Moral Foundations #1
Over the past couple of days I had a pleasant conversation with a mathematician (actually, a German mathematician, if that makes any difference) concerning the foundations of morality–what are they? And one thing that was eventually brought up was my theist leanings, and his a-theist leanings. I, of course, was accused of being a moral absolutist and unable to make any meaningful moral statements. I in turn pressured him to provide a justification for the existence of morality apart from our perceptions (does our belief in morality correspond to something in reality). To make matters “worse,” we were approaching the question — and each other — with completely different presuppositions. As near as I could tell, his was a continental philosophy (which would make sense, I suppose).
In having this discussion, two things occurred to me. The first is that there is a lot of common ground in this “moral debate,” the second is that this can often be ignored, and very antagonistic positions are held (by both sides). Which makes me wonder what the point of the debate is (other than proving that God exists because objective morality exists, for the theist). Is it in fact better to focus on these commonalities, and just “have a discussion” where you aren’t really trying to prove your side, while still attempting to bring the other person to a realization (much like Acts 15?).
So in that way, my post title is incredibly deceiving (sorry!). This is really just a bit of thought provoking, so that we don’t so quickly “take sides”. Especially relevant to the moral debate, since it’s so easily — and quickly — misunderstood.
Related posts:
- Moral Foundations #2
- The Myth of Moral Relativism
- ‘Ought’ and Naturalism
- Just Arrived: Is God a Moral Monster, by Paul Copan
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I think that truth should decide what the foundation of morality is, rather than the other way around. If the truth is that there’s a supreme being who will hold humans accountable for their actions, it follows that objective morality exists; if the truth is that there is no god, then objective morality does not exist. So really, the root of the debate about the foundations of morality is theism vs. atheism.
Those are just my opinions on the morality debate, of course.
Let’s leave the “theism vs. atheism” bit aside for a moment and consider a question: assuming objective morality exists, how could we know it apart from divine revelation? What the question is asking is this. Assuming there is a divine (moral) law giver, could one who doesn’t believe in this law giver still come to know and live by the “law that has been given”? Let’s even ignore Romans 2:15, which says that God has created us such that the law is on our hearts (we might say that it’s a “basic belief,” or that we know it intuitively). I think there is one very important way we can come to discover this objective moral set, even if we don’t come to consider the moral set that we’ve “agreed upon” to be objective. That way is subjectivism.
Very simply, we might hold the a priori belief that morality is subjective, and we’ve come to this belief because we perceive morality as being dependent upon the values of a given culture. Through examining the values of all these different cultures, we come to a moral set which we feel (important) is the best. We come to believe things like “murder is wrong,” “theft is wrong” and “it’s wrong to make someone else suffer for our own pleasure”. Someone may view all of these things as subjective observations of a “better (or best) moral code” but it is also true that this perceived subjective moral set is actually objective, because it refers to something that holds true in reality, regardless of us. The subjectivism allows for a common base from which to move forward (otherwise no progress would be made at all).
In this particular debate there is a lot of talk of “you have no foundation for your moral set, you should be a nihilist, you’re living inconsistently!” And it seems to be ignored that even in living inconsistently, even in thinking that a particular moral set is subjective. It’s very likely the case (returning to Romans 2:15), that these people are living according to an objective moral standard. Now I agree that atheists should be nihilists, and that they are living inconsistently, and that objective morality does prove there is a God, but I shouldn’t let that argument take precedence over my relationship with others (to an extent).
This approach is imperfect, so of course there are dangers. The only point being that our perception of a thing may not be correct. Many who are “moral relativists” live themselves by objective standards, even ignorantly.
Thanks for your input
The Craig/Kagan debate on this was the only one where I’ve seen an Atheist give some good arguments regarding morality. Unfortunately, in the end both could not really grasp the others ‘view’. But it was better than say, Harris/Craig, which I gave up on.
I’ll give the debate a watch. My personal view (simply stated) is that an an atheist may be able to give some very good reasons for behaving morally, but those reasons will always be arbitrary.
Oh yeah, I agree fully. I was just impressed that Kagan actually gave somewhat of a coherent argument.
