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So, no. I do not believe that there is some inherent law within nature that gives man the impetus to act morally. But there is a law that God has given (which to a certain extent is seen in nature but ignored) that does give a foundation for moral beliefs and actions. Darwinism can't do that. It can only give majority opinion rules that may change not only from society to society but from house to house (and nobody can have authority to say different opinions regarding morality are right and wrong).

Don't you see, though, that Darwinism doesn't try to "give a foundation for moral beliefs and actions"?

Consider electricity: Edison pushed hard for using electricity to kill people. Does that make theories of electricity evil or dangerous? And is Benjamin Franklin culpable for the rise of evil in the world because of his groundbreaking work on this theory?

God is an authority higher than any earthy authority and His law stands as an unmoveable guide to write and wrong that has rational, spiritual, and emotional basis.

There's a name for this: Deus ex Machina. It's when the god in the Greek play drifts down to arbitrarily settle the insoluble conflicts between the main characters. Or any time a play, novel, or movie ends with a solution that comes out of left field. It's a sure sign of a writer who's painted themselves into a corner & doesn't have the courage to go back and rethink (and rewrite) the story so it makes more sense.

OK, that's my negative reaction to your argument. (Which is a very popular creationist argument, believe me.) Now for a more positive vision:

The universe is a benevolent place. By which I mean: All you have to do to thrive in this world is to understand it and act accordingly. And our world is understandable - because there are no contradictions. The Truths by which we must live aren't "self-evident", unfortunately, but we have loads of history & knowledge that we can draw upon to learn what the truth is.

Probably the most fundamental moral truth is: Cooperate honestly with everyone, except those who've proven to be untrustworthy or dishonest in the past. In other words, don't be the one to start defrauding or stealing from others. But you can "steal" your stuff back, or enact some kind of proportionate justice upon someone who harms you.

This kind of principle is the basis for just about every system of law or morality in civilized nations that I can think of. And it's no coincidence: Since humans are the rational animal, we will necessarily each have different goals & values in life. We need a moral framework that is compatible with such individuality. A simple libertarian principle of non-initiation of force or fraud, coupled with the necessity for enacting justice when infringed against, ensures a virtuous cycle of cooperation.

It's no coincidence, either, that the tribe you mentioned that holds ritual murder in high regard is a primitive tribe. There is no way you can build a civilization upon ritual murder of innocents - because no good can come out of harming someone except in retaliation for when they have done real harm to you.

Now, if you asked a member of that tribe if they like their system, they'd probably say "yes". But that's only because that's the only system they know! If you taught them about life under different systems, most of them would realize (after getting over the culture shock) that there are much better ways to live. I think the model of the free, Enlightenment western society is taking over the world because more & more people in diverse cultures are learning what the alternate ways of living are out there.

Let me clarify this paragraph a bit:

Probably the most fundamental moral truth is: Cooperate honestly with everyone, except those who've proven to be untrustworthy or dishonest in the past. In other words, don't be the one to start defrauding or stealing from others. But you can "steal" your stuff back, or enact some kind of proportionate justice upon someone who harms you.

In practice, most of the time "you" don't enforce justice - government does. The various forms of democratic government are like technological innovations. They represent new & hopefully better real-world refinements of the above theoretical principle. Ironically, they have competed over time in a sort of Darwinian struggle to discover the most optimal compromise between maximum individual freedom vs. consistency, professionalism, & social stability. IOW, some combinations of governmental systems and social norms make it too easy for bad guys to take them over & descend into tyrannies. But some seem to be rather good at protecting our rights, upholding the conditions for that "virtuous cycle" of cooperation & progress to flourish, and stay stable enough to keep that virtuous cycle going for a long time.

And all of this comes from acknowledging our fundamental nature as the rational animal and what that implies. No deus ex machina needed.

Experimenatlly, the procedure Tit-for-Tat was a big winner in all Prisoner's Dilemma contests.

Prisoner's dilemma: a game where two prisoners have the choice of keeping quiet or informing. If both keep quiet, each is let go (score +5), if one informs and the other keeps quite, the informer is let go with a reward (score +10) and the other is punished (score -10), if both inform, each gets a mild punishment(score 0.)

Tit-for-Tat is a strategy for iterated prisoners dilemma with perhaps several players. Tit-for-Tat has two rules:

First: keep quied if this is the first time the game has been played with a particular partner.

Second: Do what the partner did last play.

Don't you see, though, that Darwinism doesn't try to "give a foundation for moral beliefs and actions"?

Yes it does. By default, when a system of belief proclaims that everything arose by chance random processes and not by the agency of a holy God, then it is making a moral statement. By obliterating a holy God from the scenario, by default, Darwinism is making a statement whether it overtly does so or not. It would be as if I said "it takes a village to raise a child." I may not make an overt statement regarding the parenting abilities of parents, but in reality my view has those implications. Darwinism is a belief system (held religiously by many) that says that life is based upon chance, that only the strongest survive, and that really we are here, live, and die and that's all there is. It wants you to think that it is amoral, but it is a system of belief and by nature it cannot be amoral. It is making some moral statement in discounting Scripture and as such is destroying the foundation for any kind of moral belief. Once again, Darwinism can only teach preference not right and wrong.

