Objective Morality Without God

[ChristineM]

It seems morality is a human (and some other animals) trait. Without it civilization could not have got started to build religion and god belief.

 

[SalixIncendium]

This question really has no relevance in most dharmic religions, as morality isn't judged by a god who passes on reward or punishment. Gods exist in dharmic religions as creators, preservers, destroyers, and guides.

In the dharmic paradigm, morality is rather governed by karma rather than any reward/punishment passed on by any judgmental god.

 

[PureX]

Morality is not about optimizing the individual, ego. Rather morality is about optimizing the group. Relative morality is the way to optimize the individual. Thou shall not steal, is better for the group. If we all agree and we all do not steal, there is less cost in terms of being defensive.

Individuals who are thieves for a living, would prefer to be able to steal, and they will justify this with some form of relative morality; I am poor and can steal to balance it off. This has an adverse impact on the group, which can be calculated based on the extra cost of alarming the house or needing a safe deposit box. This is how you make it objective.

The simplest way to objectify morality, when comparing more codes is to add the total social costs. The lowest social costs will come from the best moral systems.

The reason morality came to be, is because the team or the group, can become more than the sum of its parts. Picture a large crate full of all the parts needed to build an automobile. If we compare this crate of parts to a fully assembled auto, both have the exact same parts. However, the assembled team of parts, has a whole new dimension of functionality. It is now more than the sum of its parts.

Morality is about team building which requires people use will and choice to work as part of the team. This may require some sacrifice. Relative morality is more about each part, in the unassembled crate, wanting to be optimized in some idealized way. However, once the parts start going their own way, you cannot build a team that fits together properly. This will create social costs which we can be added; so we can objectify.

For example, the radiator part may decide it wishes to be larger and beefier so it is strong enough to cool a large truck. But since the parts fit together to form a mid sized automobile, and not a truck, the radiator is now too large, leading to problems. The hood does not close, properly, so wind resistance is worse. We can quantify the lower gas mileage and the extra ties needed to hold down the hood; social programs needed to mop up the mess from immorality; lack of team optimization.

If you look at religious organizations, social need is often done through charity and volunteers. There is no extra tax or deficit spending to tighten the seams of the group. People who care for the individual on the team will absorb the costs for the team.

We can compare this to the secular team; Government, which raises taxes or deficit spends to do the same thing, because they do not use a team charity and volunteer model, all the self serving parts do not fit with each other. They need to hire mercenaries, who help for a price.

This is easy to quantify to see where relative morality creates problems; self serving politicians who form mini teams, that compete, and waste resources to pay for their relative morality. We can quantify that also.

These are all good points, but they depend on the ethical imperative of achieving overall well being for their moral determination. As opposed to depending on our individual well being within an antagonistic universe, as the ethical imperative.

There are many here and elsewhere that hold themselves and their own group's well being as their ethical imperative, and hold everyone else as being antagonistic to that ideal. And so they determine moral and immoral behavior accordingly. This is a subjective decision on their part just as your choosing to include everyone's well being as your ethical imperative is a subjective decision on your part.

 

[Koldo]

To play devil's advocate...

What is wrong with suffering and how do you know?

The answer to this question becomes self-evident if you have gone through suffering.

Can this reason be objective or does it come down to 'we don't like it'?

How are you using the word 'objective' here? As opposed to human mental experience? How can morality be objective if so? If we exclude the mental, in what way is the concept of morality meaningful?

 

[Koldo]

Hi folks. The idea of objective morality is something I've given serious scrutiny since I began studying philosophy.

One key item I think it's good to settle before proceeding into the thick of metaethics is what role God or (insert religious entity here) has to do with whether morality is objective or not.

Some people think morality is subjective. "Is morality subjective or objective?" is another very important ethical query. But that's not the question I'm asking here. My question is: "If morality IS objective, could God's pronouncement be the thing that makes it so?"

I tend to think: no.

In my view of things "stealing is wrong" or "stealing is bad" aren't true simply because God says so.

