Meditations on Morality

In the following pages I will be exploring the following questions; “If god exists, is murder immoral? Can those who do not believe in God be highly moral people? Can people who practice different religions agree about how to resolve a moral disagreement?”

In my analysis of these questions I will demonstrate that without religion the answer can be the same towards moral questions as morality is a societal construct as is religion. There for it matters not if you are a follower of Allah, God, Buddha or even Cthulhu as human beings generally speaking agree on what is moral. That being said morality itself can be bent. I will also show the reader that morality is not dictated by religion and that for the most part moral issues can be resolved with or without religion.

Taking a look at Plato’s work; “Phaedo” Socrates makes the case that death should not be feared. Cebes counters this argument that then there is nothing morally wrong with suicide? To which Socrates argues that it is up to god to decide when we die hence suicide is wrong because it is murder of one’s self.

From the beginning of Greek philosophy religion and morality have been entwined. These thoughts of morality and god carried over into Christian believes. The term morality is from the Latin most which is itself from the Greek ethos or ethics, thus ethics and morality are the essentially the same.

In contemporary religions such as Christianity or Islam the act of killing someone outside of self-defense or war is immoral and that you will be sent to hell if you do. The problem with these arguments are that morality in this case is reliant on the threat of punishment to control behavior and keep you from murdering. If you conform to a behavior because of fear of retribution, I would argue that is not morality at work but fear of reprisal. Does your dog not bite the mail man because it’s not a moral act or because your dog fears your rebuke at such behavior? In old Norse religion murder in certain times was not only moral but lauded such as when conducting raids on English settlements, murder and rape were both rampant and celebrated, however if you murdered or raped another Norseman it was not only illegal but considered immoral unless done to sustain power. So you can see there are many inconsistencies of morality when it comes to murder in the eyes of man.

Another example of these inconsistencies can be found in “Bushido” where the Japanese warrior could not murder fellow Japanese. That is unless for example you were a Japanese officer or non-commissioned officer and you were publicly executing one of your own men to prove a point or to maintain discipline. Suicide was also frowned upon as you were destroying a resource that belonged to the emperor, but that no longer applied if you committed suicide to make up for a loss of honor or to avoid capture, especially if you committed suicide in a way that was designed to kill your enemy such as with a hand grenade as they were attempting to capture you. At the same time the whole sale slaughter of men, women and children was rewarded such as in Japanese actions against the Chinese, Koreans and people of the Philippine’s, the distinction being in the Japanese mind that they were subhuman therefor normal “moral” conventions no longer apply. History is full of such duality, morality or lack there for is a social construct.

In the modern era look at fundamentalist Muslim’s, the religion of Islam teaches peace and restraint. But only applies to other Muslims, they handily subvert these niceties by labeling anyone who is not of their own particular murderous sect to therefor be infidels, freeing them to murder, rape, torture and mutilate as they see fit. This in their mind is not morally wrong but in fact proper morally and to not murder would be immoral. By focusing only on certain verses such as “Kill the idolaters wherever you find them, and capture them, and blockade them, and watch for them at every lookout” (Quran 9:5) they can justify their actions making any action moral. If one is to consider the person, they are murdering not to be human they can then slaughter them as if they are sheep.

So, if God exists murder is not immoral if you no longer consider what you are doing to be murder. State sanctioned violence even in the bible is not considered murder but an extension of God’s will. History is full of murder in the name of God, the witch trials throughout Europe, the Spanish Inquisition, the Crusades the bloodbath that followed after Mohamed gained supremacy in his own time. To the people on all sides who participated in the violence it was more than moral but a duty, surely not all of them believed they were actually killing in the name of god but they most definitely used it as an excuse and as justification. I would argue that morality itself is a learned behavior and a agreed upon principle in a society, you don’t have Atheists committing murder at any larger scale than Christians or Satanists in modern America or vice versa, that is because the idea that killing is wrong is not a religious issue rather a societal teaching.

