In the Absence of God; Human rights cannot exist.

[dilloduck]

I would LOVE to be able to look forward to a wonderful afterlife and think that a loving god will watch after me but I can't make myself believe things that don't jive with the facts. Sometimes reality just sucks and our fantasies don't affect that harsh reality.

How can you be so egotistical to think that you won't have an "afterlife" that is pleasant ? There is no scientific evidence that says "death sucks" .

 

[YWN666]

How can you be so egotistical to think that you won't have an "afterlife" that is pleasant ? There is no scientific evidence that says "death sucks" .

I didn't use the phrase "death sucks", first of all. I said reality sometimes sucks. Second, it's not egotism. Show me something to prove that an afterlife does exist. You're playing the logical fallacy game by asking me to prove that something doesn't exist. If you make the positive assertion, the burden of proof is on you. Got anything?

 

[LOki]

If humanity developed the concept of human rights because it believed that God wanted that from them - and it did - then it is an inescapable fact that if you remove God from that equation, there's no such thing as human rights. The idea never would have existed at all.

Demonstrate God desired humans to develop the concept of human rights.

Demonstrate that absent God, human rights cannot exist.

I will go further.

This will be LOLz.

Even now that human beings are aware of the concept of human rights, of the idea of an objective moral standard, if you remove the outside influence requiring that standard, you also remove all reason and motivation to obey that moral standard, observe the human rights of others, or even believe there are such things.

Your God is in no way an objective moral standard, and your God in no way provides an objective moral standard; supernatural moral standards are nothing at all but appeals to emotion--the emotions of the superstitious, and more precisely, the emotions of their superstitious witch-doctors.

 

[Cecilie1200]

You're begging the question. You've assumed that humanity developed the concept of human rights because humanity believed that God wanted it, but you haven't shown any evidence for that claim. In making that assumption you go on to suggest if God was removed from that equation then there would have been no human rights. Yes that would be true if it was the case that humans developed the concept of human rights from God, but you haven't shown that to be the case.

On the second point. What is the “outside influence” you mention? Without that being specified your point make no sense. Is the “outside influence” God? Is it something else?

It all looks one big circular argument.

"Outside influence" would be anything humans believe to be bigger than themselves, to which they are answerable. Not every religion believes in a deity, but they DO all believe in something larger than humanity that has expectations of our behavior. Buddhists, for example, do not have a deity, yet they do have a moral standard for behavior imposed from outside themselves.

Human history and human nature provide proof that moral standards do not come from inside us, nor do they come from society, since society has to come from a moral standard.

Look at the animal kingdom. We aren't the only social animals in existence, but we're the only ones that truly have a society as we know it. I guess you could substitute the word "civilization" there. Typically, a group of animals that lives together is ruled very arbitrarily by whichever animal is the strongest and most vicious. Those animals which no longer contribute to the pack through age or infirmity or are viewed as a potential threat to the leader are summarily dispatched. There is no concept among animals of "compassion" or "charity" or anything humans would view as morals.

Human beings are undeniably members of the animal kingdom, and our base natures reveal themselves to be quite closely related to that of other social animals. Our instincts run toward self-preservation, selfishness, and "might makes right", not toward altruism. Those things that we consider to be "higher, more noble qualities", such as love and compassion and conscience, are learned and require us to suppress our natural instincts. You can see this by looking at children. Children are very primitive and instinctive creatures, and they are also incredibly self-absorbed and uncaring about anyone else as a person. This isn't a criticism of children, mind you. They are that way by necessity.

There is simply no logical reason for me to care one way or another about your happiness and well-being, practically speaking. Why should I? It does nothing to benefit me, and might even be to my detriment, to whatever extent I have to defer my own gratification to allow for yours. For me to consider it important to respect your well-being, I would have to have a reason beyond and outside myself, be it God or my hope for eventual nirvana, or whatever.

I'm going to go take a nap right now. Sorry, but I'm 8 months pregnant and 40 years old, so my energy runs short really fast. When I wake up and come back, I will continue this in even more depth. CS Lewis had some excellent writings on this subject that I want to refer to, as well.

