Why be good?

[Ben Davis]

Could it be that evolution doesn't play a role in the development of objective moral values?

*my bolding

Please can you stop using this term. It's clearly established that there's no such thing and that the term 'objective' in this context is a disingenuous misdefinition. I hope you'll prefer to engage honestly so that we can continue our discussion.

And I hope you notice the irony of your use of the term in a thread regarding morality.

[Angrboda]

The question is: How did we get this sense of right and wrong? Evolution doesn't suggest that males should be polite with females...it suggests that the strongest and most aggressive mate when and where they please. That's just "survival of the fittest", isn't it?

So, in light of that, WHY should men be good on their dates with women v. taking what they want simply because they can like our ancestors might have done a few thousand years ago?

Your understanding of evolution is somewhat primitive. As pointed out, fittest doesn't necessarily mean strongest. In a social species, the fittest may be those who are able to mesh with the social relationships the best. Therefore, evolution could promote sociability over your simplistic conception of self-interest. In that case, following social mores such as don't hurt, don't steal, would be in the self-interest of the individual. It's similar to kin selective processes; those in my social circle have genes similar to mine, so by being socially positive, I ensure the survival of my gene type. That creates a differential reproduction in favor of those who have behaviors that are well adapted to the social nature of the species, rather than selfish behaviors.

You don't share the same morals as me, yet because you are of the same species as me, it's in my best interest, genetically, to protect you.

[robvalue]

Indeed, there are no objective moral values, as has been explained at length earlier.

I don't mean to toot my own trumpet, but I'll put myself under the microscope as an example. I want to die, I'm utterly sick of life and how ill I am and I've wanted to die for about 8 years now. They only reason I don't kill myself is because of how it would devastate my wife. So I'm choosing to carry on living for an entirely selfless purpose, which I get nothing out of personally except knowing I make my wife happy. If I only cared about myself and what was good for me, I'd be off to do myself in right now. I don't do it for any big reward at the end, or because I'm scared of being punished if I kill myself. I do it because I care more about my wife's happiness than my own.

[Lemonvariable72]

If there is no God, then there is no hell; and if there is no hell, then there are no ultimate, eternal repercussions, good or bad, for how we live out our mortal lives. Of course, atheists insist that people should be "good without God."

But why? If God does not exist, why be good?

.
Since others have addressed at length let flip this around on you. Why are Catholics less moral?Aside from the systematic fuckibg of little boys by your church, american Catholics are statistically speaking both less educated and more likely to commit crimes. Why is that?'

I just want to repeat this because I am afraid it got kind of drowned out, but I want you to address this

[comet]

If there is no God, then there is no hell; and if there is no hell, then there are no ultimate, eternal repercussions, good or bad, for how we live out our mortal lives. Of course, atheists insist that people should be "good without God."

But why? If God does not exist, why be good?

hash-tag what a moooo ... ron  

[Thumpalumpacus]

Could it be that evolution doesn't play a role in the development of objective moral values?

There are no such things. Even your Christian values are relative and subjective.

If not, where do these things come from? Why be good?

This has already been answered in this thread. Why are you pretending it hasn't?

Perhaps there are some answers in the posts I haven't read yet, so I'm looking forward to getting back to my computer later today.

Looking forward to you answering my question which you dodged last night in favor of sarcastic irrelevancies.

[dyresand]

If there is no God, then there is no hell; and if there is no hell, then there are no ultimate, eternal repercussions, good or bad, for how we live out our mortal lives. Of course, atheists insist that people should be "good without God."

But why? If God does not exist, why be good?

Do we even need a eternal existence at all or eternal punishment no it would unfair in both cases. When we die that's it we go back to were we were before we were born by not being conscious anymore. Hate to tell you that but if it makes you feel any better we will still here here as matter and energy we never truly die we only exist well in the grand scheme of things 
as a small moment and even still why a eternal existence it would devalue everything life itself wouldn't even matter with that type of system.  

[Whateverist]

Everyone knows, if you want to get a lot of xmas presents, you need to be good for goodness sake. Final answer.

[dyresand]

Everyone knows, if you want to get a lot of xmas presents, you need to be good for goodness sake.  Final answer.

Exactly praise Santa Clause. 

[Esquilax]

It's interesting that you should mention a Mad Max world. The polar opposites are well-chosen.

There's a new movie out. It's on my mind.

You've identified cooperation and the social contract and the reasons for being good. However, as important as these things are for peaceful and harmonious human interaction, they are still utterly inconsistent with the a worldview that only natural, material things exist. To be consistent with this claim, we'd be forced to admit that "being good" is really just a matter of personal conviction or group consensus, not an ideal that God desires for all of us to strive for.

Randy, you've made a big claim here, but you've given not a single reason why it is so. You've just asserted by fiat that a totally naturalistic worldview- which isn't atheism, incidentally, it's something else entirely that we may not believe- is inconsistent with the premises of cooperation and social contract... why do you think that? Until you actually provide an answer to that question, until you give me some reason to believe that that is true, that contains within it referents to the position I actually hold, rather than the one you imagine I do, then I have no reason to even entertain this claim. That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.

