what are we supposed to say again when christians ask us where we get our morality?

[Statler Waldorf]

That's weird. I could have sworn I just posted prison statistics that clearly show more religious people have a very tenuous grasp on ethics as compared to atheists.

That’s not the argument. Stay relevant.

Strange how Waldorf ignores them in his Word Salad.

I have a tendency to ignore the red herring fallacy when it shows up.

He's in fact claiming the very morality the Bible supports: slavery, rape, genocide, abortion, murder... Is only wrong with God?

You’re committing the fallacy of equivocation with these terms. Secondly, yes these things would only be wrong if God exists.

It almost seems as if Waldorf Word Salad hasn't read the bible. Otherwise he would know any Christians who don't support such things are behaving ethically in spite of their religion instead of due to it.

No I have read the entire thing which is why I know that these terms have a historical meaning that differs from what they mean today and that laws under the Mosaic Covenant were replaced by the New Covenant ushered in by Christ. Nice try but you’re really only committing the red herring fallacy by bringing these things up. The argument is that such moral judgments would be impossible in a godless Universe, deal with that argument.

And no matter how he tries to ignore it, and repeat that only God is the source of morality, he can't seem to explain the statistics demonstrating Christians are far more likely to end up in prison for following biblical morality.

Even if you did give such statistics they’d be irrelevant regarding the topic of discussion.

The only explanation, it seems, is that Waldorf is attributing a person's innate conscience to God, without any support for his claim, and significant evidence against, as secular people seem to behave more ethically than the religious.

God’s common grace is extended to many. You’re dodging the issue though. How do you know what is right and wrong? By what you innately feel to be right and wrong? Seriously?

For example:

This ought to be good.

Citing four different studies, Zuckerman states: "Murder rates are actually lower in more secular nations and higher in more religious nations where belief in God is widespread." He also states: "Of the top 50 safest cities in the world, nearly all are in relatively non-religious countries."

As long as we are not counting unborn babies right?

And these findings are not limited to murder rates, as rates of all violent crime tend to be higher in "religious" states. Zuckerman also points out that atheists are very much under-represented in the American prison population (only 0.2%).

This is completely irrelevant however, atheists could commit no crimes ever and it would not change the fact that they need God to exist in order to possess a logically coherent definition of morality. I completely understand why you’d try to change the subject.

Any response to the above, or will e continue selectively responding and demonstrating his confirmation bias?

I am in no way logically obligated to respond to irrational points. Bring up something relevant to the topic at hand and we’ll dance.

They would be moral to the members of the society that defined them as such. I would not call them good, as I would not personally think that it's good to kill a person in either circumstance.

Why would you not think that? If the act could be stipulated as good or bad why do you have an opinion either way on its goodness?

My point is that few actions can be judged independent of context. Perhaps there are no actions that could be objectively labeled as bad. I pointed out one action that I cannot make conform to that idea.

Contextually how are you defining what is right and wrong? Who determines whether enough justification was given for the action? Thanks for your thoughts; they’re interesting.

You're looking at it backwards, is the problem: "only sentient beings are capable of taking part in moral thought," is not the same statement as "all sentient beings do take part in moral thought." The former is a subset of the latter.

Since using your definition we are only concerned with the well-being of sentient beings who are capable of moral thought then is it not morally wrong to torture animals?

No, because there's a progression of complexity at play here; the one human is, at least within the terms I am able to detect, more sentient than the fish. That said, if given the option I'd still prefer it that nothing died.

Why does complexity only matter at the sentient level? That seems rather arbitrary. Does this also apply to the intelligence of the individual?

You dislike pain, pain in general serves no good purpose as it denotes physical injury, so therefore pain is generally bad for sentient beings, and that forms a cornerstone of our moral systems.

This has two problems with it. Firstly, pain often does serve a purpose it prevents us from harming ourselves significantly. We stop running on an injured leg because it hurts, we do not get to close to fire because it hurts and so on. Secondly, you’re assuming that we ought to treat others the way we want to be treated (sounds familiar). Why? I see no basis for this. If someone can inflict pain on others and better their own situation then why not? Who are you to tell them they have to worsen their own situation just so not to inflict pain on others?

And to cut you off from the inevitable "that's in human terms, not god's terms," god seems to recognize that pain is bad too, as that's a part of the punishment he inflicts upon humanity in Genesis.

It’s unpleasant yes, not always bad.

I really don't get why you'd consider this a nonsequitur... well, I do, but if you'd been thinking of the argument on its own terms, rather than through the prism of "everything is meaningless without god," you wouldn't consider it that at all. My given premise is that, since only sentient beings are capable of observing and taking part in moral actions, morality concerns sentient beings exclusively, it just sort of naturally follows that the welfare of sentient beings becomes a component of morality, with those actions that allow them to flourish, so that there are continued sentient minds to take part in morality, being morally good. We survive by cooperating, our lives are immediately improved by our ability to band together and delegate tasks, which is why humans specifically benefit from not being psychopaths.

You’re still making a huge jump here. Sure, sentient beings are capable of creating moral systems and following such systems but I still see nothing that compels us to do so if we live in a purely material universe. Joseph Stalin died the most powerful man on Earth, why should a person not live their life like him? He’s feeding the worms now but if there is no god we all will be someday. Why should we care what worm food comes after us? Why should we care about any worm food besides ourselves? In the words of Himmler, “What compels us to keep our promises?” More precisely, if a person can better their own well-being, then why not hurt others?

I'm not going to play games with you, Stat: the person who is unconscious isn't totally non-sentient to begin with, and there is a very reasonable expectation that they will return to full consciousness in the future, potentially even during the act you perpetrate on them. We both know this, I really can't imagine why you'd think this wouldn't be my answer.

