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Can Science Ground Morality?

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Of course not, as we have often noted in these pages.

James Davison Hunter’s and Paul Nedelisky’s  Where the New Science of Morality Goes Wrong is a great primer on the subject.  Their take down of Sam Harris is especially good:

The new moral scientists sometimes provide certain examples that they think illustrate that science has demonstrated (or can demonstrate) that certain moral claims are true or false. A favorite is the health or medical analogy. Neuroscientist and author Sam Harris, for example, employs the health analogy to argue that science can demonstrate moral value. A bit more circumspect than some who use the analogy, he recognizes that he’s assuming that certain observable properties are tied to certain moral values. Harris puts it this way:

Science cannot tell us why, scientifically, we should value health. But once we admit that health is the proper concern of medicine, we can then study and promote it through science…. I think our concern for well-being is even less in need for justification than our concern for health is.… And once we begin thinking seriously about human well-being, we will find that science can resolve specific questions about morality and human values.12

Harris makes two assumptions—first, that well-being is a moral good, and, second, that we know what the observable properties of well-being are. Yet he doesn’t see these assumptions as problematic for the scientific status of his argument. After all, he reasons, we make similar assumptions in medicine, but we can all recognize that it is still a science. But he still doesn’t recognize that this thinking is fatal to his claim that science can determine moral values. To make the problem for Harris more vivid, compare his argument above with arguments that share the same logic and structure:

  • Science cannot tell us why, scientifically, we should value the enslavement of Africans. But once we admit that slavery is the proper concern of social science, we can then study and promote it through science. I think our concern for embracing slavery is even less in need for justification than our concern for health is. And once we begin thinking seriously about slavery, we will find that science can resolve specific questions about morality and human values.

  • Science cannot tell us why, scientifically, we should value the purging of Jews, gypsies, and the mentally disabled from society. But once we admit that their eradication is the proper concern of social science, we can then study and promote it through science.

  • Science cannot tell us why, scientifically, we should value a prohibition on gay marriage. But once we admit that such a prohibition is the proper concern of social science, we can then study and promote it through science.

 

