Why Secular Morality is Superior

[John V]

You're desperately trying to muddy the issue.

Theistic Morality: Tends by nature to be concerned with victimless crimes like blasphemy, idolatry and apostasy as well as exalting useless activities like prayer and adherence to rituals.

Secular Morality: isn't

You said that this was because “By its nature, religion will be concerned with gaining more followers and gaining increased obedience with its established followers.” I’ve shown this isn’t the case. If that point wasn’t important, you shouldn’t have led off with it.

I agree that theistic morality has features that secular morality lacks. The question is: so what? Do you have a point here?

Again, this is beside the point. Sure the Bible contains some good stuff but all of it can be just as easily admonished by secularists without the need to a god.

The argument I'm addressing when I use the term GodWillsIt is the belief among some apologists that morality requires a celestial lawgiver. My refutation is that GodWillsIt is neither necessary nor helpful to understand or discuss morality.

I’m not defending the views of all apologists. I’m defending the Bible. The fact is that the Bible goes beyond GOdWillsIt and gives the same explanation for morality that you gave yourself. This refutes your point that religion does not offer explanations for morality.

You're right in that I misspoke. I meant "the worst of", since Yahweh's dictatorial edicts on morality have no more validity than that of a mafia don or a tin-pot dictator and, reading the Bible, they're just as prone to changing tomorrow on a whim. Yahweh can say "thou shalt not kill" one day and order a genocide the next.

God is portrayed as the judge. A judge can morally sentence someone to death. A mafia don cannot. Actually, within the mafia’s morality, the mafia don can morally sentence someone to death. Society considers that immoral. Since society as a whole has more power than the mafia, if he’s caught, he goes to jail. People don’t like the phrase, but in the end, might does make right for all practical purposes.

Logical Fallacies: Ad Hominem Tu Quoque and Bare Assertioon

Logical Fallacy: Special Pleading

1. No, nobody deserves to be tortured for all eternity.

Your opinion is noted.

2. This "mercy" you speak of is only doled out to the gullible and sycophantic, indicating what's really important to your god Yahweh. This is not about punishment or justice but control.

As already noted, mercy by definition is not about justice. You continue to try to conflate the two.

Your god sounds like a wife beater and you like the battered wife trying to justify the abuse saying "he really loves me and I guess I deserve it when he beats me."

Except he’s not beating me and I accordingly have no need to justify. You should think your analogies out further. You’re not very good with them.

Where does he require that? I’ve debated this before and doubt you’ve really considered the passages in question.

http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law...2_28a.html
[/quote]
First you need to support that this was a case of rape, rather than seduction.

Oh well then, I guess since the word wasn't around and that some humans still commit crimes, I guess that completely refutes my argument that human society has determined things to be wrong that Yahweh couldn't.

Yes, known sex slaves in Western societies and nothing being done about it refutes your position.

...and pointing out that there are other bad ideologies out there is a logical fallacy called "Ad Hominem Tu Quoque." Just because there are other bad ideologies out there too does nothing to justify the abuses of religion.

And maintaining that one morality is evil and another is superior when both allow the same thing is a logicaql fallacy called special pleading. If you’re really claiming tu quoque, the debate is over, as you claimed that secular morality is superior.

Any religion that promotes the idea of a faith-based scheme of salvation is inherently dangerous, given how high the stakes are. If saving thousands of souls for all eternity means killing some unrepentant heathen to prevent him from corrupting those thousands and leading them off the path of salvation, isn't that a good thing?

Bin Laden was taken out by a secular government, not a rival religion. Again, these dynamics apply to secular as well as religious groups. Vigilantes could kill a drug dealer to prevent his leading the youth astray. Religion is not necessary.

Is ad hominems the best you can do or would you like to refute his findings?

It’s not an ad hominem. It’s an observation that he is unqualified. Logical fallacy: appeal to authority. The authority needs to be qualified in the subject matter at hand to avoid the fallacy.

[DeistPaladin]

You said that this was because “By its nature, religion will be concerned with gaining more followers and gaining increased obedience with its established followers.” I’ve shown this isn’t the case. If that point wasn’t important, you shouldn’t have led off with it.

