In UK atheists considred more moral than theists.

[robvalue]

God is omniscient, which by definition means his decisions are always perfect, they cannot be improved upon.

Not to be pedantic but that is not the definition of omniscient. You can try and suggested all knowing means he must therefore make perfect decisions but I would disagree that it necessarily follows.

He could know everything but then be a total dick. It appears that is the case.

[Catholic_Lady]

If anyone is interested, here is an article that I have bookmarked on my computer and really like. It serves as a good reminder to us Christian's as well, as we don't always show humility and kindness like we should:

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/am...ssion=true

[downbeatplumb]

Not to be pedantic but that is not the definition of omniscient. You can try and suggested all knowing means he must therefore make perfect decisions but I would disagree that it necessarily follows.

To be considered pedantic you'd have to be right...

Go ahead and explain in the scenario in which someone who knows every outcome of every decision would make a mistake.

I know the outcome of every decision. 
I just need to wait for them to play out.
The god of the old testament seemed to be surprised and wrong footed quite often, implying imperfect knowledge at that time. 
So I guess it gets its omniscience the same way I do, after the fact. 


Most of genesis is god making mistakes.

[Angrboda]

But Jeffrey Dahmer did love his neighbor!  The only person being dumb here is you, Huggy.  I asked you where your morals come from and you quote me what you think are moral truths.  That doesn't answer the question of where these morals came from.  It only tells me that you think those commands are moral.  I presume that you think morals such as "love thy neighbor" come from God.  Which gets us back to the original question.  Where did God get his morals from?  If he didn't get them from anywhere but himself, then they are just arbitrary, they are simply whatever he happened to believe for no particular reason whatsoever, he just pulled them out of his ass.  If that's the case, then his morals are no better than ones that I make up on my own out of thin air.  If there is no foundation for his morals, then they are no more right than anybody else's ideas on morals.

So I'll ask you again, if you get your morals from God, where did he get his morals from?

Still playing dumb I see..

God is omniscient, which by definition means his decisions are always perfect, they cannot be improved upon.

If God's morals are based upon himself, and that truly is the foundation of morals, then they are still arbitrary. Knowing that something is such and so doesn't make it being such and so any less arbitrary. If I were to consider my views on abortion to be the foundation of proper views on abortion, my knowing that doesn't make those views any less arbitrary. The problem is the circularity involved in having God be the source of morals, and his simply knowing that he is the source of morals. Both may be true and yet his morals would still be arbitrary. The only way out of that conundrum is to base his morals on something else, but you have not argued that he does this, so we are left with the same arbitrariness which you find problematic about what you believe to be atheist morals.

God is love, and love encompasses everything that is right and good, therefore 'love' is inherently moral.

According to whom or what is that the case? If it's only according to God, then, as noted above, it's simply arbitrary. If that's the case, then you're hypocritical for faulting what you consider to be atheist morals for their arbitrariness because your morals suffer the same flaw.

Where there is no love, then there is need for law, for love does not need to be told how to behave.

If you love your spouse, you do not have to be told "thou shalt not commit adultery", because if you truly loved your spouse you would have no desire to have an affair.

Love is selfless: "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."

If love is selfless then it's behavior in a moral sense is always objective.

That's assuming an awful lot, but you're still not understanding the basic problem. I can agree that love is selfless, that it removes the need for law, and so forth, without ever granting that the raising of love to the standard for morals is not arbitrary. Again, the question isn't about it being the case both that morals are based upon God and that God says morals are such and so, and that God's omniscience leads us to that conclusion. The question is where God gets the idea that love encompasses what is right and good from? If only from himself, then his morals are no less arbitrary than what you are alluding to as atheist morals. (And I'll simply point out that being an atheist doesn't imply denying moral realism. I don't think you're acknowledging that.) Moreover, we have to ask why God's morals are the definition of what is right. If the answer to that question is "that's simply the way it is," then your morality is arbitrary in an additional sense. (So it's arbitrary for lacking a foundation, as well as being predicated on the idea that God is the source of morals, which, if true, is also arbitrary.)

