Argument from morality

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The argument from morality is one of several arguments for the existence of God. This argument comes in different forms, all aiming to prove God’s existence from the evidence of morality in the world.

Contents 1 The argument 2 Variation 1: Moral sanctions 2.1 Criticism 3 Variation 2: Transcendentality of morality 3.1 Criticism 4 Variation 3: Moral order (Kant) 4.1 Criticism 5 General criticisms 6 External links

[edit] The argument

All forms of the moral argument begin with the observation of moral normativity. That is, human beings are typically aware of actions as being right and wrong. This awareness seems to bind us toward certain obligations, regardless of our personal goals and ends. In this sense, moral qualities have the appearance of universality and objectivity.

In its most general form, the moral argument takes the following form:

1. Moral normativity exists.
2. The best explanation of moral normativity is God.
3. Therefore God exists. (from 1 and 2)

What follows are some of the more common variations of the moral argument. The list is by no means exhaustive.

[edit] Variation 1: Moral sanctions

1. Moral norms exist and have authority.
2. If they have authority, there must be a reliable motive for human beings to be moral.
3. No such motive could exist, unless there were an omniscient, omnipresent, wholly just agent to attach sanctions to behavior under moral norms.
4. Therefore God exists.

One may ask why the required recognition and upholding of moral norms must be carried out by divine intelligence, as opposed to human intelligence. A. E. Taylor explains that the moral law holds everywhen and everywhere, whereas the human mind is limited in its comprehension and scope. Only a sovereign God could properly detect infringements of the moral law and apply sanctions. In his Letter concerning Toleration, John Locke contends that one of the few religious stances that the commonwealth cannot tolerate is atheism, for atheists have no motive to act upon their promises and oaths.

[edit] Criticism

Critics assert that laws can carry normative force without being derived from an act of legislation. Here are some examples:

• If someone affirms both "p" and "p implies q", he or she cannot deny "q".
• It is wrong to believe both "p" and "not-p" at the same time.

These laws carry clear normative force over our speech and thought. Yet, one does not feel compelled to posit the existence of a Great Logician in the sky to sanction infringements of these laws. In this light, the argument is seen to rest on the following questionable assumption: "All authoritative norms are based on the acts of a legislator." However, some theistic philosophers maintain that even such "norms of reason" derive their authority from God in some fashion.

Furthermore, critics assert that this argument denies one of the main features of moral normativity. The two norms of reason given above can be thought of as being intrinsically normative. A rule such as, "If you want to stay healthy, exercise daily", on the other hand, is extrinsicially normative, since its normative force derives from a secondary desire (the desire to stay healthy). The given argument, and its thought that God must exist to attach a fail-safe system of rewards and punishments to moral rules, concedes that moral facts are not intrinsically normative. Bindingness attaches to them only in so far as they engage with a secondary desire (the desire to avoid punishment).

Some critics might also attack (3) on the grounds that such a motive does exist in humanity's collective desire to prevent a state of nature by instituting a social contract, leading to governments which create laws that could be considered moral norms.

[edit] Variation 2: Transcendentality of morality

1. Moral facts exist.
2. Moral facts are transcendental in nature.
3. The best explanation of there being transcendental moral facts is provided by theism.
4. Therefore the existence of moral facts provides good grounds for thinking theism is true.

Here, a transcendental fact is one that cannot be stated entirely in the language of the natural sciences, and that is true irrespective of human opinion. Theism provides the most intelligible explanation for such moral facts via the notion that rightness is one and the same property as the property of being commanded by God (wrongness consists in being forbidden by God).

In order for this argument to work, it should be shown that a non-theistic worldview cannot adequately account for transcendental normative facts. Historically, the burden of proof has been placed on the non-theist to demonstrate a naturalistic metaphysics for morals, as both proponents and opponents of the moral argument tend to agree that morality may be a phenomenon which shows that there is more to the real world than meets the physicalist's eye.

