Freedom in it's highest form

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
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Remember I’m still being atheist this week, but I wanted to discuss freedom, and hear your feedback… I hope. I haven’t gotten much from my other topic, but I would prefer some from this one.

I know many of you have hit on this before in certain various areas. That religion is a restrain. I’m willing to argue it is and it isn’t. But today I’d rather argue on why it is.

Take for instance me. I’ve grown up Christian all my life, I’ve never even seen much of a change… well I was like chucky in gradeschool, throwing rocks at heads, putting rocks in girls panties, fighting, etc. And then by second grade I wouldn’t hurt a fly… this was around the time I got saved and also thougth I was in love with a certain girl. Anyway, this restraint was a good restraint. However, as a Christian, Atheist this week. I want to point out a flaw as I feel no secrets should be kept to be sincere. This flaw I guess can best be explained as having no experience in certain matters. I’ve never been fully free to feel prideful, therefore I’m overly insecure and always worried I’m going to upset someone. I’ve never felt good about the certain act of drinking, but most of my exclusiveness toward it has been because I care what my parents think. Point is I’ve never drank, I’ve never experienced. I’ve never smoked, I’ve never been in the ditch of many so called sins, I’ve stayed clear. And at certain points in my life more than ever it comes to a point where I would like to live life how I want to. It feels wrong to say that because it goes against my beliefs, but is this not freedom? I still believe the path of sin leaves you barren, hopeless, and confused. But many of these things I’ve never experienced, so I will always be riding the fence on my beliefs.

Such as, someone who’s been told fires hot, they’ve gotten close and it’s warm, but they can’t totally be against fire being hot because they’ve never been burned. And who is better to speak on such subjects?

I Don’t feel I’m arguing so much against religious beliefs as I am people who are agnostic to their beliefs. If you don’t know both sides to the story, you will always be somewhat on the fence, curious, touching a foot to the other side and pulling it back, and never being totally satisfied one way or another. I am a firm believer experience is the key to any belief, but I am inexperienced in the free lifestyle, I’ve always been restricted from my curiousities. And even though I know there wrong, I’d still like to have the freedom to try them, but yes I do have a Christian answer against this but I will not use it.

But you know this has brought me to a certain thought. Why is it that atheist and theist argue over lifestyles, when the theist says don’t do these things because they’ll leave you dry, empty, shouldn’t they do the same atheistically? Many theist don’t listen to impure things because of the ramifications they believe it has, but shouldn’t it be argued atheistically as well? Theist have to argue there lifestyle leaves you happier, so an atheist who wants to be happy should argue along side.

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I am in agreement with the last point, and I think you’ll find with a review of the opening post of my Campaign for Atheism thread, that I think a due part of the process of installing or formulating atheism is the evaluation of theism. Atheism, to be accepted, has to replace all the good things about theism, like the justifications for morality.

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Yes, except I cannot find a reason atheistically to say morals exist. Morals would have to be just constructs of our own values, and if that’s the case, a whole may be wrong, while few may be right, if man created them than they cannot be monolithic. I feel that yes, the golden rule does apply, such as you should do unto others as you would have them do unto you, but this doesn’t necessarily mean you have to by any means, and who is to tell you you’re wrong, it wouldn’t be wrong it would just be weird, or something that opposes the norm. Such as I thought earlier today, if you looked at governmental laws and broke them down to earlier cultures, people would break the law more for themselves if they could get away with it. Some men feel they can defy the law, beat it, and if some could, which some have, who is to say their law is wrong objectively? I believe such and such is wrong, so in so says the opposite, who is right? Different cultures, different laws, who is right? Debate it? Under what terms, what base can you agree? The debate will never settle, thus these morals really aren’t morals, just opinions and what would seem wiser if you wanted to live longer and be happier, and have others like you, that’s all the seem to be atheistically when I put myself in the shoes. I am not joking, I cannot find morals exist when I try to see it atheistically, no matter how hard I’ve tried, they just aren’t there. Atheism points inward to me, and sorry to say but that’s what makes it the most appealing.

For some reason I wish many times that atheism is true, but I can’t ever figure out why. As I’ve said the only thing I can think of is I want what I want, it’s my life, etc. and this is the only thing I can find, even though I’ve argued that yes even when serving a higher power it brings a happiness unimaginable, not to mention the awesome people you can spend time with, but I still wonder if it’s all just a psychological trick, that once you believe in hope whether it exists or not you feel great, and many times I’ve thought even if Christianity is true, it needs to be a happier life of false belief than one of true belief, and I believe that both ways. Theism is a trap I have no way of getting out of even if I wanted to, I’d have to lie to myself. I’d have to deny what’s more logical, in order to live for myself, which I know has no end, pleasure is never enough, nothing is ever enough except something you can’t imagine, or fully grasp, like a belief in a higher power, because if that higher power is perfect, you can’t ask for more than perfect because if it needs more its not perfect.

