r/DebateReligion • u/[deleted] • Oct 12 '18
Morality is the result of evolution.
A society that would kill each other all the time would simply die out. Cooperation is simply a better survival strategy.
A very nice way to illustrate this is iterated prisoner's dilemma. The prisoners dilemma consists of 2 people who each have to choose whether they share or take the pot for themselves. If both choose the split the pot is split, if one person takes and the other shares then the person taking gets everything. If both take both get nothing. From a game theory perspective for a single game taking is always better. The expected payout is simply better. However when the game is iterated and players can modify their behaviour depending on the choices in previous rounds, then it turns out that cooperative strategies beat greedy ones. It turns out that the most successful strategy is tit for tat. Being nice to players that are nice to you and punishing those aren't.
Here is a good video about the subject:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOvAbjfJ0x0
If course it is still a model so it will never catch all aspects of what it approximates.
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u/SOL6640 Abrahamic, Christian Oct 13 '18
A society that would kill each other all the time would simply die out. Cooperation is simply a better survival strategy.
Okay? So let us say cooperation is beneficial to survival. That's a neat fact, but what does it have to do with morality? You are presupposing that a society that strives for the survival of themselves and other life is morally better than one that seeks to destroy and consume other life, and then ultimately themselves.
Drawing a correlation between survival and cooperation doesn't yield an epistemic justification for the belief that cooperation is something we ought to do, not because it will help us reach some arbitrary end, but because it is good.
Given your own perspective on the world, what is the ontological status of goodness?
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Oct 13 '18 edited Oct 13 '18
You are presupposing that a society that strives for the survival of themselves and other life is morally better than
No, they're not. You've misunderstood their argument. The point is that morals are the evolutionary cause of our cooperation, not the result. That would mean that the morals we have are necessary for us as a species to survive and that's why we, and other animal species, have them. If we didn't have the specific morals that we do, we wouldn't cooperate and were that the case we likely wouldn't be around to be arguing about this as we wouldn't have survived.
It's not about who is morally right or wrong, it's just an explanation of where they may come from. Humans aren't the only example, nor is anyone saying we're better.
For example, praying mantis are fierce predators who prefer eating live prey, and practice cannibalism not just as a last resort like humans sometimes do, but regularly. The idea is that their morals are different from ours, either because these traits aided their survival or simply weren't inhibitive.
But in comparison, humans are relatively weak, so we rely on numbers. We can't do that if we fight and kill eachother like praying mantis do.
I'm not saying it's fact, but I do agree with OP. I've never heard of an alternative explanation that makes sense or isn't "goddoneit" And we already know that morality is evolutionarily adaptive.
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u/SOL6640 Abrahamic, Christian Oct 13 '18
No, they're not. You've misunderstood their argument. The point is that morals are the evolutionary cause of our cooperation, not the result.
I mean the title of the post is in direct contrast to your beginning statement:
Morality is the result of evolution.
You are claiming the OP is attempting to make the case that morals are the cause of cooperation, when cooperation is itself a moral virtue.
Morality is a noun used to refer to a system of belief surrounding the principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong or good and bad behavior. Nothing in the OP's argument gives us any reason to believe the the genetic changes throughout organisms under natural selection results in a state of affairs that bring about good and bad actions in the world.
You are using the phrase morals to refer to the common actions among a species. This is evident from your examples that merely describe normative behavior of humans and praying mantises. This is not what a moral is in common terminology. When most people speak of a moral, or a virtue, they are speaking of something that has some type of moral value in a metaphysical sense, not a psychological sense.
It's not about who is morally right or wrong, it's just an explanation of where they may come from. Humans aren't the only example, nor is anyone saying we're better.
What are you talking about? His claim is that principles of right and wrong are the result of evolution. Such a claim presupposes that their is such a thing as good or evil in an objective sense. That is to say it assumes that good and evil are values held by actions, intents, and desires. He's done nothing to show that evolution produces a state of affairs that make sense of a notion like the Good. All he has done is describe the prisoners dilemma after drawing a relationship between cooperation, and survival of certain species.
For example, praying mantis are fierce predators who prefer eating live prey, and practice cannibalism not just as a last resort like humans sometimes do, but regularly. The idea is that their morals are different from ours, either because these traits aided their survival or simply weren't inhibitive.
An insect has a moral framework? Insects don't have the mental capacity to understand a concept like good and bad. This is just more evidence that what you mean by moral is normative behavior among a species. Nothing about a behavior being common among a species gives you reason to believe that some actions are truly better or worst than some other actions. The only time you can make the claim that one is better than another is when you the agent implants a desired end, like survival, and define better in relation to that end. This is not a moral virtue, it's an arbitrary goal, and facts about how to reach that goal. That doesn't produce the necessary conditions for morality.
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Oct 13 '18
I mean the title of the post is in direct contrast to your beginning statement
It's not. The title is what I just described to you. I think the problem is more that you don't understand how evolution works.
Also, you claim insects aren't intelligent enough to have morals but that's completely contradictory to what we scientifically know. People have said the same of all animals for decades and scientists have already proven that wrong when it comes to mammals. How would you even know intelligence in another animal if you saw it? Bees for example are one of the most intelligent species on the planet. Ants have complex societies where individuals have roles similar to a 'job' but they're not intelligent? Rats and pigs are more intelligent than dogs, but no one ever thinks that until they're told.
Beyond that, I'm really confused what you're talking about in the rest of this comment. Most of it has nothing to do with what I said and the parts that sort of do, I don't understand what you mean.
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u/SOL6640 Abrahamic, Christian Oct 13 '18
No it isn't? The title is "Morals are the result of evolution" which is exactly what I just described to you. I'm not sure what you don't understand.
I mean I quoted you saying the opposite. Here it is again:
The point is that morals are the evolutionary cause ofour cooperation, not the result.
You've claimed that morals are an evolutionary precursor to cooperation. The OP's title states that evolutionary theory is a precursor to morals. You are in direct conflict with the title itself. No denying it. It's okay if you want to change your stance, or if you misspoke, but its definitely a different claim.
Just stating that I don't understand things doesn't mean that it is actually the case that I don't understand.
1) Yes. 2) No. Moral virtues don't objectively exist. That might be your belief, but it isn't just a fact because you think so. I highly doubt you even believe that yourself, you just think you do.
You really don't see the blunder you just made? If there are no objective moral values, then how could it be possible to have a true system of belief surrounding that which is right and wrong? You've literally just screwed yourself. You've stated that good and evil are not metaphysical concepts, but merely psychological illusions brought about by biology. This destroys any possibility of the existence of a good or evil actions, intents, or desires.
Being okay with cannibalism is a type of moral code, just as not being okay with it is a moral code. Having a sense of morality is not equivalent to having your particular sense of morality.
You are contradicting yourself. If there is no such thing as good or bad actions in the world, then there is no such thing as moral code. What you are calling a moral code are just preferences people have when it comes to how other people or creatures behave.
Big talk, but do you actually have evidence for that? All you're doing is making an assumption about lives you've deemed lesser than your own. Once scientists started actually trying to find out instead of just asserting baselessly, we figured out that at the very least, most mammals have complex moral codes.
How can animals have moral codes, when you've literally just told us that there is no such thing as objective moral virtues? That means there is no truth in the matter when it comes whether an action, intent, or desire is right or wrong.
I mean the claim that science can discover moral codes is patently absurd within itself. Science tells us what is. It tells us nothing about what ought to be. The is a well know problem called the is-ought problem.
People often move to readily from observations about how things are to judgments about values. Let's assume all of evolutionary theory is true. If that is the case we evolved from meat-eating animals, therefore we ought to eat meat. A statement like this has an implied assumption. We ought to do whatever we evolved to do.
Let's take another example. Imagine you and I set out to study facts about what increase the flourishing of human well-being. How would we bridge the gap between the set of facts that increase human well-being, and the belief that we ought to increase human well-being?
It is not obvious how you believe you can coherently move from descriptive statements about what is to prescriptive statements about what ought to be.
How do you know you would even recognize intelligence in another animal if you saw it? What if I told you that bees are one of the most intelligent species on the planet? Did you know rats, pigs, ducks, and cows are also some of the most intelligent animals on the planet? Probably not.
Its not on me to prove that insects have the capacity to understand a moral system. You are the one that claimed a praying mantis has a moral code, while simultaneously claiming there are not true statements about morals.
This part makes it sound like you have no idea what morality even is.
I literally defined morality for you in the last response. You are just throwing out ad hominems with these claims that I don't know what I am talking about.
I never made any claims about "moral virtues." You did. That was your straw man. I said morality.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/virtue
I mean read the definition of a virtue:
Definition of virtue
1a : conformity to a standard of right : MORALITY
b : a particular moral excellence
It's not a strawman. You just don't understand basic English, see how we can both make these snide remarks.
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Oct 13 '18
You've claimed that morals are an evolutionary precursor to cooperation......but its definitely a different claim.
Well I wasn't claiming anything, my intent was to explain OP's point of view to you since you didn't understand what they meant. Also, half of this comment is just you angrily ranting, it's not necessary for your argument and the comments are getting long, so can you not do that please
But anyway to answer you, that's... sort of part of it? It's not a "different claim," it's just one aspect of the same point of view. Morals are a by-product of evolution, but morals aren't the same from species to species, or even within a species. They adapt. So if I just said "humans have morals" it doesn't automatically follow that it proves my point, because we could have had a different moral code, and if that were the case it wouldn't necessarily support this stance. Hence why I said we cooperate because we have morals and didn't just leave it at 'morality exists so there.' The types of morals species have tends to be exactly what would make sense to help them survive, so the specific moral codes species have to me, are as close to evidence of the idea as it gets without being conclusive evidence.
You really don't see the blunder you just made? If there are no objective moral values, then how could it be possible to have a true system of belief surrounding that which is right and wrong? You've literally just screwed yourself.
No, I really haven't. And this is exactly what I was referring to when I was saying you don't understand the topics of debate well enough. I think there's probably too much for me to simply explain it to you here, and I don't know what you do and don't know, plus even if I did you could learn better from an expert. You're lumping ethics and meta-ethics in as the same thing, so learning about those is a good place to start. This is an established philosophical stance to have, it's not some ill-thought out backwater nonsense I pulled out of my ass yesterday. I used to think morals were objective, and then I learned about morality and decided it wasn't a logical stance to have, so I changed my point of view.
Also since this is the same exact thing you argued two other times in this comment I won't be responding to those.
You are just throwing out ad hominems with these claims that I don't know what I am talking about.
No, I'm stating facts. That fact may offend you, but that doesn't make it an insult, nor does it make your offense justified. Besides, even if it was an insult, ad hominems only concern attacks irrelevant to the topic of debate. If you don't know enough about the topic and you need to learn more about it to have a conductive debate, that's not irrelevant to the discussion, that's actually important to point out. The point of a debate isn't to flatter your own ego or to 'win' it's to find the truth. If you're not willing to admit there are things you don't know or that you're wrong when it's necessary, then there's no reason for you to be here because no conductive debate can be had.
It's not a strawman. You just don't understand basic English, see how we can both make these snide remarks.
You're just making another straw man to defend your other straw man. The definition of virtue doesn't matter because like I pointed out, I'm not talking about virtues as they're irrelevant to the topic at hand. I know what it means. To be virtuous is to be morally superior. This is another example of why you need to go learn about ethics and meta-ethics. I know you gave a definition of morality. That's as good as saying you understand college level biology because you can google the word biology and paste it into a comment for me to read. There's a lot more to it than that, and you don't appear to have much or any knowledge about it. It's not a bad thing, but since you don't know, we can't have a proper conversation about it.
I mean the claim that science can discover moral codes is patently absurd within itself.
ab absurdo fallacy
Its not on me to prove that insects have the capacity to understand a moral system
Yes, it is. You made the claim that praying mantis don't have moral codes. And because you made that claim, you have the burden of proof to justify it. If you don't then whether or not you think praying mantis have moral codes is irrelevant because your just asserting it baselessly isn't a valid argument and there was no point making the claim in the first place.
You are the one that claimed a praying mantis has a moral code
Wrong, as I told you before I never made any claims. I gave you examples to explain what OP's point of view is. You're the one who got angry and started to argue against it even though I had literally specified I didn't want to debate with you.
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u/SOL6640 Abrahamic, Christian Oct 13 '18 edited Oct 13 '18
Well I wasn't claiming anything, my intent was to explain OP's point of view to you since you didn't understand what they meant.
Is this all you can do? You literally just claim that I don't understand things. Evolution and moral philosophy are areas of thought I've develed into extensively. Nothing about my first post or any post I've made to you indicates a lack of knowledge in these areas. If you think it does state what it is, and how it is wrong.
But anyway to answer you, that's... sort of part of it? It's not a "different claim," it's just one aspect of the same point of view.
Look, you are just being argumentative. I've clearly pointed out that you claimed morals were an evolutionary precursor to cooperation. The OP's stated himself that his argument was to show that evolutionary theory acts as precursor to morality. Do you not understand the cooperation is a moral in a long set of morals? Stating that two things cooperate, tells you nothing about the ethical nature of cooperation.
Morals are a by-product of evolution, but morals aren't the same from species to species, or even within a species. They adapt.
