Is There a Point To Living a Moral Life?

[Mudhammam]

Fight? Me? Never!
I think I'm pretty familiar with some of the problems Christians have alleged against morality from a secular perspective. But I don't think they can adequately address Euthyphro's dilemma, though they seem to make an attempt by simply asserting that God = the Good. And that, to my mind, is quite question begging. It grants one assumption --- that the Good is an intrinsic property of some thing(s) that exists independently of us, and then asks to be granted another --- that the some thing is a deity whose origin is traceable to an Asian or Middle Eastern tribe of, at most, a few thousand years ago. I don't really see why either assumption should be granted, but I sure as hell don't need to ascent to the latter if it is merely the Good that we're after.

Well, you are the philosophy student, not me.  

But take a look at this, this, and this, and let me know what you think.

For the non-readers:

[video=dailymotion]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBvi_auKkaI[/video]

I think those basically make appeal to the two assumptions I suggested. 1. The Good is an intrinsic property of some thing's nature. 2. That some thing is God.

Atheist moralists don't need to make both assumptions to ground their ethical theory in some thing --- for many, for example, it's a state of consciousness --- which to them is goodness itself. One could argue for Plato's Good, the true nature of which is unknown, without conceding that we have any reason to imagine this instrinsic goodness to be deity.

[Esquilax]

But take a look at this, this, and this, and let me know what you think.

I know this wasn't addressed to me, but I find myself so very disappointed by the answers proffered within that I couldn't not add my two cents: the first link is so very proud of the same old lazy dodge, that it's somehow in god's nature to be good, which only serves to push back the Euthyphro Dilemma one step. WLC thinks he's answered that second attempt at getting a straight answer by essentially repeating the problematic first one; why is god's nature good? Because good is an "essential part" of god's nature, but that doesn't mean that god's nature arbitrarily determines morality, just that god is good by default. He attempts to resolve the dilemma by taking both prongs of the mutually exclusive proposition simultaneously: god cannot not be good, but he also determines what good is in accordance with his nature.

That simply can't be the case: if god is bound to be good essentially, then there must be some prior idea of what goodness is for god to conform to. If there isn't that, then god's nature is good because it's god's nature, which turns good into an arbitrary selection of those things within god's nature; you're simply defining good as god, which is circular. So how is it determined that god's nature is essentially good? Is it due to a prior conception of goodness to which god adheres in nature, or is it that god's nature determines what is good by fiat. To say that god's nature is essentially good only pushes back the dilemma yet a third step, or it commits a gravely circular argument by simply defining good as inherent to god's nature... which itself also doesn't resolve the dilemma.

What's particularly funny about the way Craig talks about this, and this is especially evident in is third link, is that he can't help but speak in terms of one or the other prong of the dilemma, rather than his supposedly resolved third option; "what is good or bad is determined by conformity or lack thereof to his nature," sure sounds like the fiat goodness prong of the dilemma to me, as does "things are right or wrong insofar as they are commanded by god."

Like most supposed "answers" to the Euthyphro dilemma, these simply gleefully leap down one prong while pretending they've found some third option by couching the problematic portions of that prong in a bizarrely overreaching assertion. There's not a lot actually there, though of course Craig manages to house that dearth of content in paragraphs and paragraphs of nothing.

[Whateverist]

Fixed that for you.

I openly confess that I desire to go to heaven and avoid the fires of hell. I'll gladly accept Purgatory if I can have heaven in the end.

Now, how is it exactly that we Christians are STUPID for that?

I never said they were stupid for that.  I just wouldn't say they were especially moral if all that means is they want the carrot but not the stick.  Did someone suggest you were stupid?  (Not me.)

[CapnAwesome]

The answer is no. There isn't a point to your life either.