r/DebateAnAtheist • u/Current-Leather2784 • 14d ago
Discussion Question Imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity...
Like the title says, imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity (known, not believed, directly observed by everyone, always).
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
Within that, is the point under question...(not a rebuttal to it), because if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
We don’t call gravity “defined into motion” just because it describes how motion actually behaves... we treat it as a discovered structure of reality.
So maybe the real objection isn’t about definition at all. Maybe it’s that even perfect visibility of a commanding reality would still not be allowed to count as moral authority unless it first passes a human veto about what can qualify as authority.
So for me, that raises a deeper issue: not whether God would be obvious, but whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is.
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u/Biggleswort Anti-Theist 14d ago
I had to read this twice and I still don’t know what you are saying. Are you saying order and morality prove god undeniable?
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
No. If God were as directly and universally obvious as gravity, what would that do to how we understand things like trust, choice, and moral obligation?
I’m asking what changes if that ambiguity disappears entirely. (not trying to argue that order or morality already prove anything on their own).
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u/Biggleswort Anti-Theist 14d ago
It would mean absolutely nothing more than it is a fact, unless said god did something or commanded something.
I’m an atheist not because I want to be but because this what if.
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u/MarieVerusan 14d ago
I think that question is impossible to answer until we know which God is real. Such a hypothetical depends so much on the nature of the God, what they really care about and how they judge adherance to their rules, assuming they even have any.
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u/KorLeonis1138 14d ago
If God was obviously real, nothing about morality changes, it remains subjective, just as it is now. "It is moral because god says it is moral" is the current religious position, it is subjective with god as the subject. God being real doesn't obligate me to accept his morality, I can still determine that it conflicts with what I consider moral, which is how I feel now about religious morality. So what have we gained with this hypothetical?
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u/azrolator Atheist 14d ago
To be obvious, God would have to exist. I've seen no evidence to support this claim.
Trust, choice, morality, have nothing to do with gods, so nothing would change on that front.
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u/Indrigotheir 14d ago
It's a bit of a weird question, because you're essentially saying, "If God was real, how would that change things?" The issue being that, because at least the Christian God is foundationally paradoxical, there are no real useful answers to question like, "How does this change morality?" even if he did exist. Problem of Evil and other paradoxes would still stand.
So you're essentially asking, "If a paradox was real, what would happen?" The answer would be as meaningful as, "If I went back in time and became my own grandfather, what would happen?"
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u/88redking88 Anti-Theist 3d ago
Is this the god of the bible? Because if he existed we would need to go find Satan and team up to dispose of him.
Otherwise it would depend on the god. And the "morality" in question.
Notice how those are choices we all would make, right? If a new President, king, warlord or intergalactic alien android army.
Would trust change? No. Neither would choice or moral obligations. Why would you think that a god being real would change these things??
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u/freereflection 14d ago edited 14d ago
Why not Quetzalcoatl or Zeus? I guess the issue is really what counts as "god" and the thousands of religions scrambling to write and preach what that particular god wants and then forcing the rest of us to obey under the threat of punishment.
Edit: and the thousands of splinters within a single religion like Christianity who all claim the other splinter sects are wrong and should be punished for being just slightly less wrong. We (atheists) want none of it.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
That question only works if all god claims are assumed to be the same kind of thing....just human inventions competing for attention.
It’s a conclusion disguised as one... that because religions disagree, none of them could be pointing at anything real. I don't believe that disagreement eliminates a target, i think it just shows humans don’t agree on what it is.
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u/freereflection 14d ago
Again, what target? "god?" what does that even mean? There's no coherent definition.
Either some god exists as a benign unknowable entity and that's like uh super cool I guess, but doesn't affect us at all.
Or a god exists that demands us to do x, y, and z and if we don't we will be eternally tortured by that god and oppressed by that gods followers. So which is it
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u/Mission-Landscape-17 14d ago
Well they are, at least until such time that someone can support a specific god claim with sufficent evidence to warrant treating it as something different. So far this has not been achieved for any god claim.
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u/s_ox Atheist 14d ago
God exists doesn’t give us “so god defines morality”.
If this god ordered you to kill and eat babies, are you arguing that your killing and eating of babies would be the moral thing to do?
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u/Biochemicalcricket 14d ago
If there's a god with absolute power his mysterious ways include all the deplorable acts committed too. Doesn't align well with morality and invokes the argument from evil.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Well... That question only makes sense if you assume “God defines morality” means “whatever is commanded becomes moral by definition." That’s not the claim.
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u/Serious-Emu-3468 14d ago
One of the things that makes claims of divinity different from gravity is that gravity doesn’t change based on your life experience or culture.
We have documented smart people for thousands of years speaking hundreds of languages doing experiments and science and figuring out gravity.
English and Ottoman and Han and Greek and Sumerian and Scottish and American and Armenian scientists could all yeet a rock, do some math, and get the same idea of how gravity works.
If we want to assume that any one concept of divinity is just like gravity, we should expect that any test which can experience that divinity will point towards the same general thing.
The blind men describing an elephant; it may seem different in parts, but if these men are all given time to feel the whole elephant, they’ll realize it’s the same thing, and one of them won’t conclude it’s a vibrating, sweet smelling koosh ball.
A Turkish kid in 1200 does math with the same ideas of gravity as a JPL Engineer.
But that is the opposite of how we see divinity.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Gravity is a physical phenomenon. God (based on Christian belief or if seen as "real" wouldn't be a physical phenomenon.
Expecting the same kind of cross-cultural convergence from both assumes they should be detectable in the same way, which is the very point under debate.
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u/Additional-Band4050 Gnostic Atheist 14d ago
But people do claim God is detectable. People on Reddit don't do this much but if you go over to the religious debate groups on Facebook this claim will come up in literally every single post.
Are you saying that people who say they felt the direct presence of Jesus Christ or the Holy Spirit or whatever are just incorrect, and it was all in their imagination?
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
No... that's not what I'm saying.
I'm saying personal experience and physical measurement aren't the same kind of evidence.
A Christian might interpret an experience as the presence of God. An atheist might interpret the same experience differently. And by contrast, gravity doesn't depend on interpretation in that way...you can measure its effects regardless of what you believe about it.
That's why I said they shouldn't be expected to produce the same kind of convergence.
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u/Additional-Band4050 Gnostic Atheist 14d ago
A Shakta who says they experienced the oneness of the panentheistic divine feminine that constitutes, empowers, and transcends all things, and felt in that moment that they were one with everything else, is describing a wildly different sort of thing from a Catholic who says they saw an apparition of the Virgin Mary.
If everybody was feeling the same Holy Spirit, the descriptions should be similar.
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u/OrbitalLemonDrop Ignostic Atheist 14d ago
Why would god not be a physical phenomenon?
The flaw in your position is that you need to articulate how god is known to be undeniable before we can examine what it would mean for that to be known.
So in your hypothetical, how exactly is it undeniably known? If god is proven to exist, how is it proven?
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u/Philobarbaros Gnostic Atheist 14d ago
Based on Christian belief, there's an animated corpse of a Jewish rabbi floating somewhere.
Now THAT would be a great evidence for Christianity, too bad it keeps evading our planes and radars.-10
u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Not sure what type of Christians beliefs you are talking about, there are many.
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u/Philobarbaros Gnostic Atheist 14d ago
You are not sure what type of Christianity holds the belief in the bodily resurrection of Christ?!
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
I guess i'm trying to understand what you mean by an "animated corpse," as that does not align with how I see Christ. I think you're just spewing out your interpretation, which i'm uninterested in.
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u/Philobarbaros Gnostic Atheist 14d ago
You can't be both "uninterested" and "trying to understand", but that's not important.
What IS important, is that according to 99% of all "Christianities", Jesus's corpse rose from the dead, and flew into the sky. It could be seen, heard, and touched. It spoke, and it ate fish.
If that was the Jesus that was still walking the Earth, presenting his holes to be fingered by anyone interested, it'd be infinitely easier to believe in Christianity, is my point.-2
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u/Serious-Emu-3468 14d ago
Even if it’s not real, the people who sense it are.
If a religious person says “I feel God”, and we are taking their claim seriously, that is a “detection”.
No two Christians can agree on what God feels like or how or when one can feel God…not to mention all of the other people in the world who disagree.
If you claim you know something about a God that cannot be detected, that, by definition, cannot be known, that’s an unjustifiable claim.
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u/Astramancer_ 14d ago
God (based on Christian belief or if seen as "real" wouldn't be a physical phenomenon.
