Question for Atheists; What is your moral system?

Great Debates
21

[QUOTE=Hampshire]
I replied “So you’re basically saying that without religion you wouldn’t know what’s right and wrong? Now that’s scary.”
[/QUOTE]

That’s right - the Jews all thought that murder and stealing were A-OK until Moses came off the mountain with the stone tablets.

The golden rule is pretty good but has a weakness - wouldn’t it be better to do unto others as they would want you to do unto them?

I prefer to think of it as asking whether the world would be a better place if everyone did something, and if so, that something is moral. The goal is to minimize suffering and maximize happiness. Of course, I fall short of this, since I don’t send all my extra cash to help the poor in Africa. But that’s the ideal.

22

[QUOTE=Annie-Xmas]
If you are willing to treat others the way you want to be treated, you don’t need a magical sky pixie watching you to make sure you do. I am an atheist, but I am also one of the most moral people you will meet.

My moral system? Like is a whole lot easier if you don’t f*ck with other people.
[/QUOTE]

Ahhh…as an old fanfic said (Luke Skywalker to Riekan/Kurtz) - “I believe in life and let live. Unless someone is fucking with your shit.”

I agree with Annie, with an extra helping of “massive asymmetrical retaliation once the line has been crossed”.

Otherwise, I do my job (very well), take care of my family (when I’m not 300 miles away because of my job), help people who need it (funny, according to my girlfriend, since I really dislike people on general principle), and don’t believe in the good old fashioned conservative philosophy of “Fuck everyone else as long as I got mine”.

Oh, and since I don’t believe that Magic Big Daddy In The Sky will make it all better later, I actually try to do positive things now, rather than waiting for some big magical fix at the end.

-Joe

23

[QUOTE=Revenant Threshold]
I’ll go first. I don’t believe there is a set moral standard for the universe, so really my system is pretty much a value judgement and I don’t claim it’s objective or somehow more “right” than anyone elses’ (at least in universal terms). I’m a loose utilitarian. I believe the most moral thing to do, the best thing, is that which promotes the most happiness, and likewise the least moral thing to do is that which causes the most unhappiness.
[/QUOTE]

What makes happiness the thing to optimize? How do you judge what actions maximize happiness?

For instance, let’s look at a Robin Hood scenario. Is it morally justifiable to steal from one man to feed others? Surely the unhappiness of one man is balanced by the happiness of those hungry people eating, no?

Take it a step further, what if this man discovers you, and offers resistence such that you must kill him to get the food. Does that balance out? What

It just seems to me that this sort of system allows for a LOT of difficult judgment calls. I think appealling to the golden rule (as was mentioned up thread), is a simple, no judgment call sort moral rule. The rule, in and of itself, requires no faith at all and seems to exist in similar forms in most of the world’s religions

24

I agree with PC apeman’s your question to Annie, without a well defined and universal moral system, her saying that she’s one of the most moral, doesn’t make a lot of sense.

For those atheists who deviate from the golden rule, can you please explain?

For instance, Merijeek mentioned “massive assymetrical retaliation”. Can you clarify please? In my mind, morals are not about justice, but simply a simple guideline for how you should behave. In fact, that sort of sentiment seems to fly in the face of the golden rule, because certainly you wouldn’t want “massive assymetrical retaliation” when you cross the line, especially when it’s accidental.

IOW, it seems to me that how to act morally is a distinct question from how immoral actions should be handled. The first dictates the actions of the individual while the latter is a judgment call of the society as a whole as to how certain rules deemed improper should be handled.

25

[QUOTE=cosmosdan]
I always figured atheists got their moral system the same place everyone else does. Their emotional make up and their environment. Their upbringing.

As we become adults this can be influenced by experience.

Religion or philosophy are just labels we use to describe it aren’t they?
[/QUOTE]

Don’t believe morals necessarily exist in an objective sense. In practical terms, I agree with the above for that which passes for morals. To the quote, I’d specifically add ‘thoughts’ and ‘genetics’ but that’s sort of covered. Thoughts beget other thoughts, but which thoughts are specifically begotten of course could theoretically be reduced to the personality type and experiences of the person having them.

