SkepticThinker
Veteran Member
Um no. Just no. I have said nothing about "absolute morals." That was all you. And I see that you've avoided answering the question. Again.
Perhaps you could explain why you think people need to believe in the existence of some God(s) as an absolute moral giver in order to exercise morality. I wonder why you think human beings are incapable of coming up with some kind of moral system on their own.
I say it's immoral to hurt another human being because I am a human being with empathy, and so I understand what it feels like to be hurt. I don't want anyone hurting me or my family and loved ones, so I don't think it's morally right to hurt other peoples' families and loved ones. I understand that this life I'm living may very well be the only one I get, and the same goes for the rest of the people that l share the planet with. I think that all human beings are born equal and should be treated as such. Children are especially vulnerable members of our society given that they depend on others for their care (same goes for the elderly and the disabled). Children grow up and become adults, which makes them the future of the human race. So harming them would be detrimental to the survival of the human race. I want my children and my relatives' children to carry on living and so I support the future of the human race.
These are just a few of the reasons why I think it's immoral to harm other people. And I don't need any God(s) to come to those conclusions.
I will leave you with a quote from Christopher Hitchens that I have always found enlightening:
"I incline in your direction, sir. Said it before—very suggestive thing that you just said: if there was no one in charge, how would we know how to act morally? This is indeed, this is a very profound observation. It's argued by Smerdyakov in The Brothers Karamazov, he said, "Without God anything is permissible." Some people believe that. Some people believe that without the fear of divine total surveillance and supervision everyone would do exactly as they wished and we would all be wolves to each other. I think there's an enormous amount of evidence that that's not the case, that morality is innate in us, that solidarity is part of our self-interest in society as well as our own interest and very much to argue the contrary that when you see something otherwise surprising to you, such as a good person acting in a wicked manner, it's very often because they believe they're under divine orders to do so. Steven Weinberg puts it very well, he says, "Left to themselves, evil people will do evil things and good people will try and do good things. If you want a good person to do a wicked thing, that takes religion." For example—I simply do not believe—I do not believe that my Palestinian friends I've known now for years, think that to blow yourself up outside an orphanage is a moral act—or inside one is a moral act, or an old person's home in Netanya is a moral action, that anything in their nature makes them think this, but their Mullahs tell them that there is, that a person doing this is a hero. I do not think that any person looking at a newborn baby would think, "How wonderful, what a gift and now let's just start sawing away at its genitalia with a sharp stone." Who would give them that idea were it not the godly? And what kind of argument from design is this? Babies are not born beautiful, they're born ugly, they need to be sawn a bit because the handywork of God is such garbage. Well honestly, this is what I mean when I say that those who think there's any connection between ethics and religion have all their work still ahead of them and after thousands of years, still have it all ahead of them more and more. There."
