what is real?

Originally posted by robbie carrobie
Nor I a plausible argument to the contrary.

Hence we cannot know that we know god's nature. I'm glad you helped reinforce my conclusion, thanks 🙂

Originally posted by Lord Shark
[b]I assume if I go with this I will get the chance to put you on the spot later?
If you want to, yes.

The reason why "killing people for fun is wrong" (KPFFIW) becomes a moral fact is because it contravenes or runs against Gods very nature (righteous holiness). Gods very nature is not just any old nature - it is THE nature of all ultimate real ...[text shortened]... ogs.com/notrocketscience/2009/11/creating_god_in_ones_own_image.php

Your turn. 🙂

I fail to see how pointing out these minor difficulties with my position really helps yours.

Whether God can be shown to exist or have these moral qualities is not relevant because at least the idea of a OMF itself is coherent within the Christian belief system.

You may point out that one can imagine different worlds with different "gods" and such like but that's also irrelevant because Christians don't believe this is possible. They believe in one , absolute and ultimate reality behind all existences. A reality of all realities that is righteous.

Thus we have a coherent concept of an OMF to which all men are subject whether they like it or not and that cannot be reduced down into anything else because it is the ultimate reality of all existence.

Even if you could prove the whole thing was bunkum the idea itself holds together and enables a Christian to say in good faith (consistent with his belief system) that KPPFF is objectively and absolutely wrong , period.

The Atheist appears to have no such coherent system that can be explained but still feels he is able to make the same pronouncements of moral certainty AS IF there really were OMFs - but the problem is that an Atheist believes by implication that we live in an ammoral universe where no such OMFs exist.

This is the fascinating thing. Even people with an intellectual belief in an ammoral universe still betray unconsciously a deeper belief or conviction in OMFs - even when there is no intellectual grounding for such convictions.

Understandably ,they can't seem to bring themselves face to face with the moral and emotional consequences of what they subscribe to intellectually , therefore the belief system is incoherent.

So I ask again - if I say that KPPFF is right - on what OMF do you base your argument to say that I am self evidently and absolutely wrong. Surely in an ammoral universe there can be no OMFs - only opinions.

If one truly believes that one lives in an ammoral universe then how can one make statements about objective moral absolutes that are supposed to be "self evident" . ?

Your turn.

Originally posted by Lord Shark
Hence we cannot know that we know god's nature. I'm glad you helped reinforce my conclusion, thanks 🙂

the contrary being quite naturally, any argument which defies to understand Gods nature from an observance of the physical universe. It is a single handedly Dick Dastardly assertion to state that I have supported your erroneous hypothesis! 🙂

Originally posted by knightmeister
I fail to see how pointing out these minor difficulties with my position really helps yours.

Whether God can be shown to exist or have these moral qualities is not relevant because at least the idea of a OMF itself is coherent within the Christian belief system.

You may point out that one can imagine different worlds with different "gods" and ...[text shortened]... out objective moral absolutes that are supposed to be "self evident" . ?

Your turn.

I fail to see how pointing out these minor difficulties with my position really helps yours.
I think these are major difficulties that your position has.

In order to generate an OMF you actually sacrifice a coherent account of it within Christian belief. You appeal to intuition and hand wave about the ultimate nature of reality and end with 'That's a moral fact if ever there was one.'

Your justification boils down to 'it is an OMF because god is that way'. This is no better than 'it is because it just is'.

In other words, you have just stipulated that there are OMF's and that they correspond to god's nature. There is no explanation of why this makes an OMF moral though other than to say god's nature is moral. All that does is regress one step and leave the question 'what is it that makes god's nature moral?' And the answer is that it just is.

You might wave away possible worlds with gods whose nature supports KPFF. But you wave it away only by saying you don't believe in such possible worlds. So your argument can be boiled down further to 'OMFs exist because I believe they do'.

Not very convincing is it?

The Atheist appears to have no such coherent system that can be explained but still feels he is able to make the same pronouncements of moral certainty AS IF there really were OMFs - but the problem is that an Atheist believes by implication that we live in an ammoral universe where no such OMFs exist.
There are several things wrong with this. Atheists can explain coherent systems of morality that do not appeal to OMFs. Also, as some posters pointed out, some atheists do believe in OMFs so it is simply false to say that atheists are all committed to the view that we live in an amoral universe where no such OMFs exist.

This is the fascinating thing. Even people with an intellectual belief in an ammoral universe still betray unconsciously a deeper belief or conviction in OMFs - even when there is no intellectual grounding for such convictions.
No, if they don't have a belief in OMFs there are several accounts of morality available for them so that they need not rely on any conviction that there are OMFs. Just because the only way you can see to be morally convinced is via OMFs, it doesn't follow that everybody else needs OMFs.

