Objective Morality is not God's Work

To begin with, I'd like to than KristophKP for participating in this debate. I look forward to a thoughtful exchange! In this debate, I will defend the following argument:1. If objective moral facts exist, then God exists.2. Objective moral facts exist [Not in dispute]3. Therefore, God exists.Seeing how both myself and my opponent hold to moral objectivism, the second premise is not up for dispute. Instead, the central issue is over the truth of P1 and whether or not God adequately explains the existence of objective moral facts. As such, I will argue for the truth of the first premise by showing that God is the best explanation for morality.First, some preliminaries. By "objective," I refer to the idea that moral facts are true independent of human opinion. That is, moral facts are not grounded in our thinking or deciding them. By "moral facts," I refer to moral values and moral duties. Values refer to what is good and bad. Duties, by contrast, refer to what is obligatory. As such, I will argue that God is the best explanation of moral values and duties. My arguments will also incorporate responses to Pro's position, which is that moral facts are grounded in evolutionary naturalism. Finally, when I refer to God, I am not referring to the deity of any specific religious tradition, but rather a generalized conception of deity which is thought of as being maximally great.Moral Values1. God best explains the existence of moral valuesConsider the following values: love, joy, peace, kindness, and patience (Substitute whatever value you please). What grounds their existence? Suppose, as Pro does, that we ground them in evolution such that we can reduce these values to something like "Peace is good because it is advantageous to our survival." On this understanding, something is good insofar as it has survival value, which is itself good. However, this ends up explaining nothing -- one can simply ask "Why is survival value good, and what grounds that?" Simply explaining moral values in terms of evolutionary concepts does not remove the need for an ultimate explanation of the good. Evolution can only give us a proximate grounding of morality -- not an ultimate grounding. We can see that Pro's position -- even if true -- does not in any way remove the need for a theistic explanation of morality.What then ultimately grounds the existence of moral values? It would seem that the best candidate is a mind, as moral values seem to be properties of persons. What would love and joy even mean apart from persons who embody these values? It seems wholly implausible to say that moral values exist as platonic forms. Writes John Rist:"Plato's account of the 'Forms' as moral exemplars leaves them in metaphysical limbo. They would exist as essentially intelligible ideas even if there were no mind, human or divine, to recognize them: as objects of thought, not mere constructs or concepts. But, as Augustine learned... the notion of an eternal objection of thought without a ceaseless thinking subject is unintelligible." [1]The most plausible option is to therefore ground the existence of moral values in the character of God, a supreme person who serves as a moral exemplar and the very paradigm of goodness.2. God best explains human dignity and rightsNot only must an adequate moral theory explain the existence of moral values, it must also provide an explanation of how these values are instantiated in human beings. Consider human diginity and rights -- how can an atheistic framework account for such a phenomenon? As Paul Copan points out: "Intrinsically valuable, thinking persons do not come from impersonal, nonconscious, unguided, valueless processes over time." [2] How can valuable rights-bearing persons come to emerge from a process which is intrinisically valueless and amoral? Theism offers a ready explanation for both human diginity and rights: they were created in the image of a supremely valuable being and were endowed with intrinsic value.Moral Duties1. God best explains moral dutiesMoral duties have to do with obligation: what we should or should not do. Obligations are imposed upon us by a system of social relationships. Moral duties therefore are based on commands from persons -- there is no such thing as a duty in isolation, nor are there such things to duties to abstract objects. The existence of objective moral duties therefore rests on the fact that there is a supremely authoritative person (God) who issues binding moral commands upon us. The fact that this person is supreme explains why moral duties are objective, and the fact that this person is authoritative explains why moral duties have their obligatory nature. Put another way, moral duties are commands, and commands come from minds. The ground of objective moral duties must therefore be a supremely authoritative mind.Grounding moral duties in terms of evolution is inadequate, for it shares similar problems with attempting to ground moral values in evolution.. As Greg Koukl and Frank Beckwith note: "One question really needs to be answered: Why shouldn't the chimp (or a human, for that matter) be selfish? The evolutionary answer might be that when we're selfish, we hurt the group. That answer, however, presumes another moral value, that we ought to be concerned about the welfare of the group. But why should that concern us? They would say beause if the group doesn't survive, then the species doesn't survive. But why should we care about the survival of the species? Here's the problem. The responses intended to explain morality ultimately depend on some prior moral notion to hold them together." [3]2. God best explains moral responsibilityIn order to be able to act in a morally significant way, one must have genuine freedom of the will. As Immanuel Kant put it, "ought" implies "can." We cannot be held responsible for acts which are not under our control. When a rock falls down a cliff and crushes a hiker, we do not hold the rock morally blameworthy because the rock had no control over whether or not it was going to fall. It did not "decide" to fall. Moral responsibility therefore presupposes the existence of free will. Yet how can such a thing exist in the atheistic framework? On the atheistic picture, we are no different from rocks -- our actions are governed not by an immaterial self which is genuinely free, but by prior natural conditions governed by natural laws. Thus, when someone murders another, he does not "choose" to murder any more than a rock "chooses" to fall down a cliff. We cannot be held responsible for any of our actions, however virtuous or blameworthy. On atheism, the universe "might be a moral place, but how can human beings be morally free creatures, free either to obey or disregard the moral law... Moral facts have no purchase unless we have moral freedom." [4]By contrast, moral responsibility is best explained by positing the existence of a supreme being who created the world and endowed its inhabitants with the necessary freedm to act in a morally significant way. Moral responsibility, therefore, is most at home within a theistic framework. ConclusionIn light of the arguments presented above, it seems that theism is the superior explanation. It explains moral facts in a manner which is more plausible than atheism. God is thus the best explanation of objective morality._________Sources1. John Rist, Real Ethics (Cambridge University Press: 2002) 2. Paul Copan, "The Moral Argument for God's Existence" in William A. Dembski and Michael R. Licona, Evidence for God (Baker: 2010)3. Gregory Koukl and Francis J. Beckwith, Relativism: Feet Planted Firmly in Mid-Air (Baker: 1998) 163 4. David Baggett and Jerry Walls, Good God: The Theistic Foundations of Morality (OUP: 2011) 23