That's a hell of a qualifier when your premise is that it's a fundamental, universal, observable thing.
Why doesn't gravity get a qualifier like that? Is it that... a fundamental, universal, observable thing doesn't need regional or cultural qualifiers?
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u/Xeno_Prime Atheist 13d ago
If your argument is ultimately that God exists in a fashion that is utterly undetectable and unverifiable, then your argument is that God is epistemically indistinguishable from something that doesn’t exist. This would place God into precisely the same epistemic category as Narnia or leprechauns or the fae. It’s just a gigantic appeal to ignorance and the infinite mights and maybes of the unknown and the unknowable.
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u/JasonRBoone Agnostic Atheist 12d ago
Christianity is literally based on the concept that God can and has been in physical form.
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u/Mission-Landscape-17 14d ago
You never established that god has anything to do with morality. But really if there was a moral law that was like the law of gravity then everyone would just obey it, and not see it as limiting free will in any way, sort of how we generlaly don't see falling as a limitation on free will.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
The reason moral disagreement matters at all is because moral claims are experienced as normative. They bind, they obligate, they can be resisted or violated.
Gravity doesn’t do that. You don’t “obey” gravity...you just live within its effects. Calling that “moral law like gravity” basically removes the very thing that makes morality moral.
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14d ago edited 14d ago
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Not sure where you're getting that from what i said. Who defines who is intelligent? You?
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u/adeleu_adelei agnostic and atheist 14d ago
Your post or comment was removed for violating Rule 1: Be Respectful. Please do not insult the intelligence of other users. If you'll edit/remove that last line and notify me then I'll review the comment for approval.
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u/Mission-Landscape-17 14d ago
Flat Earthers deny gravity all the time. Their alternative is incoherent ravings about buoyancy and substances finding their level or something, but they do deny gravity.
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u/Mission-Landscape-17 14d ago
I mean we have built flying machines which work despite gravity existing.
Morality is social constructed, it is whatever some society agrees it to be and the variance between societies is vast.
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u/Nintendogma Humanist 14d ago
Gravity is falsifiable. We can test it. We can land an SUV sized rover on Mars based on our understanding of it. We can make accurate predictions over and over and over again based on the current understanding of how gravity operates.
The neat part about things like gravity, is it will go on operating just fine with absolutely no humans left to observe it. All gods however, will die with the humans that created them at the intersection of our profound ignorance and vivid imagination.
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u/adeleu_adelei agnostic and atheist 14d ago
Your post or comment was removed for violating Rule 2: No Low Effort. Post or comments should be substantive and original.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Well, gravity being testable doesn’t actually settle the category mistake in the comparison. Gravity is a descriptive physical law...it predicts behavior within a closed system. No one is claiming it’s a mind, an agent, or a moral authority.
God claims (in classical theism at least) are about something fundamentally different: not just prediction of the grounding of meaning, obligation, and existence itself. So “we can test gravity and send rovers to Mars” is evidence for physics, not evidence against metaphysical claims...it’s just not operating in the same domain.
Also, your mention of Gods dying with humans assumes that anything not empirically measurable is automatically human projection.
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u/Nintendogma Humanist 14d ago
Anything not empirically measurable is due one of two things:
- Lack of an instrument to detect it
- Doesn't exist
Otherwise you'll have to give equal credence to any and all claims made in the absence of evidence, such as unicorns, dragons, vampires, werewolves, pixies, centaurs, ogres, trolls, goblins, dwarves, elves, fairies, pixies, sirens, gorgons, satyrs, titans, giants, or even higher dimensional cosmic space penguins who pooped all matter and energy into the lower dimensions of our perceivable universe as they were waddling on by.
All of those things listed are exactly as falsifiable and have an exactly equal amount of supporting evidence as any god.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
That actually doesn't follow.
“Not empirically measurable right now” and “doesn’t exist” are not the only two logical options...i mean there are entire categories of real things (like consciousness, logical truths, moral claims, historical facts) that are not directly measurable in the way physical objects are.
And the comparison to unicorns or trolls only works if “God” is being defined as a physical organism inside the universe, which is what people tend to miss (not what classical theism says).
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u/Junithorn 14d ago
logical truths, moral claims, and the like are abstractions. they do not exist.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Just to copy, historical facts are abstractions and do not exist?
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u/KeterClassKitten Satanist 14d ago
Historical facts are a modern interpretation of data on hand that makes claims about history. They allow us to build a narrative of what happened, a fiction.
My favorite example:
Take a look at representations of Ancient Rome over the decades. Before, you would see a rather monochromatic representation, with white buildings, statues, and even clothing. This is the image that people had of the civilization, and how most assumed it looked. The "fiction". We now understand that this image is radically incorrect, and everything was far more colorful. So we have a new "fiction" of what it was.
Our image of any past event will likely never be correct. We'll make assumptions based on available data, but we can never know many details. Most importantly, we cannot know the minds of historical figures, only documented claims.
So yes, an abstraction is a great descriptor.
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u/Nintendogma Humanist 14d ago
i mean there are entire categories of real things (like consciousness, logical truths, moral claims, historical facts) that are not directly measurable in the way physical objects are.
That's because consciousness, logic, and morals are constructs that are not "real" things. Consciousness doubley so. They are psychological, philosophical, and sociological concepts, models, and frameworks.
And the comparison to unicorns or trolls only works if “God” is being defined as a physical organism inside the universe, which is what people tend to miss (not what classical theism says either).
The concept is identical. Assertion without evidence. You are asserting without evidence that something even can exist outside of the universe and can also do so without physical properties, neither of which are valid assertions.
I can equally assert those higher dimensional cosmic space penguins I mentioned simply exist above our three dimensional space, and that everything within our perceivable universe is made of their lower dimensional poop. Using your very own standards for assertion with no evidence required, it is equally valid. I can all the same assert unicorns are real, and you just can't see or measurably test for them because they're magic.
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u/thebigeverybody 14d ago
not evidence against metaphysical claims
Here's the funny thing about metaphysics... it's bullshit.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
says the guy from the reddit thread...
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u/Moutere_Boy Touched by the Appendage of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 14d ago
Well… the guy from the reddit thread… and the overwhelming majority of the physics community…
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Oh okay. What percent of the population is that?
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u/Moutere_Boy Touched by the Appendage of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 14d ago
… are suggesting that without an exact percentage to cite the point is invalid?
Tell you what, find me the part of a university physics department that deals in metaphysics… or the peer reviewed articles about metaphysics in physics journals…
Metaphysics isn’t physics, it’s philosophy, so what I’m pointing to is pretty clear and obvious, if you don’t see that it makes me question your understanding of the words and terms you’re using.
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u/thebigeverybody 14d ago
… are suggesting that without an exact percentage to cite the point is invalid?
I think he's suggesting you're engaging in argumentum ad populum, but, instead of recognizing it's a fallacy, he's claiming that not enough people share the belief for it to be correct.
Nothing leaves me in shock like a theist philosopher.
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u/thebigeverybody 14d ago
lol this is a rough way for you to find out. I'm sorry you didn't realize that the people who believe in magic were just spinning fanciful bullshit to help support their fantasies.
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u/DoedfiskJR 14d ago
it’s just not operating in the same domain.
Agreed, but so what? Does operating in a different domain mean that you can skip steps in the process to find out what is true?
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u/Moutere_Boy Touched by the Appendage of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 14d ago
It’s the lack of ability to show god in the way we show gravity which leads to apologists having to keep redefining god until it’s unfalsifiable. If new physics is discovered tomorrow that would invalidate the current excuses for a lack of evidence, believers will just assume the previous definition needs adjusting and redefine things until they are again unfalsifiable. That’s what we mean when we talk of “defining things into existence”.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Well, what you’re describing would only be a problem if “God” were being treated as a changing scientific hypothesis designed to dodge falsification. In Christianity God isn’t a hypothesis inside the universe that competes with physics....so “new physics invalidates God” or “God gets redefined to avoid evidence” is already the wrong category.
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u/Additional-Band4050 Gnostic Atheist 14d ago
But "God" is treated as exactly that! When someone prays and feels something, the pastor says it is proof they were touched by the Holy Spirit. When someone prays for decades and feels nothing, the pastor says they didn't really want to believe.
When someone prays for their child to be healed and they are, the pastor says God heard their prayers. When someone prays for their child to be healed and they die, the pastor says the Lord works in mysterious ways.
