paralysis

[truth_seeker]

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@Jörmungandr, first of all, I have to begin by thanking you for critiquing my ideas in an objective way. Thank you

Exactly my point. In an atheistic worldview, there is no independent objective morality. There is no standard. There is no "should" of anything, as you mentioned.
One's own sense of empathy and consciousness (and I'm not saying an atheist can not "feel" empathy) does not entail any "shoulds" or standards on others. It's only your opinion, not binding to others in any way.

This is simply not true.  We evolved to function as a group of individuals, not as solitary individuals, so certain group behaviors form a natural imperative for us.  Morality of the group is one such behavior that while not possessing permanent, objective characteristics, does nonetheless provide for the setting of group norms that are binding on all members of the group, as a consequence of how the group treats rule breakers.  There is morality, even if it is changeable and dependent on group behaviors.  That doesn't make it any less real

That's all fine and nice. But all of this is your own take on the issue. Your entire argument is not binding to anyone. It might be a nice and humane argument, but not binding at all. Its still relative to your own understanding. So again we're back at the "blank canvas of infinite possible moralities" issue.

So if I was the disabled person in the OP scenario (and I know people in this situation), I would be very seriously and extremely threatened. Because its all relative, and "it depends", so each person I meet is an entirely open canvas of infinite possible moralities, because (in this world view) there is no independent standard objective morality. There is no "should" of anything, as you mentioned, and its all open for discussion.

That consensus morality tends to converge upon certain "absolutes" is evidence against this "blank canvas of morality" view that you are presenting...

The institutions of family, culture, and government serve to perpetuate a system of morals and stabilize it against the possibility of radical change...

This is not to say that a society couldn't change its morals such that killing your disabled person is moral, but that it does not align with recent societies and is thus de facto immoral

Your last statement completely wipes out the first two. If killing a disabled person can shift from being immoral to moral is not a radical shift, I don't know what is.

And this is exactly my point. How can you even begin to identify a "radical" shift? What is the source against which you're making the judgment whether something is radical or not?

I think a good term for this would be "boiling frog morality", following the idea that if a frog jumps into an already boiling water, they will immediately jump back out. However, if they start inside normal water, and then you gradually boil the water, the frog stays inside until their probable death.

But for a standard, independent, outside source of morality (that is, objective morality), no body would even begin to imagine pondering on this, and the issue is absolutely and completely out of question. And because of that, if I was the disabled person in the OP scenario, I would feel completely safe and relaxed. Which also eventually benefits everybody.

That depends on the objective morals in question.  Even if there are objective morals, you're simply interpreting the scenario as falling under them.  Remember that the bible didn't proscribe either rape or slavery.  This is an example of people following 'objective' morals that we today would consider unthinkable.  These two issues may well lie outside the bounds of any objective morals and be a mere human invention.  What evidence do you have that killing the disabled person is covered by an objective ethic, as opposed to being merely dragged along on the boundary of other morals that truly are objective?

You are confusing two things: the objective morality itself, and the details that can be obtained from it. For example, if the objective morality says no one is allowed to kill. Period. Then this simple objective morality statement fits a large number of scenarios. Such as a killing a disabled person, killing infants (e.g. after birth abortion), etc.  So even though the sentence "killing a disabled person" did not exist in the objective moral, it is still absolutely covered by that objective moral.

To give a legal analogy, consider the US constitution. The constitution represents the essential elements of the law of the land. However, you still need constitutional judges and courts in order to apply that constitution to specific detailed cases. Are these detailed cases mentioned literally in the constitution? of course not! But the rulings of the constitutional judges use the constitution as a "flash light" the tells you what to do in that very detailed scenario. So the final result is that the detailed scenario is constitutional, even though it was not literally mentioned in the constituion.