This brings us to our next question that we will attempt to answer: “Can those who do not believe in God be highly moral people?” When evaluating this question we have to first look at human evolution, human beings by our nature are social creatures. We rely on other human beings for survival. If we look at other primates such as the great apes we will see they too are social creatures and generally refrain from murdering their own family members, of course there are exceptions as there are exceptions in humans as well. The chimpanzee has no knowledge of God, no 10 commandments, and no oracle of Delphi to guide its behavior. It acts on it instinct, human beings are no different. When we are young, societal beliefs are imprinted on us giving us the very concept of morality, what is fair what is not. When children play games such as tag there are rules, or when you played little league as a child you were learning the generally accepted moral values of society.

Human evolution has equipped us with a large brain, bipedal movement, front facing eyes and thumbs, we lack the large claws and teeth of the other animals. We are not particularly fast, nor powerful but what we do have is our massive brain, are vocal abilities, and each other. Our need to work with others in our own society to benefit ourselves gives rise to morality, that is why it is acceptable to slay an enemy combatant but not your neighbor, they are not part of your tribe not part of your society and are a threat to your own. The idea of morality itself is in itself nothing more than an agreed upon set of behavior by one’s society. By this logic it does not matter if an individual believes in God or not, they would recognize behaviors that are considered wrong in their society and barring a psychopath would know through learned behavior what they are doing is either moral or immoral. Religion itself was just another way to unify people toward a common goal as is government and in many cases the lines between religion and government don’t exist.

Humanity developed to work together for the common good of the group, we developed culture as a way of ensuring survival of not necessarily the individual but of the culture as a whole. All of our knowledge all of our triumphs are passed to the next generation. If you were to take a modern city dwelling man and drop them in the wilderness and expect them to relearn how to make fire how to hunt how to survive they would surely perish. Culture is nothing more than the passage of learned behaviors and knowledge to the next generation. We build on the knowledge from before each generation adding new technology and new skills, the concept of morality exists to ensure this passage to limit individuals from transgressing and derailing society through immoral acts.

It is therefore logical to think that if an individual does not believe in god that they will believe in something even subconsciously. They will know without a doubt what is right and what is wrong in their own society and for the most part constrain themselves to the accepted norms and may even go above and beyond. One does not need religion to be moral, one need only examine what is good for society, what is good for themselves and what is good for their family and adjust their behavior accordingly. If an individual follows the guidelines of behavior they have been taught since birth they can not only be moral but can be even more moral than people of religion. As they may make more moral decisions based off of societal views of morality than even a religious person may make who may stray from what is considered moral due to conflicting ideas caused by religion. It is generally accepted in modern America that torturing and murdering someone in the name of god is immoral and it was generally accepted that the same was true during the Salem witch trials. But Puritan leaders and those who wanted to get rid of others they didn’t like found an outlet to murder others, many of the “witch hunters” were paid a handsome wage so it was in their best interest to whip up religious fervor and keep the trials going. I am sure there were many people there who remained silent even though they knew it was immoral to hang women on such flimsy claims of witchcraft but did nothing as not to draw acquisitions against themselves. I am sure that even those doing the accusing and those carrying out the sentences knew that the victims were not in fact witches. One of the most debated and discussed topics is whether or not we can be moral without a God. The biggest argument tends to be that if God does not exist then moral values don’t exist. That because there are moral values then God must exist. I don’t see that as particularly true, it has been argued that if there is no God we as humanity must create our own morality. I don’t see how that poses a problem, as societies will inevitably create morals as a means of maintaining behavior so as to keep society functioning.

There is no logical reason why human beings could not create a moral code without a God. The counter argument is that morals and morality are basically laws and that there can’t be laws without a law maker. Professor Shafer-Landau says the following “In my experience, people tie objectivity to God because of a very specific line of thought. The basic idea is that all laws (rules, principles, standards, etc.) require a lawmaker. So if there are any moral laws, then these too require a lawmaker. But if these moral laws are objective, then the lawmaker can’t be any one of us. That’s just true by definition. Objectivity implies an independence from human opinion. Well, if objective moral rules aren’t authorized by any one of us, then who did make them up? Three guesses. In a nutshell: all rules require an author. Objective rules can’t be human creations. Therefore objective rules require a nonhuman creator. Enter God.”

