Hymn331

Another way of saying this is that God has so designed the world that the natural man can not find God on his own (1 Corinthians 2:14). God cannot be found via the tools used to acquire knowledge. All the advancements of science in recent generations does not include a discovery that allows mankind to communicate with God.

If incontrovertible archeological evidence were to be found today that the Book of Mormon is indeed a true record, and the Smithsonian were to put this evidence on display, would the world beat a path to our missionaries to be baptized?

Certainly the church would grow in numbers but what percentage of the world truly be converted? And in two hundred years where would mankind find themselves?

That is a brilliant insight.

I think that easy faith/a believing heart is a character trait, bestowed by God. And it exists in some and not others, just like every other character trait and spiritual gift. We are all (potentially) the body of Christ, and each person’s individual character and gifts can benefit the others.

Seems to agree with the scriptures that discuss it, for what that is worth.

religiosity is not a universal moral good

I got interested in 12 step literature in the thought it might be useful for grief recovery. It isn’t, too much, but it has some fascinating things to say about the difference between religiosity and spirituality. Similar things come up when they teach nurses about dealing with people in hospitals or who are dying.

Myself, I’ve got to prepare another ethics lecture. I may even have a CD of them coming out sometime later this year. But morality and ethics may well be different as well.

No, but I am free to choose which evolutionary impulses I choose and there are merely pros and cons of each approach. To say one is “better” than the other would be silly if “morality” is just, as you say: “somehow the development of [evolution because it] was evolutionarily advantageous.”

>>> If that’s not being taught a form of moral relativism, then I don’t know what is.

How about teaching that both forms of morality, theirs and ours, are of equal value and that there really was nothing “wrong” per se with owning slaves nor something “wrong” with deciding not to as a society. Now THAT would be moral relativism. But no one, not even you, seem to be advocating that position. So it would seem we are all admiting an absolute morality here. (Or at least assuming it.) The idea that we believe our morality higher than their is not a form of moral relativism. It’s built on the assumption of absolute morality.

>>> It’s human nature to view ourselves as better and more advanced that those that came before us. That does not mean there is an absolute moral law that we now understand but that they didn’t. It means that our moral sense is different.

Now you are just restating the very point I made in #51. Are we really just in agreement and saying it in different ways?

Kari, to be honest, I’m not sure where you are trying to go with this. You make some statements that only make sense if we assume the existence of absolute morality, i.e. “As we progressed as a people we have come to understand that all humans are worthy of respect, and that it is not right for a human to own another human,” and other statements that seem to deny it, i.e. “It’s human nature to view ourselves as better and more advanced that those that came before us. That does not mean there is an absolute moral law that we now understand but that they didn’t.”

Thus its hard for me to understand what you are trying to say. Or more likely, you are simply confirming my point that no matter how much a person asserts there is no absolute moral law, they will continue to believe and act as if there is.

I did go on to make the point that I see science as undermining the idea of absolute morality as a real existing law. Based on your last post #63, you seem to agree with that point. I’m less certain if you agreed or disagreed with that idea in #60. In any case, since we seem to agree, I see no reason to pursue this point further.

I suspect, Kari, that you are arguing not with something I said but with something that you *think* I believe.

You seem to be arguing with me that the existence of belief in absolute morality doesn’t prove beyond doubt that there is a God. But I haven’t made that argument.

My oringinal point was very simple: That our sense of morality is something we feel and is thus a “spiritual revelation” regardless of what the source of it is. Even if you are right that it arises from evolution as a biological process, that feeling of morality itself is still, for all intents and purposes, a “spiritual revelation.”

It seems to me we are saying exactly the same things now:
1. Moral sense is real to us and is a “feeling” we are endowed with and that we naturally act as if it’s absolute.
2. Science does not support the idea that there is such a thing as an absolute moral law and at worst undermines the idea
3. Yet we all act and feel that there is an absolute moral law (even if there isn’t and we’re just evolved to feel that there is) so we — whether we mean to or not — continue to judge others by our standards of morality on the assumption that morality exists as a law of the universe

If you believe that it is for us to remake at our whim, then you don’t understand the basics of neuroscience, evolutionary neuroscience, or evolution in general. If it were in the ability of any creature to make themselves “more fit” evolutionarily “on a whim” then we would see new traits developed, and even speciation, occurring all the time. But I have yet to meet any animal or man who could change their inherent make-up in any conscious fashion. It’s the basic tenet of biological science and evolution, one cannot change genetic make-up and physical features at will (ignoring, obviously, the current American love affair with plastic surgery ).