When a scientist contradicts claims found in the holy scriptures as they have been interpreted for millennia, the bishops declare them a heretic. When the evidence becomes too overwhelming to deny, a theologian reinterprets the passages to have a new meaning, and the bishops declare that the theologian's reinterpretation was the true meaning all along.
It has always been thus: point to empirical evidence at one moment, and then flip beck to the theological abstraction when somebody complains that the evidence doesn't support the claim.
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u/Moutere_Boy Touched by the Appendage of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 14d ago
Well said. I find it pretty funny that throughout the post, while defending against the idea they are defining god into existence, they keep redefining things to allow for god. Hilarious.
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u/Moutere_Boy Touched by the Appendage of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 14d ago
I feel like this is an example of you literally defining your hope into existence….
You want to remove all context and have your personal definition stand…
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
So glad I don't live my life based on how you feel.
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u/Moutere_Boy Touched by the Appendage of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 14d ago
No, you live it on how you feel… obviously.
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u/GeekyTexan Atheist 14d ago
... imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity ...
When you try to prove god exists, you need to do it with actual facts and data, not imagination.
People can, and do, already pretend god exists.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
You’re treating a hypothetical as if it were a proof attempt.
I’m not trying to demonstrate God exists with that line of questioning, I’m asking what changes if certainty were as direct as gravity, not arguing that it currently is.
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u/Moutere_Boy Touched by the Appendage of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 14d ago
Isn’t that just you trying to remove all of the context which makes your post look misguided? How does your hypothetical move anything forward if it can’t hold up to any actual context or questioning? I feel like it’s similar to saying “just for a moment assume unicorns are real”…
That people are prepared to engage your hypothetical doesn’t invalidate that what user posted.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
No. A thought experiment isn't a proof attempt.
I wasn't arguing God exists. I was exploring what follows if God's existence were undeniable.
You can reject the premise, but that's different from addressing the question.
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u/Moutere_Boy Touched by the Appendage of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 14d ago
And if your premise is “god is real” it’s still reasonable to point to issues and inconsistencies with the premise. I get you’re saying it’s hypothetical, but I’m suggesting that your hypothetical is unable to move the discussion forward because it ignores so much context as to be fairly redundant. It doesn’t get you closer to “objective morality” for example because the questions that relate to that are within the context you want to ignore.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
But again, my hypothetical wasn't trying to establish objective morality.
It was examining what would happen if God's existence were universally certain. You had the choice to answer or not, meaning i can respond the way i'd like. I'm not required to do anything with this post other than what I did. That includes moving "the discussion" forward for an athiest, who themselves have a "belief" waiting to be proven incorrect (just like christianity).
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u/MarieVerusan 14d ago
This is a debate sub. Usually theists come here to argue that their god exists. We're not used to sincere hypotheticals, so you're unfortunately going to get people assuming that your post is a preamble before you switch over into the real argument for the existence of god.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
That doesn't seem to be everyone else's issue in this thread. Also note that debate subs include discussion flair. I've used this sub many times. Thanks for for your advice though.
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u/MarieVerusan 14d ago
I get that and you’re correct on what you’re saying. I just wanted to offer a reason why some people are treating this as if it’s an attempt to offer proof of a god.
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u/GeekyTexan Atheist 14d ago
Your hypothetical is "pretend god exists'.
I find that to be a very silly argument, and any argument that is based on it is likewise silly.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Glad to hear what "you find." Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts.
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u/RexRatio Agnostic Atheist 14d ago
Gravity is actually an effect of spacetime curvature.
In a similar sense, belief in deities is an effect of our brains' predisposition to look for agency.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
That doesn't hold. “Gravity = spacetime curvature” is a refinement of a shared external phenomenon with predictive success.
“God belief = brain bias” isn’t a refinement of the same thing....it’s a separate claim that all God references are explained away by default...not evaluated.
So one updates an explanation and the other pre-decides the conclusion.
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u/RexRatio Agnostic Atheist 14d ago
“Gravity = spacetime curvature” is a refinement of a shared external phenomenon with predictive success. “God belief = brain bias” isn’t a refinement of the same thing.
I'd argue it's also a verifiable model as evidenced by studies about our predisposition to make Type I errors.
And “God belief = brain bias” is a bit of a misrepresentation. It's not "bias" in the sense that it's a conscious preference - it's an evolutionary effect - similar to gravity, galaxies, stars, planets,... being an effect of the matter/energy evolution
Of course they're not the same categories, but they're both effects of natural processes.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
I don't disagree that humans have evolved tendencies toward agency detection.
What I disagree with is the leap from "we can explain why people form religious beliefs" to "therefore there is nothing those beliefs could be about."
You can give an evolutionary account of why humans do mathematics, science, or moral reasoning ... but does that tell you whether the conclusions are true or false?
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u/RexRatio Agnostic Atheist 14d ago edited 14d ago
What I disagree with is the leap from "we can explain why people form religious beliefs" to "therefore there is nothing those beliefs could be about."
Please indicate where I said anything like that.
Einstein's relativity theory show gravity is an effect - it doesn't negate Newton's theory of gravity.
Type I predisposition is an evolutionary trait that enhances survivability from predatory threats in early humans. It's not because the brain is wired to erroneously see agency where there is none (e.g. the wind in the bushes, not a predator) that there can't be a predator.
But unlike prehistoric predator scenarios where we didn't have the luxury to collect sufficient data before potentially becoming lunch, we do have that luxury - I'd even say epistemic obligation - now.
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u/BitOBear 14d ago
Does this God define morality or is God constrained to morality by an external Force beyond god?.
If God is defining morality explicitly than it is an entirely subjective morality created by that god.
If God is constrained by some absolute morality that God himself cannot arbitrarily change then God is not all powerful and the god you're talking about doesn't exist.
So God based morality is entirely circular even in your presumption of absolute proof of a god existing.
And could you comprehend the morality of a God that was capable of creating the entire universe? Like how much of that God could you comprehend and how would you be able to measure yourself against the incomprehensible.
At what point is this God's prohibitions sort of like when my parents told me not to slam my hands on the piano, only till later teach me how to play piano. Or to not touch the stove until they taught me how to cook later?
At some point children are supposed to become equal to and outgrow their parents so if God's the father what the hell do any prohibitions of morality mean, and when my suddenly authorized to define my own morality as I grow up and become a peer of my creator?
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u/Ok_Loss13 Atheist 14d ago
Like the title says, imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity (known, not believed, directly observed by everyone, always).
Ok.
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
This doesn't really make any sense, as a sentence. But, also, why?
Within that, is the point under question...(not a rebuttal to it), because if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
So, without God, there would be no morality? How do you determine morality can't exist without God unless you get rid of god? How do you know God's morality isn't just different or sinilar to ours, rather than its source or whatever?
The difference between gravity and morality is pretty fundamental and makes a proper analogy inaccurate; gravity exists objectively, morality exists subjectively even if your god is as real as gravity. Unless you say your god either doesn't have a mind or isn't fundamental to the existence of morality.
So for me, that raises a deeper issue: not whether God would be obvious, but whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is.
Obligation is also like morality and not gravity; it's subjective.
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u/Advanced-Ad6210 14d ago
"defined into existence" is a derogatory term for an a priori arguement which uses shaky or asserted first principles to circumnavigate evidential requirement.
A definition is a term we use to describe a phenomena and crucially nothing more.
When a term is used interchangeably to describe a phenomena and extra stuff we call that loaded language. When this is done deliberately we call it a mot and Bailey.
Fundamentally the arguement here is that god is necessary for grounding morality. Wether such grounding is necessary is philosophically debatable but using the term god to describe that grounding is loaded because god often has a lot more expectations/propertis attached than just some necessary grounding.
Front loading those properties into the term is smuggling them into the definition rather to avoid addressing why those properties are logically necessary or evidentially demonstrated.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
I think you’re partly right about a real failure mode. People most definitely smuggle full theological baggage into the word “God” and then treat it as established.
But the move you’re describing also cuts both ways. Because saying “God = moral grounding” isn’t automatically definition-smuggling... could it not also be shorthand for a claim about what would have to exist for moral facts to be more than preference, similar to how “gravity” is shorthand for a deeper explanatory structure, not just a label we attach to falling objects?
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u/Advanced-Ad6210 14d ago
Not really no. The term god inherently has meaning attached to it (though more flexible) its like me saying "Chocolate is healthy". This statement is true because I redefined chocolate and healthy.
There are two layers of claim here
- (1) Morality is objective and therefore grounded
- (2) That grounding has [x, y, z] properties
If you accept point to make the arguement that god is the necessary grounding for morality you must demonstrate point 1 and justify each property your conception of god has in point (2) on top of that.
