> Thanks for engaging with me.

<3

> In your last paragraph, you got to the crux of the issue. You feel that you are "allowed" (by whom?) to define your own moral values and your own priorities.

I'm allowed by me. I reject the implication that there's another reasonable answer to "whom". For the same reason you can't escape brain in a vat. I don't have cause to add any external actor worthy of consideration. I'm interested in the argument that I should define my beliefs based on some external demand or influence providing rules that I can't verify myself? (And if I can verify them myself, what value does locking my understand to that external actor provide?)

> You feel that this moral axiom is self-evident and uncontroversial. I would deny that.

I find it to be Logical. But you're assumption is incorrect, because I also don't content that it is self-evident, and I know the source of morality to be controversial.

> This moral axiom, like all moral axioms, cannot be proved by science.

As I hinted at above, I don't find "proved by science" to be the gold standard for belief. So I also reject both implications; first that the scientific method is what I use for what I believe to be true, second that it's the only method that should be used.

> And it is far from universally shared, beyond our relatively small cultural bubble. For many people, defining one's own moral values is the definition of immorality, or at least amorality. For many people, true morality has to be above one's own preferences and desires (that is, more authoritative). If you disagree, you are merely revealing how your religion differs from theirs. Your religion has moral axioms that cannot be proved, and so does theirs.

No, if I disagree, it may be just that I disagree about how we're defining the words we're using. I try to avoid using the word morality, because I agree it's useful for when you need to include something outside the specific example, hypothetical, test case, whatever you call it. I might make that mistake, but I try to restrict myself to using ethical in lieu of moral. For the defitions that I understand, and use. Everything that's ethical, is also moral, but not everything that's moral is also ethical. It gets complicated when you use morality to influence what you consider ethical. E.g. (one I disagree with) if your higher power demands that you kill some other individual, and if you define ethics as coming from your morality. That's ethical by your definition but, I wouldn't consider that ethical, even though I could be convinced it could be called moral. Again, using moral as coming exclusively from an external agent.

I also think it's dishonest to frame that belief as a 'different religion'. You make the same differentiation for morality. Where immorality is distinct from amorality. Good, bad, and unknown, or correct, incorrect, absent, are all different ideas. Framing the lack or absence of something, as a different version of something is problematic. It's also counter to the scientific method. Where you should only accept the minimum conclusions that can represent some observation. e.g. If A + B + C + D == Some Observation; and A + B + C == Some Observation. Following the scientific method you should only accept A + B + C. And remain undecided about A + B + C + D.

> Don't get me wrong, I think people broadly share many moral axioms (such as: truth is generally good, love is generally good, hate is generally bad). But the idea that we get to define our own values is not one that is universally shared, it is mainly found only in highly individualistic atheistic cultures, and like all moral axioms, cannot be proven or disproven using the scientific method.

I think a lot of ethics are provable by the scientific method. But I still reject the assertion the only way to obtain an ethical axiom is using some scientific methodology. You can state a goal, and premise, and then make logical conclusions based on them. If you'd like to be scientific about that, you'd only include things for which you have strong evidence of. Which I do, that's part of why I reject religion as a reasonable source of ethics or morality. 1) because most of them make clearly obvious bad ethical assertions, 2) because you can achieve the same outcome without it. 3) I don't find morality (something from an external something) to be required for ethics. I'm able to define ethics, and differentiate ethical, from unethical behavior without needing to consult any religious definition of morality.

Thus as someone who values science and engineering, I prefer the simpler option.