I don’t agree with that assessment, I argue that our moral codes and our laws are not indeed objective as morality varies from society to society. What we would view as morally wrong would not be viewed as morally wrong by another society or culture in a different time or place. The moral code of the Roman Empire for example would approve of slavery whole heartily where as we would say it is clearly wrong. One cannot factually state one way or another if slavery or some other grievance is wrong because it can’t be proven. It is an emotional argument, I can’t prove slavery is bad or vile or evil but I know that it is and modern society agrees. Morally to us it is abhorrent to hold another human’s liberty in your hands, this does not prove the existence of God but more so reflects on the human condition. Morality is flexible and ever changing in human societies and even changes dependent on the situation. If presented with the chance to murder a man we would all say that is morally wrong until I told you that man was a dictator and would be responsible for the deaths of many others, then it is no longer reprehensible.

It is my belief and understanding that human being even without religious experience are programed by societal teachings to be essentially “good.” It is in the individual’s best interests to conduct themselves in a manner consistent with high morals and ethics. By that I mean as social creatures we are programmed to conform to societal values for our own survival, and depending on what profession that the individual is in there may be a higher burden and even higher standard of ethics they must match or exceed in order to progress in their field a good example would be the medical field. With the Hippocratic Oath to do no harm amongst other specific standards. Most if not all professions require some form of ethics be adhered too, failing to do so will result in termination or legal action civil or criminal.

This brings us to our next question: “Can people who practice different religions agree about how to resolve a moral disagreement?” If you examine most religions you will see a common thread of what is and is not moral, it is generally agreed that murder, rape, torture, stealing, are not acceptable human behavior’s. To quote the Dali Lama “all religions contain the moral precepts for perfecting and functioning of the mind, body and speech,” most religions have more in common than not. Most religions endorse the same elements and nurture the same elements of agreed upon human behavior. Names of gods or how many gods may very but the underlying principles are usually the same or close to one another. Islam, Judaism and Christianity share more ideas and concepts than they don’t. And all of them incorporate ideas and moral principles that older religions shared. Even many of the Christian holidays are adaptations of old pagan ones.

It can be inferred then that the stumbling blocks between religions are not due to the most part from large scale theology differences but through selfish people who are using their own religious beliefs in order to benefit themselves somehow. I would think that if a Christian a Jew, a Muslim and a Pagan were walking in the forest and saw a man attempting to bludgeon a woman to death that all of them would intervene and attempt to stop the would be murderer. For the most part world societies agree on what is and what isn’t moral. Polytheistic religions of old usually got along fine with one another, there were not large scale wars over religion no mass bloodshed over belief. The ancient Egyptian’s, the Ancient Greeks, did not kill over religious views. They killed yes but as an extension of foreign policy. Even the Egyptians and Romans did not persecute the Jews because of faith but because of their growing power. The same can be said of the Romans and Christians, the Roman’s did not kill the Christian’s because they were Christian per se but because they were attempting to grow power and disrupt the status quo.

Religions may disagree on certain issues such as slavery, female circumcision, the amount of wife’s one may have, animal sacrifice things of that nature. And certain things such as that they may never agree on, there is no getting around certain elements such as that. No matter how open the dialogue you cannot convince someone one direction or the other.