The materialistic view that many neuroscientists espouse is simply that the brain entirely causes the mind (as opposed to dualism, which is the belief that the brain and mind are distinctly separate entities). There is a lot we know about brain function and mental functioning, to the point that we can localize areas in the brain that are responsible for certain action; conscious vision, unconscious vision, hearing, emotion, memory, and speech all have areas in the brain that are responsible for that function. A recent study (very limited in scope) has even shown that “the outcome of a decision can be encoded in brain activity of prefrontal and parietal cortex up to 10s before it enters awareness. This delay presumably reflects the operation of a network of high-level control areas that begin to prepare an upcoming decision long before it enters awareness.” (“Unconscious Determinants of Free Decisions in the Human Brain”Nature Neuroscience, published online on 13 April 2008)

Localization of specific activities in the brain is seen as indicative that many higher functions are a result of brain activity (and nothing else), including our moral sense. This moral sense is likely a complex interaction between multiple regions of the brain, and does develop and change over time (and I can give you some specific examples of immoral activity from brain dysfunction if you wish).

Our morals today are different that the morals of the 18th century. While I recognize that it isn’t official church doctrine, I was always taught, as I stated earlier, that the morals of our founding fathers were different than ours. They were generally righteous men who were led by God to found the US. Being slaveholders was within the norms of the time (and consistent with religious teaching then) and was not going to be a considered a sin for them. If that’s not being taught a form of moral relativism, then I don’t know what is.

It’s human nature to view ourselves as better and more advanced that those that came before us. That does not mean there is an absolute moral law that we now understand but that they didn’t. It means that our moral sense is different. We judge past generations against our moral sense, and find it regretful that their moral sense was not as advanced as ours. What will our descendants 300 years from now find abhorrent in our our morals? I believe that there will be something. Does that mean that there are yet to be absolute moral laws given to them that we aren’t ready to understand? If that’s the case, then how can we consider them to be absolute if they are dependent on the ability, or inability, to live and follow them?

Zeniff says: “And yet, I being **over-zealous** to inherit the land of our fathers, collected as many as were desirous to go up to possess the land, and started again on our journey into the wilderness to go up to the land.

Zeniff was a good man. He opposed killing Lamanites when he actually saw them and realized they weren’t the demons he had been led to believe they were. He actually fought to prevent their deaths. However, he also was “over-zealous” in his all-consuming focus on what he wanted. He was absolutely certain he was right – and it led to years of bondage and heartache and conflict and despair.

There is a lesson in there for passionate, active Mormons and ex-Mormons and everyone in between. If we become over-zealous, we end up obsessing over something that would be better left behind and moved beyond – and more of us end up as slaves to our obsession than we realize.

I could ask the reverse question as well. If it is just something we, as humans, “develop [as] an undrestanding” of “what is right and wrong” then it is for us as human beings to remake it at our whim.

>>> I was always taught that the majority of slaveholders, particularly among the founding fathers of the US, were generally righteous and honorable men who were living in a time in which slavery was acceptable. Hardly supportive of the view that moral law is absolute across time and place.

What is hardly supportive of a view that moral law is absolute across time and place? That we don’t judge those that came before us for a higher moral view that they weren’t ready to understand? (Note the implicit belief in absolute moral law for your original statement to have even been made.)

I find your distinction between “moral law” and “moral sense” to be very interesting. However, I am not sure I would agree with your basic premise. The problem with believing that there is an ultimate moral law is that it requires an a priori belief in a lawgiver. Without such a lawgiver, there can be no absolute moral law.

But which lawgiver? Jehovah? Allah? Buddha? Vishnu? While much of their moral teachings are similar, there are significant differences. As a Christian, I would assume that you believe that absolute moral law can be found in the Bible. As a Mormon, I assume that you adjust biblical morality with the teachings of the Book of Mormon and latter-day prophets. But if this is the case, then how can you really believe in an absolute moral law? It becomes a matter of whatever deity says that the moment. Hence, we have slavery being acceptable and supported by scripture (“There is not one verse in the Bible inhibiting slavery, but many regulating it. It is not then, we conclude, immoral.” Rev. Alexander Campbell). We have polygamy (both polygyny and polyandry) being acceptable at certain times, and not others (Jacob 2:23-30). We have murder and genocide being acceptable at certain times (particularly in the Old Testament, but some have interpreted BY’s teaching of blood atonement as supportive of such). And of course, Mormon history shows that it’s even ok to be “lying for the Lord” when necessary. Certainly no absolute moral law.

