Atheism on the Rise

It seems to me more that ICANT is claiming that "god" planted empathy in all of humanity in the first place, and that this is our "conscience" that identifies morality for us.The problem to me is not that he's claiming that human beings are "amoral robots," but more that he's denying reality by asserting that there is any such thing as objective morality. He clearly ignores the differences (some minor, some gigantic) in morality from different cultures - for his assertion to be true, one or more of the following needs to be true as well:1) God gave different people different "hardwired morality." This just so happens to coincide with cultural influences in an individuals geographic location
2) Objective morality exists, but people tend to ignore the "hardwired morality" provided by God and instead fall into sin. Deep down, these people all know that what they're doing is immoral due to the "hardwiring," but they make the choice to be wicked anyway.
3) The "hardwired morality" is only activated when exposed to an outside source - in other words, the "hardwired morality" is dormant until a person is exposed to the Bible in some form or another.
4) "Hardwired morality" exists, but people are deceived by the devil and confused like Eve was.It seems to me that, given the wild disparity in what is determined to be "moral" amongst different cultures, it is obvious that morality is subjectively determined by communities. Commonalities result because some basic moral tenets are required for a culture to last long - killing other members of the community without cause, for example, tends to cause communities to die out. The precise definition of "murder," however, differs wildly between cultures - in some, killing during wartime is "murder," while in others it is not; in some, human sacrifice is considered "murder," while in others it is not. Even within Christians there is a significant divide regarding such things as classifying abortion as "murder" (many clearly do, but many others do not, and there's a lot of fuzzy middle ground), or classifying homosexuality as "immoral" (including whether the behavior is evil or the person is wicked).But I agree - this is one of the prime reasons that atheism is on the rise. Religion can be useful for moral instruction, but because morality is subjective and changes as a culture evolves, disparities between ever-changing community standards of "morality" and the written, unchanging standards of religion are inevitable. As we all gain more and more awareness of the world around us and realize that there are other cultures beyond our own, it becomes readily apparent to any rational person that morality is decidedly not objective. Rational people also tend to realize that, while "because I say so" is handy for children and sociopaths, obedience is a crutch and not the ideal in terms of determining what is "right." Religion frowns on independent thought and disobedience..and so rational people are, in ever-increasing numbers, frowning back.Edited by Rahvin, : No reason given.

But this is at odds with any claim to an "objective morality." How can humans be simultaneously "hardwired" from birth to understand the Christian God's objective morality, and yet still make completely different determinations regarding morality?You're basically saying that we're all hardwired to like peaches and not like oranges, but that we're free to like oranges if we choose. That doesn't make any sense.Are human beings "hardwired" to know God's objective morality, or not?If so, why do different cultures have completely different concepts of morality?Wouldn't the rational conclusion be that, assuming all human beings are "hardwired" with the same moral standards, we should all independently come to the same conclusions regarding morality across cultures? If not, why not?If you agree, then does not the fact that different cultures hold extremely different views on morality firmly disprove the idea that human beings are "hardwired" with any sort of objective morality? If not, why not? I certainly don't consider my posts here to have any sort of copyright But I'd appreciate it if you'd post the gist of whatever sermon you come up with here on the forum so I can respond to however you use my words.

Something's amiss here, ICANT. You're claiming that human beings are hardwired to know right from wrong - that we're hardwired with an intrinsic sense of an objective morality.Then you say that you're claiming no such thing.One of us isn't understanding the other.I said absolutely nothing about obedience. I said:

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How can humans be simultaneously "hardwired" from birth to understand the Christian God's objective morality,

