You keep saying "must be". Why? Because you demand it? Again, it seems you're simply uncomfortable with there not being one; that is not an argument.

And I explained at length why an arbitrary "standard" is meaningless, would you care to address any of my points?

(August 7, 2015 at 9:39 am)Whateverist the White Wrote:

(August 7, 2015 at 8:57 am)lkingpinl Wrote: Chad, Yes!  That is exactly the point!  If there is no transcendent point of moral authority, then morals are completely relative then there is no "evil" and everyone loses their right to pass judgment on anything.  They may have an opinion, but that cannot logically condemn it without assuming moral superiority.

Clarification please.  Are you really agreeing with Chad and/or are you being a little facetious?

I can read this as saying, there is transcendence involved but it rests with God, not in us.  Therefore, while we all are entitled to our opinion (and know what the moral import of an action would be if we did it), we can't any of us logically condemn another because the transcendence rests with God alone.  In essence, if the person performing the act you find reprehensible isn't responding to God's inner guidance, why on earth would he respond to your's?

No I was agreeing with Chad.  For those that hold to no higher moral standard than self (moral relativism), you cannot logically condemn any action of another because they are simply adhering to their own morality.  If you do condemn the act you are then claiming moral superiority.  So if morals are relative then there is no good or evil as those terms become relative and ultimately meaningless.  

This is where the argument from evil and suffering falls apart because in order truly call something evil and discuss it with others and appeal that you cannot believe in God because of the existence of evil in this world, you are invoking a moral authority that transcends humanity, but that is what you are trying to disprove.

I'm guessing the answer will be "no" but using many more words.

(August 7, 2015 at 10:00 am)robvalue Wrote: You keep saying "must be". Why? Because you demand it? Again, it seems you're simply uncomfortable with there not being one; that is not an argument.

And I explained at length why an arbitrary "standard" is meaningless, would you care to address any of my points?

No because logic dictates it

When you are judging something what are you doing?  You are assessing it based on the accepted standard.  When a judge determines if someone is guilty of breaking a law, he compares the act to the law itself (the standard).

No, we all have our own standards of morality individually. That much is clear.

You keep implying Kingpin that it is logically possible to condemn someone with absolute certainty. Again, this is just the way you want things to be. Morality is a matter of discussion, and you can't even begin to decide what is moral and what is not until you decide what outcomes are important, and what is valuable. Otherwise it's one person giving out an arbitrary list.

You seem to be ignoring my entire short essay on why this is absurd, so I will leave the matter.

As for Yahweh, my interpretation of his character is not a madcap one. I assume you have read the Old Testament? It's laid out plain to see that Yahweh is a horrible monster with just about every bad (and human) character flaw there could be.

PS: This is why science demands evidence. Logic alone is not enough to prove anything exists, because we cannot be sure we haven't gone wrong or oversimplified reality. So just saying "it must logically be there" is not enough to demonstrate that it is there; and "where" this standard is meant to be, or what the point of it is (see my essay) is beyond me.

I'm enjoying the discussion however I've given up trying to talk to most theists we have here a long time ago.

(August 6, 2015 at 2:55 pm)Esquilax Wrote: I've already read ahead and seen the bits you've deleted from my post…the dishonest censorship of my response you've done before you deigned to answer it.

When editing, I always try to preserve the intent of the author and only strive for brevity. If you feel I have deleted something essential to your point then you should know that I did so by mistake, not malice.

(August 6, 2015 at 2:55 pm)Esquilax Wrote: What I'm saying is that one of the problems with the argument- because I'm pointing out the issues I have with it and not casually dismissing it, as you baselessly accuse…

Please accept my apology. What I said was not accurate.

(August 6, 2015 at 2:55 pm)Esquilax Wrote: ... it …is setting a list of criteria without demonstrating that they're the only available ones, [one] that only reduces possibilities from a prepared list,...

That is not universally true. Sometimes a person make a list that exhausts all possibilities, like A and not-A. As it relates specifically to the argument in the OP, I acknowledged other possibilities but could not readily identify them. For the revamped argument I simply put those in the category of whatever is outside of Nature, the Individual, and the Collective. To my mind that covers all known secular sources of moral authority.

(August 6, 2015 at 2:55 pm)Esquilax Wrote: Do I seriously need to point out to you that people can be mistaken in what they believe they should do…

You have made the point before. I acknowledged it as something to be explained. And I did. The argument, as I have revised it, does not hinge on the accuracy of the moral sentiments made by someone’s conscience. For example, the well water may come from a clear aquifer (source of authority) but some people may choose to add flavors to the water or drink from a dirt cup. Or someone in power, like a tyrant, could poison the well for everyone.

Most people acknowledge that it means something to be human, even though many differ on the specifics. War-mongers and torturers demonize their enemies. Abortionists and those who advocate euthanasia dehumanize the weak and vulnerable. Here is what I said in the commentary to Given 1 of the revamped argument:

Quote:Esquilax, Redbeard and others, have repeated my earlier stated concern about the variable nature of conscience between individuals and the lack of development in others. Neither TRJF (apparently) or I see this as a flaw in the argument itself. Anyone can see that people vary with respect to many other traits like physical stature, dexterity, and intelligence. There is no reason to suppose otherwise for conscience.