 

[Diuretic]

"Outside influence" would be anything humans believe to be bigger than themselves, to which they are answerable. Not every religion believes in a deity, but they DO all believe in something larger than humanity that has expectations of our behavior. Buddhists, for example, do not have a deity, yet they do have a moral standard for behavior imposed from outside themselves.

Human history and human nature provide proof that moral standards do not come from inside us, nor do they come from society, since society has to come from a moral standard.

Look at the animal kingdom. We aren't the only social animals in existence, but we're the only ones that truly have a society as we know it. I guess you could substitute the word "civilization" there. Typically, a group of animals that lives together is ruled very arbitrarily by whichever animal is the strongest and most vicious. Those animals which no longer contribute to the pack through age or infirmity or are viewed as a potential threat to the leader are summarily dispatched. There is no concept among animals of "compassion" or "charity" or anything humans would view as morals.

Human beings are undeniably members of the animal kingdom, and our base natures reveal themselves to be quite closely related to that of other social animals. Our instincts run toward self-preservation, selfishness, and "might makes right", not toward altruism. Those things that we consider to be "higher, more noble qualities", such as love and compassion and conscience, are learned and require us to suppress our natural instincts. You can see this by looking at children. Children are very primitive and instinctive creatures, and they are also incredibly self-absorbed and uncaring about anyone else as a person. This isn't a criticism of children, mind you. They are that way by necessity.

There is simply no logical reason for me to care one way or another about your happiness and well-being, practically speaking. Why should I? It does nothing to benefit me, and might even be to my detriment, to whatever extent I have to defer my own gratification to allow for yours. For me to consider it important to respect your well-being, I would have to have a reason beyond and outside myself, be it God or my hope for eventual nirvana, or whatever.

I'm going to go take a nap right now. Sorry, but I'm 8 months pregnant and 40 years old, so my energy runs short really fast. When I wake up and come back, I will continue this in even more depth. CS Lewis had some excellent writings on this subject that I want to refer to, as well.

Firstly, no worries, no need to be concerned that I'll try and assume a response that takes a while is anything other than a response that takes a while – and no, I'm not trying to be patronising, I just dislike it when someone thinks they score a “win” (spare me) if someone hasn't responded inside fifteen minutes.

Now, I need to get armed. I have my C.S. Lewis within reach!– Mere Christianity. But I really like The Abolition of Man – “We castrate and bid the geldings be frutiful”. But like that piece especially because education is an interest of mine. I haven't read "Surprised by Joy".


But I digress.

My position – hah I sound like a pompous ass already – is that what we call morality is really the rules humans worked out so that they could get on with each other. Thos rules were pretty basic at first but then – in some places, by no means all, given that humans developed at different rates depending on many variables, location being just one of them. I read somewhere that when humans became relatively sedentary (that is in some places they moved from hunting and gathering to farming, crude as it might have been in early times) they could start to use the big brains they had to reflect and think and be creative (the earliest couch potatoes?) and so we began our intellectual journey.

I don't know if was Aristotle that first identified humans as social (and political) animals but he wrote a bit about it. I wouldn't call him a couch potato but I always think it was somewhat ironic that a slave-driven economy allowed the philosophers of ancient Greece to ponder questions such as truth, love, beauty, justice and the rest of it.,

I think our “humanity” - the points you make about the difference between other animals and humans is due to evolution. Nature might be “red in tooth and claw” but it's also predictable. But just on that, have you seen the video of the hippo that attacked the crocodile at the African waterhole, said crocodile having just attacked a gazelle. The hippo fought off the croc and seemingly tried to help the gazelle which died as a result of the attack. Not only was it an out-group example of altruism, it was a cross-species example of altruism. But I'm not going to rely on one recorded incident to back up my point.

Human children are helpless when they're born. For them to survive they have to be closely and carefully nurtured. Now I always get confused about this and I'll stand to be corrected but I think it's the case that evolutionary processes among humans meant that those humans who reproduced and showed and used traits that would be considered good parenting would have ensured the reproduction of those traits in their offspring while poor parents would have seen their offspring not survive, thus humans who were good parents were better adapted to continue the lineage and eventually the pattern was set. Okay that's just my guessing, I'm not anthropologist.

