Absolute morality: PROVE IT!

I've discussed many issues with people before...and for some reason a lot of them tend to go back to the concept of absolute morality, something I don't believe in but am open to the possibility of.

So, in the tradition of threads about proving things (Previous installments include god(s) and creationism/ID), I'd like to see some proof of absolute morality.

Now, I'm a lot more open to this possibility than my previous two, simply because the first issue is a matter of skepticism and the other was a matter of science. This is a matter of philosophy.

The challenge is made, can you prove to me that objective morals exists?

Morality is based upon your point of view.
And is totally subjective.

During the roman era men fought and sometimes died in the arenas.
This was acceptable to them.

Today we would consider it immoral.

point of view.

Originally posted by madnessinmysoul
The challenge is made, can you prove to me that objective morals exists?

Of course it does, gw bush has come out saying he ordered a geezer to be tortured, that is objective morality.

It's not so much that morality is subjective as it is that objectivity is subjective. So even if morality were an absolute it would merely be so in a relative way therefore making it subjective.

The quarks have spoken, everything is subjective ... or is it?

Boris: Murder's immoral.
Sonja: Immorality is subjective.
Boris: Yes, but subjectivity is objective.
Sonja: Not in a rational scheme of perception.
Boris: Perception is irrational. It implies immanence.
Sonja: But judgment of any system or a priori relation of phenomena exists in any rational or metaphysical or at least epistemological contradiction to an abstracted empirical concept such as being or to be or to occur in the thing itself or of the thing itself.
Boris: Yeah, I've said that many times.
Love and Death - Woody Allen

reply to post by madnessinmysoul


Madnessinmysoul, the more I read your posts, the more I feel we have similar thoughts on similar subjects!

I proposed the same question in a thread I started: Does Morality exist outside of Religion and Philosophy?

We had a very short conversation there, but it might help your current seeking.

reply to post by madnessinmysoul


Not possible to those who claim there is not a G-d.

For absolute morality to work there must be a consequences or rewards for said action.

To believe it is subjective is the thinking of people that believe that what happens here stays here.

There is no ultimate authority to answer to for all the wrong against G-d and man a person has done as these types would have you to believe.

For your answer you must believe you are a spiritual being housed within a fleshly mortal body.

Why are people so binary...GOD is inside us all, at the same time GOD is the Universe itself. For we are all part of this super conciousness.

Originally posted by _SilentAssassin_
Why are people so binary...GOD is inside us all, at the same time GOD is the Universe itself. For we are all part of this super conciousness.

AMEN brother!!!
Once everyone is able to realize this, the world will be a better place.

reply to post by theUNKNOWNawaits


Truth via empirical evidence in this case.

I only have time for one last response.

reply to post by ACTS 2:38


But how is there absolute morality if it's dictated on the whim of a single deity? That's not an absolute, it's a contingent morality. It is a morality contingent upon the whim of a single being.

Absolute morality would be moral outside of the whims of a being.

Absolute morality is found in religion. I'd prefer I'd prefer a moral with a lot of thought discussion and debate backing it up. Absolute moral comes with an absolute leader, with absolute power. Unfortunately those I heard of are usually willing to kill everyone who does not agree.

Originally posted by madnessinmysoul
I only have time for one last response.

reply to post by ACTS 2:38

 

But how is there absolute morality if it's dictated on the whim of a single deity? That's not an absolute, it's a contingent morality. It is a morality contingent upon the whim of a single being.

Absolute morality would be moral outside of the whims of a being.

Technically, no. The term "absolute" doesn't have any bearing on something's source, it relates to something that is total, fixed and doesn't change. From that perspective, we might have our own personal absolute moralities (I did a thread on that a while back,) but they're only as absolute as we are.

I would tend to agree with ACTS -- only a being who is unchanging and unchangeable could have (and thus, be a source of,) absolute morality.

It's outside of the scope of the OP, but this, I think, points to the difficulty of the literalist and his non-believing literalist critic -- without a thoughtful analysis, God sure does seem to change his tune between the Old and New Testaments. But, as he, inherently, cannot do this, the interpretation is wrong, or the text has elements in it that are not to be read literally.

As for "proving it", this is impossible -- you are asking one to make an absolute (no pun intended) conclusion, based on non-absolute observations.