We are also left with the conundrum of attempting to convince others that their particular moral views may not be correct. How do we convince a modern Muslim extremist that it is immoral to commit terrorist acts, if their interpretation of the Koran says that it is morally acceptable, even desirable, to do such things? We must convince them that their lawgiver, Allah, is the wrong authority, or we must convince them that their interpretation is incorrect, despite the multitude of religious leaders telling them otherwise. A tall order indeed when determining moral law depends on determining who believes in the correct authority.

Now what if human morality really were an evolutionary process? Doesn’t that open up the possibility that moral “law” could be developed in a way that isn’t an appeal to authority? That we, as humans, could develop an understanding of what is right and wrong without needing a supreme being to tell us?

It becomes possible that certain things we now hold as moral certainties are such because we developed an innate (by which I mean neurologically wired within our brains if a full materialist view of neurobiology) understanding/sense/knowledge of those things. That somehow the development of this moral sense was evolutionarily advantageous.

It also allows us to adapt our moral sense towards other things. Your example of slavery is the perfect case study. As we progressed as a people we have come to understand that all humans are worthy of respect, and that it is not right for a human to own another human, despite the fact that the bible would allow me beat my slaves (implicitly supporting slavery as an institution, as Alexander Campbell stated).

Do we really feel outrage about past actions that we currently find morally wrong? And if we do, is that really an argument in support of the existence of “moral law”? Or do we more commonly find ourselves thinking that it was unfortunate that our forefathers felt that slavery was fine and are glad that we have progressed as mankind to recognize that slavery is really reprehensible.

Mormon teaching, at least as I was taught growing up in the church, would support this. I was always taught that the majority of slaveholders, particularly among the founding fathers of the US, were generally righteous and honorable men who were living in a time in which slavery was acceptable. Hardly supportive of the view that moral law is absolute across time and place.

The problem obviously with believing in morality as an evolutionary process it obviates a need for a lawgiver. This, ultimately, is what makes “evolutionary morality”, and evolution is general, so unpalatable to religious believers.

Excellent post. I would suggest that certainty is neither a blessing or a curse; for some is just is.

In his comments, Matt Thurston references an excellent book, On Being Certain, that I would recommend that you read if you can. Dr. Burton, as a neurologist, argues for the materialist view that, like much of our personality, the sense of certainty or uncertainty that we have about any particular subject is neurobiologically based. Obviously, if one doesn’t believe in the materialism of modern neuroscience then you won’t find yourself agreeing with Dr. Burton. I have found that thinking of certainty is these terms allows me to be more understanding and tolerant of those who express such certainty. They really are certain; they really do know for all intents and purposes.

Blake Ostler, in his presentation at FAIR conference that has been reference, is one that argues against this materialistic understanding of our self. I obviously don’t agree with some of his basic assumptions and points, but it is a good counterpoint to Dr. Burton’s book.

See, that is the point. I know that the Church is true. That doesn’t mean that I’m naive enough to think that we have the answers to everything. We happen to have truth on the KEY points of salvation, and the KEYS of authority. We have yet to get revelation on many KEY issues. Other Churches have much truth. Other religions that are not even Christian have much truth that even we don’t have. But they are missing the keys and the KEY to salvation. That is the paradox here. That is why the Lord has given truth to all the world and we cannot be arrogant to think that we have keys to everything. Some have the keys to this or the key to that. We happen to have the key to salvation that is the keystone to all truth. If you guys can’t see that, then I’m sorry for you.

The more certain someone is that they see the full picture and know the full truth, the more they are likely to retain that certainty even if the things about which they are certain change radically. I would be willing to bet that most of the most vitriolic, hyperbolic, bitter, intolerant ex-mos once were among the most certain Mormons when they were active. When they believed, everyone who didn’t were sinners, unlike them; when they left and changed their beliefs, that basic perspective didn’t change.

I find that fascinating, and I think it speaks volumes about the risk of being an active Mormon who is totally convinced that we are completely right and everyone else is completely wrong. I can’t find that in ANY of our standard works – or as the consensus of any of the FP’s or Q’s12. Such an unrealistic stance on one extreme probably tends to swing one to the opposite unrealistic stance on the other extreme when it is shattered. Unfortunately, the person doing the swinging rarely understands why they swing so far.

