What we must accept if we accept materialism

OK, so God disagrees with you. In that case you need to find another answer.y

How would God let you know what his standard was?

---

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible

I have a response to this post at Message 83. It's been waiting around for a few days and it's getting lonely.

---

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible

Hi randmanI've provided two carefully thought out responses to this post, and you haven't responded to either of them. I may be biased but I'd have thought discussing these issues would be more interesting than taking part in the rather silly 'Top Boffs Don't Believe In God' thread. (But there you are, there's no accounting for taste :rolleyes.This message has been edited by JavaMan, 02-17-2006 07:51 AM

---

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible

He might call a meeting.

Unless you've received knowledge about that standard through a personal revelation from God, then you have to accept the word of someone else that a particular moral standard is God's standard. How does that provide the absolute certainty that you require?And even if you do have a personal revelation, would you necessarily abandon your current moral standards if they conflicted with those that God insisted were his absolute standards? What I'm suggesting here is that you have adopted some of your moral standards after a fair bit of deliberation, i.e. you have quite solid grounds for them, so why would you just abandon them without question on the say so of another sentient being?

---

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible

Yes, and then we'd have no idea what the standard was.

---

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible

My moral standards would have come from God in the first place. There would be no doubt about the standard. It would be as inescapable as a mathematical formula.

Would that apply just to you or to everybody?

---

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible

Sorry to have left your post lonely for so long. Unfortunately the topic is also cold in my mind, but let's see.I think I'll just give you that you can come up with practical ethical and legal social sanctions because I've lost track of my train of thought. If I recapture it, you never know, there may be more to come. True enough, they apply to SENTIENT beings. Also to the angels in other words. However, they do seem to have an affect on the physical world, but again, I don't remember what point I was making. Maybe you should remind me of this post again some time. But the Biblical revelation explains why we don't: the Fall, which distorted the human moral sense. Yes I suppose that is a plausible enough alternative to the explanation of the Fall. You don't recognize an inborn conscience then? That is, a sense of guilt for wrongdoing that is at least somewhat independent of what you have been taught? However, the Biblical laws of the OT have served as a pretty solid foundation for law in the West. But if you are looking only at human thought, of course, it can't be perfect: again, the Fall. But also differing circumstances from time to time and place to place call for legal refinements.Sorry, perhaps I should have put off answering this even farther, since I hardly remember the discussion or what I was pursuing at the time.

It would apply like 2 plus 2 make 4.But since this is not the state of affiars, then we have no grounds for morality. One system is as good as another, logically speaking. Practically and culturally speaking, of course, we have to follow the dictates of the tribe.

I don't think you'd find many Christians accepting the position you've adopted in the last couple of posts. If morality were as certain as mathematics, there wouldn't be any more virtue in acting morally than in doing arithmetic.In most Christian theologies a Christian is no more certain in this secular sense than a non-Christian. What makes a Christian different is that, despite these secular uncertainties, he or she makes a leap of faith, accepting God and God's moral order regardless. When they talk about certainty they mean a spiritual certainty not a logical or mathematical certainty. I don't think we're actually that far apart in what we're saying. My disagreement with you is on what provides 'good grounds' for a moral judgement. As far as I'm concerned, if you don't believe in a spiritual ground underlying morality then morality is a practical affair, just the rules we use to live together in society. And because it's a practical affair we can use our reason and experience to make judgements about which rules are better than others. (And what 'better' means in a sentence like the last is precisely what moral philosophies like epicureanism and utilitarianism aim to define).

---

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible

There are no good grounds in a logical sense. Practicality is not a logical ground. One might say, "I think our moral rule should be that we must do that which helps the human race to continue to survive and to decrease human suffering."That sounds nice, but there's no logical reason why I should accept that rule. Why should I care about the human race? Why shouldn't I do that which benefits me even if it harms the race as a whole in the future? Someone might say, "it would be selfish of you to do so."
So? Or someone might say, "what's good for the race as a whole is good for you." Not necessarily. I might be able to make millions and be very happy by doing something that pollutes the atmosphere eventually. What do I care? I'm not going to be around when the atmosphere turns bad. Ultimately, all one can say is, "You ought to do what helps the race because it's the right thing to do." That's a tautology: do what's right because it's right.

There's nothing to stop you taking that attitude even if there were a logical ground. What you're asking for is not to be given a logical ground for acting in a certain way, but to be compelled to act in that way. What does that have to to with what most people think of as morality?

---

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible

It's not about being compelled; it's about having a logical reason for accepting any moral rule. The value "what's good for the human race" has no ground. The value "practicality" has no ground. The value "unselfishness" has no ground. Morality is about feelings and personal taste.However, one aspect of this issue that is intriguing to me is that morality does not FEEL subjective.