Philosophies: Liberalism vs. Conservatism

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I understand that all things related to morality have their origin on religion, and I also understand and admit that most of our morality today have been influenced from christianity, (ie murder, adultery, false testimonies) The "golden rule": treating others as you wish to be treated, comes from the Bible, or at least this is where it has been referenced. However, moral and ethical values have changed and evolved with time, due to wars, social revolutions, scientific advances, etc.

A question I ask is, why secular morality is possible today, and not centuries ago, why does make sense to a lot of people today, and not before? As I understand, all societies had religions, deities and everything, therefore their moral values then were all religious, there was no such thing as secular moral, why it is different now?


This is where I fail to understand what kind of proof nihilists or moral skepticals would accept or expect from it. I mean, I understand that morality and ethics are not solid or palpable objects that you can touch, taste and smell, those are human constructs in which have been made wether it is based on religion or not, with the purpose of mantaining order and balance in societies, in order for humans to interact with others in a way that provides a harmony between them. I don't understand and it doesn't make sense to me why the belief of being non-existence and the lack of proof arguments. I know those are purely human concepts, they don't exist in the animal kingdom, you can't prove that they exist outside the planet, in the universe, either. Obviously is not something you can measure on a laboratory under a microscope.


You must take some things for granted as well, or would your skepticism be just limited to moral values? For example, you and most people here most take for granted most of the concepts about autism and asperger's, or at least their existence, you could argue that those may not be real after all, are those people idiots for taking such things for granted, or if that's different, how so?


I don't understand much those "philosophies" if you can call them that, which there is something I wonder is that, are those ideals practical? Can you make those philosophies in practice in real life, in any society? This is something that I don't fully understand, if you don't believe in anything moral and ethical than how this would apply in the real world?

But you don’t explain how a deistic morality addresses the problem of nihilism better than a secular morality. If admitting uncertainties is equivalent to nihilism, then your position is equally nihilistic as you cannot be certain either, unless you wish to be delusional. Can you at least admit that the two are on equal grounds?

Also, I don’t think most secular moral philosophies claim to be strictly reductionist. That’s a misinterpretation IMO. There will always be grey areas in any philosophy.



We seem to be talking right past each other here. I wasn’t trying to prove anything philosophical there. I was just disagreeing with something I interpreted from you. You said that many people derive morality from religion. I was hoping you would clarify what you meant by “derive”. If you’re talking about philosophical deduction only then it was an honest misunderstanding on my part. I was thinking more in line with what causes people to think or behave morally. IMO moral behavior/thinking comes mostly from cultural conditioning and innate feelings. As you say, most people don’t think too deeply about things.



I wasn’t trying to say I have “The Truth” as you are looking for. It is impossible to prove that any system is “correct” since “correct” depends on what the ultimate goal of the system is. I was merely arguing about what I think works best to preserve a society and avoid conflict. Having laws that provide equal protection generally helps avoid conflict. That’s as far as I can go using pure logic. Saying conflict is bad or saying that people have innate rights are personal value judgments. However, these are values that most faiths have in common. They are not perfectly neutral, but they are more neutral than theocracy. Do you agree with that or not?



Well, I don’t consider personal convection to be the same as authority. Authority is holding someone (or something) else’s personal conviction as infallible. I would never consider my own personal convictions to be infallible. I am always able to apply skepticism, doubt, and cane refine my values if needed. Religions usually hold their ideals to be infallible and thus become stubborn and rigid in the face of even seemingly trivial changes.



It isn’t complete nihilism though. The fact that the world is mostly amoral doesn’t persuade me to give up all hope. I just can’t rely on a deity who designed a mostly amoral world to tell me what is moral and what isn’t.



My personal view is closer to humanism. I don’t think morality exists “out there” as some divine abstract thing. I don’t think there is any way to separate morality from human thought or behavior. Your definition of morality doesn’t exist to me. I used to have your view, but I couldn’t retain it.

A lot of your arguments style reminds me of a game that kids like me used to play with adults in order to annoy them. Anything someone says you can always question it and ask “why”, and you can continue doing this until the person either has no answer, runs in a circle, or contradicts themselves. Skepticism is fine, but it isn’t a fair argument when it is applied to everything except your own personal beliefs. That’s special pleading.

Yes. That was what I was trying to argue but I didn't have the correct lingo as I haven't studied those things. I can see how ethics developed from an analytical viewpoint in terms of societies.

Mine as well.


Very likely seems to be the case,
and it seems to be debunker rather than just skepticism, actually.