How are God’s ‘not’ arbitrary? I find it somewhat of a cop out just to assert, “we’ll they’re necessarily reflections of his nature…” Then I find you can’t coherently defend God’s atrocities in the Bible by recourse to that very same statement. This is what I find untenable about proponents of divine command theory.
That’s a very good question, and one I’m probably no where near qualified to answer. Even still, I’ll say a few things.
The first thing is that I try not to assume that God is, morally speaking, on ‘par’ with humanity. If I assume the creation account, then I must acknowledge a distinction between creator / creation. It seems evident to me that there are likely moral precepts that apply to creature that don’t apply to creator, and vice-versa. Perhaps a moral precept might be, ‘God is worthy of worship’ whereas ‘humanity is not worthy of worship’. That’s not to say I’m arguing for two different moralities, or that I’ll resort to ‘Well it was okay for God to do that!’ Only that the typical objection (from ‘New Atheists’) assumes a morally similar status between God and humanity, and I’m inclined to reject it.
I do think morality ‘springs’ from God’s character, which I think means that it is both 1) absolutely binding and 2) impossible to change, even for God (that is, God can’t change his nature). So the OT provides a rather unique challenge. I would have to assume that my moral inclinations are similar to those held by God, thought not identical. Further, I would have to assume that God was acting morally when he destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, or commanded the taking over of Palestine. That’s a large question though where I think individual circumstances need close inspection (which I’ll avoid and not do at 2:50 AM). Either then the OT authors correctly understood God, or they got it wrong in understanding God’s motives (a position a biblical inerrantist could not take, so for the sake of things I won’t). Is the morality presented consonant with what’s ideal, or part of an ‘allowable’ moral evolution towards ‘the ideal’?
So I’ll just say (for now) that I believe morality is predicated in God’s character, which is unchanging — it also means that God must abide with his character, and that the OT presents quite a challenge which I’m not sure I can address (but am always willing to try).
There is no one that can be qualified to render some authoritative decision on the matter. Philosophers and theologians don’t have some ‘special insight’ into these kinds of things that ordinary people are somehow closed to, they just tend to be more familiar with the arguments, like you and I,
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So then its more along the lines of something like a Nietzschean master / slave relationship. You have a morality for one, and then a morality for the other. It would seem then, that whatever moral precepts God arbitrary assigns to his creatures is temporarily justified and binding until God either commands something different of them, or quite simply, changes his mind. That’s no more eternally binding I find, than people who do the exact same thing without recourse to any theistic appeal, on the other hand, you’re merely at the whims of a supernatural deity. And if God’s nature is static and unchanging, then the atrocities of the Bible aren’t explained away by that, in that they’re apparently incorporated within His character and are just as much necessary reflections of His nature as compared to when He behaves morally indifferent.
An interesting thought, but not like Nietzsche’s master / slave relationship — that is why I provided the worship example the illustrate the difference I had in mind (that’s why I also made explicit mention of not arguing for two different moralities). In terms of morality being arbitrary even if grounded in God, think of it this way:
1. Necessarily, if God’s nature is immutable,
2. And moral values are found in God’s nature;
3. Then therefore, moral values are immutable.
If this is true, then God will no more change his nature than change the nature of morality, because He can’t. There would be nothing arbitrary about moral precepts.
That’s assuming 1) The Israelites correctly depicted God in the OT and 2) God’s actions in the OT are morally unpraiseworthy. If you don’t allow the moral distinction between creator and creation, then you’ll never resolve the issue. If you do, then there is a lot to be examined. Ultimately we must either believe that 1) The OT doesn’t depict God (i.e. not morally praiseworthy), or 2) God had morally praiseworthy reasons for acting and the ‘atrocities’ aren’t that at all.
And how could I not say that very same thing that you just said with regard to human intuitions about morality, without God? Or in fact, any other animals intuitions that govern their variations of moral behavior? Now you could say [as I think you probably would] that human intuitions and judgments of morality aren’t static or binding in any ‘black and white’ sense I guess you could say, but then again, neither is God’s [seeing as whatever it is He commands is good] [and I don’t know if you’re a DCT or not], if you look at contradictions of behavior in contrast with his omnibenevolent nature found in both the Old and New Testaments.
