I think that is unknown and largely irrelevant, although I would assume it's a combination.
the reason why it's not irrelevant is that a morality from god must be a standard. it cannot be a combination of the two, because you cannot be dictated by something at the same time as dictating that same something. that is like saying while being born you were birthing your mother.
the problem with religious morality is this: if god dictates morality, then morality becomes arbitrary; as in no standard exists with which to judge morality but what god were to say. this means god could say that shooting the left foot of a raccoon on sunday leads to heaven, and it becomes moral simply because of this. simply put, morality has no inherent meaning (as most religious people may find disagreeable).
the only difference between upholding and worshipping "the one God" and committing murder is that your god has said that one is morally right, and that the other is morally wrong. there exists no standard with which to judge why either action would be right or wrong in this case.
so surely then god is simply a being that abides by morality, as in whatever god does is considered moral, as he is a moral being. now this must be it right? oddly enough, no, this cannot be either. if god is a moral being, then god's actions are dictated. if he were to be dictated, that means he is not omnipotent, as in there is a standard that essentially predates god, or is higher on the chain of authority.
but the real problem with this is that we should then follow his example as a moral being. yet there are many instances of the bible in which he commits genocides and other atrocities. at this point there exists a paradox. god says this and does something different. since god did not dictate morality, would we not be moral by rejecting god's commandments and following his example instead?
this conundrum is one of the reasons i left the christian faith and generally reject theistic religions. it cannot be resolved without invoking a "its beyond our puny human brain" type answer which at this point is a pretty unacceptable answer to a philosophical question such as this.
pretty much anyone who was good at railz or duels who went to that server got banned reaper. me several times "for botting with railgun". and i've heard stories from other tastyspleeners that my experience was not an uncommon one.
so yeah, i kinda have to think that the whole sour taste of a terrible admin running that server outweighs any memories of fun (because, you know, i only got to play a few matches over the years on that server, partially hoping the admin removed the 50 yard stick from his anus)
good idea to name it after nygang, the server/clan that had the best track record of good sportsmanship, chill attitudes, and definitely an admin who welcomed people of high skill to compete on his quake 2 server. a man so humble he could be beaten a hundred times by someone and still give the ole gg.
You can try and understand morals all you want, but god has already set them up properly. In other words there's little need to try and figure them out, they've already been handed down.
you seem to be intentionally glazing over this question, because its a very important one in dispelling the idea that god can determine morality at all
as for the cat thing, it can be argued that cat's instincts as far as hunting will trump any regards to taking life. as in, the more domesticated they are, the more likely they will kill without reason. cats in the wild get plenty of hunting exercise because that is how they will eat. it is not often you hear of cats in the wild killing for the sake of killing, because most of the time they do not have such a luxury. because hunting is a very strong survival mechanism, and, because of such instincts, one's life is more important to uphold than another's, this is important for the cat. if the hunting instincts die down, so do the odds of survival (even in domesticated cats as hunting instincts are strong, so it stands to reason that this also happens within their brains).
the wild is hard to uphold morality. in the wild, to be safe is to be suspicious of any other living thing other than your own kind. an animal, essentially, cannot trust a member of a different kind. sometimes they cannot even trust members of their own kind. morality exists as instincts in taking care of their own, in some cases, taking care of their wounded and their females. the higher brained mammals such as dogs/wolves, cats/big cats, elephants, etc they all have specific instincts regarding to their own kind. elephants will risk their lives to rescue their young, as will the others, within reason.
but if you take an animal out of the wild, you will find they can cooperate. cats can befriend birds, dogs befriending cats, there have been wolves befriending humans and so forth. it shows that outside the wild, these animals can develop relationships that are not primarily based on survival, and thus will trust another kind. this is true morality, this is knowing that they are relatively safe they may pursue such relationships. and is the same for us when we left the wild and created society.
so yes, i do believe morality exists within these animals and ourselves, not just as a concept we invented, but a by product of certain instincts for survival that are vestigal and remain in our brains well after we have left the wild.
"i never said that. you made that assumption.i don't know how much research you have done. you just come off like a typical holier than thou, athiest who is never wrong. so you failed to convince me that i have attacked your character, nor have i appealed to any emotion, prejudice, or special interest. i was stating that many other people have come to the same conclusion. your not the only person who has. "
why would you even bother posting what you did in the first place? or do you really believe that i'm truly the first enlightened person and should stop the presses? yeah i didn't think so. look, it's over. it's still in your post and quoted in mine. it's right there dude, and its not even this big e-crime you seem to try to be explaining yourself out of. i really don't take offense to it, but yeah i'll point it out if you're trying to debate with me and have to sink to a low point just to get words in.
