My views on objective morality

[bennyboy]

Even something which changes can be objective, if there's a reason for the change. It may be, for example, that as humans evolve socially, what is best for them changes. If this is how God set it up, then a dynamic morality which serves the greatest possible good could still be called objective. This is CL's position, I believe.

[robvalue]

Really? I'd be surprised if that's her position

[RoadRunner79]

I'm not sure sure I'm with the atheists on this issue. Something can be objective to one and subjective to another (or group of others). For example, the cost of an apple in a corner store is (let's say) 25 cents. This price is not set by me, and it is what it is. To the store manager, the value is highly subjective-- it's what he's willing to let an apple go for.

I don't see why morality should be any different. When theists talk about objective morality, they presumably mean it's objective TO PEOPLE, not to the God who is perfectly able to decide what acts he wants to deem moral and immoral.

So to a Christian, morality is objective because God sets it, and God is beyond man's ken and control. It's not because morality is magically self-existing in the fabric of spacetime.

I think what you are talking about is the difference between objective vs subjective and absolut vs relative. I think what you are talking about falls into the latter. There is some overlap between the two topics, so they are sometimes confused.

[Neo-Scholastic]

The Euthypro Dilemma is what I've already been describing (though I didn't know it was called that until I looked it up)...

Many scholars believe that Plato’s Euthyphro is one of his first. Its early chronological position may explain why the Socratic dialog ends without resolution to the problem it raises, whether deeds are good because the gods approve or whether the gods approve of some deeds because they are good. This may also explain why so many atheists mistakenly believe the dilemma conclusively shows that divinity cannot be objectively grounded. What it really shows is that such atheists fail to consider the dilemma within the context of subsequent dialogs.

Plato presented the so-called Euthyphro dilemma in order to clear the way for his concept of The Good as the solution to the dilemma. The Good is a clearly monotheistic concept that was later developed and defined by pagan philosophers, like Plotinus, and Christian theologians like Augustine. The concept of The Good informs both the ontological proof of Anslem and Thomas of Aquinas’s Fourth Way. It also serves as the foundation for virtue ethics.

A cursory reading of a Wikipedia entry will give anyone the necessary history to understand the paradoxes’ place in moral theory. While it undermines simplistic notions of morality common in antiquity, it has no place in ethical theories since Plato. Only a very ill-informed atheist would rely on it to satisfy his immediate psychological need to reject in monotheistic moral claims.

So yeah, Mr. Redbeard, you did a fine job of rewriting the Wiki entry in your own words. To bad you lack the ability to understand why it's irrelevant and reveals your own ignorance.

The same goes for all of you that gave Kudos to his self-humiliation.

[LadyForCamus]

The Euthypro Dilemma is what I've already been describing (though I didn't know it was called that until I looked it up)...

Many scholars believe that Plato’s Euthyphro is one of his first. Its early chronological position may explain why the Socratic dialog ends without resolution to the problem it raises, whether deeds are good because the gods approve or whether the gods approve of some deeds because they are good. This may also explain why so many atheists mistakenly believe the dilemma conclusively shows that divinity cannot be objectively grounded. What it really shows is that such atheists fail to consider the dilemma within the context of subsequent dialogs.

Plato presented the so-called Euthyphro dilemma in order to clear the way for his concept of The Good as the solution to the dilemma. The Good is a clearly monotheistic concept that was later developed and defined by pagan philosophers, like Plotinus, and Christian theologians like Augustine. The concept of The Good informs both the ontological proof of Anslem and Thomas of Aquinas’s Fourth Way. It also serves as the foundation for virtue ethics.

A cursory reading of a Wikipedia entry will give anyone the necessary history to understand the paradoxes’ place in moral theory. While it undermines simplistic notions of morality common in antiquity, it has no place in ethical theories since Plato. Only a very ill-informed atheist would rely on it to satisfy his immediate psychological need to reject in monotheistic moral claims.

So yeah, Mr. Redbeard, you did a fine job of rewriting the Wiki entry in your own words. To bad you lack the ability to understand why it's irrelevant and reveals your own ignorance.

The same goes for all of you that gave Kudos to his self-humiliation.

"Augustine, Anselm, and Aquinas all wrote about the issues raised by the Euthyphro dilemma, although, like William James and Wittgenstein later, they did not mention it by name. As philosopher and Anselm scholar Katherin A. Rogers observes, many contemporary philosophers of religion suppose that there are true propositions which exist as platonic abstracta independently of God. Among these are propositions constituting a moral order, to which God must conform in order to be good. Classical Judaeo-Christian theism, however, rejects such a view as inconsistent with God's omnipotence, which requires that God and what he has made is all that there is."The classical tradition," Rogers notes, "also steers clear of the other horn of the Euthyphro dilemma, divine command theory." From a classical theistic perspective, therefore, the Euthyphro dilemma is false. As Rogers puts it, Anselm, like Augustine before him and Aquinas later, rejects both horns of the Euthyphro dilemma. God neither conforms to nor invents the moral order. Rather His very nature is the standard for value."

Get off your high horse. This is in no way indisputable evidence that the dilemma is false, or doesn't apply to monotheism. This is a rejection by a particular handful of philosophers on the grounds of: 'we think it is inconsistent with god's omnipotence, and also, God is good by nature so therefore, we refuse to accept there is any dilemma at all. Because we don't want to.'

God's supposed omnipotence (not to mention omniscience) is inconsistent throughout the entire paradigm of Christianity itself if we are following the bible as the word of God. And saying that the dilemma fails because god's nature is inherently good still leaves us with the problem of evil. And the problem of the OT.