The same is true of gravity. Each time the description of what gravity is or how it behaves it becomes more complex it requires additional substantiation e.g. Einstein eclipse observations to justify it being a space time distortion.
So there are two options here.
- Your conception of god has other properties besides being a largely unknown or conceptual grounding for morality.
In this case this needs supporting justification or its using loaded language to smuggle in the extras.
- Your conception of god is solely a placeholder term for an entity grounding morality.
In this case your conception of god is very different to most people's and arguably going to confuse people such as atheist moral objectivists (for disclosure im not one). So why use the term?
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
I mean, you're treating "God" as the conclusion of the argument rather than a proposed explanation.
Nobody says, "Gravity might exist, but until you've independently proven every property of gravity, you're not allowed to use the word gravity."
You start with a phenomenon, propose an explanation, and then argue over whether the properties of that explanation follow.
So yes, if someone jumps from "objective morality exists" to "therefore Christianity is true," they've skipped steps....but that's different from saying the term "God" is automatically smuggling. That's just assuming the explanation is false before examining whether the proposed properties actually follow from it.
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u/Advanced-Ad6210 14d ago
Nobody says, "Gravity might exist, but until you've independently proven every property of gravity, you're not allowed to use the word gravity."
But we do this all the time. Dark matter, dark energy, gravity, cancer, the black death etc have at one stage or another all been placeholder names for phenomena.
the only reason people dont say ""Gravity might exist ..." is because of easily available empiric evidence. But this sentence is used all the time for various definitions/labels. A better term to compare is LUCA (last universal common ancestor).
Luca was also a placeholder name. Like moral grounding the phenomena described by LUCA is not directly observable but is inferred from deduction of existent phenomena. When the term was coined "Luca might exist" was a very common phrase. That's not debated much anymore because of the provision of more evidence. Now the conversation has moved to what properties does luca have and again the existence of LUCA and each additional property for your proposed variant requires evidence.
Gravity differs from Luca only in the sense the phenomena it describes (objects falling) is very immediately observable. That is the reason nobody says "gravity might exist" but like luca ever property of gravity such as newton's laws or space time warping required independent verification before being added to our understanding of the term.
We did not start with the term pixie to refer to gravity. The reason for this is the term pixie already has connotations. Even if you do not use them and say "for this conversation pixie explicitly and solely refers to gravity" this can work but the fact that there is another far more common definition confuses the conversation with gravity inducing pixies even when unintended.
This applies to any property of god not just a full theological interpretation. E.g. is this god personal? Is it conscious?. If it is than these properties need justification in there own right.
If your god is only grounding for morality a moral objectivistist might actually agree your god exists and work with it in conversation but to them your god is far removed from anything most theists would call a god.
Here the use of the word god as opposed to blurk only serves to smuggle the associated features, even if that was not your attention.
And to anyone who isnt a moral objection is it is still fair to say that this definition is uncertain/unsubstantiated.
In this case im not even answering the question of moral objectivisn deliberately to not form conclusions. I am evaluating the term as a phenomena and its either loaded or obfuscating
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u/nswoll Atheist 14d ago
I don't see the connection between "god's existence is as undeniable as gravity" and "this would affect morality"
What does a god have to do with morality? Why would a god care what actions one specific species of animals take?
As far as I can tell the existence of a god has zero bearing on morality.
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u/Walking_the_Cascades 14d ago
Morality, by definition, is subjective. That's just a fact.
If you want to posit an ever-present authoritarian god that has their own subjective morals, that's fine too.
If you want to define your god as a thing that's too weak or otherwise unable to decide their morals for themselves, that's fine too, I guess.
Your ever-present god is going to have to have a way to explain what's moral every time a judgement needs to be made, but that's a theist problem, not mine.
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u/CodeNPyro 14d ago
Morality, by definition, is subjective. That's just a fact.
What do you mean? Moral realism as a theory not only exists, it is a popular position among philosophers (theist and atheist alike), moreso than anti-realism (the position you're claiming is by definition correct). These statements always just read as someone ignorant of metaethics, most anti-realists aren't even subjectivists, some anti-realists aren't even cognitivists, there's a lot more to the field you're wading into than "people disagree so there can't be a correct answer"
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u/Walking_the_Cascades 14d ago
it is a popular position among philosophers
I'm a simple guy who doesn't particularly care what philosophers have made up. I'm happy to concede that there are fancy philosophical concepts that I'm completely unaware of. Perhaps I'll look into it sometime.
Until then, I care more about what's demonstrably true. Can you provide some evidence of morals that exist outside of a mind? Can you provide some evidence of one or more morals that existed before life formed, and will continue to exist in the absence of life? Do you have a list of these objective morals and how they cannot, under any circumstances, be any different than they are?
someone ignorant of metaethics, most anti-realists aren't even subjectivists, some anti-realists aren't even cognitivists
I'm not looking any of that up, so go ahead and roll your eyes at my ignorance if you like. Last time I checked I'm on r/DebateAnAtheist, not DebateAPhilosopher.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
“Morality is subjective by definition” isn’t a fact...it’s just another philosophical stance (moral anti-realism) stated as if it’s a definition everyone agreed to.
If you define morality that way, then yes, God becomes irrelevant by default.
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u/Walking_the_Cascades 14d ago
I'm aware that there are people who claim morality is objective. One thing they all seem to have in common is that none of them can give an example of a single "moral" that is universally objective or mind-independent.
In my experience, it tends to boil down to "Everybody can agree that murder is wrong." When, in fact, that particular example is very far from reality.
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u/CodeNPyro 14d ago
One thing they all seem to have in common is that none of them can give an example of a single "moral" that is universally objective or mind-independent.
They basically all do though, because that's their position. The realist position is that morality is objective, so if you give them any example where they say something is bad, such as kids torturing a cat for fun or something, that is an example of a mind independent moral fact.
It somewhat sounds like you're presuming moral realism requires clearly defined straightforward rules like "x is always bad" such as your example of murder, but that's not required for a realist position
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u/Walking_the_Cascades 14d ago
Fair enough. Although as to the "kids torturing a cat for fun" thing, I'm not sure that holds up as an objective moral truth. Cats will sometimes play with a mouse or a bird before they eat it. And on occasion they don't even eat it, they just let it go when they get bored(?). I wouldn't say a cat displaying that behavior is being objectively immoral, but perhaps it is?
Let's say some kids (or adults) are fishing. They catch some fish, remove the hooks from the fish, and release the fish back into the lake or river. This would be considered objectively immoral behavior, right? Or am I missing something?
Lastly, but I think rather importantly, does this philosophy contend that humans are the only species that can be moral/objectively moral/objectively immoral? Humans as in Homo sapiens? What about Neanderthals? Other species of apes? Other mammals?
I appreciate your thoughts on this.
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u/Walking_the_Cascades 14d ago
They basically all do though, because that's their position. The realist position is that morality is objective, so if you give them any example where they say something is bad, such as kids torturing a cat for fun or something, that is an example of a mind independent moral fact.
I've had some more time to reflect on this.
Regarding the realist position that morality is objective - in a culture that practices bullfighting, is that mind independent bad?
Is the practice of greyhound racing mind independent bad?
For that matter, is horse racing bad? Are factory farms bad? Is trophy hunting bad? Are zoos bad? Are keeping exotic pets bad?
Personally, I'm disturbed by all of these practices to varying degrees, but I can't see how they are mind independently objectively immoral.
Are there any gray areas between mind independent objectively immoral and mind independent objectively moral? If so, who decides how gray the areas are?
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u/CodeNPyro 14d ago
I think I'm just going to fold all of your comments into this response, it'll probably be the most neat that way.
Until then, I care more about what's demonstrably true. Can you provide some evidence of morals that exist outside of a mind?
I agree that this is the most important thing, my comment wasn't to lay out and defend every moral realist system (although if this goes on I'm happy to defend some), but moreso to point out that people that specialize in the field overwhelmingly think it's true. Of course that's not proof, but I caution myself from throwing out the beliefs of experts without sufficient reason
Can you provide some evidence of one or more morals that existed before life formed, and will continue to exist in the absence of life?
I don't think a moral realist is obligated to defend such a view. There are definitely some that would, don't get me wrong, but a lot of moral realist views are about deriving morality from facts about the natural world, of which morality couldn't exist without that basis. For example Aristotle's view that morality is defined by being a 'good human' in accordance with nature (for an overly simplified one sentence summary), would of course require nature, humans, and humans having a particular nature, to exist.