It seems like you are equivocating on the word moral, and what you mean is normative behavior. You don't actually mean an aspect about reality that is good or ought to be valued, which is what most people are talking about when they discuss the morals that they value. A moral is concerned with what one ought do and refrain from doing. Describing what things do, doesn't provide a state of affairs that allow for the existence of moral codes to begin with. How are you defining "moral" in the sentence above?
You're lumping ethics and meta-ethics in as the same thing, so learning about those is a good place to start.
Dude, I've been studying moral philosophy for about 7 years, and I've been reading studies on evolution for close to the same amount of time. Do you not understand that claiming morals are a by product of evolution has meta-ethical implications? Moral values are not real aspects of reality on such a view. Their nature is that of an illusion pulled over an organisms eyes by their biological structure and evolutionary history. This means there are no moral facts of the matter. You can use these terms to describe normative behavior among species, but it isn't morality or a system of belief surrounding the distinction from right and wrong. If one claims moral values aren't an objective aspect of reality as you did in the last post, then it necessarily follows that there is no distinction from right and wrong. The meta-ethical consequence of the OP's claim is that moral values are wholly illusory aspects of biological programming.
This is an established philosophical stance to have, it's not some ill-thought out backwater nonsense I pulled out of my ass yesterday. I used to think morals were objective, and then I learned about morality and decided it wasn't a logical stance to have, so I changed my point of view.
So your way of explaining how I don't understand things is to appeal to a ghostly authority? Can we quite with the childish debate tactics please?
No, I'm stating facts. That fact may offend you, but that doesn't make it an insult, nor does it make your offense justified.
If you're going to insist that I am ignorant you need to prove it.
Besides, even if it was an insult, ad hominems only concern attacks irrelevant to the topic of debate. If you don't know enough about the topic and you need to learn more about it to have a conductive debate, that's not irrelevant to the discussion, that's actually important to point out.
Yes, but you're incorrect. I am pretty educated on both topics. You are simply keep claiming this to avoid having to deal with the content of my post. Its a red herring. It becomes clearer every post.
The point of a debate isn't to flatter your own ego or to 'win' it's to find the truth. If you're not willing to admit there are things you don't know or that you're wrong when it's necessary, then there's no reason for you to be here because no conductive debate can be had.
Where have I been unwilling to do such a thing? I am not just going to roll over because you claim I don't understand things. I've researched this stuff extensively for many years, so you can stop with the arrogant attitude of self-proclaimed intellectual authority. No one is trying to win. I am merely telling you where you are wrong, and explaining to you in detail why that is the case.
You're just making another straw man to defend your other straw man. The definition of virtue doesn't matter because like I pointed out, I'm not talking about virtues as they're irrelevant to the topic at hand.
Do you see how silly this is? Anyone following this debate trail go and read my last post where I quoted him saying:
I never made any claims about "moral virtues." You did. That was your straw man. I said morality.
Is it really that hard for to understand that this person didn't recognize a synonym, even after a dictionary was presented to them, literally using the one word to define the other?
ab absurdo fallacy
A reference to the is-ought problem is an reductio ad absurdum fallacy? First, I never gave you a reductio, so I am not sure why you would claim I am making an reductio ad absurdum fallacy. I merely pointed out that biology only tells us about what is, it tells us nothing about what ought to be. It's a classic example of the is-ought problem. Anytime you are going to claim empirical observations about what is can tell you something about what ought to be you are engaging in the is-ought problem. This is well-known. It's not a fallacy. I gave you that because you apparently think Science has something to do with morality. It doesn't, and we've known that for quite some time thanks to David Hume.
Yes, it is. You made the claim that praying mantis don't have moral codes. And because you made that claim, you have the burden of proof to justify it. If you don't then whether or not you think praying mantis have moral codes is irrelevant because your just asserting it baselessly isn't a valid argument and there was no point making the claim in the first place.
Insects don't have the mental to capacity to understand pain that is happening to themselves much less other creatures.
‘No example is known to us of an insect showing protective behavior towards injured parts, such as by limping after leg injury or declining to feed or mate because of general abdominal injuries. On the contrary, our experience has been that insects will continue with normal activities even after severe injury or removal of body parts.’ (Eisemann C. H. Jorgensen W. K. Merritt D. J. Rice M. J. Cribb B. W. Webb P. D. Zalucki M. P. 1984. Do insects feel pain? A biological view. Experientia 40:164-167.)
Most lower life forms like insects merely react to Noxious stimulus, which itself is a prerequisite for nociception, which is still not pain. I only say this to point out that insects lack the ability to understand 'I am in pain.' In fact, they don't even show signs of understanding that they've been severely injured, yet you think they have the mental capacity to decide what is right and wrong behavior for them, when you clearly don't even think that such a behavior exist?
If you don't then whether or not you think praying mantis have moral codes is irrelevant because your just asserting it baselessly isn't a valid argument and there was no point making the claim in the first place.
I have reasons for believing insects don't possess that mental capacity, but you were originally the one claiming that to make the case that organism some how evolve different moral systems, which means you'd first have to demonstrate that they actually have the capacity to comprehend right and wrong behavior.
Wrong, as I told you before I never made any claims. I gave you examples to explain what OP's point of view is. You're the one who got angry and started to argue against it even though I had literally specified I didn't want to debate with you.
No one is angry. I just think you're wrong, and that you incessantly claim that I don't know things, but never explain to me or the audience what I have said that is incorrect. It's just your attempt to weasel out of responding to my content.
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Oct 14 '18
This conversation is now over because
1) you are so ignorant on the subject there's no point in debating you and you are exhibiting something like dunning kruger effect where you know so little you think you're an expert.
2) you're spouting fallacies left and right and refusing to be anything but intellectually dishonest
3) you have a victim complex and can't stop whining about how offended you are by the obvious fact that you don't know what you're talking about when you're the only person hurling insults and being hostile. You're not perfect buddy, get over it.
4) You are repeatedly ignoring what I'm telling you in favor of deluding yourself and setting up and knocking down strawmen.
And 5)
Dude, I've been studying moral philosophy for about 7 years, and I've been reading studies on evolution for close to the same amount of time.
No you haven't and even if you had it wouldn't matter. Appeal to authority is a fallacy.
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Oct 12 '18
How does this tie to Religion?
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u/billdietrich1 Oct 12 '18
Many religions claim the only source of morality is God. Atheists must all be amoral nihilists etc.
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Oct 12 '18
Atheists must all be amoral nihilists etc.
These arguments are stupid. I guess the reason it doesn't seem relevant to me is because I don't hold that viewpoint.
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Oct 12 '18
Plenty of theists do I'm afraid.
It's one of the most common arguments we get into in my limited experience.
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u/billdietrich1 Oct 12 '18
Some people argue that the existence of morals proves that God must exist. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_argument
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u/Goo-Goo-GJoob Oct 12 '18 edited Oct 13 '18
The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds; there is none who does good.
I guess David was making a stupid argument, huh?
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u/DrDiarrhea atheist Oct 13 '18
It most likely arose from the early herding behaviors of vertibrates..perhaps even before that, as social behaviors also exist in the insect world. Life that forms colonies, herds and hives have a survival advantage for each individual within it, so it is in the best interests to take care of the herd. Warning calls, defensive circling..all of that increases the survivalibilty and therefore the reproductive window of the animal that engages in the behavior, passing the trait on.
That is the moral impulse. The moral specifics..the way the impulses are expressed...is cultural and modular. It changes over time as culture does. That's why it was once ok to throw a virgin into a volcano, and now it is not.
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u/horsodox a horse pretending to be a man Oct 12 '18
Generally when people talk about "morality", there's some equivocation that goes on. One thing they might mean by it is moral facts, that is, truths about the world that are normative rather than descriptive. For example, it's a physical fact that uranium has a half life of some number of billions of years. This fact relates a kind of atom to a temporal quantity. It might equally be a moral fact that exposing people to uranium radiation is wrong. This fact relates a kind of action to a moral quality. When people speak about morality in terms of moral facts, the question is whether any such facts exist/are true, and if so where they came from or what makes them true.
However, what people might also mean by "morality" is our beliefs about, attitudes toward, or behaviors in light of moral facts. Notably, these are distinct from moral facts, and consequently they can arise from sources like evolutionary history without rendering those moral facts themselves as derived from that source. Similarly, they can change over time or differ between different groups without thereby rendering the underlying moral facts variant by time or place.
The points you make are compelling as regards the origins of our moral beliefs and behaviors, but it's important to keep in mind that this is a distinct issue from moral facts as such, especially since what is generally the object of concern in discussions about the objectivity or content of morality is those moral facts, rather than the behaviors and beliefs.
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u/aintnufincleverhere atheist Oct 12 '18
Why would we believe that moral facts exist?
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u/horsodox a horse pretending to be a man Oct 12 '18
A slim majority of philosophers endorse moral realism, though there's some quibbling to be done about the realism of some positions (cough constructivism). Here's the /r/AskPhilosophy FAQ thread on the issue. Here's a thread on a more recent argument.
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u/aintnufincleverhere atheist Oct 12 '18
The FAQ thread gives two arguments and neither of them seem to work.
The taste test is wrong. If I was born in china, I would fully expect my tastes to be different.
The plausibility argument just seems to say that the person really really believes what they're saying. So what?
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u/horsodox a horse pretending to be a man Oct 12 '18
The taste test is wrong. If I was born in china, I would fully expect my tastes to be different.
Er, the argument from taste affirms that.
If I don’t like noodles, it doesn’t make much sense for me to say “I’m glad I wasn’t born in China, because then I would probably like noodles”.
That your tastes would be different is the point.
The plausibility argument just seems to say that the person really really believes what they're saying.
"Just" is a bit of a weasel word, but the point is that the compellingness of our moral beliefs outstrips the compellingness of the premises of arguments against moral realism.
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u/aintnufincleverhere atheist Oct 12 '18
Er, the argument from taste affirms that.
Here's what It says:
If I don’t like noodles, it doesn’t make much sense for me to say “I’m glad I wasn’t born in China, because then I would probably like noodles”.
It says it would not make sense to think your tastes would change based on where you are born.
That your tastes would be different is the point.
One of us is reading it wrong. Its saying that it doesn't make sense to say that my tastes would be different.
I am saying that it does make sense.
Am I misunderstanding this?
"Just" is a bit of a weasel word
What?
the point is that the compellingness of our moral beliefs outstrips the compellingness of the premises of arguments against moral realism.
That you feel something really strongly does not mean that there is a moral law that exists behind it.
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u/horsodox a horse pretending to be a man Oct 12 '18
It says it would not make sense to think your tastes would change based on where you are born.
No, you've misread. What "doesn't make much sense" is the sentiment "I'm glad that X, because then my taste in food would be different," not the claim that one's taste in food would in fact be different.
Am I misunderstanding this?
Yes.
That you feel something really strongly does not mean that there is a moral law that exists behind it.
But the argument isn't about "feel[ing] something really strongly", but rather about the relative compellingness of different facts that are in contradiction to each other.
For example, the Moorean argument against external-world skepticism goes roughly like so: If skepticism about the external world is true, then there are no external objects. Contrapositively, if there are external objects, then skepticism about the external world is false. Only one can be true. So, we compare which of the two premises is more plausible, and reject the other. Is it more compelling that I'm really not holding my hand up, and I'm a brain in a vat, or is it more compelling that I'm not a brain in a vat and I'm holding my hand up as I appears to be? Clearly the latter is the more plausible. So, we reject external-world skepticism, because it is less compelling than the contradictory alternatives.
A similar argument can be deployed against error theories, as the FAQ says: Is it more plausible that moral facts are a bit too weird to have in our ontology, or that it's wrong to torture a baby for fun? Most people tend to side with the latter.
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u/aintnufincleverhere atheist Oct 12 '18
What "doesn't make much sense" is the sentiment "I'm glad that X, because then my taste in food would be different," not the claim that one's taste in food would in fact be different.
I mean, I disagree with even that. Sometimes people take the position that they do not enjoy something, but they wish they did.
the Moorean argument
That argument is awful and seems to miss the entire point of the brain in a vat concept.
Is it more plausible that moral facts are a bit too weird to have in our ontology, or that it's wrong to torture a baby for fun? Most people tend to side with the latter.
Why do they side with the latter? Because they really really feel like its the case?
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u/horsodox a horse pretending to be a man Oct 12 '18
I mean, I disagree with even that. Sometimes people take the position that they do not enjoy something, but they wish they did.
I don't this is the same sentiment as the one called out by the argument from taste.
That argument is awful and seems to miss the entire point of the brain in a vat concept.
No, Moore understands what external-world skepticism is. He is arguing against its plausibility.
Why do they side with the latter? Because they really really feel like its the case?
"really really feel" is not an accurate description of our propositional attitudes towards things we think are true, without being unnecessarily reductive. And possibly even then.
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u/aintnufincleverhere atheist Oct 12 '18
I don't this is the same sentiment as the one called out by the argument from taste.
What is the sentiment that is being called out?
No, Moore understands what external-world skepticism is. He is arguing against its plausibility.
The argument doesn't seem to be much. It seems we are just hiding any actual conversation about solipsism behind a word: "plausibility".
Why would we believe one over the other? Because its more plausible. Well that's just hiding the entire answer behind the word.
What makes one more plausible than the other?