And please, explain to me the difference between God inventing moral standards and God representing the moral standard? That sounds like a definition semantic. No one has been humiliated, so take it easy.

[Redbeard The Pink]

The Euthypro Dilemma is what I've already been describing (though I didn't know it was called that until I looked it up)...

Many scholars believe that Plato’s Euthyphro is one of his first. Its early chronological position may explain why the Socratic dialog ends without resolution to the problem it raises, whether deeds are good because the gods approve or whether the gods approve of some deeds because they are good. This may also explain why so many atheists mistakenly believe the dilemma conclusively shows that divinity cannot be objectively grounded. What it really shows is that such atheists fail to consider the dilemma within the context of subsequent dialogs.

Plato presented the so-called Euthyphro dilemma in order to clear the way for his concept of The Good as the solution to the dilemma. The Good is a clearly monotheistic concept that was later developed and defined by pagan philosophers, like Plotinus, and Christian theologians like Augustine. The concept of The Good informs both the ontological proof of Anslem and Thomas of Aquinas’s Fourth Way. It also serves as the foundation for virtue ethics.

A cursory reading of a Wikipedia entry will give anyone the necessary history to understand the paradoxes’ place in moral theory. While it undermines simplistic notions of morality common in antiquity, it has no place in ethical theories since Plato. Only a very ill-informed atheist would rely on it to satisfy his immediate psychological need to reject in monotheistic moral claims.

So yeah, Mr. Redbeard, you did a fine job of rewriting the Wiki entry in your own words. To bad you lack the ability to understand why it's irrelevant and reveals your own ignorance.

The same goes for all of you that gave Kudos to his self-humiliation.

Wow. You're admonishing people for giving kudos to a post, now? Are you a child?


By the way, I came up with that argument on my own. I didn't know Euthypro's Dilemma existed as such until reading this thread.


What we're talking about is objective morality and whether God can be the source of it. You got really messy throwing words like "divinity" around, which may or may not have anything to do with the subject.


Your rejection, if I understand it correctly, is that God uses himself as the standard for goodness because he is the very essence of goodness (or something like that).


Aside from being completely circular, that still doesn't solve the problem you're having. If God decided to use his own qualities as the standard for good, then it's still arbitrary and based on nothing more than divine command.


If his qualities exist as the Objective standard for good whether he wants them to or not, then that means there's something that is capable of requiring God to adhere to such a standard. Even though God's qualities would be the basis for the rules, the actual source of moral authority wouldn't be God himself, it would be whatever authority he answers to.

[LadyForCamus]

Right.  So for all that pomp, the refutation of the Euthyphro Dilemma amounts to: "it doesn't apply because...God is good...and no one can tell him what todo." ?

[Neo-Scholastic]

You basically confirmed what I said, L4C. I do not understand why you think your post goes against my position, especially when it includes this quote:

“Classical Judaeo-Christian theism, however, rejects such a view as inconsistent with God's omnipotence, which requires that God and what he has made is all that there is."The classical tradition," Rogers notes, "also steers clear of the other horn of the Euthyphro dilemma, divine command theory." From a classical theistic perspective, therefore, the Euthyphro dilemma is false. As Rogers puts it, Anselm, like Augustine before him and Aquinas later, rejects both horns of the Euthyphro dilemma. God neither conforms to nor invents the moral order. Rather His very nature is the standard for value."

God's supposed omnipotence (not to mention omniscience) is inconsistent throughout the entire paradigm of Christianity itself if we are following the bible as the word of God. And saying that the dilemma fails because god's nature is inherently good still leaves us with the problem of evil. And the problem of the OT.

First, what you just did here is avoid dealing with the ineffectiveness of the dilemma with respect to a particular moral theory (virtue ethics) and shifted to a different objection, namely theodicy.

Second, biblical morality is grounded in virtue ethics as seen in both the OT (Leviticus 19:2) and NT (Matthew 5:48). The idea here is that since Man was created in the image of God, the better someone conforms to his innate human nature the more perfectly he conforms to the nature of the Maximally Great Being which is God.

[Neo-Scholastic]

...I came up with that argument on my own. I didn't know Euthypro's Dilemma existed as such until reading this thread.

If you say so.

Your rejection...is that God uses himself as the standard for goodness because he is the very essence of goodness (or something like that).

Something like that.

Aside from being completely circular...

Only if you ignore the context and history.

If God decided to use his own qualities as the standard for good, then it's still arbitrary and based on nothing more than divine command.

Your objection is based on the irrational idea that God could act contrary to His nature. The only thing arbitrary is the personal choice of whether or not to accept God's Nature as the object of moral reasoning. Virtue ethics argues that it is both wise and praiseworthy to do so.

[JuliaL]

My take on this Euthyphro discussion.

The Euthyphro dilemma, and Chad's supposed solution are subsets of a larger question which remains.
None of these answers cover the issues of recursion and solipsism with respect to God.
Is there anything outside of God and how would She know this?
How does She know She is unaware of being a created being?
If God is omniscient, then does She know that there is nothing She does not know?

This last point is telling, because if it is answered, as Chad might, with an arbitrary declaration that, "She just does." then the law of non-contradiction is abrogated.  God now knows the things that She does not know.  All rational bets are now taken by the house and further discussion is fruitless.


How does God know She does not reside in an infinite area of order within a larger infinity of random stuff?
A fiat declaration that "She just does, does not satisfy."