Well, as I see it, you have two choices. You can go to a place where your moral views are not subject to outside domination (Somalia or Afghanistan) or you can go to jail. In this country, the majority get to set the rules that everybody else live by. And if you don't have rules, you have chaos. I, personally, support a minimum of rules, but you've got to have rules nonetheless.
If morality is nothing more than a set of rules man has reasoned to and forced upon by others, it has no bind on anyone who chooses to ignore.
I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Everybody wants their morality to be universal. Due to the realities of human existence, that will always be impossible. What we've done, nevertheless, is to create a framework of a few rules by which most of us can agree (i.e. murder is wrong). Many other moral points are far more contentious, but at least we've agreed to set up a framework where each side to an issue can present their view without fear of being in physical danger.
If however morality is a set of rules set by a moral (un-corruptible, in-fallible) authority. A moral authority gained through authorship. Then what?
Again, I must be slow today, because I don't understand what you're trying to argue. As an atheist, I don't believe in any sort of supreme moral authority.
killing is wrong because man has reasoned it to be so.
Exactly
If you subscribe to the later I'd say that is fairly communist of you, or at least fascist. A body of men ruling morality from intellectualism or power.
Huh? I don't mean to pass judgement, I'm only reflecting on what I see as the reality of the world.
I am a Free man and no reasoning of another will constrain me. I will not be kept from killing simply because society says it is wrong.
Fine. Kill. But we will impose our morality on you, whether you like it or not, and you'll go to prison. Because murder poses a threat to the continued existence of any sort of society, free or not.
Society has no hold on me, it has no Moral Authority over me.
Tell that to the Judge.
Are you a free man or are you told what is right and wrong by the ruling society of men.
I can have enough freedom living within the wide bounds of acceptable behavior determined by society at-large. The small degree of freedom I relinquish(to punch my neighbor in the nose, for example) is inconsequential in comparison to the security I gain.
This was all you needed to type, it is the base of your ideology. And yet you condemn Christians for doing the same thing.
This is the similarity between Atheist, Communist, Neo-Pagans and all non-Judeo-Christian ideologies. One body forcing another into whatever it deems fit. The only law that can be enforce is a prefect law from a moral authority. Man can never meet those requirements. The American system of Law and Morality was based on the perfect Law of the Creator, the one who has true Moral Authority. I cannot believe I am reading a Freeper who believes that a group of men can rule over another group. For the betterment of society of course. Though I am sure that when that same majority takes your right (your group of man given i.e. GOVERNMENT right) to bear arms you will protest. What a load of BS.
Your ideology says man in all his corruption can group together and force others to submit to whatever standard they deem fit. How very similar to Communism and Nazism
Being Created gives Moral Authority to the Author of the Creation. He can set rules and give inalienable rights. We as men can then protect those rights and enforce those rules. We can reason ways to enforce morality if and only if that morality comes from the Moral Authority over all men. And when a body of men reason new rules that violate the Creator's standards we can fight, as they have no right to rule over us outside the Creators standard.
If morality is nothing more than a set of rules man has reasoned to and forced upon by others, it has no bind on anyone who chooses to ignore.
I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Everybody wants their morality to be universal. Due to the realities of human existence, that will always be impossible. What we've done, nevertheless, is to create a framework of a few rules by which most of us can agree (i.e. murder is wrong). Many other moral points are far more contentious, but at least we've agreed to set up a framework where each side to an issue can present their view without fear of being in physical danger.
Good point! In discussing morality, we are necessarily talking about principles. And principles are by definition universally applicable to everyone in a similar context. This is something that the Dostoyevsky argument ("without God all things are permitted") misses. (I guess HV would call it the "Dostoyevsky gambit", since he's just playing chess. :-)
When a sociopath declares they have the right to murder people for the thrill/money/etc., he automatically declares that people in general have the right to murder innocents as well. Such a society would quickly collapse. It would also collapse if people in general were allowed to cheat, steal, rape, & extort.
What's also usually not appreciated is the power of moral judgement. A society flourishes when most people are willing to pass judgement on the statements & actions of others, and it tends to collapse when "good men do nothing". As Ayn Rand put it, "Judge, and prepare to be judged!"
Societies also flourish when people approach the world with an attitude of justice, biased a bit towards benevolence. For example, businesspeople extend credit & cheerfully accept returns, and the most successful companies are always trying to find better ways to please their customers; meanwhile the credit & checking industry has evolved ways to comprehensively track a person's reputation, business fraud earns a CFO the perp walk on TV, etc.
These truths are by no means self-evident. They were only learned thru lots of trial & error. But underlying it all is the fact that human nature is essentially the same for all of us. Our rational minds are the only thing we have going for us against the elements & the other animals. And some kind of libertarian society is by far the best framework for letting rational beings with free will to thrive. All that rational beings need to thrive is an underlying consistency to the world. We don't need to create a supernatural Authority Figure to come down like a deus-ex-machina to impose some arbitrary standard of right & wrong to provide that consistency. It's already there.