Secular Reason: The Mother of Moral Absolutes
Morality
A very common argument of many religious people is that a secular, humanist or materialist worldview leads inevitably to moral relativism. Since, on this way of thinking (they argue), there is nothing inherently special or unique about human beings—we are just bags of water and proteins who happen to have evolved some tendency toward helping each other—there cannot be any basis for an absolute or objective morality. Furthermore, unlike in the religious mindset in which the divine invests the universe with a certain fundamental moral order, a materialist or naturalist universe has no such inherent moral order. Humanity provides no basis for morality, and the universe provides no basis for morality, so in the materialist world there simply is no basis for morality, hence moral relativism—anything potentially goes.
I recently made a post arguing that religion, in fact, leads to moral relativism. Similarly, I will now argue that secularism or secular reason can lead to moral absolutes. And the argument is just as simple: evidence. Or more precisely, fidelity to objective evidence. Secular reason has it, and religion doesn’t.
Absolute truth
If secular reason is defined as a tool for understanding the world that is based on objective evidence and arguments derived thereof, then we see that by its very nature it necessarily leads to absolute truths. Based on certain mathematical facts, verifiable scientific observations and internally consistent arguments, people were able to determine conclusively that the earth is round, against all previous assumptions as well as long-established common sense. In the same way, absolute truth about the world and how it operates has been consistently revealed over the centuries by this kind of secular reasonable methodology.
Why should the methodology for answering moral questions be any different than for other questions? Many religious people accept that science can help us explain what the stars are made of, how fast the earth spins on its axis, or what causes sickness and disease, but suddenly begin to have doubts about the potential for evidence-based reason to answer whether murder is right or wrong, or when violence is justified.
But the only way human beings can know anything is through the application of reason, no matter how intangible or abstract the nature of the question is. Everyone comes to conclusions based on some thought process. A religious person, for example, will answer the question of whether or not we should murder by appealing to god, to the moral order of the universe created by god, and to theological arguments dealing with free will. Thus, they use a certain kind of evidence and a certain kind of argument to answer those questions. And so, in spite of themselves, they are using evidence-based reason to understand things, although in an incomplete and ultimately self-defeating manner.
Religion, by its nature, is ultimately unreliable for moral questions (and all questions) because it lacks an objective standard of knowledge. But secular reason has such a standard: evidence. That evidence can come in many forms, tangible or intangible. Arguments can be made that rely heavily on physical observations, or on intangible deduction or induction. But the basic nature of the process remains the same.
Religion fails on moral truth for the same reason it fails on all truth, and secularism succeeds for the opposite reason.
So, then, what is the basis for morality in a secular world?
William Lane Craig argues in the following video that in a naturalist or materialist worldview (which assumes that only this world exists) there is no basis upon which to claim that humans are inherently special or unique or deserving of some special treatment, relative to anything else in existence.
But this is simply not true. Without going too deeply into the details of a secular objective morality, we can say, for example, that humans are special because they are us. That is, we want to survive and thrive and continue to improve our lives and enhance our existence. Therefore we should do the things that further those goals. So while the religious perspective ultimately justifies humans by pointing to god, and then justifies god by pointing back to god, this secular approach would do the exact same thing, except replacing god with humans. Note that the religious have no problem at all with a basis for morality that is justified by itself—they just have a problem with that basis being humans.
The student in the video asked why humans themselves can’t simply be the basis for morality. Craig responded that “it’s arbitrary. There’s simply no reason to invest homo sapiens and their herd morality… with the kind of objectivity that you want…”
Allow me to reshuffle this scenario, and turn it against Craig: Craig asks a secular person why God itself can’t simply be the basis for morality. And a secular person responds “it’s arbitrary. There’s simply no reason to invest God and God’s morality with the kind of objectivity that you want, Dr. Craig.”
Note that the logic works both ways! And this indicates that, when it comes to first causes (for morality or anything else), regardless of the philosophy in question, logic and the normal rules of causality break down no matter what the first cause is designated to be. This is a permanent problem for any moral philosophy, religious or secular.
So any religious person, like Craig, who would ask “on what basis do you invest humans with such specialness?” should be answered with a question: “on what basis do you invest god with such specialness?” Again, the answer must come back: the thing itself. And if that is an adequate explanation for god, then it is an adequate explanation for humans. Except, not really. It is much more legitimate for humans, because we know that humans exist. The same cannot be said for God. For that reason alone, a morality based on humans is superior to a morality based on God.
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Interesting post but slightly off base. For one I am dispointed that you’ve overlooked a fundamental part of how morality is percieved. That would be the field of philosophy. The philosopher is more to morals than the scientist.
I hear you on measuring morals with equations and how much harm they can do. But that ammounts to nothing in the long run. You can show me scientifically how murder is wrong or that it hurts someone and I’ll believe it. How likely is that to affect how the murderer feels about doing it? Not very much. Extreme example but let me put it into a more simple version.
You can show me with statistics and “reason” that stealing is wrong. That will matter very little to a theif or a starving man who needs it to survive. Reason to the starving man that he needs to do this in order to survive. Reason to the theif is that he can’t pay for it or is unwilling to so this is the easier way, statistics be damned.