The point is that all things found in the natural world reflect to varying degrees the essential form of that which makes it the thing that it is, i.e. some kind of realism. For this reason, nominalists and conceptualists will not find the Argument from Conscience 2.0 compelling. Within a realist framework, adding the qualifiers ‘healthy and normative’ is necessary to distinguish between those of us who adequately satisfy the criteria of ‘rational animal’ to the exclusion of the insane and incapable.

(August 6, 2015 at 2:55 pm)Esquilax Wrote: As I said before, there were people in the past who felt obligated to follow their consciences by "uplifting" Aboriginal children … also have examples wherein one could feel obligated to their conscience, not follow it, and indeed actively fight against it, and achieve a virtuous result.

Indeed, you have said it before. Your response presupposes the existence of some reliable external reference. Your conscience tells you that the Western education of the aboriginal children was wrong. Starting with some innate kernel of conscience, like empathy, people build their conscience with reason applied to experience. Their reasoning may be flawed and their experiences desensitizing. The fact is that each person must decide for themselves what is right and what is wrong. For this reason, I call the following of conscience uniformly virtuous, not because the end results are good; but rather, because when people following their conscience they cultivate the virtues that make people better exemplars of what it means to be human, e.g. more courageous, more rational, greater temperance, just, etc.

You say that the checking of conscience is something people should constantly check and re-verify. I couldn’t agree more. I say that it is your conscience tells you that it is right and proper to do so, because that is what a healthy and fully functioning conscience does. It tells you what you should do even with respect to itself.

(August 6, 2015 at 2:55 pm)Esquilax Wrote: Which makes the conscience itself completely irrelevant, since the argument is predicated on it working in a certain way, toward a certain pre-existing definition of good.

Yes, the argument works it’s way to a certain idea of good: The Good to be precise. But I disagree that that make the conscience irrelevant, since its function is to work towards better conformity with The Good.

(August 6, 2015 at 2:55 pm)Esquilax Wrote: It's circular.

I consider it feedback loop that strives toward a desired end – think Aristotle’s Nichomacean Ethics.

(August 6, 2015 at 2:55 pm)Esquilax Wrote: So it's special pleading, then?

The charge of special pleading only sticks when someone applies different standards to things in the same category. I listed three qualities in which God differs from human beings. They are not comparable.[/quote]

Again, please accept my apologies for inaccurate editing. Hopefully I did better this time.

Scenario to all theists:

God shows up and announces to everyone in the world that we need to know what is moral and what is not, things have not been clear enough up to this point.

"Murder and rape are moral. Helping people is immoral. Everything else is neither moral or immoral. Bye."

Now. Will you live by this moral code? It's the universal moral code, we just didn't know exactly what it was until now. Would you be fine with me murdering and raping your family? If not, on what grounds can you object? God just said it's moral, and he is the only authority.

(August 7, 2015 at 9:22 am)Whateverist the White Wrote: "God did it" must be a formulation, acceptable to Chad, where reconciling that the voice of conscience arises in the sub-conscious is not efficacious for him.

My position is a little more nuanced than than. I will admit, and actually already did, that there could be other options, but that I was hard pressed to come up with one. I invited other to add to the list of options and no one has yet done so. Also, I did not rule our the subconscious. That part of self would fall under either Nature or the individual or some combination of the two. Take a look again, not at the OP, which everyone, including myself, think fails for one reason or another; but rather, the Argument from Conscience 2.0. and also my latest reply to Esquilax, in which I said that the argument relies on some kind of realism and works with neither nominalism nor conceptualism. You should also note that in Argument for Conscience 2.0 I draw two conclusions 6a and 6b.

(August 7, 2015 at 10:03 am)lkingpinl Wrote: No I was agreeing with Chad.  For those that hold to no higher moral standard than self (moral relativism), you cannot logically condemn any action of another because they are simply adhering to their own morality.  If you do condemn the act you are then claiming moral superiority.  So if morals are relative then there is no good or evil as those terms become relative and ultimately meaningless.

I think the problem with what I bolded is that you assume a simple/unitary "self". But what is to stop someone from granting the same respect to the dictates of their conscience that you do - without assuming they come from God? Notice that the only difference is an assumption you yourself are making, not any established fact. So long as a person recognizes the importance, what difference can it possibly make? Some will protest that if it comes down to just listening to what comes out of one's own head, what is to guarantee there is any moral authority in that? But from the point of view of the atheist, that is exactly the position every theist is in as well. Even if you cite the authority of the bible, that isn't an authority I recognize and you can't use the bible to justify your choice of the bible so how is your position supposed to be any better than our own?

(August 7, 2015 at 10:03 am)lkingpinl Wrote: This is where the argument from evil and suffering falls apart because in order truly call something evil and discuss it with others and appeal that you cannot believe in God because of the existence of evil in this world, you are invoking a moral authority that transcends humanity, but that is what you are trying to disprove.

I don't find I need the word "evil". Just move the "e" to the end of the word and you get a better word without all the pretentious baggage, "vile". Those who do vile things are villains and that justifies the imposition of a duly appointed justice system to enforce our communally agreed upon laws. What happens to them after they die is of no actionable relevance to anything that requires my attention.

(August 7, 2015 at 10:33 am)robvalue Wrote: God shows up and announces to everyone in the world that we need to know what is moral and what is not, things have not been clear enough up to this point. "Murder and rape are moral. Helping people is immoral. Everything else is neither moral or immoral. Bye."

What if gravity stopped working or the speed of light went to 2 kph? Won't happen.