Do Athiests have morals?

[1robin]

Not saying that at all. Where on earth did you come up with that?

I originally asked for a line in the sand on what level of evils may occur that do not prove God does not exist or did not act. The subject was the Jews but my question was in general. The point being where ever you draw this imaginary line is arbitrary, meaningless, and is a false optimality argument.

How about your god allows for nobody to be gassed and shoved into ovens on a mass scale. Or, I suppose this god could let it happen to 6 million people before later deciding to pull the plug on it all at some arbitrary point in time. I know which of the two is the more moral choice. Maybe your god doesn't?

How about he comes and physically stops anyone from killing a child in the womb? Is that ok? How about homosexuality? they would save more than 600 million lives, or is it only the acts of freewill that you object to personally that God is on the hook for stopping at the moment which you specify? I am not picking on you, I am showing you how arbitrary your criteria are. Evil has a roll in the world because we mandated it's necessity. We don't learn until apparently until the price goes way beyond any acceptable level and many of us don't even learn then. If God sent the angel of death to stop us in our tracks when we do evil none of us would make it out of grammar school.

This is another version of the problem of evil, unfortunately your burden would be to show God could freely bring more people into a saving relationship to him by allowing less evil and that just is not within human capability.

This reminds me of an argument Chesterton made one time. If you never read him he is like a theistic Mark Twain and IMO a better word smith. He said the accusations made against Christianity are so diverse and contradictory that the faith must be the most peculiar beast ever invented. He said he finally realized it was not that Christianity was that peculiar or that it had that many faults, it was that atheists peculiarly thought that any stick was good enough to beat it with. You must find a reason in the context God comes with that causes him to fail.

You can't invent how many of what race can die before God could not exist, act, or care. That only degrades the credibility of atheism.

 

[1robin]

By talking to human beings in the LGBT community. By observing the society we live in and the general attitude towards those in the LGBT community. By reading the available research on the subject. By exercising common sense.

For you to know what you claim to know you would have to talk to every single gay person who had changed their preference. Sorry but I am done with this issue for the time being. So I will not do anything but at most give a slight comment and will not respond on this issue in this thread after that.

Then I throw your question back at you. How do you know there are thousands and thousands of people who "prefer one sex for a long time then another later on" or "switch back?" Back to what? And what reason would you attribute to this switching of sides, if not what I suggested?

Because I have known people who work in ministries that deal with homosexuality. I have no hard numbers but it is an easily and conservative guess.

Or has it never occurred to you that these people you speak of might identify as bisexual?

Some could have that label applied but the ones I mean were either attracted to one or the other, not both. However in this slippery slope the proceeds from opening Pandora's box you never know what the truth is and I doubt even the people themselves do. Have you heard of this new three person baby trend?

What stuff? The inefficacy of “conversion therapy?” The harm that it causes? This is the first you’ve heard of that? Seriously?

I don't recall what your referring to.

Or the fact that we don’t choose our sexual orientation? Honestly, I can’t even believe that someone could make such an assertion. Did you choose to be heterosexual? When did that happen? Do you think you could choose to be homosexual tomorrow?

I have already dealt with this several times.

Who?
[/quote[ Those who in their own words liked one sex for a while and then another. I only know about ten gay people, and two have claimed this, and BTW 5 of them have died very young (for whatever that is worth).

Doesn’t make it normal? Does the fact that homosexuality, bisexuality and everything in between, have existed for probably the entirety of our human existence on this planet make it normal? The APA doesn’t consider it abnormal. Actually it seems that the majority of people who find it abnormal are the religious-minded among us.

So has every other moral perversion.

“Acting on it” means what? Holding hands with someone of the same sex? Spending time with someone of the same sex? Engaging in sexual behaviors with a person of the same sex? What’s immoral about any of those things?

Yes but I don't care about benign activities, only those that produce the massive amounts of harm and costs that society must bare (is it bear or bare?).

Sure, in public we do. Behind closed doors nobody seems to care what heterosexuals do. It’s apparently only when homosexuals get together behind closed doors that everybody starts getting all worked up.

The heck we don't. Two people just got sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole where I live for heterosexual acts. I will not give details.

Sure.