I also think it’s possible that our lives have already happened and we’re just replaying them so that the basis of our personalities is from something beyond.

26

A timely question - I was going to ask this myself sometime.

Personally, I aim towards compassion, empathy, and live-and-let-live.

Where does it come from? Me, I think it’s the formerly Christian nation in which I live. Which opens an interesting debate: do these values come from Christianity, or was Christianity historically a very effective means of enforcing societal norms? I dunno.

27

Kant’s Practical Imperative (other people are ends in themselves, not means to my ends) and Categorical Imperative (which always struck me as the Golden Rule taken a few steps deeper) are what I find myself measuring my decisions against most often. I often add a dash of Ayn Rand (not that really batty shit, just the idea that human interactions should be based on an exchange of value for value). Rand helps me be an asshole when I need to, and that’s generally a hard thing for me, so thanks Ayn.

28

I hate the golden rule. Taken one way, it’s wrong. Taken the other way, it’s meaningless.

  1. If I treated everyone the way I wanted to be treated, then I’d treat my professors like a college student, my mother like she was my son, the poor like they were rich, the rich like they were poor. That doesn’t make for a happy, moral world. That makes for an entire world of mistreated people.

  2. Your rebuttals, I’m sure, are that I’m looking at it too literally. I should reverse the roles entirely, putting myself in their position. Then what would I want? In that case, I’d make a terrible linebacker, because I’d let the runner get past me every time. After all, if I were him, I wouldn’t want tackled. For some reason, we know this is an exception to the rule. Well, that just reduces the golden rule to “Treat others the right way”, which doesn’t help me much. The golden rule is just like all other proverbs…a simple self-evident truth that has to be carefully applied. It’s a concise way of putting something, but it doesn’t help me much.

My moral system is based solely on self-interest. Whatever makes me happiest is best. Altruism makes me happy, so that’s moral. In matters that don’t concern me directly, I take the side of the people most like me- those I identify with easiest. That’s why I have no compassion for Iraqis unless they’re like Americans. That’s why I like my family better than my friends, my friends better than my neighbors, and them better than strangers. Seems moral to me.

29

[QUOTE=Blaster Master]
For instance, let’s look at a Robin Hood scenario. Is it morally justifiable to steal from one man to feed others? Surely the unhappiness of one man is balanced by the happiness of those hungry people eating, no?..

It just seems to me that this sort of system allows for a LOT of difficult judgment calls.
[/quote]
Well, having the government tax people to pay for welfare programs is pretty much that scenario, right? Yes, it involves difficult judgment calls.

30

[QUOTE=Blaster Master]
What makes happiness the thing to optimize? How do you judge what actions maximize happiness?
[/quote]
This is a good question. It’s pretty much the main thing i’ll admit i’m totally uncertain on.

Generally the problem with a lot of objective moral standards (IMHO) is that you don’t actually get to see the standard in question being judged. If you think that being nice is “good”, certainly you get to see the physical results, but you don’t get to check whether you’ve successfully met the standard or not. If someone believes in a god, they (usually don’t, anyway) get to check with them to make sure what the did was really what they wanted. I choose happiness because it is something we can check; we can see if we really did promote happiness or not, even if it is pretty vague. And I chose happiness because generally people seem to enjoy it; perhaps it is just as subjective as promoting greed, or promoting murder, but at least everyone seems to think they ended up better off.

Yes, I would consider it morally justified - absent other factors.

Again, absent other factors, certainly. But what about his family? What about my family, when i’m locked up for murder? Promoting happiness needs to be taken in an overall view, not just with an example absent other influences.

I agree. But I think this is a bad point against the golden rule, not a good one; a standard rule means things are going to get through the cracks. “Do as you would want done to you”; what if you’re a masochist? Simple, no judgment calls often mean you’re going to end up doing things that go against the spirit of the rule in the effort to maintain the letter. My way certainly means there’s a lot of difficult decisions to make, but nature is made of difficult decisions. Applying a simple rule doesn’t make them go away, it just ignores them.

