Most vile concept/aspect of atheism.

Originally posted by Halitose
Didn't Kant assert in his Critique of Practical Reason that morality requires a belief in the existence of God, freedom, and immortality, because without this said existence there can be no morality?

No he didn't.

Originally posted by Starrman
Explanation?

Employing transient standards, what is acceptable today is subject to change. What is abhorred today may be embraced tomorrow. The person who is trespassing today may just be considering what he sees in the future, and acting upon the same future standard.

Kervorkian comes to mind.

Originally posted by bbarr
I have no idea what you're asking. Atheists, like all people, come to believe things about morality by reasoning about morality, learning from their experiences, and so on. Atheists, like all people, construct explanations for their experiences, including their sentiments. Some of these theories aim at describing and expaining morality. The theist claims t ...[text shortened]... al theories all posit an ultimate, ontological ground for morality. So, what's your problem?

These ethical theories all posit an ultimate, ontological ground for morality. So, what's your problem?

True. My problem is that this would be a subjective morality where you have no objective grounds to impute the one system worse than the other -- all ethical systems, from hedonism and utilitarianism through to those based on cannibalism and sadism have equal right to consideration, and no right to condemnation.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Employing transient standards, what is acceptable today is subject to change. What is abhorred today may be embraced tomorrow. The person who is trespassing today may just be considering what he sees in the future, and acting upon the same future standard.

Kervorkian comes to mind.

You have yet to demonstrate why these absolutes are so important. The moral scale (even under a Christian banner) have always changed through the ages.

Originally posted by bbarr
No he didn't.

Then how would you interpret this paragraph from Book 2, Chapter 2:

"In the foregoing analysis the moral law led to a practical problem which is prescribed by pure reason alone,
without the aid of any sensible motives, namely, that of the necessary completeness of the first and principle
element of the summum bonum, viz., morality; and, as this can be perfectly solved only in eternity, to the
postulate of immortality. The same law must also lead us to affirm the possibility of the second element of the
summum bonum, viz., happiness proportioned to that morality, and this on grounds as disinterested as before,
and solely from impartial reason; that is, it must lead to the supposition of the existence of a cause adequate to
this effect; in other words, it must postulate the existence of God, as the necessary condition of the possibility
of the summum bonum (an object of the will which is necessarily connected with the moral legislation of pure
reason). We proceed to exhibit this connection in a convincing manner."

Originally posted by bbarr
No he didn't.

In the Third Section of the Grounding and in the Kritik der practischen Vernunft (Critique of Practical Reason) (1788), Kant grounded this conception of moral autonomy upon our postulation of god, freedom, and immortality.

Since action in accordance with the moral law requires an autonomous will, we must suppose ourselves to be free; since the correspondence of happiness with virtue cannot be left to mere coincidence, we must suppose that there is a god who guarantees it; and since the moral perfection demanded by the categorical imperative cannot be attained in this life, we must suppose ourselves to live forever. Thus god, freedom, and immortality, which we have seen to be metaphysical illusions that lie beyond the reach of pure reason, turn out to be the three great postulates of practical reason.

Originally posted by Starrman
You have yet to demonstrate why these absolutes are so important. The moral scale (even under a Christian banner) have always changed through the ages.

Application, yes. Again, this only goes toward the acting agents, not the standard.

Originally posted by Halitose
[b]These ethical theories all posit an ultimate, ontological ground for morality. So, what's your problem?

True. My problem is that this would be a subjective morality where you have no objective grounds to impute the one system worse than the other -- all ethical systems, from hedonism and utilitarianism through to those based on cannibalism and sadism have equal right to consideration, and no right to condemnation.[/b]

It is an objective matter whether some principle is one we would agree to from some specified bargaining position. It is an objective matter whether some maxim fails to satisfy one of the formulations of the Categorical Imperative. It is an objective matter whether some action maximizes utility (under some description) or whether it does not, etc. etc. So, these aren't subjective ethical theories at all. They are ethical theories that aim at explaining morality through positing various ultimate, objective grounds for morality. They are not subjective. Their truth does not depend, at all, on whether anybody believes that they are true. They are not relativistic (except for relativism, which is a term that encompasses ethical egoism and normative cultural relativism), it that they are taken to apply correctly even to those who disagree with them. They are objective in every meaningful sense of the word. We can condemn them by arguing against them, much as we atheists argue against the Divine Command Theory by utilizing Euthyphro's dilemma. We argue against ethical theories by trying to show that they entail contradictions, or that they prohibit things that we take to be morally irrelevant, or that they mandate things we take to be morally atrocious, or... Sometimes our intutions about particular cases may need to be revised, but often they serve a function in debates about ethical theory analogous to the role observation plays in debates in the natural sciences. We want our theories to fit the data, and our intutions about particular cases provide some data (can you imagine an ethical theory that didn't track our intutions at all? Would that even be a theory about morality?).

Originally posted by bbarr
It is an objective matter whether some principle is one we would agree to from some specified bargaining position. It is an objective matter whether some maxim fails to satisfy one of the formulations of the Categorical Imperative. It is an objective matter whether some action maximizes utility (under some description) or whether it does not, etc. etc. So, ...[text shortened]... theory that didn't track our intutions at all? Would that even be a theory about morality?).

It is an objective matter whether some principle is one we would agree to from some specified bargaining position. It is an objective matter whether some maxim fails to satisfy one of the formulations of the Categorical Imperative. It is an objective matter whether some action maximizes utility (under some description) or whether it does not, etc. etc. So, these aren't subjective ethical theories at all.

