Do we really need explicit faith in an explicit God to be truly moral?
The argument for God from morality goes,
Objective morals exist.
Without God there is no objective morality.
Therefore God exists.
By reading this you can see that it hangs in space too much. You feel it cannot sink it for there are assumptions in there that are not made clear. It looks like something trying to impress us by seeming profound and deep and if we don't see that the problem is us.
It does indeed have unstated assumptions and they are all lies or maybe to be kind we will call them errors.
Error One: We need objective morality and to define it correctly. Actually what is important is that we have to have an objective morality even if it is not really objective. It is built into us.
Error Two: You need a God who is the personification of goodness so that to honour him is to honour all the moral virtues. Actually, objective morality can exist without being grounded in a conscious creator. A God who is more like a power would do. Indeed the god of the religions is more like a power than most realise. Also God doesn't have sex so how can he help inspire us with the great moral virtue of chastity?
Error Three: It is so simple. No!!! Saying God grounds objective morality is a very complicated question. The argument is too simple.
Clearly belief in God is not really important for morality. If it were then the person who is not believing enough is evil! You cannot make a morality based on the notion that the top moral obligation is to believe intensely! Belief does not work like that! Also, when a moral system needs and depends on a strong view of God and strong faith that will lead to people being pressured and forced. They will be afraid to say what they really think. That is not morality but blackmail.
Religion states that those who have a vague sense of
something that makes morality obligatory and objective have enough to believe in
an objective morality. But the atheist can agree and deny that whatever it is is
God. If a vague perception will suffice then religion is behaving disgracefully
by stressing that we must believe in God and its version of God to boot!
Religion contradicts itself by saying the argument above proves God and then
saying that a vague sense of something will do.
A creator could be about objective morality without being anything like a
conscious agent. If objective morality proceeds from the intelligence of a good
God then surely it can proceed from an impersonal intelligence too?
Religion will reply that God needs intelligence and to be a person. But if he
needs both it follows that if he is just an intelligence and not a person it is
better than nothing and gives objective morality some support and some support
is enough. If it takes a and b to do it then a or b can do it partly without the
other.
One day, computers will judge criminals and enforce the law. Their authority
will have to be acknowledged and respected. So why can't an impersonal force be
behind objective morality?
God does not have feelings but has intelligence. Religion teaches this. How does
his intelligence relate to his moral authority? God knowing what the right thing
is the basis of objective morality. But that means he has to see it just like we
do. It does not mean morality depends on his authority.
Human nature cannot really relate to a being that stands for a standard that is
so unfeeling and emotionless. We like to have our emotions involved in our moral
formation.
Fusing an emotionless God and morality will put people off morality if they
think they have to. It will make doing good more difficult and doing evil more
appealing.
Objective morality simply has to exist without God. The absence or non-existence
of God gives morality its objectivity and reality.