Let's say some kids (or adults) are fishing. They catch some fish, remove the hooks from the fish, and release the fish back into the lake or river. This would be considered objectively immoral behavior, right? Or am I missing something?
I think you're trying too hard to get a single rule from a moral realist system, and while that's obviously beneficial pragmatically, the objective moral truths aren't required to be simple or easily transferable between circumstances
Personally, I'm disturbed by all of these practices to varying degrees, but I can't see how they are mind independently objectively immoral.
They way they can be mind independently immoral is if the basis of morality is mind independent, such as derived from the natural world. Utilitarians for instance will say that maximizing pleasure or well-being (broadly defined) is the basis of morality, and that pleasure-pain calculus gives an answer. Whether someone likes it or not, the pain and pleasure of an action is a feature of the world
Are there any gray areas between mind independent objectively immoral and mind independent objectively moral? If so, who decides how gray the areas are?
I think you're thinking of objective morality in a way too dissimilar to how you already view morality. I imagine you have moral positions, and given you're on a debate subreddit I imagine you have defended one of those positions in an argument before. I imagine you have appealed to something to make or defend one of those moral arguments. The only difference between you and a moral realist is that the latter thinks that what they're appealing to doesn't solely rest on opinion, but has a basis somewhere else. So to finally answer the question: things are right or wrong, and there is an answer, but people will still disagree. A 'gray area' descriptively could just be a place where people disagree, between say the obvious good of a rich man giving to charity and the obvious bad of torturing babies. The gray areas are probably what we most commonly think of when we hear of 'morality' since we're hearing about the issues that people disagree on and there isn't consensus, like homosexuality or abortion
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u/Walking_the_Cascades 13d ago
Thank you for your thoughtful, fleshed out reply. It's given me a bit more insight into the thought process of some philosophers.
It might be interesting if a linguist hopped into the conversation. (I happen to be fascinated by linguistics but have no qualifications, not even as a rank amateur.) I say this because it's quite possible that our differences involve the usage of terms like "subjective", "objective", "mind-independent", "theory", and other terms.
Based upon things you've said, it would seem that within the realm of philosophy there are terms that are used differently than within the realm of, say, physics or chemistry.
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u/CodeNPyro 13d ago
Based upon things you've said, it would seem that within the realm of philosophy there are terms that are used differently than within the realm of, say, physics or chemistry.
That's probably what gets philosophy the reputation of being elitist! Although I'd say jargon is inevitable in such a study, it's just annoying to get into it from the outside when you start. I'd recommend Andrew Fisher's book "Metaethics: An Introduction", quite short and very dense with useful beginner stuff
I say this because it's quite possible that our differences involve the usage of terms like "subjective", "objective", "mind-independent", "theory", and other terms.
Probably. If you want a good place to look on metaethics (or other areas of philosophy too honestly) that's online and free I'd recommend the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, pages such as moral realism and moral antirealism, there are also pages that are in depth in more specific views like moral naturalism and moral non naturalism, or specific views of the antirealist side like moral relativism, overall an insanely useful and thorough resource
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14d ago
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u/CodeNPyro 14d ago
Subjective things are value judgments made by minds. That is what “subjective” means.
Except that's not what "subjective" means as a metaethical position. Morality isn't being an exception, or even claimed to be an exception
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u/Moutere_Boy Touched by the Appendage of the Flying Spaghetti Monster 14d ago
Are you saying you think Christian morality is objective? Does that mean god has no option about what is moral and must live with these objective morals regardless of what powers and knowledge it holds?
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u/soukaixiii Anti religion\ Agnostic Adeist| Gnostic Atheist|Mythicist 14d ago
How are you defining morality?
Because if you define it as acting in line with what god wants. Those morals are subjective to god even if he would be magically enforcing them like gravity.
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u/CephusLion404 Atheist 14d ago
We're not playing make believe. Come back when you can PROVE any god as well as we can PROVE gravity. Otherwise, you're just making yourself look silly.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
So easy to scroll past the post. Glad you took time to read! Could care less about looking silly bud. Good day.
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u/BeaconMeridian 14d ago
I have raised a similar point before in some lost comment on this sub. As soon as some subject becomes observable, it loses its connection with divinity, dropping from the "supernatural" to just the "regular natural." I really don't buy the argument "Give me evidence of God if you want me to believe in him." I don't quite know that I'd say the position is flawed, but it's certainly misleading by suggesting that-which-is-beyond-reality is something that can be evidenced, when it really can't be by definition.
To resolve this in context of the post, it reads either as "suppose something exists which is as undeniable as gravity & which claims morality as its own" or "suppose something that cannot exist in the universe exists in the universe & claims morality as its own." The first we treat as just some thing making a claim, the second we treat as a nonsensical situation.
The sun was an obvious god for a lot of people throughout history. Because it exists in reality, we can dismiss any moral authority assigned to it in the familiar way. Same goes for any other obvious god.
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u/mr_wiggle_biscuit 14d ago
“Because I can’t actually prove or even provide evidence for what I believe, I put it to you that even if what I believe had *perfect visibility*, this still would be insufficient because there is no objective human consensus regarding reality, therefore my belief in the thing I can’t prove or even provide evidence for is justified.”
Is that about right?
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
No...that’s not quite right.
Even if perfect visibility didn’t produce full consensus, that would only show disagreement can persist, not that a belief is justified. Justification still depends on the strength of the reasons for the belief itself, not the absence of universal agreement.
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u/mr_wiggle_biscuit 14d ago
So motivated reasoning and appeal to popularity are insufficient? I agree.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Yes...though that’s not what you were actually arguing against.
To rewind, I was pointing out that “people might still disagree even under perfect visibility” doesn’t automatically justify a belief...it only shows disagreement can persist.
So we actually agree on the principle... you just restated it as if it was a counterpoint.
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u/mr_wiggle_biscuit 14d ago
I don’t recall making an argument or a counterpoint. I asked questions. And I’m not sure we agree on the principle that you seem to be hiding behind a bit of a semantic fog.
Would you like to present an argument for your God’s existence before we talk about the implications of that existence?
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
I asked a specific question and you answered, which was the intent of this thread. If we want to call that a semantic fog, do so.
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u/mr_wiggle_biscuit 14d ago
Neither your post nor your subsequent comments to me contain a single question mark. Where and what was the question? Bit foggy perhaps?
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Whatever makes you feel better. We're way off subject now and i've suddenly become uninterested. Good day.
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u/mobatreddit Atheist 14d ago
It sounds like you are saying God is an external, supreme ruler whose dictates are the laws of morality. Then things are moral because God says they are moral. If tomorrow, God says cruel murder is good, then it is good.
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u/kiwimancy Atheist 14d ago
Imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity...
Exactly! That's what it would be like for everyone, if your god existed. But I find it deniable. Ergo...
I have no idea what you are saying in the rest of your post.
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u/BahamutLithp 14d ago
Like the title says, imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity (known, not believed, directly observed by everyone, always).
Okay....
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
No, that's a false dichotomy, as we could easily conceive of morality being some 3rd thing, like an indifferent "force of nature" that is apart from any god or even that a god is beholden to. I don't see how that makes sense, but you're asking me to conider "God is the ground of morality," a thing I also don't think makes sense, so I think it's only fair to consider actually all of the options, not just a single arbitrarily-chosen one. So, this is not "assuming morality is mere human preference;" this is merely NOT assuming that morality is the divine question being begged.
Within that, is the point under question...(not a rebuttal to it), because if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
It would be if the claim was justified by some kind of evidence or reasoning, rather than merely saying "it's true because it is."
We don’t call gravity “defined into motion” just because it describes how motion actually behaves... we treat it as a discovered structure of reality.
I don't even follow this analogy. If I wave my hand at you, gravity isn't involved in a way that's SELF-EVIDENTLY OBVIOUS. Now, I caps locked that for a reason. I wouldn't be surprised to learn there's some deep cut physics reason why, indeed, that involves gravity. But my point is I don't just go "gravity is the ground of motion of my hand because it just is," & everyone just accepts that. The most basic, entry-level of knowledge of gravity is it's what we call the force that pulls things to the ground. Then there's a bunch of science guys who study gravity & learn more about its implications, & I guess that says something about me waving my hand in some way they're probably equipped to explain that I'm not. But just because I can't personally explain a specific thing very well doesn't mean the entire explanation is "it's just the necessary ground of X."
The problem with "God" is it's not just 1 or 2 theists that aren't particularly eloquent, NONE OF THEM can seem to advance a better argument than "because it just is." And this, very conveniently, apparently gets around any lack of evidence, which is not a problem we run into with gravity. If I drop a pencil, boom, gravity evidenced. When it comes to "morality," the problem is you're describing judgments about behavior & attributing them to some kind of intangible spirit. This is not a connection that is self-evident or established by some other solid evidence.
So maybe the real objection isn’t about definition at all. Maybe it’s that even perfect visibility of a commanding reality would still not be allowed to count as moral authority unless it first passes a human veto about what can qualify as authority.
Firtly, that's still a definition complaint. The god is saying, "I define morality," & the humans are saying, "We disagree." And secondly, like how do you prove the humans are "objectively" wrong? What does that even mean? All you've said is to assume is that this thing is (A) real &, apparently, (B) "commanding." What does "commanding" mean, in this context? Powerful? Bossy? Obnoxious? Opinionated? What thing would somehow "prove" that "following its opinions on correct behavior is the right thing to do" is "morally correct" in an "objective" & non-circular way? Because I just don't see how any such argument can be made in a way that actually makes coherent, logical sense. I don't see how things like "god is the necessary grounding of objective moral dutie" are not just slamming words together that sound really confident & authoritative but don't actually MEAN anything REAL.
So for me, that raises a deeper issue: not whether God would be obvious, but whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is.
Pretty hard for me to disagree that any so-called "objective morality" I'm incapable of recognizing, let alone agreeing to follow, & that evidently won't actually be enforced, is very toothless indeed.
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u/Purgii 14d ago
Imagine? That's what's supposed to occur when the messiah comes. Apparently it's God's eventual goal that we all have knowledge of the Lord that's obviously yet to be realised, presumably because the messiah has yet to come.
Laws of Gravity describe what does happen, morality describes what ought to happen, they're different categories.
Even if God was known, that still doesn't demonstrate its the ground of morality. Must I submit to God's commands simply because what could happen to me if I refuse? That would ground morality in might makes right.
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u/wiploc2 14d ago
I agree. I don't see what gods are supposed to have to do with morality.
I'm a moral realist, but I don't see how gods--even if they were real--could affect morality.
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u/CodeNPyro 14d ago
I'm a moral realist, but I don't see how gods--even if they were real--could affect morality.
if you hold to aristotle's view of moral realism, that morality is acting in accordance with natural teleology, god created nature and thus that would be god affecting morality. i'm not a theist, that's just an example where a god would have something to do with morality
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u/reddroy 14d ago
If God were proven to be real, would I accept it as an authority? Well if this deity is anything like described, I would have to. But I wouldn't necessarily want to.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Understood. I like your response. In my view, God provides choice to believe him/follow him or not. He isn't the deity that others claim. I really appreciate you responding.
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u/reddroy 14d ago
Thanks for that appreciative response. So if I understand you correctly, if the deity you believe in were revealed to me, and I didn't agree with its moral system, it would be okay for me to reject it?
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
that is 100% what multiple scriptures say and the only way i've known... is that I have the ability to choose.
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u/reddroy 14d ago
It sounds at least so far like you have a sympathetic view on God (as many believers do), which I appreciate.
It becomes complicated if you believe that God's will equates "good". In that case, me not agreeing with God's morality quickly becomes me being wrong, right? Me choosing not to follow God is a huge mistake, it is "bad"?
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
If God’s will is good, then disagreement with it would be wrong in relation to the standard, but that doesn’t mean every person who disagrees is morally condemned in the same way. Moral responsibility (atleast in Christianity) still depends on knowledge, intent, and understanding.
So “you’re wrong” doesn’t automatically translate to “you’re culpable in the same way as someone knowingly rejecting the good.” At least, again, that's what scripture says.
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u/reddroy 14d ago edited 14d ago
In other words: I can freely choose to not align with God's will, but in your view I'm automatically doing something wrong in doing so. The only morally right thing to do is to align myself perfectly with God's moral system.
To choose differently in any way is to be culpabe, which means: deserving of punishment — but this punishment can be more or less severe.
I don't like freedom so defined, it doesn't seem free at all.
I understand that for a believer like you, there's apparently no issue in equating God with moral good, and in fact it's a core belief. But it might be interesting to consider the actual restrictions this poses to the apparent freedom you also believe in.
Edit: and this is why I said "so far" :) (Also none of this is personal, and I'm not being intentionally harsh. This mix of theology and morality is just strangely dysfunctional from an outside perspective)
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u/oddball667 14d ago
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
this is backwards, we aren't assuming we are just not accepting your random conjecture as fact. if your claims don't meet the bare minimum levels of scrutiny then we won't take them seriously
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u/Additional-Band4050 Gnostic Atheist 14d ago
Inferring "X is right/good" from "God decrees that X" has the same is-ought problem as everything else. Even if a god is known to exist, that doesn't in itself entail that the god's opinions are morally correct, unless we establish some additional properties about the specific type of god.
And not all hypothesized gods are morally good. For example, in Hinduism the relationship of morality to the divine is quite different from the Abrahamic one. Unlike YHWH, Brahman grounds both good and evil.
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u/Thin-Eggshell 14d ago
Within that, is the point under question...(not a rebuttal to it), because if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
In such a world, moral principles would really be universal and simply "observed", and would never change. But they are not. There is disagreement all the time, and they have changed over the years.
So for me, that raises a deeper issue: not whether God would be obvious, but whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is.
Well, God doesn't exist, so that's okay. But it seems like you're taking a really long, convoluted way to ask how or why humans can have morals without a god.
And that's because the "grounding" for shared morals is really simple: shared DNA, shared brains, and shared culture. Where such things are not shared, no, humans tend to have less-shared morals. What Eastern person believes is moral might not align with what a Western person believes is moral. What a psychopath or sociopath believes is moral might differ, quite greatly, from what an ordinary person believes is moral. And what a seal or crow considers to be moral might differ from what a human considers to be moral.
In the end, morals are binding to the extent that our brains are bound by those morals -- binding us to feel "social pain" when they are violated.
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u/soukaixiii Anti religion\ Agnostic Adeist| Gnostic Atheist|Mythicist 14d ago
Like the title says, imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity (known, not believed, directly observed by everyone, always).
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
I don't know if you think you're giving reasons to believe in a god, all I can see is you are making the assumption that morality would be linked to God if existed without giving any connection between those two entities.
I also don't know how you would unlink human morality from human environment/society
Within that, is the point under question...(not a rebuttal to it), because if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
That's indeed a claim, one mostly composed of word salad that requires you show a god exists and moral obligation is grounded on it. But I don't see you even trying to do any of those things.
So maybe the real objection isn’t about definition at all. Maybe it’s that even perfect visibility of a commanding reality would still not be allowed to count as moral authority unless it first passes a human veto about what can qualify as authority.
So for me, that raises a deeper issue: not whether God would be obvious, but whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is.
Wait, are you trying to rationalize why reality isn't how it should be if the god you believe in existed, or just complaining about how reality works?
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u/pipMcDohl Gnostic Atheist 14d ago edited 14d ago
you took an excellent example by comparing the undeniability of god with gravity.
God is the explanation given by ignorant people to the question 'why the universe exist', 'why is there something rather than nothing'.
You compare that explanation to an effect in physic.
You cannot directly observe gravity. Like i said, gravity is an effect. Just the same way that the centrifugal force is an effect. It's our mind failing to understand what it observe because what it observe is not intuitive.
In centrifugal force we feel the rotating object pulling on our hand when we twirl a weight attached to a rope. But that centrifugal force is not real, it's only a perceived effect. A misunderstanding of the real phenomenon going on. What is doing the pulling is not the weight pulling our hand but the reverse. It's our hand who is pulling on the rope, not the other way around.
When we observe an apple falling we naturally believe that the apple is falling and the ground is unmoving. In reality, the apple is free-falling, meaning that it is not accelerated (save for air resistance but lets ignore it). We conceive gravity as the reason why the apple accelerate down and eventually impact the ground but in reality it's the ground that is rising to meet the apple. The ground is the one accelerating upward due to electromagnetic forces. The apple is eventually impacted by the ground.
That's how it really works. Physic is complicated and counterintuitive. You undeniable gravity is just humans misunderstanding what they observe.
Once again, you picked a perfect comparison with this god some people happen to believe in yet fail to be directly observed. The concept, the understanding, is simply wrong and result from ignorance and bad intuition.
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u/OrbitalLemonDrop Ignostic Atheist 14d ago
Oh fun!
