The axioms of geometry have the quality of being necessarily true—that it is logically impossible to conceive of a world in which they are not true. For example, if we define a circle as a collection of points equal distance from the center, then the value of pi must necessarily take on a certain value. It is logically incoherent to speak of worlds in which the value of pi varied.

This seems to be true, but is hardly for sure. we know that some axioms may or may not be true ‘in the real world’. For example, between two points the short distance is a straight line. However if you have a point on the north pole and one one the south, you can draw as many different lines as you wish between them, provided your definition of a line would be one that encircles the globe.

And then there’s the issue that circles don’t really exist. At least not in our world. A circle is made up an infinite number of points. Yet any circle we draw will look like a pile of rubble under a powerful enough microscope. Physics tells us at the very, very, small level space ceases to be continuous. So pi exists only as an analogy. Its useful to use an approximate pi because if you’re designing a swimming pool that’s an approximate circle it’s helpfull. For absolute truth, though, isn’t reasoning by analogy more often than not a fallacy?

This brings us to the ultimate question: if God (thus defined) does not exist, do moral values have the quality of being necessarily true. Boonton suggests that the answer is yes, arguing that “something must be taken on faith, but it does not necessarily have to be the existence of God.”…

Actually that was Blake’s position. What I’m trying to get at is the odd fact that we are trying to get to absolute morality yet morality only seems to apply to humans….or relations that are like human relationships. For example, no one thinks tapeworms feeding off an animal are acting immorally. Yet a freeloader leaching off a gullible friend is seen as immoral. It’s easy to imagine circles in a universe without humans, it’s pretty hard to imagine morality in a universe lacking anything human in it.

If the world is, in fact, just comprised of matter, space and energy, on what basis could one challenge the Nazi’s self-evident moral axioms. If we are merely the end result chance and natural selection, then why couldn’t the self-evident moral axioms we hold be different in a different world.

Quite frankly because they aren’t. Do you think God could have made a universe where pi was some different number? You can assert that chance is too flimsy to base morality on but chance is only flimsy in individual transactions. The casino may win or loose a lot of money when you walk in the door, but as a whole the casino knows its going to make money. It’s quite possible to imagine ‘by chance’ a different world where Nazi’s won WWII. It’s also quite possible to imagine in such a world they would paint their destruction of the Jews as a very moral thing. But what are the chances that would really, really, work over time? Why wouldn’t future generations removed from the war start to question the morality of it? Start asking what had really been done and was it really right? It didn’t take that long for the USSR to start questioning what happened under Stalin. The US’s almost immediate romanticizing of Native Americans is, partially, I think the recognition that of the fact that its treatment of them wasn’t moral. I suspect the Nazi’s saw this too. Unlike Germany’s other programs, the jet fighters, the rockets, the autobahn and volkswagons the murder of the Jews was done ‘behind the scenes’ and in a manner that smacked of trying to get it done really so it would soon be too late to do anything to reverse it. In other words, they acted as though they knew future generations, whether or not Germany won the war, would have wanted to undo what they had done.

My last point is that it is not “faith” in God that grounds objective moral values. It has to be the existence of a God who is the greatest conceivable being. Similarly, mere “faith” in the existence of moral axioms will not do.

I think your key phrase here is ‘a God’…that leaves a real lot of room, a little bit too much room. Most common talk of God denotes a human like entity. By that I mean an entity that thinks, has opinions, even can have emotions. But I think the God required by your assertion can be much more abstract, much less a ‘personality’ and more as a ‘nature of things’.

Of course such a God can also have a ‘personality’, but what you’re saying doesn’t require it. And that leads me to ask is the bare min. God required by your assertion be enough of a God to justiy an atheist ceasing to call himself an atheist? Einstein once quipped that ‘God doesn’t play dice’ but the ‘God’ he was talking about was not the type of God that would justify rejecting atheism.

A preliminary observation is that we must distinguish moral ontology—do objective morals exist—from moral epistemology—how do we discover objective morals. Some questions of moral epistemology can be exceedingly difficult. For example, was it moral to drop the bomb on Hiroshima? Our struggles with such questions of moral epistemology, however, are separate from our struggles with questions of moral ontology—are there objectively correct answer to such questions.

Boonton makes the point that “the quest here for moral absolutes seems to be a quest for objectivity…..the way theorems in geometry are objective.” This is an important observation. The axioms of geometry have the quality of being necessarily true—that it is logically impossible to conceive of a world in which they are not true. For example, if we define a circle as a collection of points equal distance from the center, then the value of pi must necessarily take on a certain value. It is logically incoherent to speak of worlds in which the value of pi varied.

The question then is whether moral values have the quality of being necessarily true in the same way that theorems of geometry have the quality of being necessarily true—it would be logically incoherent to speak of a world that is otherwise.