By nature, religions do these things. Even the Amish, your example, are highly controlling of their followers. Pointing out some unusual anomalous examples really doesn't refute my point about the general nature of religion.

I agree that theistic morality has features that secular morality lacks. The question is: so what? Do you have a point here?

Did you miss the part about "victimless crimes" and "useless activities promoted as virtues"?

I can't explain it to you any better. If the point is lost on you, let's move on and I'll leave it to the reader to make their own judgments.

The fact is that the Bible goes beyond GOdWillsIt and gives the same explanation for morality that you gave yourself. This refutes your point that religion does not offer explanations for morality.

I never said that. I said "GodWillsIt" is useless to understand morality. If you agree, let's move on.

God is portrayed as the judge.

So your god evaluates our moral actions as a judge does and therefore morality exists outside of your god and therefore your god is not necessary to determine what is moral or what morality is?

Logical Fallacy: Special Pleading

How so?

1. No, nobody deserves to be tortured for all eternity.

Your opinion is noted.

So you disagree? If so, your twisted sense of morality is noted.

Your god sounds like a wife beater and you like the battered wife trying to justify the abuse saying "he really loves me and I guess I deserve it when he beats me."

Except he’s not beating me and I accordingly have no need to justify.

Denial and defense is a symptom of the battered wife syndrome. I stand by my analogy.

Yes, known sex slaves in Western societies and nothing being done about it refutes your position.

I'm highly skeptical of your claim that sex slavery openly exists in Western Society and "nothing is being done about it" but let that go. My point was never that secular morals have created a perfect paradise where no one ever commits crimes anymore and no one ever wrongs another anymore. Yes, crimes still do happen. Yes, we're not perfect. Yes, bad people still do bad things. Completely beside the point.

My point is that secular morals have evolved to where we say that slavery, rape and genocide are bad. Our own country no longer defends the institution of slavery on a political level like factions of it did 150 some-odd years ago. We've stopped evaluating whether or not these practices are morally defensible. We're now at the stage of struggling to stamp them out.

Compare this to the Bible with all its genocide at the orders of your god, rape at the orders of your god and rules that regulate the practice of slavery.

And maintaining that one morality is evil and another is superior when both allow the same thing is a logicaql fallacy called special pleading. If you’re really claiming tu quoque, the debate is over, as you claimed that secular morality is superior.

Special pleading? How so? Am I now responsible for defending every non-religious ideology? My Tu Quoque reference was over your claim that "oh yeah, well, other destructive ideologies are bad too, so it's all a wash". The abuses of other bad ideologies, which I don't partake in, do not justify the abuses of religion.

You're using the same Reducto Ad Absurdum tactic that you've used elsewhere in this debate. My claim that secular morality is superior to religious-based morality should not be taken to mean that every non-religious ideology that has ever existed has been perfect or that there have never been any bad non-religious people.

Bin Laden was taken out by a secular government, not a rival religion. Again, these dynamics apply to secular as well as religious groups. Vigilantes could kill a drug dealer to prevent his leading the youth astray. Religion is not necessary.

What the hell are you talking about?

It’s not an ad hominem. It’s an observation that he is unqualified.

It's a classic ad hominem. You're attacking the person and not the argument or the findings.

Saying "oh yeah, we'll you're not an expert so I'm not listening" is dismissing the person without considering the argument. If he is so inept, then point out his ineptitude in his paper.

Logical fallacy: appeal to authority. The authority needs to be qualified in the subject matter at hand to avoid the fallacy.

Wrong again. The fallacy is where some expert makes a bare assertion and you claim the assertion is true based on his say-so (i.e. "this smart guy says it's true to it must be so"). As far as I can tell, this is not a bare assertion but a published research paper.

EDIT to fix typos

[DeistPaladin]

More needs to be said on this point:

A judge can morally sentence someone to death. A mafia don cannot. Actually, within the mafia’s morality, the mafia don can morally sentence someone to death. Society considers that immoral. Since society as a whole has more power than the mafia, if he’s caught, he goes to jail. People don’t like the phrase, but in the end, might does make right for all practical purposes.

