Nr. 3 (he hinges it on an rather unconvincing argument that time displacement—i.e. caring for your future self—is comparable to agent displacement—i.e. caring for someone else) and Nr. 5 (the argument is fine, but he’s arguing against what I consider a strawman - it’s not that without God morality disappears from the hyperuranian realm, it’s that it loses a universal judge-enforcer which has some pretty harsh implications, especially for a materialist).
I don’t think it’s a strawman. When you corner a theist on this point, she will often claim that god provides objective morality regardless of the existence of hell (or other punishments). They really are claiming that without God, morality disappears—hence the relativists can’t justify anything schtick. And hence the standard non-answer to the Euthyphro dilemma, as opposed to simply admitting, “Yes, it’s above him but he enforces it.”
Oh. But aren’t we more interested in whether there’s morality in the hypouranian realm? Below the heavens, rather than above? I mean, imagine a theist (maybe it had better be a deist) who believes that God exists and determines moral values—but only for other gods. If convinced that God doesn’t exist after all, she might feel that morality had disappeared from the hyperuranian realm, but why would she care?
Hyperuranian realm = the world of ideas, as opposed to the world of physical matter. The proposition that blogger is attacking is that, without God, morality would lose its value as a concept. Quote:
it’s daft to think that God’s existence is necessary to ground normative ideals, because the whole point of ideals is that they float free from the mess of our actual reality.
Fair enough. Out of interest, which ones did you disagree with?
Nr. 3 (he hinges it on an rather unconvincing argument that time displacement—i.e. caring for your future self—is comparable to agent displacement—i.e. caring for someone else) and Nr. 5 (the argument is fine, but he’s arguing against what I consider a strawman - it’s not that without God morality disappears from the hyperuranian realm, it’s that it loses a universal judge-enforcer which has some pretty harsh implications, especially for a materialist).
I don’t think it’s a strawman. When you corner a theist on this point, she will often claim that god provides objective morality regardless of the existence of hell (or other punishments). They really are claiming that without God, morality disappears—hence the relativists can’t justify anything schtick. And hence the standard non-answer to the Euthyphro dilemma, as opposed to simply admitting, “Yes, it’s above him but he enforces it.”
Hypouranian?
No, I did mean hyperuranian.
Oh. But aren’t we more interested in whether there’s morality in the hypouranian realm? Below the heavens, rather than above? I mean, imagine a theist (maybe it had better be a deist) who believes that God exists and determines moral values—but only for other gods. If convinced that God doesn’t exist after all, she might feel that morality had disappeared from the hyperuranian realm, but why would she care?
Hyperuranian realm = the world of ideas, as opposed to the world of physical matter. The proposition that blogger is attacking is that, without God, morality would lose its value as a concept. Quote:
Aha, gotcha. Thanks.