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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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Your use of the word "If" says a lot. If a person has free will and does not know that "God" exists, in what sense can they freely cut themselves off from "God"?
In addition:
"He who orders his slave to do things that he knows him to be incapable of doing, then punishes him, is a fool". - Abu Isa al-Warraq
Sorry I'm late for this party. Did comment to something Algebe said before posting this...
Now, let's break it down and do some answer boogie...
OK. I am with you so far...
OKaayyy... I'll let you say that. I ain't. I am just agreeing that is what you are saying.
First, this hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie needs to explain WHY homosexual behavior is wrong...
This hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie needs to explain WHY marriage is necessary for sex... Before explaining WHY sex outside of marriage is wrong...
This hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie needs to explain WHY I am not allowed to think whatsoever I wish to think... Even if I never act upon those thoughts...
This hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie needs to explain WHY he wants a relationship with little old insignificant me... Then this hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie needs to explain WHY I would want a realtionship with him...
This hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie needs to explain WHY I should hold his moral beliefs to be greater than the moral beliefs I can formulate with my own cognitive abilities of empathy, rationality, logic, reason, deduction, critical thinking, sympathy, analytical thought, and the greatest one of all, LOVE, as I interact with others of my "kind."
****quickly runs and hides since I used that dreaded "kind" word****
This hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie needs to explain WHY I cannot self-reflect upon your own moral beliefs...
Comprendéz-vous?
rmfr
"This hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie needs to explain WHY I should hold his moral beliefs to be greater than the moral beliefs I can formulate with my own cognitive abilities"
In this hypothetical, God does exist and would therefore be your creator. What do you mean He'd have to explain to you why He'd know better than you? Your very faculties would have come from Him and He'd be omniscient. For you to say you know better than Him would be like sawing off the branch on which you stand. Are you incapable of any kind of rational thinking?
The rest of your post is akin to a three year old perpetually asking her parents why when they tell her not to touch a hot stove.
But that's the point of this thread. I knew that many of you would answer in this way. Even in a hypothetical where God does exist, many of you would still not listen to Him. You'd still believe that you know better. This indicates that your atheism is mostly emotional, under-girded by very poor reasons that you believe are rational.
@myusernamekthx
Actually that is no different than when I explained AND discussed anything with my twin daughters. With a little help from my wife, I was the creator of my twin daughters.
Why cannot this hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie do the same for me?
rmfr
"Actually that is no different than when I explained AND discussed anything with my twin daughters."
What would you do if your children incessantly ignored your warnings or kept asking "why"? What would you do if they freely chose to ignore your warnings? Would it make you an evil person if they decided to touch a hot stove despite your numerous warnings and explanations? What would you do if your daughters tried telling you that they knew better than you and to stop bothering them?
If you are capable of preventing evil and choose not to, you are an evil person.
(I don't actually believe in evil, except in this limited sense)
Pulling from this post...
As said in the above, if my daughters asked questions, I took them to the Walls of Why and told them to, "Go find the answer."
I was just wondering if you were intelligent enough to give me the same answer.
If this hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie of yours cannot tell me to "Go find the answer." Then he ain't.
And I am going out on a thin limb here, let's assume this hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie of yours is the same as the Christian God. If so, then your hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie would want to be found, wants us to find Him, and this deity is capable of literally anything. It should not be a problem for your sky-faerie to provide evidence that would convince me of His existence.
I am afraid that your hypothetical ultimate unlimited sky-faerie has the same chance of existence as the Christian God: 0.
Ta. Ta.
****hand kiss**** ****blow****
rmfr
He's not hiding from his daughters though, is he you clown. Your deity hasn't demonstrated a shred of objective evidence it's any more real than Thor or Zeus.
You can create fictional scenarios about your fictional deity all you want, they're meaningless until someone demonstrates some objective evidence that it exists.
If that happened I would still need it to demonstrate it was moral in some meaningful way. A deity that endorses slavery, commits indiscriminate murder, ethnic cleansing, even genocide, and encouraged the rape and sex trafficking of young female prisoners could not rationally expect me to worship it just because it was all powerful. Then again I seem to lack the amoral servile stupidity you seem to think is rational and moral. You'd have made a "good" Nazis by the sound of it.
