Morality? No religion required, study. (beliefs, verse, behavior, principle)
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Morality does not go out of the window when you remove the fear of consequences. Maybe it does for you and your ilk, but not for those of us who do not get morality from a book. Example: If I see a $20 bill fall from someone's pocket onto the ground, my morals tell me to pick it up and give it back. I have no fear of consequences if I keep the $20 (I wouldn't be arrested or anything like that), yet I still know what the moral thing to do is, and I do it. What you are saying, is that the only thing that would keep you from keeping the $20 would be a fear of getting in trouble. This is simply not true for most people. For thinking people around the world, we can tell right from wrong whether there are consequences attached or not.
And many people would pocket the money. Why are their morals different from yours? Are their brains wired differently?
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Originally Posted by southernbored
The fact that you believe that fearing God is the only thing keeping you moral is quite frightening. If you ever lost your faith, I fear for those around you.
That's a load of nonsense. If I lost my faith, I would resort back sinful man's actions be directed by selfish mood and emotions. Sure it was nice that you gave the money back to the person. It may you feel good and you knew that the person would probably respond nicely back to you. What if you knew that they would spit in your face instead? STill give the money back? After all, it's the right thing to do, but you gain a negative instead of a positive response. As Christians, we are to help people even if it doesn't appeal to our emotions. Even if it results in a negative experience. We are to forgive and love even those who have wronged us. That certainly goes against man's natural inclinations.
The fact that you need to constantly talk down about the Bible says a lot about what is really going on here. WHat's next? Calling it a moldy oldly book? BTW, the Bible has "tons of violence" because get this, man is violent! Yeah, it reports what really happened. If the Bible tried to whitewash the stories, you would be holding that up as proof that it is a lie.
Sorry Jeff, but thinking men will call out lies, inaccuracies and the like. Your holy book is filled with them. I am not talking about the violence of war or something similar Jeffery. I am talking about all of the raping, stoning, and killing, both the people (for God of course), and your God do. Your god murdered millions of people with a flood according to that book. Yea yea yea, they deserved it or whatever...
Point is, your God is perfectly happy with letting man do these violent things, and in fact, encouraged them.
What is your basis for asserting there needs to be an objective morality?
Because I'd assert that "objective morality" is an oxymoron. Like saying we should have objective music, or objective love. It is subjective by its very existence and adding some imaginary god on top of it makes it no more objective. It is just the subjective morality of your baby-killing god.
That is a good point as well. I'm not sure exactly what Viz means by "objective morality," but it seems to mean a kind of morality with no human input.
Lol. You just don't get it do you? The idea that the Bible is the "recorded Word of God" is nothing more than the opinion of human beings. The burden of proof is on you to show that the Bible is anything more than a religious text written by ordinary humans. So far, you have not done this. All you do is attempt to establish truth by perpetual repetition. You constantly refer to the Bible as "God's Word" as if repeating the assertion makes it true. It's really creepy how you attempt to turn a lie into the truth by repeating the lie a thousand times.
I disregard the Bible for the same reason that you disregard the Quran: I have no reason to think it is anything other than a book written by humans for political purposes.
Your opinion (that the Bible is an unquestionable authority) is the standard over EVERYTHING else. At least according to you. But I'm not buying it.
The person on this board who is constantly "begging the question" is you. You're the one who constantly makes arguments that assume morality must come exclusively from the Christian Bible, without backing up such an extraordinary claim.
You don't believe the Bible? Great. Good for you. But to suggest that you can state that something is moral or immoral is completely begging the question. Without an objective morality all you've got is opinion that is relevant to nobody but yourself.
You don't believe the Bible? Great. Good for you. But to suggest that you can state that something is moral or immoral is completely begging the question. Without an objective morality all you've got is opinion that is relevant to nobody but yourself.
It's simple, really. The entire premise of this thread is flawed. To have morality, one needs an objective standard. Mankind has never been been able to define one. It's above our pay grade.
You don't believe the Bible? Great. Good for you. But to suggest that you can state that something is moral or immoral is completely begging the question. Without an objective morality all you've got is opinion that is relevant to nobody but yourself.
You're right, I have no scientific or mathematical proof that murder is immoral. Neither do you. What's your point?
Quite a few people have the opinion that murder is immoral, so said morality (via the democratic process) has resulted in actual laws and punishments against murder. And the laws are pretty objective, spelling out specific definitions and degrees of murder, as well as the respective punishments. I'd say that human opinion about the morality of murder is quite relevant indeed.
So what's the problem?
Are you saying that laws based on human morality are illegitimate, and must only come from the Abrahamic God? If so, there are places like Saudi Arabia where many people fully agree. Why stay here in the Great Satan and be miserable? Why do you stay in a Democracy, ruled by fallible humans, if that's such a blasphemous concept?
It's simple, really. The entire premise of this thread is flawed. To have morality, one needs an objective standard. Mankind has never been been able to define one. It's above our pay grade.
Lets assume you are right. Mankind has never been able to define an objective basis for morality. Clearly we can examine history, current society, and even our own minds, and realize that for as long as recorded history through this present moment mankind has been making moral judgements, and constraining behavior in accordance. So clearly the lack of an objective basis has not stopped us from creating, enforcing, modifying, and rebelling against various form of morality.
Since, as you assert, we have never, ever had an objective basis for morality, then clearly what has sufficed for every civilization, every religion, every family, every person from the primordial past until now is some form of morality grounded in something subjective: opinions, feelings, instinct, emotion, empathy, these sorts of things.
Which is entirely my point. Morality is a squishy, changable thing, a creation of consensus. It is balanced flywheel of tradition, history, religion, and culture to damp rapid changes, but ultimately it is what we, collectively, say it is...
It's simple, really. The entire premise of this thread is flawed. To have morality, one needs an objective standard. Mankind has never been been able to define one. It's above our pay grade.
What is your objective standard for music?
You can't have music without an objective standard for it.
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