Christians take on the more nihilistic atheists

[robvalue]

I told you twice I don't think in terms of "good" and "evil" yet you're still talking as if I do. I don't think this is going anywhere.

[henryp]

I told you twice I don't think in terms of "good" and "evil" yet you're still talking as if I do. I don't think this is going anywhere.

I'm hung up on it, because you keep calling what you're doing morality, but morality is making the distinctions between right and wrong.  (which in the context of morals, I'd equate with good and evil).

If you're making up your own definition of morality, that's fine.  But it confuses things, since I'm arguing against a different concept, and think what you're calling morality isn't really morality. 

 If I say unicorns don't exist, and then you pull out your dog, and say I consider dogs to be unicorns.  And I say but it's not a horse with a horn in it's head.  And you say I don't believe in horses with horns in their head.  And I say, but that's what unicorns are.  To me, I consider dogs unicorns.  Language is fun.

(Not saying your interpretation of morality is that absurd or absurd at all.  Just that it's making the conversation absurd.  A shame we couldn't have come up with a better way to communicate than words.)

[henryp]

You know what else might complicate this stuff. I think I may believe pragmatism is objective from an impartial perspective. We can't even come close to properly identifying what is 100% pragmatic, but I think I believe there is a 'correct' choice to be made based on the makeup of a person's brain.

[robvalue]

Sure, determinism is an entirely different discussion and I don't think it's relevant here except as a way to end the discussion. As it happens, I lean towards determinism myself, although I acknowledge I can't possibly know what is really going on.

Good, evil and [inherently] right and wrong are all the language of objective morality. I would argue as passionately as you that objective morality is either incoherent or useless. I've defined morality as I see it, a subjective value judgement. It can be used in other senses more loosely, such as societal norms, or in the objective study of why animals appear to "care" about each other at all.

Morality, in my opinion, is not a well-defined concept. Between any two people, the very basics have to be agreed before a proper discussion can take place. Often someone makes a whole boat-load of assumptions that I don't agree with before they wish to begin. Very informally, it's the way people choose between "right and wrong", but in reality this is just their perception of what they feel is right and wrong, to them. I would use "right" only as a shorthand for what I personally think is acceptable, and "wrong" for what I think isn't. And I own it as entirely my opinion. If you don't want to call that morality, then that's fine.