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Author | Topic: Morals without God or Darwin, just Empathy | |||||||||||||||||||||||
nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Sure we do. We do what our brain tells us all the time. Just because the incredibly complex interaction of the biological, social, and individual basis for human behavior cannot be easily reduced to the pat sound-bites you seem to require doesn't mean you are right and science is wrong. "God gave us morals" is certainly easier to deal with, but it explains nothing. It is an intellectual dead end.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: You know what happens to the people who push the button? They get to be the next person hooked up to the killing machine for somebody else to kill.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Are you sure? "anything" is a mighty all-inclusive word. In my experience, individual morality is extremely situation-dependent.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: It does? Please explain.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: We have also evolved the ability to realize that we are going to die someday. Thus, religion was born in order to explain what happens after we die.
quote: No kidding? Where is the "spiritual awareness detector" in humans?
quote: Most higher animals do, indeed, have emotions. Some of the most complex animal emotional lives can be seen, not surprisingly, in our closest relatives, the great apes. Chimps, not surprisingly as they are our very closest relatives, are also self-aware, just as humans are. Remember, ana, that the ability to imagine a God may easily be an artifact of having such large, complex brains.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Nobody is saying that morality is easy to explain. On the other hand, you don't try to explain it at all. You just say, "Godidit", which is the most unsatisfying explanation of all.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: But you said that our brain function changes willy-nilly from day to day. Can you please explain how the function of the brain changes willy-milly from day to day?
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
We have also evolved the ability to realize that we are going to die someday. quote: quote: The difference is that you are making a claim that there is more to life than our body and the physical universe. I make no such claim.
Where is the "spiritual awareness detector" in humans? quote: Huh? This makes no sense. You said that we 'evolved' a 'spiritual awareness detector', just like we evolved emotions. I can point to the brain structures that produce and regulate emotion. Where on the body is the part that detects the spiritual?
Most higher animals do, indeed, have emotions. Some of the most complex animal emotional lives can be seen, not surprisingly, in our closest relatives, the great apes quote: But you do see emotions in those animals, which contradicts what you claimed in your previous post:
quote: Now it seems that you are moving the goalposts.
Remember, ana, that the ability to imagine a God may easily be an artifact of having such large, complex brains quote: Pretty much, yes. Self-awareness and the cognitive ability to plan far into the future is probably neccessary, as well.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: For the umpteenth time, ana, "Love thy neighbor" IS A PART OF SURVIVAL BEHABIOR, TOO!!!!!!!!!!!. Groups are far safer in a dangerous existence than individuals. "Love thy neighbor" is a way for groups to remain cohesive by facilitating cooperation. "Do unto others", in other words.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Yeah, and the answer the writers of the Bible give us is "Godidit." What now? How does that increase our understanding of anything at all?
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Because social interactions are incredibly complex, ana, despite you wanting it to be easy and simple to look at and understand. It isn't an either-or equation. Power is part of our survival phychology as well, as is in-group/out-group xenophobia type feelings.
quote: It is both, that is correct. But so are lots and lots of other feelings and behaviors.
quote: It certainly can be. But all of this reply of yours is another attempt to avoid the issue. You wrote:
And yes, 'love thy neighbor' is preached in many ancient religious texts, way before any behavior science tried to claim it was survival instinct. No one has to preach survival as if they were driving a mule. We already have plenty of natural selfishness driving our survival, and plenty of intelligence to make it work. You seems to me to be claiming that it is only selfishness that "drives survival", but that is not true. Empathy and cooperation also drive survival. Now, I do wish you would answer this question I keep asking: You wrote:
quote: Yeah, and the answer the writers of the Bible give us is "Godidit." What now? How does that increase our understanding of anything at all? 'Explanations like "God won't be tested by scientific studies" but local yokels can figure it out just by staying aware of what's going on have no rational basis whatsoever.' -Percy "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool."- Richard Feynman "Science is like a blabbermouth who ruins a movie by telling you how it ends! Well I say there are some things we don't want to know! Important things!"- Ned Flanders
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Er, yes they do. One of the most famous is Machiavelli's, The Prince.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Why is that an empty thought? I think it makes us humans all the more incredible that we have such capacity for amazingly complex interactions and behaviors. What you are describing is really a form of vanity or pride. It sounds as though you want God to be at the source of morality just so that you can avoid feeling ordinary.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: The particular circumstances of their lives allowed and influenced them to be incredible. Like I've repeatedly said, human social behavior is an extremely complex thing and cannot be described in dichotomies or simple sound bites.
quote: "Better" is subjective and relative. And, nobody is "just like me". I am not "just like" anybody else. And this is getting past the point of my post, which was to respond to your statement:
quote: I ask again; Why is that thought so empty?
quote: I really don't even know why you are talking about saints instead of answering the question.
quote: Well, let's look again at what you wrote:
quote: It certainly looks very much to me as though you simply do not like the idea of morality being natural because to you, it is "empty" without God being the origin of morality. I never said that belief in God, per se, was a kind of vanity, but specifically that being disappointed with and resistant to the prospect that God did not magically imbue us with a special moral sense most certainly is vain.
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nator Member (Idle past 2197 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: That is not true. You have a whole thread of evidences for why people do good things, but you have handwaved away all of it without giving any logical or factual reasons for doing so. This is poor debate. 'Explanations like "God won't be tested by scientific studies" but local yokels can figure it out just by staying aware of what's going on have no rational basis whatsoever.' -Percy "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool."- Richard Feynman "Science is like a blabbermouth who ruins a movie by telling you how it ends! Well I say there are some things we don't want to know! Important things!"- Ned Flanders
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