
Human pragmatism. The Golden Rule might be RIGHT because it makes for more stable human societies rather than because it's thought to please a supernatural deity no one has ever seen or heard.
Other Comments by Lauregon
1826. Comment #63554 by Dr Benway on August 14, 2007 at 7:22 pm
PaulEmecz:Did I say we ought to do what God wants, that whatever God wants is good? That's not the point ...So if God's will or preference or whatever is irrelevant to morality... I don't get how you relate God to morality.
Other Comments by Dr Benway
1827. Comment #63576 by Downunder on August 15, 2007 at 12:14 am
PualEmecz's 1823. I appreciate that that you are still stuck with that traditional God concept, which will take some generations to fade out. But surely someone with an intelligence like yours (and our site's friend Dianelos, who is having a well earned breather) can speed things up for yourself by realising that because a "God being" is beyond our dimensions, it is futile to even think about trying to reason in such dimension. Is there not enough science to pursue in our own universe; the dimensions of which we are still grappling with, enough problems to solve in our immediate environment to stop fussing about God?I saw a TV documentary last night featuring a USA preacher Pastor Hagee who has got himself a nice little earner, a mega church in Texas. He is a fervent Bible quoter, a fanatic supporter of Israel's actions. Had his whole congregation worked up to fever pitch in support. He strikes me as "satan incarnate". May God help America. If a Muslim preacher behaved like that, the FBI would have closed the joint. Pastor Hagee is a trouble maker. Why don't the news media crucify such people while exposing them?
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1828. Comment #63712 by PaulEmecz on August 15, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Lauregonmore stable human societies
Who says that's what's RIGHT? I remember clearly having a friend who thought that the society in Brave New World was a utopia, not a distopia. What about Walden Two?
You can't make objective value judgments that are subjective!
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1829. Comment #63763 by Donald on August 15, 2007 at 5:43 pm
PaulEmecz:The same is true in science. There are a number of bands of colour in a rainbow. I've seen one (and, more helpfully, I've seen light pass through a glass prism, which is a clearer image). I've counted. I have to say, I think there are only 6 'colours in the rainbow' (by which we commonly mean something like 'identifiable bands of colour'). You'd be surprised how many people would claim the number is 7. They don't check, they just believe what everyone else believes, on the assumption that someone is bound to have checked and they would have said if it there were only 6.
I assume you know that human colour vision is rather variable? Many people have varying degrees of "colour blindess". Red-green colour deficiency is the best known, but variation in the sensitivity of the colour cones is common. From Wikipedia:
All the Roy G. Biv mnemonics follow the tradition of including the colour indigo between blue and violet. Newton originally (1672) named only five primary colours: red, yellow, green, blue and violet. Only later did he introduce orange and indigo, giving seven colours by analogy to the number of notes in a musical scale.[13] Some sources now omit indigo, partly due to the poor ability of humans to distinguish colours in the blue portion of the visual spectrum.[14] There is also some evidence that Newton's use of the terms blue and indigo map to the modern hues turquoise and blue respectively.
Since rainbows are composed of a nearly continuous spectrum, different people, most notably across different cultures, identify different numbers of colours in rainbows.(my emphasis)
Nowadays, it is has become common to use only 6 colours to represent a rainbow. Fine, but there isn't a right answer here. Anyway, you link it to morality...
Believing that objective morality exists does not mean that we can say "and all people will agree about morality" in much the same way as believing that rainbows exist would mean that everyone would agree about rainbows.
Ok, I see what you are doing here. You are preparing the gournd for a claim that "objective morality" exists, despite a lack of agreement from your favourite sources as to the details of that morality.
So let's see what your evidence for "objective morality" is.
I do think some moral propositions are objectively true. I think there is a reality.It seems your "evidence" is subjective. Nothing analogous to measuring wavelengths here. Then you go on:
Morality either is or is not objective. If it is not, then it doesn't exist.More subjective opinion.
Then you say:
Decent implies some standard that is objective, something next to which we can measure a thing. Humanistic morality cannot be decent unless morality is objective. Humanistic morality can be pragmatic, but I'm not sure that even makes it morality, let alone 'decent'.Now you switch into insulting humanists. Why?
You also say:
Without the existence of God and some form of afterlife, how could morality, ontologically, exist?I have no good guess as to how you came to hold this view of "objective morality", nor why you need to defend it so unconvincingly, but I can see one thing: that the word "morality" means something different to you than for most of us. To borrow from _J_ in one of the "darwin2" threads:
`I don't know what you mean by "glory,"' Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. `Of course you don't -- till I tell you. I meant "there's a nice knock-down argument for you!"'