Comments
I take this to mean that you are going to stick to your alternate fact that all churches are forced by the government
You're free to take that up with whatever source you choose. I OTOH am going to focus on the dubious claim that "churches are not forced to officiate over same sex marriages".Vy
March 14, 2017
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Vy:
I’ve indulged your red herrings far enough.
I take this to mean that you are going to stick to your alternate fact that all churches are forced by the government to marry same sex couples rather than use the real facts.Armand Jacks
March 14, 2017
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Vy, you should check your sources
I've indulged your red herrings far enough.
Now, this being said, I would not be unhappy if governments and the general public pressured other churches to perform same sex ceremonies.
Of course not. It wouldn't fit the cookie-cutter Atheism you've presented.Vy
March 14, 2017
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Vy, you should check your sources. The government only has control over the Church of Denmark. The law specifically applies to the Church of Denmark, the state church. Other churches may have chosen to marry same sex couples, but that is not forced by law. Now, this being said, I would not be unhappy if governments and the general public pressured other churches to perform same sex ceremonies. Even as far as revoking tax free status to churches that refuse to do it. This, however, would be extremely difficult in the US because of previous supreme court rulings.Armand Jacks
March 14, 2017
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No, they have to find someone to do it in the state run church. ... The law only applies to the Church of Denmark.
I can seen the urge to do the CR is quite strong with you but reading is useful:
Homosexual couples in Denmark have won the right to get married in any church they choose, even though nearly one third of the country's priests have said they will refuse to carry out the ceremonies. The country's parliament voted through the new law on same-sex marriage by a large majority, making it mandatory for all churches to conduct gay marriages.
---
Seems like a reasonable compromise to me.
Shocka! You've managed to come up with the expected stories to fit the usual backpedaling "rationalizations" for the forcing but they really are, as they've always been, pathetic red herrings.Vy
March 14, 2017
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PS: A 101 on the objectivity of morality.kairosfocus
March 14, 2017
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Again, the ugly columns of smoke rise up, and ever so many pretend that all is well . . . we are making "progress" . . . even as our civilisation refuses to ponder what can happen if we cave-in and are engulfed by the subterranean, demonic, dirty fires that rage out of control. Radical relativism, amoral schemes of thought inviting the nihilism of might and manipulation make 'right' or 'truth' etc are all the rage, and the self-congratulations on 'progress' abound. We refuse to heed the implications of the nihilistic agit prop and cynical media shadow shows that are going on all around us. Consciences are benumbed, ever more perverse and destructive, addictive vices demand to be re-labelled as virtues, and we refuse to acknowledge the signs of ruin. Of all these things, perhaps the strongest single indicator of just how bad we are is the commonly seen evasion or enabling of our being embroiled in the worst holocaust in history. And the march of folly to ruin dances on and on and on.kairosfocus
March 14, 2017
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Armand Jacks: ... nor for theists, although they have been deceived into believing there is. Sorry to break the bad news.
Given materialism, in what sense do you control whether you are deceived or not? In what sense do people control their beliefs? It seems to me that you are suggesting that humans have free responsible rational top-down control over their thoughts (neurons). How do you square that with materialism?Origenes
March 14, 2017
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Vy:
Ya, you’re just forced to do it or have to find someone to do it… in your church. *facepalm*
No, they have to find someone to do it in the state run church. Seems like a reasonable compromise to me. The law only applies to the Church of Denmark. It is not an independent church and has always been under the control of the crown. Denmark does not have separation of church and state like we have in North America.Armand Jacks
March 13, 2017
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hgp has absolutely dismantled all arguments in favor of science grounding morality.
Literally.Vy
March 13, 2017
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nor for theists, although they have been deceived into believing there is. Sorry to break the bad news.
Hahaha, don't flatter yourself with vacuous assertions.
Atheists do not have a monopoly on these activities.
Shiny red herring but stay on focus.
If you can’t tell the difference between mathematical truths (that exist) and moral truths (that don’t), you are beyond comprehending.
You should be more worried about your lack of comprehension of that.
Damn, it’s almost as if there were no moral truths, just societally agreed upon subjective “truths”.
You don't say...
I have never claimed that subjective morality always works out well for all in society.
Nor have you said anything that can honestly be considered "morality" any more than the preferences of an impoverished burglar.
Nobody has ever said that people in society cannot lobby for whatever they would like. Whether or not society will accept what they have to say will depend on their ability to convince others. Unfortunately, history is full of cases where this has happened and things have occurred that our current society would not find acceptable. Things like the crusades, the inquisition, the Canadian residential school system, the holocaust, etc.
Cool story bro. Hedging prowess still not as good as CR's though.
Except in your first example, no priest or minister is being forced to officiate at a same sex marriage.