In my view, stealing is wrong for reasons. Personally, I see a plethora of things wrong with theft. It causes suffering. Arguments could be made that we are entitled to the fruits of our own labor. Plenty of reasons stealing is wrong. And if THOSE REASONS explain why stealing is wrong, then God's forbiddance of it has little to do with the objectivity of the statement: "stealing is bad." God's pronouncement that stealing is forbidden has nothing to do with the rightness or wrongness of it. Even if God exists and created the universe, his commandments cannot be what makes things right or wrong.

Some of you may notice that I'm hitting on an ancient Greek argument. But I don't want to get stuck on that argument. I'd like to move beyond it. I think there are even more reasons than the ones I've listed in this OP. But this is as good of a starting point as any.

So does anyone disagree with me here? If so, where precisely has my reasoning gone astray? And what good arguments can you quote (or produce yourself) that support the thesis that God existing is necessary for morality to be objective?

My question is: If stealing is wrong for reasons, why can't those reasons be God's commandments?

I have an answer to that but not using objective morality.

 

[Koldo]

The answer might be that they do what feels best at the time and either condemn or justify themselves later in the light of day.

That sounds like the entire humanity in a nutshell.

 

[Nakosis]

Agreed. In my personal analysis stealing isn't always bad, and can even sometimes be good. You raise an important point, but I didn't want to preemptively answer points like yours because that would have made my OP endlessly long and unwieldy. So I'll start by saying: you are right. Stealing isn't always bad.

But who says that survival is good? I actually agree with you. Survival is good. But why? Why do you think survival is good?

Because I like existence. I like the physical experience of life.
There is no guarantee of any existence after death/non-survival.

I'm not asking a political question. What if there IS no group?

Let's say that you are stranded on a desert island with someone . There are an abundance of coconuts around but they are hard to get down from the trees. Lets say that you and another person each acquire a coconut for yourselves for that evening's dinner. If you are suddenly in the mood for two coconuts, does that make it okay for you to steal his?

Let's assume that it is a one-time deal that you steal the coconut. From then on, the two of you live in harmony, never stealing the others' coconut. Does that make it okay (or morally permissible) that you stole his coconut that one time? Moral objectivity doesn't need societies to exist. And (IMO) has nothing to do with the smooth operation of societies.

Objective morals?
I don't see how morals can exist independent of individual thought.
An individual cannot have objective morals, imo, by definition.

Some outside force, the group or God, would be necessary for morals to be objective by any definition.
They would either have to have or be given the authority to do so.

If there is only me, then there is no one I am stealing from.

If there is another, then harm can come from a loss of trust between the two which makes working together as a group difficult.

 

[Rival]

The answer to this question becomes self-evident if you have gone through suffering.

It doesn't.

How are you using the word 'objective' here? As opposed to human mental experience? How can morality be objective if so? If we exclude the mental, in what way is the concept of morality meaningful?

Objective means outside of anyone's personal experience, which is by nature subjective to a person's point of view, even pain and suffering.

You are right though - if we exclude this, morality is not meaningful, it is just made up (if you disclude God etc).

This is why it is hard to defend objective morality with no God - one needs an outside arbiter which is not just as flawed and subjective as you.

 

[Koldo]

It doesn't.

It does once you experience quite a bit of it. It looks like you haven't experienced enough.

Objective means outside of anyone's personal experience, which is by nature subjective to a person's point of view, even pain and suffering.

You are right though - if we exclude this, morality is not meaningful, it is just made up (if you disclude God etc).

This is why it is hard to defend objective morality with no God - one needs an outside arbiter which is not just as flawed and subjective as you.

I mean, even WITH God, how is morality meaningful if we exclude everyone's experience?

If God says that all rape is objectively moral, in what is that meaningful to us?

 

[Rival]

It does once you experience quite a bit of it. It looks like you haven't experienced enough.

Don't presume to tell me about my own experience or what meaning it does or doesn't have. You're not the arbiter mentioned above.

