Objective Morality is not God's Work

My opponent charges me with attacking a strawman of his position, yet he provides absolutely no claims to support this baseless assertion. A strawman argument is a deliberate caricature of one's position that is attacked in place of his actual argument, yet I did no such thing in pre-emptively attacking his argument. Indeed, I simply followed his own definition of morality (As offered in R1) and showed why it is incoherent. As we will see, my opponent does not attempt to respond to most of the criticisms I offered last around. Let me start by bringing up two particularly devestating objections. Self-Refutation1. EmpiricismPro espouses a form of empiricism to which all knowledge is empirical. Accordingly, terms like "God" are meaningless, since the only knowledge we can have is empirical. Yet this is patently self-refuting, the very claim that all knowledge is derived empirically (and can only be empirical) cannot be proven empirically. Indeed, this is a philosophical presupposition about reality. Moreover, it completely ignores the fact that we have many beliefs which are not empirical in nature. Beliefs such as "contradictions cannot be true," "1.5+1.5=3," or "Truth exists" are not and cannot be empirical by nature. Empirical investigation, by contrast, presupposes these beliefs as binding in its very methodology and thus cannot be their ground.2. Defining GodPro defines God as being undefinable and appeals to this as a defense against many of my criticisms. This is self-refuting, since by defining God as undefinable, one has engaged in an act of definition. It would be like uttering in English the sentence "I cannot speak a word of English." Pro attempted absolutely no response to this, aside from a snide remark to Bertrand's paradox (Which is simply a sophistic quip that has absolutely no relevence to this). God is the Best Explanation for Moral ValuesPro admits that it is fair charge that he has "failed to provide a strong case for the origin of human values by naturalism." His latest response reinforces this notion, as it is wholly inadquate. Recall Pro's attempt to ground morality in survival benefit. In response, once can simply say "But why is survival good?" The problem is that any attempt to ground morality in survival benefit rests on some prior notion of the good, and hence survival benefit cannot ground value. Though he asks a lot of questions, Pro doesn't attempt to answer any of them. In essence, he has no response to my argument against evolutionary ethics. He writes, "My opponent’s question could also be phrased as ‘why is survival our standard of morality’, and I reason that it is so because we fear the alternative." Yet this provides absolutely no grounding for the existence of moral values. How exactly is "because we fear the alternative" supposed to ground the existence of objective value? Pro's position simply collapses into moral relativism. He does attempt to distinguish between pain and pleasure, arguing that it makes better sense to say that we act the way we do because of these considerations. Yet this fails as a ground of moral values. Avoidance of plain and maximization of pleasure may be a fine reason why we act morally (Indeed, Pro connects it with survival), but it isn't sufficient as a ground of moral value. Moreover, simply saying that this is better than the theistic explanation does not make it so. Pro provided absolutely no reason why the theistic explanation is a bad one.God Best Explains Equal Human Dignity and RightsPro's reasoning here is simply absurd. He writes: "Why is it so absurd to suggest that value can come from a valueless process?" The answer is simple: Something can't come from nothing. Contrary to what Pro suggests, if you have no money in your bank account, then writing a check for $100 will not magically create it from thin air. Once again, how can value emerge from pure valuelessness? Pro's "explanation" seems to be an appeal to moral relativism ("Why can man continually re-vamp everything that we know to be good?") -- yet the debate topic is over objective morality. It is therefore wholly inappropiate to appeal to moral relativism as a ground of moral objectivism. This is a laughable position if there ever was.As I said in the previous around, Pro's position is worse than magic. When a magician pulls a rabbit out of a hat, at least there is the hat. Pro's claim, however, reduces to the idea that intrinsic moral value can come out of thin air. You can't get something from nothing.Once again, how does naturalism ground equal human diginity and human rights? Pro provided nothing except an appeal to relativism. Moreover, Pro has not shown that God is not the best explanation.God Best Explains Moral Duties Pro provides absolutely no response to this point. He simply reiterates his claim that morality is based on survival. Yet he has not shown how this position can avoid the infamous open-question argument. Recall the quotation I gave from Greg Koukl and Frank Beckwith:"One question really needs to be answered: Why shouldn't the chimp (or a human, for that matter) be selfish? The evolutionary answer might be that when we're selfish, we hurt the group. That answer, however, presumes another moral value, that we ought to be concerned about the welfare of the group. But why should that concern us? They would say because if the group doesn't survive, then the species doesn't survive. But why should we care about the survival of the species? Here's the problem. The responses intended to explain morality ultimately depend on some prior moral notion to hold them together." [1]Pro still hasn't responded to this. His only attempt is to say "We exist." What? How does "We exist" ground morality? How do we derive duties from "We exist." Duties are commands, and commands are features of minds. "We exist" is simply a proposition that has no authoritative force to derive a command from. Moreover, why is our existence good? And what grounds that? Pro hasn't explained anything, he has merely appealed to proximate explanations when what we're looking for is an ultimate explanation.Moreover, Pro has not shown that God is not the best explanation for moral duties.God Best Explains Moral ResponsibilityRemarkably, Pro seems to concede my argument, arguing that it "doesn't matter" that naturalism doesn't permit free will. However, without free will, then one cannot have moral responsibility. Without moral responsibility, then morality as we know it is meaningless in a naturalistic universe. Naturalism cannot account for meaningful moral action and moral punishment. Conclusion: God is required for objective moralityIt's important to note that alternate explanations are not refutations. What Pro has done was offer an alternate explanation -- he by no means even attempted to argue against any of the arguments I presented in favor of God's role in morality. He only offered rebuttals to my claims that evolutionary ethics were insufficient. But both of our positions can't be right, and hence it comes down to a matter of plausibility. As I have shown, it is much more plausible to suppose that God is required to make sense of morality. Naturalism, faces an extraordinary amount of problems and thus fails as a ground of morality. ___________Sources 1. Gregory Koukl and Francis J. Beckwith, Relativism: Feet Planted Firmly in Mid-Air (Baker: 1998) 163