Actually it’s the same argument exactly. No matter how much you deny free will, you still continue to act as if it’s real.

Your argument about morality and evolution reminds me of philosophical determinists who deny the existence of free will and yet we see THEM continue to make decisions!

But what do we make of this? I think there are two possible conclusions.

The first is that people who have less believing natures are morally disordered (“hard of heart,” etc.) and should coax themselves into belief in order to right this moral failing. The idea is that prayer works for everyone if they would just give it a chance and be patient when listening for the answer. The answer received (for example, a testimony of The Book of Mormon) will be the same for every right-minded, sincere person.

The second is that religiosity is not a universal moral good. In this view, prayer works for some people but not for others. Some people might pray about The Book of Mormon and receive a testimony. Others might not. Others would be highly skeptical of its claims of historicity. None of these people can claim moral superiority. Instead, it is their moral duty to work together to solve common problems and live in peace with one another.

The problem with any religious claim of universality is the risk of sectarianism. Once there are multiple, competing groups with a claim on universal truth, conflict ensues. “Certainty” is a dangerous thing.

This is probably a post for another time, but I doubt “moral law” has any realistic possible scientific backing at all. (If anything, science really suggests that morality doesn’t exist and it’s a figment of our imagination or an artifact of evolution that can be disregarded as desired.)

He apparently thought what I was calling “moral law” was the same as “moral sense.”

Just to be clear, I was not denying here that science doesn’t back the idea that we all have a moral sense. (Seeing how it’s one of the most obvious observations that can be made, science would be pretty bad to deny that.)

My point was actually exactly what NM Tony said in #49. That science is at odds with the idea that this moral sense has any sort of absolute standard that exists. (i.e. it’s a “moral law” of the universe.)

My other point is that none of us believe that “moral law” doesn’t exist. None of us. We might say we do, but then immediately we act contrary to that way of thinking. We all accept morality in a sort of “aboslute sense” no matter who we are. For example, we get outraged over dead people that did something we felt was wrong (e.g. owned slaves) as if there was some absolute standard of morality that we can compare them to.

But if science is right, we are just being silly because there is no absolute moral law by which to do this comparision. We are just comparing them to our currently accepted and fully culturally derived “moral sense” when in fact they just had a completely different culturally derived “moral sense” alien to ours. No comparison is possible.

But do you really believe that? I don’t.

I didn’t say that, NM Tony. You are conflating scientific knowledge about how morality forms with knowledge of morality itself. The first is scientific. The second is pure feeling and is innate and is NOT discovered via scientific inquiry. We are born with the capacity and it is formed in part via our upbringing. It is “felt” and that is how we “know” it. Thus it is a “spiritual revelation,” regardless of whether it comes from God or evolution. This was my point, at the time, nothing more.

However, let me go one further, NM Tony, you say you think morality is just an artifact of evolution, but do you really believe that? That is to say, do you live your life as if morality was merely an artifact of evolution? Consider this:

If morality simply arises from the natural world and evolution (let’s call that hypothesis A) as opposed to from an absolute source (let’s call that hypothesis B) than we have no “moral grounds,” if you will, for feeling outraged over early American’s in the south owning slaves.

They simply formed a “different” morality than we do today in an attempt to replicate their DNA efficiently via the evolutionary process. They did so at the expense of someone else’s DNA, but it was an effective method (and isn’t that’s the basis for evolution, natural selection?) and arose from evolution as much as “morality” did. So strictly speaking one approach isn’t “better” than the other. They are both just biological strategies that both have pros and cons.

The “moral outrage” we feel over slavery is just evolution tricking us into creating an environment where we can replicate DNA. But wanting to hold slaves to improve one’s life at the expense of others is exactly the same — evolution tricking us into creating an environment where we can replicate DNA. There is no difference between the two. They are both just biological strategies. We are free to ignore our moral outrage as much as we are free to ignore our drive to dominate others.

Do you believe that NM Tony? If you don’t, then you actually hold to hyothesis B — that morality is absolute — whether you claim to believe it or not.

