Even if God did exist and did issue known commands, why would you and I be morally required to obey them? One common answer is that God will punish us if we disobey Him. That would give us a strong self-interested reason to obey, but that reason would hardly be a moral duty. I might have a self-interested reason to obey the commands of a tyrant who will punish me if I disobey, but I still do not have any moral duty to obey that tyrant. Another common answer is that we owe God gratitude for creating us. However, although children should also be grateful to their parents for creating them, children do not have a moral obligation to do everything that their parents tell them to do. Yet another common answer is that God the father knows best, so , if God tells us that an act is morally wrong, it is. But how do we know that God is always correct? Unless we have some independent reason to believe that certain acts are morally wrong, we have no reason to believe that God is correct when He indicates to us through His commands that those acts are morally wrong. This answer, then, also cannot tell us why we morally must obey Gods commands. Without any reason to accept that assumption, we have no reason to accept the divine command theory (of morality). from Morality Without God by Walter Sinnott-Armstrong.
Posted on: Tue, 04 Nov 2014 21:48:53 +0000
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