We should take the Moral Highground

[Adjusted Sanity]

You and many other members continue to present a straw man of religious belief. Terms like ‘imaginary friend’ and ‘sky daddy’ do not accurately reflect most believers’ concept of a supreme being. This kind of willful misrepresentation of the others’ opinion does not help further your case. It just makes you sound like a jackass.

Oh, cry me a river.

What part of "we're atheists" don't you comprehend now?

Either provide evidence and a positive ontology for your "own personal unique super special awesome particular brand of god" claim, or sod off.

being an atheist allows you to be insulting and degrading to others who believe in something you don't? Sounds like what you're fighting against.

[mediamogul]

I responded to one of your earlier posts with essentially this same argument.

Sorry, if other posts distracted me. Your posts are thoughtful and worthy of comment.

To me all sentient beings are afforded rights because of their ability to suffer. These things are not arbitrary and are related to human nature and biology.

Nature seems indifferent to suffering. The strong prey on the weak. One of my dogs caught a rabbit. While it was still alive, he held it down and bit it from head to toe, breaking every bone in its body. Then he ate the rabbit. I do not see nature as a good place to find moral instruction.

Couple this with others treating others as "ends in themselves" instead of means to an end and you have the rational basis for ethics. Ethics being normative in the sense that they demonstrate how people ought to act as defined by good and bad.

Gee thanks! (sarcasm) Now I have to go back and read Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason.

It [morality] is… based on reason and human nature…it will be based upon those two things.

I do not disagree with this. The question to me is this. Where do we get our reason and our humanity? For the reasons I stated above I do not think we can draw on evolution for help. Even though I haven’t found an alternative that fully satisfies, I’m still reasonably confident that morality does indeed have some absolute basis.

Nature itself is amoral, as in the pure biological and natural functions of the world. Humans posses language and rationality and thus comprehend suffer in an externalised sense. Animals only comprehend their own suffering when it occurs and seek to avoid it. I doubt one of your dogs comprehends that it caused another sentient being to suffer. Therein lies the reason why humans are capable of moral consideration.

I'm glad you picked up on the Kant reference. I always thought the "treating humans as an end in themselves" provision of the categorical imperative was more interesting than the categorical imperative itself.

Reason is a function of language. Without language we would not be capable of making logical inferences about the world. I for one am not constructivist and believe that language reflects some real properties of the world and thus, carefully applied, can furnish us with real conclusions in regards to normative ethics.

[Welsh cake]

being an atheist allows you to be insulting and degrading to others who believe in something you don't? Sounds like what you're fighting against.

Because every so often you theists wear down my patience to a bloody stump and you have no one else to blame but yourselves for that.

So do you have any evidence for your sky daddy concept then, or should I start getting frustrated right now, and save you the effort? Hmm?

[Adjusted Sanity]

being an atheist allows you to be insulting and degrading to others who believe in something you don't? Sounds like what you're fighting against.

Because every so often you theists wear down my patience to a bloody stump and you have no one else to blame but yourselves for that.

So do you have any evidence for your sky daddy concept then, or should I start getting frustrated right now, and save you the effort? Hmm?

I'm not a theist. Also I am not responsible for your patience. I just met you and have done nothing wrong. So I don't take any blame for that.

And no I have no evidence. Just my own belief. I don't claim to prove anything.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

being an atheist allows you to be insulting and degrading to others who believe in something you don't?

Being an atheist is irrelevant,at least in my country. We call the right 'freedom of speech'. Here that right includes (anyone) being able to give gross offence. As Stephen Fry so eloquently said " you're offended? So fucking what?"

My observation is that believers everywhere take full advantage of that right and use it against anyone who does not happen to share their personal superstitions.

You have no right of expectation here or anywhere else. My respect is earned. Post drivel and your post will be attacked.

IF you make a positive claim such as "I believe in God"',you WILL be challenged. Declining to explain your position will earn neither respect nor credibility. Only a problem if those things matter to you.

[Adjusted Sanity]

being an atheist allows you to be insulting and degrading to others who believe in something you don't?

Being an atheist is irrelevant,at least in my country. We call the right 'freedom of speech'. Here that right includes (anyone) being able to give gross offence. As Stephen Fry so eloquently said " you're offended? So fucking what?"

My observation is that believers everywhere take full advantage of that right and use it against anyone who does not happen to share their personal superstitions.

You have no right of expectation here or anywhere else. My respect is earned. Post drivel and your post will be attacked.

IF you make a positive claim such as "I believe in God"',you WILL be challenged. Declining to explain your position will earn neither respect nor credibility. Only a problem if those things matter to you.

Well I don't really have an argument for you because I mostly agree. But if you're going to wave your dick at theists, make sure to point it in the right direction and only resort to dick waving when one refuses to listen.

Immediately insulting someone's belief puts your subject in attack mode. They're not going to listen to you, and a heated insulting argument just makes both people look like assholes without solving a thing.

Also "I believe in god" is not a positive statement. It is an opinion. The statement does not claim god exists, It claims that they believe god exists. What one should challenge is the backwards beliefs religion teaches. Not a belief in god. Unless I've misinterpreted what you meant by positive statement.

[genkaus]

Then the question becomes this. From where does the 'moral sense' get its character? What allows DP to say that things like empathy and fair play are right? DP wants to say that we should follow the dictates of our inner sense of right and wrong. Why? DP says there's a survival benefit.

My point is that the survival benefit is at the genetic level, not the individual. Animals are really just gene delivery devices. Once the genetic information has been passed along, evolution doesn't care if you die. If lying, cheating, stealing, and yes raping, work as a strategy for leaving a genetic legacy then an evolution-based morality is really no morality at all.

I'd say that the 'moral sense' comes in when our actions are no longer completely determined by our instincts and natural drives. Once we find that we are capable of reflecting upon our actions, of choosing to act any any manner other than what comes naturally and consider the consequences of those actions - we find ourselves looking for a guide to act according to. Our instincts and drives do favor a particular direction for this guide, but they do not completely determine it.

I'd say that if we are to have any morality at all, it should be based on reason, not instincts or divine command.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

Also "I believe in god" is not a positive statement

Sorry mate,but it is indeed a positive CLAIM,not simply an opinion, and it attracts the burden of proof. Just as 'there is a god" OR ' I believe there is no god" and 'there is no god' Look it up.

To assert "I do not believe" is not making a claim.


One who asserts "I believe there is no god" is called "a strong or hard atheist" and attracts the burden of proof. There are very few people on this forum willing to make such a claim. (Richard Dawkins has never made such a claim;he's fully aware of the logical consequences)

Immediately insulting someone's belief puts your subject in attack mode.

Tough titties.

They're not going to listen to you

Really? I'm shocked.

[Welsh cake]

I'm not a theist.

You're not honest. Is that why you suddenly changed your religious views to a character from Conker's Bad Fur day?

You've admitted in earlier posts that you do believe in God. So were you lying to us before and now are telling the truth?

Either way you're starting to piss me off...

[Neo-Scholastic]

Once we find that we are capable of reflecting upon our actions, of choosing to act any any manner other than what comes naturally and consider the consequences of those actions - we find ourselves looking for a guide to act according to. Our instincts and drives do favor a particular direction for this guide, but they do not completely determine it. I'd say that if we are to have any morality at all, it should be based on reason, not instincts or divine command.

While I remain hopeful that reason could find a definitive basis for morality, I do not think a compelling refutation of nihilism has yet been presented. Maybe it lies somewhere halfway between Aristotle and Kant, I don’t know. In the meantime, reason alone seems more like a means for searching and not the final product.