The Moral Argument

The Moral Argument

There is more than one way to present this argument. But for our purposes here. I am going to present the deductive argument.

The argument consists basically of three simple steps:

1. If God does not exist, objective moral values do not exist.

2. Objective moral values do exist.

3. Therefore, God exist.

Let's look at the first premise: if God does not exist, objective moral values do not exist. What is key to this premise is understanding what I mean by the word “objective.” By “objective” I mean valid and binding independently of whether anybody believes in it or not. To say that moral values are objective means that these moral values are binding and valid independently of whether any human being believes in them or not.

Premise (2) says objective moral values do exist. I think that our belief in the objectivity of moral values is very much on a par, or on the same level, as our belief in the external world of physical objects. Any argument that you could give about being skeptical about our perception of moral values you could give a parallel argument about why we should be skeptical that there is a world of physical objects around us. We have, I think, a clear apprehension of a realm of moral value. In the absence of some reason to doubt that perception we ought to therefore believe that there are objective moral values just as we have a clear perception of a world of physical objects and in the absence of any reason to doubt our perception of the external world we are rational in believing that there is a world of physical objects out there. Skepticism about moral values and skepticism about the external physical world are really on a par. If we accept the existence of physical objects in the real world around us (if that is rational) then it is equally rational to accept a realm of objective moral values.

Conclusion. Therefore, it follows logically that God does exist.

Suppose someone denies premise one but argues for premise two that objective moral values exist, but God’s existence is not necessary to believe in moral objectivity. Then, according to the deductive argument, to deny the existence of God is to deny the existence of moral objectivity. The deductive argument is a logical formula of persuading the thinker to accept that, at the very least, it makes sense to acknowledge moral objectivity is valid if God exists. God’s existence creates an absolute standard for the existence of moral objectivity; otherwise, without the existence of God, morality becomes a “human convention” that inevitably leads to moral relativism or plurality.

Q&A

What do we mean by the term “objective”? Are morals truly objective.? Why or why not?

-The terms

Objective: independent of people’s (including one’s own) opinion. They are valid and binding independently of whether anybody believes in it or not. To say that moral values are objective means that these moral values are binding and valid independently of whether any human being believes in them or not.

For example, to say that the Holocaust was objectively evil is to say that it was evil even though the Nazis who carried it out thought that it was good, and it would still have been evil even if the Nazis had won World War II and succeeded in brainwashing or exterminating everybody who disagreed with them so that everyone thought the Holocaust was good. To say that the Holocaust was objectively evil is to say it was evil regardless of whether anybody thinks that it was or not. That is what we mean by objective moral values. They hold independently of whether any human being happens to agree with them or not.

Subjective: dependent upon people’s opinions, feelings, and personal preferences.

The opposite of objective is subjective.

2. Premise one. What are we really asking? Can we be good without God?

The New Atheists say that we can be good without God. They provide reasoning from evolutionary biology to explain that morality is merely a tool for survival. Others suggest that morality can exist on its own without any origin, as a fixture of the universe. Both views fail to provide a grounding or point of reference for morality in a consistent manner.

If morality is really an adaptation for survival, then we cannot know if any view of morality is true. Rather, instead of there being something actually (that is truthfully) good and evil, there is only that which aids our survival (an ever-changing sociobiological condition); nothing more. This scenario gives us no impetus for why we should do something, it only describes the way things are.

As for the argument that morality has no origin, it just exists, this is an odd argument. Philosopher William Lane Craig states that “Moral values seem to be properties of persons, and it’s hard to understand how justice can exist as an abstraction.”[1] If the universe were void of persons, would we really believe that justice, mercy, patience, love, and so on, exist on their own? These are all qualities of persons, but not necessarily of the non-personal physical realm. Further, why would we feel obligated to something that is non-personal? What would be the motivation?

These examples of alternative explanations for the existence of objective moral values and duties fail to provide a standard of goodness which is the point of reference for our moral judgments and obligations. What we need is a stopping point at which we can say, “This is how I know what is good and what is evil,” and “This is how I know what to do.” A natural stopping point is God, who, “by definition, is the greatest conceivable being, and a being that is the ground and source of goodness.”

3. Why should we think that objective moral values exist?

C.S. Lewis noted that “there were two odd things about the human race. First, that they were haunted by the idea of a sort of behaviour they ought to practise, what you might call fair play, or decency, or morality, or the Law of Nature. Second, that they did not in fact do so.”[4] How does one know that they are not living up to a moral standard, if there is no standard to live up to? Yet, all cultures throughout time and history share the basic ideas of good versus evil and right versus wrong. He argues that there is a great similarity of the human moral experience across the various expressions, because these expressions are all coming from the same fundamental source.

The second idea is that objective moral values and duties do exist. As one philosopher states, “Humans do not have to find out what is moral by reading the Bible. Such knowledge is available to all people. Romans 2:14-15 says that those without God’s special revelation (Scripture, Jesus Christ) can know right from wrong.”[3] Since humans have been made in the image of God, they are created in such a way as to reflect the moral qualities of God’s own character. While there may be some differences in the way these moral qualities are expressed or developed in differing cultures, it doesn’t mean that the fundamental grounding for morality isn’t underneath all of our expressions of morality.

Why should we believe that there are objective moral values? I think we know that objective moral values exist because we clearly apprehend them.[1] The way in which we apprehend them is through moral experience. We simply do various thought experiments in which you are placed in moral situations and ask if you don’t apprehend that there is an objective difference between right and wrong. I think the best way to show this is through just giving various illustrations.

In illustrations, we provide a moral experience for a person in which that person, I think, can apprehend an objective moral value. To give an illustration, I was speaking several years ago at the University of Saskatchewan in Canada. Prior to the speaking engagement, I was walking the halls of the university building in which it was held and a sign caught my eye on the bulletin board. It said, “Sexual Abuse: No one has the right to abuse a child, woman, or man.” It was put up by some sexual abuse prevention committee at the university. The sign struck me because I thought no atheist can say that. An atheist could not make sense out of one’s right not to be sexually abused because if there is no God there are no objective rights or objective duties. Therefore, anyone who sees that sign and agrees that no one has the right to abuse sexually a child, woman, or man has admitted in so doing that there is a realm of objective moral values and he has perceived one of them.

4. The Conclusion-Does it follow that from these two I deas that God exists? Why or why not?

The third idea is the conclusion that naturally flows from the first two ideas. If we do not find  objective moral values and duties in the world, then God wouldn’t exist. Yet we find that objective moral values and duties do exist, and therefore God exists. The argument is a powerful argument to help us understand why we think there are things such as good and evil, right and wrong, and where we find grounding for those ideas. “Being made in the image of a truthful, rational, good Being makes sense of why we trust our senses/moral intuitions.”[5] The Moral Argument conversely helps us understand what happens when we remove God as the standard for objective values and duties: we do not have any ultimate obligation to uphold fundamental beliefs in values or moral obligations, such as that each person has the right to life and so we should protect human life.

At the end of the day, I cannot get around God as the objective standard for my value judgments and for what I think I “should” or “ought” to do. To strip my existence of this standard would be to leave a massive void in my human experience.