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There is recent evidence that we are born innately having morals
(select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract. … 94DE404482). If so, this bears a striking resemblance to both Yangming and Zen ideas (one atheist, one agnostic tradition) about cultivating our original ‘good’ natures and shying away from the bad influences we’ve been exposed to.

Clearly, the situation is more complex than that. But, much of this has been discussed in other threads here, such as:

ilovephilosophy.com/phpbb/vi … 37&start=0

ilovephilosophy.com/phpbb/vi … 27&start=0

ilovephilosophy.com/phpbb/vi … 93&start=0

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Bingo, you hit the nail on the head. For an atheist, objective morals don’t exist. It may surprise most to find this has no effect, at least on my, morality. But obviously, morality doesn’t come from religion anyways. I think our preacher from the Springs represented this fact well. Or maybe Satan just tempted him with meth and booty love. :imp:

Point being, I am confident what one considers “right” and “wrong” is much more based on nurture, and in some ways nature. Yes, that nurture might involve religion, and in that way, it might have an effect, but if a man is born gay, which I believe is what happens (not becoming gay), then nature wins, and goes against nurture.

Of course, nobody has the perfect idea of what happens, but I’m not sure if anybody claims to.

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For instance, I don’t do meth because it destroys my body. A Christian might not because they think God doesn’t want them to.

What was your excuse Mr. Haggard?!

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That’s not how true Christians think or operate, typical misunderstanding though.

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Is this just for special interest? You’re not really trying to make a point I’m guessing, because this does nothing, actually probably helps my argument.

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Morality, morality, many of you keep using it, but are we discussing opinionated morals or objective ones? If objective one’s don’t exist the only way you can say your morals should be objective is if you can prove that they are better. I think it’s quite ridiculous to say objective morals exist but they’re natural, nothing could be further from the truth. Subjective yes, objective no. I’m born thinking murdering is wrong, another born thinking it’s right, who is to tell me or him we’re wrong? There is no transcendent base, pure and simple. Whether I was atheist or Theist, the point would still be without a transcendent base ‘objective’ morals, morals for all to abide by, do not exist period, and to think otherwise is to be in denial. So if atheism is true, no objective morals exist, if theism(I’ll go with Christianity here) is true, objective morals do exist.

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For an athiest objective moral laws can exist based on pure common sense. If you asked a number of random people up the street why is murder wrong? then I bet few people would be able to answer you satisfactorily whether or not they were religious. I’ll tell you why murder is wrong without just providing you with a cop out like most thiests would (they’d simply say it is because God says it’s wrong). As an athiest, I know murder is wrong because life’s the only thing that we’ve got, the only real thing that we share and understand, and with there being no afterlife that I expect, it is the most precious thing, so how can someone be evil enough to take away anothers’ life, the only thing they’ve got and that they’ll ever have, that is an act so despicable that it is beyond comprehension. That was a simple but satisfactory explanation of one objective moral rule despite me being an athiest.

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They’re not objective though, you still have no right to say they are. If you would read, listen to what I say, you would understand I’ve studied this throughout, and there is no way an atheist can claim objective morals, I’m sorry, it’s not that way and it will never be that way. You’ve given an opinion. Yes life is all we have, it’s valuable, but that isn’t an answer to a right or wrong, there is no reason why all should abide by this principle. I mean, maybe you do value life, what about those that don’t??? The Nazi’s thought it was ok to kill innocent jews, who are you to say there wrong huh? Common sense? They could tell you the same thing.

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And I don’t want you to misunderstand me here, I do believe objective morals exist, but atheistically you can’t claim them because you have no defense for them, you can say common sense, but someone else could say the same opposing you, then you have to argue well… majority rules, and then you still fail because if the majority were to become immoral and call it morally right, you’d lose your defense for atheistic “objective” morals yet again.

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You’ve asked a question and I’ve offered you a decent answer, if my morals aren’t literally objective then yours certainly aren’t, they’re only objective in your mind as mine are in my mind, you can’t escape the relativity of it all. No one really is a believer in God, and least of all those who pretend for various reasons to be the disciples and followers of Christ such as yourself. These anti-Christs who go about singing hymns, making long prayers and crying Lord, Lord, but never doing the things which He said, are known by their works to be unbelievers and infidels, unfaithful to the Master they pretend to serve, their lives being passed in deliberate and systematic disregard of His teachings and Commandments. You said you have considered using drugs or having sex out of marriage, why even the consideration and subsequent intention to do these things are seen as a sin anyway.