[edit] Criticism

Critics point out this argument's appeal to a divine command theory of ethics. Objections to divine command theories of ethics are numerous, most stemming from forms of the Euthyphro dilemma. Is an action good because God commanded it, or did God command it because it is good? The first horn would imply that what is good is arbitrary; God decides what is right and wrong in the same way that a government decides which side of the street cars should drive on. This seems unreasonable. The second horn would imply that God made his commands in accordance with transcendental facts that exist apart from God - exactly the types of facts that the theist is asking the non-theist to provide an account for. The argument is thus turned over on its head: the theist must account for the existence of these transcendental facts without invoking God. The non-theist can thus recognize the transcendentality of moral facts and yet still reject premise (2.3) on the basis that a theistic hypothesis still leaves transcendental moral facts unexplained.

Proponents of the argument maintain that the Euthyphro dilemma can be adequately resolved. Thomas Aquinas, for example, explains that God indeed commands something because it is good, but the reason it is good is that good is an essential part of God's nature. Some criticize such a response as exhibiting circularity, although it could be called a false premise to say that God's nature or actions can precede one another when the definition is a being that transcends time.

[edit] Variation 3: Moral order (Kant)

1. The summum bonum is where moral virtue and happiness coincide.
2. We are rationally obliged to attain the summum bonum.
3. What we are obliged to attain, it must be possible for us to attain.
4. If there is no God or afterlife, it is not possible to attain the summum bonum.
5. God (or the afterlife) must exist.

Premises (3.1) and (3.2) reflect Immanuel Kant's belief that behaving morally should lead to happiness. Premise (3.3) tells us that “ought implies can”. It cannot be true that we ought to seek an end if there is no chance of our attaining it. Premise (3.4) points to the fact that the world as it appears to us is governed by morally blind causes. These causes give no hope whatsoever that pursuit of moral virtue will lead to happiness. They do not even give hope that we can become morally virtuous. Human agency is beset by weaknesses that make the attainment of virtue — in the absence of external aid — seem impossible. The being postulated in (3.5) has omniscience and omnipotence combined with perfect goodness. Thus it will ensure that the pursuit of a virtuous state is possible through external aid (as in grace) and will promise an immortality where the moral journey can be completed. It will also ensure that in the long run happiness will result from virtue. Its existence would mean that there is a perfect moral causality at work in the world.

[edit] Criticism

Kant himself asserts that if the summum bonum cannot be attained, then the moral law which bids us to seek it “must be fantastic and directed to imaginary ends and must therefore in itself be false”. Critics point out a certain type of circularity: Kant's argument presupposes that both the pursuit of moral virtue and the pursuit of happiness must be rational enterprises; however, this is precisely the sort of thing that may not be true in a non-theistic universe. Kant's conception of God arises as an attempt to harmonize these two conflicting goals, but critics assert that practical reason is not committed to the pursuit of two ends that apparently conflict.

[edit] General criticisms

All these variations depend in some way on premise (1): that moral normativity is a real objective phenomenon. Some critics reject this very first premise, rendering all subsequent argumentation moot. Morality, they argue, may have the strong appearance of objectivity but is actually relative.

For example, it is possible to view moral values as social or evolutionary constructs, created by certain individuals or groups to abridge the behavior of another group to benefit themselves or others like themselves. To illustrate, a mother who has been abandoned by her partner may teach her sons not to cheat on their wives to spare other women from her pain, eventually leading to the concepts of monogamy and chastity. In this way, morality originates as a principle of self-preservation. But as it is propagated, it is ingrained into the younger generation and colors their conception of morality. Friedrich Nietzsche provides elaborate explanations of this sort of how initially amoral social practices became artificially colored with moral significance. In modern science, similar explanations of the phenomenon of morality have been given and analyzed through fields like evolutionary psychology and game theory.

[edit] External links

• Immanuel Kant's Moral Argument for the Existence of God
• Moral Arguments at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Moral Argument by C. S. Lewis