Greg Koukl - What Follows?

Taken from our blog, Greg Koukl of Stand to Reason looks at the question, "What follows if you don't think that any religion is true?". For more information, visit http://www.str.org.

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• philosophy
• apologetics

[1noen1]

"by getting together and figuring it out"  = Pragmatism Cf. Richard Rorty.

[randyhelzerman]

lol thanks ncs901, I do hope you make videos, I would look forward to seeing them.

[ncs901]

Yeah good answers lol..I'm going to have to think about you response more, and also some more questions if that's OK.

Im going to start videos as well, so perhaps you might see a video from me.

This also shows me I really have to study these certain ethical issues more in depth ( e,g,, biblical slavery and polygamy.

Anyway, thanks for the discussion and look forward to a response.

[randyhelzerman]

(cont, to ncs901) Also, as Abraham lincoln famously said in is 2nd innagural, both sides prayed to the same god, both invoked the Bible to support there positions.....the bible just couldn't be used to adjudicate here. Remember, that was a much more religious time; almost everybody in the north and the south believed the bible was the rule of life. Anyways, i hope this answers your questions ok....

[randyhelzerman]

(cont, to ncs901) I think the question of "whose side wins" becomse so much HARDER when you try to ground morality in a theistic perspective. Most christians think its only moral to marry 1 wife, most muslims think its moral to marry up to 4. Both presumably think this morality is underwritten by their god, but how do you tell who is right? Even if you agreed on the Bible, for example, that doesn't help. The Bible doesn't prohibit polygamy, for example. Why did monogomy win? (cont)

[randyhelzerman]

(cont, to ncs901) your question "What if there exists an ethical disagreement on an issue, whose side wins?" is a very good question. But I think that the question is much easier to answer from an atheist perspective than from a theistic perspective. There's no one way to decide who wins, it depends on the moral in question. Slavery was decided in one way, equal rights for women was decided in another, elimination of debtor's prisons was decided in another, etc (cont)

[randyhelzerman]

(cont, to ncs901) we didn't invent computers. We don't need god to underwrite or ground the superiority of computers to pencil and paper. Computers just ARE better at adding up lot of numbers than pencil and paper are. Similarly, freedom just IS better than slavery. But a free society is something we invented. I believe we can--just like we invent things like computers--we can also invent better ways of being, we can invent new morals. (cont)

[randyhelzerman]

Hi ncs901, thanks, I always try to discuss things in goodwill. I also believe that whether, say, slavery, is good or not, is independent of whether everybody agrees with it or not. But that is still consistent with morality being invented by us. For example, I think that computers are objectively better than pencil and paper when it comes to adding up lots of numbers :-) I think that anybody who doesn't think so is wrong :-) But this doesn't mean that (cont)

[ncs901]

Which seems like a sort of normative relativism-we "ought" to do what people decide on what we should do.

So let me also ask you this:

What if there exists an ethical disagreement on an issue, whose side wins

Also when does a certain moral principle become objective?

Thanks again. I'm mainly here for experience..You seem like a smart guy whose interested in truth.

[ncs901]

Hello Randy. Sorry I didn't respond earlier. Anyway, let me press you with some comments and questions.

( capitalization is only for emphasis)

"eventually we figured out slavery was wrong. "

Well a key factor when it comes to objective morality, is this: To say a certain objective moral principle is wrong , is to say it is wrong INDEPENDENT of whether any one believes it or not.

What your suggesting seems to be saying the opposite, that morality is DEPENDANT on the people.