|Monroe County (MI)|
Here's how I taught this argument in my philosophy of religion classes.
First, state the argument.
P1 – If there is no God, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.
P2 – Objective moral values and duties exist.
C – Therefore, God exists.
Second, explain how Craig defends premise 1 (P1).
- Many atheists affirm P1.
- If there's no moral lawgiver, then we're just making moral values and duties up. Such things are only subjective. If they are only subjective, then they are not binding.
Third, explain how Craig defends premise 2 (P2).
- Objective moral values are properly basic beliefs.
- Moral duties logically imply that there is someone to whom we are morally responsible.
How does Craig defend premise 1?
Premise 1 (P1) of William Lane Craig's Metaethical Argument for God's existence is: If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.
I explain this in my philosophy of religion classes using this example.
Imagine you are a student in a class where the professor is never seen. Every day you come to class and assignments are written on the board, such as: "Do problems 1-50 on p. 100." One day you ask, "Who is teaching this class?" Someone replies: "No one. This class does not have a teacher." At that point you respond: "Then I see no reason why I have to do these problems."
Analogically, if there is no God who issues moral commands, then moral values are only invented by "the students." Thus they are not binding on us. As Ivan Karamazov never said, "If there is no God, then everything is permitted." Craig cites ethicist Richard Taylor:
"A duty is something that is owed . . . . But something can be owed only to some person or persons. There can be no such thing as duty in isolation . . . . The idea of political or legal obligation is clear enough . . . . Similarly, the idea of an obligation higher than this, and referred to as moral obligation, is clear enough, provided reference to some lawmaker higher . . . . than those of the state is understood. In other words, our moral obligations can . . . be understood as those that are imposed by God. This does give a clear sense to the claim that our moral obligations are more binding upon us than our political obligations . . . . But what if this higher-than-human lawgiver is no longer taken into account? Does the concept of a moral obligation . . . still make sense? . . . . the concept of moral obligation [is] unintelligible apart form the idea of God. The words remain, but their meaning is gone."
Conversely, if God exists, then God’s commands make things right and wrong. This view is called Divine Command Theory.
For an introduction to Alston's, Adams's, and Quinn's reasonings that Divine Command Theory does not fall by the sword of Plato's Euthyphro Dilemma, see this article in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
How does Craig defend premise 2?
NOTE HERE that evolutionary explanations claiming to explain how moral reasoning evolved do not affect Craig's argument, and if intended to they commit the genetic fallacy.
“Objective moral value” defined: a moral value that is valid independently of our apprehension of it. An OMV says is something that is good or evil independently of whether any human being believes it to be so.
• A moral value is about whether something is good or bad.
o This has to do with the worth of something.
• A moral duty is whether something is right or wrong.
o This has to do with the obligatoriness of something.
o Right and wrong are not the same as good and bad. Right and wrong have to do with moral obligation, what I ought or ought not to do.
“Objective”: to say that something is objective is to say that it is independent of what people say or perceive.
“Subjective”: to say that something is subjective is to say that it is not objective; that is, it is dependent on what human persons think or perceive.
If moral values are only subjective, then they function like personal tastes, such as, e.g.: I like Coke better than Pepsi.
If moral values are only subjective, then I have no moral obligation or duty to follow them.
Is P2 true? Do objective moral values exist?
I think so, for the following reasons.
Moral values are “properly basic.” Like, e.g., sense experience, or the laws of logic.
A “properly basic belief” is one that we assume to be true even though we cannot evidentially prove it to be so. (This is anti-W.K. Clifford stuff.)
We assume, for example, sense experience to be veridical (true). We cannot evidentially “prove” it to be so. Because that would require using our sense experience to “prove” its own veridicality.
Likewise we assume, e.g., modus ponens to be logical. (“If P, therefore Q. P. Therefore Q.”) We can’t prove it to be so by using logic, since that would require we trust in logic to “prove” that we can trust in logic. The claim here is that we are to view our apprehension of objective moral values in just this way, and that it is reasonable to do so.
To further explain, we are wise to assume that our senses, our powers of reasoning (Plantinga calls this “our belief-forming mechanisms), and our most fundamental moral instincts are not systematically deceiving us. They are all to be trusted in the absence of a defeater. Even the most radical skeptic trusts in his sense experience and in logical reasoning. Thus statements like “I perceive a world external to myself” and “1+1=2” are “properly basic.” While it’s certainly true that we can misperceive things and make logical mistakes, such mistakes hardly call into question the general reliability of our sense or reasoning powers; indeed, they presuppose it. The ability to detect error presumes an awareness of truth.
