What I envy about theists

Originally posted by josephw
Well, to be honest, after reading your's and Twhitehead's exchanges, I don't see how anything either of you said has anything to do with morality.

I think all you did was give a report on the state of the debate about morality as an academic and philosophical conundrum.

Personally, I like to keep it simple. Morality is really nothing more than a word u ...[text shortened]... n impose that code on and in man's inventions.

That's like putting the cart before the horse.

You're right. Nothing I've said above has much to do with morality itself. I haven't spoken at all about the actual content of morality (i.e., what is good, bad, right, wrong, etc.). My discussion here has been more abstract and deals with the relationship between the causal explanation of our moral sentiments and their justification or reasonableness. My point is that even if evolutionary theory is correct as an account of why we have certain moral sentiments, beliefs, intuitions, etc., it is simply irrelevant to the further question of whether these things are justified or reasonable for us to have.

While it's open to you to characterize morality in terms of good or bad conduct, it's not particularly helpful. First, it's plausible that the scope of morality extends beyond conduct. For instance, some character traits, beliefs and desires can be moral or immoral. Second, there are types of good and bad conduct that don't have much to do with morality. Good conduct at the dinner table, for instance, seems more a matter of etiquette than morality. My bet is that if you try to further clarify what you mean by 'good' or 'bad' conduct, you'll just end up helping yourself to the very notion of morality your account was supposed to render simple.

Anyway, my two cents.

Originally posted by bbarr
You're right. Nothing I've said above has much to do with morality itself. I haven't spoken at all about the actual content of morality (i.e., what is good, bad, right, wrong, etc.). My discussion here has been more abstract and deals with the relationship between the causal explanation of our moral sentiments and their justification or reasonableness. My p ...[text shortened]... e very notion of morality your account was supposed to render simple.

Anyway, my two cents.

Well said, and I agree. Allow me one more jab at it if you will.

"I haven't spoken at all about the actual content of morality (i.e., what is good, bad, right, wrong, etc.)."

Forgive my apparent muddleheadedness, but I'm trying to say something about what I'm thinking and I'm not doing such a good job of it.

It's not even the content of morality, nor necessarily the origin of morality per se that I wish to speak to. I think the best way to say it is to say how morality could not have originated as a product of evolution. Reveal Hidden Content

Take a single moral issue for example, like lying. In the first place lying is possible, and conversely so is telling the truth. How could this reality in which we live have generated through natural processes the possibility of the necessity for moral choices?

That probably isn't clear. If matter is what the universe is made of, and is subject to physical laws, how do those laws, which affect matter, govern thought that deals with the immaterial?

Is this just gibberish? Am I coming through?

Originally posted by FMF
Is the belief that 'it is not a sin to say you don't believe in God' a common belief among Christians?

If I said yes, or no, how would you reply to both?

Originally posted by josephw
Well said, and I agree. Allow me one more jab at it if you will.

[b]"I haven't spoken at all about the actual content of morality (i.e., what is good, bad, right, wrong, etc.)."

Forgive my apparent muddleheadedness, but I'm trying to say something about what I'm thinking and I'm not doing such a good job of it.

It's not even the content of mora ...[text shortened]... govern thought that deals with the immaterial?

Is this just gibberish? Am I coming through?[/b]

I'm not sure I understand. You don't seem to be asking about the evolution of our moral psychology (e.g., our moral commitments, intuitions, beliefs, etc.). Rather, you seem to be asking how consciousness itself could have arisen from matter and purely material processes. At least, that's what I take your reference to thought and immateriality to indicate. Am I on the right track?

Originally posted by bbarr
As somebody who studied, wrote and taught moral philosophy for a decade, I can only tell you how it actually proceeds in practice. And, again, I'm not sure that what you're saying conflicts with anything I said above. If you do, I'm interested where you think we differ.

I am afraid I have only done one philosophy course. I also don't have the time to give this the justice it deserves. However, my experience of the one course I did, was that it made me (and other students) question our intuitions and think more about where they come from and whether or not they can be grounded in something more solid than intuition and whether different intuitions we may have come into conflict with each other in certain situations etc.
I feel that understanding where our intuitions come from provides enormous benefit to the above study.

Originally posted by twhitehead
I am afraid I have only done one philosophy course. I also don't have the time to give this the justice it deserves. However, my experience of the one course I did, was that it made me (and other students) question our intuitions and think more about where they come from and whether or not they can be grounded in something more solid than intuition and wh ...[text shortened]... that understanding where our intuitions come from provides enormous benefit to the above study.

Right, that sounds like a standard applied ethics course. Moral theory is a bit different than applied ethics, in that moral theories (Kantian deontology, Aristotelian virtue ethics, Mill's utilitarianism, etc.) are supposed to help explain the inferential relationships among our intuitions, clarify the concepts involved, go some way towards providing a rational basis for our considered moral judgments and so on. I was talking about this enterprise when I said we start with our commitments and intuitions; they serve as grist for the theory mill, but also as quasi-axioms that constrain moral theories. If a moral theory entails that rape and murder are perfectly fine, then that moral theory is doomed. The point here is that it doesn't really matter whether these commitments are caused by evolution or God. We're stuck with them; they go down so deep in creatures like us that our moral theories must, essentially, take them as given.