Consider electricity: Edison pushed hard for using electricity to kill people. Does that make theories of electricity evil or dangerous?
No. But what you don't understand is that if you structure an entire WORLDVIEW that excludes God, then you are making a moral statement (every man is a god unto himself and is not accountable to a Creator, that the Bible is full of lies, and that man is nothing more than a more highly evolved animal). This statement is ripe with evil and danger. It has produced Hitlers, Mussolinis, Stalins, as well as Kip Kinkles and Columbine murderers.

And is Benjamin Franklin culpable for the rise of evil in the world because of his groundbreaking work on this theory?
Saw something interesting that you may already have known. The ancient Egyptians may already have known a little something about electricity. Not really relevant to this discussion, but just say that as an aside.

God is an authority higher than any earthy authority and His law stands as an unmoveable guide to write and wrong that has rational, spiritual, and emotional basis.

There's a name for this: Deus ex Machina. It's when the god in the Greek play drifts down to arbitrarily settle the insoluble conflicts between the main characters. Or any time a play, novel, or movie ends with a solution that comes out of left field. It's a sure sign of a writer who's painted themselves into a corner & doesn't have the courage to go back and rethink (and rewrite) the story so it makes more sense.

Except that isn't how God operates. This evidence may be anectdotal, but I have seen God move directly in my life. My mother felt him directly comfort her "like having a blanket wrapped around" her when my brother committed suicide in 1985. I have watched him take impossible situations where there seemed to be no hope, and turn them around. I have watched a beloved Pastor's wife tell the story of when her sweet husband passed away and God not only told him the time of his death to the minute but also allowed the family watch him as he entered paradise "It's so bright! Can't you see it!" as he reached his swollen arms (From water weight due to terminal cancer) towards the sky and went home. And, there is so much more. You see Jenny, I have seen so much in my 27 years of being a Christian (I was 9 at the time), that no matter what, I KNOW that God is there and I KNOW that He is more than just the god of the deist who winds up the universe and lets it go on its own. I know this by faith, I know this by experience, and I know this through His Word. In Darwinism, where does life have any meaning at all? It doesn't. It looks at life strictly in terms of chemicals and time. Where is there room for hope? There is none. Man is on his own. Where can we possibly understand human intelligence? Love? Joy? Peace? Nowhere, because the very things that make us human have no naturalistic explanation. In an effort to prove a theory popularized by one who had lost his faith in the 1800s, modern science is today throwing out the only thing that gives anyone any hope or meaning- that there is a God, that we are here for a purpose, and that He is sovereign. That, indeed is a very evil and dangerous doctrine.

OK, that's my negative reaction to your argument. (Which is a very popular creationist argument, believe me.) Now for a more positive vision:

The universe is a benevolent place. By which I mean: All you have to do to thrive in this world is to understand it and act accordingly. And our world is understandable - because there are no contradictions. The Truths by which we must live aren't "self-evident", unfortunately, but we have loads of history & knowledge that we can draw upon to learn what the truth is.
How do you know what truth is? And how do you know the "truth" you believe is correct? Because it benefits human kind and the world? What is to say that this truth is right or wrong? There is no foundation for stating something is right or wrong in Darwinism. Only preference. If I prefer you not live, then I can kill you and nobody can point to anything higher than man's preference to say I'm wrong. As I pointed out last night, in different parts of the world, treachery is a virtue. No contradictions? They must not have gotten the manual that this universe is supposed to be benevolent.

Probably the most fundamental moral truth is: Cooperate honestly with everyone, except those who've proven to be untrustworthy or dishonest in the past. In other words, don't be the one to start defrauding or stealing from others. But you can "steal" your stuff back, or enact some kind of proportionate justice upon someone who harms you.
Sound similar to "do unto others as you would have them do unto You."

This kind of principle is the basis for just about every system of law or morality in civilized nations that I can think of. And it's no coincidence: Since humans are the rational animal,
But why is he rational?
we will necessarily each have different goals & values in life. We need a moral framework that is compatible with such individuality.
But who decides what this moral framework is? As I stated before, opinions in America are quite different than those elsewhere. In some places in Europe, euthanasia as A.O.K. It isn't here. Around our nation, some people feel that abortion is A.O.K. while others believe it is murder. Some feel homosexuality is wrong, other's applaud it. In Africa, some are cannibals, others abhor such a thing. In the Middle East, some feel it is virtuous to crash airliners into tall American buildings, while we call such a thing "terrorism" and disdain it. Who makes up the rules? They aren't self evident, but can they be evident at all in a world with such a wide variety of opinion on right and wrong. If we are just animals, what makes your opinion any more right than Osamas? How can there be any absolute right and wrong without a higher standard than human preference? Darwinism can not answer these questions in any way resembling legitimacy because it has cut the legs out from moral law altogether.

A simple libertarian principle of non-initiation of force or fraud, coupled with the necessity for enacting justice when infringed against, ensures a virtuous cycle of cooperation.
You are thinking with a Western mind. Not every culture values such things.

It's no coincidence, either, that the tribe you mentioned that holds ritual murder in high regard is a primitive tribe. There is no way you can build a civilization upon ritual murder of innocents - because no good can come out of harming someone except in retaliation for when they have done real harm to you.

Now, if you asked a member of that tribe if they like their system, they'd probably say "yes". But that's only because that's the only system they know! If you taught them about life under different systems, most of them would realize (after getting over the culture shock) that there are much better ways to live. I think the model of the free, Enlightenment western society is taking over the world because more & more people in diverse cultures are learning what the alternate ways of living are out there.
Have you watched the news lately?????