Without God there is no objective basis for morality.

I think this issue has been inflated to mean more than it does. The claim is only that morality exists and can be judged based its ability to promote and achieve the stated goals and typical definitions support me. I’m content to let any voters to decide who has the burden of proof. Objective: Having actual existence or reality. Uninfluenced by emotions or personal prejudices: an objective critic. Independent of individual opinion and cultural norms. Morality: descriptively to refer to some codes of conduct put forward by a society or, some other group, such as a religion, or accepted by an individual for her own behavior or normatively to refer to a code of conduct that, given specified conditions, would be put forward by all rational persons. [1] In practice we accept that morality is part of a life strategy that can be defended and defined objectively A good morality is effective to achieve the stated goals, usually to promote general well being etc. In any other area of life a good strategy will have objective reasons to support adopting that strategy and morality is not an exception. We define and defend differing moral codes based on merit all the time it is the field of ethics. “The general meaning of ethics: rational, optimal (regarded as the best solution of the given options) and appropriate decision brought on the basis of common sense [3].” Moral claims are in practice defended based on their objective relative merit as a life strategy. Take proponents of Abstinence for example [2]. To support this idea they argue that abstinence prevents teen pregnancy, STDs and psychological problems. Opponents argue that the strategy is impossible to utilize by hormonal teens and that there are more effective ways to mitigate the risks. Saying morality is not objective is the same as saying that moral claims are not objective. If I were to approach you and say, “hey I have a great idea to advance goodness in society. Lets just kill all convicted criminals!” Would you be trapped arguing from your emotions, personal prejudices and cultural norms until when backed into a corner you just blurt out, “well god says it’s wrong even though your idea is flawless.” Of course not, we could agree on a goal, say to benefit society, and then discuss the facts. To argue this case you can bring up ideas about human rights, uncertainty with respect to legal convictions, a distinction between violent crime and misdemeanors etc, all objective arguments in support of the moral superiority of our current legal system vs. the murder of all criminals. Objective morality need not be universal, personal and cultural differences are facts to be considered. Saying that morality is based mainly on the facts of reality and not personal prejudice or emotions does not mean there is one right way to live. People are different and so are our goals and preferences. Your goal may be to achieve happiness without negatively impacting those around you or to work tirelessly for the greater good. Either goal will have several strategies that work well and many that don’t. Frequent charity is arguably a good strategy to support the greater good while rampant cold-blooded murder clearly is not. Morality in this respect in analogous to chess, there are many effective strategies. My terrible chess ‘strategy’ is objectively bad when compared the various strategies a chess master would utilize. There are many good strategies for baking, golf, leadership etc and others that are clearly good and bad. Why is morality an exception? Morality exists independent of personal prejudice, emotions and cultural norms Say there is a culture that supports regularly beating children to promote discipline. I don’t mean this as an emotional ploy just a clear-cut case of a bad moral rule. This culture universally accepts beating children and has an emotional/cultural prejudice to support behavior since it has been the custom for many generations. Lets say that like most cultures they want to raise healthy productive children. The claim that it is wrong to beat children is independent of prejudice and cultural norms. Beating children negatively affects emotional health, lowers self-esteem and causes psychological problems etc. and there are objectively much better moral strategies to promote discipline given their goal. “That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” –Hitchens If morality does not exist independent preference, if there are no arguments in favor of an issue that are not heavily dependent on personal prejudice and cultural norms then what are we even talking about? Think of all the clearly moral issues that are discussed on this site: gay marriage, abortion, pre-marital sex, adultery, stealing etc. Are views on these topics just brazen assertions not based on objective arguments? [1] http://plato.stanford.edu... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org... [3] http://en.wikipedia.org...