Do you think having a belief and obeying the rules make you less 'human' and ...

Soul Winner wrote: »

If God is the originator of this universe then He is the source of all truth, so what He says is what defines truth. If He doesn't exist then truth is whatever we want it to be and whatever works for us.

So if god didn't exist I could define the truth as "I am able to fly" then proceed to jump off a building and fly around could I?

chozometroid wrote: »

Actually, yes, that would be correct.

Seriously?

iUseVi wrote: »

I knew someone would say it. I almost posted "you are walking into a trap Sam...."

PS. Where's my cow?

liamw wrote: »

I wish God didn't exist. That would be amazing

Odd how it seems we would have more free will if god didn't exist since we wouldn't be bound by the laws of physics

Wicknight wrote: »

Yes, sorry should have been clearly ... what I mean was the idea that it is ok that he do what he likes with us and the universe because he created us is a subjective moral opinion of yours, one that I actually disagree with.

If its true then its true, it is not my opnion of it that makes it true. It is either true or it isn't. If it is true then it doesn't matter what my opnion of it is. My opnion is subjective, but the trueness or not of God creating the universe is not dependant on my opinion.

Wicknight wrote: »

That is the point. The way wave lengths are reflect off the surface of the car is a property of the car and of light. It exists as a self contained property of these things. The only things that have to exist are the car and light

Which is why God's judgement on something being moral or immoral is subjective, because it is an external judgement on something.

That only applies to any created being's perception of the things not the originator's perception. The properties of the light photons and atoms are all properties of His origination and are dependent on His sustenance.

Wicknight wrote: »

It does not exist as a property of the thing itself. It is an external judgement on that thing.

Like I said, only when it comes to any created being's perception not the originator's. If there is an originator then His existence is not based on my opinion, it is either true or it isn't.

Wicknight wrote: »

Again that is irrelevant (and doesn't actually make sense, since truth does not have a "source").

Truth does not have a source? If that statement is true, then does that statement have a source? Who is it that says that truth doesn't have a source? Why should we beleive that that staement is true?

Wicknight wrote: »

The judgement is a property of the judge, not the thing he is judging. It is his opinion and as such is subjective. It would not exist if he didn't exist. And you can have more than one judge and thus more than one judgement.

If one of his judgments was 'shooting kids in the head is wrong', would that cease to be a true judgement when the judge dies?

Wicknight wrote: »

No truth is something that is true. Truth doesn't have a source nor is it dependent on something. It is a self contained concept based on logic. God is irrelevant to this.

Again, if that is really true, then who is it that determines this truth? I want to know who the person is that says that truth has no source and if that statement is true then how can that statement be really true? If truth really doesn't have a source then the truth of the statement (truth has no source) also has no source, if it is just true because it is true then that means that objective truth exists no matter what. So if God exists then that is an objective truth and if He exists then He is the source of all truth which would make the statement (truth has no source) false.

Is the statement: "The earth exists." true?

Answer: Yes

Does the earth have a source?

Answer: Yes

Which means that the true statement: "The earth exists." has a source in reality somewhere, unless you believe that the earth has always existed?

My point is that the statement: "Truth has no source." is an oxymoron. If that statement is in fact true then it too has no source in reality, so why should we believe that it is in fact a true statement? It reminds of the statement: "There is no absolute truth except the truth that there is no absolute truth." Which would again render that statement false if it was in fact true. Oxymoron. It is like saying that married bachelors exist or that you can hear the silence. Bachelors can get married but once married they cease to be bachelors, they can't be both bachelors and married at the same time. That too is an oxymoron.

liamw wrote: »

I wish God didn't exist. That would be amazing

You can always wish.

Sam Vimes wrote: »

Yeah religious people say that a lot but if people aren't necessarily aware of these laws it means that people can mistakenly think their subjective moral opinion is objectively moral, people can be fooled into thinking that someone else's subjective moral opinion is objectively moral and that people can deny that someone else's actual objective moral opinion is objectively moral when it suits them or when they honestly think otherwise. So if objective moral laws exist but people aren't necessarily aware of them, why do they matter? How is a world that contains only subjective morality any different to a world where objective moral laws exist that people aren't necessarily aware of?

When God says covetousness, anger, adultery, and stealing are wrong, they are wrong regardless of the morality that society has "decided" to observe. This means that people who know what God's moral law is are able to recognize when society is swaying from the true standard of right and wrong. Otherwise, there would be no way to tell if your behavior is truly right or wrong, only that it is the norm of the time and place. This really does result in a world where "anything goes."

chozometroid wrote: »

When God says covetousness, anger, adultery, and stealing are wrong, they are wrong regardless of the morality that society has "decided" to observe. This means that people who know what God's moral law is are able to recognize when society is swaying from the true standard of right and wrong.