I don’t think it’s a horrible rule. I just think it’s too easy. It’s like playing tennis by standing in one spot and making exactly the same racket movements; yes, you’ll hit the ball sometimes, and certainly it means you don’t have to make tricky decisions about where to move and how to hit the ball. But it’s not the most effective approach.

31

[QUOTE=Blaster Master]
For instance, Merijeek mentioned “massive assymetrical retaliation”. Can you clarify please? In my mind, morals are not about justice, but simply a simple guideline for how you should behave. In fact, that sort of sentiment seems to fly in the face of the golden rule, because certainly you wouldn’t want “massive assymetrical retaliation” when you cross the line, especially when it’s accidental.
[/QUOTE]

If it’s accidental, that’s why intent matters. That’s just sense. Something to remember, here, is that none of the folks responding in this thread are going to have a black and white view.

I, for one, am perfectly willing IF NECESSARY to lie, cheat, steal, and kill. But that’s if I deem it necessary, not if Richard Dawkins tells me I should.

As for the “massive asymmetrical retaliation”, that’s just because some people occasionally need to be taught a lesson. Not because someone accidentally dinged my fender.

-Joe

32

[QUOTE=jjimm]
A timely question - I was going to ask this myself sometime.

Personally, I aim towards compassion, empathy, and live-and-let-live.

Where does it come from? Me, I think it’s the formerly Christian nation in which I live. Which opens an interesting debate: do these values come from Christianity, or was Christianity historically a very effective means of enforcing societal norms? I dunno.
[/QUOTE]

I don’t think any reasonable person could think that compassion came from Christianity; same for empathy and live-and-let-live.

Live-and-let-live, for example, seemed to be a specific tenet, in practical terms, of the Jewish faith. Which, incidentally, is related to one aspect of why some ancient peoples found it offensive; it operated on the assumption that there’s no point in trying to convert anyone since they’re not the chosen people anyway. Snobbish as that may be, it does result in a live-and-let-live ethos in religious terms at least. xianity ranks pretty high up, in my view, of ideologies that aren’t about live-and-let-live in practical terms, historically speaking. Pretty aggressive, I’d say.

Compassion would seem to result from a sense of shared connection with the person for whom the compassion is expressed; that shared connection could be familial, strategic, evolutionarily adaptive, or ideological; if that’s true, then xianity would serve as an ideological basis for compassion to the same extent that any other belief system would (one, specifically, that posits that all human beings are part of the same shared connection in that they’re all children of god, etc. despite the ideological arrogance that betrays.) Same goes for empathy.

I think there might be a good argument, however, for suggesting xianity’s influence in propagating values like compassion and empathy without suggesting xianity originated them which seems like an overstatement.

It’d be similar to the Muslim notion that everyone is a Muslim whether they know it or not. Then, of course, you’d also have to define compassion and empathy in either secular or religious terms; to a believer that chops off your head that could be compassionate if they’re thinking in afterworld terms.

But I think in secular terms, it can be argued that xianity influenced the development of compassion and empathy as an express “twist” on other concepts such as honor from one notion to another more ‘enlightened’ one (to use modern secular terminology).

33

[QUOTE=IntelSoldier]
My moral system is based solely on self-interest. Whatever makes me happiest is best. Altruism makes me happy, so that’s moral. In matters that don’t concern me directly, I take the side of the people most like me- those I identify with easiest. That’s why I have no compassion for Iraqis unless they’re like Americans. That’s why I like my family better than my friends, my friends better than my neighbors, and them better than strangers. Seems moral to me.
[/QUOTE]
This is really, really disturbing.

34

In a single sentence: Happiness is good. Pretty much what Revenant Threshold and black rabbit already said.

To answer Blaster Master, happiness is the thing to optimize, because I decided it was. It’s an assumption, not a conclusion. Obviously, other people can choose differently, but that’s what I value.