The really weird thing is, you provide the answer that proves you wrong in the very paragraph where you make the claim, because you're totally right: cooperation and the social contract are very important for peace and harmony. That's exactly the sort of world I'd want to live in, because it's demonstrably better for us all, as I said, and more importantly showed, in my first post. It's a simple matter of rationality; in a world where we all agree to certain rules regarding conduct, and recognize the value in cooperation, we are able to build enormous, sprawling societies filled with technologies and comforts that would have been unfathomable to the tribalistic cultures that preceded us, in addition to allowing us all to specialize in our knowledge and share that expertise with others. I am able to hold a job in a non-essential field, that I absolutely love, because the social contract allows me to rely on other people to produce my food, clothes, housing and so on; none of that would be true if the social contract were not present. The best possible world, for me as an individual and for my society as a whole, is one where we cooperate.

Your mistake in thinking is terribly obvious, but since you allude to it more specifically below, I'll deal with it there.

Can atheists justify, according to atheist principles, why they believe it is "wrong" to pollute oceans, cut down rain forests, or hack into someone’s bank account and steal their life savings? If the stronger members of the human species engage in such behaviors in their pursuit of dominating the weaker members, and if there is no God and therefore no transcendent, prescriptive moral law given by God to guide us into knowing what is right and what is wrong, then on what grounds can atheists legitimately oppose such behaviors?

Literally every part of this paragraph is factually wrong. Congrats, on that.

For starters, there are no atheist principles beyond a lack of belief in god; it's a position, not a worldview. So your first question is entirely malformed, but it's also answered in my first post, so hey.

As for the rest... I didn't realize that morality was all about me. Because it's not; morality is about the best possible guidelines for the entire group. Special pleading is what you're thinking of, where one is determining morality for themselves, but everyone else has to leave me alone and not do the same to me as I'm doing to them. It's by definition an irrational stance to take; you don't get one set of rules for yourself and another for everyone else, because there's no justifiable reason to do that.

Incidentally, when you talk about the strong dominating the weak, you're describing Mad Max world again. Hell, you're describing every piece of dystopic or post-apocalyptic fiction we've ever created, in broad strokes. Oppression by a stronger force, unjustly, is a hallmark of the genre, and I kinda don't want to live in a world like that. Do you want to live in a dystopia, Randy? What makes you so sure that you'd be the strongest, rather than one of the ones being dominated? Pure assumption? The odds are against you, against any individual, just by numbers alone, you know. And hey, I work in media, I write books for a living, do you think I'd have any reason to continue doing that if people could just steal my earnings or product from me whenever they wanted? Do you think, say, pharmaceutical companies would continue making life-saving drugs, if people could just steal them whenever they wanted? You think farmers would farm, under those conditions? You think doctors would operate? Hell, you think you'd be able to get something as simple as a cup of coffee, if the barista couldn't be reasonably certain that he wouldn't be robbed of that coffee instead of paid for it?

Gee, it's almost as if the entire edifice of our society relies upon the social contract, and that society is more valuable for every single individual member than the short term gain one might get in predating other people until they too get predated upon...

Oh, and also? I just plain don't want to dominate other people... well, except maybe consensually, in the bedroom. I tend to like other people, I see their value as discrete entities and I'd prefer that bad things not happen to them because of that. Why? Are you saying that you do want to dominate and hurt other people? Why do you want that?

Hey, let's talk about this bit, now!

if there is no God and therefore no transcendent, prescriptive moral law given by God to guide us into knowing what is right and what is wrong, then on what grounds can atheists legitimately oppose such behaviors?

Okay, let's talk about transcendent, prescriptive moral laws, shall we? Where do they come from? You say they're given by god, but does god give them to us because they are good? Or do they become good, because god gave them to us? What is the reason god gave us these moral laws, in your view, essentially?

If the moral laws come to us via god because they conform to what is good, then moral goodness exists separate from god, and it both does not require him, and can be determined without him, via rational inquiry. If the moral laws are good because god has given them to us, then they are fiat command alone, and the actual content of the laws is irrelevant, when compared to the authority of the commander; in that situation there's nothing transcendent or morally good about the specific set of moral laws we've been given at all, just in obeying whatever the law giver decides to give us. If that were true you would have no reason to oppose any given behavior at all, because if god changed the moral laws tomorrow then that behavior could be moral. God could make it so that dominating the weak, murder, all kinds of things, would be moral, and you'd just have to go along with it.

So which is it, Randy? Is god irrelevant to morality, or is morality irrelevant to god?

Doing so would be intolerant and would have the net result of the atheist forcing his morality on others -- the very thing atheists object to in the first place.

I don't think you actually understand what we're objecting to, regarding religious morality, Randy. I really, really don't.