Just as we can be mistaken re. our senses and our reasoning, so also we can by mistaken re. the making of moral judgments. In spite of this there still are certain moral truths that we can’t not know unless we suppress our conscience or engage in self-deception. We possess an inbuilt “yuck factor” – basic moral intuitions about the wrongness of torturing babies for fun, of raping, murdering, or abusing children. We can also recognize the virtue of kindness or selflessness.
Today, e.g., President Obama referred to the bombing in Boston as an act of "evil." That such an act is evil implies "for everyone." The statement bombing innocent people is evil is objectively true.
But what about the person or persons who did this evil act? What about people who can’t tell the moral difference between Mother Teresa and Joseph Stalin? Craig's (and others') answer is: Those not recognizing such truths as properly basic are simply wrong and morally dysfunctional, like someone who believes that “1+1=3.” Note: we imprison persons who like to rape little girls.
Are moral values, like sense experience and logical reasoning, properly basic? Is our moral awareness epistemically foundational and “bedrock?” Even some atheists think so. Atheist David O. Brink states: “Our commitment to the objectivity of ethics is a deep one.” Atheist Kai Neilsen writes:
“It is more reasonable to believe such elemental things [as wife-beating and child abuse] to be evil than to believe any skeptical theory that tells us we cannot know or reasonably believe any of these things to be evil… I firmly believe that this is bedrock and right and that anyone who does not believe it cannot have probed deeply enough into the grounds of his moral beliefs.”
If this is true, then basic moral beliefs are “discovered,” not “invented.” Just as a person who cannot understand the logic of a disjunctive syllogism is logically dysfunctional, and just as a person who is skeptical that they are now eating breakfast when they are, so also are persons morally dysfunctional who cannot see that torturing and raping little girls for fun is objectively wrong.
In my experience the person who protests against this usually does so because they think we have not discovered but invented moral values. The common explanation of the inventing of moral values is that of evolutionary theory. For example, atheist Michael Ruse states that “morality” has evolved as an aid to survival and allows our species to perpetuate itself? What can we say about this?
• At its worst, this kind of reasoning is an example of the genetic fallacy.
• At its best it only proves that our subjective perception of objective moral values has evolved.
• Craig – “If moral values are gradually discovered, not invented, then our gradual, fallible apprehension of the moral realm no more undermines the objective reality of that realm than our gradual, fallible perception of the physical world undermines the objectivity of that realm.”
• Many of us think we do apprehend objective moral values.
• Even Ruse writes: “The man who says that it is morally acceptable to rape little children is just as mistaken as the man who says, 2+2=5.” (Ib., 92)
What if there are objective moral values, and we evolved, without God guiding the process, to apprehend these moral values? Craig says that such an idea is “fantastically improbable.” The odds of blind evolutionary processes evolving creatures that perceive objective moral values is hard to believe. It is more reasonable to believe we are created by God to apprehend moral values.”
Atheist Daniel Dennett has written that, if there is no God and evolutionary naturalism is true, ethical decision-making “holds out scant hope of our ever discovering a formula or an algorithm for doing right.” (Copan, 145)
Someone who freaks out when I say that a person who can’t see that torturing and raping little girls for fun is morally wrong does so, I think, because they view such acts as personally invented subjective preferences, such as “I like Pepsi.” It would be arrogant of me to say that someone who likes Pepsi more than Coke is wrong. Surely the affinity for Pepsi is a subjective taste and not some objective truth.
But if the statement Torturing and raping little girls for fun is morally wrong is only someone’s subjective preference, then it is absurd to accuse people who disagree with this and engage in raping and torturing little girls for fun.
I also think it is odd, if not logically absurd, for someone to think I should not call someone “morally wrong and dysfunctional” if they think moral values are only subjective.
As for me, when I meet a person who thinks torturing and raping are only subjective preferences, I won’t let them near my kids. Philosopher Paul Copan puts it this way: “Although basic moral principles – to be kind, selfless, and compassionate; to avoid torturing for fun, raping, or taking innocent human life – are accessible and knowable to morally sensitive human beings, some improperly functioning individuals may be self-deceived or hard-hearted sophists.” (144)
Copan says: “Thus, we should reasonably believe what is apparent or obvious to us unless there are overriding reasons to dismiss it – a belief that applies to our sense perception, our reasoning faculty, and our moral intuitions/perceptions.” (144) Just as we perceive a world external to us, and intuit certain laws of logic that are properly basic, so also we apprehend certain moral truths to be objective.
