What could make morality objective?

[Peter Holmes]

Any expression of a value-judgement is 'in my opinion'.

Right. And that "opinion" has no objective referent whatsoever; so it means only "This is what Peter happens, at this moment, to feel like."

So, in my opinion, believing X is morally right or wrong just because a god says it is - is morally degenerate.

Can't be, objectively.

So all you're really saying is, "Peter feels he doesn't like believing..." It cannot actually BE "morally wrong," far less "degenerate" (presumably from some higher state, which also doesn't objectively exist), and there is no content at all in the adjective "morally" that is not also in the phrase "Peter feels like..."

You are, by you own admission, Peter, talking about nothing at all objectively true. You're just emoting, without the slightest pretext for anyone else having to think you are talking about more than your temporary feelings.

Since nothing is objectively morally right or wrong, then of course all we have is our judgement. But my or anyone's moral judgement can be more or less rational, intelligent, compassionate, and so on. Your description of subjective judgement as necessarily fickle, selfish, transient, and so on, is a figment of your religiously-diseased imagination.

And yes, believing something is morally right or wrong just because a god or anyone else says it is - that really is an abnegation of moral responsibility of which anyone uncorrupted by religious belief would be ashamed. That you aren't ashamed demonstrates the moral damage.

[Immanuel Can]

But my or anyone's moral judgement can be more or less rational, intelligent, compassionate, and so on.

These also are subjective values. Who says being "rational" is "good"? Who says being "intelligent" is? Who says "compassion" is a "good" thing? Their "goodness" is also merely in the subjectivist's imagination, in the world as you see it.

All you've done, there, Pete, is use one gratuitous, pseudo-objective value to bolster another. You haven't shown that any of your judgments, or the honorifics you'v attached to them are objectively warranted.

Your description of subjective judgement as necessarily fickle, selfish, transient, and so on, is a figment of your religiously-diseased imagination.

That's really funny, Pete.

They're descriptions of the necessary implications of YOUR subjectivism, Pete...nothing I believe. Personally, I wouldn't put any stock in a subjective moral judgment.

...an abnegation of moral responsibility...

If such a thing every happens, it's not "bad" in a subjectivist's world. You don't objectively have any "morals," nor any "responsibilities" either. You only have what you feel you have -- or no, we should say you have nothing at all, since one can't "owe responsibility" to one's mere subjective impressions.

P.S. -- I think you meant "abdication."

[Sculptor]

But my or anyone's moral judgement can be more or less rational, intelligent, compassionate, and so on.

These also are subjective values. Who says being "rational" is "good"? Who says being "intelligent" is? Who says "compassion" is a "good" thing? Their "goodness" is also merely in the subjectivist's imagination, in the world as you see it.

You are doing a great job of shooting yourself in the foot.

[Immanuel Can]

But my or anyone's moral judgement can be more or less rational, intelligent, compassionate, and so on.

These also are subjective values. Who says being "rational" is "good"? Who says being "intelligent" is? Who says "compassion" is a "good" thing? Their "goodness" is also merely in the subjectivist's imagination, in the world as you see it.

You are doing a great job of shooting yourself in the foot.

Oh, Sculpy.

You're so silly. You couldn't even find the phrase, "in the world as you see it"?

Roll on.

[henry quirk]

You have your theory - people own themselves, so it's morally wrong for them to be owned - and you're sticking to that, come hell or high water.

Yep, and you'll get to see me dig in my heels some more in a new thread.

Watch for it, Pete.

-----

Is this the argument again, Henry?

In part. No worries, Mannie: as I say, there's gonna be a new thread soon.

It'll be a glorious exercise in cut & paste, expansion, and mule-headedness.

[Immanuel Can]

It'll be a glorious exercise in cut & paste, expansion, and mule-headedness.

I'm livin' for it.

[henry quirk]

It'll be a glorious exercise in cut & paste, expansion, and mule-headedness.

I'm livin' for it.

Tonight, mebbe tomorrow.

Soon.

[Peter Holmes]

But my or anyone's moral judgement can be more or less rational, intelligent, compassionate, and so on.

These also are subjective values. Who says being "rational" is "good"? Who says being "intelligent" is? Who says "compassion" is a "good" thing? Their "goodness" is also merely in the subjectivist's imagination, in the world as you see it.

All you've done, there, Pete, is use one gratuitous, pseudo-objective value to bolster another. You haven't shown that any of your judgments, or the honorifics you'v attached to them are objectively warranted.

