Morality without God

Could you elaborate a bit? For example, if you personally are confronted with a situation that involves making a difficult ethical decision and you choose to do what you consider the good/moral/right thing to do, do you feel that the decision came from you or from your god? Same question if you decide to do something you realize is probably bad. Are immoral acts only reserved for people and moral acts are all because of a divine being?Hm.....I feel, after reading the previous statements, it is apparent that humans can make their own moral code. I feel that God's is best. For the question of a difficult ethical decision, I would (assuming I had time to do this) first see if the Bible had anything to say about it. If not, I would do my best try and decide what God would like me to do in this situation. This decision, I hope, would come from God, as I certainly do not feel I would do very well on my own trying to make a difficult moral decision. Humans do have a tendance to maximize their personal gain, which is not always the "right" thing to do. But, again, the source of other's moral code is different.
If I do something that I realize was wrong, then it would have to be my mistake. This is, you realize, because my basis for morals is based on God being the standard for morality. I realize commands in the Old Testament seem completely immoral, like the call to war against many other nations. I do not fully understand God's reasoning for these, but, in many cases, it was as punishment against nations that did not respond to His calling to repent and turn back to Him.
I don't fully understand the last question asked. Are you asking if people are fully evil, and only God can be good? I would say no, because there are many examples of people that do great things to help others. If you're asking if God is allowed to do evil things, I would again say no, as in my belief God is infallible. If you would care to expand that question, that would be great.

I know it has been declared OT, but I did want to let you know about an interesting read on this subject....
Brain Sex by Anne Moir and David Jessel.I know it was written back in the early 90s so I'm sure it is out of date, but it does bring up some interesting issues concerning, genetics, pre-natal hormones, and environment.The hairy guy you have been talking to might have something to say about this book.{ok...sneaking off before my alter-ego discovers my off topic posts)This message has been edited by Asgara, 10-22-2004 06:16 PM

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Asgara
"Embrace the pain, spank your inner moppet, whatever....but get over it"http://asgarasworld.bravepages.com
http://perditionsgate.bravepages.com

So GOD is incapable of changing his mind? He's a pretty limited and unimpressive being. Why coudn't this situation happen? Are you saying GOD can't apparate into your home and tell you to do something? Once again he seems pretty limited and not at all like most people make Him out to be.

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*not an actual doctor

God sounds a lot like allah.

It seems sad that god who started out creating the universe, then did all the miracles in the bible, is now reduced to designing cell propulsion systems.

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For Him to tell me to do something directly against what He has already said to be moral would merely show that whomever is talking to me is not Him.

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But you said that God is the source of morality.This means that he is not bound by it and can change it at any time.Therefore, if God said it was moral to do X (even if it is immoral by the old moral standard), it would be a moral thing to do, yes?

If you don't fully grasp the morality of God's past actions, how can you conclude that a scenario like Dr.Jones* presented would never happen?What if it was God's way to punish your mother because she "did not respond to His calling to repent and turn back to Him"?Or perhaps a disgusting test of your faith, of the type God seemed to enjoy enacting in the OT?Given the scenario laid out it Revelations, I would say God is capable of anything...

Hi achesst

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I don't fully understand the last question asked. Are you asking if people are fully evil, and only God can be good? I would say no, because there are many examples of people that do great things to help others.

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But according to your answer, if you do something good, it is not your decision but that of god. If you do something bad, it is your fault. So god only can get credit for doing good but not for doing bad. In effect, you can only choose to be immoral. So any time someone does good, you would have to say that it is a supernatural being acting and anyone doing good is a mindless robot which is under supernatural control. It does seem to indicate that the view is humans are evil immoral creatures that can only do good unless control of their minds is directly established by the supernatural.
I am not sure if this is how you view it or not?

Flies Only, Well, yes and no. In that it's probably more complicated than that. What is clear is that a majority of men (maybe even all) will engage in homosexual behaviours under the right social and (apparently) enjoy it. However, what also seems to be the case is that there is a proportion of men who prefer to engage in homosexual practices regardless of the prevailing social pressures. I wasn't trying to make a joke, my point was very serious. Just because men engaged in homosexual behaviour does not mean they were sexually attracted to one another in the way that we would expect today; it is entirely possible that homosexual practices among them were simply a form of mastarbation. Well?

Mr Jack:Perhaps I need to step back for a moment and reassess what I’m trying to say. My original position was (and still is) that homosexuality is no more immoral than heterosexuality. I say this not because of any thing found in the Bible (quite the contrary as a matter of fact) but rather, because in my opinion homosexuality is genetically determined. But let me go one step further (since this thread is not solely about homosexuality) and state my position on morals in general, as they relate to God. In a nut shell, I guess, I would say a behavior that is not destructive to ones self or to others is probably a behavior that I would not classify as immoral. Does that make it moral.I’m not sure? Oh sure, I’d imagine that you (and others) can come up with some examples that would give me pause, but right now, right off the top of my head, I cannot think of something that an individual might do (that fits the above criteria) that would cause me to say that that particular behavior is immoral. So am I immoral if I masturbate?.I think not. Am I immoral if I engage in homosexual behaviors, even though I am a heterosexual and know that the Bible tells me I should not?again, I don’t think so. I hope this addresses both of you points and answers the final question in your reply.