That all assumes that human beings are capable of determining definitively what is objectively moral inerrantly, that they never convince themselves that something is moral when it's not and that they will always willingly go by what is considered objectively moral but that's quite clearly not the world we live in. Objective morality sounds great in theory but humans are neither particularly good at determining what is objectively moral nor particularly good at following it even when they do determine it

chozometroid wrote: »

Otherwise, there would be no way to tell if your behavior is truly right or wrong, only that it is the norm of the time and place. This really does result in a world where "anything goes."

There are plenty of ways to tell. One simple example is if somebody thought there was nothing wrong with raping my child I would correct him, possibly with a baseball bat. Human beings are perfectly capable of determining what's "wrong" by finding out what other people will and will not accept being done to them. I don't need to appeal to any authority other than my own to tell someone that I don't want something done to me or my loved ones. If I tell someone not to do something to me and they do it anyway that is "wrong" and they will know because I will fight their attempts to do it. I might lose but them being stronger than me and able to force their will upon me does not make what they're doing "right"

Wicknight wrote: »

Objective truth exists no matter what. That is the point. Objective truth is above even God. It exists as properties of ultimately reality, which God merely exists in (assuming he exists which isn't actually that relevant).

If you believe this then you don't understand the nature attributed to the God of Christianity. Nothing can exist above God because that would make God something other than a God. It would be simpler to say that objective morality is part of God.

Wicknight wrote: »

Why is he the "source" of all truth simply because he exists.

For the same reason we say he is the source of creation. Because without him there would be nothing - no truth, no creation.

Wicknight wrote: »

Think of it this way. God cannot be the "source" of the fact "God exists in reality" because that would require God to exist first in order for the statement to be true, which would be an illogical paradox.

What's all this "first" and "exist" business about? Are you attempting to apply a temporal argument to an atemporal being? With regards to God there was no first, just as there was no before. God never not existed. God simply is and so too the qualities attributed to him.

chozometroid wrote: »

But over time, each passing generation may be slightly less offended by the raping of their child (Especially if society continually allows more questionable behavior. Each new generation will start at a point of much greater leniency than the previous one. Imagine after 10-20 generations on this course...), and eventually they will no longer view something that is definitely "wrong" as being wrong.
With God setting the standard, we don't have to depend on our flawed "social morality" to tell us what is acceptable.

No matter what knots a society twists itself into to convince itself that rape is ok, no one wants to be raped. Rape can never become a social norm in the way going to the shops for milk is normal because that will mean that almost all of the population will be having something done to them that they don't want done to them. The only way rape will ever be widely acceptable within a society is if the vast majority of people somehow decide that they kind of like being raped. Do you see that happening?

Sam Vimes wrote: »

No matter what knots a society twists itself into to convince itself that rape is ok, no one wants to be raped. Rape can never become a social norm in the way going to the shops for milk is normal because that will mean that almost all of the population will be having something done to them that they don't want done to them. The only way rape will ever be widely acceptable within a society is if the vast majority of people somehow decide that they kind of like being raped. Do you see that happening?

I suppose rape, by definition is "unwanted," so it's not the best example. We can replace "rape" with "sex with animals" and it still makes the point.

Wicknight wrote: »

Most Christians I understand believe that God can only do what is logical, ie he cannot make a rock he can't move or he cannot kill himself, or he cannot act in a way other than his own nature.

This implies that the rules of logic, including the concepts of true or false, are above even God.

You can imagine the same rules of logic exist independently of God. God may not exist but true is still true and false is still fallse. These concepts do not require God to exist, and if he does exist he is as bound by them as anything else in reality.

I can agree with this if I avoid arguing over semantics.

With that said, however, the "rules of logic" is not an actually entity nor a force, so to say God is "bound" to them is not even necessary and probably is just creating a stumbling block when talking to theists.
To say "God cannot do the illogical" is just us placing God within the syntax/semantics of our language, and says nothing meaningful about the attributes of God.

You made me think of something, though. Perhaps you could say God must recognize "truth" in order to distinguish "truth" from "untruth." God may be the source of "truth" because He is the source of all knowlege. He simply knows "what IS" and is able to actually be "truth" without truth existing above Him.
When a statement is made that is untrue, God compares it with what actually "is" and recognizes it as untrue.
So, "true" and "false" do not have to exist above God. God has all knowledge and anything that does not agree with this knowledge is "false."

Sam Vimes said:

Quote:
Originally Posted by wolfsbane
This gets to the heart of the issue. I was not saying - nor was PDN - that atheists do not have reasons for acting morally. Self-interest, achieving desired ends, is a logical reason for such behaviour.
Can you see no rational reason to help someone without wanting something in return?

Not without God being real. If He is as He says, then doing good is rational because:
1. it pleases the One whom we love;
2. is the right thing to do;
3. it brings eternal reward.