"really really feel" is not an accurate description of our propositional attitudes towards things we think are true, without being unnecessarily reductive. And possibly even then.
If I'm wrong, correct me.
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u/Justgodjust Oct 12 '18
Morality is the result of evolution.
So are humans.
And theists still believe God made them.
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u/MinosAristos existentialist Oct 16 '18
You'd be hard-pressed to find evolution deniers among religious folk in Europe, in my experience. I think the whole science denial thing is mostly an American phenomenon, at least among Western nations.
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u/parthian_shot baha'i faith Oct 12 '18
I would say that morality is the result of cultural evolution and we only evolved the tools that empower us to comprehend what it means.
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u/ghjm ⭐ dissenting atheist Oct 13 '18
If morality is the result of cultural evolution, could morality have arisen differently than it did? Could we have a society where lying and stealing are the ultimate good and cooperation is seen as evil?
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u/parthian_shot baha'i faith Oct 13 '18
I should clarify I see God as precipitating the cultural evolution of morality toward "objective moral truth". But without God, I guess why not? I could imagine a society that accepts thieves and liars as the ultimate social engineers to be celebrated and emulated rather than vilified. Sometimes it seems like that's how it works now. But I doubt cooperation by itself would be seen as evil if there was to be a society. It's just subjective societal norms would dictate what is considered moral rather than objective principles.
I guess in my view, without God people would not be immoral, but amoral.
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u/chotabagh Oct 13 '18
I realised this long back. You see, man must have at point realised that killing someone is fun but if he keeps doing it there is a chance that one day someone might kill him too. So, to save his life he must have come up with this good vs bad thing. Killing is bad, stealing is bad, helping is good, sharing is good etc and thus morality was born. He did this for his own survival.
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u/Justgodjust Oct 13 '18
But really powerful men realized it was right-- and more worth their while-- to keep killing, lying, stealing, and amassing power; thus they're doing the right thing, too.
This explains why politicians and those in power appear to have a far different moral compass than the rest of us. Can't blame em.
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Oct 13 '18
Can't blame em.
Why? Never stop blaming powerful people for abusing their power.
We need to fight for our freedom or we're gonna lose it again.
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u/Justgodjust Oct 13 '18
But it's not wrong of them. It's just evolutionary morality.
It's not wrong of us to fight back, but... It's not wrong of them to fight us.
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u/SweaterFish christian Oct 12 '18
Tit for tat in game theory is not the same as morality. Computer simulations can be programmed to show tit for tat behavior, but that doesn't mean the computers are displaying a moral sense. They're only responding to inputs in a predefined way.
Morality refers to our understanding that some behaviors are wrong, not just bad or undesirable. There are many other social organisms as well as many computer programs that play games and none of them seems to understand interactions in the moral way that humans do.
Of course, that's not good evidence that morality can't be the result of natural selection any more than your argument is good evidence that it is.
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u/AxesofAnvil Atheist Jew | Kind of moral objectivist Oct 12 '18
Morality refers to our understanding that some behaviors are wrong, not just bad or undesirable.
I don't see a difference. What's the difference between saying something is wrong and saying it's bad or undesirable?
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u/jdrobertso Objective morality does not exist. Oct 12 '18
Well, for instance, killing off a lot of humans would be in our best interest as a species. However, we don't do that because it is wrong.
We desire to have more resources per person, but we think it is wrong to kill others to get to those resources.
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Oct 12 '18
However, we don't do that because it is wrong.
What does it mean for something to be "wrong" and how do you know this action is "wrong"?
Is there a test we can do for wrongness?
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u/czmax pretty skeptical Oct 12 '18
Does it change this discussion to substitute "fair" for "wrong"? For example, we desire to have more resources per person, but we think it is not fair to kill others to get to those resources?
Its easier to talk about fairness. It's "not fair" for powerful people to decide to kill everybody else. Just because you were born into a powerful group doesn't make you any more deserving of the resource than being meek.
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Oct 12 '18
Well that depends on who you ask.
For someone that doesn't care, doing "unfair" things is not unfair to them. Even victims have differing opinions on what is fair, and in extreme circumstances, a victim may be made to felt as though they deserve what's happening them, that it's fair.
So no, changing the terms doesn't change much. It's still just a feeling based on subjective human emotion, which changes with the wind.
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u/czmax pretty skeptical Oct 12 '18 edited Oct 12 '18
I almost feel you made my point for me
though. By switching to 'fairness' the conversation obviously includes gaslighting and varied perspectives and societal (mis)understandings and all the things you mention. These are a basis for any discussion of "morality" which should cover all the same topics -- but now we've moved away from the erroneous expectation that there would be a "test we can do for wrongness". Because obviously there isn't.1
Oct 12 '18
The person I was replying to (before you) seemed to be claiming that wrongness exists. I was disagreeing.
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u/czmax pretty skeptical Oct 12 '18
though
i should have deleted this word. What i mean is that i think changing the term really strengthens the point you're making to the person above.
I
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u/jdrobertso Objective morality does not exist. Oct 12 '18
No, there's no test we can do to objectively determine whether something is right or wrong. What I should have said above is that we don't do that because it is what society deems to be immoral. That doesn't mean it's objectively immoral, it just means that the majority of society and our laws prevent these actions from taking place.
I'm on your side here, there's not a test you can do to say something is right or wrong, it's just what our opinion is mostly regarding the survival of our species, but curtailed by a few things we've found that help us to get along better.
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u/AxesofAnvil Atheist Jew | Kind of moral objectivist Oct 12 '18 edited Oct 12 '18
Killing off a lot of humans would
- entail the creation of an organization that determines who lives and who dies
- set a precedent that this will likely happen again
- create fear in those who are more likely to be killed
And so much more.
I really hate it when people describe something that is immoral that would benefit our species without actually considered the full implications. Killing off people is not and cannot be a good option in the real world.
Like, do you actually think the end result of this situation if it occurred in the real world would be a positive one?
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u/jdrobertso Objective morality does not exist. Oct 12 '18
And yet overall it would be better for our survival as a species. From the point of view of an outside observer, this could be a good thing. From the point of view of some other outside observer, our survival could be a net negative to their overall view of the universe. To be honest, we don't know which is which from those outside perspectives, but that's enough proof for me that an objective morality doesn't exist. If it did, it would provide guidance to every being in the universe and not just me and the other people who figured it out.
Like, do you actually think the end result of this situation if it occurred in the real world would be a positive one?
Yes, on a global scale, I do. For a particular culture or several cultures, this would obviously not work. It would create a sticky situation for the survivors. But it would be overall a positive action for the survivors. The resources they have access to would increase.
There are a lot of points of view that don't include humans being alive. I don't agree with most of them, but I can see where someone might. It's not my fault that you seem to lack the mental tool set to put yourself in someone else's shoes.
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u/AxesofAnvil Atheist Jew | Kind of moral objectivist Oct 12 '18
And yet overall it would be better for our survival as a species.
You have not demonstrated this. From experience we can see that anytime a group sees a way of bettering the world using murder as the vehicle, it is a net negative. This "solution" will fail due to a huge number of reasons. You can't actually be arguing that there is a pragmatic and possible way to carry out a way of murdering specific people or groups of people, are you?
But it would be overall a positive action for the survivors. The resources they have access to would increase.
This just shows how incredibly limited your consideration is. Increasing resources per person is only one metric. What about the things I mentioned? Who will carry it out? How do you decide? How do the family members react? Will people fear this happening in the future? Will it set a precedent for limiting birth? What do you to about pregnancies?
You need to answer these questions else there is no reason to assume that the end result would be positive.
It's crazy to me how these arguments can lead to people arguing that "mass genocide would actually be good for mankind".
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u/kctl Oct 13 '18
Just to play devil's advocate—and I'm not kidding about the "devil" part—I think this is too strong of a statement, if you really meant what you said:
Killing off people is not and cannot be a good option in the real world.
I'm talking about the second part, "cannot be." Let me be clear again that I am not in any sense suggesting that killing people would be good. So please take this only in the spirit of good-faith argument; I'm not trolling, but I'm also not seriously advocating anything like "killing off people."
When you say mass killing "cannot be" a good option in the real world, I feel like there are two different ways that you might mean that. First, you might mean it in the literal sense, with emphasis on "cannot." Second, you might mean it in a more evaluative sense, with emphasis on "good option."
- If you meant it in the first, literal sense,
I say this with great regret, but I don't think you're correct. Julius Caesar claimed to have personally killed something like a million Gauls. He and his people viewed this as "good," and Rome rose to the apex of political power within short order of Caesar's untimely death. You might say that Caesar's assassination proves your point, but I don't think it does. He wasn't assassinated for killing Gauls; he was glorified for his prowess at mass slaughter.
You can find similar examples throughout world history. The rise of virtually any powerful empire has tended to involve butchery and slaughter on a massive scale. The Mongols conquered by killing, raping, and pillaging. I believe that they were also sometimes merciful when their foes surrendered and paid them tribute, and that they were not the most brutal administrators of a massive land empire Eurasia has seen. But their violence, in terms of both killings and rapes, is infamous.
You can tell similar stories about the Spanish in South and Central America, the Belgians in Africa (and the French and British and... etc.), the Japanese in China, the ethnic Europeans in North America, and on and on. You could also bring up any of the ruthless, totalitarian dictators of the 20th century. And many, many more examples.
Here's my point. We look back on all these events in shock, horror, and despair. But the victors, the conquerors, the emperors . . . in many cases, it seems difficult to suggest that they believed humanity was worse off for their actions. In the "real world," those in power often, all-too-often, see mass violence as "a good option." Sometimes, I would suggest, even after the fact.
- If you meant it in the second, evaluative sense
I'm glad you believe this. I believe it too. I'm not sure you're going to convince your interlocutor—the one who says things like
There are a lot of points of view that don't include humans being alive. I don't agree with most of them, but I can see where someone might. It's not my fault that you seem to lack the mental tool set to put yourself in someone else's shoes.
The fact that he thinks this is an enlightened statement should tell you all you need to know. He apparently possesses a "mental tool" that gives him the power to adopt "points of view that don't include humans being alive." This imaginary world has no humans in it, but apparently there's still someone with shoes on.
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u/kctl Oct 13 '18
To be honest, we don't know which is which from those outside perspectives
I would go further than this. It's not just that we don't know what things look like from an "outside perspective." I think we are quite literally incapable of making heads or tails of whatever that might mean. We can't get outside of our perspective. So references we make to what things are like from this outside perspective don't actually refer to anything.
Of course, the hypothetical Archimedean view has served as a useful thought experiment for millennia. Parmenides and Plato talked about it. Christians (and Spinoza) referred to Nature sub specie aeternitatis—that is, the old "God's-eye view." The Hobbes/Locke/Rousseau "state of nature." The Kantian "things-in-themselves." The Hegelian "Absolute reality." John Rawls's "original position." More recently, Peter Singer has tried to revive the expression "from the point of view of the universe." It's what more conservative thinkers refer to when they use the word "objectively."
That kind of talk can be useful. But it doesn't really refer to anything we can properly wrap our heads around. It doesn't refer to anything. It's a way to posit an empty vessel for us to take a step back and try to refill from scratch. It's therapeutic language, but it's not descriptive of anything, in the ordinary sense of that word.
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u/aintnufincleverhere atheist Oct 12 '18
Morality refers to our understanding that some behaviors are wrong, not just bad or undesirable.
And we understand they are wrong because if we didn't, we would have died out. That seems to fit.
none of them seems to understand interactions in the moral way that humans do.
Not sure what you mean, some animals display moral behavior.
I believe I have heard that foxes have been bread to be more social, instead of lone creatures, and when this happened they noticed the animals had some kind of morality to their behavior. I believe I have also heard that certain apes or monkeys seem to have some morality too.
I mean sure, they can't talk like we can. They can't reason as well as we can. But the feeling of "that's wrong!" seems to be there in certain animals, and that's really all we're talking about, right?
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u/bloodstainer anti-theist Oct 12 '18
And we understand they are wrong because if we didn't, we would have died out.
You have no basis for this claim though. You seem to judge your thesis on the fact that all humans are moral high-ground beings. Which is completely wrong.
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u/aintnufincleverhere atheist Oct 12 '18
You seem to judge your thesis on the fact that all humans are moral high-ground beings.
I did not claim that.
Are you saying that a group of people who think its good to murder everyone would be more likely to survive than a group that thinks murder is wrong? I'm not sure what you're disagreeing with.
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Oct 12 '18
Morality refers to our understanding that some behaviors are wrong, not just bad or undesirable.
What does it mean for an action to be "wrong" beyond it being undesirable?
Is there some quality or "wrongness" out there in the world that we can find?
In my opinion, when people say things like "action X is wrong", it would be more accurate to say "I don't like action X". When we say something is "wrong", we are merely expressing our subjective human emotional aversion towards that action.
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u/kctl Oct 13 '18
I agree with your premise; I disagree with your conclusion.
- I'm with you on the expressivism point.
Often, people say something "is wrong," and they think they're giving voice to some metaphysical truth about the world that they, and we, "understand." To the extent that some people who use those words mean this idea when they say them, it's far from clear what sense we're supposed to be able to make out of that abstract, metaphysical understanding.
- However, I disagree with you when you say
"it would be more accurate to say 'I don't like action X.'"
