Objective Moral Values and Duties Show that God Exists

In order to clarify, I am defending three premises. 1) If God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist. 2) Objective moral values and duties do exist. 3) Therefore, God exists. The third premise merely follows from the first two. If objective moral values and duties can only exist if God exists, and objective moral values and duties do exist, then it follows that God exists. I did not detect in my opponent"s response any objection to premise one. I pointed out the grounding problem of objective morality in an atheistic universe (that there is no other candidate in which objective values can be "rooted"). Since that point is unopposed, I will not belabor it here. Instead my opponent denies premise two, "Objective moral values and duties do exist", and affirms moral nihilism. He states that morality is a social construct, that it has no objective reality. We first need to understand the full implications of this view. First, it turns out that morally reprehensible acts are not really morally reprehensible. In fact, to say that something is morally reprehensible is only to describe our reaction to it and NOT to say anything about the act itself. If my opponent is correct then actions such as rape and child abuse are not really wrong, they are just taboo or opposed to social norms. On this view, molesting a child is morally equivalent to wearing white after labor day. This also means that social reformers are, in fact, immoral because they oppose social norms. Consider the Valkyrie conspirators who risked, and ultimately sacrificed, their lives in an attempt to end the tyrannical and murderous reign of Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany. If my opponent is correct, then it is the conspirators who acted in a morally reprehensible way and Adolf Hitler who was the paragon of morality (because he embodied the cultural norms and expectations of his society). I"ll say that again, on my opponent"s view Adolf Hitler turns out to be the moral hero of the story because he embodies the social norms of Nazi Germany. Moral progress is also impossible on my opponent"s view. The United States engaged in the horrible practice of slavery many years ago, and today it does not. If my opponent is correct, then this represents no moral improvement whatsoever. The difference in the practice and prohibition of slavery is no more superior morally than differences in popular fashion between the two eras. Are we really going to say that acts like child abuse and rape are not really wrong? Are we really going to say that social reformers like Martin Luther King Jr. were actually moral villains? Are we really going to say that evil but socially consistent men like Adolf Hitler are actually moral heroes? Are we really going to say that social developments like the prohibition of slavery represent no moral progress whatsoever? If we are to adopt my opponents view, then we must answer "yes" to each of these questions. So what reason does my opponent give in support of his claims? As it turns out, very little. He simply appeals to difficulties in moral reasoning. He said, "I have shown that morality is just this, influenced completely or almost completely [by] personal feelings or opinions." He has only shown that people come to different moral conclusions, but this does nothing to undermine the objectivity of morality. Consider the scientific enterprise. For centuries scientists have come to different conclusions about the nature of our universe. Does that undermine the objectivity of the universe? Clearly not! This is because our understanding of things (be they universes or moral values) is incomplete and progressive. Our limited understanding, however, is no evidence against the object that we understand. The fact is that our common sense experience of "right" and "wrong" shows us that there is a real difference between the two. This is obvious to us, and unless and until my opponent gives us some reason to doubt objective moral values that is more obvious to us than our common sense experience, we are rational to maintain our belief in them. My opponent suggests that there may be some basis for objective moral values other than God. He has given us no candidate for such a basis, however. The fact is that there simple is no candidate for objective moral values apart from God, because there is no candidate who has an unchanging/unchangeable nature and existence. If morality is merely a social construct, then (as both my opponent and I have shown) different societies will come up with different moral systems. If it is created by individuals, then different individuals will come up with different moral systems. If it is created by evolution, then a different evolutionary history will have produced different moral values and duties. God, however, could not have been different. Philosophers recognize that God, if he exists, exists as a *necessary* reality. This means that his existence does not depend on any external source, and he therefore is the same in every possible world. Only if such a necessary being exists can there be any objective basis for morality. I want to be clear, I"m not saying that such a being exists and therefore objective moral values exist. I"m saying that objective moral values exist, and they can only exist if such a being exists. The moral argument (the three premises I have stated above) leads to the conclusion that such a being must exist, it does not start with that assumption. If my opponent abandons his position of moral nihilism and instead denies premise one, "If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist", then he must give us some alternate objective grounds for moral values and duties. This objective grounds must be the same in every possible world (unchanging and independent from any external cause) and it must be capable of obligating us to conform our behavior to it (it must be capable of issuing moral duties to us).