Ya, you're just forced to do it or have to find someone to do it... in your church. *facepalm*
Your second example has nothing to do with a church.
And just above your excuse was "no priest or minister is being forced to officiate at a same sex marriage".
It is of a minister who is employed by the city to perform CIVIC marriages at city hall. By law, same sex couples have the right to get married at city hall. If the person hired to perform these ceremonies refuses to provide the service that the couple is legally entitled to, they should be fired. ... Religion is not a defence for breaking the law.
And just as expected, "REMEMBER SEGHREGATION YHOU BIBLE-THUMPING BHIGOT!!!".Vy
March 13, 2017
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hgp has absolutely dismantled all arguments in favor of science grounding morality. I'm not sure what's left to argue over at this point. I suppose we could argue about how well an objective morality can be ascertained by fallible people, but only in the context that it is the only option left.Phinehas
March 13, 2017
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Vy:
Indeed there isn’t, for the materialist.
nor for theists, although they have been deceived into believing there is. Sorry to break the bad news.
Don’t lie? Hmm… That’s a new one. And killing those who rejected their “[muh feelings] agreement within society for subjective ‘moral’ ‘values’ “ certainly wasn’t a problem for these murderous “rationalists”. They also clearly don’t mind murdering dissenters en masse.
Atheists do not have a monopoly on these activities. Theists have demonstrated that they are quite adept at it as well. Maybe they just learned from us atheists.
“If you believe that [2 + 2 = 4], you are not likely to modify [that] to adapt to changing times”.
If you can't tell the difference between mathematical truths (that exist) and moral truths (that don't), you are beyond comprehending.
For example, there was a time when I was opposed to [racism]. Slowly, I changed my opinion on it but still had reservations about [not adopting the ‘sub-humans’]. I now fully accept both. Many [Xs], however, still vehemently oppose it because they still believe that [racism] is objectively wrong” Gotta love that changing “morality”! The US slave owners of the past weren’t wrong, they just had a different morality and yours is changed. If slavery happens to be in vogue in the future, your “morality” can just shimmy right along with the hoard. Same with the Nazis and every other thing that is bad today.
Damn, it's almost as if there were no moral truths, just societally agreed upon subjective "truths". I have never claimed that subjective morality always works out well for all in society. Just that history is best explained by subjective morality than it is by objective morality.
You mean legal, not illegal and “spreading like wildfire”. Necrophilia and incest rights for the youths of Sweden seems to be an important endeavor; trying to pacify the Muslim immigrants perhaps? And lest I forget, polygamy is apparently now the “next great frontier of social liberalism” thanks to the letter-brigade.
Nobody has ever said that people in society cannot lobby for whatever they would like. Whether or not society will accept what they have to say will depend on their ability to convince others. Unfortunately, history is full of cases where this has happened and things have occurred that our current society would not find acceptable. Things like the crusades, the inquisition, the Canadian residential school system, the holocaust, etc.
Except of course they are, have been, “should be” and the lemmings would love nothing more.
Except in your first example, no priest or minister is being forced to officiate at a same sex marriage. Your second example has nothing to do with a church. It is of a minister who is employed by the city to perform CIVIC marriages at city hall. By law, same sex couples have the right to get married at city hall. If the person hired to perform these ceremonies refuses to provide the service that the couple is legally entitled to, they should be fired. The fact that she is a christian minister is completely irrelevant because being a minister is not a requirement of the job.
Need I mention the fact that you can kiss your business goodbye if the letter-brigade lemmings find your business to be too Christian for their liking?
Most jurisdictions have laws that make it against the law for a business that provides service to the general public from denying that service to people legally entitled to it based on religion, gender, sexual identity, etc. You may not like the law, but if you are a business owner you must abide by it or seek another profession. Religion is not a defence for breaking the law.Armand Jacks
March 13, 2017
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Imperceptibly, through decades of gradual erosion, the meaning of life in the West has ceased to be seen as anything more lofty than the "pursuit of happiness", a goal that has even been solemnly guaranteed by constitutions. The concepts of good and evil have been ridiculed for several centuries; banished from common use, they have been replaced by political or class considerations of short lived value. It has become embarrassing to state that evil makes its home in the individual human heart before it enters a political system. Yet it is not considered shameful to make dally concessions to an integral evil. Judging by the continuing landslide of concessions made before the eyes of our very own generation, the West is ineluctably slipping toward the abyss. Western societies are losing more and more of their religious essence as they thoughtlessly yield up their younger generation to atheism.
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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To the ill-considered hopes of the last two centuries, which have reduced us to insignificance and brought us to the brink of nuclear and non-nuclear death, we can propose only a determined quest for the warm hand of God, which we have so rashly and self-confidently spurned. Only in this way can our eyes be opened to the errors of this unfortunate twentieth century and our hands be directed to setting them right. There is nothing else to cling to in the landslide: the combined vision of all the thinkers of the Enlightenment amounts to nothing.