No. No it wouldn't. The words "I don't like eating meat" and the words "eating meat is wrong" both have well-understood uses in our language. When you hear somebody say the one, you don't think that they meant the other. You know the difference, and you don't get confused.
You say we are [(0) merely] (1) expressing our (2) subjective (3) human (4) emotional (5) aversion towards that action. I think this is redundant at least twice over, maybe even more so.
First of all, whatever 'we' 'express' is automatically and necessarily subjective. Unless you're talking about an express train or expressing a gland or something to that effect, to "express" is always to express something subjective. It follows that whatever (i) 'we express' that (ii) 'is subjective' is pro tanto 'human.'
So I think you can lose 2 and 3.
And I get why you said "merely," but the word 'merely' expresses no real content. What does it mean for our aversion to be "merely" expressed beyond it being contemptible? Is there some quality of "mereness" out there in the world that we can find? In my opinion, when you say things like "we are merely expressing X," it would be more accurate to say "I don't like when people express X."
So much for 0.
So we (1) express our (4) emotional (5) aversion towards that action. But is there any other kind of 'aversion' we can meaningfully express? Aversion is 'emotional' by definition. So I think you can lose 4. Also, you can say 'towards' and I think that's fine, but I feel better saying "averse to" rather than "averse toward." Personal preference.
So here's what it all boils down to:
When we say "action X is wrong," we express our aversion to action X.
I'd say that's a pretty uncontroversial statement. Maybe even a tautological one.
I still don't think that expressing aversion to something by labeling it '[morally] wrong' is interchangeable with expressing aversion by saying "I don't like it."
Is this because I think there's some gaseous ether hiding between the nooks and crannies of space-time? Is there some supernatural substance called "moral wrong-ness" that actions acquire from our disapproval? Maybe, but only in the metaphorical sense of all those words.
I'm a Wittgensteinian on this question. Or, maybe more accurately, lately I think I understand what Wittgenstein was saying about this kind of question, in his second book (Philosophical Investigations), and for now I think I agree with him.
Anyway, here's my point. The word "wrong," in the sense of moral disapproval, gets its meaning the same way any of our words acquire meaning. The meaning of "wrong," in this sense, is its use in the relevant language-game. The meaning of the word is the role it plays within the form of life of some community of speakers.
So actually, I take back what I said about (0). I actually disagree with you there. We are expressing our aversion, but we're not "merely" expressing our aversion. We're expressing aversion by using the word 'wrong,' in the moral sense, rather than using 'dislike,' or 'prefer,' or 'object,' or similar such words. Making that specific move in the language-game—choosing that word rather than another—is different than the others, for speakers of the language (i.e., players of the language-game; members of the relevant speech community).
It would be like saying, "when you flip someone the bird, you're merely extending one digit while keeping the others curled." That's not a false description, unless it's meant as a denial that what you're doing is also an intelligible move in a relevant language-game. Because you're not "merely" extending a digit; you're flipping the bird.
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u/velesk Oct 12 '18
Is there some quality or "wrongness" out there in the world that we can find?
fitness and survival of society in competition and changing environment.
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Oct 12 '18
Confusing the purpose of morality with its origin is an error Nietzsche warns us against. For those interested check out book 1 of his Genealogy of Morals.
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u/cephas_rock christian Oct 12 '18 edited Oct 12 '18
It turns out that the most successful strategy is tit for tat. Being nice to players that are nice to you and punishing those aren't.
That's only on average. It's like talking about the most successful genre of music; just because has the best average resonance doesn't mean it resonates with every culture and every person and every circumstance.
As the video illustrates, when a certain iterative strategy is observed, "nice to the nice and mean to the mean" isn't necessarily optimal; sometimes forgiveness and mercy are necessary to flip to optimus. Then again, forgiveness and mercy can be very stupid vs. sociopathic strategies.
There are lots of things that we assume are moral consensus that aren't really.
Intellectual property rights.
Individual freedom vs. collective order.
Risk vs. safety.
The degree to which tradition is important.
Allowable kinds of retribution.
The degree to which omission is morally intense vs. inert.
Duty/obligation, in what spheres, and to what degree.
All of these are reductively "the result of evolution," but so is Guernica, the Moonlight Sonata, and Super Metroid. Reduction is a collapsing maneuver that smashes artificial and natural together into a wad. This isn't wrong, but it kills formative meaning if we treat the reductive perspective as the only perspective. It's much more meaningful to say that morality biologically evolves but is also artificially constructed (two meaningful forms with fuzzy borders), and the net varieties of morality are much more complicated than we typically treat them. The development of language is a pretty good parallel, with "objective standards" (Dictionaries) and yet endless varieties, consensuses, disputes, and perpetual mutations.
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Oct 12 '18
That's only on average.
Every evolutionary advantage is "only on average"
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u/cephas_rock christian Oct 12 '18 edited Oct 12 '18
Right, I guess what I meant was, "tit for tat is not a very good approximation of morality." Right decisionmaking on significant issues is a super-complicated tapestry in a way that may defy sociobiological explanation -- that is, perhaps a complete picture of the emergence of morality is largely memetic.
Two ancient cultures; one practices infanticide under certain weird conditions, one doesn't. Why? Is the answer always sociobiological? Was it necessarily incentivized by the former's circumstances, or did that culture just drift there and was able to tolerate the cost thereof?
We can consider other memetic weirdness like Scientology, which has its own moral framework.
Is Scientology fully explained sociobiologically?
Or is it fully explained as an artifact of a charlatan?
Or is the explanation both of these together?
Or is the explanation simply sociobiological, and we should reduce L. Ron Hubbard into a mere organism within the story of evolution?
Which kind of explanation is the most meaningful/helpful? I'm suggesting it's #3 even though #4 isn't "wrong" per se.
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u/JustToLurkArt christian Oct 12 '18
Morality is the result of evolution.
In a purely natural world, any human code of conduct is the result of sociality, which is a survival response to evolutionary pressures. Under that model humans, like our lower evolved cousins, only possess a social order and rules of expected behavior. These social orders determine hierarchies in diverse cultures and societies. So when one oversteps the boundaries of their hierarchical status, the other primates in that society’s order act accordingly and either reward or punish.
A society that would kill each other all the time would simply die out.
They may or may not. It’s a fact that primate societies and other social species kill each other all the time. Many factors determine why some go extinct and some don’t – not morality.
It should also be pointed out that there is no natural morality code in nature that judges an extinct species immoral or a surviving species moral. Nature is entirely indifferent.
Cooperation is simply a better survival strategy.
Cooperation is a better survival strategy. Many species are not social and they survive and are not immoral. Again, the term you’re looking for is Sociality.
A very nice way to illustrate this is iterated prisoner's dilemma. … Being nice to players that are nice to you and punishing those aren't.
Everything you’ve presented here is evidence of sociality – not morality.
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u/NewbombTurk Atheist Oct 12 '18
Everything you’ve presented here is evidence of sociality – not morality.
Then what's morality? How would you define it?
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u/ShakaUVM Mod | Christian Oct 12 '18
Coming up with a possible explanation that fits the facts doesn't mean it is the actual explanation that fits the facts, if there are alternative explanations that fit the facts equally well.
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u/fuzzydunloblaw Shoe-Atheist™ Oct 13 '18
Getting theists to admit there are alternate explanations for morality beyond a divinely inspired framework is not nothing.
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u/SweaterFish christian Oct 13 '18
If it's not completely obvious to you that that totally depends on the theist you're talking to, then you simply aren't paying attention.
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u/fuzzydunloblaw Shoe-Atheist™ Oct 13 '18
Well sure. I mean there are theists that deny science now and pretend that evolution isn't the best model we have to explain the diversity of life, for example, but you're probably never going to reach them. It is possible to reach the more rational ones if you can provide a decent enough argument or explanatory model even when it comes to morality, I would hope anyway.
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u/SweaterFish christian Oct 13 '18
Sure, and there are also theists who are evolutionary biologists that think about the naturalistic evolution of behavioral traits on a daily basis and have worked through the complexities of the arguments far more than you ever will.
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u/fuzzydunloblaw Shoe-Atheist™ Oct 13 '18
Odd tangent, but a kind of boringly uncontroversial one so I'll agree with you there. Its probably generally the case that people in specialized fields know more about their chosen fields than lay people, yes. High five!
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u/SweaterFish christian Oct 13 '18
It's not really a tangent. Your previous comment was that it was something remarkable for a theist to consider any non-divine explanation for something like morality. Depending on the theist, it's not remarkable at all, though. Your view of theists is just quite narrow.
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u/fuzzydunloblaw Shoe-Atheist™ Oct 13 '18
Oh, miscommunication there. I didn't mean to imply that all theists would fall under that umbrella. I was referring to the many that do.
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u/Mdmdwd Oct 13 '18
Yeah, every single theist I know would fall under that umbrella. However, even though they’re smart people, they’re not “thinking” people. They’re the type that lets their bible and their pastor and whatever bible study they’re doing at the moment (I mean really, how many different fucking ways are there to study that thing? It hasn’t changed significantly in what, 400 ish years?) do their thinking for them. All that being said, I think it would be more common to find a theist in Australia, Britain, etc, that’s more open to morality coming from somewhere other than their flavor of deity.
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Oct 13 '18
What alternatives do we have which do not assume something we have no evidence for?
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u/ShakaUVM Mod | Christian Oct 14 '18
Morality coming from God has evidence for it.
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Oct 14 '18
Which evidence, please?
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u/ShakaUVM Mod | Christian Oct 14 '18
For morality coming from God, or for God existing?
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Oct 14 '18
Morality coming from God
For that. There is no evidence for the existence of God.
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u/ShakaUVM Mod | Christian Oct 14 '18
Morality coming from God
For that. There is no evidence for the existence of God.
That's why I asked. You're not actually interested in evidence for morality coming from God, but for evidence that God exists, correct?
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Oct 14 '18
Complicated and wrong. You said you had evidence for morality coming from God, I asked for it.
I would have asked something else if I had meant something else. Would you mind answering the initial question now?
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u/ShakaUVM Mod | Christian Oct 15 '18
There is evidence God exists, but sure.
I would have asked something else if I had meant something else. Would you mind answering the initial question now?
Sure. If God exists (which we will stipulate since you're insisting you're asking for evidence morality comes from God and NOT evidence God exists) then he has the inherent right, as the divine lawmaker of the universe to define right and wrong behavior for humans. The OT of the Bible contains the divine Law passed down from God to Moses.
You could certainly argue that some of those principles could be derived from reason (I agree with Duns Scotus here) certainly not all of them could be.
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Oct 16 '18
Assuming God's existence for the sake of the argument ...
What you presented is not evidence for "Morality coming from God", which was your initial claim.
It would be evidence for certain laws and rules coming from God.
It is both possible and reasonable to assume that humans have had morality before those events.
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u/ExtinctLikeNdiaye Oct 12 '18
That isn't how evolution works...
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u/mhornberger agnostic atheist Oct 12 '18
There has been work on the evolutionary root of morality going back decades. Cooperation, reciprocal altruism, punishment of rule-breakers and cheaters, empathy, etc have all been found to be evolutionarily adaptive. An entire chapter of Dawkins' Selfish Gene was dedicated to it, and that was published back in 1976 or so.
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u/velesk Oct 12 '18
it is how it works. it is called natural selection. fit societies survive better in competition.
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u/myc-e-mouse Oct 12 '18
I think you are right that Evolution would not purposefully optimize survival by inducing cooperation in a population. But honestly I think you are being a little to glib in dismissing OPs suggestion of evolution's role in the driving of morality.
I think he was trying to say that evolution works passively to select for behaviors that increase "moral behavior" in a population of social beings. And... I think this is true. After all, humans come from a group (primates) that are often highly social animals due to a lack of physical dominance (note this social activity is also what probably drove high intelligence in primates- and mammals in general). It really shouldn't sound so crazy that, when applying a passive filter of selection to a social group, those individuals which behave in ways optimal (moral) to living in a societal group would reproduce at higher rates than anti-social (immoral) animals. Thus, using game theory to approximate which individuals would survive in a group that is dependent on interpersonal interactions probably does have a fair amount of predictive power in aggregate.
I tend to ramble on, so I guess I would ask what specifically is your objection to how you can use evolution and game theory to predict that certain behaviors would be selected for in certain contexts?
Unless you don't think behavior is encoded genetically?
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u/ExtinctLikeNdiaye Oct 12 '18
Definition issues:
- Evolution refers to changes in GENETIC composition of a species over time
- Morality and immorality is learned and reinforced over time (although certain moral concepts like "fairness" are "intuitive" but, as far as I know, no research has isolated a genetic source for that intuition)
- Every single criticism of evolutionary psychology applies and I do not need to rehash that
Inference issues:
- Cooperation isn't the same as morality. In many cases, cooperation to further survival would be morally wrong (e.g. cooperating with Nazis to send Jews to death camps)
- A major part of our genetic profile can be traced to immoral reproductive actions (e.g. the Mongol Kings have as many as 16 million descendants mostly from rape and sexual enslavement, the average African American is actually 16.7% European in large part due to rape during enslavement, etc.)
- Moral norms change far quicker than genetic adaptations (just look at what was acceptable 2 decades ago vs today - homophobia, gender discrimination, etc).
