On "Without God, there's no reason to be moral"

[DeistPaladin]

I've often heard others in the freethought community comment on Christians who use the morality argument as a source of validation. Such Christians often claim that without a belief in God (along with scripture and commandments), there's no reason to be moral. The usual commentary is to express concern about how depraved an individual must be to have the threat of Hell hanging over them before they'll act in a decent fashion.

Personally, I give them more credit than that. As Hitchens noted, did the ancient Hebrews not understand that lying and murder were wrong before Moses came down from the mountain carrying the ten commandments? Most of the atheists I know were Christians once and yet I have yet to hear of one story of anyone going on a crime spree after losing his or her faith.

Neither have I noted that piety prevents anyone from coming up with flimsy rationalizations for questionable behavior. The fear of Hell doesn't seem to stop bad people from being bad, especially since the doctrine of Christianity offers forgiveness for everything except apostasy.

I don't know who said this originally but the only thing religion does is convince otherwise good people to do bad things. Beyond this argument being an appeal to consequences, it strikes me as a rationalization to validate their beliefs, one that will turn out to be false if they should ever lose their faith.

 

[Skillbus]

It pisses me off when people cannot accept that morality is not objective. I think the fact that people (usually theists) think that morality can exist outside the self is somewhat damning because it shows that they view morality strictly in terms of being "good" or "bad," which I think is a result of basing their morals on ideas of judgment, punishment, and reward. I think if you do good things because you want to be a good person, rather than because you want the world to be better, that is not really morality. It's definitely not morality if punishment/reward, even in the form of the opinion of you held by someone else, including a god, is your motivation. Of course, for the most part, I don't give a shit what makes you behave morally, as long as you do so. Most religious people I know are a lot more kind and generous than myself.

 

[Aught3]

Religion is the moral framework through which believers understand good and evil. When someone doesn't subscribe to the same (or similar) framework they can't understand how someone can still be moral. It's just a failure of the imagination on their part.

 

[Andiferous]

Neither have I noted that piety prevents anyone from coming up with flimsy rationalizations for questionable behavior. The fear of Hell doesn't seem to stop bad people from being bad, especially since the doctrine of Christianity offers forgiveness for everything except apostasy.

This is the problem, methinks. Considering that the Christian rulebook is allegory and symbolism and interpreted in a myriad of different (and sometimes contradictory) ways, and personal relationships with god are necessarily vague. It all seems the perfect training for interpretation and reinterpretation and justification in all 57 varieties.

 

[creativesoul]

With the 'God of Abraham' there's plenty of reason to be moral...

 

[nemesiss]

what i think is part of the problem is the indoctrination that people have done to themselves and others, by making the claim that morals came from a god and CANNOT be obtained or be kept without a god.
if this is hardwired into someones brain, its almost impossible for that person to stay sane without religion.

 

[Demojen]

God=Reason=Morals?

AhahahahahahahAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

Is this a joke? That's a rhetorical question. This is BULL!

I'd love to go into the details as to why and or how but I've done it and I'm sure most everyone here has done it themselves a hundred times or more.
It's starting to get boring. Like arguing with a second grader why five times four equals twenty and not nine.

So, given the question of their relationship, I'm just going to post this tidbit extra:

 

[Exmortis]

Morality is a fickle thing.

In relation to this thread, it is not exclusive to one group.
Priests who dabble in acts of pedophilia, for example, aren't exactly the height of morality.

 

[Gavin_Farewell]

You probably heard it from AronRa. He did a wonderful speech on the Evolution of Morality.

In many cases religion actually perverts morality. Such as... the brainwashing of young children before they are old enough to make up their own minds.

 

[tangoen]

I am not claiming to be an expert but i always thought that morality just went hand in hand with compassion, empathy and simple understanding . i emphasize for less fortunate so i try to give when i can. i don't murder or steal just because i would understand the hurt it can cause. it's real simple why i am a moral person and it's because i have every reason to and i do not have a single reason to be immoral. i guess for the people who believe in the conventional god must have real evil desires. I don't believe in the christian god but it never for a minute stopped me from believing that morality has a place in a civilized world.

this might just another way to label non christians as the anarchistic, hedonistic slovenly butchers of the world that need salvation.

 

[eric8476]

you can be moral without religion.

 

[DeistPaladin]

you can be moral without religion.

One step further: religion is neither necessary nor even helpful in determining morality.

 

[Andiferous]

you can be moral without religion.

One step further: religion is neither necessary nor even helpful in determining morality.

To be fair, I think this is more true of organised religions, and certain organised religions in particular. Often when this is the case, it is because people would rather adopt a belief set rather than evaluate their own morality.

I think that people can be both spiritual in some way and moral at the same time, because many folks do arrive at spiritual conclusions after intensive moral questioning.

 

[DeistPaladin]

The problem with religious based morality is a classic conflict of interest.

Religion cares first and foremost about its own promotion. Hence victimless crimes like blasphemy and idolatry are demonized while useless activities like prayer, church attendance and rituals are lauded as virtues. just look at the ten commandments and we find the first four strictly relate to matters of religious observance. A casual reading of the Bible or the Koran reveals that Islamo-Christianity is concerned first and foremost with fidelity to the faith and admonishments about how to treat others ethically is almost an afterthought.

Additionally, the divisive nature of believer vs. skeptic, my religion vs. your religion and the internal strife of orthodox vs. heterodox is bound to create problems or even dehumanize others or sanitize inhumanity against them. Any notions of salvation serve to aggravate this issue, ratcheting the stakes to overwhelming levels of importance.

This is to say nothing about outdated or bizarre taboos like dietary restrictions or laws against homosexuality that may be unique to a certain religion.

Neither necessary nor helpful.

 

[Andiferous]

The problem with religious based morality is a classic conflict of interest.

Religion cares first and foremost about its own promotion. Hence victimless crimes like blasphemy and idolatry are demonized while useless activities like prayer, church attendance and rituals are lauded as virtues. just look at the ten commandments and we find the first four strictly relate to matters of religious observance. A casual reading of the Bible or the Koran reveals that Islamo-Christianity is concerned first and foremost with fidelity to the faith and admonishments about how to treat others ethically is almost an afterthought.

This idea is generalised to Islamo-Christianity religions, rather than the broad spectrum of religions and/or the idea of alternate or individual spirituality. Again, religion covers a very broad spectrum of belief systems, and some people who might consider themselves religious (or spiritual in some way) might not subscribe to any one organised religion in particular (or do subscribe but with caveats).

In the case of Islamo/Judeo/Christianity I agree with the assessment.

But in the case of something like Buddhism, this statement doesn't necessarily hold.