(May 27, 2015 at 7:34 am)Randy Carson Wrote: What I am asking is: what is the BASIS for objective moral behavior? Where does it come from?
If some feel that they have already answered, my apologies; however, I re-phrased my OP based on a quick scan of a few responses.
I will try to get through all of the posts as quickly as time permits. Sorry for the delay.
The objective basis for moral behavior is reality.
Morality is all about the well being of other humans (or sentient beings). Moral behavior increases the well being of other humans, and minimizes the harm to other humans.
I'm sure we can all agree on the following points:
1. We all live in the same reality, subject to the same physical laws.
2. We all have very similar physical bodies.
3. Because of this, we can extrapolate that what is harmful to my well being, is almost assuredly harmful to the vast majority of other humans' well being.
For example: life is preferable to death, health is preferable to disease, freedom is preferable to slavery, comfort is preferable to discomfort, etc.
From there, all it takes is a modicum of empathy and rationality to understand that harming others well being is not advisable, since there is always someone in society with more power than you that has the ability to harm yours.
You'd believe if you just opened your heart" is a terrible argument for religion. It's basically saying, "If you bias yourself enough, you can convince yourself that this is true." If religion were true, people wouldn't need faith to believe it -- it would be supported by good evidence.