Your description of subjective judgement as necessarily fickle, selfish, transient, and so on, is a figment of your religiously-diseased imagination.

That's really funny, Pete.

They're descriptions of the necessary implications of YOUR subjectivism, Pete...nothing I believe. Personally, I wouldn't put any stock in a subjective moral judgment.

...an abnegation of moral responsibility...

If such a thing every happens, it's not "bad" in a subjectivist's world. You don't objectively have any "morals," nor any "responsibilities" either. You only have what you feel you have -- or no, we should say you have nothing at all, since one can't "owe responsibility" to one's mere subjective impressions.

P.S. -- I think you meant "abdication."

I do mean 'abdication'. Thanks. To believe something is morally right or wrong just because a god or anyone else says it is - that is an abdication of moral responsibility. It is to outsource your own moral judgement. And instead of criticising me for making moral judgements, how about addressing your abdication of moral responsibility?

For example, you and I believe slavery is morally wrong. You claim I have no right or justification for believing that - and you're sticking monotonously to your fatuous argument that moral subjectivism means moral nihilism, which is ridiculous.

But you believe it's a fact that slavery is morally wrong. And in the OT, the NT and the Qur'an, the invented god of Judaism, Christianity and Islam endorses and never condemns slavery. (Let's leave out genocide, collective punishment, sexual slavery, the oppression of women, the killing of homosexuals and witches, the beating of children, substitutionary human sacrifice for now - and the other moral abominations performed, commanded or endorsed by the monstrous god of those wicked books.)

Never mind my supposedly unjustified condemnation of those atrocities. How about your attitude towards them? You think there are moral facts, so that immorality exists independent from judgement. So how is the objective immorality of your invented god not, in fact, immoral? How is your fictional creator-god off the hook of objective moral condemnation? After all, facts are facts, even for a god who created everything.

And just to be clear. You believe slavery is objectively morally wrong - so 'it's okay if the creator-god endorses it' is apologetic bs. Don't even bother with that.

[Veritas Aequitas]

But my or anyone's moral judgement can be more or less rational, intelligent, compassionate, and so on.

These also are subjective values. Who says being "rational" is "good"? Who says being "intelligent" is? Who says "compassion" is a "good" thing? Their "goodness" is also merely in the subjectivist's imagination, in the world as you see it.

All you've done, there, Pete, is use one gratuitous, pseudo-objective value to bolster another. You haven't shown that any of your judgments, or the honorifics you'v attached to them are objectively warranted.

Your description of subjective judgement as necessarily fickle, selfish, transient, and so on, is a figment of your religiously-diseased imagination.

That's really funny, Pete.

They're descriptions of the necessary implications of YOUR subjectivism, Pete...nothing I believe. Personally, I wouldn't put any stock in a subjective moral judgment.

...an abnegation of moral responsibility...

If such a thing every happens, it's not "bad" in a subjectivist's world. You don't objectively have any "morals," nor any "responsibilities" either. You only have what you feel you have -- or no, we should say you have nothing at all, since one can't "owe responsibility" to one's mere subjective impressions.

P.S. -- I think you meant "abdication."

There is no objective theistic morality.
Theistic morality is subjective and pseudo-morality, i.e. grounded based on the theists' subjectivist's delusion that God exists when God is merely an illusion.

[Belinda]

But my or anyone's moral judgement can be more or less rational, intelligent, compassionate, and so on.

These also are subjective values. Who says being "rational" is "good"? Who says being "intelligent" is? Who says "compassion" is a "good" thing? Their "goodness" is also merely in the subjectivist's imagination, in the world as you see it.

All you've done, there, Pete, is use one gratuitous, pseudo-objective value to bolster another. You haven't shown that any of your judgments, or the honorifics you'v attached to them are objectively warranted.

Your description of subjective judgement as necessarily fickle, selfish, transient, and so on, is a figment of your religiously-diseased imagination.

That's really funny, Pete.

They're descriptions of the necessary implications of YOUR subjectivism, Pete...nothing I believe. Personally, I wouldn't put any stock in a subjective moral judgment.

...an abnegation of moral responsibility...

If such a thing every happens, it's not "bad" in a subjectivist's world. You don't objectively have any "morals," nor any "responsibilities" either. You only have what you feel you have -- or no, we should say you have nothing at all, since one can't "owe responsibility" to one's mere subjective impressions.

P.S. -- I think you meant "abdication."

