In reply to Rahvin,
Since I would like to try to reply to most of the people's comments on this post, I will not reply to every point you made, as some of them are common to other posts.
No worries. No need to get overwhelmed by multiple responses.
quote:
Ethics and morality are human constructs
You claim you have no underlying assumptions. Perhaps different atheists have different specific beliefs, but YOU make the assumption that ethics and morality are human constructs. If this isn't an underlying assumption, then I don't know what is.
My apologies, but then it is apparently true that you do not know what an underlying assumption is.
That morality and ethics are human constructs is not an assumption - it is a
conclusion based on evidence, some of which I posted.
Allow me to explain in greater detail. If morality is an external, objective "entity," rather than human invention, then we should not see multiple systems of ethics, and different moral values according to culture.
But that's
exactly what we see. Moral values are a function of culture, not an objective, independently existing "entity." Different cultures have different values, and use different ethical systems. Some societies have communal property rights, and no concept of theft. Some are highly patriarchal; others value both genders equally. Some are highly accepting of outsides; others are xenophobic to the point of considering
being an "outsider" to be immoral. Some consider nudity to be shameful and harmful; others consider it perfectly natural and normal. Some consider working on a specific day to be immoral; others have no such restriction.
Babies are not born with any sense of morality. Their initial
social instincts are selfish in nature - they want food, they want attention, etc. They have no built-in concept of property. They have no idea what "death" is, and thus no concept of "murder." They don't know about sexuality, and so don;t have any opinions on whether a given sexual orientation is moral or immoral. They don;t know what the Sabbath is, and so can't tell wehter working on it is good or bad.
They don't even know what God is, and so cannot determine whether they believe in such a thing or not, let alone whether doing so is good or bad.
Even in Authoritarian ethical systems, we typically see people decide for themselves what is right and wrong even above the dictates of the Authority. Most Biblical Christians who accept the moral authority of the Bible, for instance, would still identify even
play-acting that one was going to sacrifice one's child to be horrifically immoral child abuse, or would condemn the Bible's instruction to
execute rebellious children.
I take this as
evidence that suggests the
conclusion that morality is the invention of social animals.
It's not an assumption at all, even if you disagree with my conclusion based on the evidence.
My underlying assumption is that morals and ethics etc. are derived from God and God alone. To address why different civilizations have different "taboos", I need go no further than the Word of God. "For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. " (Romans 1:21-23). We live in a world corrupted by sin, and the cannibals you speak of are the people spoke of in the aforementioned scripture passage.
Yet those cultures had no concept of the Hebrew "God" before it was
told to them. Various cultures around the world have worshipped nature itself; animal spirits; ancestors; multiple pantheons of wildly different deities; enlightened human beings; and all manner of other things. There is
no evidence that any of them "knew" your deity and "chose" nott o worship him. The words of your book are not themselves
evidence - they are an
assertion that has not been supported.
So I will ask: If a cannibal (from say, Africa) and an American meet out in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, where they are no longer connected to their respective societies, would it be right for the cannibal to cannibalize the American, or would it be wrong?
From my understanding, most cannibalistic societies that still exist are South American tribes.
In any case,
I am a member of Western society, and specifically I am a Utilitarian and a Secular Humanist. I value human life in and of itself, and judge morality based on the preservation of that life and the increase in its quality for the greatest number of people.
I would judge cannibalism to be immoral
if it involves murder. While I feel generally grossed out by cannibalism of someone who has died of natural causes, I see nothing
ethically wrong so long as his family consents to the consumption of the corpse (because I value the potential emotional harm to the family).
The cannibal
himself may of course disagree, and that proves my very point - morality is not universal and objective, but is
subjective and unique to individuals and societies.
The fact that you or I can make a moral judgment does not make our moral values objective, Sac, even if we were to agree. The fact that
others come to different moral conclusions in the same circumstances means that morality is
subjective and is determined by the individual.
quote:
There is no basic underlying assumption to atheism, any more than there is a basic underlying assumption to simply not believing in Santa Claus.
As I have already shown, you do have underlying assumptions.
No, you've made that
assertion, but you haven't
supported it with evidence.
If someone truly believes in Santa Claus, you can perhaps say that their underlying belief is that there is the possibility of the existence of flying reindeer, and other such things exclusive to Santa Claus (realize, please, that this is merely an example).
But the statement was not about someone who
does believe in Santa. It was about someone who does
not. To
not believe in Santa, one
could actively believe that particulars of the Santa myth are impossible, and thus there is no such thing. This, admittedly, requires that one have previously determined (by assumption or by other evidence) that the particulars of the Santa myth are impossible.
However, one could instead
passively lack belief in Santa simply because they have not been convinced. This requires no assumption at all - it doesn't even require a pre-existing conclusion regarding the possibility of the individual aspects of the myth. This would also describe someone who has
never heard of Santa - if you've never heard of a thing, you can hardly believe it exists.
I will conclude by saying that you either believe that there IS a god, or you believe that there is NO god. There are absolutely no other possibilites.
Except for those who believe in many gods. Or those who have never heard of god.
Or those who passively lack belief because they aren't convinced.
You may believe in a different god than your neighbor, but you still believe in a god.
Please, do tell me which deity I worship? I don't recall praying lately.
Likewise, atheists may come to different conclusions based on what their underlying assumptions may be (whatever you say those are). But the theists are still theists, and the atheists are still atheists. There are only two sides to this argument, either positive or negative. To say you are neutral is to say that you believe in both theism and atheism, or neither.
Clearly you've never heard of Agnisticism. An agnostic does not know whether there is or is not a god, and believes that it is
impossible to ever know.
A better definition of fence-sitting neutrality I've never heard.
Certainly you cannot say you believe in a god and that you don't believe in a god. Also, you certainly could not say that you do not believe in atheism, since that is precisely what you believe in.
It;s impossible to believe in atheism. Athism is defined by a lack of belief. That's like saying "I believe in not believing in Santa Claus." It;s utter nonsense.
Once again, I am a theist, you are not. Therefore, you are, by definition, an atheist, which is the negative side to the theist/atheist debate.
False dichotomy. You;re insisting that belief in dieties is binary, only two responses.
That;s jsut not the case.
Imagine for example a test question: "Do you believe in God? Yes/No"
I know how you would answer. I know how I would answer.
But how would an agnostic answer? An agnostic believes it's impossible to know, he neither believes nor disbelieves.
How would a polytheist like a Hindu answer? The believe in
many gods, and so answering "yes" would not be entirely accurate.
And lastly, I do have an underlying assumption for my "disbelief" in thor. That assumption is that God is the one and only living and true God, and this precludes the possibility of thor.
Then let me rephrase.
I presume you do not believe in fairies or leprechauns. Is that an accurate assumption on my part?
™ Version 4.2
(1)