Your statement that morality has little or no scientific basis is incorrect. There are numerous scientists who are in active study concerning the nature of morality and altruism. For example, Steven Pinker, Marc Hauser, and Austin Dacey are among the more prominent scientists working on this and showing that morality can indeed be a biological and evolutionary process In fact, there is strong and empirical evidence that a moral code and altruism exists among more primitive life forms (some have even suggested that it may include the bacteria E. coli). Most of morality is subjective based on cultural traditions and learnings, but there are some very basic moral overlaps among all cultures (e.g. murder, theft, adultery are considered wrong on various levels in most if not all cultures.).

In order to keep this from being a total threadjack, I think morality studies are essentially based on the uncertainty and implausibility that a supremely moral being is in charge of our moral judgment, especially when one evaluates the abhorrent morality of deity in scripture. As far as having a moral sense of seeing slavery as immoral, we still have a basis for the injustice of dehumanizing an individual and exploitation. Furthermore, humanity has a capacity for empathy and learning, as do many primates. All in all, there seems to be more evidential certainty that morality is indeed an evolutionary artifact. But science discovery is based on uncertainty and inquiry, which is why dogma is such taboo in scientific inquiry–though some scientists still fall into dogmatic thinking. Nevertheless, uncertainty is still a pivotal role in science.

Yes, but it’s the “knowledge” of moral law that is the “spiritual revelation.” Somehow, John, you know (or think you know) what moral law is. Somehow Steve does. Somehow *everyone in the world* does. Where is this knowledge coming from? How can it be accounted for?

Did they find it out via scientific inquiry? Is there some rational thought processes that lead us all to it? Do people go to school and start out with no understanding of moral law and then we program them to accept it via book learning?

That line of thought is a dead end. If morality is merely an artifact of evolution, for example, then we certainly have no basis for (to use an example) the moral outrage we feel over our early ancestors in America owning slaves. Who are we to pit our evolutionary developed moral sense against theirs and judge ours superior? Yet, we all *know* we can and we all *know* we’re right. How do we know that?

(And isn’t that really just asserting that there is some absolute standard for morality that time can’t change even if the entire world votes and decides it was morally okay at the time? Which, be definition, makes it something other than an artifact of evolution, btw.)

There is no rational explanation for this phenonmenon that doesn’t result in abandonment of believing morality exists and is real. But the fact is that we all “feel it” and nothing more. It is “merely” a spiritual revelation how we receive knowledge of moral law.

But since we all base our lives around this spiritual revelation (no matter what your religious preference, even atheist), I assert this means that spiritual revelations are already widely accepted by every living human being (unless they have no higher brain functions at all) as the primary and most important source of knowledge available — the source of knowledge that you can and will organize your life around.

Ah, I see what you are saying.

To my understanding, revelation could potentially disclose the content of moral law, but the act of revelation itself is the disclosure, not the content. That is, moral law and revelation are not synonymous. If they were, an Islamic text revealed by Allah with detailed prescriptions for social interactions would probably line up a bit more nicely with Jewish or Christian accounts of revelation about the proper modes of social interaction.

Stephen,

The scientific method is the strongest possibility for a unifying international paradigm our world has right now. Just think of the global warming discussions taking place. Yet, humans have given the direction of inquiry a specific bent, towards preserving those values you cite of justice, peace, love, and cooperation. This indicates to me the possibility of a moral law existing behind or above all of the cultural trappings of our particular lives which we glimpse imperfectly. These values could have been selected for naturally, but that for me does not answer the final question of why THESE values, (or if they might not be encouraged by the parameters of the physical universe, a la an anthropic principle), which seem consistent over the span of recorded history.

And John I agree…the only form of probability with which we can come together on is that of scientific probablity. Nevertheless…I think most people in the world want happiness and do not want death, killing and chaos but like justice, love and cooperation. Don’t ask me why…perhaps it is evolutionary, entropy based, or spiritual….however I think that the innate reasons for this desire can be preprogrammed due to our cooperation as a evolving species…and I dont see this as mutually exclusive from our spirituality.

Absolutely not. I’m the first one to say that everyone should be speculating on which star kolob is, or where zarahemla was, or if adam had a bellybutton. I’m expressing the fact that that stuff isn’t core testimony, and core testimony is what is certain, while everybody’s various candidates for zarahemla are as numerous as the stars in the heavens. I think Cerro Vigia is a pretty kool Cumorah, althogh Cerro Rabon is a good one too. Maybe we should go digging down there and see if we can find a cave with cool stuff in it.