If one truly believes that one lives in an ammoral universe then how can one make statements about objective moral absolutes that are supposed to be "self evident" . ?

Your turn.
Right, I won't answer from my own meta-ethical perspective because I don't believe in OMFs, although I'm happy to answer questions about that when this debate is concluded.

What I'll do is offer one of the possible atheist candidates for OMFs.

Suppose an atheist says to you that the universe is so structured that 2 + 2 = 4, or that pi x D = C are objective facts. These are not like trees. The latter would be true even if the universe in fact contained no circles. They are mind-independent, since they would be true if there were no observers in the universe.

The atheist can then say that ethical facts are like this. The universe is so structured that KPFF is wrong. Just as pi x D = C appeals to abstract entities like circles that need not be instantiated, so OMFs appeal to abstract ethical entities.

Originally posted by robbie carrobie
the contrary being quite naturally, any argument which defies to understand Gods nature from an observance of the physical universe. It is a single handedly Dick Dastardly assertion to state that I have supported your erroneous hypothesis! 🙂

Just fix the car Muttley!

Originally posted by Lord Shark
Just fix the car Muttley!

LOL😵 Ok Penelope Pitstop

Originally posted by Lord Shark
[b]I fail to see how pointing out these minor difficulties with my position really helps yours.
I think these are major difficulties that your position has.

In order to generate an OMF you actually sacrifice a coherent account of it within Christian belief. You appeal to intuition and hand wave about the ultimate nature of reality and end with 'T ...[text shortened]... t need not be instantiated, so OMFs appeal to abstract ethical entities.[/b]

Your justification boils down to 'it is an OMF because god is that way'. This is no better than 'it is because it just is'.

-------------shark--------------------------

Yes , God is that way because he is.

It doesn't have to be better. It's just a brute fact according to Christian belief. Physicists have no problem in stating the possibility that maybe some laws of nature (eg speed of light , nature of gravity etc) might just well be brute facts. The laws of physics are perceived as "just being that way" - dores this discredit the idea?

Of course not. Logic dictates that there must be some brute facts of existence upon which other facts are founded or justified. This works scientifically - why can't it work with God's nature?

I don't see how it discredits the idea. Why do you talk as if it does?

Originally posted by knightmeister
Your justification boils down to 'it is an OMF because god is that way'. This is no better than 'it is because it just is'.

-------------shark--------------------------

Yes , God is that way because he is.

It doesn't have to be better. It's just a brute fact according to Christian belief. Physicists have no problem in stating the possibility ...[text shortened]... s nature?

I don't see how it discredits the idea. Why do you talk as if it does?

The God hypothesis doesn't explain anything in detail. Physics does. There's no problem with saying "it just is that way" but there's no way to build on this scientifically with the God hypothesis.

Religion is not science; there is no miracle detector or blessing sniffing dog.

Originally posted by knightmeister
I fail to see how pointing out these minor difficulties with my position really helps yours.

Whether God can be shown to exist or have these moral qualities is not relevant because at least the idea of a OMF itself is coherent within the Christian belief system.

You may point out that one can imagine different worlds with different "gods" and out objective moral absolutes that are supposed to be "self evident" . ?

Your turn.

The Atheist appears to have no such coherent system that can be explained but still feels he is able to make the same pronouncements of moral certainty AS IF there really were OMFs - but the problem is that an Atheist believes by implication that we live in an ammoral universe where no such OMFs exist.

Hey, knightmeister, I have explicitly asked you multiple times to support your assertion that the proposition that objective moral facts exist has logical implications that result in coherency problems when conjoined with atheism. Guess what, you have simply refused (or selectively ignored my request for you) to even list for us what these problematic so-called logical implications actually are in your opinion. Hey, time to put up or shut up. It's really not the atheist's problem if you are too lazy to study any secular ethics before you feel the need to declaim on the possibility of objectivity in secular ethics. And it's also not the atheist's problem if you are too dense to understand that, with respect to moral realism or the existence of moral facts, etc, the atheist can simply offer views that are dialectically symmetric to any theistic view that you offer.

And, I mean, for Chrissakes, you just stated that the existence of OMFs is, for you at bottom, a brute fact. A brute fact, by definition, has no explanation. You do understand this, right? But, see, at the same time it's like you're ragging on the atheist because you don't think he can offer any explanation for the existence OMFs, as if some explanation of the existence of OMFs is requisite for the acceptability of any view on the matter. See any problem here?

Understandably ,they can't seem to bring themselves face to face with the moral and emotional consequences of what they subscribe to intellectually , therefore the belief system is incoherent.

