That quote gets thrown around this forum pretty often. There is truth to it, but how much? I'm interested in when morality becomes objective. What about:

Deist worldview?
Islamic worldview?
Another Christian sect's worldview?
Worldview for another member of the same Christian sect as you, who differs on several moral issues?
Worldview for another member of the same Christian sect as you, who differs on only one moral issue?

Atheism <------------------------------------> Your version of morality

At what point does objective morality become "allowed for"?

Femaleism does not allow for objective car driving!

On a more serious note, I have never understood why "godgiven" is automatically assumed to mean "correct".

I think the flawed logic goes something like this godgiven -> objective -> correct. I guess it makes sense if you assume god is someone who can't be wrong (aka removing the burden of proof by invoking the invisible unicorn), the problem being that in the 3 Abrahamic religions this is not so.

It's possible that the phrase "objective morality" is an oxymoron. Morality is prescriptive and therefore depends on an issuing authority, which means it is not objective imo.

For example, the morality issued by God is backed by God's authority, and weighted accordingly. The morality issued by your cousin Bob is backed by your cousin Bob's authority, etc. In other words, since a morality is necessarily paired with a source to derive its value, it does not exist in an independent, or objective, sense.

You're describing what most would call "moral relativism" and I would assume that most of people here would disagree with you.

If you and I were stranded on a desert island and the two of us were 100% sure that we were never going to see another living person for the rest of our lives, it would still be morally wrong for me to rape you.

Logically, it's just wrong and it's wrongness is not at all dependent on some decree from an authority figure.

Lol, for reals? Care to demonstrate a logically derived morality?

I could, but I'm not going to. Just for future reference, more people will probably be more willing to debate you if you didn't start your argument with "lol."

Instead, I'll just give you a link.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critique_of_Pure_Reason

For future reference, less people would lol @ you if you didn't post things like "it's just wrong" and then follow-up your decree with "it's wrongness is not at all dependent on some decree from an authority figure" and nothing else.

I just wish that people could learn to argue without being demeaning. If you want something clarified, you could just ask. I realize it's the Internet, but jesus. You can disagree and be civil about it.

In very crude terms, Kant argues that an action is wrong if general practice of that action would create a paradox. For example: dishonesty. In order to to gain something by lying to someone, you have to deceive an honest person. In a world where everyone is dishonest, you can't betray someone's trust. There is no trust to betray. Hence, general dishonesty creates a paradox and therefore it is wrong.

Whether you buy that or is irrelevant imo because you are defending an absurd principle.

You're claiming that there is nothing inherently wrong with FGM.
You're arguing that it is morally fine to fart in a crowded elevator.
You're arguing that it's okay for me to rape you on a desert island.

Why should I bother continue to argue with that? Can I prove to you that any of the above is wrong? Absolutely not. I can't prove that they are wrong anymore than I can prove that 2+2=4.

There are certain basic premises or axoims in life you need to be able to accept as true without proof or else you are not going to be able to prove anything.

So far you have made a lot of noises but have yet to show anything is inherently wrong or even what that could possibly mean, creating a "paradox" notwithstanding.

And no, just because everyone has to start with unproven premises does not make your or Kant's particular set of unproven premises worth diddly.

If you need a higher power to tell you that it's wrong to fart in a crowded elevator, there isn't much I can do for you.

We've reached my axioms that I accept without proof.

All I can say is that I reject moral relativism and if you are a theist, it's kind of disturbing that you don't.

If God determines what is "good," then saying "God is good" is synonymous with saying "God approves of himself." If there is no standard of morality to hold God to, he is basically a tyrant. He is morally no better or worse than Satan who I'm sure also approves of himself.

What a sad, sad world you live in.

I'm interested in questions like this, but have no formal philosophy training etc.

I would argue that "morality" is an invented concept and therefore "moral" or "immoral" acts are defined by the creators of the concept and cannot exist objectively ("Justice" would be another example of a value judgement which I would not accept existed objectively). This is not presupposed on atheism or theism - the only difference is who sets the rules.

My simple view is that I believe that a test of morality is "treat others as you would have them treat yourself". I would argue that this doctorine is perfectly sensible and a good way to test morality of uncertain acts.

The use of "God" here is precarious. The way you have phrased it, all of the circumstances from the OP apply. However, that's not how you mean it (I think). Is the morality issued by your god is the same as the morality issued by your neighbor's god?

Also, is objective (absolute) morality any better than subjective morality? Many theists seem to think so, but I disagree. In real world practice, there isn't much, if any, of a distinction between the two.

Depends what you mean by "wrong" though.

I thought about the god vs god dilemma. The fact is that if there is no True God, there is no true morality, and everyone's version of morality is subjective to their creation of their god.

However, if there is a God of the biblical sense atleast, there is an objective morality as God is defined as being perfect goodness, justice, mercy, etc.

It's just a matter of if it's true or not. And those who are religious will probably each believe their own religion is true. So it is up to us as humans to seek out the truth with as little bias as possible so we can learn the truth. Any man who seeks the truth honestly will be looked on favorably by God, even if what he finds is not the truth, as God knows our intellects and wills are clouded.

Isn't it enough to point out different cultures throughout history that have not worshipped the Christian God and see that they all had moral codes.

Personally, I find this one of the more annoying topics because its pretty obvious that people have developed and acted by moral codes throughout recorded history (and throughout the world today) without any knowledge of (or need for) the Christian god.

The fact that Christians can't figure out that there's perfectly good reasons to not murder people without God telling them so exposes some pretty frightening limitations on their intellect.

If morality just means doing whats right/wrong good/bad then i absolutely dont like to hit myself in the head with a hammer, so that might count.

Possibly, depending on which of my neighbors you're talking about.

The phrase "objective morality" does not make any sense that I can see.

+1

Actually, the fact that many people did have moral codes is reason to believe there is a God who implanted this sense of a moral right vs wrong in people's hearts.

So you admit that god was sloppy work the day he made hitler, stalin, jeffrey damher etc?

yet more brilliant logic. people are generally good therefore there must be a god.

Morality is normative. I don't see why authority is a necessary feature of all normative judgements. I can see why it is necessary that they be true. But I don't see why I need someone with authority telling me to so. In fact, it seems to me that the Euthyphro objection decisively refutes the claim that authority has an important justificatory role at all.

I also don't see why your view that morality is grounded in something means it is not objective. Scientific claims are objective (yes?). Scientific claims are grounded in facts about the physical world.

It is "allowed for" atheists. It is possible that morality is not universal or objective. But there are millions of atheists who do believe in universal or objective morality. Many of the most prominent defenders of universal or objective morality are atheists. I don't see any important connection between a belief in objective morality and religion at all.

If anyone wants to assert claim that the atheist worldview does not allow for objective morality, they should show the aspect of the "atheistic worldview" that is inconsistent with an acceptance of universal morality.

What would an objective moral in an atheistic construct be grounded in?

Authority is the source of the relevance of normative judgements to others.

The physical world has properties which anyone can independently confirm. Morality is prescriptive, not descriptive.

It could be grounded in the natural world, in a Platonic realm of forms, in human reason, in human desires, in pretty much the same things that it would be grounded in for the theist (except the commands or character of God).