Finally, philosopher Thomas Reid “claimed he did not know by what reasoning – demonstrative or probable – he could convince the epistemic or moral skeptic.” (Copan, 144)
Paul Copan, “God, Naturalism, and the Foundations of Morality.” (In The Future of Atheism: Alister McGrath and Daniel Dennett in Dialogue, 141-161)
William Lane Craig, Reasonable Faith; “The Indispensability of Theological Metaethical Foundations for the Existence of God”
William Lane Craig & Paul Copan on: Objective Moral Values Exist
(Some lecture notes for my Philosophy of Religion class)
William Lane Craig’s metaethical argument for the existence of God is:
1) If God does not exist, then objective moral values do not exist.
2) Objective moral values (OMVs) do exist.
3) Therefore God exists.
How can we argue for the truth of the second premise?
How do we know there are OMVs?
We recognize them. Like we recognize (1) “The lights in this room are on.”
The truth or falsity of (1) is objective, not subjective.
Consider (2) Racism is wrong. Is (2) true or false? The correct answer is: true.
But how do we know this?
Philosophers like Craig and Paul Copan (as well as Alvin Plantinga and William P. Alson) say that we just recognize that (2) is wrong, in the same we that we recognize the truth or falsity of (1).
So, moral values are apprehended. Like we apprehend, by sense experience, that the lights are either on or off. Moral values function like Plantingian properly basic beliefs.
Objection: you can’t prove that (2) is right.
This argument does not claim to indubitably prove this.
There are very few things in this life about which we can be absolutely (deductively) certain.
E.g., Craig says, “How do you know you’re not just a body lying in the Matrix and that all you see and experience is an illusory, virtual reality?” (All Craig quotes from "How Can God Be the Ground of Morality?")
- Yes, it’s possible that is true.
- But I have no good reason to doubt what I see.
- “The mere possibility provides no warrant for denying what I clearly grasp.” (Craig)
So, while I cannot deductively prove that (2) is right, I have no good reason to doubt that (2) is right.
Objection: moral values differ from culture to culture.
This is partially true. Not entirely. Because nearly all cultures believe, e.g., (3): Stealing is wrong.
The truth that many moral values differ from culture to culture does not cause us to believe moral values are not objective. Just as, should we find a culture that believes the earth is flat, we should not thereby reject the objective truth that the earth is round.
What if some culture believes (2) is wrong?
- The answer is: that culture is wrong. The reason we can say “racism is wrong” and “racists are wrong” is because “the ability to detect error presupposes an awareness of truth.” (Paul Copan, “God, Naturalism, and the Foundations of Morality,” in The Future of Atheism; Alister McGrath and Daniel Dennett in Dialogue, 142. Note: Copan's essay is one of the best I have ever read on this subject. He's an excellent writer and a very good thinker.)
- Copan writes: “Humans may misperceive or make logical missteps. However, such mistakes hardly call into question the general reliability of our sense or reasoning powers; indeed, they presuppose it.” (142)
Copan: “We possess an in-built “yuck factor” - basic moral intuitions about the wrongness of torturing babies for fun, of raping, murdering, or abusing children. We can also recognize the virtue of kindness or selflessness, the obligation to treat others as we would want to be treated, and the moral difference between Mother Teresa and Josef Stalin. Those not recognizing such truths as properly basic are simply wrong and morally dysfunctional.” (143)
Atheist Kai Neilsen writes: “It is more reasonable to believe such elemental things as [wife-beating and child abuse] to be evil than to believe any skeptical theory that tells us we cannot know or reasonably believe any of these things to be evil… I firmly believe that this is bedrock and right and that anyone who does not believe it cannot have probed deeply enough into the grounds of his moral beliefs.” (in Copan, 143)
Which means: basic moral principles are discovered, not invented.
We would expect this sort of thing if God exists. We would not expect this sort of thing “if humans have emerged from valueless, mindless processes.” (Copan, 143)
Objection: evolution has programmed us to believe in certain values. Therefore those values are not objective.
- This commits an informal logical fallacy - the genetic fallacy.
