Review 2 (General)

by Mark , Tuesday, October 21, 2008, 17:49 (5875 days ago) @ dhw

Thanks for the reply, dhw. Apologies accepted - I wouldn't like the task of summarising the contributions on this site! - dhw: "...once the choice is made, whether social or religious, then that provides an "ultimate basis" outside oneself."
If there is a God who is the source of morality then there is an obligation upon me whether I choose to accept it or not. If there is no God yet I choose to submit to a code devised by me or by society, then there is nothing more basic than my choice. The code has no truth of its own, no objectivity. This is a significant difference. - dhw: "I see no sign of objectivity in religious codes either, because they are constantly changing and even Christians cannot agree among themselves what they are.."
Firstly, whilst believing that God is the source of goodness, I and most Christians do not claim to have complete and certain knowledge of what is good in every circumstance in life. The disagreement between religions, and within Christianity, is not necessarily a sign that good is subjective, but that good is not fully known. The disagreement between physicists on string theory does not mean that we should doubt whether string theory is objectively true or false.
Secondly, the differences can be exaggerated. It's not as if basic principles such as "do no harm" or "do as you would be done by" are changing and disagreed across humanity. The difficulties arise when there are competing moral claims and differing beliefs on all kinds of matters by which to judge them. - dhw "I'm not sure that I've understood any of this, but I would suggest that the "tension" lies between the concept of a loving God and the suffering that he has created."
Yes, that is the first tension I was trying to highlight. - dhw "I find your second statement disturbing. As an agnostic, I feel a deep revulsion at suffering, and it is based on sympathy, empathy, human compassion. How can you say that these feelings are without foundation if I don't accept God?"
To be clearer, I should have said "without objective foundation". I don't know if that makes it more acceptable? Without God, revulsion at suffering is purely your decision to feel that way. You may say that everyone else thinks that way, and that it is deep in your biology, but they are not foundations. In other areas we can freely seek to act and think contrary to our instincts and contrary to the majority of other people, and see nothing wrong in that. I am pressing this because I think this is what makes atheism so hard. The belief that murder of children is wrong is no deeper than an arbitrary decision of the will. I think many atheists fail to face up to this, fail to appreciate that for them any distinction between goodness and taste is an illusion. This is what I mean by saying that atheism leaves a different tension. For the only basis for screaming at God saying "this suffering is wrong" is God himself. If you leave God out because of the suffering, you can no longer say to anyone that the suffering is wrong. You can only say "I don't like it. I wish you wouldn't do it. I will try to stop you." Moral language such as "right", "wrong", "ought" is redundant to atheists, but of course they employ it as much as anyone else.