Where does morality come from? (VFX Street Preaching Week #2)

[ProtestantsRUs]

Morality comes from Christianity, specifically Jesus' teachings. The Lord laid down His morality, and humanity has followed it, whether we like it or not

[SkinheadSaint]

WOW! talk about neglect of context to shove atheist dogma...

[A4thinker]

@Evid3nc3, you've made a fundamental error in this video. You state that natural selection explains morality because it has survival value for the species as a whole. Now whilst I agree that natural selection is responsible for morality, you're talking about something called 'group selection' which has long been abandoned in biology. Look up 'selfish gene' theory and you'll see that natural selection acts on genes, not even on an individual, never mind a species.

[OliverKako]

I find it hard to believe that God needs to use a nomad tribe to kill another tribe when he can do with the click of his fingers.

[UndeadClown95]

I must say VenomFangX your moral compass is so fucked up I will be surprised if you make it back to the parking lot.

What movie? Someone's seen it

[UndeadClown95]

Dude I wanna like see VenomFangX street preaching so I can run up and kick his ass. He would feel good in the long run he would think God would reward him for it. So I'll make sure his reward is good and use a baseball bat if i have one.

Thats how my morality works BITCH LMAO

[Lukyo1984]

Moral intuition? First of all morality doesn't exist in the natural world, there is no basis to deem some actions good and others evil. Even if it did morality would actually hamper a creatures ability to survive. True morality demands a creature to sacrifice himself for the benefit of other creatures which could possible kill the creature before passing on the trait of moral intuition.

[ubermensch826]

Yeah now that I think about it, the Westboro Baptist Church is the most logically consistent religious group out there.

[thevoyce123]

I believe we can both agree, at least, that morals imply right and wrong. What is the meaning of right and wrong, and what is the basis of comparison for right and wrong? Is not right and wrong purely subjective?

[lgbuzals]

It would be nice to see a similar study tested on American children of Christian parents. However, I wonder how many of them would know the story of Jericho. Perhaps a different story would need to be used.

[monkeyundertree]

Great video!! Thank you for making all the nice vidoes! Please keep making them!

[christinepeace]

Hey fellow atheist and I am guessing fellow toronto dweller. Nice video and am subbing you asap.

Cheers Christine

[graciousSenor]

That's one argument used by my theist friends which irritates me most. Morals necessitate a moral law giver. How? How is it absurd to say we can account for morals with natural selection, adaption and survival over time and through evolution.

[dablue1]

@graciousSenor The easiest way to prove that your morals are not objective but subjective is to ask your theist friend a series of questions. (I use this one) Is killing good or evil? when someone verbally harasses you? in self defense? in wartime? because you feel threatened? If they don't believe in your personal religion? by accident? if the person you kill does bad this? or is a murderer? or rapist? or pedophile? Most people will answer things like this differently.

[dablue1]

@graciousSenor cont.

If people or the same religion answer these differently then they are showing how something that they believe to be morally objective is actually subjective.

If they believe killing in self defense is morally OK and killing in general is bad then they are not acting on a moral objective.

They are using the context of the situation to determine if the action was OK which is why we can say morals are subjective and differ with each person.

[grammaticus00]

I would not have put it better.

[emeralds222]

Excellent video. I'm going to mark this as one of my favorites.

[LoganApostolicVision]

This is me, SoUlunSettled. I don't have time to argue everyone who has a belief. To many people. Lol I can pray for you. You cannot stop me. I will continue in the word. If someone say's "there is no truth", the statement, "there is no truth is a lie", Because there is NO truth. The Bible is my School Master. I will not be convinced any other doctrine. You must not either. So as we part, Good luck on your journey & I pray blessings for your life. My commision is to Love. I want to fulfill that.

[CBALLEN]

Merlin claims that he "used' to be a Christian,get him to tell you about it sometime.He claims to believe God is evil,but being a product of natural selection and mutations,I just don't see where he arrives at calling anyone evil,since evil can't exist in a purly natural universe.Go figure.

[LoganApostolicVision]

Jesus said in the last days man would call evil good and good evil. If a woman doesn't want a child she can kill it at birth, That's fine. For me to say Jesus loves you is evil? You believe what you want. I have an elderly lady who spent 30 yrs praying for me everyday in severe pain & Am going to Pray for her. Spend your life as you please.When I was on the bar stool or drinking/drugging with the good ol boys I was liked. Now I'm a Misfit because I say, Love? Beat yout head against a wall.