I thought I had already told you I was done with this subject. If I could have been sure I had I would not have responded to anything in this post. Now that I know for certain I have already said I was no longer going to discuss this, that will be actualized. I am simply worn out with this topic.

 

[1robin]

This is just a partial list of states that feel that people/organizations/states that break the rules of war should be held accountable for doing so:


Afghanistan

Albania

Algeria

Argentina

Armenia

Australia

Austria

Bahamas

Belarus

Belgium

Belize

Bolivia

Brazil

Bulgaria

Burkino Faso

Canada

Chile

Columbia

Cook Islands

Costa Rica

Croatia

Cyprus

Czech Republic

Denmark

Dominican Republic

El Salvador

Estonia

Fiji

Finland

France

Georgia

Germany

Greece

Guatemala

Guinea

Guyana

Haiti

Honduras

Hungary

Iceland

Ireland

Israel

Italy

Jamaica

Japan

Kazakhstan

Kenya

South Korea

Kuwait

Laos

Latvia

Lebanon

Lesotho

Liberia

Liechtenstein

Lithuania

Luxembourg

Macedonia

Malawi

Mali

Mexico

Monaco

Mongolia

Nauru

Netherlands

New Zealand

Nicaragua

Norway

Palau

Panama

Paraguay

Philippines

Poland

Portugal

Qatar

St. Kitts and Nevis

Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

San Marino

Serbia

Seychilles

Slovakia

Slovenia

South Sudan

Spain

Suriname

Sweden

Timor-Leste

Togo

Tonga

Trinidad and Tobago

Ukraine

United Kingdom

United States

I can agree in theory anyway. I would have to see the evidence in each case but this just proves my point. We are not in some brave new sanitized world where new laws have made this a new moral age. We are the same self interested, devious, and petty race we have always been and to those who wish to do evil a law is irrelevant.

 

[1robin]

List of parties to the Geneva Conventions - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I have looked this up several times. I don't know to what effect you gave the link however. Let me add a note here that you may find interesting. Unless you served in the military and were a military historian you probably don't know this. It is an international law to not use hollow point bullets and a general practice to use smaller caliber steel jacket rounds. Now to the uninformed that probably sounds like an attempt to sanitize war and make it less brutal (even though we still use things that can incinerate cities and bombs that are designed to infect people with incurable diseases). However neither of those are actually humane. We don't use hollow points or large caliber personal weapons because we don't want to kill the other guy, we want to horribly wound him and therefor ties up his buddies to carry him back, hospitals to take care of him, equipment and costs to sustain him. We can also carry 50% more of teh smaller ammunition and wound 3 people instead of killing one. Even our seemingly benevolent rules have sinister motives many times. One of my favorite generals was stonewall Jackson. I read he said early in the war to raise the black flag and have an OT war where no quarter was given no prisoners taken. I thought that terrible because he was also a sincerer Christian, that is until I read why he said that. He said war is the scourge of all evils but if you must fight then go for the throat. The war would have been over in six months (the civil war), instead of 4 years of starvation, disease, and oceans of blood. He was harsh and he was benevolent. Things are not as simple as secularism tries to wish them to be.

 

[1robin]

I should have mentioned those are heterosexual women.

In that case this is easy. I never said that even in the US most of the people with aids are homosexual though it may be rue. My point was that homosexuals create a vastly higher percentage of aids cases per person than heterosexuality................................dang it I started to violate my own rule. I am not going to debate this topic if I can ever recognize it for what it is before I begin anyway.

 

[1robin]

Not from me. Any arguments that atheists are making, start from firmer ground than any argument that starts with the premise of a supernatural being and no supporting evidence. From my perspective you can go all William Lane Craig until you're blue in the face. It seems patently obvious that religions have been plagiarizing morals from other sources, since day 1 of religion.

That question was directed at a specific person. Your free to comment of course but the question would not apply to you.

I don't know what the WLC and your claiming to know all the religions in the world are invented stuff was all about. Even if the latter was true you would not have any way to know it and a wealth of evidence exists that at least one is true. As for Craig your going to need to post your degrees in order to dismiss him out of hand.

