It's been a while since I blogged on religion, but this is one where I feel that even the best atheist debaters are missing the point.
A common apologist canard with regard to theism versus atheism is the concept of what they call morality. "How can you be moral without God?" or some variant therein. Now, of course there is the method of simply answering that question directly. How atheist make moral decisions, what the origin of morality in humans and society, objective versus subjective morality, etc. This has been done to varying degrees of effectiveness, and while it can get the point across, it's ignoring that there's an equivocation fallacy in the premise.
The question "How can you be moral without God?" is based on the apologist suggesting that the rules put for by a god in a holy book (for example, the commandments in the Bible), establish morality. The problem is to call that morality is to conflate that with the traditional meaning of the word.
The philosophical concept of morality and in any other context is reliant on the action being a personal choice to do an action that is perceived beneficial to others regardless of the effect on oneself. Any useful definition of morality includes in some part empathy. Following rules in order to not be punished by a god is the opposite of the general definition of morality, not the basis of it.
So we've established two general definitions for morality
a) Following the rules of a god
b) Acting in accordance to empathy and assessment of positive effects of an action, without concern for one's own wellbeing
A question that could be asked of you is, "Is it more moral not to kill someone because you understand that person likely values his life, or because you're afraid of going to jail?" Under definition a) the question doesn't even make sense.
So it leads me to wonder, do the Christians who pose this question believe we should "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" because it's in accordance with empathy, or because Jesus said so?
A common apologist canard with regard to theism versus atheism is the concept of what they call morality. "How can you be moral without God?" or some variant therein. Now, of course there is the method of simply answering that question directly. How atheist make moral decisions, what the origin of morality in humans and society, objective versus subjective morality, etc. This has been done to varying degrees of effectiveness, and while it can get the point across, it's ignoring that there's an equivocation fallacy in the premise.
The question "How can you be moral without God?" is based on the apologist suggesting that the rules put for by a god in a holy book (for example, the commandments in the Bible), establish morality. The problem is to call that morality is to conflate that with the traditional meaning of the word.
The philosophical concept of morality and in any other context is reliant on the action being a personal choice to do an action that is perceived beneficial to others regardless of the effect on oneself. Any useful definition of morality includes in some part empathy. Following rules in order to not be punished by a god is the opposite of the general definition of morality, not the basis of it.
So we've established two general definitions for morality
a) Following the rules of a god
b) Acting in accordance to empathy and assessment of positive effects of an action, without concern for one's own wellbeing
A question that could be asked of you is, "Is it more moral not to kill someone because you understand that person likely values his life, or because you're afraid of going to jail?" Under definition a) the question doesn't even make sense.
So it leads me to wonder, do the Christians who pose this question believe we should "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" because it's in accordance with empathy, or because Jesus said so?
Recently Spotted:
*crickets*
Something I plan on doing in a YouTube video later on is posing the following question: "would you rather have peace and contentment on Earth, or would you rather do the will of your god?"
Either doing what you're told is more important or establishing peace and contentment on Earth is more important.
Let's consider them separately:
1. The believer thinks that doing the will of their deity is the best way to establish peace and contentment, in which case peace and contentment is the goal and their following of the deity's commandments can be called into question based on whether or not following them would actually produce said results. This follows from a resolution of the Euthyphro dilemma using a notion of "good" that doesn't mean "whatever deity x happens to want".
2. The believer thinks that doing the will of their deity is more important, no matter what the content of said will is, establishing that the believer ultimately cares nothing for his or her fellow humans and that peace and contentment doesn't matter.
I'm tired and probably left some holes in my reasoning, but I just wanted to get it out there.
BTW, like I alluded to, I'm on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/Spootmeister
I'll be posting videos mainly on the philosophical and evidentiary problems with theism (and supernaturalism in general), as well as videos about things like epistemology, ethics, and metaphysics (but it won't be too deep, since I've only had two philo courses and done some independent reading online).
/shamelessselfpromotion
If your question, a theist can believe godliness is the best path to peacefulness, regardless of omnibenevolence.
But long time no post, beaver! I'll subscribe to you on Youtube so long as you show your face more than once every two months!
*watches youtube video
What? Who's that guy.
He is not angry and certainly not a Beaver!
Boooooooo
If we look at the former case, then we see that the desire to live in a peaceful, harmonious world trumps the desire to follow commandments qua commandments, and we thus have a chance to convince someone that following their deity's commandments might not, in fact, lead to the goal. The way is clear to bring in empirical evidence.
The reason I tied this to the Euthyphro dilemma is that the two different definitions of "good" (the meaningful one and the one that makes a deity's goodness trivial and meaningless), represented by your (a) and (b), are the same two types of definitions you get within the dilemma, one on each horn.
Iga: Well, at least now you guys can hear my voice, as I'll never be useful on the podcast.
I was never useful in any podcast, but it did not stop me from hosting a few. Besides you already know how to record your own voice, that is definitely a plus.
P.S. never mention a dilemma, like Euthyphro, when you are not going to state it.
What's the Euthyphro's dilemma anyways.
It's in part to distinguish between the theists who think that following a deity will result in real-world good versus the ones who say "He made you, so you should obey".