A personal morality

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I still refuse to believe in it (relative morality). I have a fear, no... I know that if I KNEW for sure, that there was absolutely no doubt that relative morality is correct I'd become one of the most immoral guys in this planet. I'd start "playing" girls just to get sex and doing one night stands. I'd cheat everywhere I could in the working life and so on...

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Really?You have that much a disregard for the feelings of others that you could hurt people and not care that you hurt them?That makes you a sociopath.

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Yeah, basically. But I wouldn't say incapable, its more like umwilling.

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Take god out of this world and.... fuck it, let's party.

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If you really, truly believe that the only reason you wouldn't behave immorally and hurt other people is through fear of punishment from God, then that is a truly frightening thought.It means that you are basically amoral at heart, without a conscience.That makes you pretty much a sociopath.

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If god says "Don't lie or I'll kick your ass"

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Do you really think that your God is interested only in blind obedience? That seems to be only a simplistic understanding of why god chose those particular rules (the 10 commandments).I mean, don't you think God is more interested in how lying to other people hurts those other people, or how being in the habit of lying makes people less able to trust each other, thus keeping people from being able to love and depend upon each other?I mean, isn't the first and most important of God's commandments "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"?Aren't most of the ten commandments simply more specifications on how to treat others the way one would like to be treated?They seem to me to mostly be a bunch of rules for how people should live so they can come together and live in harmony and community.

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Tell me, have you ever held a management position?

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Yes.

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Ever tried to get employees to be good workers without a fear of punishment?

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Yes. It works very well.

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Positive reinforcement can work a little, but when it comes down to it, sometimes you gotta bust out the whip

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Well then, you must be doing something very wrong if you find that the carrots don't work and you frequently have to resort to the whip.Management experts, the management methods used by the best companies, and psychologists all know that the way to get the best performance out of anyone is NOT to rely mostly upon punishment. Rewards and clear expectations work far, far better.

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The last time I got into a bar fight...

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LOL!!!None of the unbelievers I know personally have ever been in a bar fight.None of them have been involved in any sort of violence or threats of violence past the age of 14 or so. It just isn't something that grown ups in my world do. Maybe you have a problem, I don't know.That "feeling" you talk about having, that voice that you hear that says "This is a bad idea, you shouldn't be doing this even though you want to right now"; everybody (who isn't a sociopath) has that voice inside of them. That is your conscience.Some people attibute it to God, others don't.Edited by nator, : No reason given.

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But that is just my opinion, because without god, we are amoral beasts.

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When people have damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex of the brain, they become sociopaths.This part of the brain, just like every other part of the brain, evolved, and it doesn't take a huge leap to understand how the ability to empathise with and feel remorse for hurting others would be adaptive in a social species.Without God, then, we would still have a conscience and wouldn't be amoral beasts.

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Well, they do in southern Illinois.

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You are missing the irony here.None of the unbelievers I know get into bar fights, nor have they engaged in violence since they were immature children.You, a believer, an educated professional, and an adult, are claiming that morality comes from God, and you rely on God to tell you that getting into bar fights is wrong when your conscience fails you.Bar fights. You actually need God to tell you that it isn't a good idea to get into bar fights? None of my unbeliever friends need God to help them in this regard. At all. Not even a little tiny bit.

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When my conscience isn't getting the job done, I can turn to god to pick up the slack.

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That's still your conscience.Some people attribute it (or in your case, a part of it) to God (or their long-dead Grandmother, or someone else they wouldn't want to disappoint), but everybody has it.

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I don't think its my conscience.

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But then you are merely dismissing the evidence from neuroscience regarding the role of the ventromedial frontal cortex in producing the conscience.To follow your lead, it means that God's ability to instill morality and a conscience in people can be stymied by a brain injury.

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If it was from god, unbelievers would still have it even though they don't believe in him.

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Since everybody has a brain, everybody has a conscience....except the people who's ventromedial frontal cortex is damaged or abnormal.That's what Occam's Razor tells us.

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And they're gonna be fucked when they actually need to use violence.

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See, to me, part of growing up is learning how to deal with people and situations without resorting to violence.Getting into fights (not talking about self-defense) is most often a failure of maturity, wisdom, and intelligence.

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Bar fighting is all culture.

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See, here's what my non-God, brain-based, unbeliever morality tells me about that.If it is the culture where you live that otherwise educated adult people regularly get into drunken brawls in bars, and your morality tells you that getting into bar fights is wrong yet you are tempted to do so in those places anyway, then you don't go to the bars where the fights happen.Didn't God ever tell you that?Edited by nator, : No reason given.Edited by nator, : No reason given.

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No, I was typing about something other than my conscience.

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But what is that thing? Your assertions don't constitute a real argument in favor of the existence of anything beyond a brain-based conscience.

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Not necessarily.

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Well, actually, yes, this is the logical conclusion of what you are claiming. It is not "twisting" what you are saying to apply your claims to the issue and follow where they lead.Aren't you claiming that at least some of what we call the human conscience is NOT produced in the brain and is instilled in us by God?If what you say is true, it shouldn't be possible to remove this God-given conscience through damage to the brain, right?

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Bad people look for people like you to prey upon.

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No, bad people look for people like you who are easily goaded into foolish behavior, like brawling in bars, to prey upon.Who's the smart one; the person who gets into the fight, or the person who avoids the fight in the first place?

I don't twist what you say. I am using the logical argument called reductio ad absurdum. If you don't think that your claim leads to the conclusion I've come to, then explain to me how they don't.I should think that you might expect to be challenged on your claims at a debate forum. You have, however, often made claims here and then refused to defend them.