Quote:
Originally Posted by wolfsbane
What we mean by them having no rational case for moral behaviour is this: they have no rational defence that makes any behaviour immoral as such. It may be rational for one to be kind to his neighbours rather than oppress them (he gets a good feeling and is treated well by them in return). But it may well be rational for another to oppress his neighbours - his superiority in power is such that it is very unlikely to have negative consequences for him, and certain to have several advantages. So he, with his majority colleagues, enslaves the minority and lives high on the hog. He lives in luxury and dies peacefully in his bed. His slaves live miserably and die early from exhaustion.

Both behave rationally in their self-interest.
This is all great in theory, atheists can have rational reasons for immoral behaviour but christians can't because nothing trumps the argument from authority that is objective morality. It all sounds wonderful and if that's how it worked in practise we'd be living in a utopia but we're clearly not.

Agreed. But one day we will be.

To explain it in your terms, humans are sinners by nature so you can say all you want that certain things are objectively wrong but even people who believe in god will go ahead and do them anyway with pretty much the same regularity as non-believers.

True believers will not. Their lives will be characterised by generally holy living. And even false religions can inculcate a morality that is generally better than others - at least outwardly. Invented morality is better than none. Secular humanists are safer neighbours generally than hedonist hoodies.

But I agree that many religionists have no more morality than the moral secularist. Their religion is in name only.

Pointing out that there is an objective morality is useless unless you have any more means of making people follow it than I have of making them stop doing things to me that I don't want them to do.

My point in this thread has not been the effectiveness of objective morality. It has been to show the irrationality of atheists claiming any action is good or evil in itself.

My scenario: I say to someone that I don't want him to do something to me so he should stop. he says that he's powerful enough to prevent reprisals so he does it anyway.

Your scenario: You say to someone that you don't want him to do something to you because it's "just wrong" but he has a sinning nature so he does it anyway.

Either way the same bad things happen

Certainly, especially as he does not believe my assertion about it being wrong. If he did, it would give more restraint to him than otherwise.

Quote:
Originally Posted by wolfsbane
But the lack of rationality I refer to is in the atheist saying either of those men are behaving immorally. They are behaving differently; there is no moral content. There is no morality. Kindness and oppression are alike in the materialist world.
You say: "But it may well be rational for another to oppress his neighbours - his superiority in power is such that it is very unlikely to have negative consequences for him, and certain to have several advantages". I will grant you that but there are a few things to consider:
No matter how powerful somebody is, the possibility of negative consequences can only ever be "very unlikely", he can never be absolutely sure that there will be no reprisals

Absolute certainty is not needed. All of us live with taking risks daily - otherwise we would never leave the house. Having an acceptable risk/reward ratio is what counts.

The vast majority of people on the planet do not fall into that category. Mostly when people do wrong there might be some brute force element to it but afterwards they have to try to stop people finding out what they did (or at least proving what they did) because no matter how powerful someone is they can't fight the combined force of all the people who refuse to accept those who harm others, ie the vast majority of people on the planet.

So oppression and kindness are not alike. One leads to happiness and cooperation for all and the other leads to misery for the victim and constant fear for the perpetrator.

I did not mean they were alike in their consequences. Only in their nature, if materialism is true.

And they only come anywhere close to being alike in the case where someone is either strong enough to fight off everyone else on the planet for his entire life or sneaky enough to make sure no one ever finds out what he did. And as long as humans are sinners, telling somebody that something is wrong it little more effective than telling them there will be reprisals

Indeed, telling them there will be reprisals is generally more effective than merely telling them it is wrong. But if we can persuade them that being wrong makes the reprisals eternal - then substantial behaviour modification can be expected.

Most effective of all is for them to fall in love with the Lawgiver - that motivates an earnest desire to keep His laws at all times. We do not always succeed in keeping them, but we pick ourselves up and try again.

We have been born again, made new creatures, given a new nature - so we will be marked by marching to a different moral drum. If our conduct is no better than our heathen/atheist neighbours, then we are deluding ourselves.

Wicknight wrote: »

But God can't be the "source" of all knowledge because God knows he exists and he exists independently of himself (he just is, he has always just existed.) and thus he got that knowledge, at the very least, from being aware of his own existence, thus the knowledge did not come from himself.

Again to say that God is the source of all knowledge is to define "everything" and then define God outside of that set, which is illogical.

You could say that God is the source of all knowledge except knowledge of his own existence and the reality he exists in. But it doesn't have quite the same ring as these absolute religious statements you guys are so found of :pac:

Well, if you mean "knowledge" simply as something that can be known, then yes, the knowledge of God's existence, as well as knowledge about anything, is outside of God. I would say God is the source of all knowledge only because He knows all things, but I can forego that claim.
God is the source of truth though, because He has knowlege of all things.