`But "glory" doesn't mean "a nice knock-down argument,"' Alice objected.
`When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, `it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less.'
Other Comments by Donald
1830. Comment #63779 by PaulEmecz on August 15, 2007 at 9:52 pm
Donald,I think there is a bigger issue concerning rainbows, which is hinted at when you talk of different cultures. In some, their language is only able to talk about colours as either light or dark. Since all scientific theories, any statement about the world around us in fact, needs to be expressed in one language or other and interpreted by individuals from a subjective perspective, there will always be an element of subjectivity to any statement. The rainbow example was merely trying to make the point that, regardless of whatever people believe, there is some objective reality. I also mentioned the age of the universe - we may have different opinions about what that might be, but there is an objective truth.
You could turn round and claim that people experience time in different ways. You could even question whether it is meaningful to talk of time as 'existing' in the earliest moments of the universe. You may also claim that it would be impossible to measure the age of the universe without some agreed physical location from which to measure it. Maybe you might say there is no right answer as to the age of the universe.
I wonder if you're trying to bring the argument back to the old ground of ontology - does 'colour' actually exist? Do space and time, come to that? I think there is a right answer to questions about the physical world - what I'm really claiming is that it is possible for people to actually check how many bands of colour they can see in a rainbow or in a spectrum, even though most people don't actually check and just take someone else's (a teacher's, usually) word for it. There are dangers, particularly highlighted in this thread, in making every question an ontological one. I have appreciated the idealistic theism vs naturalism debate, but it also goes round in circles and doesn't always clarify things.
Anyway, so you think there is no right answer to the colours of the rainbow question. You say about my statement about objective morality that
It seems your "evidence" is subjective.Isn't all evidence 'subjective' in some sense? All experience of the world is subjective, but don't let's say that we cannot make any statements about an objective reality. What sort of humpty-dumpty science would that leave us with?
Then,
Morality either is or is not objective. If it is not, then it doesn't exist.
More subjective opinion.
No. Just to label this 'subjective' because it relies on the use of words, and meaning is 'subjective', is to muddy the waters. The Concise Oxford Dictionary says that moral means:
concerned with goodness or badness of human character or behaviour, or with the distinction between right and wrong
What I am saying is that if there is no right and wrong, then there is no morality. If there is no objective standard of goodness or badness, then there is no morality. I am quite happy to use different words. Some people may choose to say "When I talk of morality, I am not talking about what is right or wrong, I am merely talking about rules of conduct that exist in a society". Let's use different terms, then, because if we're talking like that, there will be no right or wrong answer as to what we mean by society or what these rules might be. We'll be muddying the water again and there will be nothing meaningful we can say about morality.
I take morality to refer to what one OUGHT to do. When I say it is objective, I mean that when soldiers rape women as part of warfare, this is actually wrong, not merely contrary to my view on what is right or wrong, or contrary to general agreement in my part of the world about what we should or shouldn't do.
Your next bit astounds me.
Decent implies some standard that is objective, something next to which we can measure a thing. Humanistic morality cannot be decent unless morality is objective. Humanistic morality can be pragmatic, but I'm not sure that even makes it morality, let alone 'decent'.
Now you switch into insulting humanists. Why?
Firstly, this wasn't a comment about humanists, let alone an insult! It was a response to bouwe:
I hasten to add however that just because morality doesn't seem (to me) to be objective does not mean that "anything goes" -- so long as we agree on the golden rule we can work out a decent humanistic morality.What I was saying was that the word 'decent' implies a standard of rightness and wrongness. I am not claiming even that humanistic morality is subjective! There may well be humanists who hold that morality is objective – good, because I don't see how it would be morality if it wasn't (but let's not get back to humpty dumpty again). I merely said that IF humanistic morality is not objective, it could not be decent, If morality is not objective, nothing is decent. Things may be seen by some people as decent, but there would be nothing that actually was decent.
Honestly Donald, I think you find it easier to obfuscate, throwing in quotes about meaning and questioning whether there is any right answer about statements about the objective world, but really you have a very firm belief in objective reality, you just don't believe in morality (which, as I said above, refers to what one OUGHT to do – call that what you will if you think 'morality' means something else). Why not come out and say this, rather than pretending that I am somehow attacking humanists?
Going back over very old ground, let me ask you a very simple question.
Imagine whatever horrific event you like, but I will use Myra Hindley as an example. As I'm sure you know, she abducted, sexually abused, tortured and murdered five children. Do you think she OUGHT NOT to have done this? I want to say 'Was this wrong?' or 'Was this immoral?' but you can cloud the issue by questioning the meaning of the questions. More than just going against agreed codes of conduct, was she actually WRONG to act this way?
