Response To My Moral Claim

Here is an interesting response to my most recent post about the atheist Twitter claim on morals:

in response to I think your analysis really misstates the core argument of non-believers though, and turns it into a nit-picky argument about the authorship of the bible. The argument that we non-believers have regarding morality really isn’t about the bible per se, it’s about the reliance on a belief in a great supernatural whozits up in the sky as the basis for one’s morality. And an objection to the contention that seems to follow from that belief: that those of us who don’t believe in supernatural forces can’t possibly be truly moral people, or have any real basis for our morality and moral actions.

This is a good comment because it highlight’s two important points.   One of them is a common misconception of the Christian stance, the other a very valid point. 

The first point stems from the posters objection “to the contention that seems to follow from that belief [the belief in morals based in God’s nature]: that those of us who don’t believe in supernatural forces cant possibly be truly moral people, or have any real basis for our morality and moral actions.”

This is not what Christians believe.  Christians believe that all people, regardless of what they do or do not believe, have a basis for morality.  The Bible teaches that moral law is “written on the hearts” of all people, believers and unbelievers alike.  This means that Christians understand every person’s moral beliefs to be grounded in the existence of a morally perfect God, who created every person in his own Image, regardless of whether or not they believe that He did.  Because of this, an unbeliever’s sense of right and wrong is real, even though certain aspects of it can be suppressed or resisted at any given time. 

When I lie, I am suppressing the belief in what I know to be true, that lying is objectively immoral, even if only for a moment.  There are those who do not believe that lying is objectively immoral.  Under the Christian view, lying still is objectively immoral, this person has just decided to permanently suppress the truth.

There is a second point implied in this comment, found in the phrase, “cant…have any real basis for our morality…”, probably referring to the Christian belief that without belief in God, the atheist has no way to ground the existence of objective morality.  This is true.  How can something be objectively moral or immoral, if there is not some kind of law that transcends personal beliefs?  If there is some kind of transcendent law, what could it be if not God?  If there is no transcendent law, then nothing is objectively immoral, that is, it is not immoral in and of itself.

Take the example of torturing babies for the fun of it.

Is it objectively true that “torturing babies for the fun of it" is wrong?

If you affirm that it is, you need to be able to ground that somehow.  You would need to appeal to a transcendent law that torturing babies for the fun of it, breaks.  This law would have to be immaterial because of its transcendent nature.  I have not ever heard of, or read an atheistic way to do this.  I am open to checking out possibilities, but most atheists are naturalists, and do not believe in non-physical things, therefore to most atheists an immaterial, transcendent, moral law could not exist.

If you say, “To me it is wrong, but it might not be to someone else.”  Then by definition you are saying that there are some situations in which torturing a baby for the fun of it is morally acceptable.   This is because when you say this, you are assigning the moral value of an act to the subject (the person perceiving or committing the act) rather than the object (the act itself).

Therefore, the Christian position does say that even though an atheist can and does perform morally good acts and does have a built-in basis for morality (being made in the image of a moral God), he does not have an adequate way to ground objective morality within his own worldview.  In order to affirm objective morality the atheist is forced to borrow from theism, the existence of a transcendent moral law.

We all know that torturing babies for the fun of it is objectively, universally wrong.  Everything in you knows the preceeding sentence is true.  If you know something to be true, that your worldview tells you cannot be true, then you need to consider why you believe your worldview at all.