That said, the question of the source(s) of morality is a really interesting - and for my money unsolved - question. But just because we don't yet have an answer to a question by no means supports the idea that the answer must be supernatural. Argh.

My argument is not a statement to knowledge of where morality comes from but only what it's nature must be depending on what source we assume it came from. With God it is actually objective fact, without it is our preference and opinion, but I ma not arguing which one we actually have. I did not assume it was supernatural. I gave two propositional arguments.

 

[1robin]

Possibly. There are a few tangents where I know we won't agree but I am too tired to go back and find them. My original post where I quoted you was just debating the worth of subjective morality to begin with. So as of right now I think both our posts are in agreement.

Close enough.

 

[1robin]

The bible isn't the only thing in the corner stone, and really just serves to show the dominant religion at the time of the laying.

The original issue was your saying religious people had not been the ones who did something or other I can't remember that had to do with the moral foundations of societies and laws. The dominant religion of the US was the issue that most pertained to the original issue.

Which scriptures are carved in the Capitol Building?

That's a good question. I heard what they were but cannot remember. Let me see if I can find out in the meantime.

And the secular revolution you speak of included adding God to the currency, and to the Pledge.

Of course not. I did not say the theists turned off the lights and went home. The secular revolution was a trend not an armed invasion. Christianity is still alive and strong but our court systems and politics were infected by secularism and the trend continues as does the decline over all.

 

[1robin]

Then I'll wait until you find the time. All of the pages answer in detail your question.

Oh alight. Please give me the link again and I will print and read it when I can. It better be good or I will no longer be able to take the insistence as seriously in the future.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

The original issue was your saying religious people had not been the ones who did something or other I can't remember that had to do with the moral foundations of societies and laws. The dominant religion of the US was the issue that most pertained to the original issue.

Nah, not me. I faded out of the thread pages ago, but I lurk a lot (partly due to the mod thing). I just thought I'd drop in uninvited and ask a few unrequired questions...lol

That's a good question. I heard what they were but cannot remember. Let me see if I can find out in the meantime.

Cool. I think they include some but not all of the ten commandments. The selection of commandments is interesting. However, I am not sure if there are also OTHER scriptural references there.

Of course not. I did not say the theists turned off the lights and went home. The secular revolution was a trend not an armed invasion. Christianity is still alive and strong but our court systems and politics were infected by secularism and the trend continues as does the decline over all.

I dunno, man...I think current religiousness, social norms, etc are commonly compared to post WW2 America, as if that period is an accurate representation of history. In that same period, theists were powerful enough to get the currency changed, and the Pledge of Allegiance changed. Try and do either of those things now. Good luck.
Further, America's enemy went from the Germans and Japanese to the godless commies, wherever they might be found.

Consider Joseph McCarthy's speech at Wheeling (1950). Add it to currency changes to include God. Add it to Pledge changes to include God. And now watch the horror of 'traditionalists' who want atheists to leave their Pledge alone. Phhht. Traditionalists. They're ignorant revisionists.

 

[ArtieE]

Oh alight. Please give me the link again and I will print and read it when I can. It better be good or I will no longer be able to take the insistence as seriously in the future.

The original link is in post 1029.

 

[Monk Of Reason]

Oh alight. Please give me the link again and I will print and read it when I can. It better be good or I will no longer be able to take the insistence as seriously in the future.

Here is the link he was talking about.
http://www.cep.ucsb.edu/papers/MoralHeuristicsLaw06.pdf

 

[ArtieE]

I can agree in theory anyway. I would have to see the evidence in each case but this just proves my point. We are not in some brave new sanitized world where new laws have made this a new moral age. We are the same self interested, devious, and petty race we have always been and to those who wish to do evil a law is irrelevant.

But if we can get some of those people who wish to do evil to believe in a religion and a god commanding them to behave morally and they do less evil because of that it's good for society. Even though some might do evil in the name of their god.

 

[ArtieE]

One of my favorite generals was stonewall Jackson. I read he said early in the war to raise the black flag and have an OT war where no quarter was given no prisoners taken. I thought that terrible because he was also a sincerer Christian, that is until I read why he said that. He said war is the scourge of all evils but if you must fight then go for the throat. The war would have been over in six months (the civil war), instead of 4 years of starvation, disease, and oceans of blood. He was harsh and he was benevolent. Things are not as simple as secularism tries to wish them to be.