I am sorry to use such an awful example, but it cuts through the crap about different definitions of morality which can go round in circles and gets to the point – the vast majority of people in our country act as though this behaviour is actually wrong, that it ought not to be done. Are they right? I think the answer is simple, and is much easier to be certain about than the number of colours of the rainbow, which you say there is no right answer about.
Other Comments by PaulEmecz
1831. Comment #63780 by PaulEmecz on August 15, 2007 at 10:08 pm
Just reading that last comment back, I am in the UK, where Myra Hindley lived, and that's why at the end I use the term 'our country'. As I say, you can use any exmaple from your own country, and I clearly believe that morality holds across different countries. I don't know if I'm being overly defensive, but I just think we all know what we mean here when we say something is wrong - I'm just asking "Is it wrong?" I think that most people answer 'Yes'. Good, because I am convinced that they are right and that this isn't as contentious as some people make out. The question then comes "What makes it wrong?", which is where I believe God comes into the debate. I acknowledge that Duncan, and others, can easily claim that there is no morality, that Hindley was not actually wrong - if that's his view, he should say so. What he can't do is claim that objective morality doesn't exist and yet that somehow she was objectively wrong because although objective morality doesn't exist, morality does exist, objectively. It is too easy to try to confuse what is a simple question. Was Hindley in fact wrong, and ought she not to have done what she did?
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1832. Comment #63829 by Donald on August 16, 2007 at 10:42 am
Paul, the point of my comments has mostly sailed past you.OF COURSE I would describe Myra Hindley as immoral, and Hitler, Pol Pot, Kim Yong Il, ..., etc, etc.
You seem to be attempting to steer me into sharing your "understanding" that morality, right and wrong are absolutes, with definitions lying outside human brains. This cannot succeed. I regard such absolutist views as simplistic and, like a belief in "god", a evasion from dealing with the real world in all its complexity.
Like Dianelos and Darwin2 you have made your own definition of "god". You have also made your own definition of "morality".
In an earlier thread I tried to open a discussion about what you mean by "morality" and said a little about what I and other people mean. Instead of acknowledging that "morality", like "god", is a word that means different things to different people, you continue to write as if "morality" had an exact meaning, that YOU understand that meaning, and that I don't get it. (I accept that, as a result of my comment and other comments, you have modfied your terminology to use "objective morality" instead of "morality", but I detect no real change in your viewpoint.)
As I tried to tell you before, I (and others) ground the meaning of "morality" (or "objective morality") in the interests of humanity. You seem determined to ground morality in an imaginary being outside the universe. This enables you to deprecate my morality, and at the same time justify (to yourself) your belief in the imaginary being.
You accuse me of "obfuscation". My apologies. I misjudged the level of the conversation.
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1833. Comment #63849 by Corylus on August 16, 2007 at 12:25 pm
Paul OK! Time to call 'time out' on the abstract philosophy. Incidentally Paul, I totally get where you are coming from when you say that:
There are dangers, particularly highlighted in this thread, in making every question an ontological one. I have appreciated the idealistic theism vs naturalism debate, but it also goes round in circles and doesn't always clarify things.I'm hearing you!
So let's talk practicalities :-)
You say that when you ask atheists about morality that "no decent response is ever given".
Actually; as I have suggested to you before; I suspect the problem is that you just get lots of different responses because different atheists take different stances with regard to moral theory.
The fact that you do not like any of these responses yet given doesn't mean that no decent response is ever possible of being given. Maybe one day you will hear something that hits the spot...
Anyway, back to practicalities. May I put a question to you, as a believer playing the morality card, to which I never get a decent answer?
Say that you are right and that (for a consistent atheist) morality, be it subjective or objective, does not exist.*
My question? So what? What are you going to do about it?
Belief cannot be forced. There are people about who never seem to have a religious thought in their lives - they just don't get it.
What do you suggest is done with these people?
1)Gently persuade? You are ignored.
2) Maybe you would like to tell them, firmly, that they must believe? Not working.
3) How about threatening them into believing? Methinks you might be told some fibs. (Hmm, maybe it would it be acceptable is they just 'faked it till they made it' or lied?). Oh dear, nothing works!
What do you want to do Paul? Maybe..
4) How about locking them up in case they act immorally due to their pernicious lack of belief? For the greater good?
Please, suggestions!
Clue: you can either go with locking up the innocent and violate your own ideals of objective morality, which are about love, justice, truth etc.. Or you can say that the above is not acceptable and give up your absolutes.