The Philisophical ramblings on the other hand might mean more to them. Reflect for a moment if you will on what idealism and ideological presses have done in the past. From the founding of democracy to the civil rights movements. None of these would appeal to statistics or reason. They appeal to the human soul and sense of righteousness. In the past this has worked wonders.
Was it reason or emotional ideas that allowed the Berlin Wall to fall? Facts would point to that it was an unrealistic idea. The Soviets were too powerfull it was thought. However the passions of the European people prevailed and defied reason and tore down a symbol of Soveit opression. Thus marking the end of an era. Without appealing to mans sense of immaterial emotions morals stand for nothing in the face of evil. That is where religion can effectively trump a secular reasoning. Or even simple philosophy. Without that passionate immaterial grace mankind possess morals count for nothing.
Slightly impassioned I know but it stands to reason that even a “secular” logic can’t go without appealing to our unreasonable emotions.
“You can show me scientifically how murder is wrong or that it hurts someone and I’ll believe it. How likely is that to affect how the murderer feels about doing it?”
This is absolutely true. And it has nothing to do with the topic of this post. The issue here is which system—secular reason or religion—is better at revealing moral truths. The answer is the former, for the reasons laid out here and in the previous post on religion and moral relativism.
But revealing or discovering moral truths has nothing to do with actually implementing it. (And this is an age-old problem in philosophy.)
The point you are getting at is correct; when it comes to actually motivating people to do that which is moral, passion and emotion can be very useful. But note: in order to figure out where to direct that emotion, reason and logic is absolutely required.
“Was it reason or emotional ideas that allowed the Berlin Wall to fall? Facts would point to that it was an unrealistic idea.”
The answer is: yes. It was both reason (which led to people realizing, over the decades, that the Soviet system was bad) and emotion (which delivered on the reason-derived idea) that made it happen. Some facts indicated that it was unrealistic, but others indicated that it was very realistic.
Religion has generally done an effective job in motivating people to do various things (both good and bad), but secular entities have as well—think of the secular nation-state (nationalism), secular political philosophies (capitalism, communism, etc).
Well I suppose thats what I’m driving at. I’m off topic I know but its not so much finding moral truths as motivating them. Which is precisely why I’m not arguing for one side or the other on who finds them! Thats highly irrelevant in my opinion as long as someone does.
It all comes down to the motivation to do good.
“It all comes down to the motivation to do good.”
Ah, but Cidd, how do you know what is good? You don’t want to deal with the issue of how to figure out moral truths, and that is understandable and perfectly normal. (Weird people like me are interested in this kind of stuff.) But you should remember that before we can do a good thing, we must know what the heck is good and what is not.
No matter one’s background, it is a tough issue. Religious people need to deal with the fact that their beliefs and doctrine have been and are used in immoral ways, and secular people need to deal with the fact that things like our deep-seated instincts can be forces for good or for bad.
We could all use some reflection on what we truly believe is right and wrong. And I believe (indeed, I know) that a secular framework gives better and more solid answers. Next question, naturally, is how best to implement it.
Hi
Religious people also have to deal with the issue that their moral doctrines might really be as ‘relative’ as any other since there is a tendency to either cherry pick, ie choose those tenets that gel with reason or conveniently discard or ‘re-translate’ those that don’t. How can those who claim absolute morality for the Bible simply discard those moral values that don’t make any sense and still declare it is an objective standard? It’s all very slippery.
I don’t like relativism much [though it's useful for choosing wallpaper and tbe like] and I do believe that if there is an objective standard of morality out there then we can only access it through reason. There doesn’t seem to be any way to prove though, that an objective standard exists. As far as morality goes, all we can claim for secular reasoning is that it’s the best we’ve got….we can’t establish that any reasoned moral conclusion is a moral truth. Can we..?
Great points, Jane.
I do think it’s possible to say X is a moral truth–if we have a moral standard against which we can test it. Technically you could say, along the lines of Dr Craig in the video, that we can’t “prove” beyond doubt that X is a moral truth. But the only reason that is true is because we can’t prove anything beyond all doubt. That is, we can’t prove that reality exists, for example. So we have to assume that on blind faith.
However, if we are going to assume that reality exists, and we are going to assume that objective truth is possible in the area of, say, matter and energy, then it follows that objective truth is also possible in the area of morality. So either (1) we can know things, and therefore we can know moral truths, or (2) we can’t know moral truths, in which case we cannot know anything.
I understand…perhaps it is possible to know morality in the same way as we know things about the ohysical world. Still, what happens if there are two right ways to do things, both being equally reasonable….? How are we to judge which one is a moral truth?
Maybe when it comes to morality it’s better to talk in terms of universals rather than truths…the Truth word seems to get everyone, including me, in a lather.
Cheers
I suppose in that case we could say the two possible courses of action are equally moral.
Yes, semantics and language can be very powerful… and problematic
[...] theism–the moral argument–which I have dealt with before, specifically in regard to secular moral absolutes. His first major point is meaningless because it is based on subjectivity and outrage: “This [...]