I think human altruism works on the basis of proximity. I suspect we all know the old journalistic saw that a couple of thousand people drowned in a dam burst on the other side of the world is news while the death of a friend is a tragedy.

I'll stop there. Swirling thoughts, lots of ideas that aren't taking shape yet. Certainties and doubts are circling each other warily.

 

[Cecilie1200]

Demonstrate God desired humans to develop the concept of human rights.

Demonstrate that absent God, human rights cannot exist.

I don't have to demonstrate that God wants anything, because there's no need for God to even actually exist for the statement to still be true. All that needs to be true is for humans to have BELIEVED that God existed - any god, or higher consciousness would do - and that He or it wanted certain things from them. And I don't have to demonstrate that, because we know it to be true. Humans have always believed in higher, more-powerful beings than them, be it the Greek/Roman pantheon, the Norse pantheon, the various spirits of the North American aborigines, the Druid beliefs . . . go as far back as you like, and you will find primitive peoples believing in something outside of themselves that wants something from them.

As for human rights, they are a concept that grows out of a moral standard that says, "This is right and this is wrong. This is good and this is evil." Human beings being, at base, the selfish animals that we are, we don't have any motivation in and of ourselves to believe anything is good or bad beyond what serves or hinders the fulfillment of our own desires. We could easily exist in the same way other social animals do. But we don't. Instead, we suppress our natural instincts in service of something we consider better and higher than self-gratification: morality. Civilization. And where did modern man come by his concepts of what morality and civilization are? From his ancestors. Where and how did they come to develop them? Right back to the beginning of my argument.

Your God is in no way an objective moral standard, and your God in no way provides an objective moral standard; supernatural moral standards are nothing at all but appeals to emotion--the emotions of the superstitious, and more precisely, the emotions of their superstitious witch-doctors.

You might want to go look up the phrase "objective moral standard", then, Sparky, because you don't talk as though you have any idea what you're talking about. Even if the morality provided by religions is "appeals to emotion", that doesn't negate the fact that it's still an objective moral standard. I should also point out that some of the greatest philosophical thinking of human history was done on the basis of that "superstition", so unless you have some brilliance to offer equal to that of Thomas Aquinas et al., I would suggest you hold off on the supercilious condescension.

 

[Cecilie1200]

Firstly, no worries, no need to be concerned that I'll try and assume a response that takes a while is anything other than a response that takes a while – and no, I'm not trying to be patronising, I just dislike it when someone thinks they score a “win” (spare me) if someone hasn't responded inside fifteen minutes.

I agree. Anyone who doesn't ever seem to have anything to do other than sit on this message board 16 hours a day is assumed by me to not have enough life experience to be worth talking to. I'd rather talk to someone who goes away for a few hours to clean the house, walk the dog, talk to friends, whatever.

Now, I need to get armed. I have my C.S. Lewis within reach!– Mere Christianity. But I really like The Abolition of Man – “We castrate and bid the geldings be frutiful”. But like that piece especially because education is an interest of mine. I haven't read "Surprised by Joy".

I also like "The Screwtape Letters". It's really fascinating how much he was able to say about Christianity and the condition of mankind by using the reverse psychology approach.

But I digress.

Well, we certainly can't allow THAT around here.

My position – hah I sound like a pompous ass already – is that what we call morality is really the rules humans worked out so that they could get on with each other. Thos rules were pretty basic at first but then – in some places, by no means all, given that humans developed at different rates depending on many variables, location being just one of them.

But how much reason do humans have to TRY to get on with each other on that level? Other animals don't. Even humans themselves don't until someone teaches them to do so (you could consider parents to be the "higher power outside themselves" for children).

Even if you're completely cynical about religious belief and consider it all to have been the invention of the shamans or other clergy as an attempt to control people, my point still stands, because it was still the belief of the people in the higher power their clergy/shamans/whatever convinced them of that made them suppress their natural animal instincts in favor of social consciousness. And without basic moral standards, it wouldn't have been possible for human thought to arrive at the point of contemplating something like human rights.

I read somewhere that when humans became relatively sedentary (that is in some places they moved from hunting and gathering to farming, crude as it might have been in early times) they could start to use the big brains they had to reflect and think and be creative (the earliest couch potatoes?) and so we began our intellectual journey.