I'm waiting.
-------
*N.B. You already know my position on this:
Objective morality does not exist and to say that it does is wishful thinking.
Morality, however, does exist. It is something that humans can constantly work on by increasing their knowledge of what harms others.
This is also, because we are all connected in the PHYSICAL world, (Dianelos!) what harms all of us. It is therefore sensible, rational even (although I admit that word is a loaded one), to care about it.
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1834. Comment #63855 by _J_ on August 16, 2007 at 12:47 pm
I've been doing so well at not getting sucked into this, but ooh, PaulEmecz, you're making Dawkins' words from this week's The Enemies of Reason leap to my tongue: 'I think you're so close, but you're damn wrong!'Two ways into this point:
1
Isn't all evidence 'subjective' in some sense? All experience of the world is subjective, but don't let's say that we cannot make any statements about an objective reality. What sort of humpty-dumpty science would that leave us with?
Absolutely right! So, let's remind ourselves of what science is again. Why, it's the system we have contrived for squeezing the errors of subjectivity out of our investigations of reality as far as we are able to. To tiptoe as close to objectivity as we are able, always remembering that we're never going to be 100% certain and may have to revise our understanding as new facts come to light.
2
What I am saying is that if there is no right and wrong, then there is no morality.
If there was no funny and unfunny, there'd be no humour.
Different people laugh at different things.
Is humour objective?
If not, does it therefore not exist?
To bring these two points together: you are quite right to insist that anything that exists has an objective existence. This is of course the position of naturalists and/or scientists all over the place. Existence is existence and things that don't exist, don't exist. I'm glad to hear you say so.
So yes, there's an objective reality somewhere in morality, just as there is in humour. But, just as is the case with humour, this does not necessitate some sort of universal Ten Commandments of what is moral (or funny).
If you really understand and believe what you are saying when you maintain that anything that truly exists at all has an objective reality, then your only way of proceeding logically is to let our system of determining objective truth as best we can – science – investigate and turn up whatever it turns up. Which so far is that the objective truth of morality is that it's built up from a huge and complex interaction between brain cells, chemicals, entire human brains, societies and cultures and traditions, experiences, and so on, and so on. Looking for a complete, objective statement of morality is looking for something truly, unimaginably vast. This doesn't mean that such a thing doesn't exist. But it's something we can be fairly confident that we're never going to nail down in absolute detail.
On the other hand, leaping to the idea that there must be some kind of outside provider of objective morality makes nonsense of your claim that anything that exists must have an objective existence. Positing a god is subjectivity running rampant. That's one whopping great assertion of objective non-existence you've made there.
So, which is it? Does objective morality have to objectively exist in the sense that we can use our objective truth finding system (science) to uncover it? Or does it not, in which case anyone can make anything up they personally subjectively want to and pretend it's 'objective truth' because it makes morality feel (subjectively) a bit more concrete? At the minute, you seem to be bending over backwards to bite out the Achilles heel of your own argument. Which, to finish as I started by borrowing words from Dawkins, is 'not a very dignified' position.
By the way, on your response to bouwe:
I hasten to add however that just because morality doesn't seem (to me) to be objective does not mean that "anything goes" -- so long as we agree on the golden rule we can work out a decent humanistic morality.
What I was saying was that the word 'decent' implies a standard of rightness and wrongness. […] I merely said that IF humanistic morality is not objective, it could not be decent,
I can see what's gone wrong here and it's a simple but telling misunderstanding. I suspect that bouwe, by 'decent', meant 'functional' (in the sense of 'that's a pretty decent bridge'). You have interpreted 'decent' as meaning, effectively, 'moral', though, which is the way that the word is commonly used in the context of discussions about morality.
Logically, bouwe, can't have meant 'decent' as 'moral', as he was making a comment about the whole of morality, not about particular behaviours within a common moral code. There is no way that a system of morality in total can be judged decent or indecent in the sense of 'moral or immoral', since the system of morality is itself what determines 'moral' and 'immoral'. To say 'morality is moral' is nonsensical, tautologous or both, depending on which way you look at it.
The reason this misunderstanding is telling (as well as simple) is that it seems to demonstrate the readiness with which you assume objective, transcendental (in the sense of being supplied by something outside our realm of the physical, like a god) morality to be a given. Even when bouwe is trying to explain to you how a non-objective, non-transcendental morality can be (and probably is) constructed by and between humans, you still slip easily into judging this within a perspective of a greater, objective and transcendental morality. Or, at least, you find it plausible that bouwe could himself be making such an error – which seems unlikely, and is certainly not necessary.
