1 of 1- DanielCC
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God, NL, Ultimate Meaning and the Moral Argument
Given that God not only the highest good also but as that from which all good springs there is a strong intuition that the Deity should take centre place in our Axiological theories.
We can illustrate this with the central premise of WLC's Moral Argument i.e. that if objective moral values exist then God exists, and with the negative formulation given by the 18th century Libertines, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, arguably Sartre and many others to the effect that if God does not exist then there are no objective moral values (this is often phrased in the specifically negative formulation 'Everything is permitted' but also equally applies in the positive 'Nothing is innately worth doing'). In somewhat simplistic parlance 'morality should depend on God'.
One of my objections to Natural Law theory is that it rules out the possibility of such a moral argument and thus does not make God central to Axiology. By taking the good as stemming the fulfilment of our bodily ends Natural Law offers an opportunity for an entirely immanent ethical theory; one which has much to commend itself to atheists. I would propose that it’s no coincidence that realist 'metaphysically heavy' atheists such as Quentin Smith and Evan Fales look to a form of Aristotelean virtue ethics, which is very like Natural Law, as the best alternative to a theistic ethical theory.
Natural Law theorists have been keen to reassure me that their account does imply the existence of God in virtue of the immanent teleology involved entailing the success of the Fifth Way. This explanation strikes me as too general. Consider: one could give a similar argument along these lines to the effect that Utilitarianism implies the existence of God in virtue of the contingent beings involved entailing the success of the (a) Cosmological Argument. Qua ontological back-drop both Natural Law and Utilitarianism imply God but crucially neither does qua axiological theory.
So I’ll open to the floor for suggestions of alternative ethical theories or amendments to existing Natural Law which might better serve to capture this centrality.
Last edited by DanielCC (5/08/2016 3:41 pm)
- iwpoe
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Re: God, NL, Ultimate Meaning and the Moral Argument
It's also worth noting that Nietzsche himself seems to hold to something like a virtue ethics.
I'm still not sure this helps the naturalist. One might want to know that the natural laws are in fact good. Say you honestly think that the natural law is real but it restricts homosexual activity or implies some sexist conclusion or another, so you begin to think it absurd and arbitrary. The naturalist might begin to say (as some do say this) that these aspects of the immanent moral life are unfortunate holdovers from our past- society needs to correct the slow aspects of evolution -and not binding morally at all. That constitutes a general crisis of authority if followed consistently.
The theist has God to stop this skepticism of authority in the immanent order: the axiological upshot as I understand it is not that God is merely the source of such law (because all lawfulness points to him) but the reason it has authority- if that makes any sense. One is going to want to say that the immanent order is part of a general order specifically provided by god, not some accident merely superveniant on God's more general cosmological order.
Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
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It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
- DanielCC
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Re: God, NL, Ultimate Meaning and the Moral Argument
iwpoe wrote:
I'm still not sure this helps the naturalist. One might want to know that the natural laws are in fact good. Say you honestly think that the natural law is real but it restricts homosexual activity or implies some sexist conclusion or another, so you begin to think it absurd and arbitrary. The naturalist might begin to say (as some do say this) that these aspects of the immanent moral life are unfortunate holdover's from our past- society needs to correct the slow aspects of evolution -and not binding morally at all. That constitutes a general crisis of authority if followed consistently.
But what grounds does one have to do this if one has elected to take Natural Law as one's ethical theory? What grounds could the atheist have on their own theory to disregard negative conclusions in X specific circumstance? I understand the circumstances you describe but I think it's implicitly tantamount either to the supremely ad hoc or to denying Natural Law in the first place.
(I can think of a way an NL theorist could destroy the perverted faculty argument but it would be at the cost of other aspects and involve a move practically no atheist would be willing to make, that is simply to deny that one's body and all its ends are identical to one's self, a conclusion which yeilds substance dualism)
The theist has God to stop this skepticism of authority in the immanent order: the axiological upshot as I understand it is not that God is merely the source of such law (because all lawfulness points to him) but the reason it has authority- if that makes any sense. One is going to want to say that the immanent order is part of a general order specifically provided by god, not some accident superveniant on God's most general cosmological order.