Well, I'd say it's pretty obvious that you're not going to have a lot of time to spend on painting sunsets and writing emo music when it's all you can do to keep body and soul together every day. This would be why western civilization didn't start to really make advances until after the cessation of the waves of barbarian invaders throughout the Dark Ages.

On the other hand, you still have to have something to reflect UPON. And it should be noticed that the earliest philosophers all believed in some sort of higher power in the universe, and started their ponderings from that belief.

I don't know if was Aristotle that first identified humans as social (and political) animals but he wrote a bit about it. I wouldn't call him a couch potato but I always think it was somewhat ironic that a slave-driven economy allowed the philosophers of ancient Greece to ponder questions such as truth, love, beauty, justice and the rest of it.,

Why is that ironic? One would certainly hope that morality and mankind's understanding of good and evil would evolve and improve over time, just as our understanding of science and technology does. It would be absolutely depressing to think that we don't grow as a species.

The people of ancient Greece, for all that many people think of them as advanced, civilized people, lived in a very harsh and primitive world. It made perfect sense to them that the losers of a battle would pay for that loss by becoming slaves, just as it was a fact that if THEY had lost, THEY would have become slaves as well. That was how human history had always been before them, and to some extent was a necessity of survival in that time.

As time passed, more modern men evolved their moral understanding and view of the world to decide that slavery was evil (interestingly, the first men to conceive that idea were religious, and did so from a religious point of view), just as Aristotle and his contemporaries had evolved THEIR moral understanding and view of the world over that of their predecessors. It all built upon what came before, and one devoutly hopes that those who come after us will build upon what we have come to understand and have an even more finely-tuned moral and social consciousness.

I think our “humanity” - the points you make about the difference between other animals and humans is due to evolution. Nature might be “red in tooth and claw” but it's also predictable.

I don't believe in macro-evolution, as I have never seen any evidentiary reason to do so. On the other hand, what I have been describing concerning human beings using the advantage nature gave them - intelligence - to decide that there is something higher and better than themselves and use that belief to civilize themselves would very much be micro-evolution . . . evolution inside a species.

But just on that, have you seen the video of the hippo that attacked the crocodile at the African waterhole, said crocodile having just attacked a gazelle. The hippo fought off the croc and seemingly tried to help the gazelle which died as a result of the attack. Not only was it an out-group example of altruism, it was a cross-species example of altruism. But I'm not going to rely on one recorded incident to back up my point.

WAS it altruistic? How do you know? Can one question a hippopotamus as to his motives? Or can one only anthropomorphize his actions according to human perceptions?

Human children are helpless when they're born. For them to survive they have to be closely and carefully nurtured. Now I always get confused about this and I'll stand to be corrected but I think it's the case that evolutionary processes among humans meant that those humans who reproduced and showed and used traits that would be considered good parenting would have ensured the reproduction of those traits in their offspring while poor parents would have seen their offspring not survive, thus humans who were good parents were better adapted to continue the lineage and eventually the pattern was set. Okay that's just my guessing, I'm not anthropologist.

The problem with the idea of natural selection and "survival of the fittest" is that it's a tautology. It basically says, "This survived, ergo it must have been the fittest."

All animals have the built-in instinct to reproduce and ensure the continuation of their species, and humans have it too. However, we do not see in other animals the levels of attachment to offspring that humans typically display, because humans have managed to think about it and apply moral standards to it. And, of course, we also see that many humans, sadly, have managed to overcome any sort of moral training in this regard, and even to overcome their basic animal instincts.

I think human altruism works on the basis of proximity. I suspect we all know the old journalistic saw that a couple of thousand people drowned in a dam burst on the other side of the world is news while the death of a friend is a tragedy.

It doesn't really matter. My point is that humans have no natural reason to be altruistic toward anyone, and we certainly don't have an inborn instinct toward it. Altruism is a learned attitude, whether applied to one we know well or a complete stranger. And by the way, friendship is ALSO a learned attitude, grown out of the same moral standards that gave rise to altruism and the concept of human rights.

I'll stop there. Swirling thoughts, lots of ideas that aren't taking shape yet. Certainties and doubts are circling each other warily.

