So where does morality come from, if not from God? Two places: evolution and secular reasoning. Despite the notion that beasts behave bestially, scientists studying our primate relatives, such as chimpanzees, see evolutionary rudiments of morality: behaviors that look for all the world like altruism, sympathy, moral disapproval, sharing ”” even notions of fairness. This is exactly what we’d expect if human morality, like many other behaviors, is built partly on the genes of our ancestors.
And the conditions under which humans evolved are precisely those that would favor the evolution of moral codes: small social groups of big-brained animals. When individuals in a group can get to know, recognize and remember each other, this gives an advantage to genes that make you behave nicely towards others in the group, reward those who cooperate and punish those who cheat. That’s how natural selection can build morality. Secular reason adds another layer atop these evolved behaviors, helping us extend our moral sentiments far beyond our small group of friends and relatives ”” even to animals.
So why is morality declining,…
Hmmm…never met an fish or lizard with a moral code, and I believe the Soviets came up with the Gulag Archipelago throw secular reasoning.
But, in all seriousness, the faultiness of that logic is that “good” can only be defined from within one’s own head. There is no external criteria by which to judge what “good” is other than by what I, as the individual atheist, says that it is.
Exactly so. Using this evolutionary drive towards a moral code only suffices for a moral code that is descriptive. It can tell us how humans (with variances) actually behave, and what they “intuitively†feel to be moral. It cannot ever tell us anything about a normative moral code. It can never have any authority over someone who disagrees.
Ethical animals? Really? I heard Jane Goodall speak earlier this year and she says that, in the beginning of her observations of chimpanzees, when she thought they behaved better than many people, she discovered how randomly and insanely violent they could become. Not just some of them — all of them.
Because they do have many human-like characteristics and behavior, we focus on how alike we are. That’s why foolish people try to keep chimps as pets until they grow, become strong and unpredictable, throw off their training and behave as the animals they are. As Dame Jane says, great apes may share 95 percent of our DNA but they do not have the ability to plan or imagine the effects of their actions far into the future.
As for humans, it’s rather ludicrous to claim that people can be “good without God.” It may be impossible to tell. Modern societies are rooted in religious ideals. You could remove every place of worship and cleric from society and the influence would still be there — judicial and legislative systems were developed using religious laws and teachings. Primitive peoples developed their own belief systems based on their experiences with nature.
It seems that spirituality and the practices that are derived from it are intrinsic to humans. Thus, atheism is learned and unnatural.
Without God…what [i]is[/i] “Good”? Without transcendence, everything is subjective and temporal and ultimately devolves due to entopy such that nothing, nothing at all, would be left to mark the passage of all of history. It would be as if nothing ever happened. So, without God, any talk of “Good” or “Evil” is meaningless. In fact, any pretense of free will or love or creative thought is falacious because without God, it’s all just chemistry and random chance. The nihilism is inescapable without God.
Grrrr…typo….should be “entropy”
I remember when noted atheist Madelyn Murray O’Hare was on Phil Donahue (no old age jokes, please! I was a child), after her son (the one the lawsuit taking prayer out of schools focused on) became a Christian. O’Hare kicked him out of the house and ordered him to never contact her again.
Phil asked her if she would ever forgive him and accept him back, and she said “No way”. He was shocked and asked “why not?” She responded “Forgiveness is a Christian concept. It doesn’t apply to me.”
Peace
Jim Elliott <><
Lots of noise from atheists, but nothing much of substance….
It seems to me that most morality springs from love or Love. If it springs from the lower case sort of love, it is simply off the mark and temporal. If it springs from that Love which God offers, it is eternal.
um, it’s been my experience that yes, you can be good without God but it’s a wishy washy kind of good; i.e. depending upon the situation. i’ve heard the term moral relativism and i think it applies here and i can see where it could get out of hand. it’s much easier to follow God’s word imo because it’s consistant and never changing.
and yes, primates are most vicious and murdering; not to say they don’t have many great qualities, but a pack of apes will have no qualms in tearing the vital organs and digits off your body.