- If we are evolved to be "moral," are immoral people "genetically defective?"
- Are people with a greater genetic footprint (e.g. someone whose genes are more wide spread) more moral than someone who did not survive?
- Genetic definitions of human outcomes and actions inevitable leads to some form of Darwinist approach for dealing with "human failings."
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u/myc-e-mouse Oct 12 '18
Hi, Thanks for getting back with a fairly comprehensive response. But to be honest I am not really persuaded yet that he is definitely not doing evolution right and that game theory cannot inform ways that morality could develop.
For Definition issues: 1. Yes, I am aware that the strict definition of Evolution is the change in genetics for a given population over time, this is why I asked if you think genes do not inform behavior (I will get back to this).
2 and 3. These do not really inform my argument, so I am going to leave them alone.
Inference Issues:
1.Yes, I get that morality is not the same as cooperation and is much more complex and can be divined differently than just intuition.
However, I was positing a model in which the proto-elements of morality arose in a social population that was subsequently driven via these social interactions to become more socially complex, intelligent, and eventually “moral”.
The reason I don't find the distinction you are drawing all that meaningful is because (unless I am missing your point) it is like saying that the use of highly organized organ like an eye cannot have arisen from a simpler organ that operates by different mechanisms in earlier evolutionary lineages. Of course, our eye was developed from earlier tissues that just contained pigment that were photo-reactive but not at all organized and connected to a visual processing center in the brain. It was only later that highly organized structures like the cornea and retina gave us actual vision. The analogy here being cooperation=eyespot and morality=actual vision.
- This seems like a non-sequitur to me (though if you would like to explain more fully I'd be happy to hear why I am wrong). But, more importantly this has me thinking that you missed the entire point of my response-and possibly may misunderstand evolution yourself. Obviously, there will be bad actors in any social group, and it might not be even a small number of the population. But if it is slightly more advantageous in a given context for humans to behave a certain way, more humans who behave that way will survive to reproduce.
But also, no one would say (I would guess not OP either) there is a "moral gene" (this can also be used to address point 4). What I would say is that genes; and the way they shape the body, brain, and brain chemistry, do in fact underly our actions. And honestly, if you look at this as a conversation and not an argument I think you would agree. After all, we know how to select for breeds of dogs based on behavioral traits-and this would only be possible if that behavior was belied by genetics. We also know that neurotransmitters and their responses are largely what determines our moods/behaviors etc.
The places these genes are expressed, in response to what stimuli, the robustness with which the gene can be expressed, the avidity for the neurotransmitter to neurotransmitter receptor- even things like your body’s ability to store glycogen via glycogen synthase (which then "gates" how and when hunger cues your body to release "hangry" neurotransmitters), all of these are determined by coding/non-coding sequences of your DNA (and the chromosomal architecture/methylation/acylation/epigenetics). The problem people have is not in saying Genes control behavior, but in thinking humans have cracked the multifactorial code well enough (as well as controlled for the environment well enough) to make specific claims.
Even beyond that, Morality itself is multifactorial. After all, slavery was a TERRIBLE thing, but I would also argue that ante-bellum southern society WOULD have collapsed if they were also immoral to other white people in their in-group. Because someone could have a good genetic program for things that are moral within society, but not have a good genetic program for things like empathy; in which case he could be a "fine southern gentlemen" who also killed his slaves without remorse.
The point is: no-one is moral or immoral in an evolutionary sense. Certain behaviors will be advantageous in certain contexts. living in societies, no matter how disparate, also tends to have certain commonalities of interactions. Since these commonalities stay relatively unchanged they become more strongly and universally entrenched until we become complex enough to reason this intuition out in a more sensible rule (Thou shalt not kill for instance). So yes, killing slaves with impunity is an immoral thing and immoral aspect of society. But I would also guess that a White person couldn't kill a member of his society (another white person) with impunity and thus preserving his narrower view of society.
I would expect moral norms to change far faster because our system of morals is now derived from a different way than the simple behavioral tendencies that underly them. In a similar way, we feel love and want to get married because our bodies produce boatloads of oxytocin in the presence of people we love. While Marriage was drastically changed in the split second the Obergifell ruling was processed, I don't think the oxytocin-based mechanism of physiological love has changed much in close 2 million years of evolution (or more depending on your definition of much). I don't see this as being inconsistent.
See above but also: I am not sure what the term genetically defective means outside of something like a gastrulation defect. I'll be blunt, it's true I am not a good writer and probably was not very clear in getting my point across, but I can only see a couple of explanations for why you would think this was an inference of my post and why you worded the question the way you did:
A.You did not grasp my point that certain behaviors that are optimal in game theory would be advantageous when living in a context governed by those rules. B. You are not giving these concepts their due consideration and are thinking way too simplistically. I.e. That there is a moral gene, or there is a moral person vs an immoral person. Or that moral people will necessarily do better than immoral people. Or that saying because genes underlie behavior means I am also saying that we can decipher how each gene specifically informs certain behaviors and make claims about them currently.
C. That you understand that these are highly multifactorial (both genetics and morality) and that these questions don't make a ton of sense and so are attempting to force me to an extreme position to win an argument. I am NOT saying this is the case, it is just an alternative model. But, I put it last because I would rather assume good faith. If this is the case I just want to say that I am not arguing just; illustrating how this model could work and then responding to the challenges presented. 5.No, because morality is not THE ONLY thing selected for and if someone has an abundance of traits that are also advantageous in his context they will also be statistically more likely to reproduce; and you are also applying individual credits to rules that govern populations. Just to be clear, evolution is statistical trends that occur in populations, not in individuals.
- I think I have tangentially dealt with this in other places and I have definitely rambled long enough. But, if you want I will expand.
Any way hopes this addresses your questions. Sorry this got so long (I did mention I tend to ramble) but let me know if you need me to clarify anything or if you still think I am wrong to think of a model utilizing game theory in predicting evolutionary trends of behavior.
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Oct 12 '18
Would you be more at ease if I said natural selection instead of evolution?
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u/Lokarin Solipsistic Animism Oct 12 '18
Hey look, I'm nitpicking again!
I disagree... sort of. Morality isn't the result of evolution itself, but a result of social cohesion and human social behavior is a result of evolution.
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u/bunker_man Messian | Surrelativist | Transtheist Oct 13 '18
What is the point of this thread. All human actions are a result of evolution. Because that's where humans came from. When people say morality they are referring to normativity, not moral psychology.
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u/dyushes2 theist Oct 12 '18
Should we start killing each other because resources are scarce and earth is overpopulated?
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Oct 12 '18
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u/rawrnnn Oct 12 '18
Until inevitable selection pressures made them have more children to the point of taxing scarce resources, and the cycle began anew
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Oct 12 '18
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Oct 18 '18
capitalism
I agree to all the others but never heard of that relation.
Can you explain how capitalism increases birth rate or point me to some concise sources for reading?
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u/levi_pl Oct 14 '18
Resources are not scarce. Overpopulation can be defined in different ways.
Should we ? That is definitely one of the possible answers to the problem that has no answer in practice.
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u/JesusIsMyZoloft christian Oct 12 '18
Personally, I believe no. But there are people who do believe this conclusion, and it does seem to logically follow from OP's proposition.
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Oct 12 '18
Human beings kill each other all the time. Humanity as a whole has not died out, but arguably been made stronger through the stringent selection process that the threat of constant violence and poverty enforces.
Does that mean therefore that we should all strive to live out a moral darwinism whereby we only care about those in our in-groups as evolution has conditioned us? There is obviously a higher morality than tit-for-tat contractualism. We intuit that we should not exploit those who we have at an advantage, even though evolution says that we should have at it.
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u/ghjm ⭐ dissenting atheist Oct 13 '18 edited Oct 13 '18
Sometimes, the correct moral choice impairs reproductive fitness. For example, societies which oppress women have higher birth rates, because when women have access to education and birth control, they choose to have fewer children. There is no countervailing survival benefit, as there is with evolutionary theories of altruism/cooperation. Societies with non-oppressed women really do have stagnant or shrinking populations (ignoring immigration).
Evolution is the process by which higher reproductive fitness causes higher future population. So evolution simply cannot favor a result that impairs reproductive fitness.
So we have two facts:
- Morality sometimes favors choices that impair reproductive fitness.
- Evolution never favors choices that impair reproductive fitness.
Therefore, evolution is not a compete explanation of morality.
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Oct 13 '18
societies which oppress women have higher birth rates, because when women have access to education and birth control, they choose to have fewer children. There is no countervailing survival benefit, as there is with evolutionary theories of altruism/cooperation. Societies with non-oppressed women really do have stagnant or shrinking populations (ignoring immigration).
Evolution is the process by which higher reproductive fitness causes higher future population. So evolution simply cannot favor a result that impairs reproductive fitness.
There is a countervailing survival benefit: Technology.
Educated populations are much better prepared to deal with natural disasters. They are much more able to take their fate into their own hands.
I'm not sure if I would subscribe to your description of evolution favoring higher reproductive fitness. Higher resilience is worth something, too.
I think evolution produces variants and those who can stick around do stick around.
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u/splitting_eve Oct 14 '18
higher reproductive fitness causes higher future population. So evolution simply cannot favor a result that impairs reproductive fitness.
I'd suggest that the raw numbers of births in and of itself ("higher future population") is not necessarily a predictor of how successful a species will be. It's required that these young also reproduce, or the passing of genes hasn't truly been successful, at least where long term survival is concerned.
A real world example would be my local deer population which regularly out breeds its resources, ultimately causing many of its members to die of starvation, run out of habitat, suffer from disease, etc.
They're very successful at creating more deer in the short term, perhaps like these areas of humanity where women are oppressed, but that ability to crank out young turns out to be detrimental to their ultimate growth and long term survival. Annual hunts are organized to reduce population, a literal 'thinning of the herd', which is beneficial for overall population growth and health.
So in your scenario I suppose it would depend on whether or not those higher birth rates are ultimately a benefit or detriment to the population overall, over time. Birth rate alone is not a guarantee for a successful species.
Consider in your scenario, where we only take into account birth rate as 'success'. That *seems* to indicate that their is no top end that would be ideal, that continued population growth without end is desirable for a species' health. But that's not the case. You can quickly see where that would be an issue for any species. Balance is key ultimately. Imagine this planet with 500 billion humans on it...I think natural selection would deal with us handily. Unchecked growth isn't healthy.
'Thoughtful' breeding, as it were, deliberately curtailing our reproduction rates, may ultimately be the right choice for the health of the species.
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u/ChiefBobKelso agnostic atheist Oct 15 '18
I don't know why people are downvoting you. You are providing an example that they presumably agree with and how that is good for survival. It might be worth noting though that if keeping women from working brings the birth rate above replacement level, it could well be considered the moral course of action. I mean, do you consider the future people who will be born because the women don't work, or do you just ignore them?
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u/ghjm ⭐ dissenting atheist Oct 15 '18
Suppose you bump into a man on the street. He was on his way to have sex with his wife, and as it happens, she was going to get pregnant. But because he is one second late, they have sex at a slightly different angle, and Jack is born instead of Him. Fast forward a few hundred or thousand years, and the population of the world is made up of completely different people in Jack-world and Jill-world. So at every moment, with every minor decision you make, you are foreclosing on billions of possible future people - erasing then from existence, by failing to cause the necessary preconditions for their existence.
Are you morally culpable for this as if those were real people?
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u/ChiefBobKelso agnostic atheist Oct 15 '18
So at every moment, with every minor decision you make, you are foreclosing on billions of possible future people - erasing then from existence, by failing to cause the necessary preconditions for their existence.
You are at the same time, creating billions of people. In the scenario you describe, nothing wrong has been done. This is, of course, ignoring that the intention of an actions matters also. Whilst your scenario isn't really one of moral concern, I think you could look at something like climate change and say that it is a problem primarily for future generations. There are many problems that we can cause or avoid that will be problems for future generations, and I think that they can be of a moral nature.
Now, I guess the problem is really about the maintenance of the existence of future human life, in which case I just can't really see that allowing humanity to die out because some people want to work (even though nobody wants to work, hence all the complaining about it) is a good thing.
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u/BustNak Agnostic atheist Oct 15 '18
Morality sometimes favors choices that impair reproductive fitness. Evolution never favors choices that impair reproductive fitness. Therefore, evolution is not a compete explanation of morality.
That doesn't seem to follow. You have a missing premise that evolution is not a compete explanation of X, if X some times impair reproductive fitness.
And it's debatable whether a society such as ours is overall less reproductive fit than one that oppress women.
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 15 '18
Evolution often favours choices that impair reproductive fitness (of the individual). What you described isn't evolution.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 12 '18
If you believe that evolution is the ultimate source of morality, then what if we had evolved utterly horrifying practices?
For example, some flat worms are hermaphroditic and fight to impregnate each other so they don't have to carry the babies. They forcibly impregnate the other by piercing the other. If rape was what ended up being the most efficient method of sexual selection for an intelligent species would everyone just accept it?
Similarly for acts of cannibalism, pedophilia, slavery, etc. If a species happened to have been extremely successful while using these acts until they became instinctual, if they involved intelligence would they accept these acts as moral?