It is both fascinating and confusing to contemplate the origins of human civilization, I'll admit. Anthropology can make all sorts of guesses, inferences, and observations, but it's only a little better than the study of evolution. No one was actually there to know for sure.

 

[LOki]

I don't have to demonstrate that God wants anything, because there's no need for God to even actually exist for the statement to still be true.

You make a point.

All that needs to be true is for humans to have BELIEVED that God existed - any god, or higher consciousness would do - and that He or it wanted certain things from them.

Another point; well done. But I'm failing to ascertain how this imaginary "higher consiousness" is going to be able to provide an objective moral standard, or be the necessary contingnecy upon which the existence of rights exists.

And I don't have to demonstrate that, because we know it to be true.

You actually do, because there is nothing about any religion, any god, that demands human beings have rights; but we agree that we do, and some of us assert that these rights are self evident.

Humans have always believed in higher, more-powerful beings than them, be it the Greek/Roman pantheon, the Norse pantheon, the various spirits of the North American aborigines, the Druid beliefs . . . go as far back as you like, and you will find primitive peoples believing in something outside of themselves that wants something from them.

I don't argue against this, but will argue that in all of these cases (and those derived from the traditions of the rock-chucking retards from the Middle East), the will of these mystical beings were the moral justification to violate the rights of human beings, and in none of those cases was it possible that rights were an endowment from these beings.

As for human rights, they are a concept that grows out of a moral standard that says, "This is right and this is wrong. This is good and this is evil." Human beings being, at base, the selfish animals that we are, we don't have any motivation in and of ourselves to believe anything is good or bad beyond what serves or hinders the fulfillment of our own desires.

This could be an objective standard for morality--certainly more objective than that provided for by a leprechaun.

We could easily exist in the same way other social animals do. But we don't.

And good thing too, we really wouldn't be living as human beings then, would we?

Instead, we suppress our natural instincts in service of something we consider better and higher than self-gratification: morality.

Nonsense. Morality serves us. It is contingent uppn us. You put the cart before the horse.

Civilization.

More nonsense. Civilization serves us. It is contingent upon us. You put the cart before the horse.

And where did modern man come by his concepts of what morality and civilization are? From his ancestors. Where and how did they come to develop them? Right back to the beginning of my argument.

And the measure of those morals, based upon superstitious fears has proven to be nothing greater than rationalizations for some human beings to murder, rape, torture, and enslave their fellows.

You might want to go look up the phrase "objective moral standard", then, Sparky, because you don't talk as though you have any idea what you're talking about. Even if the morality provided by religions is "appeals to emotion", that doesn't negate the fact that it's still an objective moral standard.

You might want to go look up the phrase "objective moral standard", then, Sparky, because you don't talk as though you have any idea what you're talking about.

I should also point out that some of the greatest philosophical thinking of human history was done on the basis of that "superstition", . . .

Demonstrate.

. . . so unless you have some brilliance to offer equal to that of Thomas Aquinas et al., I would suggest you hold off on the supercilious condescension.

It's apparent to me that brilliant as Auinas was, it was not his superstitious rationalizations that were brilliant, but his valid reasoning.

 

[Diuretic]

Quick response Cecilie - I forgot about the Screwtape Letters. I should be taken out and flogged mercilessly (well I'd sooner that than be given a revolver and a bottle of brandy and be pointed towards the drawing room to "do the right thing by the Regiment".

I'm going to have to ask for an adjournment for the purposes of rumination. And no, it's not to sober up as some of my detractors would have it

 

[Diuretic]

Is this a good thread that I see before me?

 

[Cecilie1200]

Another point; well done. But I'm failing to ascertain how this imaginary "higher consiousness" is going to be able to provide an objective moral standard, or be the necessary contingnecy upon which the existence of rights exists.

Once again, you make the mistake of thinking God must definitively exist for the statement to be true. Only the existence of the BELIEF is necessary, not the actual object of belief. You can be utterly cynical and say that priests/clergy/shamans provided the moral standard for whatever reason you think they did, and the statement still remains true. Without the people's belief that there really was a God of some sort, it wouldn't have worked. Morality and human rights cannot exist and would not exist were it not for belief in God.