Human beings on a whole don’t live there day to day lives rigidly worrying about religion, one does not drive their car thinking I have to make sure to stop at this red light because of god. No they think to themselves if I don’t stop at this light I could get in an accident or a ticket. Human beings will do what is necessary at that time to survive and what is best for their own interests. It can be argued that the official state religion of Nazi Germany was Nazism, under that regime the persecution and murder of jews, gypsies, poles, among many other groups was not only considered right but the law. Which then poses the question just because it’s legal doesn’t mean it’s right or moral. The executioners of the Nazi regime viewed themselves as moral and family men even if the rest of the world myself included viewed them as immoral psychopaths. Many people living under that regime would turn a blind eye to what was going on for their own survival, many others would actively participate in it for the same reason. So it is clear to me that humans will do whatever they must to ensure their own survival.

It becomes clear that on the question if people from different religions can agree on what is moral, I would say it depends on the actual act we are trying to define is. In many cases I would say it makes no difference the religion they would all agree of the immorality or the action. But in some cases there can be no agreement, as a whole though for most fundamental moral questions there is little to no conflict between the religions.

The very nature of morality is ties to each individual own existence; what society they live in what subset or society. One needs to realize the entire world we live in is in itself a fabrication. Every society is nothing but a forced cohesion of humanity who are indoctrinated into their society’s belief system. Whether it be dictatorship, communism, a king, religion it matters not our actions and our beliefs will be to a large extent dictated by whatever society we grew up in. A personal example of this was I was raised on stories of my grandparents on my father’s side being captured and put in the Gulags by the soviets before going on to fight with the British eighth army in North Africa and Italy, and my mother’s parents being victims of the holocaust. As such I was taught self-reliance, hunting, shooting, self-defense and a distrust of anything that resembles tyranny, a person fed liberal beliefs with no exposure to firearms whose parents were lawyers in New York city is not going to value freedom or firearms how I do and in fact will probably view my ownership of fire arms as immoral and fail to see the world through my eyes no matter what. To that person they are moral and I immoral, in my own eyes they are neither just ignorant of history nor lacking the same upbringing as myself. Another influence of morality would be life experience, I have lived in many places and been in war zones since I was 18, I am currently 33 this would of course cause me to view the world around me differently than someone who has lived in Mayberry Tennessee their entire life. Those examples don’t mean we will disagree on whether or not murder is immoral.

Hopefully it is becoming clear to the reader that whether a person believes in God, Yala, flying monkeys, Sea creatures or karma, what we can agree on fundamental moral issues. That morality is not dependent on religion, rather that religion is tied to morality. But like all human constructs religion can be used for immoral purposes. Murder by itself is a natural act of humanity, as we have been murdering each other since man first wielded a rock what makes it immoral is that we as humanity have decided that it is in fact immoral, god or gods hold no bearing on it. So by society’s standards of morality whether or not god exists or not murder can be immoral, God’s existence poses no real bearing on whether or not murder is moral or immoral.

Can a person who is a non-believer be highly moral? I say the answer to this is clearly yes, and I hope I have proved it to you dear reader. Religion does not hold a dichotomy over morality, it can help certain people become moral or stay moral but morality comes from inside the belief system of an individual. A belief system that has been imprinted on them from a young age by whatever society they come from. One could argue more moral outrages have been committed motivated by religion than any other cause in human history. Even different subcultures will view things differently. In America certain people would view homosexual marriage as immoral where as large groups of people would find no moral objection to the union. Any individual can be highly moral as long as their actions are in line with their own morals or those of the people they associate with. What modern America considers moral will not be the same as America in the heyday of slavery. A slave owner in the 1800’s would have viewed slavery as moral and his right where as today we view it as an insidious disgusting barbaric practice, that same slave owner would have most likely have viewed gay marriage and mixed race marriages as immoral. Morality is not a fixed thing but we as a society today can mostly agree on acceptable behavior and practices regardless of religious or regional views.

Can people of different religions agree on moral questions? For the most part I would argue yes but in certain circumstances I would say no. It all depends on the particular behavior we are trying to label moral or immoral. A better thing to think about as an individual is if you are living up to your own morality, can you live with your actions, would you want someone else to do to you what you do to others. If you are married the simplest thing to think of is don’t do anything you wouldn’t want your spouse to do, don’t do anything you wouldn’t want to tell to your spouse.