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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KF @204: Well stated, as usual. Thanks.Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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Oh, OK KF. It's been fixed though.Vy
March 13, 2017
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Vy, I don't have general mod powers and am not thread owner. Unfortunately, I cannot help. KFkairosfocus
March 13, 2017
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@Origenes
... and a thousand party hacks did not believe was that God was watching what they were doing.
Oh don't worry, this time they will surely, surely get it right! They have the all-seeing eye of science! *facepalm* @KF, my comment "is awaiting moderation". It has a couple of hyperlinks relevant to Armand's claims so that might be why it's stuck in the digital limbo.Vy
March 13, 2017
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D (and O), thanks for the very important reminders on what happens when men shake a fist at God and imagine they can govern themselves without him, turning morality into subjectivist, relativist nihilism and the power plays of might and manipulation make 'right.' Because men refuse to acknowledge the world-root IS who grounds OUGHT, they walk in needless blindness, with demonic ferocity. And then their successors (who forget that some of us lived through at least some of what happened just a little while ago) want to pretend that nothing happened, nothing is wrong, there is no cause for concern, there are no hard-bought lessons of history to heed, the unborn child can be dehumanised in our perceptions and robbed of her or his life to the tune of 800+ millions under false colour of law -- and mounting at a million more per week -- and so forth. Ugly, huge columns of smoke are rising up all across our civilisation, pointing to a common, demonically dirty fire that is undermining the very ground we are standing on. The fires threaten to cause collapse that will let them engulf us all, And still, the atheistical folly marches on. Let me again point to Plato's warning from 2350+ years ago, a warning the atheists, for years, have consistently dodged:
Ath [in The Laws, Bk X 2,350+ ya]. . . .[The avant garde philosophers and poets, c. 360 BC] say that fire and water, and earth and air [i.e the classical "material" elements of the cosmos], all exist by nature and chance, and none of them by art . . . [such that] all that is in the heaven, as well as animals and all plants, and all the seasons come from these elements, not by the action of mind, as they say, or of any God, or from art, but as I was saying, by nature and chance only [ --> that is, evolutionary materialism is ancient and would trace all things to blind chance and mechanical necessity] . . . . [Thus, they hold] that the principles of justice have no existence at all in nature, but that mankind are always disputing about them and altering them; and that the alterations which are made by art and by law have no basis in nature, but are of authority for the moment and at the time at which they are made.-
[ --> Relativism, too, is not new; complete with its radical amorality rooted in a worldview that has no foundational IS that can ground OUGHT, leading to an effectively arbitrary foundation only for morality, ethics and law: accident of personal preference, the ebbs and flows of power politics, accidents of history and and the shifting sands of manipulated community opinion driven by "winds and waves of doctrine and the cunning craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming . . . " cf a video on Plato's parable of the cave; from the perspective of pondering who set up the manipulative shadow-shows, why.]
These, my friends, are the sayings of wise men, poets and prose writers, which find a way into the minds of youth. They are told by them that the highest right is might,
[ --> Evolutionary materialism -- having no IS that can properly ground OUGHT -- leads to the promotion of amorality on which the only basis for "OUGHT" is seen to be might (and manipulation: might in "spin") . . . ]
and in this way the young fall into impieties, under the idea that the Gods are not such as the law bids them imagine; and hence arise factions [ --> Evolutionary materialism-motivated amorality "naturally" leads to continual contentions and power struggles influenced by that amorality at the hands of ruthless power hungry nihilistic agendas], these philosophers inviting them to lead a true life according to nature, that is,to live in real dominion over others [ --> such amoral and/or nihilistic factions, if they gain power, "naturally" tend towards ruthless abuse and arbitrariness . . . they have not learned the habits nor accepted the principles of mutual respect, justice, fairness and keeping the civil peace of justice, so they will want to deceive, manipulate and crush -- as the consistent history of radical revolutions over the past 250 years so plainly shows again and again], and not in legal subjection to them [--> nihilistic will to power not the spirit of justice and lawfulness].
Misanthropes. KF PS: On the objectivity of morality, I suggest a 101 here: http://nicenesystheol.blogspot.com/2010/11/unit-2-gospel-on-mars-hill-foundations.html#u2_moralskairosfocus
March 13, 2017
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In the early days of the German advance into Eastern Europe, before the possibility of Soviet retribution even entered their untroubled imagination, Nazi extermination squads would sweep into villages, and after forcing villagers to dig their own graves, murder their victims with machine guns. On one such occasion somewhere in Eastern Europe, an SS officer watched languidly, his machine gun cradled, as an elderly and bearded Hasidic Jew laboriously dug what he knew to be his grave. Standing up straight, he addressed his executioner. “God is watching what you are doing,” he said. And then he was shot dead. What Hitler did not believe and what Stalin did not believe and what Mao did not believe and what the SS did not believe and what the Gestapo did not believe and what the NKVD did not believe and what the commissars, functionaries, swaggering executioners, Nazi doctors, Communist Party theoreticians, intellectuals, Brown Shirts, Black Shirts, gauleiters, and a thousand party hacks did not believe was that God was watching what they were doing. [Berlinski]