[The Grand Nudger]

Turtles all the way down.  

At least..in the case of secular moral realism...there's going to be some acknowledgement that if you drill it down and down and down, theres an underlying arbitrarity.  The acknowledgement that, had things been different, they would be different.  

If assault were pleasurable and beneficial then assault would be, at least..within the confines of what a moral person could morally do.  Could have been that way.  Somehow..lord knows how, we could have evolved in such a way and live in such a world as to have made that a reality.  We didn't. We don't. It isn't....and there isn't anyone on earth or in heaven that could change that. In that sense, I'm not sure that whatever arbitrarity in a secular morality is a meaningful arbitrarity - but the possibility is there.

I also enjoy noting that the fundamental units of both secular and theistic morality are the same. I maintain that theists are wrong in their subject of emphasis, but not wrong in their approach.

[Aroura]

Not to be pedantic but that is not the definition of omniscient. You can try and suggested all knowing means he must therefore make perfect decisions but I would disagree that it necessarily follows.

To be considered pedantic you'd have to be right...

Go ahead and explain in the scenario in which someone who knows every outcome of every decision would make a mistake.

That isn't what pedantic means, either.  A person can be nitpicky and still be incorrect.  Just as a being can know everything and still be a dick. Also, that being is not, by definition, also able to do everything, so they might not be able to take the action they deem "perfect".

So if a being knew every outcome but could not take all actions, that's a perfect example of your requested scenario.  Or if they knew every outcome but desired a negative outcome, that's another example of your requested scenario. 

Now if you pair omniscient with omnibenevolent and omnipotent, you might begin to have an argument, but then we butt up against the problem of evil.

But yeah, you can't just toss out one of the three and act like it covers the whole gamut.  It doesn't.

[Angrboda]

Turtles all the way down.  

At least..in the case of secular moral realism...there's going to be some acknowledgement that if you drill it down and down and down, theres an underlying arbitrarity.  The acknowledgement that, had things been different, they would be different.  

If assault were pleasurable and beneficial then assault would be, at least..within the confines of what a moral person could morally do.  Could have been that way.  Somehow..lord knows how, we could have evolved in such a way and live in such a world as to have made that a reality.  We didn't.  We don't.  It isn't....and there isn't anyone on earth or in heaven that could change that.  In that sense, I'm not sure that whatever arbitrarity in a secular morality is a meaningful arbitrarity - but the possibility is there.

I also enjoy noting that the fundamental units of both secular and theistic morality are the same.  I maintain that theists are wrong in their subject of emphasis, but not wrong in their approach.

I wouldn't necessarily disagree in any one point here, but I think as a practical matter, it would be more rational to base morals on the arbitrary facts of human nature rather than the equally arbitrary revealed morals of an inscrutable sky fairy. Even if we are made in his image, it is that image which we have to contend with, not a bunch of guesswork that revealed theology can never completely eliminate.

[The Grand Nudger]

I find myself..at least in my life (not so much here because I mostly point and laugh at charlatans and assholes) telling theists exactly that thing.

This is the image I have.  This is all I need to justify my positions.  Not just in a moral context, in any context.  This is the world I have, this is all the world I need to justify my positons.  A person can propose other images and other worlds all they want...but I am this, playing this game, on this board.  I could be getting it wrong, somehow, in context of some other image or life. It wouldn't be the first time that the rules for two different games were..well..different..and I'll cross that bridge when I get there, if there's a bridge to cross.  I'm doing this eyes wide open.  I've made a conscious decision..by the rules of this lifes game..and on this lifes board, to solve the problems before me in this life.

One foot in front of the other..left..left. left right left. In that, I truly "make no plan for the morrow"...which you think they'd be a little bit appreciative of..but I digress.

[robvalue]

Morals come down to, "This is the way I think things should be".

[The Grand Nudger]

Invariably so...and all thats left are questions as to why you might think that way.  If an objection amounts to "but great-fairy says...!"...pft...  get the fuck outta here with that trash.