As for deciding what actions maximize happiness, it’s a judgment call. Generic cases can’t really be considered because there are lots of factors to consider. Usually, you won’t know everything that matters in the situation. And usually, when you don’t know the other factors, the special case is the golden rule. I don’t know what they want, so I’ll assume they want the same thing as I do. But usually, people don’t want exactly the same things that I do, and if I know what they do want, I should do that instead.

Also, I think even if god did exist, he wouldn’t be the arbiter of morality any more than he would be able to change mathematics. Just because someone more powerful than you (even infinitely so) says that something is right, doesn’t mean it actually is right.

35

Be good to thy neighbour and good things will happen to thou. But do it not for that it is in thy best interest. Do it for it is how thou get your strength to endure the challenges thou’ll face. So don’t be a dick.

“WWJD?” is good too.

Of course there’ll be times where making the right choice is hard, but the Holy Books isn’t much help then either. Every good moral advice in the Holy Books have already trickled out into the collective mind of modern society.

A perhaps once groundbreaking and progressive rule of life (e.g. turn the other cheek), would now be a cheesy and obvious moral in a Hollywood RomCom. Society’s moral code has already surpassed the Bible.

36

[QUOTE=Giles]
There was a Jewish prophet around 2,000 years ago who said:

That seems a good start for a moral philosophy to me.
[/QUOTE]

“This is the sum of duty. Do not unto others that which would cause you pain if done to you.”
– Mahabharata 5:1517, from the Vedic tradition of India,
circa 3000 BC

“What is hateful to you, do not to our fellow man. That is entire Law, all the rest is commentary.”
– Talmud, Shabbat 31a, from the Judaic tradition,
circa 1300 BC

“That nature alone is good which refrains from doing unto another whatsoever is not good for itself.”
– Avesta, Dadistan-i-dinik 94:5, from the Zoroastrian tradition,
circa 600 BC

“Do not do to others that which would anger you if others did it to you.”
– Socrates (the Greek philosopher),
circa 470-399 BC
The Jewish prophet was a little late to the table.

37

I agree with the other godless heathens here. :smiley: As Lu-Tze said, I do unto otters as I would have them do unto me and so far I don’t have any swimming in my toilet, so…um…

…

I got lost there, didn’t I?

Anyway, I just try to treat people fairly because I want the same.

38

Off the top of my head, I think my “moral” stance (scare quotes to indicate that in my mind, moral entails religious belief; I prefer the term “ethical”) can be expressed with three terms: honesty, empathy, and egalitarian.

Honesty entails attempting to rationally understand the world (including myself) as it is, and is the core of everything that follows. Empathy recognizes the commonalities among people and, to a greater or lesser degree (as appropriate) among all life. Egalitarianism encompasses the “golden rule”, but recognizes that the differences between myself and others should be respected.

It’s in the interplay of the three that the ethical work gets done: honesty requires me to recognize my flaws (including “immoral” feelings and actions), while empathy allows me to acknowledge the flaws (and merits) in others, and egalitarianism permits forgiveness (and/or punishment, when warranted). Furthermore, honesty recongizes that my point of view isn’t always the best (or even correct); combined with egalitarianism, it leads to humility.

39

Survival of the species first
Survival of myself second
My happiness third
The species’ happiness fourth

Everything else just sort of becomes “try not to cause suffering”. I think that’s a pretty objective moral system, to be honest.

40

Moral system, moral system… I know I left the damn thing around here somewhere. One day I have got to clean up this freakin’ office… okay, I think this is it. I know it’s a Visio file. Is it? Or was it Excel… no, definitely Visio, because it was a flowchart. “MorSys.vsd,” this must be it. Annnnd… dammit. No, this is the one I used to evaluate my own mortality and place in the universe.

Well, shit. I may have deleted it. I’ve got a shoebox of floppies in my bedroom closet I’ll need to check. Meantime I guess I could summarize it by saying I mainly avoid doing things to others that make me feel bad afterward. I don’t like to feel bad. Self-conditioning over time, I guess. Probably a good thing I’m not a masochist or a complete sociopath. Without a nice stiff religious dogma to keep me in line, I’d probably do some real damage.