Re the point in the last paragraph what resources has the theist to make that distinction? The actual facts appear to present a case of under-determinism (the immanent order would 'look' the same were it specifically provided or accidentally supervenient).
Last edited by DanielCC (5/08/2016 4:56 pm)
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Thread Starter- iwpoe
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Re: God, NL, Ultimate Meaning and the Moral Argument
Hmm, I take it that the naturalist is in the position of having to say that our particular moral constitution is a kind of accident, or one moral possibility amongst others that just so happens to be for very particular biological reasons. I understand that there can be other forms of naturalism which don't appeal to this kind of evolutionary thinking, but I take them to be not worth our time.
From within that framework you could have a skepticism from novelty:
1. Our moral constitution is the product of historical change.
2. In principle a new moral Constitution could arise in history.
3. There is no way to arbitrate between the arrival of a new moral Constitution or some kind of Aberration.
:. Any proposed moral alternative is a possible case of a new moral Constitution.
It would be a naturalist variant of arguments for social relativism: lots of different moral opinions point to lots of different natural variation, thus lots of different possible authorities. But lots of different Authority is no Universal Authority at all, thus there is no Universal natural law.
As to the second point. I'm not sure. I think you'd have to have a transcendental argument: if the laws are to be as authoritative as we think they are, then God (or some equivalent authority) must have granted them.
Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
- DanielCC
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Re: God, NL, Ultimate Meaning and the Moral Argument
It occurred to me just after writing this reply that perhaps one could give something analogues to the old argument for the soul's immortality based on natural desire, to witt no properly natural desire is in vain, therefore if we have this desire and our bodily selves cannot account for it then we must be something more than our bodily selves. This might be a promising avenue to explore (one could link it with Kantian 'Ought Implies Can' arguments to the effect that 'We Ought to be capable of endless moral progress ergo we are so capable') - the controversial aspect of course being how we justify claims to possession of such desires. It wouldn't quite give us God but it would make things even more uncomfortable for the naturalist.
Hmm, I take it that the naturalist is in the position of having to say that our particular moral constitution is a kind of accident, or one moral possibility amongst others that just so happens to be for very particular biological reasons. I understand that there can be other forms of naturalism which don't appeal to this kind of evolutionary thinking, but I take them to be not worth our time.
1. Our moral constitution is the product of historical change.
2. In principle a new moral Constitution could arise in history.
3. There is no way to arbitrate between the arrival of a new moral Constitution or some kind of Aberration.
:. Any proposed moral alternative is a possible case of a new moral Constitution.
I think the naturalist can evade this by sticking to his/her guns re metaphysical commitments and appealing to immanent teleology. Thus whilst our species did not have to arise i.e. it arose through contingent circumstances, its biological constitution is not accidental in as far as it follows from the dispositional properties ('final causes') of our natural kind structure and the dispositional properties of the lower inorganic matter subsumed under that kind.
So points 1 and 2 would be denied. Instead we'd have something like 'Our kind is instantiated in virtue of historical circumstances but given we - the existing beings - are this kind we cannot be anything different' with 2 being countered by 'Since justified moral constitutions are parallel to biological constitutions another moral constitution could only arise accompanied by the respective biological change'.
As long as the naturalist has the NL theory basis about natural ends he or she can wave away the existence of moral differences between societies as being irrelevant. If the argument from morality differing by societies has any force against NL it would appear it must have it against all accounts.
As to the second point. I'm not sure. I think you'd have to have a transcendental argument: if the laws are to be as authoritative as we think they are, then God (or some equivalent authority) must have granted them.
I'll suspend judgement on such arguments till I see them.
Last edited by DanielCC (5/08/2016 7:35 pm)
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Thread Starter- iwpoe
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Re: God, NL, Ultimate Meaning and the Moral Argument
I'm a little confused: are we talking about atheistic methodology in ethics or plausible atheistic ontologies that can support ethics? I am well aware that atheists can in fact be moral realists simply by fiat, but it's very hard for me to see how you're going to have an ontology that includes imminent teleology but still have plausible atheistic arguments of the usual sort. So, yes, I could have made a naturalist who is a kind of Platonist but how's he an atheist?
Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
- DanielCC
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Re: God, NL, Ultimate Meaning and the Moral Argument
I'm a little confused: are we talking about atheistic methodology in ethics or plausible atheistic ontologies that can support ethics?
I am talking about the place of God in ethical theories i.e. does X ethical theory qua ethical theory and not qua ontological background (on which, as I said, Utilitarianism gets theistic results) imply the existence of God?
I am well aware that atheists can in fact be moral realists simply by fiat, but it's very hard for me to see how you're going to have an ontology that includes imminent teleology but still have plausible atheistic arguments of the usual sort.
Well it's ultimately as plausible as any atheistic ontology, that is it's not, but there's nothing about the notion of immanent teleology itself which should worry the atheist any more than their allowing contingent beings or change. Granted it's not the regular mechanistic, Humean atheism but that's to its proponents credit.
(Out of interest what arguments did you have in mind?)
So, yes, I could have made a naturalist who is a kind of Platonist but how's he an atheist?
An atheistic moral Platonist would hold that goodness consists of instantiating or possibly participating in the respective properties considered as Platonic 'Abstract' objects and that no being approaching God exists (the 'and' is important since plausibly one could give the same account of morality and allow that God exists, and follows said morality - Keith Yendel does something like this)
Last edited by DanielCC (5/08/2016 7:37 pm)
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Thread Starter- Greg
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Re: God, NL, Ultimate Meaning and the Moral Argument
One of my objections to Natural Law theory is that it rules out the possibility of such a moral argument and thus does not make God central to Axiology.
Some natural lawyers think something like the intuition behind the moral argument is right; O'Brien, there, is formulating an argument due to Geach. The claim, though, is not that one cannot have any moral knowledge but rather that one cannot recognize the force of moral absolutes.
But I think it would generally get things backwards, on such an account, to infer God's existence from the truth of some moral absolutes. It would rather have to go the other way.
Natural Law theorists have been keen to reassure me that their account does imply the existence of God in virtue of the immanent teleology involved entailing the success of the Fifth Way. This explanation strikes me as too general. Consider: one could give a similar argument along these lines to the effect that Utilitarianism implies the existence of God in virtue of the contingent beings involved entailing the success of the (a) Cosmological Argument. Qua ontological back-drop both Natural Law and Utilitarianism imply God but crucially neither does qua axiological theory.
But the theory of value in natural law theory is predicated on final causes, and the claim is that natural law theory qua committed to final causes implies God's existence. Surely that implication is much more direct than utilitarianism.
So I’ll open to the floor for suggestions of alternative ethical theories or amendments to existing Natural Law which might better serve to capture this centrality.
I have never been too fond of the moral argument. I appreciate what Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Sartre, and others are getting at (and was personally somewhat influenced by Dostoevsky for a time), but I'm just not convinced that the intuition behind the moral argument is correct or that it is a particular discredit to an axiological theory not to accommodate it. I am usually surprised at the extent to which WLC gets away with that argument. As a natural lawyer, I tend to view my toughest competition as being the contemporary Kantians, who try to argue that morality arises sui generis out of the structure of pure practical reason or out of interpersonal relationship (e.g. the Strawsonian reactive attitudes).
I think a true moral theory could imply the existence of God, but the idea that moral realism is only possible given theism is just not something I am committed to, apart from the fact that I will reject each moral realism that is not natural law theory, which I think implies theism.
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Re: God, NL, Ultimate Meaning and the Moral Argument
An atheistic moral Platonist would hold that goodness consists of instantiating or possibly participating in the respective properties considered as Platonic 'Abstract' objects and that no being approaching God exists (the 'and' is important since plausibly one could give the same account of morality and allow that God exists, and follows said morality - Keith Yendel does something like this)
Isn’t morality and ethics a duty that you owe to another person? If we participate in it (as an atheistic moral Platonist) wouldn’t that just be something that just is rather than a duty, leaving aside how it even came to be? Also where does the intrinsic value of a person come into play when it is just the Platonic Abstract objects that are instantiated?.
Just disregard my comment about Keith Yendel, I have not read him but thought that he was supporting atheistic moral Platonist.
Last edited by Jason (5/09/2016 11:50 am)