Well, that is because you are not recognizing that I am speaking of a philosophical construct and idea. Not of human action. I am speaking of right and wrong, not of benefit or harm. I know about game theory! It has absolutely nothing to do with philosophy though other than the fact that it is a logical construct to help us understand human behavior.

But that is not what I am speaking about. You are not understanding my distinction. You can't disagree with my distinction because that is like saying that you disagree with the existence of a theory that a deity may exist, you may disagree with its truth, but you can't say that there is no theistic theory. I am not talking about biology though, I am talking about an abstract "ought"ness.

No, that doesn't mean anything. I can say that I don't believe that mathematical impossibilities exist, but that does not mean I understand how one would work.

No, I literally mean God. How do you comprehend a deity that is bigger than you are? Whether he exists or not is irrelevant, the idea of a deity who came from nothing, holds all truth and wisdom, and who sets up moral order is astounding and the purposes in doing so is by far unknown and unknowable. I don't think that such a being can be truly comprehended.

I am not asking for a proof or disproof. Do you comprehend God though? Or do you merely accept his existence?

You are assuming a morality to prove morality. Who defines productive? If we define it in terms of widgets then we just beat people until more and more widgets are produced. I mean, even productivity is a loaded term in some ways.

Culture has changed, but that isn't what I am talking about.
It isn't, secular actions that are orderly and organized are so, and these actions do fall into a category we know as ethical but nothing says that they have anything to do with an abstract moral truth. You are merely addressing culture, not philosophy. Culturally, any idea is possible, even logically contradictory ones.


You can't prove it but you still stand by it, and that is the problem. They aren't solid or palpable objects, so why claim that they actually exist in the first place? Eating using silverware is also a cultural construct, why do we separate it from others such as sexual acts? I don't mean from the biological perspective but rather what makes it so philosophically different. Maintaining order is a behavioral problem, not a moral one.


No, not necessarily at all. Autism and asperger's are merely categories of human beings. They are not different realities so much as distinctions within this one, sort of like how we distinguish electrons and protons. One may argue that these distinctions are valid or invalid, but either way there is no real difference to our world.


Ideals? No, these aren't ideals. These are theories on how the world IS! What is there to practice with a flat or a round world? If you don't believe in moral truth of some form then you don't live one, and the consequences of no moral valuation can be quite dire, but it is the logical conclusion from it... most people aren't logical but they lie and say they are.

No. I cannot because they ARE NOT. Deistic morality is based upon a deity with the power to impose deistic morality. Secular morality comes ex nihilo, which doesn't make sense at all. If we have an ex nihilo morality then why not claim we have this non-interventionist ex nihilo deity who has the power to set it up as a morality from nothing makes no sense, it is fundamentally detached from any notion of higher truth.
Perhaps not, but they still don't explain where this morality comes from. It is always ex nihilo, which for something purely a concept seems inexcusable.

Right, they don't. I am concerned with the philosophy because the actuality is just simply a matter of sociology, psychology, economics, biology and etc.


No, I don't think that anything can necessarily be more or less neutral. Where does this neutrality come from? I mean, I don't think that Christianity for example really has innate rights and it places morality as a believer's task, not necessarily onto merely restraining the actions of non-believers.


I don't see the difference between my own and someone else's personal conviction in terms of validity. Refining really depends on what we speak of.


Meh, you can never really even challenge a deity in terms of logic anyway. It is like an ant calling a person a fool, the gap would have to be by nature astounding.


I don't think that what you describe actually has much to do with morality. I don't see this as a matter of retaining definitions but rather of consistency. Definitions don't have to change when frameworks change, as there is no reason to lose the ability to think in that framework.

Have I ever argued my personal beliefs? I have not even stated my personal beliefs, nor do I really care to. My entire position is just skepticism against whatever beliefs exist other than my nihilism-objectivism dichotomy in moral theory.

You’re special pleading again. If you wish to emphatically claim that one is better than the other, you can’t have your cake and eat it too. You can’t attack secular morality with skepticism without leaving yourself open to the exact same attack. I can equally claim that morals given by a deity are arbitrary and meaningless. How do you KNOW your deity’s morals are correct? Because the deity says so? Because the deity created the universe? Well then the deity must have created both good and evil. How do you know the deity prefers good over evil? Why not have a deity that prefers evil?


It isn’t any more ex nihilo than anything else. It comes from human thought. If you argue that morality must be independent of human thought than I can argue that it must be independent of a deity.


It’s more neutral because it’s a more common subset. It has rules that most people can agree on. A lot of it is a subset of Judeo-Christian values. It’s also a subset of values from other religions.



Well that’s very convenient.