If moral values are rooted in the character of God, then I think the answer is yes—moral values are necessary truths. I would define God as the greatest conceivable being, which would necessarily include the quality of moral perfection. If a God thus defined actually exists, then objective moral values necessarily flow from his character of moral perfection.

I would note that the existence of a God such as Zeus will not do. It has to be a God who is the greatest conceivable being. I would also note whether the Christian, Muslim, or Jewish God exists and is such a God is a question for another day.

This brings us to the ultimate question: if God (thus defined) does not exist, do moral values have the quality of being necessarily true. Boonton suggests that the answer is yes, arguing that “something must be taken on faith, but it does not necessarily have to be the existence of God.” I think his position is along the lines of Brett Lythgoe’s suggestion that, “All one need is proper reasoning (as well as a good heart), and if one, makes proper deductions about morality, that ultimately are based on self evident axioms, then God is superfluous.”

I don’t think this argument works, however, because I can imagine a world in which “self evident [moral] axioms” are different from those that exist in this world. I do not think that they have the quality of being necessarily true.

For example, imagine that the Nazis won World War II and either brainwashed everyone to believe that “Jews are evil and must be exterminated” or killed everyone who believed otherwise. In such a world, the remaining people who reasoned from self-evident moral axioms would deduce a very different set of moral values from the one’s we hold.

If the world is, in fact, just comprised of matter, space and energy, on what basis could one challenge the Nazi’s self-evident moral axioms. If we are merely the end result chance and natural selection, then why couldn’t the self-evident moral axioms we hold be different in a different world.

My last point is that it is not “faith” in God that grounds objective moral values. It has to be the existence of a God who is the greatest conceivable being. Similarly, mere “faith” in the existence of moral axioms will not do.

But subjectivity gets a lot of unjust bashing. The fact is, its an objective fact that all of us live our lives subjectively. Subjectivity is, objectively, as aspect of the universe so any ‘universal’ needs to incorporate it, not try to keep it apart. Hence unlike geometry, there’s a lot of thrashing around and griping. Blake complains, “There can be no argument at all unless everyone agrees on some fundamentals….But today’s humanists aren’t. You can’t even get them to agree to something as simple as one standard…” As if everyone agreed on one standard last year, last decade, or even two thousand years ago. You should have sold that tonic back before Christianity split into 1,000+ different denominations…

because they genuinely believe they are smarter, “more right”, better, elite, and deserving of different and better treatment than “people in flyover country”.

Actually if they really believed this then they would agree on something ‘fundamental’. What’s ironic is that you probably don’t even see that you’re no less elitist than the imaginary people you complain about.

anyway, this question has been answered in the affirmative for centuries. its pithiest expression I know of is found in the voice of dymitri karamazov, “without immortality, everything is permitted.”

as far as I’ve seen, any argument to the contrary, including the ones in this thread, can be restated as argument by assertion.

best,
kristan

So even if folks, as per your description, bring up these issues, I still think natural law has a preliminary answer for them without explicitly having to spell out its divine provenance.

As I said – you have to take something for granted.

There can be no argument at all unless everyone agrees on some fundamentals.

But today’s humanists aren’t. You can’t even get them to agree to something as simple as one standard, applied equally, because they genuinely believe they are smarter, “more right”, better, elite, and deserving of different and better treatment than “people in flyover country”.

If you accept natural law – and you have an agreement about what that means – then sure, no problem.

But why should anyone believe in natural law if they don’t believe in the divine (in whatever form)? There is only one reason: because they choose to – because for some reason it suits them to do so.

So even if folks, as per your description, bring up these issues, I still think natural law has a preliminary answer for them without explicitly having to spell out its divine provenance.

That is quite different to the claim to legislate for oneself i.e. draw up the rules for oneself.

But that is exactly what today’s humanists are arguing: that laws do not apply if a person does not accept them.

I have known people who think of themselves as not only moral and good, but as good citizens. But they feel no shame at all about circumventing laws they don’t agree with. They honestly believe that the fact that the law is “wrong” (in their own opinion) means the law is not valid.

Civil disobedience* –> reductio ad absurdum

Unfortunately, they are not quite able to reconcile the fact that, if this were true, it would apply equally to Christians and conservatives as well.

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*Civil disobedience does not necessarily lead to such an absurd conclusion if one recognizes constraints. Problem is, if you have a disputed boundary (“who decides what a just law is?”), you’re also going to have a dispute over the boundary resolution process (“under what conditions or circumstances is civil disobedience justified?”)

What you are doing is describing the conditions under which an obligation is incurred.

In a law theory of ethics, what obliges is the divine law – as rules oblige in a game. How the rules apply to a given set of facts is another question.

That is quite different to the claim to legislate for oneself i.e. draw up the rules for oneself.