"...all train compartments smell
vaguely of #. It gets so you
don't mind it. That's the worst
thing that I can confess. You know
how long it took me to get there?
A long time. When you die you're
going to regret the things you
don't do. You think you're queer...?
I'm going to tell you something:
we're all queer. You think that
you're a thief? So what? You get
befuddled by a middle-class
morality...? Get shut of it. Shut
it out. You cheated on your
wife...? You did it, live with it.
(pause)
You # little girls, so be it.
There's an absolute morality? May
be. And then what? If you think
there is, then be that thing. Bad
people go to hell? I don't think
so. If you think that, act that
way. A hell exists on earth? Yes.
I won't live in it. That's me.
You ever take a dump made you feel
you'd just slept for twelve hours...?"

- Al Pacino
Glengarry Glen Ross

reply to post by adjensen


But morality from a deity isn't fixed, it's whimsical morality.

Why?

Well, which do you want:
1: A deity with free will
2: A deity without free will

A deity can only be the source of absolute morality in case number 2. To be 'unchanging' would be to be entirely subject to a lack of free will. A being with free will dictating morality would be subject to being able to change the system of morality, therefore voiding its status as absolute. It would be, at best, conditionally absolute.

Why would a deity necessarily change morality just because it had the ability to? If the deity is the divine ruler of all it's morals are just what it wants you to try to follow and that's that. Of course, people do not like a deity that's not their equal.

Morality is an absolute that we apply subjectively. Summed up simply, Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, or even simpler, love each other. Though this moral is absolute in that it is the one behavior we all desire from others, it is subjective in that we pick and choose who we apply it to ourselves.

With Love,

Your Brother

Originally posted by madnessinmysoul
To be 'unchanging' would be to be entirely subject to a lack of free will.

Within the scope of you and I, sure. But God is unchanging, not because he lacks free will, but because he exists outside of time. The whole "always has been, always is, always will be" thing -- God doesn't change because he's already had his full existence, or perhaps one might say that he IS existence, and he's already experienced the full existence of our reality.

I know that's confusing, I barely begin to understand it, but, as an example, I live my life -- starts in 1962, ends some point in the future, and I'm a little dot moving forward along that line. God already knows when my line ends, knows all the stuff that I'll do between now and then, knows what your reaction to this missive will be, though, to me, I haven't finished it yet, and you have yet to read it. God isn't the line -- he isn't time -- but he's the paper that the line is drawn on (metaphorically, of course.) God doesn't change, because he just IS.

People tend to get all hung up on the notion of "Old white guy with beard, hanging out in the clouds", but if one spends time seriously exploring the Christian faith, one quickly runs into what is referred to as the incomprehensibility of God, the realization that not only is our personification of him wrong, but the reason that we don't really "get" some aspects of God is because we inherently cannot. When one matures spiritually to the point of being able to dismiss the "old white guy" bit, it is a real game changer. Not everyone gets there, I don't think that everyone needs to get there, but for many, like me, it radically alters our intellectual view of God.

As you had posted in an earlier thread, go out and look up into the sky at night and try to truly wrap your mind around what you are looking at. Look at a star and think about the nature of light, distance, time. Look at a place where there are no stars and think about the nature of infinity and eternity.

That's a piece of this incomprehensibility part. God has free will. God never changes. God is infinite. Those things are all interrelated, but the how (and perhaps the why) is tucked away in that incomprehensibility piece, at least for me, and I hope to one day be able to sit down with him, or at least someone smarter than I, and learn about it.

Is rape ever justified in any culture?
Is torturing a baby to death ever justified?
Isn't telling the truth, always to be preferred?
Isn't stealing, no matter how small, a crime?
There are absolute morals. You know something is wrong intuitively, and you also know things that are intuitively good as well. Like ... love and charity.
These concepts are absolute morals and are not relative.
And ... they have been created in us for a purpose. You may not buy into my last statement, but whether you do or not is irrelivant. Absolute morals exist.
Empty philosophy can not erase the truth.

www.proofthatgodexists.org...

moral law is objective and absolute.

I don't believe in an objective morality.

Originally posted by slugger9787
www.proofthatgodexists.org...

moral law is objective and absolute.

I'm not convinced.