It is not possible to have objective moral standards without God.

However, I feel it fails to properly argue what was intended in this debate and your position of the subjectivity of morality leads to many problems which I would like to address. Firstly your point that "morals are a human construct" is a fair point to be made. If one were to take the reductionist materialist approach (or another type of belief that rejects God), then we are essentially small bits of inconsequential meat drifting aimlessly through the universe. If this is the case, the position that there are no objective morals seems to be a reasonable. However what I have cause with is the fact that people with this sort of belief system also claim to be able to do right and wrong and to have moral opinions that should be seriously considered. For example you then argue that we do have "morals" which can be derived from human empathy. While this may be a basis for your ethical system, it is by no means the sole way that moral systems have always developed. Kantian ethics are based upon pure practical reason and absolute moral laws. Kant thought that lying was wrong in all circumstances, whereas in some cases empathy would drive us to tell white lies. The ethics of Confucius are based largely upon a rigid societal order in which people must best fulfil their role in their family or in wider society. You may think these moral systems wrong, but without a standard of objective morality this would be hypocritical as these morals are simply human constructs developed from certain cultures and societies " just as yours are. If one was morally superior than the other then morality would not be subjective. Another example that this would also apply to is Nazism. Their systematic execution of millions of people was obviously not based upon an empathetic moral system but instead on a belief that some races were inherently superior. Yet as a moral subjectivist, I assume you would also not consider this sort of event as wrong (in an objective sense), as yet again it is simply based upon the changing moral ideas of society. Additionally, your idea about empathetically based morality does not successfully pass the is/ought principle I previously mentioned. Just because we have the ability to empathise with people, this does not mean that we should base our actions around others based on their perceived emotional condition. The sole fact that I understand what someone might feel like when I treat them badly, does not mean I should not treat them badly. The question of why we should act based on our empathy is simply impossible to answer only using facts about the world or logic " otherwise there would be objective morality. While your argument of there being no objective morality does not require morality to pass the if/ought problem, it also makes it difficult for you to persuade others of what to do, or that what they are doing is wrong. You then use the example of slavery to show that historically the ethics of a society can change and something once considered a normal part of life is now considered morally reprehensible. It is true that society"s general position on moral issues have changed massively and are still changing today. However this does not mean that at each stage in time their morals were equally correct (or incorrect). We now think slavery was wrong. Three hundred years ago many people did not think that. It is possible that we are right and they are wrong or vice-versa. Your argument about the God of the bible having changing ethical values, while not relevant to the debate, are also not an infallible argument. My argument was not based upon a specific God (however I think the timeless view of the Christian god makes the most sense in finding morality), but instead my argument was based upon the existence of a creator that has moral intentions for humans. Additionally many Christians do not consider the Bible as the word of god and something to be taken literally, allowing for the difference in opinion within the Bible. It is clear that you consider God false and the idea of God given morals, or morality discoverable in nature due to God"s existence, as simply another human moral system that only pretends to be more correct than the others. However this debate was not about the existence of objective morality. Instead it was about if people without belief in a God could find an objective moral system. While it is clear that you don"t believe in objective morality, it must also be considered that with this belief system criticism of historical atrocities such as the Holocaust is meaningless, and that if a barbarian from a warrior culture were to invade your country then murder everyone you knew, this would not be morally wrong " as saying it was wrong would only be from your own subjective perspective.