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This is directly related to your claim that: You're claiming that all human beings, from birth, know good from evil because the laws of objective morality (as described in the Bible) are hardwired into the human mind.Why, then, do different cultures know that different things are good and different things are evil? Should we not all arrive at the same conclusions regarding what good and evil are (regardless of whether we are able to hold ourselves to those standards), since we all are hardwired with the same knowledge?I'm not talking about actions or obedience. I'm talking about what each culture identifies as "good" or "evil." If it's all hardwired identically in every human being, we should all identify the same things as "good" and "evil," should we not? Why, then, do some Christians consider abortion to be a form of murder and evil, while others do not? Why do some people think that killing in the name of their beliefs (whether it be suicide bombing, killing abortion doctors, or what have you) is "good," while everyone else things it's "evil?" Shouldn't we all identify those actions as "good" or "evil" universally, if we're all hardwired with the same knowledge of "good" and "evil?" Let's reword the analogy then.You're saying that we're all hardwired to know that peaches are good, and oranges are bad, yes? We should all "know," instinctively from our hardwiring, that x is good and y is bad?Why then is this not the case? Why do some people identify x as bad, and some as good? Shouldn't we all arrive at the same determination if we're hardwired to "know" that x is either good or bad?Why do some people think peaches are good, and some people think they're bad? If there is an objective truth, and we all know it, why do we not all come to the same conclusion? These statements are contradictory.You are simultaneously saying that "God's absolute morality is written in mankind's mind," and responding that human beings are not hardwired to know God's objective morality.Which is it? Are we hardwired with the knowledge of good and evil, or are we not? I'm convinced only because of the evidence presented to me - the fact that human beings have extremely different standards of morality, which directly contradicts the idea that morality is hardwired identically in all human beings from birth.If you present evidence contrary to my current position, I may change it. You have yet to do so. I haven't been talking about whether human beings act ethically, ICANT. I've been talking about different cultures identifying the same actions differently.If we all "know" good from evil, why do some people think abortion is evil and some do not?If we all "know" good from evil, why do some people think that blood transfusions are evil and some do not?If we all "know" good from evol, why do some people think homosexuality is evil and some do not?If we all "know" good from evil, why do some people think eating meat is evil and some do not?If we all "know" good from evil, why do some people think believing in a different religion is evil and some do not?If we all "know" good from evil, why do some people thinkt hat cannibalism is evil and some do not?If we all "know" good from evil, why do some people think that human sacrifice is evil and some do not?I could go on. I'm not talking about the actions themselves - I'm asking why, if as you and the Bible claim we're all hardwired with the same instinctual "knowledge" of good and evil, we don't consistently identify good and evil in the same way? So you simply dismiss varying moral standards as people "convincing themselves that what they believe is the absolute truth and everybody else is absolutely wrong?"Projecting much, ICANT?What leads you to conclude that human beings are hardwired with identical knowledge of good and evil? What makes you think that human beings "convince themselves" to ignore that knowledge?Since moral standards differ so wildly even within communities, you're suggesting that basically every human being is deluding themselves regarding morality on one point or another (since it's virtually impossible for any two people to agree on every moral question), but that deep down we all "know" the same moral standards. What leads you to believe this?It seems to me that your unbending faith that what you believe is the absolute truth is forcing you to take the position that human beings "convince themselves" to ignore our moral hardwiring, because your beliefs require that moral hardwiring to exist.It seems to me that the rational conclusion to draw from the fact that moral standards differ wildly is that human beings have no such inbuilt moral hardwiring, that morality is a subjective determination influenced primarily by the culture an individual is raised in. What evidence do you believe refutes such a conclusion? Why do you believe it is unreasonable?Is your only reason your unbending faith that what you believe is the absolute truth, and thus when the Bible says that humans are hardwired with the knowledge of good and evil it must be true regardless of any evidence?What would falsify your position that the knowledge of good and evil are hardwired, ICANT? I never said they were, nor did I say that you claimed as much. Again - if we're all hardwired with the exact same knowledge of good and evil, why don't we all identify the same things as good and evil? Why do moral standards differ?

No. ICANT is claiming that those people had intrinsic knowledge of morality granted from birth by God, and that any differences between their moral structures and Biblical morality are due to wicked humans choosing to ignore their inbuilt moral sense and ignore God.It's neatly unfalsifiable and untestable. Atheists and other non-Christians can be moral because God grants everyone inbuilt morality. Different moral standards across different cultures are handwaved away as some sort of "choice" to ignore what we all know deep down.Such a position requires as an axiom that God exists, and that God does in fact write morality into the human "heart" as described in the Bible. Of course, there is no evidence to support this outside of the Bible's claim, and no way to test it with the clever apologetics ICANT has set in place that dismiss contrary evidence.ICANT's issue is that he has an untestable and unsupported hypothesis that rests on two similarly unsupported and untestable assumptions. It's a matter of ICANT's faith, and he's not going to change his mind regardless of any evidence short of proving God doesn't exist.It's a textbook example of why apologetics don't work. ICANT is not following evidence to an unbiased conclusion; he's reinterpreting evidence to support the conclusion he held from the start. Obviously, this is false reasoning. Differences in human morality across different cultures and belief systems are not evidence that people choose to ignore their universal inbuilt morality, but are rather evidence that human morality is subjective and there is no such universal inbuilt moral code.ICANT's position is similar to claiming that there is an invisible pink unicorn standing in front of the White House, everyone can see it, but those who claim to be unable to see it have chosen not to. It's unfalsifiable, it's completely unsupported, and it's the hallmark of a person incapable of rational thought.Christians love to make this claim, which is identical to the "you know God exists, deep down" nonsense. It's also how they justify the implication of Christianity that those not exposed to Jesus must necessarily go to Hell - everyone knows about Jesus deep down, you see. The fact that those who have never heard of Christianity universally do not have any idea who Jesus is is the result of their conscious choice to reject the beliefs that they've never heard of but "know, deep down."There's a reason it's foolish to tell someone else what they are thinking or feeling, or what they do or not do. Christians don't often get that memo.