You actually do, because there is nothing about any religion, any god, that demands human beings have rights; but we agree that we do, and some of us assert that these rights are self evident.

Untrue. Christianity for one is founded on the belief that we are all creations of God, beloved by Him and equally valuable to Him. It also contains very specific instructions as to how we are to behave toward each other which run very contrary to our own natural inclinations, but directly parallel to the most generally-accepted moral standards of western civilization, where Christian influence has been most directly prevalent for the longest amount of time.

We only agree on these rights because we have been conditioned by centuries of our forebears agreeing on it. What I am trying to do is take us back to how and why our forebears first came to that agreement.

I don't argue against this, but will argue that in all of these cases (and those derived from the traditions of the rock-chucking retards from the Middle East), the will of these mystical beings were the moral justification to violate the rights of human beings, and in none of those cases was it possible that rights were an endowment from these beings.

I'm afraid you're very, very wrong. Even Islam and older violent religions like the Thuggee contain prohibitions of a certain amount of respect accorded to one's fellow travelers. They simply define "fellow traveler" much more narrowly than most religions do. And I can assure you that those rights Islam assigns to observant Muslims are very much derived directly from Allah's "revelations" to Muhammed.

This could be an objective standard for morality--certainly more objective than that provided for by a leprechaun.

Just because you don't personally agree with it doesn't make it any less of an objective moral standard. It's just not YOUR objective moral standard.

And good thing too, we really wouldn't be living as human beings then, would we?

Of course we would. You have a rather naive view of what human beings really are. We might not be living as humane beings, but the sort of depredations one sees in Muslims, just as an example, are very, very human in nature.

Nonsense. Morality serves us. It is contingent uppn us. You put the cart before the horse.

Nope. Morality does NOT serve us. It might serve some higher vision of society and civilization, but it doesn't do a damned thing for individual people except insofar as they subscribe to that higher vision.

What benefit do I get out of being considerate of YOUR desires and freedom and happiness? Look around you. There are, sadly, many examples in the world of people who do not believe there is any objective standard of right and wrong, that there is anything higher and more important than themselves. And they have answered this question. Their answer is, "Not a damned thing. Now give me all your money before I shoot you in the face." Which is a very natural, logical, HUMAN attitude.

More nonsense. Civilization serves us. It is contingent upon us. You put the cart before the horse.

Again, how does civilization serve me as an individual, unless I believe in it? And why WOULD I believe in it, unless I believed there was something higher and better than my own personal self-interest to aspire to?

And the measure of those morals, based upon superstitious fears has proven to be nothing greater than rationalizations for some human beings to murder, rape, torture, and enslave their fellows.

Well, thank you for that kneejerk from the religious bigotry peanut gallery. When you're ready to talk about logic and history, rather than your own primitive superstitions, let me know.

You might want to go look up the phrase "objective moral standard", then, Sparky, because you don't talk as though you have any idea what you're talking about.

Demonstrate.

It's apparent to me that brilliant as Auinas was, it was not his superstitious rationalizations that were brilliant, but his valid reasoning.

Objective moral standards would also be known as "moral absolutism". The New World Encyclopedia defines moral absolutism thusly:

In terms of morality, ‘absolutism’ refers to at least two distinct doctrines. Firstly, absolutism may refer to the claim that there exists a universally valid moral system, which applies to everyone whether they realize it or not. In this sense, absolutism is opposed to moral relativism, which denies the existence of universally applicable moral principles. Secondly, absolutism may refer to the claim that moral rules or principles do not admit any exceptions.

The phrase "objective moral standard" would refer to the first doctrine.

And that is your one and only demonstration of "looking something up". I won't do your homework for you again. If you don't know what a phrase means, I suggest in the future that you refrain from attempting to debate it.

The idea that Aquinas was brilliant and had valid reasoning irrespective of and separate from the foundation he built that reasoning upon is too ludicrous to even dignify.

 

[Cecilie1200]

Quick response Cecilie - I forgot about the Screwtape Letters. I should be taken out and flogged mercilessly (well I'd sooner that than be given a revolver and a bottle of brandy and be pointed towards the drawing room to "do the right thing by the Regiment".