Maybe the war had been over in less than six months if he had fought a real OT war.

"Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.'"

 

[1robin]

Nah, not me. I faded out of the thread pages ago, but I lurk a lot (partly due to the mod thing). I just thought I'd drop in uninvited and ask a few unrequired questions...lol

Drop in and ask away.

Cool. I think they include some but not all of the ten commandments. The selection of commandments is interesting. However, I am not sure if there are also OTHER scriptural references there.

Oops, I forgot about this. The day I tried to look it up my DOD server's selective firewall barred any type of search. I will try again.

I dunno, man...I think current religiousness, social norms, etc are commonly compared to post WW2 America, as if that period is an accurate representation of history. In that same period, theists were powerful enough to get the currency changed, and the Pledge of Allegiance changed. Try and do either of those things now. Good luck.

That is what I am saying. The secular revolution began in the late 50's. It of course did not begin strong and so theists did have some political successes early on but the balance of power has shifted these days. All kinds of laws restricting and preventing even the exercise of faith in setting it is appropriate to has taken place, morality has shifted in a horrific direction, and politics has all but given up on faith (Last election the democrats took God out of their platform all together).

Further, America's enemy went from the Germans and Japanese to the godless commies, wherever they might be found.

I agree but don't see the relevance. Now we are becoming the Godless commies anyway.

Consider Joseph McCarthy's speech at Wheeling (1950). Add it to currency changes to include God. Add it to Pledge changes to include God. And now watch the horror of 'traditionalists' who want atheists to leave their Pledge alone. Phhht. Traditionalists. They're ignorant revisionists.

Subtract from that the presence of faith in party platforms, the abolishment of congressional chaplains, the rules restricting even mentioning Christ in military prayers, the moments of silence instead of actual prayer in public settings, the rise of abortion, the rise of teen pregnancy, drug abuse, sexual violence, violence in schools, violence and sex on TV, etc.......

If you want to see the greatest theological and moral barometer in history look at TV programming from the 50's compared with today. I don't think anything beyond XXX porn and live dissections is not allowed on today's TV programming. We went from leave it to beaver to sex and the city, from the Andy Griffith show to the Texas chain saw massacre, etc..... I need no argument beyond two TV guides.

 

[Monk Of Reason]

Subtract from that the presence of faith in party platforms,

Faith and party platforms are not seperate. If they were we wouldn't have "re elect god" republican bumper stickers

the abolishment of congressional chaplains, the rules restricting even mentioning Christ in military prayers,

Look at it from another perspective. Can we replace them with Muslim religious leaders in the same positions rather than Christians?

the moments of silence instead of actual prayer in public settings,

Should we change it with five daily chants to Mecca and make it mandatory? Or should we have a moment of silence so all those who are religious or not can do whatever it is that they feel they should do during that time?

the rise of abortion,

This has been beaten to death so I don't think there is any more argument to be had.

the rise of teen pregnancy,

Technically teen pregancy is way way way way down. It was not that long ago that women were getting married and having their first children before 16 as a normal occurrence. Now that almost never happens.

drug abuse,

I agree with this one. But I don't agree it has anything to do with religion and has far more to do with the war no drugs.

sexual violence,

I haven't seen any statistics to support this. Rape is actually gone down over the years by a LOT.

violence in schools,

True. Has a lot to do with socioeconomic statistics and the availability of guns. I don't actually know the history of violence in schools compared to before thought if you are going purely off of 1950's standards far fewer kids were going to school back then than now.

violence and sex on TV, etc.......

This and of itself isn't morally wrong. And studies how shown that violent video games for example actually tend to create less violent people. I don't know what the statistics are on television but I find it strange that despite this we have still fewer rapes, murders and crime overall nearly every decade for the past seven decades.

 

[Mycroft]

When someone claims that he/she is irreligious, does it give them justifications to negate teachings of religious communities. For example, thou not steal. Does it give someone who claims to be irreligious the right to steal?

