shart1780 said:
I've never understood how this view could be logically defended.
If there is no God, and if we are truly sophisticated animals with no true soul, then what does right and wrong really matter at all? It wouldn't.
Let's say The human race evolved from soulless creatures and we're still soulless creatures that will just dissolve into the dust when we die like every other animal. How is there truly any wrong at all? If there is no universal right or wrong we are simply masses of flesh bumping into eachother on a tiny ball in space.
If we are fleshy masses with no real purpose (except maybe the percieve purpose society makes up for us), why is it wrong to kill? Al it would be is the act of causing another mass of flesh to cease to live. Why is that "wrong"? Why is it not wrong for my cat to kill a mouse for sport?
And if morals are decided by society, then who's to say the ancient Mayan cultures who practice savage human sacrifice were morally wrong? In there minds that was perfectly acceptable because society said so. Something can't be wrong in one part of the world and right in another. It just doesn't make sense.
If right and wrong are only dictated by society than I'd say that morals are a pretty stupid and petty thing.
And that is what I don't get with religious people. The notion that they have a monopoly on morality. That they are the only ones capable of feelings, forgiveness, and so on.
Ever read Kant? He gives some answers.
I'm sure you have interacted with other non-religious people, or read some posts on here from people like me, A_Wanderer or dazzlingamy. Did you ever get the feeling that we are blood thirsty, immoral creature seeing every person as a pile of flesh and bones?
As I said, morality is not a religious term that doesn't apply to atheists or agnostics, or people from other religions.
I value other people, as I value other creatures. I reject any killing for fun.
I don't think we are so much superior of animals. But on the other hand, animals usually don't kill for pleasure. Either they are hungry, or they are defending themselves.
I'm not a cat expert to know why they play with a mouse, but I think it's insulting to say a non-religious person like me would do the same thing, only because we don't believe that there is something in Heaven or whereever controlling and steering us. I don't need God for my set of morals.
I don't know what our purpose is, but when the useless flesh of my father's died one and a half months ago there was so much more that left than just that. There left loads of purpose. When people kill each other, they don't just take the life of another person.
I really don't get how you could imply we are viewing people just like atoms without a reason for being on earth.
Other cultures had other sets of principles and morals. And mind you, the reason the Mayans sacrificed people, like other cultures did, was to please their Gods. Am I to say whether this was moral or not? Today, it would be far from moral.
But then think about what the Catholic church did to people not applying to their set of principles. The Malleus Maleficarum, Giordano Bruno, Galileo Galilei, the crusades, the support of the Nazis (also done by the Lutherian Protestants) and so on. And all in the name of God.
It took centuries to be able to say that the earth isn't flat, that there doesn't need to be a higher being, or that we might not be the middle of the universe, without getting brutally tortured and killed by those oh so moral higher people.
by myself:
Society defines what is right and what is wrong. But not solely. The law, developed over centuries and revisited over and over again provides for a basis we can use to define what is right or wrong, moral or immoral. Not one person, and never one book.
Please reread that again, and if need be, I will clarify.