Why Secular Morality is Superior

[DeistPaladin]

He didn't miss speak at all. He was perfectly clear. Secular morality is a popularity contest. The only reason the mafia don isn't regarded as moral is that a greater power exists. If he had more power then his morals would apply.

You and he keep repeating this straw man argument but that's not what I've ever written on the topic of morality. I've said repeatedly in this thread that there are far more satisfying explanations for the nature of what morality is and what is moral beyond "big invisible sky daddy says so".

For example, we could discuss The Social Contract. We treat others the way we would wish to be treated. We as humans are empathetic beings as well as community organisms. We feel the pain of others and seek to minimize that pain. We bond together in communities and seek to bring about laws that best help society to function. What we call "morality" is a measurement of how we treat our fellow sentient beings, that we respect one another's rights and act with integrity, as we would have others act with us.

There are other philosophies we can call upon to aid our discussion of morality. Perhaps we could go with Bentham and his Utility-based principles? He came the closest to convincing me there is an "objective" basis of morality. By his theory, there is a sum total of pleasure and pain in the universe, totals which can vary with our actions. Actions that help relieve pain or enhance the pleasure of others tends to be morally correct. It's not a perfect system but we can discuss the merits and flaws of it to help elucidate our understanding of morality.

Or maybe we'd like to review Rawls and his Veil of Ignorance, where morality can be evaluated by imagining that we will be in the situation but we don't know which role. We would want to resolve the issue or create a society that contains the most justice because we couldn't be sure in which role we would end up.

It may shock you and John V but there are many different philosophers out there who have discussed morality without ever having to fall back on GodWillsIt and yet they also don't throw up their hands and say "oh well, it's just a matter of who is strongest or has the most popularity".

DP: Shall I stop? You seem to have retreated to ad hominem in your latest replies.

Uh oh. Someone's projecting.

I'm trying to investigate how you're giving the judge a free pass where morals don't apply to his judgement.

There is no "free pass". Making an error in judgment due to faulty evidence is not a moral issue.

God is depicted as making moral judgements, some extremely harsh in resulting in a death sentence. Yet God is not susceptible to populist pressure or lack of knowledge in arriving at his judgements. And yet you call him immoral.

Yes, I'm aware this is how you want to depict your god. However, your god isn't interested in right or wrong. If I have accepted Jesus, I have my slate wiped clean. If I have not, I'm tortured for all eternity regardless of my best attempts to be a good person. Faith (or gullibility) is all that matters to Yahweh.

It's not a bare assertion. It's a simple logical conclusion of God.

Logical conclusion based on what evidence or what logical progression. All I've seen you do is come up with a contrived definition of your god as "good" and the follow with the assertion that since he's defined as good, all his decisions are good. And we know that he is good because all his decisions are good. This is begging the question.

The rest of your post is just "blah blah blah, God is good, he just wants you to connect with him, he's just in his judgments on Judgment Day yatta yatta, bare assertion, bare assertion, article of faith goes here"