I'm going to have to ask for an adjournment for the purposes of rumination. And no, it's not to sober up as some of my detractors would have it

Knock yourself out. I'm taking the day to plow my son through his English and Word-Building schoolwork, so my mind and patience are a bit overwhelmed at the moment, anyway.

 

[Cecilie1200]

Is this a good thread that I see before me?

Nah. You just need to sober up.

 

[Diuretic]

Nah. You just need to sober up.

Too late!

Still readin' an' still thinkin'......

 

[LOki]

Once again, you make the mistake of thinking God must definitively exist for the statement to be true.

I've made no such mistake at all.

Only the existence of the BELIEF is necessary, not the actual object of belief.

So much then for an objective standard.

You can be utterly cynical and say that priests/clergy/shamans provided the moral standard for whatever reason you think they did, and the statement still remains true.

No, not really; not objectively.

Without the people's belief that there really was a God of some sort, it wouldn't have worked. Morality and human rights cannot exist and would not exist were it not for belief in God.

I have already demonstrated otherwise.

Untrue. Christianity for one is founded on the belief that we are all creations of God, beloved by Him and equally valuable to Him.

Read Genesis.

It also contains very specific instructions as to how we are to behave toward each other which run very contrary to our own natural inclinations, but directly parallel to the most generally-accepted moral standards of western civilization, where Christian influence has been most directly prevalent for the longest amount of time.

Provide one valid example.

We only agree on these rights because we have been conditioned by centuries of our forebears agreeing on it. What I am trying to do is take us back to how and why our forebears first came to that agreement.

Nonsense. We agree on rights by the same rational faculty that brings us to agree that the sun is at the center of the solar system--it has zero to do with conditioning.

I'm afraid you're very, very wrong. Even Islam and older violent religions like the Thuggee contain prohibitions of a certain amount of respect accorded to one's fellow travelers. They simply define "fellow traveler" much more narrowly than most religions do. And I can assure you that those rights Islam assigns to observant Muslims are very much derived directly from Allah's "revelations" to Muhammed.

You have a very selective veiw.

Every Holy War, Crusade, witch-hunt, Jihad, and Inquisition proves you unambiguously wrong.

Just because you don't personally agree with it doesn't make it any less of an objective moral standard. It's just not YOUR objective moral standard.

It has nothing to do with my agreement, and everything to do with your "objective" standard being an imaginary standard.

Of course we would. You have a rather naive view of what human beings really are. We might not be living as humane beings, but the sort of depredations one sees in Muslims, just as an example, are very, very human in nature.

No. Humans are rational by nature; our rational nature is what distinguishes us from all other life on this planet; being rational is how we exist as human beings--rejecting a rational life is rejecting life as a human being. The depredations of the Muslim zealot are irrational--so were the Crusades, so were every witch-hunt, so was the Inquisition.

Nope. Morality does NOT serve us.

It sure does, Jasper.

It might serve some higher vision of society and civilization, but it doesn't do a damned thing for individual people except insofar as they subscribe to that higher vision.

If morality did not serve the interests individual people, then they would adhere to it.

What benefit do I get out of being considerate of YOUR desires and freedom and happiness?

There's always your own freedom and happiness to consider, and my role, or the role of others, in it.

Look around you. There are, sadly, many examples in the world of people who do not believe there is any objective standard of right and wrong, that there is anything higher and more important than themselves.

Yeah, and they fly planes into buildings full of innocent people.

And they have answered this question. Their answer is, "Not a damned thing. Now give me all your money before I shoot you in the face." Which is a very natural, logical, HUMAN attitude.

It is an irrational, ANTI-human attitude.

Again, how does civilization serve me as an individual, unless I believe in it?

Been to the doctor's office lately? Used a pencil?

And why WOULD I believe in it, unless I believed there was something higher and better than my own personal self-interest to aspire to?

You could belivie in civilization just because it exists, and nothing higher or better than your own personal self interest needs to be involved.

Well, thank you for that kneejerk from the religious bigotry peanut gallery.

Nothing the least bit bigoted or kneejerk about it.

When you're ready to talk about logic and history, rather than your own primitive superstitions, let me know.

When you're ready to talk about logic and history, rather than your own primitive superstitions, let me know.