I do mean 'abdication'. Thanks. To believe something is morally right or wrong just because a god or anyone else says it is - that is an abdication of moral responsibility. It is to outsource your own moral judgement. And instead of criticising me for making moral judgements, how about addressing your abdication of moral responsibility?

For example, you and I believe slavery is morally wrong. You claim I have no right or justification for believing that - and you're sticking monotonously to your fatuous argument that moral subjectivism means moral nihilism, which is ridiculous.

But you believe it's a fact that slavery is morally wrong. And in the OT, the NT and the Qur'an, the invented god of Judaism, Christianity and Islam endorses and never condemns slavery. (Let's leave out genocide, collective punishment, sexual slavery, the oppression of women, the killing of homosexuals and witches, the beating of children, substitutionary human sacrifice for now - and the other moral abominations performed, commanded or endorsed by the monstrous god of those wicked books.)

Never mind my supposedly unjustified condemnation of those atrocities. How about your attitude towards them? You think there are moral facts, so that immorality exists independent from judgement. So how is the objective immorality of your invented god not, in fact, immoral? How is your fictional creator-god off the hook of objective moral condemnation? After all, facts are facts, even for a god who created everything.

And just to be clear. You believe slavery is objectively morally wrong - so 'it's okay if the creator-god endorses it' is apologetic bs. Don't even bother with that.

Well said Peter. However both you and Immanuel don't accept God evolves. God has a history. Christians have a sort of handle on this fact when they say Jesus was God's son. Unfortunately most Christians are also supernaturalists who don't understand the metaphor 'God's son' and moreover believe Jesus was The one and only Christ.

[Sculptor]

These also are subjective values. Who says being "rational" is "good"? Who says being "intelligent" is? Who says "compassion" is a "good" thing? Their "goodness" is also merely in the subjectivist's imagination, in the world as you see it.

All you've done, there, Pete, is use one gratuitous, pseudo-objective value to bolster another. You haven't shown that any of your judgments, or the honorifics you'v attached to them are objectively warranted.

That's really funny, Pete.

They're descriptions of the necessary implications of YOUR subjectivism, Pete...nothing I believe. Personally, I wouldn't put any stock in a subjective moral judgment.


If such a thing every happens, it's not "bad" in a subjectivist's world. You don't objectively have any "morals," nor any "responsibilities" either. You only have what you feel you have -- or no, we should say you have nothing at all, since one can't "owe responsibility" to one's mere subjective impressions.

P.S. -- I think you meant "abdication."

I do mean 'abdication'. Thanks. To believe something is morally right or wrong just because a god or anyone else says it is - that is an abdication of moral responsibility. It is to outsource your own moral judgement. And instead of criticising me for making moral judgements, how about addressing your abdication of moral responsibility?

For example, you and I believe slavery is morally wrong. You claim I have no right or justification for believing that - and you're sticking monotonously to your fatuous argument that moral subjectivism means moral nihilism, which is ridiculous.

But you believe it's a fact that slavery is morally wrong. And in the OT, the NT and the Qur'an, the invented god of Judaism, Christianity and Islam endorses and never condemns slavery. (Let's leave out genocide, collective punishment, sexual slavery, the oppression of women, the killing of homosexuals and witches, the beating of children, substitutionary human sacrifice for now - and the other moral abominations performed, commanded or endorsed by the monstrous god of those wicked books.)

Never mind my supposedly unjustified condemnation of those atrocities. How about your attitude towards them? You think there are moral facts, so that immorality exists independent from judgement. So how is the objective immorality of your invented god not, in fact, immoral? How is your fictional creator-god off the hook of objective moral condemnation? After all, facts are facts, even for a god who created everything.

And just to be clear. You believe slavery is objectively morally wrong - so 'it's okay if the creator-god endorses it' is apologetic bs. Don't even bother with that.

Well said Peter. However both you and Immanuel don't accept God evolves. God has a history. Christians have a sort of handle on this fact when they say Jesus was God's son. Unfortunately most Christians are also supernaturalists who don't understand the metaphor 'God's son' and moreover believe Jesus was The one and only Christ.

So says The Book of God. There are other books. The Book of Nature for one.

The trouble is with God, is that s/he/it tends to allow a long list of contradictory beliefs to flourish about s/he/its nature. Conflict and suspicion are the constant bedfellows of all religions, as a result. You might want to think about the nature of such a god that encourages this conflict.
Know him (her/it) by his deeds, I say.