You’re going to say this is all irrelevant, but f*** it. I have to look at things in a practical light when people’s beliefs put the human race in danger of self annihilation.

The problem is many humans THINK God wants them to do things like kill the nonbelievers. At this point it doesn’t matter what the deity actually wants. To them it’s a moral duty to kill the unbelievers. If masses of people believe a deity wants them to commit genocide they will do it without question. Who are they to question their god’s morality?



Then I’ll use the term “ethics” rather than morality.



But you do argue on the side of objectivism. But what do you base the objectivism on? I don’t get how invoking a deity automatically makes something objective. I can just keep asking “why” and “how” until you eventually can’t provide a reason. Then I can dismiss your objectivism as no better than nihilism. That’s exactly what you do to any argument for non-theistic morality.

I think of 'oughtness' in terms of consequences. If shooting a machine gun into a crowd causes pain, suffering and death, it is morally wrong. If we were in a dimension where that same action brought about health, happiness, and long life, it would be morally good.

I think that hou we evaluate oughtness is partly innate, and partly develops (or is ret*d by various belief structures). Infants aren't terribly empathetic outside the relationship with the mother, but they aren't naturally mean. They can learn consideration and compassion for others, or they can learn nonsense like blacks and Jews and Mexicans are inferior and don't need to be treated like people.

What does Liberalism and Conservatism mean?

Because the deity designed things. Yes, he said so, and the deity has special powers that we as mortals do not know. If evil is preferred then why isn't evil considered good? Can a deity really be evil?


No, because I argue that morality must be built into the universe and into a metaphysical part of the universe. There must be a spiritual world in order to have morality in this case.


Common subset? I don't see that as distinctive because how can we separate some elements of moral truth from others without being immoral?

Yes it is.
What is practical?
Yep, who are they?


Yes, I do. Objectivism is based upon definitions. A deity or other spiritual being is necessary for fulfillment of the definition. Nope, because we fall back to premises and morality just IS defined the way it is. Which means that we will be forced to agree to disagree at that point. Then we are stuck. I do that with any argument for non-theistic morality, but seriously, if I argue that morality is something metaphysical built into the nature of the universe then there must be a metaphysical device to insert it. In any case, based upon my definitions morality MUST be objective, and this objectivity demands something beyond pure reductionism. Ultimately, my reason for objective morality being caused by a deity is because only something defined as greater than that which can be understood can create morality, otherwise morality cannot be created. This holds against nihilism because my method of skepticism can only work against the knowable and not the fundamentally unknowable.

Last edited by Awesomelyglorious on 30 Nov 2007, 5:34 pm, edited 2 times in total.

The political left and the political right respectively.

Someone wrote about AG's arguments:
"A lot of your arguments style reminds me of a game that kids like me used to play with adults in order to annoy them. Anything someone says you can always question it and ask “why”, and you can continue doing this until the person either has no answer, runs in a circle, or contradicts themselves. Skepticism is fine, but it isn’t a fair argument when it is applied to everything except your own personal beliefs. That’s special pleading."

Thank you, I've been trying to figure out how to say that for a long time here. I am perhaps one of the most philosophically analytical, questioning, non-conforming people here, but I don't take it to such an illogical and counter-productive level that AG does. AG has serious mental issues, and how could anyone trust a guy who boasts about how selfishness and greed are such glorious traits?
I mean he talks about "logic", but when he argues in circles and sets the bar to where NOTHING can ever count as evidence, how logical can he really be? If everyone played the "why" game to every discovery and finding under the blue earth, how could we ever gain knowledge to progress? I mean part of solving a problem is recognizing the problem.
If anything, greed and selfishness are the reason why our world is so f****d up. Rather than using this as a "human nature" crutch and trying to legitmize hurting others for blatantly selfish purposes, maybe people should make a conscious effort to do the RIGHT thing. This isn't biologically impossible, do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Unless you've got to take an immoral stance or what could be viewed as an immoral stance for survival, that's different.
Sad thing is, many people aren't intellectually capable of having morals out-side of a pre-defined frame work such as PC or religion, and it's sad, it really is. If people only knew how dumb television and propaganda makes them they'd turn off the TV, take their kids out of school, and stop going to church/mosque/synagogue/coven/whatever. Even if they believe in religion, or god, lemme tell you that the church is the word of MAN, not a god. Even if I were Christian or something I'd still stand by that statement. It's an institution of man.

I mean like, I can watch the tv and not be effected by it, propaganda just bounces off of me because I've awakened to it for so many years now. But some can't watch the TV without being brainwashed, and those people really shouldn't watch TV.