The difference between ethical atheism and nihlism is that ethical atheists have more faith

[genkaus]

Where does the victims "right to live" come from?

From the recognition of his capacity for self-determination.
Or from social contract agree upon.
Or from his desire not to die.

To be an honest atheist means to reflect on the nature of these concepts.

No, being an honest atheist means admitting to disbelief in god. You can still lie about everything else and not reflect on anything you don't want to.

Is your knowledge that there is right to live stronger than your belief in absolute, unguided atheistic evolution as the means by which life was created? I do not think you can have both.

I do have both. Yay.

Why do people have a right to live more than ameobas?

Because amoebas are not a part of human society - d'uh.

Religious morality and secular morality are totally different. Religious morality says that people are created with a certain nature, and to disagree with that nature is to rebel against God. Things are not only prohibited because God forbids them, they are prohibited because that prohibition is part of the divine order of the universe that is established.

Isn't that the greatest irony of it all? Religious morality is the one thing that almost consistently dictates that you go against your nature.

A good person is a person that lives in a way that is consistent with how people are created to live.

Given that people weren't created, much less created to live in a particular way, there can be be no such thing as a good person.

That is true that you get your morals from the culture you are from, but that does nothing to deal with the problem of cultural relativism. What if you have a choice to either fight in the Chinese military or the American military. How do you know which country to serve? Should you follow Hitler because you were born in Germany.

If you can, try to pick the winning side. Or better still, stay out of it.

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To be a Christian really means that your will is always directed towards wisdom.

Then why is it that Christians are often so stupid?

I believe that there could be alternative ways of understanding God, that could also be directed towards wisdom, or towards human nature and the glory of God represented in nature.

Except, there is no way understand what doesn't exist.

So I think that the sort of nihilistic ethics would be condemned in pretty much every single religion and philosophy ever developed.

Except, you know, the nihilistic philosophies themselves.

People are created to direct their wills towards what is good, and it is possible to know what is good. Is the knowledge of what is good less important than knowing the details of esoteric scientific theories, if they can even be understood at all?

Given that those "esoteric scientific theories" can and do inform one's position on the knowledge of good and that people without those theories can and do fall prey to corrupted knowledge of good as presented by various religions (esp. Christianity) - yes, it is.

Human biology and culture reveals that it is wrong to be foolish and direct the will only the pleasures or arbitrarily. Nihilism is a way of saying that foolishness is acceptable because there is no such thing as wisdom. As hinted at before, this also destroys the foundations of atheist epistemology, at least epistemology understood in a sense in which there are duties to accept the fruits of epistemology.

Given that nihilism doesn't say that - I don't see any foundations being destroyed.

So nihilism really is incompatible with the aggressive scientism that dominates atheist discourse. Christianity is actually close in many ways to the rationality of science. Christianity demands that the will be filled with epistemologically responsible concepts at all times. This is what nihilism denies.

I always laugh out loud when I see rationality and Christianity in the same sentence. Clearly, you seem to have little knowledge of demands of Christianity and none of nihilism.

Anyone who defends nihilism is defending that it is ok to be a bad person. I think it is safe to call them a bad person.

Actually, why stop at nihilism? This is just another way of saying that anyone defending a morality which is not my morality is a bad person according to my morality. Therefore, it is safe to call him a bad person according to my morality.

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I can't decide if you have your head in the clouds or up your ass. But in this you are on the same level with plenty of atheists.

Was that a dig at me?

You insist on placing morality under the domain of reason,

He does no such thing. He tries to, but fails miserably.

but that is not where morality comes from.

As we've previously established - maybe not yours.

No one responds to morally reprehensible behavior involving cruelty to others in a purely intellectual way.

I do.

"Gee, don't they realize that their actions, if adopted by everyone, could one day result in harm to me or mine?" That isn't the way it works.

Not the line of reasoning I'd use.

It is empathy for others which makes us recoil against cruelty, and empathy operates at the level of feeling, not rationality.

And a highly unreliable basis it is.

There is no need to justify an assignment of value to people objectively, for either theists or atheists, if you recognize that empathy and not rationality is the basis of morality.

You mean, for your morality - which is self-contradictory and unreliable.

One need not have a reasonable justification for rejecting cruelty in order to avoid what one finds unpleasant.

Unless they wish to actually justify their position and expect others to share it.

In the same way I need not have an objective basis for rejecting store-bought mayonnaise in order to leave it off my sandwiches.

But then, you don't expect others to do the same, do you?

In both cases I avoid what I don't like and pursue what I do. That isn't to say that rationality doesn't come into play to sort out conflicts in our empathy or tastes or preferences or desires generally. Of course it does.

Thereby showing why it serves as an unreliable basis.

That in fact is the proper use of rationality, to serve feeling and come up with strategic goals for maximizing that which one is drawn to and avoid that which one is repulsed by. One just needs to keep rationality in its place.

"Proper use"? How very teleological of you. Tell me, how did you divine that that was the "proper use" of rationality or who told that? The little bird that sings inside you?