Maybe god is evil. Who is to say that he isn't? Having ultimate power does not equate to ultimate goodness.
Maybe he really likes raping children. And by the often Christian definition of good being whatever god says is good, maybe raping children is good and you shouldn't have a problem with it.
Stone Jade
"Maybe god is evil. Who is to say that he isn't? Having ultimate power does not equate to ultimate goodness. Maybe he really likes raping children. And by the often Christian definition of good being whatever god says is good, maybe raping children is good and you shouldn't have a problem with it."
This is precisely the point, and of course theists who make the claim for objective morality never answer when you ask how they can objectively know if divine diktat is moral. The reason is obvious, since if they can use their human reasoning to assess the morality of claims assigned to their deity, then they it shows the hypocrisy when they decry that same human reasoning of morality in atheists. On the other hand if as they claim all human reasoning is subjective, then they are lying when they claim divine diktat is objectively moral, as they have no objective way to assess this.
Either way religious and theistic morals are entirely subjective, what's more they are derived from archaic superstitions originating in the bronze age, which explains why they endorse so many barbaric, cruel and bigoted ideas, like slavery, stoning children to death, murdering people who happen to be gay, and on and on.
That's before we point out the subjective way the average theists cherry picks which part of divine diktat they subjectively want to follow.
It blows my mind. On one hand, I've often heard Christians say that they have a "feeling", a "knowing" that the god of the Bible is the One True God. It's been revealed to them. But then, somehow, the gut feelings disappear regarding the horrific acts the Bible says that god committed. All intuition about "right and wrong" is abandoned and frantic, squirming justification replaces it. "Maybe god was just testing them." "They brought it on themselves." "He didn't really want them to do it, but he let them choose." God is immune to all scrutiny. Unless it's someone else's god. Then we can absolutely criticize that god's ethics.
According to you, god does exist. So why are you asking atheists who do not believe in the existence of gods how they would act in an universe where god exists? Atheists cannot listen to a being they do not believe in the existence of.
It sounds like you believe that believing in the existence of god and listening to god are the same thing. That is an emotional stance.
myusernamekthx,
"Even in a hypothetical where God does exist, many of you would still not listen to Him. You'd still believe that you know better."
According to the biblical fairy tale when Adam & Eve ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil they became just as smart as Yahweh on this issue. Consequently there is nothing more that he can tell us about moral issues. We are perfectly capable of governing ourselves by our laws and codes of ethics. Yahweh is only needed to fork over eternal life or eternal punishment.
Hey Y'all;
Finally figured it out.
myusernamekthx is using and going by William Lane Craig's bullshit known as Divine Command Morality.
Technically, it is called the Divine Command Theory (which should actually be called Hypothesis).
Divine Command Morality: The belief you Absolutist Apologists hold onto that says that anything your God commands is good, regardless of its actual moral implications. This is the biggest pile of bullshit I have ever heard. I found these two formal definitions for Divine Command Morality: "Morality is dependent upon God, and that moral obligation consists in obedience to God's commands." And from Wikipedia: "A meta-ethical theory which proposes that an action's status as morally good is equivalent to whether it is commanded by God." In other words, if "God" tells you to perform an ethnic cleansing, then it is morally good. To which I would say, "Bullshit!"
And he is definitely following the second part of this adage:
Morality is doing right, no matter what you are told.
Religion is doing what you are told, no matter what is right.
— H. L. Mencken
rmfr
Now to go back and read the new comments...
There's a quote from a Dostoevsky novel that is often paraphrased as "Without God, everything is permitted".
But myusernamekthx has clarified that "With God, anything could be permitted".
What's the point of Objective Morality if you cannot tell the difference between god and the devil?
What's the point of god?
"But myusernamekthx has clarified that "With God, anything could be permitted"."
I never wrote that.
A maximally powerful being would have necessary existence (cannot fail to exist, exists in all possible worlds, etc.); meaning, whatever moral nature that being has would be the same across all possible worlds in the same way that 2 + 2 = 4 in all possible worlds.
