The moral argument for God is sound.

The Moral Argument for God is Sound. The task of this debate is to show that the moral argument for God is rationally sound; it makes sense. To do this, it requires I demonstrate that the contrary argument makes no sense. My opponent (Con) proposes this syllogism:1. If God does not exist, objective morality does not exist.2. Objective morality does exist.3. Therefore, God exists. 1. If God does not exist, objective morality does not exist. There are numerous ways to tackle this argument. 1) Prove the Bible is reasonable to believe as God’s word to humanity, affirming His existence. In this way, the moral argument for objective morality would make sense because it is reasonable to believe there IS an objective best - an omniscient Being who knows all things and commands against evil. Prophecy is concrete factual proof that can be used to establish the Bible as logically sound. I will leave this argument for another day since we are debating morality. 2) Contrast the two positions – God or impersonal forces. What is the more sensible explanation? If you take God out of the equation, what is left is an impersonal, indifferent, uncaring, random, evolutionary process devoid of reason that is responsible for morality - but how? How does such a process arrive at moral beings? The answer is not known but speculated upon and assumed it does happen. "In perhaps its broadest form, the How question asks how the consciousness of the relevant sort could be caused or realized by nonconscious items, but we can generate a wealth of more specific questions by further restricting the range of the relevant explanans...How it is that anything so remarkable as a state of consciousness comes about as a result of irritating nervous tissue, is just as unaccountable as the appearance of the Djin, when Aladdin rubbed his lamp (1866)." https://plato.stanford.edu... The article goes on to describe many different competing explanations of consciousness. "...neuroscientists still don’t know what consciousness is, or how it’s even possible...Most neuroscientists agonize over consciousness because it’s so difficult to explain..." http://www.pbs.org... So, if and how consciousness arises from physicalism/matter is highly speculative. Without conscious, and reasoning beings morality is dead. With God, we have the necessary being that creates other sentient, thinking beings. With subjective beings, it appears we do not have the answers. World history testifies against subjective beings finding the moral truth without first presupposing God. 3) Show that subjective morality or relativism does not make sense of morality, nor can it. Relativism would demonstrate the impossibility of basing morality on a fixed best. How do you determine "good" or "right" if you have no fixed best, just subjective beings arbitrarily making it up? The evolutionary system has no moral or teleological end in sight. If morals are always evolving then how does someone ever arrive at a BEST? If "best" is arbitrarily made up and differs between cultures and people what standard do we measure "best" against? How does an uncaring, indifferent, impersonal, non-thinking universe achieve an end in sight - something that is best? There is no REASON that it would or SHOULD since it is a process devoid of intelligence or uniformity. How does a subjective human being arrive at best? This is something I will be looking for my opponent to answer. [1] Is genocide right? [2] Is infanticide right? [3] Is cannibalism right?[4] Is human sacrifice right?[5] Is child abuse/molestation right? Can my opponent say for certain? Does he know for certain? Here are countries, listed by Wikipedia, that have practiced or still practice these:[1] http://www.pbs.org...[2] https://en.wikipedia.org...;[3] https://en.wikipedia.org...[4] https://en.wikipedia.org...[5] https://en.wikipedia.org... So, if good is what evokes approval, then anything can be passed off as good. It is all relative. Therefore, to determine what is good an absolute, objective best is needed. Can Con produce such a standard? I will be looking for Con's SOUND explanation to make sense of morality from the subjective stance, OR prove that objective morality apart from God is possible and sound. 2. Objective morality does exist.Morality requires a best. You can't describe something as good unless you have an accurate, fixed measure of goodness; something that is best to measure good against. Since morality is a mindful process, which conscious being established what is best? A=A; The Law of Identity (The heart of the matter).You can’t have a moral right unless you have a fixed identity for what is right. Physically,A dog is a dog. A dog is not a cat. A dog has a distinct, fixed identity.Likewise, abstractly/nonmaterially, Good is good. Good is not bad. What is right has a definite, fixed identity. You can’t determine right without having an objective best measure against which to compare rights. Con must show how two opposing subjective individuals, or systems of thought regarding what is right, can both (logically) be right, or how he determines which is correct. The Law of Identity, as well as the Law of Noncontradiction, and Law of Excluded Middle says both can't be right because they state opposites. So, if he can't make sense of which moral view is indeed right then the case for the biblical (revealed) God (as the ultimate objective being) is sound in making sense of morality. It is sound because there is a best we can measure what is right against, versus subjective claims. It is sound because it gives a reasonable answer to the query. Con, which society is correct in its view of abortion as a woman's right to choose, or correct that it is wrong (unless in life threatening conditions)? http://www.choike.org...https://en.wikipedia.org...Which is right? Without this fixed measure goodness and rightness loses its identity. Morality makes no sense unless you have something more than subjective opinion to fix it on because it becomes a question of whose personal, relative opinion, or which cultural opinion? Then, what makes such opinion RIGHT? Let’s see if Con has a solution or just wants to beg the question that morality doesn't need one. This inability to establish a fixed identity is one of the problems of relativism. It can’t create any fixed moral identity. The Bible has a sound reason for why there is evil (moral wrong). People suppress the knowledge of God. In fact, the biblical account attributes this to the Fall when moral relativism started. What moral relativists do is enact their preferences - their likes and dislikes, since it 's hard to fasten objective moral beliefs to subjective minds without an objective being first revealing them. It would be interesting to see how Con does this. Morality requires mindful being, yet not just any mindful being. Morality is not dependent on Con's belief or my belief. It is independent of either. But morality is necessarily a product of conscious beings. The question is which mind is the necessary mind. Can Con point to that mind(s)? Can Con show his thinking is objective in regards to morality? I contend that morality is like mathematical laws; we discover them via our consciences. What is good is independent of whether Con or I believe it. I argue that Con KNOWS it is never right to torture an innocent baby for the fun of it, neither murder or rape an innocent human being or baby for fun. So these are objective moral principles. The Bible lays down a moral code that I believe is most sensible and objective in our human dealing with each other:1) Do not murder,2) Do not steal,3) Do not lie,4) Do not commit adultery,5) Do not covet. That covers humanities relationship with each other. Jesus summed these principles up in "love your neighbor as yourself." If Con does not think these are objective moral standards of human conduct, then let him JUSTIFY how it is ever right to murder, lie, steal, or rape for fun. If he can't do that then, he thinks these are objective, universal moral obligations also. A stone nor a tree contemplate right and wrong, so material, mechanical processes are not a SOUND explanation for deriving morality. Unless Con can present a sound reason how something physical/material can acquire the non-material, abstract nature of consciousness, morality, logic, intelligence/reason, and life, for his view to be consistent, then I contend it is not. Norman Geisler makes the argument that "human thoughts and transcendent moral laws are not material things. They are immaterial entities that cannot be weighed or physically measured." - I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist. p. 187 So, Con has to take a giant leap of faith from what we observe - minds and conscious moral beings giving rise to other similar beings - to demonstrating material things giving rise to immaterial entities such as morality. He has to prove that morals are physical and explain them as such. 3. Therefore, God exists.He is the explanation that is sound and can make sense of morality. Con needs to demonstrate he can, or prove that morality does not exist, that what we call moral is just opinion enforced by might. A few questions for Con:1) Does evil exist?2) Is tolerance a universal "good" or are there some things you should not tolerate?3) Is it EVER right to torture a baby for fun, or murder for fun?4) Are love and kindness "good" qualities, independent of what a person might think of them?5) Are human beings intrinsically valuable?