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Then perhaps the other reasonable choice is, it's us who decide what's good and what's bad?
Who else is around to do any deciding? And why would you or I abrogate our personal responsibility for our own morality to some other person (capital P or not) anyway?
Who else is around to do any deciding? And why would you or I abrogate our personal responsibility for our own morality to some other person (capital P or not) anyway?
Does it also mean there is no universal right or wrong, good or bad?
Does it also mean there is no universal right or wrong, good or bad?
There is only human morality. Remove humans from the planet and the concept of morality vanishes entirely.
Morality is entirely contractual, a series or agreements and assumptions about expected behavior and inappropriate behavior. It came into being as a precursor of civilization which requires cooperative efforts and common agreements regarding how we will treat one another. There is no universal or cosmic or karmic enforcement of these agreements, only human enforcement.
Does it also mean there is no universal right or wrong, good or bad?
Correct. Morality is emergent from societal interactions.
That it is not objective, immutable and endorsed by some backing authority or axiomatic principle does not make it any less useful. In fact those things would make it far LESS useful.
Does it also mean there is no universal right or wrong, good or bad?
How could there be?
If you stand over a person and shoot him, is that right or wrong? How about if you stand over a person who is trying to rape your child, and you shoot him? Right or wrong? What if a person screaming in pain from cancer begs you to shoot him so he can finally go to heaven? Right or wrong? What about if you shoot a baby? Right or wrong? It's all "shooting." Is, therefore, shooting right or wrong?
Is stealing bad? Is stealing less bad if you take from a rich than a poor person? Is stealing still bad if it's food you're stealing and you're literally starving to death? Is stealing bad if you steal back something that was initially yours and was stolen from you? What's your verdict - is stealing right or wrong?
Is it evil to lie? Is it evil to lie to a child with cancer who says "Am I going to get better" and rather than simply saying "Statistics say: no," you fudge, "We have faith in the doctor's abilities and she will do EVERYTHING she can to make you better"? Was this lie evil?
Is torrential rain good or evil, a reward or a punishment? Is rain good if it feeds crops for starving people? How about if it floods people from their homes and drowns babies?
Are volcanoes bad because they kill people and animals? Or are they good because they relieve pressure within the earth?
Is treating a child to a favorite food good? What about if you treat a very overweight child who is ill from too many treats? Are you being good and caring, or dangerous and evil? It's all giving food. Is giving food to a child, therefore, a good or evil act?
How about treating just the underweight child but not the overweight child? Good or bad? How about in the children's view? Good or bad?
No. There IS no "universal" right or wrong. Religions try to tell you there is, then make tons of apologetics for the exceptions. But yes, it is we who "decide" - on a case-by-case basis - what's good and what's "evil," and those definitions change constantly...as well they should, since the concepts are not, themselves, constants but rather, abstract ideals that don't hold up in the real, physical world.
In order to answer the question "do bad people go to hell," One must first determine what he or she believes concerning this whole concept of hell. Either you believe there is a hell, or you don't believe there is a hell. By the title of this question, I am assuming that the person asking this question is unsure of two things. First, if there is there a hell, and two, do bad people go there? I am a Christian, and I do believe that hell is real. Of course, if you are an atheist or agnostic, you wouldn't believe in the existence of hell; however, I will be addressing this question from a Christian perspective. There are quite a few scriptures in the Bible that talk about hell, but regardless of what people argue about what hell actually is, in scripture (2 Thess.1:9) hell is an eternity away from God. Revelation 21:8 and numerous other scriptures state that the sinful or the ones who reject Jesus are the ones who are going to hell. So in short, if you believe the Bible for what it actually says, than yes. Bad or "sinful" people who don't repent from their sins and receive Jesus as their savior from sin, go to hell.
An important concept to understand when it comes to what hell is according to Bible believing Christians, is that hell is not a place that God just throws everyone who doesn't believe in Him, or for people who sin. We believe that God gave man free will, and out of our ignorance, we practically choose a Godless life resulting in a Godless eternity. We all have a choice to either except Christianity or to reject it. That choice right there is not just a choice that effects our immediate world, but it also effects where we spend eternity. A big question when it comes to hell, is "If there is a God, and He is a loving God, how could He send people to hell?" The answer to that question is fairly simple. God doesn't send us to hell. We are the ones who choose a Godless eternity.
JerZ,you are correct to say that the act of shooting is not right or wrong; however, the context in which we apply shooting is what makes it right or wrong. To kill out of defense according to the Bible is not wrong, but to kill out of anger is wrong. Just because an act is not right or wrong, in this case shooting, doesn't mean that there is no universal right or wrong, it just means our actions can make an act right or wrong. We all know that to kill out of spite or anger is wrong. Why do we know that? Is it because we are all preprogrammed to "be nice"? Or is it because THERE IS universal morality? Either way, we all know that there is right and wrong. To shoot an old lady for fun would obviously be frowned upon in society. If there is no universal right or wrong, than why is it wrong to do so? If there is no ultimate right or wrong than every school shooting, terrorist attack, homicide, act of rape, and every other atrocity, is both excusable and tolerable.
Last edited by ThunderWalker; 05-25-2016 at 10:26 PM..
JerZ,you are correct to say that the act of shooting is not right or wrong; however, the context in which we apply shooting is what makes it right or wrong. To kill out of defense according to the Bible is not wrong, but to kill out of anger is wrong.
Then why did Jesus instruct injured parties to turn the other cheek?
Where in the bible does it say to kill out of defense isn't wrong but to kill out of anger is wrong?
Many atheists would disagree with me...but I would say no to both the above statements. I think there is a permanent right and wrong. It existed before us in the same way math existed before us. We discovered aspects of math. Further aspects await discovery. We discovered aspects of right and wrong. Further aspects away discovery.
We discover what we know of right and wrong through our reasoning process. Sometimes we're wrong, but using our own brains are the only way I know of to get close to being right.
Is the comparison apt? The laws of math would be unalterable, exact and testable. Whatever laws of morality you might postulate would be subject to argument, subject to exceptions, subject to degrees, subject to differing interpretations, and most importantly, untestable.
Take the concept of killing. Surely, in a world where life must consume other life in order to exist, we cannot judge the cattle immoral for eating the grass, or the spider immoral for killing the fly. The notion that some types of killing are wrong did not exist until humans arrived to give it some consideration. And after all this time we are still arguing about it. Non orthodox religious practices can still get you killed in some parts of the world, in others such a notion is abhorrent. The USA is still pretty evenly divided on whether or not an abortion should be regarded as a murder. We kill during war and view that as an exception, but that is little more than rationalizing the needs of a particular nation being greater than the immorality of killing.
It is impossible to reconcile the above with the idea that we are dealing with some pre-existing, universal law. What you are postulating would require characteristics which are not in evidence. The universal moral laws would need to be universally recognized, unambiguous and unvarying. Then we might view them on the same level as the laws of mathematics.
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