There Exists an Objective Morality

The only evidence for the existence of objective moral truth is our so-called moral intuition. However, this intuition is unreliable, and it may be alternatively explained by natural selection. It is unreliable because there is wide disagreement over the actual content of objective moral truth. It may be explained by natural selection by noting that empathy (the basis, in my view, of moral intuition) would likely promote group coherence and cooperation for mutual benefit, thereby enabling those with empathy to survive and reproduce more successfully than those who are non-empathetic. Furthermore, if objective moral truth existed, it would be a strange metaphysical entity indeed , as it would be intrinsically motivating, yet not confirmable by sense-data. By all menas of rationality, one should not posit such a strange entity if the only evidence for it (so-called moral intuition) is unreliable and may be explained instead by a scientific theory (natural selection) that is widely accepted.[1] Take for instance the Donner Party. This was a group of emigrants who made the fateful decision to take a newfound shortcut through the Sierra Nevada Mountains about 150 years ago. History shows that the party became trapped by the winter snows and 41 of the 87 members died. The ones that survived were accused of resorting to cannibalism.[2] If someone told you "that man killed someone" I think the majority of people would agree killing is bad and would also agree that it is a universal ethical belief that the man committed a terrible act. However, I you were to change the sentence to say "That man killed someone who was about to kill a woman after raping her. The man stopped it by killing him first", then the issue of killing becomes gray and subjective because the "killer" was protecting someone else from being murdered. Does this scenario hold the same as the first one? Ethical dilemmas are never clear and are rather subjective depending on an individual's perception of an issue. The second statement starts to reveal the subjective nature of morality altogether. As for the values of security and privacy and the debate on which value is "more important". There is no objective answer. We want to remain safe in a world that has threatening aspects to it, but at the same time we want our privacy, as do the people out to hurt us. In the world. there are many volatile issues that are forefront in the political debates (stem cell, abortion, illegal immigration for starters), most of which are rooted within moral issues. Based on the division we have in the world on many issues, this further illustrates that morality is not universal, but subjective. Hitler thought he was doing the right thing based on his model of the world! He didn't think he was being evil, and neither did his people at the time...in fact, they're the ones that put him into power. Morality is subjective. You say he is evil because disagree with what he is doing. You assign "bad" with things you disagree with and "Good" to those things with which you agree. [3] Descriptive relativism is a family of empirical claims to the effect that certain groups in fact have different modes of thought, standards of reasoning, or the like. Such claims are meant to describe (but not evaluate) the principles and practices of the two groups, and they are compatible with the claims that both groups are right (in their different ways), that only one is, that neither is, or even that (in the case at hand) there is no such thing as getting things right (e.g., there is no ultimate fact of the matter as to which epistemic principles or ethical principles are correct). It is possible to be a descriptive relativist about some things (e.g., ethical principles) but not about others (e.g., logical principles).[4] The claim that a person's culture, language, or the like influences his modes of thought does not mean that they completely determine how she thinks. Smoking is a causal factor for lung cancer; other things being equal, smokers are more likely to get cancer, and to do so because they smoke. But many other things, from genetic make-up to exposure to asbestos, are causal factors as well. Similarly, a claim that culture or language or some other independent variable affects a particular facet of experience or thought allows for other influences as well, and descriptive versions of relativism come in stronger and weaker forms, depending on the hypothesized strength of an independent variable's influence. The descriptive relativist's claims about epistemic principles, moral ideals and the like are often countered by arguments that such things are universal, and much of the recent literature on these matters is explicitly concerned with the extent of, and evidence for, cultural or moral or linguistic or human universals.[5] Sources: [1] http://groups.able2know.org... [2] http://www.collegenet.com... [3] http://newburkeian.blogspot.co.uk... [4] http://plato.stanford.edu... [5] http://en.wikipedia.org... For my opponent, I propose the following challenge: How would you motivate a non-empathetic atheist--who is convinced that they will not get caught--to refrain from a harmful action (such as torturing a child for fun)? And if you cannot do so, how can you posit the existence of objective moral truth (objective in the sense that it applies to everyone, and moral truth in the sense that it should provide at least some motivational force)?