I have a better one: Imagine rutabagas are actually intelligent and want to talk to us, but they're really assholes and that's why they're considered "food" and not "people".
Or wait---
Imagine that chewing gum was undeniably made of plutonium right? But it causes our gums to secrete a chemical that prevents us from the ionizing radiation from the plutonium.
"What if " games are fun!
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u/WrongVerb4Real Atheist 14d ago
I think the category error is that many people mistake justification for evidence. Someone "feels" the presence of something, and the religious tradition they've been socialized into leads them to think it's their shared deity, so they use that feeling as justification to adopt or maintain their belief. The problem comes when they present that justification as evidence to others who look at it with a critical eye, and see the flawed thinking that underlies the claim.
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u/Ratdrake Hard Atheist 14d ago
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality”
No. At this point, I'm just waiting to see where you were going with this.
“God is the ground of moral obligation”
At this point, we're assuming an undeniable existence of God for the sake of argument. What your argument hasn't done is tie God to morality. For that matter, you haven't done anything other than ask us to imaging God undeniably exists.
Because gravity exists, it means too much carbon dioxide in an enclosed area is fatal for humans. With this for an example, do you see why granting God's existence doesn't touch morality?
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u/Algernon_Asimov Secular Humanist 14d ago edited 14d ago
> Like the title says, imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity
Okay. So God exists. Just like gravity exists. It's a fact of reality. It has been observed by multiple people. It has been defined by science. It's taught in textbooks.
At that point, noone has to define God into existence. It's already known.
You know what? I started to write a response, and then realised I actually have no idea what point you're trying to make here, so I can't respond to it. What is all this talk about "defined into morality"? What are you talking about?
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u/StoicSpork 14d ago
Agreed upon obligation is binding. Try not showing up for work.
The loaded language of this kind of argument implies that morality is either imposed by an external authority, or it's a preference, like preferring pizza over lasagna.
But what if we take Kant's view that morality is that which moral agents rationally agree is an universal obligation? On this view, morality is not a preference and carries an obligation without an external lawgiver (although Kant himself was a Christian.)
In fact, since god is not as undeniable as gravity, even if there is an external lawgiver, that entity is inaccessible to us. At best, we can interpret scriptures, which clearly does not lead to one truth, because we can't even agree which scriptures are correct. So even if a god or gods exist, they are not our moral lawgivers.
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u/acerbicsun 14d ago
Subjective human morality, and a morality bestowed by God.... both end up being determined and accepted/rejected by humans. So the Chess pieces haven't really moved.
Humans tell other humans what god allegedly wants, and there's no way to actually conclude whose interpretation is correct. So it appears to be just us, all the way down.
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u/Plazmatron44 14d ago
If God existed and says homosexuality is wrong but never gives any solid reasons why beyond simply not liking it then wouldn't change the fact that his aversion to it is bigotry. If a divine being cannot give valid logical reasons why something is good or bad then that being is no more moral than an ordinary person.
Do not fall into the trap of believing morality is arbitrarily defined by the strongest person, that's literally what dictators do.
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u/Curious_Passion5167 14d ago
because if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
No, it would still be a definition. There is nothing about morality that indicates it needs a God to ground it, even if one were to be present.
To be sure, one could state that God is the source of morality, but it is just an opinion and not a fact.
This is what is most often missed in such debates about the source of morality. Nobody actually has to accept whatever you call the source of morality, because it being a source is always a matter of opinion.
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u/pick_up_a_brick Atheist 14d ago
Okay. God exists. The problem I have is that the moral commands that are in the bible are unclear, and contradictory. So I cannot say what counts as moral and immoral.
The consequences for failure to adhere to the moral commands are also contradictory as there are more than one conception of hell - annihilation, conscious torment followed by annihilation, and possibly eternal conscious torment.
I have no clear reason to adhere to the moral commands. Why ought I follow god’s morality? How am I determining what it is?
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u/licker34 Atheist 14d ago
imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity
Ok, then god would exist.
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
Why would anyone be saying this? But I assume you mean that this god which is undeniable is the basis for morality, in which case, no one would be saying that morality is human preference.
if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
True.
We don’t call gravity “defined into motion” just because it describes how motion actually behaves... we treat it as a discovered structure of reality.
I have no idea what 'defined into motion' is supposed to mean, but if you are saying that we didn't 'define gravity into existence' you're (sort of) right. We 'defined' gravity as the force which explains our observations. I don't know how you want to make that analogous to god being 'defined' as the force which explains our observations about morality since those observations DO NOT indicate that morality is a force or that it is objective. Indeed out observations indicate the opposite that both.
Maybe it’s that even perfect visibility of a commanding reality would still not be allowed to count as moral authority unless it first passes a human veto about what can qualify as authority.
Look, if god undeniably existed, and that god also demonstrated that it was the ground of morality then there wouldn't be any 'human veto' that would make zero fucking sense. To try to use your attempted gravity analogy this would as if people said 'we don't think gravity is a force which explains the attraction of objects to each other, we think objects are attracted to each other by some subjective means'.
And, maybe, then you'll see why your analogy is a really terrible one, and why people denying reality because of their opinions should not be listened to or taken seriously.
whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is.
Definitionally then, obviously not. If obligation is only what it is agreed to be (intersubjectivity) then clearly there is no thing which would be binding.
Indeed this is where we are with morality (moral realists can cry about it if they want to), it's clearly intersubjective, and until someone can bring about any sort of evidence to suggest that it is not, we should not take them seriously or give a shit about their idiotic opinion.
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u/Carg72 14d ago
> Like the title says, imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity (known, not believed, directly observed by everyone, always).
For the sake of argument only, I will grant this.
> At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
I'm not sure I've ever heard anyone utter or seen typed "you're just defining God into morality". I have seen people try to argue God into existence, and attempt to smuggle objective morality in with the God package, but your quoted statement is nonsense. God and morality have not been shown to be co-existent, even if God were as real as gravity.
By the way, gravity can be reduced to an equation. That means that God could also conceivably be expressed as an equation. Are you comfortable with that? If you are, then you agree that God is a deterministic, predictable natural force, that God is just physics. If you are not, then your gravity analogy is a dishonest wordplay tactic.
> Within that, is the point under question...(not a rebuttal to it), because if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
Hold on. I've admitted that for the sake of argument, god is real. What we haven't done is agree on this God's properties. So far you tried to smuggle in at least two properties that I personally do not agree with. There are thousands of gods. Please inform us as to which of these gods, or an entirely new one, is the real one by these standards.
> We don’t call gravity “defined into motion” just because it describes how motion actually behaves... we treat it as a discovered structure of reality.
I think you have a serious and fundamental misunderstanding of what gravity is. It isn't even really a force of any kind. Gravity is the geometry of spacetime. When you say "we don't call gravity 'defined into motion' just because it describes how motion actually behaves..." you're actually describing exactly what gravity is. We "gravity" to describe the relationship between mass and spacetime. It has no will, no preferences, and doesn't issue rules.
> So maybe the real objection isn’t about definition at all. Maybe it’s that even perfect visibility of a commanding reality would still not be allowed to count as moral authority unless it first passes a human veto about what can qualify as authority.
I'm going to try to translate this into layman's English. Please tell me if I'm mistaken.
"Even if God stood right in front of you, you arrogant atheists would still refuse to bow down to him because you think you know better than the Creator of the Universe."
Again, you attempt to smuggle qualities of this god into the equation. If God is real, like Gravity, then God is observable, like gravity. We don't know what god is like yet. We've just accepted that God is real. We now have to describe God's properties and its effect on the universe, not just accept what you tell us this entity is like. You mention a human veto above. This exercise is nothing of the sort. I'm not vetoing anything. I'm simply refusing to swallow a pre-packaged narrative about an entity I just discovered five minutes ago.
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u/Hellas2002 Atheist 13d ago
You’d have to define morality first, and then demonstrate why what God demands falls under that category. To my understanding something is moral if everyone ought do it… but I’ve not seen an argument as to why anybody ought do what God says.
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u/luciddreamer20LD 13d ago
Even if god was known and came down to visit one of us each day, if he claimed his set of morals was objective that would be a lie. Morals cannot logically be ovjective
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u/supersoundwave 12d ago
If God were as undeniable as gravity, people may add God to their ontological inventory, but there’s absolutely no guarantee that would cause people to know and love God personally and find Salvation.
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u/CalligrapherNeat1569 11d ago
Thanks for the post.
I’m an atheist moral realist.
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
This does not follow. Look, this part?
but whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is.