Origenes
March 13, 2017
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For tens of millions of laymen access to the Church was blocked, and they were forbidden to bring up their children in the Faith: religious parents were wrenched from their children and thrown into prison, while the children were turned from the faith by threats and lies…
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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Tens of thousands of priests, monks, and nuns, pressured by the Chekists to renounce the Word of God, were tortured, shot in cellars, sent to camps, exiled to the desolate tundra of the far North, or turned out into the streets in their old age without food or shelter. All these Christian martyrs went unswervingly to their deaths for the faith; instances of apostasy were few and far between.
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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Militant atheism is not merely incidental or marginal to Communist policy; it is not a side effect, but the central pivot.
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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Within the philosophical system of Marx and Lenin, and at the heart of their psychology, hatred of God is the principal driving force, more fundamental than all their political and economic pretensions.
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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It was Dostoevsky, once again, who drew from the French Revolution and its seeming hatred of the Church the lesson that “revolution must necessarily begin with atheism.” That is absolutely true.
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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I agree. There is no moral “truth”.
Indeed there isn't, for the materialist.
Hoever, that does not mean that materialist do not strive for agreement within society for subjective moral values. Some are easy. Don’t kill, don’t steal, don’t lie,etc
Don't lie? Hmm... That's a new one. And killing those who rejected their "[muh feelings] agreement within society for subjective 'moral' 'values' " certainly wasn't a problem for these murderous "rationalists".
But that does not mean that materialist do not strive to have their subjective moral values adopted by others
They also clearly don't mind murdering dissenters en masse.
In many respects, accepting that morality is subjective is more robust than believing that it is objective.
And that continues to be one of the most useless and vacuous claims Atheists spout out in numerous forms.
If you believe that your moral values are objective, you are not likely to modify them to adapt to changing times.
"If you believe that [2 + 2 = 4], you are not likely to modify [that] to adapt to changing times". Yeah, I heard, "science is sexist".
For example, there was a time when I was opposed to same sex marriage. Slowly, I changed my opinion on it but still had reservations about same sex adoption. I now fully accept both. Many Christians, however, still vehemently oppose it because they still believe that homosexuality is objectively wrong.
"For example, there was a time when I was opposed to [racism]. Slowly, I changed my opinion on it but still had reservations about [not adopting the 'sub-humans']. I now fully accept both. Many [Xs], however, still vehemently oppose it because they still believe that [racism] is objectively wrong" Gotta love that changing "morality"! The US slave owners of the past weren't wrong, they just had a different morality and yours is changed. If slavery happens to be in vogue in the future, your "morality" can just shimmy right along with the hoard. Same with the Nazis and every other thing that is bad today.
Both same sex marriage and adoption have been legal in Canada for well over a decade and civilization hasn’t collapsed, opposite sex marriages still exist, polygamy and bestiality are still illegal
You mean legal, not illegal and "spreading like wildfire". Necrophilia and incest rights for the youths of Sweden seems to be an important endeavor; trying to pacify the Muslim immigrants perhaps? And lest I forget, polygamy is apparently now the "next great frontier of social liberalism" thanks to the letter-brigade.
and with adopted kids of same sex couples are no more likely to be homosexual than any other kid
Yeah, it's not like same-sex relationships are more likely to be unstable which has been linked to questioning your sexuality, right?
churches are not forced to officiate over same sex marriages.
Except of course they are, have been, "should be" and the lemmings would love nothing more. Need I mention the fact that you can kiss your business goodbye if the letter-brigade lemmings find your business to be too Christian for their liking? Yeah, yeah, "REMEMBER SEGHREGATION YHOU BIBLE-THUMPING BHIGOT!!!" 'cause race and homosexuality are on the same level... riiiight.
All of the things that would happen if same sex marriage was legalized.
No kidding.Vy
March 13, 2017
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[...] the demon of evil, like a whirlwind, triumphantly circles all five continents of the earth…
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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Only a godless embitterment could have moved ostensibly Christian states to employ poison gas, a weapon so obviously beyond the limits of humanity.
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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The only possible explanation for this war [WW1] is a mental eclipse among the leaders of Europe due to their lost awareness of a Supreme Power above them.
“Godlessness: the First Step to the Gulag” Alexander Solzhenitsyn Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion on May of 1983
Dionisio
March 13, 2017
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