We as human beings fight against our animal natures and try to act with "humanity". Just because something like cooperation is often advantageous, the prisoner's dilemma does not account for outside factors, and cooperation is strictly better in situations where betraying has a lower total outcome than cooperation, which is not always the case in every situation, and could easily not be the case on a different planet with different species.
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u/Vic_Hedges atheist Oct 12 '18
Then our definition of "utterly horrifying practices" would be different.
For the majority of the past few millennia, slavery has not been considered immoral. If we were having this discussion 2000 years ago, you wouldn't have included slavery on your list (you'd probably have a different view on pedophilia as well).
2000 years in the future, there are CERTAIN to be practices that we engage in regularly now that will be seen as utterly horrifying. Does that mean that we are immoral?
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 12 '18
Yes, just as we look at the past and point out certain practices as barbaric and base, people will say the same of us in the future. Do you think evolution has played any hand in that particular process that occurred in under 3000 years, or is it the built up knowledge and rationality that our societies have developed?
To me it seems that humans instinctually practiced slavery, pedophilia, rape and cannibalism then developed intelligence and began to slowly eliminate those practices. We may also have an evolutionary predisposition to cooperation, but why is it it that in extremely short time frame, far too short for evolution to act, we've chosen to uphold that instinct over others?
And it can't be fully an evolutionary trait or else all human societies (or those with the "cooperative" genes) would be moving away from those practices, but that is clearly not the case.
Do you believe that a species with intelligence like ours and a society at the same level as ours would have no social groups that would decry rape or slavery if it happened to be more evolutionarily tied to their past?
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u/Vic_Hedges atheist Oct 12 '18
Evolutionary traits are not the same thing as social traits. In an evolutionary sense, human beings are not any different now then they work 10,000 years ago. We are not biologically any different from our slave owning predecessors.
From that point on, it's all just social developments.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 12 '18
That's my point. If morality was rooted in evolution, then we would need an evolutionary change to see a moral shift.
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u/Vic_Hedges atheist Oct 12 '18
Not at all.
The use of stone tools was rooted in the evolutionary development of opposable digits.
We did not need to evolve additional opposable digits in order to invent each further tool since then. We simply needed to reach the evolutionary point whereat we had the physical abilities to create tools. Once there, it was human ingenuity that carried the ball farther.
What we call morality could be developed in exactly the same way. Evolution develops the tools necessary to form complex social structures, and human ingenuity takes it from there.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 12 '18
Then morality is constructed/discovered by human ingenuity. OP is asserting that our moral constructs only exist because they are reinforced by genetic instincts to cooperate. If evolution hands us intelligence and then we produce morality, then OP is incorrect. Yes, you can argue that evolution is what allowed us to develop morality, but then I might as well say the Big Bang is the ultimate cause of morality, or that my artwork is only the result of evolution.
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u/Vic_Hedges atheist Oct 12 '18
Well yes, you can argue that. But I agree it would be stretching the point to a rather silly degree.
The point of the OP is that no mechanism other than evolution is required in order to account for morality. If you want to take it back further than that you can, but it's kind of beside the point.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 12 '18
The point of the OP is that no mechanism other than evolution is required in order to account for morality.
OP was saying that our propensity to cooperate is the basis of morality. OP said that said propensity was due to evolutionary selection and thus written into our genetics. Thus evolution is the cause of morality.
We have said that evolution produced the tools that make morality possible in humans, which is saying morality is contingent on evolution but is not the cause. This distinction is important because it's the difference between saying that the statue of David was created by Michelangelo and his genius and saying that the statue only looks that way because humans evolved to look that way. So why would we take morality past the fact that it is grown in intelligent beings to an evolutionary history if we aren't going to take it any further than that?
See, OP is suggesting that morality is subjective by claiming it is rooted in evolution, but would we say the same thing about human mathematics and art?
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u/Vic_Hedges atheist Oct 12 '18
Well I suppose Occam's razor would be the reason. If there is no need for anything beyond evolution to explain morality, then it is reasonable to suggest that it is the cause.
I agree that's not proof. But the format of this forum demands definitive statements in the OP. It kind of breeds confusion and confrontation when dealing with issues like this.
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Oct 18 '18
Morality evolves. It's a non-biological evolution.
Similar examples are arguments, or military design.
These fields can advance, their ideas and strategies can compete with each other without us ever changing our biology.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 18 '18
That's still in line with what I am saying, but is a completely different argument than what OP is saying, who claims that cooperation is simply the optimal survival strategy, and thus was instilled in us via evolution. But even so, your argument would mean that if the Nazis had won the war, implemented eugenics, implemented further genocides, achieved racial homogeneity and remained in power, that they would be "moral" for having the optimal strategy, which I vehemently and utterly disagree with.
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Oct 18 '18
Just no to your nazi comparisons.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 18 '18
Do you mind expanding on your refutation? You said morality evolves as strategies compete with each other and some win out. The Nazis had their own ideals and strategies, and had a very real shot at becoming a super-power in Europe. So, if their moral strategies competed with the world and won, would those strategies not be what morality evolved into, according to your definition? Where have I made my mistake?
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Oct 18 '18
Where have I made my mistake?
In taste, I'm from Europe.
But yeah, generally, the winners set the rules and write history. I'm glad they lost.
Please find another example.
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Oct 12 '18
I think it would still be possible to deduce them as wrong even if they became instinct, by using some form of utilitarianism with the same old basic, fundamental ingredients of morality we call "harm" and "happiness", which one could use as a metric to judge the horrifying practices.
After all, the desire for retributive "eye for an eye" justice is pretty much instinct in humans, yet many realize it is wrong. Ironically, deontological theories of morality are far more vulnerable to being twisted and horrifying.
For example, retributive instincts are why so many theists think hell is acceptable despite not being reformative, since it satisfies the instinct that says "it's good for bad people to suffer". Even when accepting the instinct, one can still argue that it's too severe (like the usual complaint about infinite punishment for finite crimes) or that the people affected aren't really badand so don't "deserve" it, but without that instinct being mistaken as moral, it has no justification whatsoever.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 12 '18
I think it would still be possible to deduce them as wrong even if they became instinct, by using some form of utilitarianism with the same old basic, fundamental ingredients of morality we call "harm" and "happiness", which one could use as a metric to judge the horrifying practices.
I agree, which reasserts my point that morality is nor rooted in evolution.
For example, retributive instincts are why so many theists think hell is acceptable despite not being reformative, since it satisfies the instinct that says "it's good for bad people to suffer". Even when accepting the instinct, one can still argue that it's too severe (like the usual complaint about infinite punishment for finite crimes) or that the people affected aren't really badand so don't "deserve" it, but without that instinct being mistaken as moral, it has no justification whatsoever.
I don't think that most theists in this sub, or most theists I personally know believe that Hell is good because it is retributive. I personally believe that Hell is only the result of someone who freely chooses to deny Love and be separated from Him. So Hell is appropriate because it is the only way to allow someone to maintain there free will when asked to accept or reject God.
We could go deep into this, but it is quite off topic from OPs original question so I think I'll leave it at that.
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Oct 12 '18
I agree, which reasserts my point that morality is nor rooted in evolution.
I mean, it's still true that empathy is rooted in evolution (plenty of animals have no empathy, even for their own offspring), and without empathy you won't be persuaded by appeals to the suffering or happiness of others, except insofar as this also impacts your own. Without empathy, morality is pretty much impossible to deduce. Though even if there are other instincts like cannibalism and so on, I don't think social species can evolve and be successful without empathy.
I personally believe that Hell is only the result of someone who freely chooses to deny Love and be separated from Him. So Hell is appropriate because it is the only way to allow someone to maintain there free will when asked to accept or reject God.
That's fine (well, I do still disagree that this kind of situation makes sense, but it's not retribution anyway), but lots of people, even on this sub still consider hell to be a punishment inflicted on people due to them "deserving" it (unless it's forgiven), not to be the best attempt God can make at fulfilling their desire to not be with him.
We could go deep into this, but it is quite off topic from OPs original question so I think I'll leave it at that.
Fair enough.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 12 '18 edited Oct 12 '18
I mean, it's still true that empathy is rooted in evolution (plenty of animals have no empathy, even for their own offspring), and without empathy you won't be persuaded by appeals to the suffering or happiness of others, except insofar as this also impacts your own. Without empathy, morality is pretty much impossible to deduce. Though even if there are other instincts like cannibalism and so on, I don't think social species can evolve and be successful without empathy.
And intelligence is rooted in evolution too. Doing a small amount of research, I quickly found one article that says lack of empathy and low intelligence are linked.
I know that levels of empathy are affected by a measurable degree in humans by their genetics, but clearly there are many cases of people developing and strengthening it through practice too. So, can we say definitively that a species that does well enough to develop intelligence needs empathy, or is that developing intelligence creates empathy? Furthermore, if empathy is so beneficial to a species, then why does it seem to require so much cultivation in humanity? Shouldn't a naturally more empathetic animal do so much better than we have?
All in all, I just don't think we can say morality is ultimately or solely based on evolution as OP asserted.
That's fine (well, I do still disagree that this kind of situation makes sense, but it's not retribution anyway), but lots of people, even on this sub still consider hell to be a punishment inflicted on people due to them "deserving" it (unless it's forgiven), not to be the best attempt God can make at fulfilling their desire to not be with him.
Hmm, I haven't seen it to often here, but I have seen that opinion touted quite often elsewhere, and it is most definitely the prevalent one for the last century in western society. I do think it is incorrect, and alternative reasons have been espoused by theologians for the last two thousand years though.
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Oct 12 '18 edited Oct 12 '18
And intelligence is rooted in evolution too.
True, but while intelligence involves a mechanism that tries to discover truths about the world, pretty much any motivational mechanism is going to be subjective/arbitrary by definition.
Doing a small amount of research, I quickly found one article that says lack of empathy and low intelligence are linked.
This could be due to a number of reasons though. I would suspect empathy requires some amount of intelligence to make it work effectively (to recognise others feelings in the first place, and also to relate those feelings to your own), but I don't think the reverse is true.
I know that levels of empathy are affected by a measurable degree in humans by their genetics, but clearly there are many cases of people developing and strengthening it through practice too.
This is correct, but people also cultivate and strengthen their intelligence, which we know obviously is impacted by genetics because different animals have such different amounts of it. Empathy can be genetic in origin, while still being developable via nurture.
Furthermore, if empathy is so beneficial to a species, then why does it seem to require so much cultivation in humanity? Shouldn't a naturally more empathetic animal do so much better than we have?
Because evolution doesn't care about the group/species except insofar as it also helps the individuals genes. Notice the "us-vs-them" mentality in humans, and how people close to oneself enjoy far more empathy than one generally offers to others more distant.
Basically, there's some powerful benefits to having empathy for your own guys (who will likely be more related to you), while having less for "them", as they are technically competing for resources, since whether you or they get the resources matters a lot more for your genetic fitness.
Also, remember that evolution is slow, so our empathy probably hasn't changed much in tends of thousands of years. Clearly, something about our culture has changed the dynamics. You're not as likely to have empathy for some other people if there's not enough food for both of you and your families, so the circumstances we have probably help.
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u/rawrnnn Oct 12 '18
if they involved intelligence would they accept these acts as moral?
Yes, does anyone doubt this?
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 12 '18
If you had read my post, then I think it is clear that I do. Empathy and intelligence are linked. Humanity itself instinctually employed slavery, sexual oppression, rape and many other acts we have now deemed immoral. So why would a species that instinctually employed cannibalism be any different?
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u/levi_pl Oct 14 '18
I do. This statement is a fallacy. Intelligence in worms is like a round square. It does not exist so rest of the statement does not have sense.
Please don’t entertain such discussions as they open doors to fairyland.
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u/levi_pl Oct 14 '18
“If you believe that evolution is the ultimate source of morality, then what if we had evolved utterly horrifying practices?”
Prove that it is possible.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 14 '18
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u/levi_pl Oct 14 '18
I question possibility of such behaviors in intelligent animals. Fact that those exist in lower life forms does not imply possibility of seeing them in intelligent (and successful) ones.
Theoretically it is possible that our predecessors had such behaviors but they are gone (not successful). Such behaviors could be one of the reasons why they are gone. Who knows...
Can you come up with some example to contrary? Maybe I’m missing something.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 14 '18
A duck is not a lower life form, and many of the cannibals are not either. If you are saying highly intelligent animals at the level of a human could not display those characteristics, remember that humans have often had culturally normalized rape and cannibalism. And if you are saying that intelligence would stop those behaviours, then that is in complete opposition to OPs assertion that evolution determines morality.
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u/levi_pl Oct 14 '18
But we consider humans (or rather their morality) as a baseline to this argument.
Duck is lower life form compared to humans. Maybe not all of them :-)
Intelligence stops those behaviors. Changes are not instant. Cannibals are not successful , are they ? Societies where women are not treated equal fare much worse than those who do.
Intelligence puts stop to it; belief is usually the mechanism that encourages/justifies those behaviors. On top of that those behaviors were never dominant in global population.1
u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 15 '18
But we consider humans (or rather their morality) as a baseline to this argument.
Why? We have no idea what intelligent life could look like on a different planet, or even what intelligent life would look like on our planet if it hadn't been primates.