I think that’s a rather euphemistic way of putting it, intentionally, and all I would say to that is this: I’m not interested in hearing any justifications for atrocities, whether or not the ‘reasons’ behind them were of good intentions really doesn’t matter to me [its bad, end of story], however that doesn’t mean that I’m not willing to hear a defense of the antithesis, I’m more than willing to listen and entertain other people’s ideas without my own input. But this isn’t anything I haven’t heard hundreds of times before.
There is a reason why you don’t believe in objective morals, remember when you said, “There are no objective morals.”? I’ll give you one other reason, if you aren’t already aware.
Because what you’re then dealing with is ‘morality’ as conceived in finite minds. Humanity isn’t immutable, neither is the mind. ‘Moral evolution’ occurs, if you will. Such evolution might take the form of homosexuality being illegal and then recognized as a legitimate lifestyle. If someone claims morality is to be found in human nature, and humanity — as will all animals — are constantly evolving, then morality is necessarily arbitrary.
I’ve already commented on this, if you want to go back and address those comments for real.
There’s nothing ‘euphemistic’ about my reply, and calling it euphemistic as an excuse to ignore it… That’s about as low as any Thrasymachus. If you aren’t really interested in a reply, don’t ask.
I’m not even sure what this was really responding to, but in case you didn’t see what I did here [trying to make a comparative analogy], this might serve as an explanation:
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/hypothetical
And? I’m not sure what the problem here is supposed to be, I hope to conceive of morality in terms of the fact of the matter of how things ‘are’, not what they should be.
Which I made a point of saying, it’s no more arbitrary than God’s reasons. You’re no better off than I am here.
Of which I don’t find convincing.
I wasn’t aware that I ignored it, as I said, I’m willing to hear people’s reasoning for the given hypotheticals that are being discussed, whether its ‘truly’ euphemistic or not has no correlation to a person’s use of it as an excuse. A person may go and call somebody an ‘idiot’ as an ad hominem attack on them, but that doesn’t negate the genuine possibility that that person truly ‘is’ an idiot. I personally find it to be euphemistic, someone else may not, if they don’t, good for them. So what?
I’m aware of what a hypothetical is. I was replying to your question / suggestion concerning why we can’t ground morality in ‘human intuition’ the same way we ground morality in God’s nature. In case you missed what I said the first time, it’s because human nature is different than God’s proposed nature, and that therefore any grounding of morality in ‘human intuition’ will be along different lines.
Well God’s ‘reasons’ aren’t arbitrary at all. If you’d reply to what I said, you’ll see I am ‘better off’ than you are (i.e. you ignored the syllogism I provided).
I noticed.
Now you’re just being pretentious.
I don’t see how that is sufficient however. If the two natures are of a completely different kind, what specifically, ‘should’ [not does] merit that we should follow the moral dictates that emanate from his nature?
Jeremy, I read both you initial post, and all of the comments leading up to this very post right now. I keep trying to throw up new case examples by which we could move this dialogue into a bit of a different direction, this in part, was because I didn’t find that very convincing. God’s reasoning lies in what he commands, becomes intrinsically good. This is like a president or prime minister who pardons himself for potential war crimes that he’s likely to commit, or becomes absolved of any ‘evil’ proclivities that can be ascribed to his nature from his actions. So of course, God is by nature good, because he can get away with practically anything that He wishes to do.
Okay, whatever, I’m not going to argue with you over this.
We’ve been talking about the grounding of moral absolutes, now you’re changing the question to ‘why ought we follow the moral precepts which emanate from God’s nature?’ Are you done with the original question?
Right, we’re discussing moral ontology, and from reading this discussion, we’re really not talking about two different subjects, we’re talking in two different ways of describing and looking at the same thing. I admit my questions to the discussion at the level you’re thinking of, are largely preliminary, so they aren’t ‘directly’ addressing points X, Y and Z of what you’re talking about. I’m trying to ask you to qualify these things more so that you and I can get closer to the same central point. If you don’t want to do that for me [and I’m trying to do the same for you as well], then is conversation is simply over.
