Is there "good" without God?

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Could God decide that torturing babies is good and it would be good? Or is torturing babies intrinsically evil and is evil regardless of what God thinks. In other words, God has nothing to do with determining what is evil and/or good.
Note, please no silly answers like God would say it was good if it saved more babies. Because once again God is relying on a morality not determined by him.
Note, another silly response would be that God would never decide that torturing babies is good. I am not asking what God's decision would be. I am asking if he determines what is good or bad.

I voted "no" because as the eternal Creator of all, God is the source of absolute truth. Ultimately, torturing babies is wrong because He says it is. Unlike us, God doesn't change; He knows how to work with changes in us and the world, but His very nature has always been the same.

When discussing morality on any issue, the most important starting point is defining the independent standard you're using for comparing your options. Words like "right" and "wrong" are terms we use to describe how closely a situation matches the independent standard. There's tons of reasons why we may hate certain things, but our emotions aren't the standard...God is.

I have always been an atheist and always will be. I don't understand how I could or would even want to worship a god who is essentially killing hundreds, if not thousands, of innocent people every day and creating the horrific quality of 'life' suffered by many people in the poorest parts of the world, meanwhile apparently blessing others and giving them privileges for no obvious reason. I understand that 'right' and 'wrong' have are subjective terms, but how could anyone say that the amount of poverty in this world is acceptable? How anyone would want to support that is beyond me...

I voted "Yes" (a) because I don't believe any gods exist and (b) because I don't accept the principle of an independent standard of authority regarding morality as described by Moviefan2k4. All humans are born with certain moral principles (with the exception of psychopaths / sociopaths) such as do not kill other human beings. Social conditioning and peer pressure add other aspects of morality and ultimately everyone has their own individual moral standards and decides what they consider to be good or bad/evil.

I view it as immoral to subscribe to a notional independent standard of morality when that authority is outdated and contains aspects which I consider immoral or oppressive e.g. hating and discriminating against homosexuals. Similarly Muslims justify various acts of cruelty and suppression towards women on the grounds of their independent standard of morality again attributed to a god.

I think humans generally have a higher standard of morality than that attributed to these various ancient gods. I've seen Christians who would otherwise be "good" people, behave quite obnoxiously due to their religious beliefs. Good people turned bad by their external independent morality.

No, because then you'd only have an "o" left.

One major problem is that so many people determine what they believe about morality based on emotional reactions. Don't get me wrong; I feel terrible about racism, murder, rape, and all sorts of things...but my responses don't determine the truth of what's right or wrong. If humans just invented morality, then everyone would agree on it, but we don't...and that reality is a reference to the need for an external standard that's both personal and powerful, not to mention beyond time, space, or matter. Concepts like love, honor, justice, peace, and selflessness aren't rooted in materials or molecules. If you murder somebody, the carbon atom isn't bothered one bit.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 101011.htm

I can understand your argument, but it is unworkable. Which external standard should humanity use? Each religion has its own god or gods and its own set of moral principles that each religion believes is given by their own god. Throw in the fact that religion is in the decline and that secularism is in the ascent, most people aren't going to accept such external standards. That is before even mentioning that atheists and secularist don't even believe that the external standards were even created by a god; they are simply moral standards written by men a long time ago.

Another argument against the external moral standards is how badly out of touch they are with modern society and how badly used/abused they are to inflict subjugation or even terror over other groups of mankind. The world is full of religious people who believe it is their moral duty to proselytise the unbelievers and even to kill them in the name of their external god given moral standard.

I know what you are saying. Why is something good just because God says? Why can't it be good because it helps people or makes them happy? Why can't we do good in the name of good instead of in the name of God? God is a dubious character in the Bible.

I chose not to vote, as voting no involves saying yes to potential infanticide, showing that there was probably a certain bias associated with this thread. On top of that, believers have done terrible things in God's name, despite claiming Abrahamic morality.
But - - I think all good comes from God, even if you believe in him or not.

I believe that if there is a universal "good" and "bad", it would have to be defined by God/gods. Otherwise, morality is just humans coming up with meaningless standards that facilitate unity/happiness, which we decided is good.

It sounds cynical and nihilistic, but that's essentially the way it is. Segregating minorities used to be considered moral. The Biblr says to go into all the world and share Christ's teachings, not to subjugate people while claiming moral authority.

If you have to believe in a magical invisible man in the sky that has no proof of existence to be a good person you are weak minded and only use religion as an outlet for your behaviors. You dont have to believe in a god to be a good person if you think otherwise you lack logic, reasoning and are simple minded.[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGjziqe_Zak[/youtube]

Last edited by AspieOtaku on 22 Jan 2014, 3:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Religion and delusional thinking are equally effective at justifying atrocities.

Last edited by Fnord on 22 Jan 2014, 3:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

The key to this is accepting absolute truth, which many don't want because it means their beliefs are wrong. Some would protest with "Who are you to judge?", and my answer is "I'm not. This has nothing to do with me; I'm just a messenger. Take your problems to the source; He can handle it."

Religion in general may be declining, but there's still tons of people in the world who serve Christ. The ministry He started is the biggest on Earth, with Islam and Judaism not far behind. All three have one thing in common: the acceptance of an external final authority.

The debate has been about belief for far too long; people need to get back to discussing truth instead of throwing emotional tantrums. In the end, it doesn't matter what any of us choose to accept in our minds; absolute truth will be the deciding factor. If any religion is 100% true, then by definition, all others are false; that notion upsets a great many people, but its supposed to.

I've often said that the key to understanding different belief systems is looking at those who originally founded them, not the applications today. Just because different religious values are abused, that doesn't mean they should be discarded completely.