My views on objective morality
March 1, 2016 at 8:49 pm
(This post was last modified: March 1, 2016 at 8:51 pm by LadyForCamus.)
(March 1, 2016 at 7:59 pm)bennyboy Wrote:(March 1, 2016 at 3:49 pm)LadyForCamus Wrote: ::bold mine:: CL, I think you've just demonstrated that your morality is subjective without even realizing it in the paragraph above. You have interpreted the scripture in a fashion that feels right to you. Because there is no unchallenged consensus amongst Christians on how to interpret the OT, the individual is left ultimately responsible for drawing their own conclusions (and boy, don't so many things get lost in translation?). Completely subjective.
To play devil's advocate here (snerk), CL never said that everyone has the same moral sense. She believes there are "right" morals out there somewhere which people might, if they try, discover.
This isn't that different than anything else in life. Your perception of my desk might be subtly (or even quite) different than mine. However, we might both believe there is probably something unerlying our perceptions which is objectively real.
Even without regard to whether God exists, I can see how this might be the case. If we see instincts not as possessions of a person, but rather see a person as an expression of genetic material, then those behaviors which best express the tendencies (I avoid saying intent or purpose) of the DNA could be objective.
Hmm...okay, I see your point. So, we could consider each individual's genetically expressed tendencies as objective for that specific person? So...quite literally I could say "my objective morality could kick your objective morality's ass!" and it sounds reasonable. [emoji39] Of course, this still leaves us with the problem of every single person on the planet having a different genetically objective moral sense.
Or, in the context of an objective moral code from God (like the desk example), if it is up to us humans to "discover" this transcendent moral code for ourselves, how do we know when we have actually done so?
And to take it a step further back, do these moral truths exist independent of any human perception or agency, (like the laws of logic)? If so, how? And in what form? Only in god's mind perhaps?
*head explodes*
Nay_Sayer: “Nothing is impossible if you dream big enough, or in this case, nothing is impossible if you use a barrel of KY Jelly and a miniature horse.”
Wiser words were never spoken.
Wiser words were never spoken.