Flies Only, Elipsis indicate where I have omitted parts of the above quote.So if you think a behaviour is not immoral if it is not destructive to oneself or to others, then why are you trying to bring genetics into the question of homosexuality? What is it's relevance?

Mr Jack: A fair question. I guess I originally brought up homosexuality to see why those who think it is immoral think that. My guess would be that most of them make their decision based on the Bible and my argument would then be that since the behavior is based on genetics, that it is not "fair" to judge it as immoral (I guess you could call it a preemptive strike). Personally, I could care less if the behavior has a genetic bases or not, but I would imagine that there are those that would disagree with that notion. Again, the thread is a question of morality without God (is it possible?) and my response is yes.

I think Dr. Jones is posing an interesting question. If morality truly derives from God then It is impossible for God to make immoral decrees. If God is the ONLY soruce of morality then by definition if god says something is right, then it is right if god says something is wrong, then it is wrong. However Most christians I know balk if asked what they would do if God asked them to do somthing they knew was immoral. This seems to imply that there is some sense of morality outside of Gods commands.To paraprhase Thomas Nagel in "what does it all mean?" if god makes some miselanios decree to do something, that does't make it right or wrong, It might be INADVISABLE, to disobey god but it is not nessesarly immoral.
I think most christians would argue that god hasn't made any bad decrees and that he won't make them. God is infallabe, they would say. But it's perfectly easy to imagine moraly fallable gods even if this suggestion seems intolerable to some.
A jewish frend of mine says that there is no moral relevance to keeping Kosher. But the fact that it is not a moral command makes it more important to keep. I.e. you shold practice being obediant even when it doesnt matter.If obedence to God is your only moral maxim you had better hope (or pray) that you do not become Schitzoprenic becase then you will have nothing preventing you from commiting immoral acts when you begin to halucinate. If you don't beleve in God you need to find out what keeps you from commiting imoral acts if you beleve you can "get away with it."In either case I think an argumnet exists for a "universal morality" that is independant of a belief in God.Atheist arguments about how it is "not useful" to commit an immoral act are easy to dismantel because one can always imagine situations where one could greatly benifit from an immoral act and get away with it. We all have a resposibility to refine our moral sense regardless of our religios beleifs, I am dishertend when I hear fellow athests only appeal to the socity and its retribution as a reason to act morally, just as I am dihearted when I hear my christian frends say that moraity derives soley from God.Perhaps God (if he exists) has a much better grasp on morality than we lowly mortals but that dosent mean we should abandon our morality in favor of mere obediance! After all the reason for "the fall" was our gaining the knowlege OF good and evil their by implying that we have our own moral sense.This message has been edited by The Dread Dormammu, 10-26-2004 07:13 AM

Right. Unsurprisingly, it turns out that most people will commit those acts, no matter what they might say the rest of the time. Hence, soldiers rape and pilliage, even if they believe those things are wrong. The vast majority of human beings will deliver lethal electric shocks to hapless subjects when ordered to as long as its made clear that someone else will be responsible. Hence, Abu Graib.People internalize moral codes by habit, and that's a good thing for people, because you're often wrong about when "you can get away with it." But, unsurprisingly, pretty much every human being does immoral things when they feel they can get away with it. Why? Because you'd like there to be? Sadly, human beings don't really act like there's any kind of universal moral code - human cultures develop all kinds of different morals, and human individuals break moral codes when they're sure they can get away with it.This message has been edited by crashfrog, 10-26-2004 04:24 PM

So GOD is incapable of changing his mind? He's a pretty limited and unimpressive being.Why coudn't this situation happen? Are you saying GOD can't apparate into your home and tell you to do something? Once again he seems pretty limited and not at all like most people make Him out to be.So, you seem to think that, because someone doesn't continually change their mind as to what is and is not good, that makes them less than perfect? If the god you wanted were in place, no one would have any idea as to what He wanted, because He wouldn't know all the time, and it would keep changing. The god you want certainly seems less godly than my God. And God not being able to appear in my home? I didn't say He couldn't do that, I said He cannot, and does not, change His system of morality to the complete opposite on a whim. Also, as the other statement about this being a punishment to my mother (about which I still feel it was inappropriate for "dr" Jones to have my hypothetically rape and kill) I quote for you Hebrews 10:30, "For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his people."
In a final note, if you are just trying to put down my religeon and my God, as opposed to having an honest conversation, please stop asking these asking this, and any other, ridiculous question.