Nu

Weak atheist toward the concept of God
Strong atheist toward the Christian God

Weak existential nihilist other than a basic axiom, "it is better to know than not to know"

Causal determinist
Incompatibilist

Nu

btw, contrary to what II says, atheism caused a severe moral crisis for me. honest intellectual openess lead me to view morality as arbitrary and then abandoning it all together.

i am still trying to get rid of vestigial guilt from far too effective social conditioning.

EvilTeuf

Hi, Nu. In a way, this kind of proves the point that morality is a subjective social construction... But enough of that. What kind of moral system are you working at following now?

Nu

My weak existential nihilism should cover my stance on morality as well.

To clarify, I do not willingly follow any moral code, subjective or objective. True morality may exist, but there is no convincing evidence at this time.

I came to this belief when I concluded that morality can not exist without a God-like entity, and realized that I do not believe in such an entity.

There are times when I am irrational and those vestigial influences from my Christian upbringing cloud my judgement.

[ August 23, 2002: Message edited by: Nu ]</p>

99Percent

Objective morality does exist. Let me ask you the following two questions:

1. What is the ultimate goal of all human beings?
2. Does free will exist?

Vibr8gKiwi

In my experience this is common for exChristians (but temporary). Their morality really is often based on their religion as that is how they were raised. When they lose their religion, they suddenly are "allowed" to do all sorts of things they couldn't do before. They suddenly don't have a simplistic predefined value system already setup anymore and go through an adjusting period.

Most my experience is with exmormons, and some of them have a time of experimenting with things that were heavily restricted before: drinking, sex, swearing, thinking for themselves, and whatever. Usually there aren't really any problems as this experimentation is part of their recovery process and they soon discover their own values and limits.

Interestingly the morality of bigger issues (like very unethical and illegal things such as murder, rape, stealing, etc.) never come up--people understand these things are wrong at a very low level, and luckily even religion has a difficult time screwing that up.

tronvillain

99Percent:
Perhaps it does, but you have yet to find an argument that shows it. You know, you never did get back to me on that other thread...

Anyway, I suppose I could attempt to lay out a few pieces of my "worldview":

Strong Atheism
Skepticism
Subjective Morality (Emotivism)
Strict/Probablistic Determinism
Compatiblist

There are of course many other things I could list, but Nu kept his list relatively short.

Scorpion

This should be interesting

This is kinda difficult question to answer since 1) I can not possibly know what every single human being wants, and
2) I don't have any "ultimate" goal whatsoever.

Very tough one and depends heavily on what kind of connotations "existence" should have in this discussion... do I need to commit to determinism/non-determinism in order to move on with the argument or will you be happy if I just accept that free will is a useful and meaningful concept for now?

...wait a minute, does this have anything to do with the topic of this thread? Isn't this Moral Foundations stuff anyway?

-S-

[ August 23, 2002: Message edited by: Scorpion ]</p>

Samhain

Morality is a concept based on human empathy and perception, and being such, is subject to the flaws and subjectivity of human existence. Objective morality does not exist. Morality is a concept not a science.

There is no "ultimate" goal for all human beings. The only one that could even be considered as remotely objective would be existence, plain and simple. Futher than that humans make their own goals, and no two are exactly the same. Existence can't really even be considered a "goal" anyway, as when one exists, they simply do, there is nothing more to obtain than prolonged existence, and even that is a subjective desire.

I'd say yes, at least for a free-will to choose from a set of choices, futher than that (i.e. to choose uninhibited by anything) is a tad more complicated, but how does either answer, free-will or determinism, provide a substantial argument for objective morality?

Sorry, 99Percent, objective morality is a nice thought, but, like oragami, folds under pressure.

99Percent

tronvillain: Perhaps it does, but you have yet to find an argument that shows it. You know, you never did get back to me on that other thread...

I finally got down to responding, please check the Moral Foundations forum.

Scorpion: This is kinda difficult question ("what is the ultimate goal of all human beings?") to answer since 1) I can not possibly know what every single human being wants, and 2) I don't have any "ultimate" goal whatsoever.

Sure you do. The ultimate goal of all human beings is happiness.

Very tough one ("Does free will exist?") and depends heavily on what kind of connotations "existence" should have in this discussion... do I need to commit to determinism/non-determinism in order to move on with the argument or will you be happy if I just accept that free will is a useful and meaningful concept for now?

Talking about being happy! Yes I will be happy if you accept that free will is a useful and meaningful concept. In fact it could be argued in the strictest of logic that free will does not exist, but we are trying to be reasonable not logical. (There is a difference).

...wait a minute, does this have anything to do with the topic of this thread? Isn't this Moral Foundations stuff anyway?

Yes I expect this thread to move over to MF+P any moment now

Samhain: Morality is a concept based on human empathy and perception, and being such, is subject to the flaws and subjectivity of human existence.

Yes, subjective morality does, but not objective morality which is based on pure reason.

Objective morality does not exist. Morality is a concept not a science.

Of course morality is a concept, but concepts don't deny existence, like numbers or the color red. Objective morality is not a science because it is based on reason.

There is no "ultimate" goal for all human beings.

Yes there is - it is happiness

Futher than that humans make their own goals, and no two are exactly the same.

Why do humans make their own goals to begin with? It is because everyone wants to maximize their happiness, whatever that means to each individual. And this is where free will comes into play. If you recognize that everyone wants to maximize their happiness and that everyone has the free will to do so then you are very close to accepting that objective morality exists already.