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Do You Beleive In Such a Thing As Objective Morals

Many Christians just can't seem to wrap there heads around the fact that people can have morals with a God or the Bible to tell them the difference from right and wrong. Personally, I believe all morals are subjective. Where your morals come from is based off of the society and people surrounding you along with the area of which you live. I'm sure if you asked a Christian that if someone was to prove there is no God today if they would still have the majority of the same morals that they would answer yes. And if you ask them why this is well that is where they all kind of become stuck because whatever they respond with helps the other person's argument. Objective morals to Christians are just something they think they have but in reality for the most part they are all subjective. Any thoughts?

ryanneburch 3 Nov 28
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11 comments

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I am often confused by the difference between 'morals' and 'ethics'. To me morals are a higher, more inclusive term. The prime moral should be about pragmatics namely the survival of life including our own. In that case it is objective. This report is scary and talks about the means versus the moral ends.
[thehumanist.com]

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I would say morals are bound into the collective or social structure of our existence. But within that structure you can have objective truths. Until the last few hundred years slavery was debated and fought over for millennia. Right now we can say slavery IS bad and it is objectively true. Even if someone attempts to justify slavery or even perpetrate it we can allow the full weight of our objective truth to fall on them. Of course we can look back in time and see where the collective truth of that time and place doesn't agree with what we now know. Again slavery or how about the Salem witch trials?

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Moral or ethical systems can be objectively compared according to a metric, so people who agree on goals can have an objective discussion. People who have differing goals will run into trouble.

Many religious people value local social harmony and their place in the community over winning debates on the interwebs. On the other hand, atheists/agnostics might prioritize rationality and finding the truth. So they're unlikely to agree on moral or ethical questions.

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no only ethics. ethics are for the propagation of the species. morals are for small men with silly hats to inflict their warped slants on your life

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Moral traditions vary from culture to culture and from one time to another. Conditions tend to drive moral structures. Also, moral ideals may be rigid in one area and more flexible in another.

A lot of people in this world have died over differences in moral ideas. Absolute/objective moral codes are a product of religious notions 'set in stone'.

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I don't believe in objective morality either. All societies have rules against stealing and killing, but those rules still have variations when it comes to for instance self defense, or war. We just do the best we can to survive as a society.

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I think you meant to say people can have morals WITHOUT a god or the bible

Yep, just realized that, thank you.

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If you look up the word moral in the dictionary, there is no reference to religious roots. I think that says it all, don’t you? A moral is a decision.

Don’t you think a better word to explore is ethics?

Ethics isn’t a religious word, either, I just meant it plays a bigger role than morals.

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Yes and no. Different people define objective morals differently. Christians seem to think that objective morality means something out there in the ether. I think that some morals have evolved and become established in society so that nearly everybody accepts them. Each and every individual doesn’t have to find on his own, that something like murder is bad. It is just generally accepted so it is considered objective. Other than that, I think that you are completely correct in that the view of how most Christians define objective morality is wrong.

gearl Level 8 Nov 28, 2017
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Yes. One can and should use an objective basis for establishing a moral code. Then, objective analysis of the situation an determine if a decision or action matches the basis for the code. Such a moral code is far superior to one dictated by religious dogma.

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I believe gravity existed before we discovered it and I believe there are objective ways to establish morality. I think we slowly get closer to uncovering it. I don't hold every person who lived in a previous time or a society that is further from those objective morals to the same standard as our society, but I do hold anyone who resists moving towards objective and universifiable morals accountable for the delay in finding better ways of interacting.

The best example I have is that back in highschool in the 90's we referred to bad things as "gay" because that was our only exposure to what it meant. Then one of our friends came out of the closet, we considered it and never did that again. I will also started me educating others into changing their behavior. That doesn't mean I wasn't wrong before I knew it was wrong as a 14 year old in the 90's but it is more important that I learned and shifted towards the correct behavior.

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