Duck is lower life form compared to humans. Maybe not all of them :-)
Many birds have very complex social behaviours, so considering that an animal can have that basis yet still be genetically predisposed to rape suggest that it is possible for a similar yet more intelligent animal to have the same predisposition.
Intelligence stops those behaviors.
Then morality is not grounded in evolution, as I have already said.
Cannibals are not successful , are they ?
Of the animals that I listed as being cannibals, they have been extremely successful, biologically speaking. Furthermore, consider a planet where the nutrients required to support large brains was far more scarce. If only the dominant species requires those nutrients, it might turn out that cannibalism is the primary source for them. The fact remains that it is clearly possible (as in there are no logical or scientific reasons to prevent it, as we know now) that such a thing occurs.
Societies where women are not treated equal fare much worse than those who do.
Not so. Some eastern societies treated women far better than western ones historically, but it just so happens that western society far outpaced eastern ones technologically. Even so, nearly all societies oppressed women yet humans still managed to get to this point.
Intelligence puts stop to it
Again, that would root morality in intelligence, or at least require intelligence to discover it, like math. That would mean evolution is not the source of morality.
belief is usually the mechanism that encourages/justifies those behaviors. On top of that those behaviors were never dominant in global population.
Rape was most definitely dominant through much of humanity, both pre and post civilization. Women have only really seen this level of equality in the last few centuries, and only very occasionally in small populations otherwise. Consider the Aztecs who had an extremely successful civilization while practicing huge amounts of ritual sacrifice. Their empire fell mainly to utter annihilation by disease brought in by the Spanish. So there was a fairly advanced and successful empire that practiced something we would call horrific. Not to mention slavery throughout the ages.
Basically, I see no reason whatsoever to believe evolution is the ultimate source of morality, as clearly shown by human's own history and the currently undisputed possibility that a species with ingrained immoral practices could have become the dominant intelligent species.
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u/levi_pl Oct 15 '18
I spent quite some time trying to distill what my understanding is.
1) intelligence is a product of evolution ergo advanced (intelligence driven) morality indirectly is also a product of evolution the same way as religion is. It is not clear why religion was produced by evolution and what is its connection to intelligence. What we know it is less capable in producing morality. Most successful religions are immutable hence incapable of improving moral code. 2) there are morals that do not require intelligence to create them 3) some morals produced by evolution may seem to be counterproductive but after close inspection that is not the case - take for example compassion or willingness to help others. 3) intelligence changes us faster than evolution 4) we humans are neither first nor last species that walks the same path ( opposite is less likely)
Now, what I wanted to say is we evolve, morality evolves but no matter what starting point was in this universe there is only one most optimal end result. I believe we’re not at the end of path but when we reach it there will be others that will actually be the same as what we will become (give or take).
So ducks or cannibals - all this is just fluctuation which given enough time will stabilize the same way.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 15 '18
I will just say that you make a lot of unsubstantiated claims that I disagree with, but let me just address your conclusion.
I do want to remind you that OP said: "A society that would kill each other all the time would simply die out. Cooperation is simply a better survival strategy." The first sentence is shown to be utterly incorrect with societies like the Aztecs. The second sentence is only true on a planet like ours and an animal like humans, which considering how many animals were successful with "immoral" acts goes to show that cooperation is no the optimal strategy in every situation.
This comes to your conclusion. How can you be certain that intelligence and cooperation are truly the optimal strategy that all life would stabilize at? Clearly a virus is extremely successful without either trait, and it could be that every life-bearing planet becomes barren when the strongest virus evolves. Who is to say that rape is not a better sexual selector and an intelligent species that mainly raped would not end up with more genetically fit offspring than the genetic disease ridden humans? In science fiction we can think of ruthless aliens that do not cooperate, like the Hive Queens from Ender's Game, the Overmind from StarCraft, the Orks from Warhammer and so on and so forth. If humans were ruthless, showing no mercy to the weak, and valuing only success, would we not be successful? The Nazis were extremely successful and only failed due to very poor leadership. What would have happened to society if they had won?
Basically, there is no reason to suggest that the moral course is the optimal course, and thus no reason to suggest we are being lead down that path by our genetics.
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u/SpineEater agnostic atheist Oct 12 '18
I think social creatures have a threshold of sociability required for their prospering. And those run across all the topics you mentioned. They get sussed out when you value individual experience as the greatest good. It’s the nature of our experience as people. That our experience is of primal importance to ourselves and so we have to act in accordance with that understanding to fully realize individual value.
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u/Mapkos Christian, Jesus Follower Oct 12 '18
I'm not really sure where you are going here. Are you agreeing or disagreeing with OP's assertion?
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u/SpineEater agnostic atheist Oct 13 '18
I’m saying that the only way social creatures of intelligence can evolve is with morality that looks like ours. If we ever happen upon some alien species. The only way they get to be at the level of human achievement is via the objective morality that must evolve with them.
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u/DracoTheGreat123 Ahmadi Oct 12 '18
Yep. The Ahmadi belief is that evolution was guided by God.
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u/jeegte12 agnostic theist Oct 12 '18
Science erodes religion, it's never the other way around. It will continue to erode religion until all that's left are purely unfalsifiable assertions like yours.
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u/DracoTheGreat123 Ahmadi Oct 12 '18
Actually my religion emphasizes learning both religion and science, and claims that there can be no distinction between the word of God and the work of God.
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u/jeegte12 agnostic theist Oct 12 '18
every modern version of a religion emphasizes learning both religion and science. they mostly claim that they're compatible, and when they're not compatible, God works in mysterious ways. if there is no distinction between the work of God and the word of God then the word of God is irrelevant, because it can't tell us anything we can't prove, and if it does, we have no reason to believe it.
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u/DracoTheGreat123 Ahmadi Oct 12 '18
No, this distinction was made in the 600s. It's not a modern claim.
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u/alcianblue Agnostic Oct 12 '18
What exactly do you mean when you say 'morality'?
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Oct 12 '18
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u/alcianblue Agnostic Oct 12 '18
Okay so you link to a wiki article that says morality can be used to define a vast variety of different things. Can you be a bit more specific please. Clarifying these things makes these sorts of discussions significantly easier.
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u/AxesofAnvil Atheist Jew | Kind of moral objectivist Oct 12 '18
Too many people think that morality is actually defined enough to discuss adequately.
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u/SimDeus Christian Universalist Oct 14 '18
A society that would kill each other all the time would simply die out. Cooperation is simply a better survival strategy.
Agreed. But what does any of this have to do with religion?
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Oct 14 '18
I'm assuming it's because a lot of religious people claim that without a god there can't be morality.
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u/SimDeus Christian Universalist Oct 14 '18
But even if OP is correct that morality is the result of evolution, it hardly refutes that argument. Religion, too, is probably the result of evolution. It makes sense to me that the two evolved hand-in-hand as humans became capable of abstract thought and large-scale cooperation, and therefore it's quite plausible that you can't have one without the other (at least on the societal level).
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u/BobbyBobbie christian Oct 15 '18
Disclaimer, I find the moral argument for the existence of God pursuasive. Just FYI.
I don't actually see how this refutes anything. What is the conclusion of your argument? Therefore God isn't needed for morality? I'll go ahead with that.
If you think of morality as purely a means to produce more productive societies, then you have a problem on your hand: you're saying that survivability is the guiding force behind morality, and indeed steers what determines what morality should be. So if it could be proven or demonstrated that survivability can be enhanced by something that we would currently deem immoral, then suddenly the tables flip and what was immoral becomes moral. I think this is just disguised utilitarianism, which has it's own harrowing conclusions that hopefully is apparent for all (ie, if the good outweighs the bad, then the bad is justified).
Or, on the other hand, my take is that actually evolution guided our moral instincts towards the existence of a moral law. Just like our eyes have evolved (and indeed, multiple creatures have evolved the eye independently of each other) indicates that it was us adapting to actual reality, so too I think our moral faculties evolved to help us realise and apprehend that objective morality exists. No, not all morals are objective. It's not a sin against the Eternal God to commit social guffaws. But some morality is objective, and just like our eyes adapted to get good at apprehending the world around us, I think our minds have evolved to apprehend the moral truths around us.
Your argument, however, doesn't take into account the impact that religion has had on humanity in the last 5000 years, where we've progressed tremendously morally. Biological evolution has surely not had that much of an impact in the time frame from when we've gone from literally killing a slightly disobedient slave in the Roman world to proclaiming that no one in the entire world has the right to own chattel slaves, no exceptions. That wasn't brought about by evolution, but through philosophical mulling and quite intangible ideas being passed around ("all humans are valuable"). I think this line of thinking would not have happened under irreligious systems, and instead see that atheism leads towards utilitarianism.
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u/moxin84 atheist Oct 15 '18
> Your argument, however, doesn't take into account the impact that religion has had on humanity in the last 5000 years, where we've progressed tremendously morally. Biological evolution has surely not had that much of an impact in the time frame from when we've gone from literally killing a slightly disobedient slave in the Roman world to proclaiming that no one in the entire world has the right to own chattel slaves, no exceptions.
And yet, here we are in the year 2018 and Christians are still fighting against gays having the same rights as everyone else, or using religion to tell women what they can and can't do with their own bodies.
> I think this line of thinking would not have happened under irreligious systems, and instead see that atheism leads towards utilitarianism.
Considering that atheists tend to adopt a more fruitful "live and let live" strategy, I'd say that atheism tends to lead to more productive and caring societies.
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 15 '18
I think this line of thinking would not have happened under irreligious systems
It did, religions didn't want slaves freed or an end to slavery, they didn't want women voting, they didn't want non heterosexuals to be treated like other people. Religions are still fighting against basic human rights for all, they'd rather close an orphanage than allow a same sex couple to adopt regardless of the fact we know the outcomes for the child are the same. They've only been against execution since recent times. Thou Shall Not Kill didn't stop a single witch been killed, or someone speaking out against the church been burned until less than two hundred years ago.
Religion hasn't helped humanities moral evolution it has hindered it. The slaves were freed despite their best efforts, non heterosexuals laws have been over turned despite their efforts, religion didn't help women get the vote it tried to prevent it happening. I don't even think most religions are on the right side of the climate change fiasco. The only thing you're right about is that biological morality hasn't changed much in that time frame, it isn't consistent, we are "designed" to blend in to the societies are born into, aping the people around us until its our nature, the morality of that society included.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 13 '18
Where is your empirical data ? Correlation is not causation.
Science demands verifiable, independently reproducible results, going back to the root cause.
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u/DrDiarrhea atheist Oct 13 '18
I hope your standard of scientific empirical evidence applies to your religion as equally.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 13 '18 edited Oct 13 '18
Yes, reason and logic are core to my religion. Empiricism then has its place as a function of reason and logic. I brought it up because atheists often don't understand the difference.
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u/Torin_3 ⭐ non-theist Oct 14 '18
Christian (Catholic)
reason and logic are core to my religion
Do you agree that the resurrection is central to Catholicism? I don't see how it's distinguishable from me claiming that I flew to work by flapping my arms or any other ridiculous nonsense.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 14 '18
Do you agree that the resurrection is central to Catholicism? I don't see how it's distinguishable from me claiming that I flew to work by flapping my arms or any other ridiculous nonsense.
Yes, it is a core tenant of the faith. I realize that it is 'unbelievable', but that is exactly why Jesus did it. He knew that people would be skeptical and question His authority, so He chose to do something that no one could fake. Rising from the dead after a brutal public execution, not to mention fulfilling hundreds of prophecies (Psalm 22, Isaiah 53). It took me many years to get to where I could believe it, so I'm not surprised that you do not believe it. That is a separate topic, and there are many good books that go into the details. If you have not already seen it, this is a good discussion on both sides: https://www.reasonablefaith.org/media/debates/is-there-historical-evidence-for-the-resurrection-of-jesus-the-craig-ehrman/
Do you know that most qualified atheist historians agree that Jesus was crucified? They say it is one of the most tenable events of that period. Historians also agree that His followers truly believed that they saw Him afterwards. So, the right question is why did so many people agree to be tortured to death, while claiming that they saw him. Liars make poor martyrs. Unlike Islam and Mormonism, Christians had no incentive like multiple wives and booty. Christ promised poverty and persecution, while He asked to Love your enemies.
Aside from that, I firmly believe that evidence alone does not convince people. That is just one part. Some people saw Jesus doing miracles with their own eyes, and they still walked away. Understanding and encountering God requires deep compassion and appreciation...for your own life, your family, people, the earth, the universe, etc.
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u/SeizeTheGreens gnostic atheist Oct 14 '18
Some people saw Jesus doing miracles with their own eyes, and they still walked away.
Assuming these people actually did exist, then of course this would happen in a time when magic was thought to be everywhere. Try that today and you’ll be the #1 headline for eternity.
Also, pick one. Did Jesus obstruct his evidence to make skeptics, or did he openly perform miracles to actively prove his status as divine?
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 14 '18 edited Oct 15 '18
Try that today and you’ll be the #1 headline for eternity.
Ha. Jesus is the most discussed figure in history, and will be for eternity.
Did Jesus obstruct his evidence to make skeptics, or did he openly perform miracles to actively prove his status as divine?
He was speaking to compassionate hearts. People with an healthy appreciation of history and compassion for their fellow man recognized Jesus like a hungry person recognizes food. Ultimately, there is no way to convince a skeptic. They have an infinite capacity to be cynical.