I mean, even WITH God, how is morality meaningful if we exclude everyone's experience?

If God says that all rape is objectively moral, in what is that meaningful to us?

The standard here is 'objective'. If God, as Ultimate Moral Arbiter and non-subjective, says something is wrong or right, it is wrong or right whether you find that meaningful or not, whether you understand it or not. The point is that the God has set a standard that is outside of anyone's personal experience, pain or pleasure, or feelings - it's objective.

 

[SalixIncendium]

It does once you experience quite a bit of it. It looks like you haven't experienced enough.

What an incredibly thoughtless and insensitive thing to say.

That said, what unit of measure does one use for suffering, and what or who determines what is "enough?"

 

[Rival]

What an incredibly thoughtless and insensitive thing to say.

That said, what unit of measure does one use for suffering, and what or who determines what is "enough?"

'My suffering is worse than your suffering' does like rather like a bizarre Monty Python argument between two Mediaeval friars.

 

[LuisDantas]

The OP ist quite correct IMO. The only way for a claim that "morailtx is objective because It is dictated by god" tô be correct or even make some sense is by deifyring human perception and reason.

 

[Revoltingest]

Ayn Rand tried to justify objective morality.
But she had to choose her premises.
Others start with different assumptions.
But objectivity, ie, reason, can apply once
the premises are chosen.

 

[Koldo]

Don't presume to tell me about my own experience or what meaning it does or doesn't have. You're not the arbiter mentioned above.

You can't both say you don't know/see what is wrong about suffering AND come across as someone that doesn't live in an ivory tower.

The standard here is 'objective'. If God, as Ultimate Moral Arbiter and non-subjective, says something is wrong or right, it is wrong or right whether you find that meaningful or not, whether you understand it or not. The point is that the God has set a standard that is outside of anyone's personal experience, pain or pleasure, or feelings - it's objective.

1) How do you determine God's morality is actually objective, rather than merely God's personal opinion?

2) What's the point of an objective morality that says something that is absolutely contrary to everyone's experience? As in, why would we not ignore it? If God said all rape is moral, would you rape people?

 

[Koldo]

What an incredibly thoughtless and insensitive thing to say.

You should direct this towards the one asking what is wrong with suffering.

That said, what unit of measure does one use for suffering, and what or who determines what is "enough?"

Just keep inflicting suffering upon yourself until you realize what is wrong with suffering.

 

[SalixIncendium]

You should direct this towards the one asking what is wrong with suffering.

Why?

I'll also point out that you never really answered the question. All you did was unfoundedly diminish another person's suffering. Even in your latest post.

 

[Rival]

You can't both say you don't know/see what is wrong about suffering AND come across as someone that doesn't live in an ivory tower.

I didn't say I don't see what is wrong with suffering. I see what is wrong with it from my personal subjective point of view. What I cannot do is say that objectively my suffering is morally wrong. I cannot make myself an objective arbiter based on personal subjective feeling, that is nonsense. My personal feelings, suffering here, do not dictate what is objectively moral or immoral for others. Nor even for me. Objectivity is by its very definition not subject to personal experience, feelings or otherwise- you are trying to take two incompatible things and mix them. Either you can have objective morality or you can have morality given meaning by feeling, but you can't have both.

As Salix said though, you haven't answered the question.

God's morality is objective based on God's being outside of human subjectivity and as the very creator of all of these things. As maker, he gives the standards, being as he out outside of time, space, feeling, etc. He has the most objective view possible.

This is for you to decide. Many people do find issue with this.

 

[Koldo]

Why?

I'll also point out that you never really answered the question. All you did was unfoundedly diminish another person's suffering. Even in your latest post.

If you need to ask why you should label a post that asks what is wrong with suffering as thoughtless and insensitive, you don't deserve an answer.

 

[SalixIncendium]

If you need to ask why you should label a post that asks what is wrong with suffering as thoughtless and insensitive, you don't deserve an answer.

Just because you don't have an answer doesn't mean I'm any less deserving of one.