Now, if you want to say that it just so happens that God's moral nature is one where He enjoys murder, rape, etc., then that's up to you. Obviously, that isn't the case going by the 10 commandments and the teachings of Jesus, for instance.
Conversely, your moral beliefs are contingent upon socioeconomic and cultural influences as well as whims. If you were born during a time when chattel slavery was normal and legal, then you would have probably accepted it while God would have looked down on you knowing full-well that chattel slavery is wrong.
When I asked you if you would kill a child if you believed that god told you to, you said "Of course. I'd be stupid not to.".
Can you give a list of things you would not do if you believed god wanted you to do them?
Your god is in favor of torture, which is the greatest evil, which would thus make your god the greatest evil if it existed.
"When I asked you if you would kill a child if you believed that god told you to, you said "Of course. I'd be stupid not to."."
Try to think past stage 1 for a change.
If a maximally powerful being (God) commanded you to perform X, then that command would be an expression of His moral nature; and this moral nature would be the same (along with the rest of God) in all possible worlds in the same way that 2+2=4 in all possible worlds.
Now, if I knew for certain that a being was God, then of course I'd want to follow any commands given to me by this being. This is because His moral nature, whatever it is, would be by definition objective. This is different from saying that God just randomly issues out commands and whatever He says goes. His commands wouldn't be random or arbitrary, they would be the expressions of His objective moral nature.
If you want to say that God's moral nature is one that enjoys rape or murdering children, then feel free to, but the Bible paints a different picture, especially in the form of the teachings of Jesus and the 10 commandments.
And if you want to keep on pressing by saying, "Well, let's say that if God were what we call evil, what then?" I'd say that it'd make no sense to call such a being objectively evil. On what grounds would be able to say that? That'd be like saying that 2 + 2 = 90, when in reality it equals 4. Wouldn't it make more sense to say that the person who thinks 2 + 2 = 90 is just bad at math? Maybe you're just bad at moral reasoning.
utterly futile....
plainly bollocks....
and very dangerous to your brain...
don't read it....if you do, you'll feel (shivering then seizure, and coma afterwards.)
isn't this trolling??did you even get what he was trying to say?
Erm no. A person is not moral because they are powerful, as you imply. A person is moral because they are moral. Whether 2+2=90 or whether a being is maximally powerful is completely irrelevant.
"Erm no. A person is not moral because they are powerful, as you imply."
Yeah, I didn't write that.
I wrote that God is a necessary being--but you don't know what that means. That's because you're ignorant of basic philosophy. A necessary being is one that exists in all possible worlds. A contingent being is one that does not exist in all possible worlds. For example, you're a contingent being because you could have failed to exist. Your parents didn't have to procreate, to use one example. You could also cease to exist; for example, an immigrant from a Muslim country could throw acid in your face and then set you on fire.
On the other hand, necessary beings exist in all possible worlds and cannot fail to exist. One example of this is mathematical truths. Even in a possible world where no matter and energy exists, the proposition 2 + 2 = 4 would still be true.
In philosophy (and theology), our God is defined as a maximally powerful (which includes necessary being). This means our God exists in all possible worlds and cannot cease to exist. This means that whatever nature our God possesses is the same in every possible world, which includes His moral nature.
So the question you should be asking is what is God's moral nature. I believe God's moral character can be found in the Bible, especially in the ten commandments and the teachings of Jesus.
"A person is moral because they are moral."
This is just circular reasoning. You haven't explained what is moral. Is deep-frying a baby moral? Well, according to you, it is moral just as long as you think it's moral. Morality is completely arbitrary under your definition. What's moral for one person may not be moral for another person; yet, neither one can ever say that they're objectively correct.
The laws of nature define all possible worlds. If the laws of nature are not necessary, then nothing is necessary. And if they are necessary, then everything that exists is necessary.
Your definition of god is not actually agreed upon by philosophers and theologians.
God is only maximally powerful if it exists and is maximally powerful. Similarly, god can only be a necessary being if god exists.