Again, put up or shut up: explicitly list the logical implications of the existence of OMFs that are problematic for the atheist -- you know, the ones that you think amount to a consistency problem when conjoined with atheism -- so that we can directly consider them one by one.

Originally posted by Lord Shark
[b]I fail to see how pointing out these minor difficulties with my position really helps yours.
I think these are major difficulties that your position has.

In order to generate an OMF you actually sacrifice a coherent account of it within Christian belief. You appeal to intuition and hand wave about the ultimate nature of reality and end with 'T ...[text shortened]... t need not be instantiated, so OMFs appeal to abstract ethical entities.[/b]

There are several things wrong with this. Atheists can explain coherent systems of morality that do not appeal to OMFs.
--------------shark ---------------------

KM---- And I have no problem with this , as long as they recognise that they cannot state their system of morality as if it were an OMF. Such Atheists can have opinions about morality but not hold to absolute givens.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SHARK SAYS---"Also, as some posters pointed out, some atheists do believe in OMFs so it is simply false to say that atheists are all committed to the view that we live in an amoral universe where no such OMFs exist.
-------------------------------shark--------------------------------------
KM------This is where the problem is because they need to state clearly what they believe this OMF is , but they don't. They appeal to all the advantages of believing in God (an OMF) but get rid of the "nasty God bit".

Originally posted by knightmeister
There are several things wrong with this. Atheists can explain coherent systems of morality that do not appeal to OMFs.
--------------shark ---------------------

KM---- And I have no problem with this , as long as they recognise that they cannot state their system of morality as if it were an OMF. Such Atheists can have opinions about morality but ...[text shortened]... ppeal to all the advantages of believing in God (an OMF) but get rid of the "nasty God bit".

God is not an "objective fact".

Originally posted by LemonJello
[b]The Atheist appears to have no such coherent system that can be explained but still feels he is able to make the same pronouncements of moral certainty AS IF there really were OMFs - but the problem is that an Atheist believes by implication that we live in an ammoral universe where no such OMFs exist.

Hey, knightmeister, I have explicitly aske ...[text shortened]... problem when conjoined with atheism -- so that we can directly consider them one by one.[/b]

And, I mean, for Chrissakes, you just stated that the existence of OMFs is, for you at bottom, a brute fact. A brute fact, by definition, has no explanation. You do understand this, right?
------------------------------LEMON--------------------

I have stated that God is a brute fact and God's nature is the ultimate reality of existence itself. The fact that God's nature is holy means he is the OMF.

But if you take out the brute fact of God - what happens to the OMFs? Obviously you need something else to root OMFs in (because God doesn't exist in the Atheist model)

All I'm asking is WHAT is the Atheist OMF rooted in ? Does it exist on some quantum level? Is it in our DNA? Is it an integral part of electromagnatism? What are we talking about here?

No-one seems to able to tell me. Not even you.

Originally posted by LemonJello
[b]The Atheist appears to have no such coherent system that can be explained but still feels he is able to make the same pronouncements of moral certainty AS IF there really were OMFs - but the problem is that an Atheist believes by implication that we live in an ammoral universe where no such OMFs exist.

Hey, knightmeister, I have explicitly aske ...[text shortened]... problem when conjoined with atheism -- so that we can directly consider them one by one.[/b]

with respect to moral realism or the existence of moral facts, etc, the atheist can simply offer views that are dialectically symmetric to any theistic view that you offer.
------lemon---------------------

But just because they can , doesn't mean it's coherent. At least the Theist has a model or framework on which to pin OMFs. At least the Theist can make positive statements about the nature of reality.

It's one thing to say that certain things are objectively true , its another to say why you think they are true.

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
God is not an "objective fact".

Maybe , maybe not. But it's consistent that if you believe he is an objective fact then you can also say that OMFs exist as well.

Originally posted by knightmeister
And, I mean, for Chrissakes, you just stated that the existence of OMFs is, for you at bottom, a brute fact. A brute fact, by definition, has no explanation. You do understand this, right?
------------------------------LEMON--------------------

I have stated that God is a brute fact and God's nature is the ultimate reality of existence itself. The ...[text shortened]... agnatism? What are we talking about here?

No-one seems to able to tell me. Not even you.

Right, so you have no argument to back up anything you claim in this thread. You attack atheism and say it is somehow logically inconsistent with committment to objective moral facts, but you are not even willing to support this in any way. Well, then, why should anyone take you seriously?

And, I guess you just failed to see the problem to which I alluded. Hey, if you can claim that OMFs are at bottom simply brute, then so can the atheist. So if they offer no explanation for OMFs, what exactly is the problem? They have thereby done no more and no less than yourself.