.…
Okay, so if you want to call them ‘commandments’, ‘precepts’, ‘reflected back supernaturally’ whatever word it is you’re thinking of, we’re still both intrinsically referring to God’s nature and character, merely at a different level. I was taking commandments as a central example, as they have to do with morality, I know we aren’t talking about the ten commandments directly, that wasn’t my point. When God ‘does’ ‘command’ something of someone, it is ‘just as much’ a reflection of his nature by what he commands them to do, they really aren’t distinct from one another. We’re not genuinely talking about two different things. You make a point of the creation / creator distinction, but in talking about the direct relation of morality springing forth from God’s nature, its no different from the example I’m using when I say God commands X from somebody.
All I’m asking is why you’ve changed the question, perhaps I also want to highlight that you are changing the question. If you’re asking ‘preliminary questions,’ that’s fine. The answer to ‘why ought we follow God’s moral precepts’ seems to me to be, very simply, because God is morally praiseworthy, and because morality is predicated in God’s nature, (that) morality is also ‘morally praiseworthy’.
A counter-example of what, the idea that morality is predicated upon God’s nature rather than His commands? For what reason are you providing the counter-example, so simply mention it, or because you see it as a more reasonable ‘explanation’?
I don’t see that I’ve changed the question, when I referred to direction, I meant it precisely in the preliminary sense, of diverting to qualify some statements before we get to the core of the argument. Its not as if I want to talk about something different at all, and I’m sorry if I came across that way. So then, under your clarification here [which I thank you for, <3], any act [this is my attempt to understand you here, please correct me if I get you wrong], which God commits, is therefore morally praiseworthy, no matter what He does [why this is the case, I don’t know, and I’m not yet asking you to answer that]. Now humanly acts, because they spring forth for God’s nature, are justifiable simply because they arise out of God’s inner moral constitution, yet, this does not account for evil acts, and further as a subset, it does not account for acts that God tells humans to commit [possibly for some specific occasion] which would otherwise be evil for humans to do in general. So to me, I see a few contradictions perhaps in this statement, I’m not sure. We don’t have a kind of two separate moralities as I raised in my Nietzschean point, yet we don’t have identical moralities because as we clarified there is Godly nature on one hand [Creator] and Humanly nature on the other hand [Creation], which strikes me as a way of saying that they are two separate moralities, yet at the same time they aren’t, and there is just one morality? o.O.
Not at all, all I wanted is to see your reason and response to such a hypothetical. It did somewhat indirectly have to do with what we were talking about, all I was asking by posing that statement was for you to answer it so that it would clear up some potential misunderstandings that could’ve arisen on my own end, :/.
In fact, with regard to this discussion specifically, this is very, very much what I’m trying to say right here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RqkskhzRCc
Right, with the understanding that God can’t act in morally unpraiseworthy ways.
When I get an hour I’ll give them a watch.
Okay, good, then we’re thinking along the same lines here. So any act that God performs, or any manner of behavior he exhibits, or anything that He tells people to do, cannot in any way, cease to be morally unpraiseworthy [this is very much similar to DCT reasoning, irrespective of the slightly different approach]. Am I correct so far, o.o?
Okay, moral order here might be a rather ambiguous term for us. Are these evil acts, contrary to God’s moral constitution, or contrary to the human moral order that is a reflection of God’s nature? I wasn’t actually thinking of Abraham at all, I was thinking more of the conquest of Canaan, or 2 Kings 2:23–25. I know you’re not arguing for divine command theory directly, but many of the descriptive elements of your own thesis very, very much resemble the inner dynamics of how divine command theory works. Besides that, you have to bring in a supplementary explanation at some point, to account for the significant ‘commands’ that God directly issues upon people, or even the ten commandments themselves, which I think your explanation doesn’t ‘directly’ address.