It has been mentioned to you that morality is inherently subjective. But if morality is not defined on the basis of what is moral, then it cannot be considered moral in any sense. However, in your case, you are arguing that something is moral if you believe a maximally powerful being wants you to do it. So you do not even seem to have any standard of morality other than "might is right".
I don't think that the opinion of humans based on their observations of the natural world is completely arbitrary. That is purely your view.
this is what your god think of you "myuser"
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"The laws of nature define all possible worlds."
...You don't understand what "possible worlds," "necessary," and "contingent" means in the context of philosophy. I've told you this numerous times and even provided a link for you to read. So why are you insisting on misusing these terms and pretending like you do understand what they mean? Are you a troll?
"Your definition of god is not actually agreed upon by philosophers and theologians"
Maximally powerful being or greatest conceivable being is a normative definition for God in philosophy.
"It has been mentioned to you that morality is inherently subjective."
I know that you believe morality is subjective. That's the logical consequence of being an atheist. You can believe killing babies is good just as easily as believing ice cream is good. I believe morality is objective, which means murdering a baby is as wrong as 2 + 2 = 90; and it wouldn't matter if you thought murdering babies was good or if an entire planet thought that murdering a baby was good. It'd still be wrong.
"you are arguing that something is moral if you believe a maximally powerful being wants you to do it."
To be precise, I believe being good is to mimic the moral behavior of our God and to follow His commands.
"So you do not even seem to have any standard of morality other than "might is right""
I never gave a reason for why one ought to follow God's commands or ought to mimic His moral behavior, so that's a lie. All I wrote is that God's moral behavior is objective. A person could follow God's commands or mimic His behavior for a multitude of reasons. One reason might be because they're afraid of Him. Another reason might be out of respect. Another reason might be because they feel like God would know best, since He's an omniscient being.
"I don't think that the opinion of humans based on their observations of the natural world is completely arbitrary."
The atheist should believe that their moral beliefs are arbitrary (if they're logically consistent), which is precisely what you wrote earlier. You wrote that morality is inherently subjective, which means it's person-relative, which means it's in fact arbitrary. That's what arbitrary means.
Myusername, I’m curious...you have accused other posters of not understanding philosophy. You also use your understanding Of it to prop up your arguments. Are you educated in it? If so, to what level? Have you any credentials?
It is clear you do not understand what is meant by the "laws of nature" or the word "possible". You are using an argument for god that is by no means a normative definition in philosophy. Rather, it is considered a deeply flawed argument.
I know what arbitrary means. But I did not take you to task not for saying that human opinion is arbitrary...but for saying it was [i]completely[/i] arbitrary. Now, you may indeed think that human opinion is indeed completely arbitrary, but you are even making two distinct things equal the same thing, which is demonstrably false.
Do you suppose he was this stupid to start with, or has religion caused some or all of it? It's clear that stupidity is a fertile incubator for superstition, but does superstition simply take a free ride on the coat tails of the stupid, or does it take a more proactive role in the unabashed stupidity we see here?
I found this article that makes some salient observations.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/mr-personality/201312/why-are-re...
and this
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/atheists-more-intelligent-tha...
Of course that data is measuring general trends, and need not be required in this case as he simply is too stupid to understand why his claims are asinine. I'd genuinely feel sorry for him if he wasn't such a deeply unpleasant troll.
All beings that exist necessarily exist, otherwise they would not exist. It has nothing to do with being maximally powerful. That is simply what you would expect based on the laws of nature. Any thing that is possible necessarily exists, otherwise it would not be possible.
"All beings that exist necessarily exist, otherwise they would not exist."
I think we ran into this same problem before. You don't seem to have a basic grasp of logic and philosophy.
In philosophy there are these terms called contingent and necessary. These terms fall under ontology in philosophy. I suggest that you go read up on what these words mean, and then come back to me.
The laws of nature define what is necessary, otherwise they would not be laws of nature. For the same reason, they define what is possible.
The concepts of "contingency" and "necessity" to refer to beings is a peculiar habit of theology, rather than philosophy. You cannot prove a being exists by defining it as necessary. That would simply be an argument over semantics, rather than matters of fact.
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