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"Could you put more words in my mouth kami? that is the biggest fallacious, most rediculous statement i heard. you obviously don't understand what i wrote. i said morality is subjective with or without law, meaning individuals choose what is right or wrong based on a religious doctrine or lack thereof.(atheism). your pointing to an islamic doctrine when i have made no mention of that. how is anyone responsible for what someone else believes? how is their behavior condoned because i'm stating people interpret ethical standards differently and independently. "
you said subjective, not me. and you saying "with or without law" doesn't change what subjective morality means. what you're talking about is MORAL RELATIVISM. i've been trying to get you to use that term for ages now. and moral relativism does. not. work. why doesn't it work? the islam example is a perfect one for dispelling this shit. and it doesn't matter if you don't talk about islam. hey maybe if i don't talk about kids killing animals it doesn't happen guys.
what you're saying is morality is subjective, *ahem*, "with or without law". either you need to get a new word, start referring to it as moral relativism, or stop talking about something you haven't even learned about. you say the words subjective and choose. this means the rules for which morality can be derived are arbitrary. this is from your explanation: scenario one - i can create a church and gain followers, and i could create a commandment that says you should steal from your neighbor at all times. this would be considered moral if people followed it, because they believe in the church and derived morality from my commandments or scenario two - because morality is subjective, i choose not to follow the commandment of "do not covet thy neighbor's possessions". since said morals are not objective, i can read this document and subjectively weigh in each one, finding that this one is insignificant. in this case, subjectively, i choose to derive morality from this document. in this case, why would god create something called "commandments" when they really should have been called "very serious suggestions"?
you are being intentionally vague with the word subjective for some reason. these two possibilities can be derived from your use of subjectivity in morality. scenario one sides more on the principle of moral relativism. this, for me and most of the thread, is what we've gotten out of your talking. and since there's more of us than the one person you are representing here, im assuming this means you fucked up when writing it, not me or the other people reading it.
scenario two talks about how there is, in fact, objective morality, but because such morality can be derived differently from person to person, there is no standard in weighing right or wrong at all. there are only shades of gray. this is what you sound like you're talking about now, but, if you are indeed a christian, i probably wouldn't admit to this. moses called them commandments for a reason. this also means you cannot objectively agree that murder is wrong, because the outcome depends solely on the person it is being presented to. and this is wrong.
there are indeed things we as humans of sound mind will agree upon as right and as wrong. this list is very very small, because there are only a few situations in which morality can be considered completely objective for humanity. and that would be things like not murdering people, protecting the young and/or the pregnant. these sorts of things are derived from a survival standpoint very early in our development.
if we murdered our neighbors, we would have less people in the tribe, less people to hunt/protect the women and children. the odds of survival go down as there is objective safety in numbers. as for protecting the young and pregnant, this also has to do with the survival of our tribes. to survive as humans we need our offspring to be healthy and to someday do the jobs we did. this is a very survival oriented mindset and something that all humans of sound mind were able to do without having to contemplate the complex philosophical underpinnings of morality.
we had this well before commandments ever existed and before christian prophets ever graced the earth with their presence. so when i say christianity has nothing to do with morality, i'd say that's pretty good evidence of that.
if you want to talk about helping the fellow man, more often than not, it pays the survival of the group for communal aid to be given. when one member is down, that's one member not reproducing or hunting or protecting or nurturing. however, since abstract thought wasn't as high, such a thing was probably abused very little so that such a system worked. other than being the alpha male, there was little to be ambitious about. morality? before christ? well i never!
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the rest of your post attempts to talk about my points as strawman even though it was completely your fault for not explaining what you meant about moral subjectivity (you know, since no one uses that terminology), so i don't believe i need to address it. i still think you're backpedaling and actually meant moral relativism based on your former posts, but i'll give you the benefit of the doubt and have addressed your last post only.
Ad-Hominem 1. appealing to one's prejudices, emotions, or special interests rather than to one's intellect or reason. 2. attacking an opponent's character rather than answering his argument.