You talk about Hitler and Nazism thinking you know all about it, I couldn’t even begin to tell you-there was nothing special about Hitler, he was a nobody who came from nowhere as far as the social scale is concerned, he possessed no common sense or form of respect, he manipulated the people by exploiting the inherent fascism that had already been blossoming in Germany since the start of the First World War. Looking at the holocaust, and the things Hitler and the SS had done, any rational decent person who lives by common sense would come to the conclusion that it would be hard to class him as human at all. Actions speak louder than words, and I’m sorry but anyone who takes power and imposes their ideas on others by force and murder has crossed the line, you only have to look at it to understand the reasons for which some things are out of order.

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Doubt and self desire goes hand in hand with consideration, rebelling as well.

I don’t believe there was anything special about hitler either, but you are avoiding my point.

I’m not saying you can prove one way or another your morals are objective, I’m saying the belief affirming objective morals while they are the same time relative is ridiculous, you are speaking out of two sides of your mouth. As I said objective morals still have to exist whether nobody agrees with them or not. You are discussing what a ‘majority’ prefers, and as I said if this majority changed it’s mind what then would you do? You would try then to prove by reason, well all of you, you’re wrong because you yourself wouldn’t want to be murdered(some suicidal people might), golden rule, blah blah. They could say so, maybe I don’t, why is it wrong I kill whatever I want and live however I want, maybe some is more risky, but does that make it wrong? Is sky diving immoral? Deep sea diving? Everything risky to your own death is immoral? If so this a first to me.

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Not all people would submit if the system oppressed their views, Hitler was right when he stated in ‘Mein Kampf’ that the majority of humanity is cowardly and selfish when their lives are at stake, but what right did he have to exploit that, there can be no justification for what he did, nor what Stalin did. Objective moral laws are affirmed as objective by the use of thought and common sense whether they are relative or not-cruelty and fear are the sides of the same coin, it’s not as if people were born evil it’s due a mass complexity of psychological and sociological reasons, but people who impose belief by oppression refuse to accept the relativity of it all and will murder for the sake of their beliefs, everyone knows life is worth more than an ideology, they’re just too cowardly to admit it. And as for whether putting your own life at risk is immoral, then you would have to look at the consequences, if it’s harmless fun then that’s a choice down to you, imo suicide is one of the most selfish thing you could do, think of the loved ones you would be leaving behind, think of the emotional devastation you’ll put them through.

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Morals are triggered maybe by emotions and selfpreservation/common sense.

At least for me it seems so. I find the thought of killing or injuring an innocent human repulsive. Not immoral but, repulsive. To defend against an attacking human, I feel justified and righteous, not morally correct.

Morals may be just the word attached to a given set of normal reactions of emotional stress. Society advances the general positive emotion by creating laws to keep actions from causing emotional distress for the general public.

Common sense/selfpreservation says that if we all went around behaving as criminals we will eventually become the victim, and those that we are attached to will become victims. Morals is just a blanket word to cover a set of circumstances that the public generally find right or wrong due to emotional reactions and logical common sense.

But, there are subsets of morals according to beliefs and cultures, this is where conflict arises. We find it difficult to grasp that our subsets of morals are not followed. These subsets seem to be more emotional than they are common sense or selfpreservation. They are more in line with emotional social preservation.

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You are still missing the point. So what you’re saying is if it’s painful it’s wrong, if it’s pleasureable it’s right? I see many problems with that. Dad rapes and beats his daughter, but the daughter likes it, is that immoral?

I’m bringing up the point that if morals as you say they are, are constucts of ourselves, and there is no transcendent base in which to anchor your beliefs on, you have no stance in which to make value judgements, all you can say is well… that’s just my relative beliefs, in which case they’re not objective. You keep saying it’s common sense, maybe for you it seems that way, but what about those who observe other purposes, killing the innocent for their God is no big deal to some, do you call that immoral or moral? Shouldn’t it be common sense that it’s wrong? But they don’t believe so. Then you run into causes, if the cause is good well, then it’s now morally ok, however, you can’t even stand on whether or not it’s a good cause.

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Freedom: Independence, an absence of dependence.
Indifference.

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Mind clarifying how that helps your argument?

Also, you never addressed this point in another thread (the humanism one)

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If we’re born innately having morals, it just proves that much more that they are relative and not objective. It just proves that much more that without a Transcendent base our morals are just opinions, and opinions we feel good because we feel so are the conclusions.

The biblical God is above all, he created the universe, and if you believe this than his law is objective, and you have a valid stance to say why something is wrong.

Now I won’t go through the process of repeating my points I’ve restated over and over that many of you keep ignoring for w/e reason. Whether atheist or theist, I’d still agree with such a belief.