A judge can morally sentence a criminal to a punishment because of their crimes, not because being a judge somehow allows him/her to do as he/she wills with just anyone. Society seeks to punish wrongdoing in an effort to discourage and rehabilitate.

Hell, by contrast, is not a punishment for crimes. It is a place of infinite torture for those who were not gullible or who were raised with the wrong religion. Further, Hell can't discourage any wrongdoing because it isn't revealed until after we die. It can't rehabilitate because there is no parole. It serves no purpose except to torture.

Now the mafia don, in contrast to the judge, can do as he wills with anyone. It's not about morality. It's about strength and fear.

Your comment that might makes right is another example of your twisted (or childish) sense of morality and how it hasn't progressed past Kohlberg's preconventional phase of moral development. Before you say "ad hominem", it's useful as an example of how religious thinking stunts our thinking about morality instead of helping to elucidate for us what is moral and what morality is.

[fr0d0]

A judge can try to make a moral decision but he is limited by information. So his decision could be unjust/ immoral.

Your idea of divine justice is fanciful. God, being all knowing, is in a position to make that call.

The mafia judge represents secular morality here. John V makes a very good point... popularity is all that keeps his morality from being law.

Secular morality is an argument from popularity.

Christian morality bases itself upon the idea of an all knowing God being capable of absolute morality. Only by gross misrepresentation does the op challenge this.

Secular morality falls short of Christian morality by a country mile.

We've clearly established this now. The OP fails miserably.

[ideologue08]

A judge can try to make a moral decision but he is limited by information. So his decision could be unjust/ immoral.

Your idea of divine justice is fanciful. God, being all knowing, is in a position to make that call.

The mafia judge represents secular morality here. John V makes a very good point... popularity is all that keeps his morality from being law.

Secular morality is an argument from popularity.

Christian morality bases itself upon the idea of an all knowing God being capable of absolute morality. Only by gross misrepresentation does the op challenge this.

Secular morality falls short of Christian morality by a country mile.

We've clearly established this now. The OP fails miserably.

Yeah, but not just Christianity, Islam says same thing. Secular morality can't compete with an all-knowing all-encompassing God. To make matters worse for them, God's judgement is all that matters anyway since he will hand out the final punishment or reward. So yeah, the OP fails badly.

[downbeatplumb]

Secular morality falls short of Christian morality by a country mile.

Secular morality has the advantage of being able to improve over time. Religious dogma retards human advancement and restricts changes to systems that refer to morals by being set in stone at a fixed time in antiquity.
Deist Paladin has already gone over these so I wont repeat them here.
My point is that you are looking at religious morality through rose tinted glasses and being very wrong as a result.


As well as that.

A good secular person is good because they are a good person, a good theist may be good just because they are afraid of god.

You can see this time and time again over multiple threads. theists saying that without god there is nothing to stop them going on various sorts of evil rampages

To me this suggests that the average theist WANTS to go on an evil rampage and its only the thought of their particular deity that is holding them back.

Secular morality for the win.

[ideologue08]

Everyone has tinted glasses on here mostly. And a secular person can be good simply because they don't want to go to prison.

[Fidel_Castronaut]

Secular morality has the advantage of being able to improve over time.

Pragmatism. Love it.

I am just as moral as all of my friends who are theists to varying degrees of opinions on certain subject matters (anecdotally. We haven't been shut in a room and asked to whether or not we'd kill a person sitting in front of us).

Secular also doesn't equal atheist. By virtue of demographics until relatively recently there were more secular Christians than atheists in England and Wales. After all, secularism was a Christian idea!, probably the best thing the belief system has ever done for the world.

[fr0d0]

Secular morality is no more than a fashion statement. It never progresses. It merely changes.

Everything you're using to put down theistic morality is human abuse of that theism. Perfect morality is a goal all people can aspire to. It cannot be forced. Without choice morality is impossible. If you do good because of fear or coercion then you didn't choose of your own volition. Your action was not based on your morals.

[Silver]

If you do good because of fear or coercion then you didn't choose of your own volition.

Choice is always a component between deciding upon more than one path. I would rather do good because it is the right thing to do, not because a biblical magical sky daddy has informed me that I must be good or suffer the consequences.