It's rather like listening to someone patiently explain how the world can exist without god, and then saying, 'That's all very well, but God makes all things so he made your godless universe too'. Which is the point at which people throw their hands up in the air and headbutt substantial objects.
Apologies for probable mistakes in the above – have had no time to proofread.
Other Comments by _J_
1835. Comment #63856 by Dr Benway on August 16, 2007 at 12:48 pm
Paul,I don't get how you connect morality to God.
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1836. Comment #63864 by phil rimmer on August 16, 2007 at 1:07 pm
Paul, can a proposition (for action, let us say) be more moral than another, similar proposition? Have you ever changed your mind about which is the preferred of two such propositions?
We live in the same world, fed by the same cultural insights, and make similar moral decisions. We just explain them differently.....
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1837. Comment #63874 by PaulEmecz on August 16, 2007 at 1:26 pm
_J_the objective truth of morality is that it's built up from a huge and complex interaction between brain cells, chemicals, entire human brains, societies and cultures and traditions, experiences, and so on, and so on. Looking for a complete, objective statement of morality is looking for something truly, unimaginably vast. This doesn't mean that such a thing doesn't exist. But it's something we can be fairly confident that we're never going to nail down in absolute detail.
I think what you're doing in approaching morality scientifically is a kind of anthropological explanation of morality. In terms of what I am calling morality (the idea that we actually should do one thing and ought not to do another thing), what you're doing is explaining why people believe in morality. You aren't actually talking about morality at all.
Let me be clear - that's just what YOU are doing. It would be quite possible to use a scientific approach to work out moral rules, but that wouldn't work without a creator. Having a creator means that we have a purpose. Aristotle says that a knife is a good knife if it cuts well, because the purpose of a knife is to cut. I have a collection of stones (well, three - not sure if it counts as a collection). Are they good stones? Well, wouldn't that depend what they're for?
So, why is there intelligent life in this universe? If you simply believe that the universe popped into existence with no prior cause and just happened to be suitable for the evolution of intelligent life (why you'd believe that is still a mystery to me), then there is no purpose to human life. It would not be possible to have one good human and another bad human (I hope that answers Dr B.s point).
So, if we assume that there was a creator of the universe, who intentionally set it up so that intelligent life would evolve, then we can use observation and reason to work out what moral laws would hold.
It's not that science can't investigate morality without a creator, it's just that without a creator, there would be no OUGHT. A smooth, flat stone might be best if it was for skimming, a large, round one if it was for weighing down papers. What are we for? Lauregon earlier suggested that the purpose of life was to live in 'stable societies'. I have to say I didn't think much of that, and I think you need to look at what an individual is for before you can answer questions about what society should be like.
Donald, you can't in all fairness accuse me of having 'made your own definition of "morality"' - I literally copied out a definition from the Concise Oxford Dictionary.
You say 'OF COURSE I would describe Myra Hindley as immoral' - do you mean that she should not have done what she did? I would say it is obvious that you mean this, but I don't want to be accused of misrepresenting you. If she should not have done what she did (which I believe is obvious) then we must ask where we get SHOULD from.
Corylus, I will answer your question in a bit - the family is calling...
Other Comments by PaulEmecz
1838. Comment #63875 by Northern Bright on August 16, 2007 at 1:32 pm
1834. Comment #63855 by _J_ on August 16, 2007 at 12:47 pm That is a truly impressive post, _J_. Well done, and thank you.
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1839. Comment #63882 by PaulEmecz on August 16, 2007 at 2:02 pm
CorylusSay that you are right and that (for a consistent atheist) morality, be it subjective or objective, does not exist.*
My question? So what? What are you going to do about it?
I am a great lover of the truth. I simply cannot live with an unacknowledged contradiction. I don't know that it's a good thing, but it's how I am.
It makes sense to believe there is no God and no morality. I wouldn't argue with someone who said that (well, I would agree about morality but not about God). It makes sense to say God created the world and intended intelligent life to exist, and this is compatible with morality. It simply doesn't make any sense at all to say that the universe merely sprang into existence, but there is somehow something that we OUGHT to do as intelligent people. It just isn't right to say that.
Does it help to point that out? I don't know. Does it lead to people behaving better? I don't know. That's not why I say what I say. I say it because I am convinced of it.
