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

[Statler Waldorf]

That's your claim. You need to logically support this claim, otherwise it can and will continue to be dismissed out of hand.

Negative claims do not have the burden of proof so I do not have to support anything. However, you’ve supported it for me by being incapable of defining any particular act as good or evil without appealing to the existence of YHWH. Thanks again.

Are you capable of presenting an argument to support this?

Whether or not I can is irrelevant because I am not required to do so; negative claims my child…negative claims. I do not have to support the claim that morality cannot exist without God any more than I have to support the claim that pigs cannot naturally fly.

Hint: "Nuuuuh but you dunno whar yur moral come frum an um a geddum frum mah bible" is not good enough.

Tell us how a system of morality can exist in a purely material Universe; I am still waiting for you to support your claim that it is possible. Tell me how a pig can naturally fly.

Social principles beneficial to a tribal animal.

…and you have already been told that this is a descriptive observation of behavior, since it is descriptive in nature it cannot be used to derive a normative system of behavior which is what morality is; so you fail. Can you explain how morality can exist in a purely material universe in a manner that is not illogical?

Evolved empathy.

This in no way demonstrates that humans ought to feel empathy so you have not even begun to deal with morality yet. Humans evolved the ability to kill, rape, enslave steal, lust, and lie as well. Tell us how you know that humans ought to perform any of these evolved behaviors but not all evolved behaviors.

P1 Any behavior that is evolved is morally good.
P2 Rape is an evolved behavior
C. Therefore rape is morally good.

Does anyone believe this is a logically defensible definition of morality? Really?

Both are displayed in other nonhuman species.

Other non-human species rape, kill, and steal as well. Are these therefore morally good behaviors?

You claim these must come from God in humans, but have yet to tell us why you believe this, and support it with a compelling argument backed by evidence.

No, I am saying that in a purely material universe it is impossible to define any act as good or evil. Your argument above supports this beautifully since it can be used to define any evolved act as morally good. That’s even ignoring the fact that you’re committing the naturalistic fallacy by appealing to descriptive claims about nature in order to try and derive a normative system of behavior. It’s like we are a team, I make a claim and then you help support it for me.

Theft, for example, is something that I would not want to have happen to me. Therefore I can reason that it is wrong to take something that belongs to another based on that.

You lost me, how did you get from “I do not want this done to me” to “therefore it is morally wrong”?

I think that's part of it. We are social creatures and we seem to place a great deal of import in fitting in and being accepted into our local community or society. I think that there is at least some level of peer pressure that drives local standards of behavior, which is why otherwise minor social cues (how polite we are, for example) might change the way we are treated from one place to another.

So then the statement, “The entire society went along with the moral atrocities being committed” is impossible? Or even nonsensical?

Have fun in Vegas.

Thanks my friend! I had a great time.

Not really. All I have to say is you don't have the evidence. If I'm really wrong, then you should show me that I am.

The evidence? You were claiming that I do not have access to God’s revealed word but the Bible is readily available to anyone who is interested in reading it so obviously that claim is easily refuted.

So since you don't have access to that source objective morality, you have to rely on your own thoughts and understanding about what constitutes right and wrong, even if they are based on what the Bible says (or, rather, your interpretation of it).

I do have access to it though since the Bible has been translated into English for nearly half a millennium now.

So it's absolutely objectively right to kill babies?

Killing is only immoral when it violates God’s decreed will. The example you gave did not violate God’s decreed will.

And how do you know it should only be the case when God decrees it?

Because morality as a normative system derives from God’s character, therefore it’d be impossible for something to be morally good and yet contrary to God’s decree because God’s decrees derive from His character.

Seems to me you are relying on your interpretation of these passages in coming up with these moral standards.

Not at all, the passage explicitly said that the Israelites were commanded to perform the acts by God.

Are you saying that it was morally wrong for the Israelites to do what they did? The other atheists on here are claiming that morals are determined at the societal level which would mean that what the Israelites did was not morally wrong even in the view of atheism because they were doing it to another society. Are the other atheists in this thread wrong?

If another Christian slaughtered some babies as punishment for the wrongdoings of their parents, and he justified this by saying that it's objectively right to do so, then on what objective basis can you argue that he's wrong? From your subjective interpretation of the Bible?

The exact same way I would correct someone who claimed that their math textbook really taught that “2+2=5”, simply show them the passages in question and use proper exegesis to demonstrate that their understanding of the text is in error. You’re committing a non-sequitur by trying to argue that the fact that human knowledge gained through sensory perceptions is fallible somehow means that objective truths cannot exist or be known. We can know what is morally wrong just as well as we can know that 2+2=4. This sort of hyper-skepticism can be raised about any aspect of knowledge and is therefore not a legitimate objection to my position.

For one, these decrees in scripture have not been shown to be from God, let alone the fact that his existence has yet to be demonstrated.

That’s a red herring, God’s existence and direct revelation are presupposed within the Christian conceptual scheme and your claim was that the Christian conceptual scheme does not have an objective definition of morality. This means you need to accurately represent that conceptual scheme and wage an internal criticism against it. Anything else is guilty of begging the question. Show me how Christianity cannot have an objective definition of morality even when granted the truth of its premises for the sake of argument.

"Reason."

You should not need a cheatsheet for that.

How does reason demonstrate that the atheist can have a defensible definition of morality that is consistent with his atheism?

I came across this today. Sorry if it's something everyone has already seen and discussed to no end.

http://www.ted.com/talks/frans_de_waal_d...s#t-181294

Animals kill, feed their young, wage war, practice self-sacrifice, rape, steal, commit infanticide, and so on. How do you know which of these behaviors are morally good and which ones are morally wrong?