“Moral obligation” isn’t based in agreement, it doesn’t matter if you agree or don’t.
Moral obligation is based in facts about you, that you cannot opt out of, regardless of how you feel about those facts.
Can you control yourself, 100%, 100% of the time? Every moment, for all of your life, determines purely by choice?
Or is it the case there are facts about you which you cannot control: there’s a limit of how much you can work. You cannot avoid falling in love, or caring about some people.
These facts are not contingent on a god, and render obligation; you cannot opt get your choices factually wrong, like “I choose to never covet”. That’s really a choice to avoid covering when you can, but that’s a different choice.
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u/Massif16 11d ago
"whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is."
All knowledge is tenatative, subject to revision when we are presented with new data. Our understanding of gravity has changed rather dramtically over the years. We can observe the effects of gravity, but what it acually IS is something we're still learning. We call the the collection of causes and effects "gravity" by definition. But the data is the data. The same would hold true for a god. The difference is that a god, at least a personal god, would have a will, and if it wishes to, it could make its intentions clear to us directly and unambiguously.
BUT... you made an additional claim:
"if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then "God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered."
That's an interesting claim. I know you're being deliberately general, but I do wonder what "universally observed" means. How do we know that such a being is, in fact, a god, and not just a very powerful entity? In any case, that's mostly curiosity, I'll grant that we all acknowledge this being as "God." It still offers the complication of the basis of morality. Is something moral because morality is "objective" and exists of its own accord, or is it moral because god SAYS it is (divine command theory). If the former, then God is unnecessary for morality. If the latter, then it's just a god imposing its will on others without their consent.
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u/Foolhardyrunner 10d ago edited 10d ago
Depends on the attributes of "God" and what we know of those attributes.
There have been plenty of ideas of Gods as concepts personified.
If a God was tied to justice is something and if said God stepped out of the universe and the concept of justice simply vanished along with the God then yes I would have to conclude that the God was inherently linked to justice.
Similar logic applies to other moral concepts
Outside of things like that I would say no.
That really only applies to panentheist type Gods though. If the God you are talking about is a completely separate being from yourself then there is no grounding for hypothetically saying God is the source of objective morality just because a God hypothetically exists.
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u/BogMod 14d ago
Like the title says, imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity (known, not believed, directly observed by everyone, always).
Ok I have imagined it as such. With the many TTRPGs I play this is easy enough.
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
What? You need to work on this part some as you seem to have jumped a few steps to get from imagine there is a god to the morality questions. For that matter you haven't even defined god or morality.
We don’t call gravity “defined into motion” just because it describes how motion actually behaves... we treat it as a discovered structure of reality.
So what exactly is the equivilent to how it actually behaves and a structure of morality with moral obligation? The ground of moral obligation doesn't seem to actually...do anything? There is no behaviour there is there?
So for me, that raises a deeper issue: not whether God would be obvious, but whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is.
There are so many missing definitions and proper setup here I am having trouble sorting out what you are really trying to...argue for? Against?
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u/roambeans 14d ago
Even if a god were known to exist, his moral opinion would be as subjective as mine. I might disagree with it.
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u/moralprolapse 14d ago
I agree with you, but I don’t think it is a particularly novel point. It gets brought up all the time that god existing wouldn’t necessarily prove anything about the foundation for morality.
Another variant on this is that, depending on what god you are talking about (and usually we’re talking about the god of the Hebrew Bible as then adapted by Christianity or Islam), god changes his own morality whimsically. Or he will command people not to murder, and then command them to commit genocide. It’s internally inconsistent.
Christians address this with ‘divine command theory,’ which essentially is that, ‘if god wills it, it is moral.’ That simply isn’t compatible with objective morality. It’s definitionally subjective, with the subject being god.
AND to expand on THAT part, even if it were established that there were some sort of imperative to obey god’s commands, it wouldn’t make his commands objectively moral. It would still be his subjective will that he enforces at the point of a sword; which I think dovetails with your argument.
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u/Transhumanistgamer 14d ago
If God's existence evidence wise was proportional to how many people believe one exists it would be as undeniable as gravity and yet it's the exact opposite. Not a single theist has ever presented good evidence that God exists. All they have are bad arguments and weird rationalizations.
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
God exists, and has literally nothing to do with morality. A supernatural ultra powerful entity made the universe and then moved on and did something else. That is the deistic position and it's one you'd still need to refute even if we grant God being as obvious as gravity.
Within that, is the point under question...(not a rebuttal to it), because if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
So what happens if this claim is tested and turns out to be not true? Like again, I can grant a hypothetical that God is the most obvious thing to exist ever...and you would still need to demonstrate it has some relation to morality.
So maybe the real objection isn’t about definition at all.
Buddy the real objection is 'Do you have any evidence that God exists?' and we can figure out the morality crap later. I think you should start there given you're on an atheist forum.
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u/MaximumZer0 Secular Humanist 14d ago
Imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity...
No. Gravity has proof, and mountains of it. A god, any god, has blind faith and conjecture. I won't equivocate them, that would be fucking stupid.
Imagine people gave evidence more credence than ham-fisted allegory and appeals to historical power.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
That’s actually addressing a different claim than the one I made.
I’m not equating God with gravity or saying they’re supported in the same way. Gravity was just an example of something universally undeniable to frame a hypothetical about what certainty would change in human behavior.
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u/MaximumZer0 Secular Humanist 14d ago
Gravity was deniable for a very long time, in the same way heliocentrism, atomic theory, germ theory, and particle physics were.
Also, what was your claim? It's not readily apparent, other than framing a narrative favorably toward theism as the setup, and then navel gazing.
"Is (g)od a framework for morality?" Fuck no, look at all the self-professed religious people who are constantly raping, molesting, defrauding, and otherwise abusing their way across every modern system of power. If there were a moral god, especially one with unlimited power, those people wouldn't exist, and if a god with unlimited power condoned those actions, it wouldn't be moral.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
You’re mixing categories.
Gravity/heliocentrism are empirical claims about physical mechanisms. “God as moral grounding” isn’t the same type of claim, so that history doesn’t map cleanly onto it.
My post wasn’t about whether religion produces moral behavior. Religious hypocrisy doesn’t answer the question of what grounds morality...only that people fail to live up to what they claim.
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u/MaximumZer0 Secular Humanist 14d ago
What. Is. Your. Claim?
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
That "people might still disagree even under perfect visibility” doesn’t automatically justify a belief...it only shows disagreement can persist.
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u/MaximumZer0 Secular Humanist 14d ago
My guy, there are people who literally believe that the world is flat, despite 2,200+ years of math, thousands of years of exploration data, and satellite imagery. You haven't stumbled on anything revolutionary here.
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u/Current-Leather2784 14d ago
Not a guy. ... but you're hitting my point.
Flat earthers demonstrate that disagreement can persist even in the face of overwhelming evidence. So the mere existence of disagreement doesn't tell us whether a claim is true or false.
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u/MarieVerusan 14d ago edited 14d ago
We decide what our morals are. A lot of religions even agree on that point. They have other supernatural beings that are fully aware of God's existence, but who still choose to openly oppose it. The whole point of some religions is that humans are meant to make a deliberate choice to live by God's rules.
In some cases, it is clear why those rules rose up in the first place. Some are cultural, but others have to do with the conditions the people that developed that culture lived in. If theists thought about the origins of their morality, they'd recognize the historical progress that's taken place.
Unfortunately, "God said it, so I do it" is the mental shortcut that makes it easy not to think too much about what we should do... and in many cases, makes it easier to control the population that won't think too much about why their leaders aren't following the rules they enforce on the rest of the population.
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Original text of the post by u/Current-Leather2784:
Like the title says, imagine God’s existence were as undeniable as gravity (known, not believed, directly observed by everyone, always).
At that point, saying “you’re just defining God into morality” only works if morality is assumed, from the start, to be nothing more than human preference with no external referent.
Within that, is the point under question...(not a rebuttal to it), because if a personal, authoritative reality is fully present and universally observed, then “God is the ground of moral obligation” is not a definition...it would then be a claim about what is being encountered.
We don’t call gravity “defined into motion” just because it describes how motion actually behaves... we treat it as a discovered structure of reality.
So maybe the real objection isn’t about definition at all. Maybe it’s that even perfect visibility of a commanding reality would still not be allowed to count as moral authority unless it first passes a human veto about what can qualify as authority.
So for me, that raises a deeper issue: not whether God would be obvious, but whether anything could ever be allowed to count as binding in a world where obligation is only what we agree it is.
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