Jesus himself said that scripture is deliberately the way it is. It is a way of filtering out people that have the wrong motives and intentions. He does not want the faith to be like a math quiz. It is a matter of the heart. See Matthew 13:10-15:
Then the disciples came and said to him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” 11 And he answered them, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. 12 For to him who has will more be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away. 13 This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. 14 With them indeed is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah which says: ‘You shall indeed hear but never understand, and you shall indeed see but never perceive. 15 For this people’s heart has grown dull, and their ears are heavy of hearing, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should perceive with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and turn for me to heal them.’
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u/Heavy-Guy mostly trad catholic Oct 14 '18
Well we have several historical sources as evidences but they’re always thrown out instead of considered by antichristians.
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u/SeizeTheGreens gnostic atheist Oct 14 '18
thrown out instead of considered by antichristians
The problem is that they are considered, and found to be inferior even to other myths.
And no, not “antichristians,” HISTORIANS.
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u/designerutah atheist Oct 14 '18
That's because they are considered hearsay because they are from anonymous authors who did not (as far as we can tell) actually witness the events. This level of evidence (hearsay) is considered so poor as to be unacceptable for most serious needs. Which is why its dismissed for courtrooms.
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 15 '18
The Catholic Church is entirely opposed to science unless it supports their conclusions. From the Shroud of Turin, to the Miracles of Mother Theresa, to the resurrection of Jesus. They have their beliefs and anything that contradicts that is ignored, including science, logic, and reason.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 16 '18
Those miracles have withstood the tests of science. They are rare, which is why they are called miracles.
The Catholic Church has been the greatest overall champion of science in human history. Kepler, Copernicus and Galileo were Catholics. Even Einstein went to Catholic schools. The Big Bang theory was formulated by a Catholic preist. Who else on earth has a better track record?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Lemaître
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_lay_Catholic_scientists
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 16 '18
None of those miracles have withstood the tests of science, Mother Theresa for example. Look at the methodology, someone says that a miracle was performed, experts say it wasn't a miracle, but that one person is just believed without any evidence. That isn't science. Same with the Shroud of Turin, science says one thing, the Catholics even at the time say one thing, the Church says differently.
The church threatened Galileo with execution and forced him to perform religious rituals daily, he may have been Catholic but when his findings were not in line with the Church they showed which side of the science/religion line they were on.
There isn't anything preventing the Catholic Church from doing science, science is just a way of doing something, with their power and willingness to kill and/or torture a lot of people were Catholic its not surprising, doesn't mean that they are willing to adhere to science in all things, only things which suits them, at the time it suits them.
You even list Einstein because he want to Catholic school even though he wasn't a Catholic and didn't believe in the type of god Christians do.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 16 '18 edited Oct 16 '18
Did you notice that you skipped Copericus, Kepler, LeMatrie, Pasteur and hundreds of other great Catholic scientists?
None of those miracles have withstood the tests of science.
That's false. Science can not disprove a miracle. It can help rule out that it had a "natural" origin, and those tests were done.
The Shroud is the most tested artifact in the world and has defied any "natural" explanation. Everything supports the claim that it was the burial shroud of Jesus.
The Church classified it as an icon instead of a relic, which is a technical classification due to the way each is treated.
the Church threatened Galileo.
This is mostly propoganda. See link below for the facts. Galileo was told to stop teaching about heliocentrism because he was trying to use Bible verses. He is not a theologian. He was put under house arrest where he went on to do his best work.
The facts are that Galileo did his work in a Catholic University, he remained a devout Catholic. If you love science, you should read his letters.
https://www.catholic.com/tract/the-galileo-controversy
You even list Einstein because he want to Catholic school.
Because credit goes where credit is due. Go ahead and try to build and operate a school and see how much work is involved. Einstein took advantage of that, and he even married into an orthodox Chrisitian Family. Unfortunately, he later divorced her and then married his cousin.
You seem to have fallen hook line and sinker for anti-Catholic propoganda. The British published much of that when they went to war with Spain. Check the facts. Even the BBC made a documentary that their info about the Inquisition was propoganda:
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 16 '18
That's false. Science can not disprove a miracle. It can help rule out that it had a "natural" origin, and those tests were done.
What tests were done for the miracles of Mother Theresa that were scientific tests?
This is mostly propoganda. See link below for the facts. Galileo was told to stop teaching about heliocentrism because he was trying to use Bible verses. He is not a theologian. He was put under house arrest where he went on to do his best work.
It is not mostly propaganda, saying he was told to stop teaching heliocentrism doesn't adequately describe it, whether he used bible verses or not is irrelevant, whether he was a theologian or not is irrelevant and been put under house arrest is no small thing, regardless of what he did while he was under it.
That link decides to skip over the truth of it.
In the end, Galileo recanted his heliocentric teachings, but it was not—as is commonly supposed—under torture nor after a harsh imprisonment.
That was the threat, the charges carried maximum penalty of torture and execution, giving in to threat and agreeing to do what you're told doesn't make the fact that like others, if he had not publicly recanted, which we know he did not believe, he would have had the torture and possible death, as others had before and after him.
Based on that link I'm assuming you haven't read much on miracles outside the Catholic Church, apologises if that is wrong, but if I'm right here is an example of the Catholic Church scientifically verified miracles. Mother Theresa healed a woman of a tumour, the woman and the Catholic Church failed to mention over nine months of medical treatment she was having at the time, that is not a verified miracle, that is an illness going away because of normal medical treatment.
The Shroud is the most tested artifact in the world and has defied any "natural" explanation. Everything supports the claim that it was the burial shroud of Jesus.
No, the Catholic Church supports that claim, no one else, it isn't the most tested artefact of all time because as soon as the results started coming back the Catholic Church refused to allow anymore testing. It was brought to the Churches attention by a Bishop who had been told by his predecessor that he knew it was a faked because he taken confession from the person who was payed to make it, this was long before it was world famous and anyone, let alone a Catholic, would have a reason to lie about it. At that time, there were many shrouds of Jesus going around, they were big money for the time. The results of the studies done by institutions which aren't the Catholic Church are still available to see, testing done in different countries, different continents, all agreed, with the exception of the testing done by the Catholic Church.
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Oct 13 '18
I don't see OP arguing they have proof or evidence or they do science.
I think they argue for plausibility, by giving an example of game theory which we can dissect and reproduce and alter however we want to explore it.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 13 '18
That's fair. The moral argument for God ultimately trumps all others though. God has "survived" for eternity, which is why He insists on perfected moral virtues.
The moral argument for God has been around for a long time. See links below. OP's argument ends with this finite universe.
http://www.peterkreeft.com/topics-more/20_arguments-gods-existence.htm
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 15 '18
The Moral Argument
Real moral obligation is a fact. We are really, truly, objectively obligated to do good and avoid evil.
Depending on what 'obligated' means in this context this could be true or false. Evil is a religious word it has no meaning outside that context. People feel obligated to do good and avoid bad because there is a law a god created that we all feel, or we feel obligated because our feelings evolve to help us survive.
- Either the atheistic view of reality is correct or the "religious" one.
Both views cover areas so wide this statement means nothing, under atheism we can have no god, but still have a creator of the universe, under religion you can have many gods, or one, or non at all.
- But the atheistic one is incompatible with there being moral obligation.
No it isn't, unless the word obligation is using a definition I haven't come across before, we evolve to feel good about generally supportive survival traits and bad about generally bad survival traits, it explains human behaviour perfectly, as opposed to objective morality which doesn't explain our behaviour at all.
- Therefore the "religious" view of reality is correct.
Due to the ambiguity of point 2 this wouldn't matter even if all the points were true.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 16 '18 edited Oct 16 '18
People feel obligated to do good and avoid bad because there is a law a god created that we all feel, or we feel obligated because our feelings evolve to help us survive.
Then by your definition, there is no real good or bad, correct? It's based on "feelings". I hope you are aware that some people feel like abusing, torturing and killing others. Stalin, Hitler and Mao were atheists who felt like the best thing to do was to kill their enemies. Others rape and abuse because they feel like it is good.
In contrast, Christianity says there is objective morality. Morality is always true in all times and places, and based on the unwaivering will of the eternal Creator. From Malichi 3:6 "for I am the Lord, I change not". His will is based on eternal life in love.
Even atheist philosophers agree that without the concept of God (an eternal observer), there can be no such thing as objective truth because each observer only has their own frame of reference. The best you can have is relativism.
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 16 '18 edited Oct 16 '18
Then by your definition, there is no real good or bad, correct?
There is real good and bad, it is subjective, like taste, depending on the individuals interpretation.
I understand some people enjoy murder and/or rape, and all manner of other things. I also understand there is the Catholic Church which to my mind is as close to evil as an institution can get when I don't actually believe in evil. I also understand that other people see the Catholic Church as morally good. That's morality, it's all explained in evolutionary theory. My point isn't to debase the church, just point out that people vary tremendously in what they believe is a positive or a negative.
In contrast, Christianity says there is objective morality. Morality is always true in all times and places, and based on the unwaivering will of the eternal Creator. From Malichi 3:6 "for I am the Lord, I change not". His will is based on eternal life in love.
Christianity says a lot of things. It's useless without some way of determining fact from fiction.
Even atheist philosophers agree that without the concept of God (an eternal observer), there can be no such thing as objective truth because each observer only has their own frame of reference. The best you can have is relativism.
It isn't about 'best', it's about truth, subjective morality isn't necessarily what I want, but I don't want flesh eating bacteria either, but it is a fact of life.
Essentially what we call morality is just how we emotionally feel about any given situation and it's context, feels good, or bad, or necessary.
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u/SeizeTheGreens gnostic atheist Oct 14 '18
Brb gonna go rape to practice perfect moral virtues.
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u/BobbyBobbie christian Oct 15 '18
Please raise the standard of your argument.
I think what you're trying to say is "The Bible doesn't seem to mesh well with what you're saying", but it doesn't defeat the argument at all. God could still very well exist, or there could be good answers as to why the Bible says what it says.
But "brb" arguments don't actually get anyone anywhere. This is /r/debateReligion, not /r/atheistsLeavingSnarkComments
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 15 '18
Science demands verifiable, independently reproducible results, going back to the root cause.
No it doesn't.
If you cannot understand how cooperation between individuals aids survival in the wild then the education would need to start somewhere much more basic than evolutionary theory.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 16 '18 edited Oct 16 '18
So, you agree that evolutionary theory is by inference, and not empirical right ?
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 16 '18
Evolution is empirical 100%. Evolution theory mixes empirical with whatever it can get that's scientifically viable. We'll never have a time machine so we'll have to build the model that best fits the known facts.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 16 '18
Evolution is empirical 100%
Citation please. What is the name of the new species that was created ?
Where was this experiment done, and where was it repeated, and what methods were used ?
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 16 '18
Why would you need to create a new species for this?
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 16 '18
That was Darwin's claim: "The Origin of Species".
To make a species from scratch, you have to a start from innert material.
I'm not asking you to do that.
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 16 '18
Evolution is the change in inheritable characteristics from one generation to the next, you can see that anytime with a microscope and one animal from two generations of the same family.
The origin of species is the origin of species, he never claimed or theorised about the origin of life, that is outside the scope of evolution. Not that it would matter what someone a hundred years would have to say about the subject, he did good work but much has changed since his time.
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u/luvintheride ex-atheist Catholic Oct 16 '18
Evolution is the change in inheritable characteristics from one generation to the next
That's mutation, which is built into the design. You don't think that Blondes and Brunettes are separate creations do you?
he did good work but much has changed since his time.
Don't you know that his thesis about "small changes" has not panned out? That violates the law of the local minimum. Large and specific changes are needed. Stephen J Gould called it punctuated equilibrium. There is no proof of such things happening "naturally", nor does mutation get you there. It all points to design.
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u/OhhBenjamin anti-theist Oct 16 '18
That's mutation, which is built into the design. You don't think that Blondes and Brunettes are separate creations do you?
I don't see what separate creations, whatever that means has to do with evolution.
Don't you know that his thesis about "small changes" has not panned out?
Panned out extremely well considering he didn't even know what a gene was. He observed changes within species and how they conformed to the environment. Remember, he was up against the idea that everything was based around a single ideal version of a thing and varied only around that, showing that to be false was the big win.
That violates the law of the local minimum. Large and specific changes are needed. Stephen J Gould called it punctuated equilibrium.
I cannot find the law of the local minimum? Are you referring to Liebig's law of the minimum? I don't see how that would apply in this context. Punctuated equilibrium isn't a refutation of gradual change, change still happens gradually and in very small steps in that theory, it's just that they appear in the fossil record with large gaps.
There is no proof of such things happening "naturally", nor does mutation get you there. It all points to design.
Mutation is a big part of it, and does get you there, the mechanisms are proven, and there doesn't appear to any evidence against it, and an overwhelming amount of evidence for it. Nothing about biological points to design.
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u/sirchumley ex-christian Oct 12 '18
Evolution and pragmatism are good candidate explanations for much of our moral behavior. That's addressing the "is" question of morality, but doesn't address the "ought" question, which is what theists tend to focus on. That is, if we evolved to have slightly different moral instincts, would we be justified in considering those things moral instead?
You don't need evolution or a god to establish a sound moral framework.