Darkwolf377...
I’m probably the last person you want to hear from and a delayed response at best!
I know I come across harshly for which I apologize. I also apologize if it is inappropriate to answer and divert from the original subject matter, but I see this happening with all kinds of subject matter in FR, so I assume it is acceptable to some degree(?).
For brevity - here are your quotes, and then I’ll make a comment or two about them on the whole afterward:
“They (morality tales) came from the accumulated wisdom and observation of...people.”
“Bible tales are invented stories meant to show what some have decided is morality based on the ethical beliefs that emerged over thousands of years of human behavior, during which a society or societies saw what, in their view, worked for them, what didn’t; what actions were justified and which weren’t.”
“...it (morality, good/evil) came from the human experience of that behavior which benefits the individual while at the same time allowing society to function based on local custom and prefered behavior...”.
Ok - let me clarify that I do understand people make choices in what they believe and I don’t want to come across as beligerant and telling you - you are dead wrong. That is not at all what I want to say.
Certainly I cannot and will not force or push my stuff onto you.
So, it is good tho, to attempt to prove things out and/or at least discuss, right?
Your three quotes above are your answers to questions I posed in asking you (anyone) to explain how those first beings in the human chain (at any point) came up with that ‘sparkle’ to even consider intangibles such as ‘good’ and ‘bad’?
I need this explained in really simple terms. Fuzzy terms like “emerged over thousands of years of human behavior” just doesn’t tell me a thing about that one ‘person’ that first came up with ‘good’ and ‘bad’. That initial spark of knowledge of something not seen, not ever even thought of prior to a certain moment in ‘evolutionary history’, yet it “emerged” some how, some way.
That is the moment I need explained in detail. I need for you to tell me what put the bug in their ear that made them consider something inconceivable prior to that moment in all of world history. This knowledge of good and evil emerged from what exactly?
Also, several of you seem to place this event or ‘emergence’ of knowledge of good and evil in relatively modern days and not something that would or could(?) have occured with our cavemen friends from the past, or even earlier in the chain. It would be interesting to hear how any evolutionist would arrive at a time frame within such a monumetal event could have occured - this kodak moment when that first ‘person’ suddenly thought of ‘good’ and ‘bad’.
You can say it emerged all day, but it had to emerge from someone somewhere at a specific moment the first time.
So if I hear correctly from your standpoint, humankind went from the basics of eating, sleeping, reproducing surviving existence - basically the animals life as it had been for.....a long time........to the one unique set in the ‘animal kingdom’, and one individual from that set of animal life at some point in time conceived from nowhere, this notion of good and/or evil?
I’m going to say it one more time. The emergence came from somewhere the first time it occured. Tell me all about that moment, please.
(And I must say, the third quote of yours sounds like it is straight out of a book or dictionary.)
While this definition would suffice as the ‘end all’ giving some a nice warm fuzzy, it does nothing to provide an answer as to the origination of morality from a point in time when - just before that moment - was never dreamed of by these human animals....or wait....is it animal humans?
It is difficult to absorb your point of reference when you speak of humans rather than us as - just animals. We are in fact - just ‘animals’ by the default rule of evolution - once wild, then magically ‘domesticated’ over time and accrued this thing known as morality. Or have we acheived something higher than the plane of the animal kingdom?
So when I replace all your references of “human” with “animal” - then attempt to come up with a point in time that a single animal (that first one) came up with this good/bad thing...it truthfully becomes quite silly....
What is fuzzy about the expression “emerged over thousands of years of human behavior”? It is rather juvenile to think that our entire morality just popped into existence in one person. Our political system, our sciences, our art, our civilization didn't just happen all at once, so what is so confusing about the idea that as humans gradually moved from tribal to community cohabitation that certain attitudes and behaviors would develop?
It is rather simplistic to say as you do that if I can't come up with the name of the one person who suddenly discovered morality (which I never claimed to have because I never claimed such a person existed) than the only answer is that a being who somehow was never born and has always existed dropped it on our heads like a rock. It's like people who believe UFO's are alien spaceships--just because I can't explain what that light in the sky is, how does one make the leap to saying "Ah ha, an alien spaceship!" without any evidence at all?
One only need look at how human behavior, ethics and community has evolved in the period of recorded history to see that people do indeed change their behavior over time to accomodate different ideas as acceptable and others are not in terms of human behavior. As I said previously, you don't have to ACCEPT the point of view I have, but to say you don't even UNDERSTAND it shows one is either stupid (which I don't believe you are) or simply willfully ignoring alternate points of view.
Your mistake, I think, is refusing to budge from your rather odd idea that the ONLY conceivable origin of morality is if one single human was given the idea as a gift from above.
I'm not trying to force you to believe my position, which is something many religious folks do try to do. I'm just trying to get you to accept that an idea you may not agree with is not so crazy as you seem to want to believe it is. Based on thousands of years of human civilization, which even you must agree shows we have evolved in our thinking about MANY things (humanity didn't just accept Christianity in one weekend), I'm perfectly comfortable in believing that the concept of morality (which you must agree has MANY interpretations, many of which we can both agree are abhorent) is the sum of centuries of thinking, action, and exchange of thoughts and ideas.
In comparison, claiming that an invisible god just dropped the idea of morality from the sky seems silly to me.