Ms. Siv

First of all, you are implying genetic determinism. Our genes dont determine us completely. We are a product of our genes + enviroment. Aggression is built-in but for what purposes this aggression was built in may no longer be true. We no longer have dominance hierarchies (or at least its now mutated to such a degree that the resemblance to a dominance hierarchy is vastly reduced), we no longer wander from place to place hunting and gathering. We breed plants and animals for food.
We no longer breed as much as we can. We use contraception, plan our families etc.
The environment we live in now is quite different from what our brains evolved for. So the phenotypic effects of our genes would also be different.


Sure it does. But you dont need an imaginary source for this fear . You have a very source in our legal systems. Thats what curbs people most of the time. Not fear of judgement day, but fear that the police will catch you

- Sivakami.

God Fearing Atheist

Just a couple things:

1) "Subjective" and "relative", although closely linked, are logically independent concepts. The former sees values as dependent on affective relationships, the latter, that these relationships can differ.

2)In what sense are you using "values"? "Values" and "morals" are also conceptually distinct. I, for one, hold the subjectivity and relativity of values, while at the same time affirming an objective moral code.

Now, if you do indeed means "value" as in, "the extent to which an actor prefers an outcome to any other", consider the following arguments:

Ontological queerness: if values exist independent of actors, they must be something inherent to objects, or states of affairs involving those objects. But this is difficult to imagine. What sort of property contains prescriptivness? What sort of property has the power to compel us desire it?

relativity: its a simple fact that many people (and many cultures) seem fond of all sorts of different things. This may not be a proof of relativity (as opposed to subjectivity, which is the former), but it certainly gives the position a bit more force.

indifference: Hare asks us to consider two worlds: one in which values are objective, another in which they are subjective. In both worlds, however, the people in them continue being concerned with the same things. The result is there is no fundamental difference between the state of affairs in either. We can then view objective value as so much ethical junk to be shaved off the universe using Occams razor.

-GFA

Francois Tremblay

Apart from Sivakami's stomach-churning collectivism, much can be said about the notion that religious people cannot be moral in themselves.

Where would they get their morals ? Not from reality, since they promote faith about ethical issues (likewise, the belief in an afterlife completely neutralizes even the possibility of a religious people getting a rational sense of morality). So if there is any place they should get them, it is in their doctrines. But the Bible, and most doctrines, are so contradictory that no clear moral line can be given from them.

There seems to be no way Christians can be moral except by imitation.

[ February 02, 2002: Message edited by: Franc28 ]</p>

joedad

I think the question is too general and already betrays assumptions. I'd rephrase it to read, "Can a person be good with a god?"

Now let's make it even more specific: "Can Tony Blair be happy with Zeus?"

Now I think the topic can be discussed.

And I'm not trying to poke fun, either. Whenever you say "God," this to me is simply an idea. It takes an actual "god," if you get my meaning, to get any meaningful discussion going about "God." Hope that makes sense. It's the difference between talking about "Religion" and "a religion."

You can look at it from another angle by asking, "Can people be happy with any religion?" I'd have to say "no," because there isn't any one "people." There are persons and groups of persons. I'd have to change that to, "Can any one person be happy with any one religion?" Again, I'd have to answer "no," simply because people (and peoples) differ.

But in the sense that you are using "God" and perhaps "Religion", this is really a question about Natural Selection, because it involves humans and human behaviors and the pressures which ultimately select for both, same as any other "thing."

Ultimately, I think the question has to be broken down into hermeneutics and survival. If survival is good, then "Yes, people can be good with God." If hermeneutics, then "yes" and "no." (Not meaning to sound like Barker there.)

joe

pug846

Jonte, are you claiming that no theist can be “good” (as you define it)? Is there some sort of logical relationship there, or are your handful of examples supposed to set up that relationship?

Sivakami S. said:

Just curious, what “works” better: having abortions or not having abortions, having the death penalty or not having the death penalty, etc.? Should I adopt an ESS, even when it doesn’t benefit, but harms me? What should I do this? If you aren’t describing a prescriptive but a descriptive aspect of human nature, how can it be considered a morality?

Are there any species alive today that don’t follow ESS strategies and therefore, every specie now alive is exceptionally “moral?”

Andrew_theist said:

Please explain what you mean by “objective” and what values are objective and how we know that particular value is objective. Please don’t put up a caricature of a subjectivists position.

pug846

Jonte, are you claiming that no theist can be “good” (as you define it)? Is there some sort of logical relationship there, or are your handful of examples supposed to set up that relationship?

Sivakami S. said:

Just curious, what “works” better: having abortions or not having abortions, having the death penalty or not having the death penalty, etc.? Should I adopt an ESS, even when it doesn’t benefit, but harms me? What should I do this? If you aren’t describing a prescriptive but a descriptive aspect of human nature, how can it be considered a morality?

Are there any species alive today that don’t follow ESS strategies? Or is every species now alive exceptionally moral? Are insects moral?

Andrew_theist said:

Please explain what you mean by “objective” and what values are objective and how we know that particular value is objective. Please don’t put up a caricature of a subjectivists position.

E_muse

But often the changes in our environment are caused by us and what is going on in our brains - we create and shape our environment. This is simply true. Where does one leave off and the ohter take over?

I'm not saying you do need an imaginary source.

And where do our legal systems come from if they do not stem from our imaginations?

Jonte

Thanks to everyone who commented on my intentionally provocative posting. Some responses:

God Fearing Atheist asks if I’m proposing “some sort of utilitarianism”: absolutely! But in the original “greatest happiness of the greatest number” form rather than the Fabians paternalistic “greatest good of the greatest number” and I’d want to add a “floor” of basic human rights. And before anyone comes up with the standard objection, measuring happiness is NOT difficult, you just ask people and believe what they tell you since distinguishing “perceived” from “real” happiness is just nit-picking.

I disagree with Sivakami S’s ESS: evolution has built us flexible enough to conceive of our own goals and these need not necessarily be the same as the goals which drive evolution.

Andrew_theist raises a number of interesting points:

My death penalty and contraception point was intended to point up the inconsistency between believing in “the sanctity of life” to the point of granting it to a single-cell fertilised egg, but then being willing to grant the state the right to deprive it to fully developed adult human beings.

As for my charitable friend (Mr. 10%), he did not consult me about it so much as boast in a sanctimonious sort of a way and I absolutely back up my assertion that such un-considered giving can very easily do more harm than good. In this case the charity he was supporting was buying grain from Muslim war-lords in Northern Sudan and giving it to Christian war-lords in Southern Sudan who were selling it on the black market. Both sets of war-lords were using the money to finance a very dirty war between them. This was an extremely inefficient way of feeding the starving, but a remarkably efficient way of prolonging and escalating a war!

Where is this going? I think I’m suggesting that a public policy of encouraging religious belief as a way of making society better is misguided. Individuals probably either believe or not, but religion often gets an easy ride from non-believers who still think it “does some good”.

Pug846 asks if I’m claiming that “no theist can be good”. I like Franc28’s anticipatory response “only by imitation”, but I think I’d say “only by accident”. I suppose the logical link is that being good requires not just good intentions but also taking responsibility for the consequences of your actions. Religion militates against this by short-circuiting the calculus of consequences either with formalised rules or with “divine guidance” (intuition or guesswork).