Sure but one can't (or shouldn't) reject number 1 (the Bible is an authority)...just because one doesn't like it...... one is suppose to reject "1" on the basis of arguments and evidence, not on the basis of Personal preferences.
My reasons for rejecting the Bible as an authoritative source ARE based in evidence.
Why should a non theist (which I assume includes you) trust his consciousness? Why do you trust a whole bunch of electrical impulses in your brain that evolved through the process of natural selection?
Conscience, not consciousness. I trust it because it has served as a more reliable guide for making decisions about right and wrong than any other source. Also, its urges are compelling. Disobeying them leads to a kind of suffering - shame, guilt, regret, etc.
I used to trust the Bible, but it's moral advice just didn't resonate with me. Its versions of love, mercy, and justice aren't mine. It is inadequate for dealing with modern ethical issues. It's advice on slavery is inadequate. Its sexual mores reflect another time and way of living that are no longer relevant today. It's view of women is ancient and obsolete, presently manifesting in the States as a Handmaid's Tale dystopia. My conscience advises me better than the book.
Premise 1 consciousness evolved through random mutations and natural selection
Premise 2 random mutations and natural selection dont aim at good moral values
Therefore, consciousness doesn't tell you if something is immoral or not.
This is an unsound syllogism. It commits a fallacy of composition, which occurs when one assumes that the qualities present at one scale exist at all scales. Conscience is an emergent phenomenon not found in its components the way life is an emergent phenomenon not found in any of its chemicals. Consider the wetness of liquid water. No water molecule is wet. Wetness emerges at a larger scale.
Natural selection applied to genetic variation in populations over generations leads to forms and behaviors of increasing complexity over geological time that facilitate propagation of the population. Whatever arises through genetic variation that does this will be selected for. It is not a random process. Only the genetic variation is random. The natural selection is directed naturalistically toward greater fecundity, which is facilitated by certain types of social interactions that promote communal well-being. This is the origin of the Golden Rule, which has arisen independently in multiole human cultures
I assumed that you are a non-theist, and that you accept the theory of evolution by natural selection, if my assumptions are wrong, please correct me.
You are correct. I am a humanist. My metaphysics is naturalistic (no supernaturalism), my epistemology is empirical (no faith), and my moral code derives from the application of reason to my moral intuitions, which are constructive.
Ok so we agree, the "its a natural inclination " is a bad argument
It's not my argument. I agree that not all natural inclinations are desirable. Homosexuality and pedophilia are both natural inclinations, but one harms people and needs to be suppressed. This would be a good example of where I leave biblical ethics behind. The
Bible says nothing about pedophilia specifically, but it forbids homosexuality. Why? That was a world that promoted fecundity. Its children often died before maturity, its women died in childbirth, its men died in war, and everybody died from untreatable infectious diseases. So, any womb ready to carry a child was ready for sex whatever the age, but non-procreative activities like homosexuality (and refusing sex to a husband, and the rhythm method, and masturbation) were forbidden.
Those rules promoted keeping populations up. Today, overpopulation is the problem. That's what I mean about much of biblical morality being about another kind of life, and not only no longer relevant today, but being counterproductive. That's why the rational ethics of humanism work better than the crystallized, received ethics from the past.
I hope you'll make a deliberate effort to address all of the elements of this post. I will assume that any point made that you don't indicate disagreement with is one you accept, and discussion on that point has reached its natural end and resolution. I've done that with your post. I have quoted and responded to every point that I didn't agree with and explained why. And regarding the point that I did agree with that you asked about, the one immediately above, I answered it. Will you return that courtesy and explain why you disagree with every comment in this post with which you disagree? I require it from you to continue doing the same for you. It's where things broke down between us last time, and why I began refusing to address issues of interest to you. Either this is a two-way discussion or neither way. Either we each respect what's on the mind of the other, or neither of us will. Fair enough?