So, I'm not sure which people you mean who don't believe in God. Do you mean the ones who share the same moral code - something like the Golden Rule - but are confused about why they OUGHT to follow it? They'd be easy to get along with. Do you mean the ones that realise that morality, a genuine OUGHT, doesn't go with Atheism? I think that's a sensible position, so I'd find it hard to convince them of anything else. There would still be the legal system that would, to an extent, protect us should such people suddenly desire to do terrible things (and therefore do them, lacking any reason not to). They would know they could lose freedom acting immorally. While they could do much that is wrong and get away with it, there would be limits.
I wouldn't ever want to bully someone into believing what I believe, or trick them. I am not a fan of Walden Two - I think that's an atheistic response to the lack of any objective morality. I still think you can point out moral truth and people can see it, even if they haven't got consistent reasons for believing that we should act morally.
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1840. Comment #63887 by Dr Benway on August 16, 2007 at 2:20 pm
PaulEmecz:So, if we assume that there was a creator of the universe, who intentionally set it up so that intelligent life would evolve, then we can use observation and reason to work out what moral laws would hold.It looks like you mean that God's will (aka purpose) serves as the bridge from "is" to "ought." But I said that before, and you disavowed that position.
It's not that science can't investigate morality without a creator, it's just that without a creator, there would be no OUGHT.
Maybe you just haven't thought this through.
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1841. Comment #63896 by PaulEmecz on August 16, 2007 at 3:23 pm
Dr BIt is important to be careful about what we say on this thread - I am about to continue an ongoing discussion simply about the word 'decent' in a minute.
Your original point in 1822 talked about God's wishes and what God wants. This is the bit that I wasn't happy with - it's not the same as God's will.
When I married my wife, I made various promises to her. To each question, I answered 'I will'. That means that I intend not to sleep with anyone else, I intend to look after her when she is sick etc. Now, looking after a sick person can be a real trial, and I may well want to give up. I might wish I could leave her. However, I intend to stay with her if that happens. Not long ago on this site I suggested that if I did not believe in God, my commitment to my wife would be less strong. That was wildly misunderstood. If it was in my own best interests to leave my sick wife, or to seek comfort in the arms of another as she lies in a coma on a hospital bed, why should I not do so? The should comes from the morality that I have been talking about.
This is not about the whims of an all-powerful being. It has nothing to do with God's wants or wishes. It is to do with God's will. What is God's intention or purpose for this universe?
If you talk about wishes and wants, these can clearly change. It would not make sense (as Plato demonstrated) to believe that what is good could change according to the wishes of an all-powerful being. However, we are talking about the reason why God created the universe, the will or purpose or intention. The purpose of intelligent life in this universe is unchanging.
You said
But don't you see that you still need a bridge from the "is" concerning God's will to the "ought" of the rules we accept for ourselves?
No, I don't see that. If God made us for a specific purpose, that gives us an ought. Why should a knife be sharp? Because a knife's purpose is to cut. Why is a murderer a bad person? Because one of the purposes of human life is to protect and preserve the innocent. That is an unchanging, God-given purpose.
_J_
I suspect that bouwe, by 'decent', meant 'functional' (in the sense of 'that's a pretty decent bridge').
What would we say a decent bridge was? Would a decent bridge allow a train to plunge off it into a river? That would be madness. Madness.
The real question is what was the bridge for? I have a colleague who insists that morality is constructed by the minority in power in order to control the vast majority. As the minority are vastly more priviliged, it is in their interest to maintain the status quo (Lauregon's stable society). If people were allowed to steal, they would lose out (being so wealthy), so it is immoral to steal, etc. If this is the case, if morality is constructed by the very few in power, and its purpose is to keep them in power, would that be a decent, functional morality?
I know how bouwe was using the word. I was merely making a point - morality can fulfil a purpose, but if it is a subjective purpose, then why is morality itself good? Put another way, to reject my view of morality (as dealing with what is objectively right and wrong, what we ought to do) stops morality from being something which we should adhere to.
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1842. Comment #63897 by Donald on August 16, 2007 at 3:26 pm
Paul"you can't in all fairness accuse me of having 'made your own definition of "morality"' - I literally copied out a definition from the Concise Oxford Dictionary."Ha! Very amusing. But perhaps you were serious. So here is a serious reply. Yes, if you agree with the COD definition, then superficially, you have not made your own definition. But the COD definition of morality is not self contained. It relies on definitions of "good" "bad" "right" and "wrong", and you have contributed (at least in part) your own definition for those concepts. According to you, those concepts are only given their meaning if there is a divine creator. The COD doesn't define them that way. So, in a slightly deeper sense of what you mean by "morality", you have made your own definition, and it is not in the COD.
And, yes, of course I do say Myra Hindley SHOULD not have done those crimes.