No games here; I think this is a legitimate question. If morality only pertains to sentient beings then it seems to follow that all acts against non-sentient beings are permissible and amoral. There are girls who are date raped and have no recollection of the event; is this act still immoral? I’d say yes, but given your definition it would appear not. Many people commit adultery and are never caught. If god exists this act is still morally wrong, given your definition of morality it would not appear to be. Your sort of pragmatic approach to morality falls apart when applied to very simple situations such as the ones above.

It is relevant because I want to live in a society where my well being is relatively safe from others, so I care that others well being is also safe.

What if someone wants to live in a society where they can lie and kill their way to the top? Is such behavior now morally acceptable?

I already did.

Life, freedom, comfort, health, ability to thrive.

What if someone wants to define it differently? In a purely material universe such emotions and states are merely material; why are you putting a premium on some matter over other matter?

That's another discussion.

It seems appropriate now. If your definition is truly not arbitrary then surely you have a reason for choosing sentient beings.

Because a society with rules where members have a reasonable chance at well being, means that I will also have a reasonable chance at well being.

So your motives are purely selfish? Well what if someone cuts out the middle man and just lies, steals, cheats, and kills their way to success? Are their selfish acts any more immoral than yours?

Because I or a loved one may be a victim of their preferences that are not in line with the well being of others.

Yes, but how does that affect them?

How is the fact that the vast majority of people prefer to; live, be pain free, not be slaves, be arbitrary?

Because it’s irrelevant what the vast majority of people want for themselves when we are talking about how they should treat others. A person could want to live pain free and still inflict plenty of pain on others and why should they not? You’ve yet to bridge that gap.

This is not rocket science.

Indeed, but atheists sure seem to struggle with this argument.

Here's a thought experiment that may help.

Imagine you are part of a group of people with varying backgrounds, sexes, races, and beliefs. Your group is in charge of creating a new society, but when you are finished, you have no idea if your gender, color, beliefs, etc will be the most accepted.

Ok.

So, how would you go about designing this society in a way that, even if you ended up in the lowest status, with the minority race and beliefs, you would have a chance at a decent life other than maximizing well being in that society?

Depends on what the society’s goals were, many societies do just fine by condoning actions that I am sure you condemn as immoral. Not only this but why are morals defined at the society level rather than the family or some other level? What happens if one society rapes, kills, and steals from another society? Is that now amoral rather than immoral? Without a god who owns all of us and who cares about our actions this all falls apart rather quickly.

To the OP: I think we get our morals through evolution. Look at chimps and apes. They are social creatures just like us. They have no bibles.

You do realize that chimps steal from, kill, and rape one another don’t you? Morally good behavior since they evolved it?

Still not arbitrary. If you could show there was benefit for the species from any of the alternative moralities you suggest then you might have had a point in suggesting they were valid. Evolution through natural selection gave us the basic properties from which we formed out moralities. It can't be any other way.

Why should it benefit the species and not the individual? If a person took this selfish attitude they surely got it from evolution so that does not answer the question any. Apparently we steal, kill, and rape because we evolved to do so; so are these morally good actions?

You will have to explain how empathy, reciprocation and a basic sense of fairness fail to provide your "ought." As I see it, unless I am misunderstanding you, that is exactly what they give us.

No because you are only cherry-picking the human behaviors you personally like. If humans ought to engage in all behaviors and emotions that they evolved then that would include killing, stealing, lying, and raping and not just feeling empathy and compassion for others. This is why you cannot bridge that gap from the way things are to the way things ought to be. You have no basis for claiming people ought to engage in one behavior over another.

We have evolved the ability to overcome our instinctive morality along with other instincts too. This should not come as a surprise, and it isn't all bad news. Heroism, for example, is the over-riding of our strongest driving force - self preservation. Things cannot be morally good if they are not in the interests of the species and there would have to be exceptional circumstances for them not to be in the interests of individuals or groups.

How can you say we have overcome such behaviors when the last century was the most brutal mankind has ever witnessed? Secondly, why should people overcome such behaviors? We have made it thus far engaging in such behaviors and such behaviors are very common amongst other animals. Lastly, why do you keep putting the survival of the species as the standard of measurement? In a purely material universe why should I sacrifice my well-being just so that other bags of tissue and water called humans can be morn and live after I am gone? This does not make any sense without god.

At the same time we have to recognise that one of the best ways to get people to behave immorally is religion. Difficult to get people to fly planes into buildings without it.

Did not seem too hard to get people to try breeding apes with women and kill over 50 million fellow Russians without religion. Of course this was all for the “betterment” of the Russian people so apparently that means it was all morally good behavior.

I am not sure we do define universal differently - I just don't accept it as a concept. What I provided was as close as I can get - although a case could be made for including other species.

Societies get to dictate their moralities. Families and individuals get to define their's within the parameters of those of the society.

Why does it work this way? If I am the only person in Nazi Germany objecting to the mass murder of the Jews I am therefore morally wrong because society had already dictated otherwise?

History judges how well or badly they did.

How is this possible? If morals are determined by societies then how could later societies determine whether the morals of another society were good or bad? I hardly think Stalin cared what people 50 years later would think, he died the most powerful man on Earth and did so by lying, stealing, and killing his way to the top. Was he an evil man? If God exists, yes.

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I think that equating morality with obedience to authority -- which many (not all) theological constructs tend to do is, in and of itself, immoral.

Why is it immoral?

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I think that equating morality with obedience to authority -- which many (not all) theological constructs tend to do is, in and of itself, immoral.

Why is it immoral?