Christian morality: an atheist's point of view (death penalty, vengeance, genesis)
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The same thing that tells YOU that ... unless you're some kind of sociopath, as I said; unless you're just faking your humanity and blindly following the dictates of your religion.
Otherwise, good ol' fashioned empathy tells me that. Again, as I've stated before, there ARE certain universals which exist inside the parameters of being a normal human being.
So now it's empathy. OK. Now again...why is that the standard to judge morality by? What gives you the right to say someone else is wrong if they disagree with that? Do you believe that you can say they are wrong?
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No ... I don't. The only reason why there is any question over God's actions in the OT being immoral is because it was God. If any mortal had committed those same actions for the same reasons, that person would be considered the biggest monster in all of human history.
You would be hard pressed indeed to find anyone who would regard the actions in the OT as moral, good, and righteous if you took God out of the equation. Saying I have to somehow prove those actions are immoral is just a heaping helping of equivocation.
You're absolutely correct. Taking God out of the equation DOES change things. But then, the state of Nebraska has the authority to take a human life. I don't...but the state does. So does that mean that the state is immoral every time it does?
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More equivocation.
Yet, you continue to duck and dodge the question.
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Yes, that is EXACTLY what you are suggesting whether you realize it or not. According to you, the only justified morality comes from God. We only know what comes from God by studying the Bible. Anything else, again according to you, cannot be justified. Unless, of course, you can answer your own questions with secular ideas. No religion.
I challenge you to either recant the lie or give me a quote showing where I have said anything stating that.
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You're right, they don't have to agree with me. But if enough do, then it has the potential to become a moral rule. There are plenty of things some people find immoral that I find to be silly - like profanity. Then again, when it comes to business practices, there's a list a mile long that I find immoral that others do not.
A moral rule accepted by a group of people is not the same as morality. The government can legalize rape, but it would still be immoral.
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Your version of morality has to be legitimized and accredited by your God - and that happens within the pages of a 3,000 year-old book with laws that are equally that old. Your moral view on homosexuality is just one case in point. Fornication ... yet another case in point.
Yes--fornication and homosexuality are immoral. But eating shellfish is not. The difference, of course, is that the sexuality issues were addressed to all of mankind, while shellfish was only to a few people. The sexuality issues are also issues that were addressed when the human race was created.
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The cosmological argument has been thoroughly debunked as merely the "God of the Gaps" argument. We don't know yet, therefore, God.
It's been no more debunked as a "God of the Gaps" as evolution has been debunked as "evolution of the gaps". The fact that you disagree with the conclusion does not give you the right to state that it's invalid.
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No.
Murder is just a subset of killing - and prohibitions on killing are not absolute.
Actually....yes, someone is killed in a murder. But there are justifiable reasons for killing. The very concept of murder is that it is an unjustified killing.
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But even assuming this is objective morality, there is no reason whatsoever to believe God "programmed" it that way. I understand that believers are wont to fill every crack and crevice with their gods and their dogma, but there simply is no reason to assume that any god is responsible - and there is even less reason to believe it was your specific deity.
You don't believe that there is such a thing that is always right or wrong?
But then, the state of Nebraska has the authority to take a human life. I don't...but the state does. So does that mean that the state is immoral every time it does?
You've never noticed the people who protest executions? They usually stand outside the prison with protest signs. They are courageous enough to declare capital punishment immoral and take a stand for what they believe
You, meanwhile, won't declare the Nazis immoral. Why is that?
You've never noticed the people who protest executions? They usually stand outside the prison with protest signs. They are courageous enough to declare capital punishment immoral and take a stand for what they believe
And they are wrong.
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You, meanwhile, won't declare the Nazis immoral. Why is that?
Of course I will. Hitler was completely immoral. The Nazi party was immoral. The Holocaust was immoral.
::Sigh::What obliviousness . . . What God has "written in our hearts" in agape love tells us what is right and wrong, Vizio . . . NOT some ancient words "written in ink" by our ignorant primitive ancestors!! Morality does NOT depend on the whim and caprice of God. It is objective and absolute based on agape love because God IS agape love . . . NOT some capricious dictator. There is only one morality and it is always the same regardless who does it (even God), period. Only our ignorant ancestors thought otherwise and claimed God did immoral things. That is the veil of ignorance over reading the OT that Christ came to lift!!! You and those like you retain that veil of ignorance and pervert the Gospel of Christ by excusing and rationalizing Evil as Good because you believe somehow God was involved. It is a travesty of human perversity and double-mindedness. Morality is NOT flexible . . . not even God can alter what is immoral and make it moral.
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Originally Posted by Vizio
You're absolutely correct. Taking God out of the equation DOES change things.
Then YOU do NOT "believe that there is such a thing that is always right or wrong."
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<snip>
A moral rule accepted by a group of people is not the same as morality. The government can legalize rape, but it would still be immoral. <snip>
Actually....yes, someone is killed in a murder. But there are justifiable reasons for killing. The very concept of murder is that it is an unjustified killing. You don't believe that there is such a thing that is always right or wrong?
Your double-mindedness continually amazes me. That you seem oblvious to it is even more fascinating.
::Sigh::What obliviousness . . . What God has "written in our hearts" in agape love tells us what is right and wrong, Vizio . . . NOT some ancient words "written in ink" by our ignorant primitive ancestors!! Morality does NOT depend on the whim and caprice of God. It is objective and absolute based on agape love because God IS agape love . . . NOT some capricious dictator. There is only one morality and it is always the same regardless who does it (even God), period. Only our ignorant ancestors thought otherwise and claimed God did immoral things. That is the veil of ignorance over reading the OT that Christ came to lift!!! You and those like you retain that veil of ignorance and pervert the Gospel of Christ by excusing and rationalizing Evil as Good because you believe somehow God was involved. It is a travesty of human perversity and double-mindedness. Morality is NOT flexible . . . not even God can alter what is immoral and make it moral.
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Originally Posted by Vizio
You're absolutely correct. Taking God out of the equation DOES change things.
<snip>
You don't believe that there is such a thing that is always right or wrong?
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Originally Posted by MysticPhD
Then YOU do NOT "believe that there is such a thing that is always right or wrong." Your double-mindedness continually amazes me. That you seem oblvious to it is even more fascinating.
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Originally Posted by Vizio
Of course I do. Murder is ALWAYS wrong.
Your inability to actually read what I write amazes me.
I read just fine. You state that taking God out of the equation changes the morality of an act . . . in your view it can be moral if God does it but immoral if we do. That is NOT something that is always right or wrong!!!
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