As regards where SHOULD comes from, I refer you to a much earlier post of mine on another thread - but briefly, SHOULD and OUGHT are the language of instruction and advice. Humans advise and instruct each other for the joint benefit of individuals and society - it's part of human culture. Wise or well-brought-up humans follow the advice. No god needed.
You write to Corylus:
It simply doesn't make any sense at all to say that the universe merely sprang into existence, but there is somehow something that we OUGHT to do as intelligent people. It just isn't right to say that.I disagree. It's fine to say that. However the OUGHTs become a complex issue involving distant consequences, and it is not feasible for most individuals to examine all the ramifications, any more than most individuals build their own homes. We accept the moral codes of our culture, and only seek to change the design of moral codes cautiously and slowly. Again, no god needed.
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1843. Comment #63899 by PaulEmecz on August 16, 2007 at 3:42 pm
_J_If you really understand and believe what you are saying when you maintain that anything that truly exists at all has an objective reality, then your only way of proceeding logically is to let our system of determining objective truth as best we can – science – investigate and turn up whatever it turns up.
It's interesting that Professor Dawkins chose to call his most recent series 'The Enemies of Reason'. Not 'The Enemies of Science'. By 'Reason' he means 'The rigours of logic, observation and evidence.'
If I walked onto a University campus, and wanted to find those people who could tell me best how to reason, with whom should I converse? Who do you really think would have the best understanding of reason? Which discipline has Logic most prominently on its curriculum?
I am no enemy of science - I think science can tell us a great deal about the world around us. I think philosophy can tell us a great deal about science, and if we really want to know the nature of objective reality, I know where I'd go first.
Science has its place, but answering questions about morality is not in its scope. I mean, really, would you expect a scientist to tell you whether it is immoral to clone a human being? Science will answer the questions that need to be answered before we can make a moral decision - what are the benefits and risks of cloning?; what is involved in the process of cloning? etc. Would you really say to a scientist "And have you got any evidence about whether it's morally right or not?"
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1844. Comment #63902 by PaulEmecz on August 16, 2007 at 4:19 pm
DonaldAnd, yes, of course I do say Myra Hindley SHOULD not have done those crimes.
As regards where SHOULD comes from, I refer you to a much earlier post of mine on another thread - but briefly, SHOULD and OUGHT are the language of instruction and advice. Humans advise and instruct each other for the joint benefit of individuals and society - it's part of human culture. Wise or well-brought-up humans follow the advice. No god needed.
There is a difference between describing how people behave and saying how they should behave. Your answer is that an accurate description of the world is that in it many people behave prescriptively.
If you ask two people a question, and one says "The answer is x" and the other says "I think the answer is x", does that mean the same? Well, they both think the answer is x...
Was Myra Hindley wrong? No, but people say she was wrong. And I am a person. And I say she was wrong. So she was wrong. But that's just me saying she was wrong, that's not her being wrong.
- 'Myra Hindley was wrong' means 'People say Myra Hindley was wrong'.
- Why do people say she was wrong?
- 'Because she was wrong'.
- No.
- 'Because what she did was against the joint benefit of individuals and society'.
- Good. So, the joint benefit of individuals and society is good.
- 'No, society just says that the joint benefit of individuals and society is good.'
- Which means that it is good.
- 'If you say so.'
Does this really work for you?
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1845. Comment #63946 by Corylus on August 17, 2007 at 12:06 am
Paul Thanks for the speedly answer. So as I understand it your interest in the morality problem is about the following:
I simply cannot live with an unacknowledged contradiction. I don't know that it's a good thing, but it's how I am.Fine. No problem with that. Of course, to be fair, this does require you to engage with atheists pointing out contradictions, like the problem of evil for example.
(I had to ask what you would do about fixing atheist morality because I have noticed an agenda behind many people who talk about this issue. To wit they are generally concerned with keeping theistic reasoning and justifications alive in legislation and educational policy. As a secular humanist this scares the living c*&p out of me).
Now back to practicalities, re your pointing out moral contradictions:
Does it help to point that out? I don't know. Does it lead to people behaving better? I don't know. That's not why I say what I say. I say it because I am convinced of it.OK, but if you notice that non theistic morality seems to make people behave better (however it is that you define 'better'), does that not indicate that there is an inherent contradiction in your own position?
Re the debate about definitions, I am beginning to suspect that you are actually doing something much stronger than defining God as the bridge to morality, I think you are actually defining God herself as morality. (In much the same way that theologians go for the whole 'God is Love' shebang).