Objective moral standards would also be known as "moral absolutism".

No it wouldn't, so the rest of this is just bullshit.

The New World Encyclopedia defines moral absolutism thusly:[BULLSHIT SNIPPED]

An objective moral standard is a standard that exists independent of anyone's beliefs or opinions; independent from from our conscious recognition of it.

The difference between moral absolutism and moral objectivity is illumated by a question:

Socrates--"Is an action good because the gods love it, or do the gods love it because it is good?"​

And that is your one and only demonstration of "looking something up". I won't do your homework for you again.

Doing my homework for me doesn't count when you get it wrong, Jasper. If you had done my homework properly, you'd know that though objective standards are necessarily absolute, absolute standards are not necessarily objective.

The consequence is that objective moral standards are not the same as "moral absolutism."

If you don't know what a phrase means, I suggest in the future that you refrain from attempting to debate it.

I suggest you go to school before you declare that you've schooled me, Jasper. You should be particularly sure that your right about the terms you're schooling me on, before you you declare that you've schooled me.

The idea that Aquinas was brilliant and had valid reasoning irrespective of and separate from the foundation he built that reasoning upon is too ludicrous to even dignify.

Aquinas was superstitious douche when he was being a superstitious douche--when he was being rational, he did so brilliantly. Sorry about your luck, but the notion that Aquinas was sometimes wrong is not too ludicrous.

 

[YWN666]

If we are to believe Cecilie1200, then everyone on this board has reading comprehension problems, except her!

 

[Diuretic]

On religion. I'm not completely cynical about it. I don't see shamans or priests as inventing it, merely taking advantage of what appears to be a human trait, possibly connected with our ability to perceive self-awareness. While other animals appear to possess self-awareness I think only humans have very high levels of self-awarenss which allow us to ask questions about life, the universe and everything.

Humans have big brains but are, compared to other animals, physically puny. Our advantage is our brain. Our ability to cooperate with one another is not necessarily innate I think but our realisation that individually we're not likely to survive in a world full of predators pushed us towards accepting that living collectively was an advantage. I think it was from that collective behaviour that we formulated rules to get along and perhaps those in charge relied on religion to support those rules.

 

[Cecilie1200]

If we are to believe Cecilie1200, then everyone on this board has reading comprehension problems, except her!

No, not everyone. You are not everyone, and should refrain from assuming that you represent "everyone" when I choose to comment on the fact that YOU, individually, are an imbecile. Please consider a very, very specific observation.

 

[Cecilie1200]

On religion. I'm not completely cynical about it. I don't see shamans or priests as inventing it, merely taking advantage of what appears to be a human trait, possibly connected with our ability to perceive self-awareness. While other animals appear to possess self-awareness I think only humans have very high levels of self-awarenss which allow us to ask questions about life, the universe and everything.

Humans have big brains but are, compared to other animals, physically puny. Our advantage is our brain. Our ability to cooperate with one another is not necessarily innate I think but our realisation that individually we're not likely to survive in a world full of predators pushed us towards accepting that living collectively was an advantage. I think it was from that collective behaviour that we formulated rules to get along and perhaps those in charge relied on religion to support those rules.

I don't happen to believe that various clergy invented morality, either. My point is that even if you don't believe in God, Allah, the divine consciousness of the universe, or whatever, the point still works. The concept of human rights has to derive from a moral standard which says that THIS is right and THIS is wrong, contrary to our natural inclinations, and because it is contrary to our natural inclinations, it requires reference to something outside of ourselves.

The problem with saying, "But see, humans could come up with this because of our need to be collective and social" is that that doesn't require real morality, let alone observance of human rights. As I keep pointing out, there are other animals that also live and act collectively, and survive and get along quite well. When you get right down to it, more human societies have existed and functioned without those concerns than have done so with.

 

[YWN666]

No, not everyone. You are not everyone, and should refrain from assuming that you represent "everyone" when I choose to comment on the fact that YOU, individually, are an imbecile. Please consider a very, very specific observation.

No, after reading quite a few of your rants, a pattern emerges. When you can't win a debate on the merits, you attack your opponent the way you're doing here. Seems odd that so many people have reading comprehension problems and you are right every time! You're a genius!!