Where in my response do i appeal to emotions or special interests?. or perhaps i offended you with my example comparison to adulterous people who go with other peoples wives? or perhaps you sounded condescending, when you stated that people who need rules to behave morally, didn't grow up right. while we are on the topic, seeing as though you are admitting you are an athiest. hence giving the conclusion of being apathetic to the idea of bagging another man's wife, as if it is of no consequence.
on the other issues you brought up.. you must have been the only person to ever come to that conclusion ever. i guess people really do have all the answers...
you're obviously being sarcastic. what you mean by this is that because i am not well known nor published in journals of philosophy or science i have no credibility. even though i never claimed that this is my own idea, you attack the idea based on who i am, not for what the idea is itself. that is called ad hominem in debating. essentially you choose to ignore the point and instead refute the person making the claim rather than the claim itself.
I am stating that morality is subjective because of the fact that everyone is a sinner. the bible states that noone is sinless except christ. saying morality is timeless, is very subjective in time and place. example being that cavemen had instinct to club a random woman and mate with her to procreate the next generation. by today's standards, if that had occured it would be illegal and immoral. although it was accepted before because its was beneficial to the survival of the species? today the law would have something to say about that. now modern man just uses roofies and excessive alcohol.
first of all, we're not debating the bible. the bible is a second hand source of hearsay. it is not written by god or christ, and it was written thousands of years ago. you'll find that you go to any philosophy, philosophical theology (as far as relating morality questions, not historical relevance), or any other class, you'll find that the bible is not an acceptable source for this reason. the bible has many contradictory notions in it, and it's no surprise that even the bible affirms that even "the devil can quote scripture for his own ends" -Psalm xci. so while we could use the bible as a good source of debate, i'd rather skip 20 pages of you quoting scripture for your ideas and me quoting scripture that contradicts them.
secondly, morality cannot be relative or then it is completely arbitrary. morality serves a valuable purpose in human relationships; a purpose you can find the roots of in how animals form relationships. again, as long as you say morality is subjective then you MUST agree that there is nothing morally wrong with muslims killing the female rape victims for shaming their own families. and if you agree with this, then you are, quite simply, a pretty immoral person. if morality is subjective, then it is subjective, and i am only required to put forward a single example of how it is not subjective. i am not saying there exists a single tablet of morality in the universe, but for the purposes of humanity, there are some things that can be considered universal such as not murdering your neighbor, protecting the young, and protecting the pregnant to say a few.
to say morality is subjective is to say it is arbitrary. that is to say, i am allowed to judge morality for myself. so what if i said it was completely okay to burn churches down all the time? because you say morality is subjective, and because there is nothing about burning down a church in the ten commandments, you would have to agree that it is moral. because it is subjective and i therefore have judged it to be okay, then it is okay.
but let's take this a step further: if you believe that morality is subjective, then your 10 commandments do not have to be followed. 10 commandments would be what you should consider objective rules of morality. if these are not objective and so not set in stone, then someone may interpret them however they wish to. in the 10 commandments, it says "Thou shalt not murder". because of my subjective moral right, i will determine it can mean "Thou shalt not murder, except if someone insults my mother". Perhaps I made a special case because it bothered me so much. it may be extreme, but in my view there, i figured people who insulted my mother deserved it.
you cannot have your cake and eat it too. if you say morality is completely subjective, then no parts of morality are objective, including your commandments from your god. so no, morality is not subjective.
and golgo13, morality is not subjective; yet i also do not need a bible to tell me how i should live my life. if anyone needs a manuscript of what is right and wrong, then they have not grown up correctly. there are some tenents that must be obeyed in life so that our society both advances and survives, and such things that are against this are considered immoral. you can easily have morality without the 10 commandments or 7 deadly sins.
you just proved morality is subjective without law. example* lets say you think it would be ok to get with your bosses wife while the next person believes it is wrong. who is the arbitor of what is right and wrong? your own mind. so you base your morality on laws created by man do you not?
what about laws not yet created by man? by which component will you judge the valid morality of the law? so, saying morality is not subjective in the absence of law or (the ten commandments) is refuted.
on the other issues you brought up.. you must have been the only person to ever come to that conclusion ever. i guess people really do have all the answers...
morality can be extended to follow societal laws. at such a point, it may be moral to follow it or not.
but since you say morality is subjective, i guess that means its okay for muslims to kill the rape victims in their own family. its okay for them to subjugate their women to such a stripping of autonomy and promote them as objects to be collected in some cases.
and furthermore, it is not my own conclusion. this is an arguement put forth by many scientists who attempt to show reason in the face of god. richard dawkins makes this, carl sagan has talked about this, many others have spoken. and we're not going very far if you're going to post ad hominem in response. i have said nothing personally about you, but apparently my lack of celebrity status means that my words have no meaning.
i was really hoping we wouldn't get to that point.
this ww2 part has gone off on a tangent. its interesting and i'd love to keep going, but i doubt it would ever end.
and golgo13, morality is not subjective; yet i also do not need a bible to tell me how i should live my life. if anyone needs a manuscript of what is right and wrong, then they have not grown up correctly. there are some tenents that must be obeyed in life so that our society both advances and survives, and such things that are against this are considered immoral. you can easily have morality without the 10 commandments or 7 deadly sins.