Morals have nothing to do with religion, we've had rules and laws against stealing and killing since our earliest tribal origins. People were not, for example, stealing or killing before Christianity, The Ten Commandments or the Coming of christ. It wasn't as if 'Thou Shalt Not Murder' or Thou Shalt Not Steal' was a particularly revolutionary piece of legislation.

 

[icehorse]

That question was directed at a specific person. Your free to comment of course but the question would not apply to you.

I don't know what the WLC and your claiming to know all the religions in the world are invented stuff was all about. Even if the latter was true you would not have any way to know it and a wealth of evidence exists that at least one is true. As for Craig your going to need to post your degrees in order to dismiss him out of hand.

My argument is not a statement to knowledge of where morality comes from but only what it's nature must be depending on what source we assume it came from. With God it is actually objective fact, without it is our preference and opinion, but I ma not arguing which one we actually have. I did not assume it was supernatural. I gave two propositional arguments.

Sincere thanks for a great summary.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Drop in and ask away.


Oops, I forgot about this. The day I tried to look it up my DOD server's selective firewall barred any type of search. I will try again.


That is what I am saying. The secular revolution began in the late 50's. It of course did not begin strong and so theists did have some political successes early on but the balance of power has shifted these days. All kinds of laws restricting and preventing even the exercise of faith in setting it is appropriate to has taken place, morality has shifted in a horrific direction, and politics has all but given up on faith (Last election the democrats took God out of their platform all together).

I agree but don't see the relevance. Now we are becoming the Godless commies anyway.

Subtract from that the presence of faith in party platforms, the abolishment of congressional chaplains, the rules restricting even mentioning Christ in military prayers, the moments of silence instead of actual prayer in public settings, the rise of abortion, the rise of teen pregnancy, drug abuse, sexual violence, violence in schools, violence and sex on TV, etc.......

If you want to see the greatest theological and moral barometer in history look at TV programming from the 50's compared with today. I don't think anything beyond XXX porn and live dissections is not allowed on today's TV programming. We went from leave it to beaver to sex and the city, from the Andy Griffith show to the Texas chain saw massacre, etc..... I need no argument beyond two TV guides.

Just out of curiosity, what is immoral about live dissections?

And I mentioned this before, but you didn't respond ... You seem to ignore shows like the Honeymooners, where you had a husband constantly threatening to punch his wife "to the moon" and "in the kisser." Is that what you consider good, wholesome programming? Not to mention that have always been plenty of violent movies. Scarface immediately comes to mind, and that made in 1932. I think that was considered pretty violent in its time. The Outlaw was made in 1943, prominently featuring Jane Russell's curvy figure. I'm sure that was pretty risqué for it's time too. And if you think porn didn't exist, well then I don't know what to tell you. There really are no "good old days" where everything was perfect, I don't think. At least not in the way you see it.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I have looked this up several times. I don't know to what effect you gave the link however. Let me add a note here that you may find interesting. Unless you served in the military and were a military historian you probably don't know this. It is an international law to not use hollow point bullets and a general practice to use smaller caliber steel jacket rounds. Now to the uninformed that probably sounds like an attempt to sanitize war and make it less brutal (even though we still use things that can incinerate cities and bombs that are designed to infect people with incurable diseases). However neither of those are actually humane. We don't use hollow points or large caliber personal weapons because we don't want to kill the other guy, we want to horribly wound him and therefor ties up his buddies to carry him back, hospitals to take care of him, equipment and costs to sustain him. We can also carry 50% more of teh smaller ammunition and wound 3 people instead of killing one. Even our seemingly benevolent rules have sinister motives many times. One of my favorite generals was stonewall Jackson. I read he said early in the war to raise the black flag and have an OT war where no quarter was given no prisoners taken. I thought that terrible because he was also a sincerer Christian, that is until I read why he said that. He said war is the scourge of all evils but if you must fight then go for the throat. The war would have been over in six months (the civil war), instead of 4 years of starvation, disease, and oceans of blood. He was harsh and he was benevolent. Things are not as simple as secularism tries to wish them to be.

I gave the link to counter the point you were trying to make that it's a cut throat world where nobody cares about doing the right thing. You posted a list of people who don't care about the rules of war. So I posted a list of those that do. Mine are states/countries. Yours are small groups of terrorists.