You can walk this road if you wish, but you will end up making your definitions so nebulous and so prone to differing interpretations that they end up losing all explanatory power. Once, this happens you are back to where you started.
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1846. Comment #63978 by PaulEmecz on August 17, 2007 at 6:01 am
CorylusIf you notice that non theistic morality seems to make people behave better (however it is that you define 'better'), does that not indicate that there is an inherent contradiction in your own position?
I don't think it does. There are two questions - does non-theistic morality seem to make people behave better? As a teacher, I see hundreds of people from theistic and non-theistic backgrounds. Rather uniquely, as an RS teacher, I often know whether people are theistic or not. I'm not at all convinced that people do behave better from a non-theistic background. I would tend to say that people who are commited, either to theism or atheism, are more likely to have thought about morality and live more consistently than others. I do see a fair degree of homophobia among some theists, but it's firmly there among those not commited to either position, and there is less racism among the theists as far as I can see. Theists tend to be commited to living better, less selfish lives, although the good there is often undone by some of the principles still hanging around. There are many enlightened theists, though, whom I know personally and have great respect for.
However, what if it were true? Would it call my beliefs into question? I don't think so. Non-theists would still live in a universe designed by God, so no surprise if they pick up on the moral principles inherent in the world. As a Christian, I note that most of Jesus' criticism was aimed at the religious. Maybe that is what happens - maybe theists get lazy because all the answers are handed to them on a plate, and they stop asking questions for themselves - why does that show that God didn't design the universe?
No, I don't see the problem here.
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1847. Comment #63985 by Dr Benway on August 17, 2007 at 6:47 am
PaulEmecz:It has nothing to do with God's wants or wishes. It is to do with God's will. What is God's intention or purpose for this universe?What's the diff between "wants or wishes" and "will, intention, or purpose"? These are all "ought" words, differing only in emphasis or priority.
Our bodies issue a number of oughts, like "thou shalt breathe" and "thou shalt empty thy bladder" and "thou shalt fart" and "thou shalt eat that delicious piece of chocolate cake on the table."
Those around us impose a few oughts like, "thou shalt not fart too close to me."
Our capacity to appreciate long-term consequences introduces oughts: "thou shalt cut out sweets which are making thee fat."
Interest in sustaining cooperative relationships imposes a sense of fairness with its oughts, like "thou shalt not take a second piece of cake until everyone has been served."
Appreciation for how fairness and justice are influenced by the greater social ecology imposes oughts like, "thou shalt advocate for the basic needs of the poor."
Principles of fairness are prioritized above cake. Usually. So justice might be something we "will" while cake might be something we "want."
But this matter of priority doesn't change the essense of my earlier point: asserting "X is something in accord with God's will" might be a true statement about God's will. A bridge is still required from the "is" about God's will to the "oughts" which are the rules we accept for ourselves.
Your tacit bridge: we ought to act according to God's will. Is this correct?
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1801. Comment #61971 by Dianelos Georgoudis on August 7, 2007 at 4:33 pm
Lauregon (post 1796, or #61942):By "perfect memory" I meant the kind of memory a perfect person would have; hmm maybe I should have written "ideal memory" rather than "perfect memory". (Here is the original context of our discussion about God's memory from post 1749, or #61352: By knowing oneself and considering what is ideal one comes to know God, and hence reality. Take any other bit of your structure as a person, say your memory. [and so on])
No, that was not my meaning – and I see now how difficult it is to write well about these things. First of all there are personal evils (evils committed by persons) and these of course have to be overcome. As for the natural evils (such as natural catastrophes, illness etc) they are not individually "crafted" by God. Rather these happen within the mechanical and effectively random physical environment we experience. That environment is caused by God for a good reason, namely to give as the opportunity to grow in virtue, but it's not like when a child dies from cancer that it was God's will; rather it is to be understood as an accident of nature. But I think that even the painful memory of these natural evils will be overcome in the end.
If you want to see "complicated and cumbersome" you should study how naturalist scientists describe physical reality (start with the so-called interpretations of quantum mechanics and then move on to the so-called hard problem of consciousness). Further, the context of our discussion is how reality is, and to offer as an argument that the other party tries "to avoid facing the reality" as you understand it – is of course begging the question.
I am certainly not dealing with science, because science only discovers patterns present in part of our experience (namely in our experience of physical phenomena) and has nothing to say about the objective reality that causes them (except of course that it is such as to cause them). As for facts, facts are all evidence we have, all data in our disposal both third-person and first-person (so if I dream of a ghost, that's data too). As for my dealing with psychology, you are quite right: If reality is personal then of course psychological thought is the way to understand it.
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