Atheism and morality

[genkaus]

Morality is not a 'system of ideas'. This is just so horribly confused it hurts. Morality is something we have an idea 'of'.

You are wrong by the very definition of morality. Morality is defined as a system of ideas differentiating between right and wrong. It is defined as code or a set of guidelines (which is a subset of ideas) to judge human behavior by. To ignore this simple truth and keep repeating that it is not a system of ideas is not just being confused, it is being willfully stupid.

A normative moral theory is a theory about what morality instructs us to do. So, it is a theory about what all right acts have in common apart from their rightness, or what all wrong acts have in common apart from their wrongness. Utilitarianism is one such theory (not a very good one, but still). Deontological views constitute another family of such views. Virtue ethical views constitute another camp. Pluralist views another. And so on. THese are all views that attempt to articulate a pattern in what it is that morality instructs. But they do not constitute metaethical views. They are not telling us what morality 'is', only what it instructs us to do and be.

Normative ethics does not address the question of what morality is because it starts with that understanding. You know what all these "moral theories" have in common? They accept and understand that morality is a system of ideas that contains the guidelines to human behavior and then they all attempt to figure out what its content should be.

What morality 'is' is something that instructs and favours and whose instructions have inescapable rational authority (it has other features as well but these are the least disputable, in my view).

Your view is wrong. What morality is is system of ideas that contains instructions as to how one should act - it does not instruct or favor.

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The insane never think they are.

The insane often recognise their own insanity. Any other pearls of wisdom to offer?

And yet, you don't recognize yours.