So then I still don’t see how this is not two distinct moralities, or one morality for the purpose of two primary applications. There is no hidden integer [that I’m aware of] between 1 and 2. When I raised the point about two different moralities, you corrected me by saying that that was a false understanding, yet you don’t directly say that its a singular morality either. So what exactly is it,
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So long as you are keeping in mind the moral distinction between creator and creation, yes.
‘Both’. I put ‘both’ in inverted commas as I the ‘moral order’ is one-and-the-same.
I realize what I’m saying is similar to DCT. In finding morality to be predicated upon God’s nature, I avoid what is otherwise the ‘Euthyphro dilemma’ (which, incidentally, is a very good argument against religions which employ multiple deities, such as those found in Greek mythology). In terms of a ‘supplementary explanation,’ I think I need only reply that any act God commands (in reference to an act with moral dimensions) to a people — such as the 10 commandments — is a necessary reflection of God’s nature. How that relates to the conquest of Canaan, or 2 Kings 2:23–25 would need to be examined. If you want to, that is — raise the objection.
Haven’t I said there is only one morality? (e.g. “There is only one ‘morality’”.) I think the worship example demonstrates fairly well what I’m getting at: there is one moral order (‘one singular morality’) and that moral order has different implications depending on the being in question. For instance it is morally praiseworthy to worship God, while it is not morally praiseworthy to worship a man or a woman in the same way.
… Eh? I find these two statements in complete contradiction:
So they are the same… yet they aren’t the same… at the same time? [I know you feel you’ve already responded to this, but it doesn’t seem to be anymore objective than naturalistic grounds for morality, where certain situations have different practical applications, such as your creator / creation distinction] O.O, I don’t see how this is a logical possibility, seeing as there are two different sets of rules governing what constitutes the legitimacy of certain forms of behavior, none of which can be characterized as ‘evil’ when applied to God, yet can be applied with regard to humans. This seems just bizarre to me, :/. It doesn’t appear anymore objective than Rawls Theory of Justice or any other contractarian variations, seeing as their applications share much overlap.
Yeah, I know what it is you’re saying, and what you have claimed, I’m just expressing my inability[?] perhaps, to logically comprehend your original thesis [your initial claims were explicit, your descriptive impressions however seemed rather different]. But, if human’s ethical nature ‘arises’ and emanates, and springs forth from God’s nature, then its logically hypocritical for Him to exempt Himself of the ‘evil’ and unjustifiable actions humans commit, seeing as they come from His essential nature. I understand this, I just don’t see how it is.consistent and coherent [with his attributes], because evil is just as much a reflection of his nature, even if you call it good simply because it comes from him, okay, but that still doesn’t change the fact of the matter. And what is it about God, that makes him morally praiseworthy?
I don’t see that you avoid the Euthyphro dilemma at all… you simply redress the same problem with different terminology. If one of the elements that makes God the legitimate source of morality for example is His praiseworthiness [any being that is morally praiseworthy], then I can simply ask you, what is it about God that makes him morally praiseworthy? Honesty? Is that element of his nature morally praiseworthy because God decrees that it be so, arbitrarily, is it because that’s just what His nature ‘happens’ to be? Is it his acknowledgement of this element of a moral standard higher than Him, or independent of His ability to affect it? Your thesis doesn’t escape the dilemma at all, you just reposition the same problem.
What about the worship example do you find undemonstrative about what I’m saying? I don’t see where you are getting ‘two moralities’ from what I’ve said, in distinguishing between ‘creator’ and ‘creation’.
I’m not sure you understand (or if you do, what you understand). I never said ‘human’s ethical nature… springs forth from God’s nature’. I said morality — which is binding on both God and humanity — springs forth from God’s nature. There is no separate ‘human ethical nature’ that finds its origin in God’s nature, alongside ‘God’s ethical nature’ (or some such thing).
Well put it this way: if God were not morally praiseworthy, then He would not be God and we wouldn’t give this ‘God’ a second thought. And no, God is not able to change morality (e.g. suddenly declare evil to be good) because that would require God to change His nature. God can’t change His nature and therefore can’t arbitrarily decree moral precepts.