[sOuLunSettled]

Sorry for typo's! Faith without works is void. You cannot earn salvation. You cannot come to the Father but by the Son. You can Debate til your blue in the face And God with still Judge your life, Even to the thought. I hope one day you pick up your bible & through the HolySpirit begin to find the Love in it all. You talk bad about my father like you know him personally! I love people & Care about 7 Billion Souls on Planet earth. This Street preacher does to! Iam one also :) Is he harming you?

[SuperMerlin100]

Did you not watch the video?

And if you did what does your comment say about your morals if your defending god a genecidal monster!

[sOuLunSettled]

Well, If you understood Old t New Testiment,. Haf a relationship with Jesus, You would understand when paul said we don't fight against flesh & blood But Principalities & wickedness in high places. We spread the Gospel, God will judge just the unwicked, He sits at the Throne. Your religion on YouTube if wrong is sending people to Hell. Poll that in your mind! IK the outcome, Blame God. Circular reasoning! Does The sermon on the mount endanger people? Are Spreaders of the Gospel evil doers? WWJD

[SuperMerlin100]

Yes, yes the bible is evil. The evil is still there in the new testament.

[zecnobot]

5 Stars!

[GoforBroke4]

Now, now evid3nce3. I thought you were smarter than this.

Can it be scientifically tested whether religious people are more moral or not? If it turns out they are, will you admit that you were wrong?

As well, what the experiment you quoted really showed was the nationality and not religion is what affects morals.

[Evid3nc3]

Absolutely. Show me a study where non-Israeli Christian children are tested and don't give pretty much the exact same answers, and I will believe it.

You can't say it "was nationality" and it "was not religion" from the study alone. All you can say is that it may have just been their nationality and not their religion. The test I recommended above (do it with American Christian children) would put an end to that question.

[sammygee17]

i think tamarins experiment is flawed (if it is testing whether or not religion was a significant factor in judging whether or not joshuas military campaigns were morally good) because 'jewish' is a nationality as well as a religion ...

[kingasaurus]

I would agree if not for the fact that I suspect American fundamentalist Christians, who have no ethnic or national loyalty to Israel, would nonetheless answer the two competing questions in the same way the Israeli children did. Their loyalty would be religious in character. The excuse-making that bible adherents make for Old Testament mass killing by the "chosen" people is nothing new.

[1clevername]

I see where you are coming from in certain situations but why give to the poor or help those in need if it has nothing to do with your success as an individual. Why not just murder those who get in your way especially if you are sure you will get away with it. Getting caught is the only reason not to do evil.

[Evid3nc3]

"Getting caught is the only reason not to do evil."

One of the best reasons not to murder, etc. is because if everyone acted like that, our species would quickly cease to exist.

Probably the greatest evolutionary stride made by Homo Sapiens was the ability to look outside of one's individual self and see how helping others does help one's self.

[DeemotheAthiest]

Helping the needy can is done for different reasons by Atheists and Theists

Theists help the needy to gain gods approval and secure a good place in heaven. (this might not be the initial reason but it does play a part)

an Atheist helps the needy because they dont like seeing their fellow humans suffer.

while both are helping i would prefer it if the only reason they helped was because it brought satisfaction from helping a fellow human.

[xCrazyJayx]

Well, to be fair, not all theists believe in god the same way as a religous person does Deemono. (You can believe in higher power or god, without believing in heaven or hell or religion.)

[pricer5]

How did those animals get their moral intuition in the first place?

[Evid3nc3]

That is a question that is probably addressed in the book "The Science of Good and Evil".

There are a lot of things about us that have a clear evolutionary advantage (like suspecting that shadows are possible predators) that we don't necessarily know the genetic origin of yet.

[gato77777]

Ok, so there's no question that Morals exist but then you mixed matched your answer.

If you are talking about 'morals' but then ask if they come from a Being who is immaterial,,,,

Don't you see there is no correlation between the 2?

[gato77777]

sorry, I meant to say,, like you said,, a material Being.. thus mixed matching moral with a material Being..

:>

[Evid3nc3]

Your wording is a little unclear here..

I didn't say "morals exist" in a metaphysical sense. I said that it is clear that we (human beings) have a moral *intuition*.

The rest of your comment doesn't make sense to me..

[gato77777]

Ok, sorry about my bad English...

