Amid all these thoughts about where morality comes from, it strikes me that I haven’t written anything about why I think it even matters. As long as we have a sense of right and wrong, it keeps us out of trouble (mostly) and it allows us to get along in the world, what difference does it make how it got here?
This question is important to me from two perspectives. First and probably most important (again, at least for me) is that anything as foundational as our sense of morality should be open to examination. Not just “what” is morally right or wrong, but “what makes it so?” When I was a kid growing up as one of Jehovah’s witnesses in north central Illinois, questions like this simply never came up. I “knew” that all the answers I needed were in the Bible; if they weren’t, they weren’t important. (I’ve heard this line of reasoning used in both Christian and Muslim historical accounts as a rationale for dismissing scientific inquiry. I suggest this is specious reasoning, but I digress!) When I had a question requiring some kind of weighing of alternatives, I’d go to the Bible for the answer. Or probably more specifically, I’d go to the Watchtower’s Society’s literature which would point me to the appropriate scripture. (Looking back, I wonder at this attitude of acceptance; today I can’t imagine this lack of critical thinking, but at the time it simply didn’t occur to me to question any further. Critical thinking is another blog post though.)
Then one day I started thinking about what I had simply accepted without question up until then. It started with a particular line of reasoning that went something like:
1. I’m one of a relatively small group of people who enjoy God’s exclusive favor (or so I thought).
2. The reason I’m in this group is because my Dad is. This is true in most cultures: people tend to stay in the belief system in which they were raised. If he had stayed a Methodist I would have been raised a Methodist.
3. Thus, an accident of birth determined that I received God’s favor.
Seems kind of capricious of God, doesn’t it?
It goes beyond that three-step logic chain, but in any case the more I thought about what I believed and why, the more questions were raised. The exact process is for other posts, but what I’m getting to is I no longer just accept things “because.” Important beliefs not only should be open to question, I would suggest they MUST be questioned.
The second issue for me is the knee-jerk reaction I get from people who say “If there is no god, why be a good person?” I know lots of highly moral atheists and agnostics (in fact, in many cases they seem to me to have a higher sense of morality than many “Christians” I know!), so this line of reasoning seems counter to my personal observations. If the justification for being a moral person doesn’t necessarily come from God, where DOES it come from?
It seems a reasonable question to examine.
About BigBill
Stats: Married male boomer.
Hobbies: Hiking, woodworking, reading, philosophy, good conversation.
Why even ask the question?
Amid all these thoughts about where morality comes from, it strikes me that I haven’t written anything about why I think it even matters. As long as we have a sense of right and wrong, it keeps us out of trouble (mostly) and it allows us to get along in the world, what difference does it make how it got here?
This question is important to me from two perspectives. First and probably most important (again, at least for me) is that anything as foundational as our sense of morality should be open to examination. Not just “what” is morally right or wrong, but “what makes it so?” When I was a kid growing up as one of Jehovah’s witnesses in north central Illinois, questions like this simply never came up. I “knew” that all the answers I needed were in the Bible; if they weren’t, they weren’t important. (I’ve heard this line of reasoning used in both Christian and Muslim historical accounts as a rationale for dismissing scientific inquiry. I suggest this is specious reasoning, but I digress!) When I had a question requiring some kind of weighing of alternatives, I’d go to the Bible for the answer. Or probably more specifically, I’d go to the Watchtower’s Society’s literature which would point me to the appropriate scripture. (Looking back, I wonder at this attitude of acceptance; today I can’t imagine this lack of critical thinking, but at the time it simply didn’t occur to me to question any further. Critical thinking is another blog post though.)
Then one day I started thinking about what I had simply accepted without question up until then. It started with a particular line of reasoning that went something like:
1. I’m one of a relatively small group of people who enjoy God’s exclusive favor (or so I thought).
2. The reason I’m in this group is because my Dad is. This is true in most cultures: people tend to stay in the belief system in which they were raised. If he had stayed a Methodist I would have been raised a Methodist.
3. Thus, an accident of birth determined that I received God’s favor.
Seems kind of capricious of God, doesn’t it?
It goes beyond that three-step logic chain, but in any case the more I thought about what I believed and why, the more questions were raised. The exact process is for other posts, but what I’m getting to is I no longer just accept things “because.” Important beliefs not only should be open to question, I would suggest they MUST be questioned.
The second issue for me is the knee-jerk reaction I get from people who say “If there is no god, why be a good person?” I know lots of highly moral atheists and agnostics (in fact, in many cases they seem to me to have a higher sense of morality than many “Christians” I know!), so this line of reasoning seems counter to my personal observations. If the justification for being a moral person doesn’t necessarily come from God, where DOES it come from?
It seems a reasonable question to examine.
About BigBill
Stats: Married male boomer. Hobbies: Hiking, woodworking, reading, philosophy, good conversation.