The Tanager wrote:
Divine Insight wrote:I started this thread for The Tanager to post his arguments for non-subjective or "
objective" morality.
Apparently it turns out that he doesn't have any arguments to support those philosophical ideals.
I agree with you, for starters he would need to show where there is evidence for the existence of such a thing. But thus far, no evidence has been produced.
For those reading this who were not a part of that other thread, DI and I perceive how that discussion went very differently. I will summarize my claims there for anyone interested here and will gladly clarify and defend those claims further.
You were demonstrated to be wrong in the other thread. And ironically you repeat those flawed argument again here:
(1) If atheism is true, then human morality is probably subjective.
It wouldn't just "
probably" be subjective, it would be subjective. That's all it could be. And that's also all that it actually is.
(2) If theism is true, then human morality is objective.
This is clearly false because even if a God existed (especially a God as described in the Hebrew Bible, then morality would be nothing more than the subjective opinions of that God.
If there actually existed an objective morality then even the God would need to abide by that higher morality. But the Biblical God has no problem murdering anyone he feels like murdering. He even commanded men to kill other men who worship God's other than him. He's a self-confessed jealous God who has no problem killing anyone who doesn't worship and obey him.
But never mind the immoral God of the Bible. That's obviously a work of fiction anyway.
The bottom line is that if there was an objective morality that says that it's wrong to kill human babies then any God who created animals that would attack an eat a human baby would be an immoral God. Yet, that's exactly what we see happening in our real world. So there cannot be any objective morality. Even if a creator God exists he would necessarily be an immoral creator. Unless you want to claim that it's moral to kill human babies.
(3) Assuming agnosticism on the theism issue, I argued that objectivism would be more plausible than subjectivism until a defeater comes along...(akin to trusting our physical senses until shown evidence that we see a mirage before us)...due to a very specific universal human initial moral intuition that morality is an objective kind of thing.
But this argument fails for the same reason. The defeater already exists. It's called the universe. Many people refer to it as "real life".
I did not propose data backing up that this is universal (since it is introspective evidence and we can't get that kind of data on it) and only offered it in that light, telling those whose introspective evidence goes against that to discount the argument and turn back to agnosticism concerning the objectivism/subjectivism issue.
Introspection can't change the fact that we live in a dog-eat-dog world. Humans can do all the introspection they so desire, that's not going to change the reality that the natural world does not behave in a fashion that humans consider to be moral.
The fact that the world is not designed in a way that even humans would consider to be moral proves that there cannot be a moral creator God, or any form of objective morality.
So there is no question that objective morality does not exist. It's a philosophical dream that many humans, including myself, would be thrilled if it could be true. But the fact is that it can't be true. The facts are already in. We live in an universe that does not behave in way that we wish it would behave.
That's reality.
Talking about an imaginary objective morality may be a temping philosophical dream to wish for. But unfortunately the universe doesn't behave in a way that is compatible with that dream.
If this universe was created by a God, then that God cannot be moral., At least not in a way that would be compatible with what humans think should constitute morality.
It's not just that there is no evidence for objective morality. The problem for moral dreamers is that the evidence that no objective morality can exist is already abundant in the universe. Right here on planet earth, right before our very eyes.
And the immorality of the earth can't even be blamed on humans. Animals were behaving in ways that humans deem to be immoral long before humans ever evolved, and if humans became extinct tomorrow animals would continue to behave in ways that humans would consider to be immoral. So actions that humans would consider to be immoral exist even without humans being around to complain about it.
The world is innately immoral. And if it was created by a God then the creator God is necessarily also immoral. So trying to claim that our universe was created by a perfectly moral creator doesn't work anyway.
The evidence against the existence of any objective morality is overwhelming.