But the point is this,,

Somehow to you and everyone I know knows that we DO have this moral *intuition* about what is good and what is wrong,, it is indeed ingrained in our hearts,, so,, I don't see the correlation you try to make with morality and a Being of whom we have no physical evidence,, an immaterial Being,,

Isn't it obvious that = morality is immaterial,, the giver of Morality is immaterial,,

[gato77777]

so I don't know why you are looking for evidence for a material Being when morality is immaterial as well...

[Evid3nc3]

I understand that moral intuition seems like this when you think about it in the abstract. But the reality is that we actually have ways to measure moral intuition, to see it as a concrete force that affects our actions in a concrete way.

An example of this is to ask 1000 people if they think that killing is wrong. If 100% of them say "yes" then we have reasonable evidence that they all have the same moral intuition, and, therefore, that moral intuition exists.

You can't do this with God.

[gato77777]

How do you measure moral intuition?,, You think there's a chance,, in the future perhaps,, for a medicine to cure evil?

[Evid3nc3]

You can measure whether people have a common moral intuition, yes. By seeing if they give the same answers to moral dilemmas. It was done in the book "The Science of Good and Evil" and it was done in the very video you are commenting on.

I never said that morality had anything to do with medicine. That is obviously absurd. Just because you can measure something, that doesn't mean it has anything to do with medicine.

[gato77777]

So, you think morals are rather subjective than objective? that is since, somehow, morality could be 'measured' by people's responses to its dilemmas..

Science of Good and Evil?,, I wonder what kind of science this book is pretending to make... Would it rather be called,, "Views from scientists on philosophical problems about Good and Evil"??

[Evid3nc3]

No the difference between scientists and the religious (and/or philosophers) is that scientists actually do TESTS for their beliefs. So the guy who wrote the book doesn't just believe his assertions about morality without testing them. It is actually superior to the religious approach because religious people just believe whatever is in their books without testing it.

[gato77777]

So, are you of the view that b4 you believe something you must test whether it is true or not?

I believe that view is called evidentialism but for what I know, we humans do not need evidence for all of our beliefs.

[Evid3nc3]

If the morality is applied to all humans on earth, it is objective not subjective. Subjective morality says each individual human gets their own version of morality.

That is not what the bio-ethics community is going for. They are proposing an objective system.

[gato77777]

Hmm,, proposing an objective system, that is rather confusing. At least for me it is.

[terminaldeity]

So is Kantian ethics. The Metaphysics of Morals by Kant is an important piece of literature that I implore everyone to read. It proposes the idea of universal morality without bringing God into the equation.

[gato77777]

Great wishful thinking in Kant's metaphysics.. no doubt

[terminaldeity]

Most people already live by a sense of duty

[Akatam0t0ma]

The basis of all human morality is the Golden Rule, which basically says "treat others as you wish to be treated". This law exists in many religious texts from various unrelated cultures, and it predates the Bible by many years.

[SuperMerlin100]

That rule is flawed if people start shooting at you and you still treat them like you wish to be treated you're probably going to die.

[2ravenf0x2]

sadly I have nothing to comment on this response seeings how are using examples from Richard Dawkins who I have read back and forth and watched his lectures. I have found though he is intellegent yes, he is insulting and full of himself because of that intellegence and thinks he is better then any other person. God Bless!

[Evid3nc3]

I agree that arrogance is an undesirable character trait. But it has nothing to do with whether a person is right.

I think that VFX is extremely arrogant in many of his videos. But I hear him out because he may have a point.

In any case, the study I cite in my video wasn't even done by Richard Dawkins. It was done by the Israeli psychologist, George Tamirin. Dawkins merely references the study.

[Boepyne]

Very good. I'd forgotton that example from Richard Dawkins book. Thanks

[Evid3nc3]

Glad to remind you of the excellent study he cited. Best wishes.

[KasparHauser4]

I think I have intuitively known this for years. Here in the USA many of the major christian denominations have no position on the war in Iraq. I kept asking all who would listen how could the denominations with no articulated position on a war we are actively engaged in be considered a moral leader of it's flock? If all the Churches spoke up in unison and spoke with a loud voice against the war it would have been over in a heartbeat. But for the most part they stand cowardly mute.

[KamratSvenneryd]

Great videos man, hope you will keep on going with this video-series. :)

[Evid3nc3]

Thanks!