by cantleave 122 Replies latest watchtower bible
Cantleave that's an impossible question to answer.
We only arrived to our moral contruction today because it was founded on religious ethics wheter you believe them or not currently.
If you could put two babies in a desert island and let them grown and reproduce and grow old and die, then you could have experimental evidence of what your question implies. Until then.... it remains impossible to prove it true or false.
Eden
S.
I guess I view empathy as an emotion, where morals are a set of inate values. The way I read the quoted material was that the empathic brain reacts to the facial expressions and actions that others experience. I see not doing certain things (kill, rape, steal) as an inate value...even remote cultures have certain inate values that aren't violated without sanction.
Sorry if I am not being very clear today!
We only arrived to our moral contruction today because it was founded on religious ethics wheter you believe them or not currently.
I totally disagree. How do explain tribal people who display a code ethics?
You might this an interesting read, the conclusion is that the code ethics for these tribes are based on humanism not religion.
Interesting read Cantleave...and I agree that religion alone does not establish morality, but that still doesn't resolve (and it probably can't for a certainty either way) whether morals requires the existence of a deity or intelligent designer. It ultimately comes down to faith and belief in either argument.
Theists fear that if there is no absolute morality the sky will fall down.
Absolute morality actually means men imposing a lot of capricious laws on others and insisting that god says so.
Objective morals are not only possible without god they are only possible without god.
The author of the article you mentioned characterized the african society as highly religious and even highly spiritual. The difference is in the contrast he notices between the "revealed religion" and "non-revealed religion", which is how he characterizes the african society.
Still, the etchics and morality of the africans ARE indeed based on religion. They're not "objective morals" that were rationalized from pure thinking; as if the idea of a world without god(s) is even considered by them.
Eden
I had this discussion with a preacher the other night. He said the only way we can have morality is believing in a god who made them. Then he called them christian morals. I asked him which ones. The ones our founding fathers had for the U.S. Where slavery was good. Genocide of Indians was a godly right. Where women was property. He told me that was not the right morals but I said it was for those people who lived back then. They called themselves christians. Then I brought out that morals are diffrent for every generations and are all man made not god made. At that point he started side stepping and changing the subject. Our rights and wrongs are all made up by the society we live in. In our own time we have seen what was good morals when we was kids to find out as adults they were dead wrong. Morality does not require a god. Totally ADD
As others pointed out, it is easy to see why there seems to be two kinds of morality. One seems relativistic and the other is absolute. The absolute would imply that their needs to be a source of authority which for the theist (and I assume you mean Christian) would be G-d. However, the Christian paints himself into a corner (often unknowingly) when he states that without G-d he would be a sinner. Considering that the true test of character is whether or not you would do the right thing even when no one is watching, this assertion says little about that person's character.
it is easy to see why there seems to be two kinds of morality. One seems relativistic and the other is absolute.
I think its helpful to think about three
1. Absolute morality = morals by divine fiat. It results in all sorts of capricious rules that have no logical meaning.
2. Objective morality = arrived at through careful consideration of what actions will result in the greatest good in terms of the well being of conscious creatures.
3. Relative morality = an attitude that morality is dependent on culture.
I reject 1 and 3.
I am a moral realist and believe that there are moral tuths or facts that can be discovered.
I do not agree with your statement. I do not think that god creates that moral compass. That comes from within and you don't need a god to tell you/ show you that. I know many christians that are not moral and that varies from christians that have affairs, that do not honor contracts, that lie...so that statement is incorrect.
I do not believe in a god and yet I find that my I am far more considerate, tolerant, loving, caring, to others.