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according to the bible all the shit happening in the world was fortold to happen by the prophets and jesus.
what the hell have prophets ever foretold that wasn't vague and was infact accurate and true?
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I know that could imply that if there was a god he is actually allowing all the bad things to happen but on the other hand it also says that satan "has but a short time, and he knows it" and after satan is cast down to hell anyone who has been saved will be wiped clear from all their grief.
we have to understand if god is a force of good or if he is a force of evil. if he is a benevolent god or not. and finally if we have free will or not.
we are supposedly creations of god. now if we think of god as an omnipotent being, then time as we understand it has no meaning. god could conceivably exist at all points in time at the same time. like a circle, constantly moving in cycle. this means, when god creates, he also watches it finish. he knows the exact history of every thing that's happened at the same time he'd create it. this means, he knows exactly what is going to happen. why would he create people he knows are going to be evil? why would you specifically create that if you know you have to be a certain way to enter into heaven? it makes no sense. he is essentially deliberately sending people to hell. these people have no chance, because their history is already done. he would know upon creation.
so why would he allow it to go on? the bible talks of repenting and doing good deeds. but it means nothing, as i said, he would know upon creation whether you go to heaven or hell. so literally whatever you do means nothing, because your history has been read already, and you will do what you have already done.
so at this point, god creates evil people knowing full well they have no chance of getting into heaven, and watching them live out their wretched lives, possibly killing people who don't deserve it.
also for christianity, only people who accept jesus will get saved. what of the thousands of good people who will never hear about jesus, or the other good people in the world who just aren't convinced due to having no reason to believe? these people will go to hell?
at this point god just sounds like a huge dick to me
The end justifying the means in relation to the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima is not exactly a valid argument. Japan was the aggressor. They fucked with a sleeping giant, woke him up, and got stepped on. Shit happens. By your own admission, primal instincts (such as self preservation) always trump moral rationale.
killing of civilians is never acceptable, not even in war. we didn't know what we had when we used it. no person will ever be able to convince me that there was no alternative to using the bombs on two major japanese cities, because, as i said, we had no idea what we had in our possession. it had never been used in combat before, and especially not to the levels we used them at.
they are still witnessing the horrors. genetic mutations and cancers that have been markedly higher. there was no foresight to this because this was the precedent. and it's why we will never do it again. remember that. the japanese may have initiated with us, but they targeted pearl harbor. we targetted two cities.
If people don't believe in a god then they can easily say the rules are dogma and can do what they please, basing it on their own subjective reasoning. thus, encouraging more chaos in the world. not to say that all athiests are immoral
we were having such a nice discussion too :\ would you agree that the person who does the right thing when no one is looking is more of a moral person than the person who does the right thing because someone else is watching? the answer is yes. why? because to do the right thing is simply to do the right thing. it involves your action as well as your motive. this would be considered the most moral perspective.
in a christian's case, there are 10 commandments among other rules. if you break these commandments, you are likely sent to hell or will suffer some divine retribution. this is no different than me putting a gun to your head and telling you to feed a bunch of homeless people. after you're done, are you a moral person because of what you did? no, i had a gun to your head. i was obviously controlling your situation. to do the right thing for no other reason other than that it is the right thing, is moral. to do the right thing just because you kind of want to avoid being sent to hell is motivation, and thus you are not doing it for the sake of doing the right thing.
and atheists only have more of a chance to be more moral people if they do moral things without the eye of god looking over their shoulders. to do the right thing without any benefit or consequence, in the face of even personal harm, that is being truly moral; it is not doing something because god told you what happens if you don't.
in islam's sha'ria law it's perfectly acceptable and infact encouraged for men to dominate their women into subjugation. i hold that the subjugation of autonomy is immoral. in all cases, once we understood the autonomy of slaves, we rid ourselves of the terrible ignorance. once we realized the autonomy of women is the same as men, we allowed them to stop being property and vote in our government.
what you say by your quote is that morality is either subjective or relative. if it is subjective, then it is meaningless as a means of self governance and how we interact with the world (both natural and social). if it is relative, then there are many contradictory rules in this world. this would also point to morality being meaningless if this were the case.
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