Atheism Cannot Rationally Explain Morals.

Ringo: "On the contrary, evolution suggests that our genes are important, and our children have to be protected until they can pass them on."On the contrary, evolution suggests that life is meaningless and that nothing is important. Evolution is blind, mindless, unconscious and uncaring. It doesn't care if you and your children exist or don't exist. Do you think human beings need to exist? Of course they don't! Evolution doesn't care if your children pass their genes on or not. Evolution is just a series of meaningless accidents; it doesn't care if all life ceases to exist; it doesn't care if atoms themselves cease to exist. If you think life is important you suffering from a delusion that contradicts science.----------------------------------Ringo: "That is the foundation of all morality". Science says existence is meaningless, so there is no foundation for morality.

jar: "The God portrayed in the Bible stories ...does not think people are important."For God so loved the world that He gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. - John 3:16----------------------------------------------You call this God a "vicious genocidal monster", the implication being that he is immoral. Ok, it's your opinion is that genocide is immoral, but your opinion is unscientific, because science says human beings are no more important than bugs (or rocks, for that matter). So if killing bugs isn't immoral, neither is killing humans. Therefore in order to prove that this God is immoral, you must first - at the very least - prove that the life of a human being is worth more than he life of a bug. Otherwise, all you've got is your opinion verses the opinion of this God. So tell me, how are you going to come up with this proof when it contradicts science?

Oh, do tell. What does evolutionary theory say about the meaning of life and accidental mutations.

Rare indeed is the atheist who accepts the inescapable existential implications of "science" - ie, that life and morality are meaningless. On the other hand, all those atheists who can't face up to these bleak implications and delude themselves that life and morality do have meaning, can take comfort in knowing that "science" also says it doesn't matter what a man believes, it life adds up to the same thing in the end - nothing.

Hang on now, let me get this straight ... you can see no difference in value between(a) the life of a meaningless machine that was fashioned by a meaningless process of evolution and that will last only a few short meaningless years,and(b) a life created in the image of a loving God, an omnipotent God who created the entire universe out of nothing and who has the power to grant that human being eternal life and eternal happiness in a paradise where ageing, ugliness, boredom, worry, fear, disability, illness and pain don't exist?Wow.

PaulK: "We can value ourselves for what we are."Ok, what are we? According to science we are a bunch of atoms assembled by a series of blind accidents to form a meaningless machine. We live a meaningless life of a few years and die, disintegrating into the meaningless atoms we're made of and into eternal oblivion. What's valuable about that?

Do I advocate capital punishment for women who have abortions? No.

Which part do you disagree with?(Btw, you accuse other posters of making assertions without explanation, but I've noticed that you're pretty good at it yourself ; in fact, you're the worst offender.)

Why have you drooled this stupid lie? Who do you hope to deceive by telling it?
(Does that sound familiar? It should.)But seriously, you can deny the inescapable implications of your "science", but you can't change them. But, no matter, life is meaningless so you may as well live in a dreamworld.---------------------------------------------------------Do you need to exist? No, you don't - the universe will proceed quite nicely without human beings. So since you don't need to exist, what is your worth?Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.

jar says: "the God described in the Bible says that humans have the same capacity to know right from wrong the same as God does. Have you ever read the Bible?"Humans have the capacity to form their own code of morality, but it may be very different to the code of morality of the God of the Bible. For example, Hitler thought it morally acceptable to murder 6 million Jews, but I don't think the God of the Bible - who told the Jews that he loves them - would consider it morally acceptable to kill 6 million Jews.Er, yes, I have read the Bible. -----------------------------------------------------You say it was immoral for the God of the Bible to kill certain human beings. Well, I've studied science and evolution and come to the conclusion that life is meaningless, and since it is meaningless, it is worthless. So when you say it was immoral for that God to kill all those human beings, I've got no idea what you're on about and wonder how you could be so ignorant of science. Morality? Why the hell should I care about morality? If life is meaningless, so is morality. And how did you work out that it's "wrong" to kill humans? Please explain.

Matter, per se, is chaotic. Chaos can't produce inevitabilities (outcomes), as chaos can only produce more chaos. If chemistry leads to outcomes it cannot be chaotic, but ordered. The only way chaos can become ordered is by an input of intelligence. Hence, if chemistry produces outcomes it must be designed/programmed to do so. Some intelligent entity would be necessary to do the designing/programming.------------------------------------------Morality involves choice. Selective pressures remove choice, don't they?------------------------------------------

Tangle: "Tell me, is it also true of a Christian who believes that evolution is a scientific fact?"No, a Christian doesn't believe that a human is worth as the same as a bug because a Christian believes humans are made in the image of God and the Bible also says God values humans other creatures. God says killing another human is a serious sin but killing a bug in not a very serious sin (or perhaps not even a sin at all).--------------------------------------------To a evo-Christian, a human is not the product of a meaningless process, but created out of love by God who promises eternal life to those who love him.

Firstly, I don't know how you have linked morality to ecology. If atheists are correct - ie, evolution is true and there is no God - then life is meaningless and therefore morality is meaningless, which in turn means it doesn't matter if humans pollute the environment to the point where all life on earth is destroyed, since no life needs to exist.But in answer to your questions:1. I don't know.
2. I don't know.
3. I don't know.If you think bees are worth more than humans, does that mean killing a human is less immoral than killing a bee?Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.

Paulk: "Don't you think culture has something to do with it [human behaviour]"?Human culture is the result of human brain activity. If human brains are the result of evolution, then so is human culture.-----------------------------------------Paulk: "that would be true if all human behaviour is all unthinking instinct."How do you know that all human behaviour is not instinct? Perhaps individual humans are programmed by their DNA to behave in a certain way, regardless of the "thinking" they might do before deciding to act out the behaviour in question.William Provine believed that evolution means human beings have no free will.

Tangle: "The absence of anyone who thinks he's no more important than a bug is rather devastating to your argument don't you think?"I've already mentioned the atheist who told me, "We're just grubs." No doubt there are more atheists who think the same way.----------------------------------------------Tangle: "This silly idea of the ToE as a worldview is purely a creationist idea."Nonsense. Read the conclusions atheist William Provine came to, based on his belief in ToE. It shaped his entire approach to life. Provine also said "Evolution is the greatest engine for atheism ever invented."
There are many theists who abandoned religion as a result of believing ToE to be true. Richard Dawkins speaks of the influence ToE has had on his worldview.
I would imagine there are many millions of people in the world whose outlook on life has been influenced as a result of taking ToE seriously.