Originally posted by twhitehead
Sonship kept accusing me of the same thing, but when challenged on it, he failed to substantiate the claim.
Lets see if you can do better. Please state a question that FMF has refused to answer and lets see if he continues to refuse to answer.

Please state a question that FMF has refused to answer and lets see if he continues to refuse to answer.

Why would I want to do that? That's FMFs MO... he will ask the same question over and over again until he gets an answer he's looking for, or gets no answer at all. If he gets the answer he's looking for he can start in with his little gotcha game. But if he gets no answer, he can then claim an opponent is stonewalling and refusing to answer his question. Part of his debating technique is to start off aggressively asking (and refusing to answer) questions. You're essentially asking me to play the same game FMF plays... why would I want to do that?

I could go back and look at all of the questions I've asked that weren't answered, but if I'm able do something as simple as that (it doesn't require a college education or any advanced training) then why wouldn't you or FMF (or anyone else for that matter) be able to do it? FMF wants to sucker people into playing his game, and it appears you want to sucker me into playing that same game with him... seriously, don't you two have anything better to do at a game site message board?*



*FYI I'm not above occasionally tossing out a few nonsensical (or rhetorical) questions of my own when responding to silly questions.

Originally posted by lemon lime
I could go back and look at all of the questions I've asked that weren't answered, but if I'm able do something as simple as that (it doesn't require a college education or any advanced training) then why wouldn't you or FMF (or anyone else for that matter) be able to do it?

So you're asking me why I ~ myself ~ don't go and look for examples of questions you've asked that weren't answered?

Originally posted by josephw
If I said yes, or no, how would you reply to both?

If you gave a clearer answer, I would address it, yes ~ and I have replied to something you said, which you have not addressed. You said: "I don't find anything in the Bible that says anything about God judging a person about, or for what they think." Is this belief (that God does not judge people for what they think) a commonly held belief among Christians aside from yourself?

Originally posted by lemon lime
[b]Well I get a certain amount of stick from people here (who are still Christians) for telling the truth about my loss of Christian faith ~ they resort to all manner of projections and pronouncements about me lying now and/or lying in the past etc. etc. ad nauseam.

That can happen if you're being less that forthright with the people you talk to. F ...[text shortened]... y about. Unless of course you're wrong and there is a God who is always paying attention.[/b]

If answering questions is such a big de for you, then how come you ignored my questions to you in the Eden thread? Seems to me that you want others to operate by a set of standards that you yourself may not be willing to adhere to.

Originally posted by bbarr
Right, that sounds like a standard applied ethics course. Moral theory is a bit different than applied ethics, in that moral theories (Kantian deontology, Aristotelian virtue ethics, Mill's utilitarianism, etc.) are supposed to help explain the inferential relationships among our intuitions, clarify the concepts involved, go some way towards providing a ratio ...[text shortened]... down so deep in creatures like us that our moral theories must, essentially, take them as given.

Our various moral codes have taken them as a given within the 'in group', but allowed them quite freely against those not in that group. If you define the in group too narrowly then rape and murder are essentially fine, as, say, against the Midianites. One could take the example of warrior cultures, where constant, low level inter-tribal warfare serves as a check on excess population. This serves the greater good of preventing them from overburdening their environment so they can live more or less sustainably. Indeed, a hunter-gatherer group is going to have very different ideas of what morality consists of than will modern day New Yorkers.

Originally posted by lemon lime
...you're trying to get me to say something you can use against me.

Are your beliefs really so brittle that you are afraid you might say something about them that you cannot defend or that they can somehow be used "against" you? 🙂

Originally posted by lemon lime
You're essentially asking me to play the same game FMF plays... why would I want to do that?

No, I am not.
You accused FMF of failing to answer questions. I just wanted to know if your accusation is valid. It appears from your response that your accusation is not valid. You just made it up in a fit of anger.

Originally posted by bbarr
If a moral theory entails that rape and murder are perfectly fine, then that moral theory is doomed.

Why is it doomed? As rwingett says, it was considered perfectly acceptable in some cases in Biblical times. If you were to talk to some South African men, they would tell you that they find them perfectly acceptable today. They may have to watch out for the law, but they are not stopped by their moral intuitions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_violence_in_South_Africa

More than 25% of a sample of 1,738 South African men from the KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape Provinces admitted to raping someone when anonymously questioned;

Originally posted by rwingett
One could take the example of warrior cultures, where constant, low level inter-tribal warfare serves as a check on excess population. Indeed, a hunter-gatherer group is going to have very different ideas of what morality consists of than will modern day New Yorkers.

I totally agree with this statement. Admittedly, I am an engineer and have not even had the one basic course of philosophy that twhitehead mentions, but I have followed this debate with interest.

I recall a book I read some time ago, (The Peace Child) where the author describes a tribe in Papua New Guinea which raised lying and treachery to cult status. For example, if you could ingratiate yourself by lying and deception into an enemy group, gain their total confidence and then kill a significant leader, y are the greatest hero ever. Thus, when the missinaries presented the story of Jesus to them, they were shocked to see that Judas was actually in their view the hero!

What I am trying to say( as rwingett said) morality must be culturally conditioned. What I think Bbarr and Twhitehead are discussing, is HOW and WHY such a moral compass arises in the first place. Self-interest? Group survival?

That is a question for the philosophers...