Taking all into account form the Book of Human Experience, it is fair to conclude that the god so interpreted by the fact is not any kind of god worthy of the name.

[Peter Holmes]

And just to be clear. You believe slavery is objectively morally wrong - so 'it's okay if the creator-god endorses it' is apologetic bs. Don't even bother with that.

Well said Peter. However both you and Immanuel don't accept God evolves. God has a history. Christians have a sort of handle on this fact when they say Jesus was God's son. Unfortunately most Christians are also supernaturalists who don't understand the metaphor 'God's son' and moreover believe Jesus was The one and only Christ.

Thanks, Belinda. Just some thoughts.

1 The god that monotheists call God (Allah) is just one of thousands invented by our ancestors. Their insistence that their god is the one and only real god, unchallenged for so long, should no longer be accepted, in my opinion. 'Your god is an idol, which I know because my god is real' should be laughed out of intellectual court.

2 A god doesn't evolve or have a history in the way that a real thing may do - unless, say, unicorns and fairies can be said to evolve and have a history.

3 As you know, the vast majority of people who call themselves Christians don't agree with you. And every single one of them thinks their distillation of the snake oil, hawked by their bunch of hucksters, is the right one.

[Belinda]

Peter Holmes wrote:

2 A god doesn't evolve or have a history in the way that a real thing may do - unless, say, unicorns and fairies can be said to evolve and have a history.

Fairies as ideas did evolve as ideas. Same with the God idea which evolved and still does. Many people's ideas change with time and experience. It's a mistake to throw out the God idea unless you understand the benefits of the evolved idea of God.

You yourself are so attached to the idea of God as entity rather than idea you can't see any benefit in evolved modern ideas of God.

For instance, do you understand the difference between transcendent God and immanent God?

[Immanuel Can]

To believe something is morally right or wrong just because a god or anyone else says it is - that is an abdication of moral responsibility.

Is it, now?

Well, then you're no subjectivist. You're invoking a moral principle there as if it were objective -- you're assuming we have a universal "moral responsibility" to do what you like, which is not to believe that God grounds moral obligations. You're indignant over a thing you don't even believe exists, really. Because subjectivism requires that all you mean is "Peter doesnt' like..."

And while I am not deliberately attempting to displease you, you will have to explain to me how that universal and objective moral obligation not to ground morals in God devolves upon me...with only reference to subjectivist assumptions.

So I'm ready to hear about that.

For example, you and I believe slavery is morally wrong.

No, according to subjectivism, all you believe is that you don't like slavery. That's where the power of your claim has to begin and end, or you'll transgress your own philosophy and become an objectivist.

You think there are moral facts, so that immorality exists independent from judgement. So how is the objective immorality of your invented god not, in fact, immoral?

Because in your subjectivist telling, NOTHING can be "immoral." It can only be "Unliked, right now, by Peter."

In fact, as per subjectivism, Peter could change his "liking" in the next five minutes, without violating moral subjectivism. His "liking" is totally personal, and devoid of objective force or referent in the outside world. It's not "immoral" for anyone to "like" anything at all, per subjectivism, and this "liking" has no obligation whatsoever even to endure itself.

Again, you're clearly not even able to stay a subjectivist even long enough to write one message, Pete. Isn't it quite obvious to you by now that subjectivism is either totally solipsistic, individual, temporary and contingent on mere personal feelings? And since it is ungrounded in any objective reality, you just can't manage to moralize at all, as you do here, without violating it over and over.

Give it up. Either subjectivism is false, in which case you can put objective moral questions to me, or it's true, in which case you simply cannot without violating your own claims.

Which is it?

[Peter Holmes]

Peter Holmes wrote:

2 A god doesn't evolve or have a history in the way that a real thing may do - unless, say, unicorns and fairies can be said to evolve and have a history.

Fairies as ideas did evolve as ideas. Same with the God idea which evolved and still does. Many people's ideas change with time and experience. It's a mistake to throw out the God idea unless you understand the benefits of the evolved idea of God.

You yourself are so attached to the idea of God as entity rather than idea you can't see any benefit in evolved modern ideas of God.

For instance, do you understand the difference between transcendent God and immanent God?

Two different things here:

1 The idea of non-existent things such as gods, unicorns and fairies has changed. True, but they still don't exist.

2 Some current ideas of non-existent things may be useful and so worth holding on to. But not if the ideas also cause harm.

I think the damage caused by even 'evolved' ideas of gods and other imaginary things far outweighs any good from holding on to them.