- Craig says it’s “at worst a textbook example of the genetic fallacy and at best only proves that our subjective perception of OMVs has evolved.”
- The “genetic fallacy”: when someone tries to invalidate a view by explaining how that view originated or came to be held.
- Such as: “You only believe in democracy because you were raised in a democratic society.”
- Compare: “You believe the earth is round because you were born in a scientific age.”
Objection: But if evolution is true why should I think moral values are objective?
- Answer: because you clearly apprehend them. Evolutionary theory gives you a reason to doubt the objectivity of moral values ONLY IF naturalism (atheism) is true.
- This objection “begs the question” (an informal logical fallacy) because it presupposes that naturalism is true.
- Craig agrees that, if naturalism is true (if there is no God), then our moral experience is illusory. That, precisely, is Craig’s first premise in his metaethical argument for God’s existence.
Which is: If God does not exist, objective moral values do not exist.
If God does not exist then a moral universe is far less likely.
But, as Copan writes, If humans are God’s image-bearers, then it’s not surprising that they are capable of recognizing or knowing the same sorts of moral values – whether theists or not. (142)
Rawls' Rejection of Utilitarianism
I found this article on John Rawls' interesting, especially regarding his attack on utilitarianism.
The pre-Rawls preference was utilitarianism, which seeks to answer the question: how can we maximize people's preferences. How can we achieve the most satisfaction possible for everyone. But utilitarian theory "has some odd consequences." Why, e.g., is rape "wrong?" The article states: "A utilitarian would have to answer that the pain to the victim outweighs the pleasure to the rapist. Surely, though, this is not why rape is wrong; the pleasure the rapist gets shouldn’t be counted at all, and the whole thing sounds ridiculous. (By the way, Judge Richard Posner, who might be called Jeremy Bentham redivivus, accepts just this view of rape in his Sex and Reason.)"
Consider this. Executing a few Danish cartoonists may bring pleasure to a Muslim mob, giving them pleasure. Doing this would achieve greater satisfaction for a greater number of people. "A utilitarian would have to endorse the execution." Herein lies the problem. "As Rawls says, “there is a sense in which classical utilitarianism fails to take seriously the distinction between persons.”"
Rawls, thus, rejects utilitarianism, and puts forth his own theory in his famous book A Theory of Justice. The rest of this essay presents Rawls' theory and objections to it.
Does utilitarianism give us a metaethical foundation for objective moral values? I dont think so, for a number of reasons. Here's one post I made, where Rawls rejects utilitarianism.
And one more, related to this discussion...
The Return of Goodness; The Return of God
Edward Skidelsky has written an intelligent essay on virtue ethics - "The Return of Goodness." It's a call for an ethic based on goodness rather than a utilitarian ethic. For example, utilitarian philosopher John Stuart Mill wrote: "Neither one person, nor any number of persons," declared John Stuart Mill, the originator of this principle, "is warranted in saying to another human creature of ripe years, that he shall not do with his life for his own benefit what he chooses to do with it." In other words, do what you want as long as you don't hurt someone else.
"Mill's principle has come to shape western public doctrine. It lies behind the social legislation of the 1960s and the anti-discriminatory legislation of the past four decades. Neither left nor right dares reject it openly. Yet in historical terms, it is an anomaly, a departure from the common sense of our species." So "a man who, having fulfilled his obligations to others, settles down with a six-pack to watch porn on television all day may be foolish, disgusting, vulgar and so forth, but he is not strictly speaking immoral. For he is, as the saying goes, "within his rights.""
"Virtue" has no place in this philosophy of morality. So? Skidelsky, who also cites the support of Richard Reeves, suggests that our real problems in our nation are not economic, but moral. We lack the moral resources to better our lot in life.
Virtue ethics argues that some choices really are better than others. There is such a thing as "goodness." "Goodness" sounds like it's an objective moral value, contra utilitarian subjectivism. Skidelsky thinks we can agree to this without belief in God. He says "it is a religion - a religion without God."
Can we be good without God? Yes, I think we can. Does goodness make any sense without God? No, I don't think so. We need a metaphyscial foundation to be able to claim that there is such a thing as "goodness." It is precisely the loss of God that led atheistic philosophers to try to find an ethical theory without God. Hence utilitarianism. So it seems our real problems are not essentially moral, but religious.
Re. Craig, he considers, unsurprisingly, utilitarianism. See, for starters, Craig and Moreland, Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview.