Peanut Gallery for Tanager & Wiploc on the Moral Argumen

wiploc · Post by **wiploc** » Sun Mar 25, 2018 6:14 pm

This is the peanut gallery thread for those who wish to comment on Tanager and wiploc's one-on-one discussion of the question of whether objective morality requires the existence of a god.

I couldn't fit all that in the title, above, so I just called it the moral argument.

Tanager and I won't post here until after our one-on-one thread closes. But we may respond to comments here in our one-on-one thread.

Exception: Once our one-on-one thread exists, one of us will come back here one time to post a link.

William · Post by **William** » Wed Apr 11, 2018 2:50 pm

[Replying to post 60 by Divine Insight]

DI the points your post argues have already been addressed sufficiently in my prior posts and I see no need to get into circular debate with you.

Overall your complaint is that the personality is separate from GOD-consciousness because it is 'personality' and I have already explained why this does not actually have to be the case, and I also explained the 'illusion' aspect as well in relation to GOD-consciousness. You brought the idea of 'illusion' into this discussion as if somehow it would perhaps help you win this debate.

If the personality desires to be separate from the knowledge of GOD-Consciousness, then that is the choice the person has made. The person, in Buddhist terms, remains 'unenlightened' and thus 'under illusion'. The illusion they are under is that they think they are separate from GOD-Consciousness. No matter if they are theist or atheist, it is the same illusion.

Also, as I explained in prior posts, the individuate consciousness is a gift and not all illusions are 'bad'. Those that allow for the person to understand they are not separate at all from GOD, are 'good'. The illusion of personage does not support one way of understanding but resist the other.

You appear to be arguing 'illusion' from a strictly westernized mindset.

AgnosticBoy · Post by **AgnosticBoy** » Sun Apr 15, 2018 10:42 pm

I haven't had time to read the full debate, but some comments lead to me asking about the end goal. I hope that the debate will not simply turn into arguing against all of the naturalistic explanations because that alone would not justify the theistic viewpoint. For all I know, all explanations (theistic ones included) may fall short and we're left with agnosticism. Perhaps, you guys won't be able to avoid going over the naturalistic explanations but I hope the theistic explanation is examined based on its own merits.

I can't deny though that showing how the theistic explanation is coherent is a positive step, even if you can't show that it's the ONLY good explanation.

William · Post by **William** » Mon Apr 16, 2018 2:45 pm

[Replying to post 62 by AgnosticBoy]

As a theist who thinks that my observations best align with Panenthism, i do not separate 'natural' from...well what? 'supernatural? 'unnatural'?

I think such terms originate from separatist mindsets which view the universe as 'parts' - sometimes working against one another, rather than a whole system which is working in wholeness - its parts working together.

Obviously this has to come about because it is possible to view things in that way, because 'things' are 'separate' but even so, there is no reason to assume therefore that they are all not working in congruence, even that it is not altogether so apparent due to our particular situation within the whole of it.

rikuoamero · Post by **rikuoamero** » Wed May 30, 2018 8:32 am

I've been following the discussion and would like to ask some questions of my own. I don't think Tanager/wiploc will answer here, but these are my thoughts.
Tanager says

The buck stops with the potter. If Phil manages to create beings, there is still someone over Phil (his creator and/or sustainer) stipulating what kind of obligations (if any) he is under, even concerning his own creations. The buck does not stop with Phil.

Much like wiploc says in his latest reply, this just means Might Make Right, or Ultimate Might makes right.
What obligation do creations have to obey an ultimate creator? Suppose the ultimate creator is wiploc's malevolent scorpion god, and Scorpion God says to his creations "Sting each other to death". There is none higher than Scorpion God in this scenario.
Are we to sting each other to death because Scorpion God created us, sustains us and commands us to?

If the pot has free will and decides to make a crack in itself so that it no longer holds water, the potter can do with it what it wants to. The potter obligates the pot to hold water. If the potter is rational, the nature of the clay turned pot would help it to hold water well. The potter can have different motives for making such obligations (personal pleasure, making the pot happy, etc.), but that doesn't change whether they are objective obligations placed on the pot.

So let's run with this. Let's assume there's a potter, and a pot that the potter made, and the pot is sentient, has free will.
Should the pot do everything the potter says? What if the potter wants to put dangerous acid in the pot, and use it as a container, so that the potter can douse someone else in acid, to harm or kill them.
If I were the pot in that scenario...I wouldn't want to be an accessory to murder. I'd crack myself. Sure, the potter can do what he wants to me, he has the ability...but where is my obligation to go along with what the potter wants? There's the practical argument, namely that the potter will destroy me if I don't obey him...but that's a coward's argument ultimately.

Basically, should us humans, assuming we have been created by a creator, obey our creator if he tells us to do something that we think is morally wrong?
So far in this discussion, to boil everything down, tanager says yes...but his reasons mainly (from what I can see) are simply might makes right. If we don't do what the potter says, he will discard us.
This is one of the reasons I broke with Christianity. It teaches that we have free will...that God values our free will...but we should NOT disobey God, even if we think a command being given is of dubious moral value.

TSGracchus · Post by **TSGracchus** » Sat Jun 09, 2018 5:52 am

[Replying to post 64 by rikuoamero]

Let's make it even simpler. Suppose God tell's me to take my son up on a mountain, cut his throat and burn his body, just to show how much that I love God. Suppose God tells me to invade a peaceful country, put every one to the sword except virgin girls who are to be distributed as slaves.

Perhaps you begin to see? Perhaps that God is just some fiction manufactured to justify rape, pillage, murder and genocide. And perhaps, just perhaps mind you, the people who fall down and grovel and sing praises to that monstrous fiction are still around and still ready to do whatever his holy priests and prophets demand.

It is just a hypothetical situation, and not to be confused with anything we can see right before our very eyes.

jgh7 · Post by **jgh7** » Sat Jun 09, 2018 2:28 pm

Objective morality is a tough topic. My thoughts are that for objective morality to exist, every single person has to be held accountable for their actions.

Since humans are unable to do this (bad people often get away with their actions), then I do believe an all-powerful God is necessary for objective morality. It is the only way for everyone who has existed, currently exists, and will exist to be held accountable for their actions and thus have objective reasons to follow morality.

There has to be undeniable and unavoidable reason that someone ought not to do something. If someone can easily get away with it, then there is no such reason and no objective morality for that person.

rikuoamero · Post by **rikuoamero** » Fri Jul 13, 2018 5:38 am

Glad to see wiploc is back, was honestly getting worried. In reading his latest response, I noticed he had quoted from Tanager the following phrase

because God makes rape wrong for every human.

What the heck does that mean? God makes rape wrong for every human? Is it along the lines of a legislature declaring an activity to now be illegal? Was reality rewritten such that rape becomes harmful? What about the rapist, how is rape wrong for him/her?
There are some people for whom rape is an actual fetish, and some of those fantasize about being a rape victim.

jgh7 · Post by **jgh7** » Sat Jul 14, 2018 2:18 pm

rikuoamero wrote: Glad to see wiploc is back, was honestly getting worried. In reading his latest response, I noticed he had quoted from Tanager the following phrase

because God makes rape wrong for every human.
What the heck does that mean? God makes rape wrong for every human? Is it along the lines of a legislature declaring an activity to now be illegal? Was reality rewritten such that rape becomes harmful? What about the rapist, how is rape wrong for him/her?
There are some people for whom rape is an actual fetish, and some of those fantasize about being a rape victim.

Something could still be wrong even if someone enjoys it. I think the Tanager's argument is still about ownership in the sense of God creating and sustaining mankind and thus God's will for mankind dictates right and wrong. Wiploc has repeatedly raised objections along the lines of "So if the creator views rape and murder as good, then is it good?" I haven't seen an adequate response from Tanager yet in this regard, but I haven't followed everything in the debate.

rikuoamero · Post by **rikuoamero** » Sat Sep 08, 2018 2:29 pm

From Tanager's latest post

(1a) Intelligent creators ground or explain this through the very idea of creation (not transformation, but creation). Why is anything the way it is on this view? The creator chooses to do it that way. Scientific laws, the intelligibility of reality to humans, physical characteristics, whatever. Whether the creator places moral value within actual acts (all forced copulation is bad no matter if a human or a shark does it) or if the creator places moral values within specific creatures and not others (forced copulation is morally bad for humans, but not for sharks), moral values exist because the intelligent creator made it that way.

I believe the second of these. God creates humans with a certain moral sense that tells us rape is wrong. Sharks are amoral, not moral or immoral. We have a capacity they don't, a moral sense/awaraness/etc. In this view, human moral values are absolutely true regardless of what a human may choose to believe. And those are created in us by the creator.

In the scorpion god scenario, scorpion god creates humans with a value judgment that says being stung to death is bad. This comparison will pick back up in (2a) and (3a).

Surely Tanager can see the problem with 1a. If as he says God created humans with a moral sense that says "rape is bad, m'kay?", then this doesn't tell us anything about actual objective morality (should it exist). His God could very easily have had it as "rape is good, m'kay?".
I'd be much interested to know how under 1a, he knows sharks to be amoral, and not moral/immoral. Sharks are created, aren't they? Wouldn't this mean his god had to have given them some sort of moral sense? Or under Tanager's view, are there two categories of created creatures, those with a creator-given moral sense, and those without a creator-given moral sense? How does someone tell that their moral sense is from a creator, and not simply their own?

As for the scorpion god...this is an invention of wiploc's. But it is also a dead ringer for the Bible God. Apparently, according to Tanager, Bible God created us with a moral sense that says "rape is bad, m'kay?". However, Bible God is also said to have ordered for rapes, just like the hypothetical scorpion god here who commands for stings, even while he creates creatures with a moral revulsion to stinging each other.

Post by **The Tanager** » Sun Oct 21, 2018 5:32 pm

I wanted to thank you all for following along wiploc and mine's discussion and sharing some thoughts on it here. I enjoyed having it with wiploc and I think you should consider voting for him as 2018's most civil debater and debate him head-to-head any chance you get. I love head-to-head, would advise you all to do it with others and would always be open to talking about any subject with any of you.

As to the things you asked here concerning my posts in the head-to-head, I felt like I tried to touch upon them in the course of my responses to wiploc. I'm sure I could have done so more clearly at times. I would gladly answer here any questions anyone had for me that came up as you followed along our discussion that you felt went unanswered.