Isn't this circular reasoning, since you are claiming objectivity by placing morality under the scrutiny of a given moral system, which is itself subjective?

Originally posted by Halitose
It is an objective matter whether some principle is one we would agree to from some specified bargaining position. It is an objective matter whether some maxim fails to satisfy one of the formulations of the Categorical Imperative. It is an objective matter whether some action maximizes utility (under some description) or whether it does not, etc. etc. ty by placing morality under the scrutiny of a given moral system, which is itself subjective?

How on Earth do you get that from the passage you've quoted above? In that passage I was identifying the sets of facts that, respective to each of the theories mentioned, are taken to be the subvenient base (ground, base, foundation, source, etc.) of morality. Identifying these sets of facts does not require presupposing the truth of any particular moral theory; it merely requires you to have read some theoretical ethics.

EDIT: Did you intend to quote a different passage from my post?

Originally posted by Conrau K
Has it occured to you that love from God remains self-centered. We love God so that we dont go to hell or to experience soem higher self. Nothing more. It still remains trivial whether from God or not.

Also, evolution would not be self-centered exactly, it would be perhaps more gene-centered.

Whats so good about love for God?

You are correct in that the initial motivation for coming to God may involve a self interest in self preservation. When one comes to God, however, God has a way of changing your heart. You then start to love others who have nothing to offer you in return. You also begin to love those who may wish you dead. This is a supernatural kind of love. This is because God is the source of all love and it naturally flows when he comes into your life.

Originally posted by Halitose
Then how would you interpret this paragraph from Book 2, Chapter 2:

"In the foregoing analysis the moral law led to a practical problem which is prescribed by pure reason alone,
without the aid of any sensible motives, namely, that of the necessary completeness of the first and principle
element of the summum bonum, viz., morality; and, as this can ...[text shortened]... gislation of pure
reason). We proceed to exhibit this connection in a convincing manner."

Read this, from the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

The reality of freedom is only the first of Kant's three 'postulates of pure practical reason'; the other two are the existence of God and the immortality of the soul. Again Kant's argument is that, as the first Critique showed, neither of these can be proven by theoretical metaphysics, but they can nevertheless be postulated as necessary conditions of something essential to morality. In this case, however, they are conditions not of our obligation under the categorical imperative but for the realization of the 'highest good.' This is another complex and controversial concept. Kant typically defines it as happiness in proportion to virtue, which is worthiness to be happy (5: 110), but suggests different grounds for the necessity of this conjunction. In the Critique of Practical Reason, Kant sometimes treats happiness and virtue as two separate ends of human beings, one our natural end and the other our moral end, which we simply seek to combine (5: 110). In other places, however, beginning with the 'Canon of Pure Reason' in the first Critique, he holds that since what virtue does is precisely to coordinate our mutual pursuit of ends, and happiness arises from the realization of ends, maximal happiness would inevitably follow maximal virtue under ideal circumstances (A 809/B 837 ). Of course, circumstances are not always ideal for morality: as far as we can see, no one achieves perfect virtue in a normal lifespan, and such virtue as is attained is hardly always rewarded with happiness. To counter this, Kant holds that we may postulate immortality, in which to perfect our virtue, and the existence of God, who can legislate a nature in which the ends of virtue are achieved.

This theory has seemed to many to be Kant's vain attempt to save his personal faith from his own scathing critique of metaphysics. Before such a claim could even be discussed, we would have to know what Kant really means by a postulate of practical reason. Kant gives several hints about this which have not been adequately explored. In the first Critique, he discusses the practical postulates in a section where he considers readiness to bet as a measure of belief, thus suggesting that what he actually has in mind is Pascal's wager (see Pascal, B.): since there is no theoretical disproof of these postulates, and nothing to lose if they are false, but their value to happiness is great, it is rational to act as if they were true. In a later essay, a draft on the 'Real Progress of Metaphysics from the Time of Leibniz and Wolff' from the early 1790s (posthumously published), Kant makes an even more striking suggestion. There he says that in the assumption of the practical postulates 'the human being is authorized to grant influence on his actions to an idea which he, in accord with moral principles, has made himself, just as if he had derived it from a given object' (20: 305 ). Here the suggestion is that the practical postulates are nothing less than another expression of human autonomy: not theoretical beliefs at all, let alone religious dogmas, but ideas which we construct for ourselves solely to increase our own efforts at virtue. This idea, that God is in fact nothing but an idea of our own making for use within our moral practice, is a thought Kant repeatedly expressed in his very last years (see §14).

Note that the postulates of practical reason function essentially as motivators; ways of bootstrapping ourselves into continuing to act morally despite the world not being constructed so as to continuously reward our efforts. But for Kant, as you can read in the Groundwork, right action results from the good will (a will that acts in accord with the Categorical Imperative out of respect for the moral law, and not merely by virtue of desire for reward), and our obligations to act rightly are not contingent on our being rewarded by the world. In fact, for Kant, the consequences of an act are completely irrelevant in determining the acceptability of a maxim for action, and do not excuse failures to act in accord with the CI. So, since moral rightness doesn't, for Kant, depend on God, and since our obligations to act rightly do not depend on God, and since the postulates of practical reason are essentially devices we employ to self motivate, it is simply false that for Kant morality is dependent on God.

If you have any further questions, feel free to ask.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
In the Third Section of the Grounding and in the Kritik der practischen Vernunft (Critique of Practical Reason) (1788), Kant grounded this conception of moral autonomy upon our postulation of god, freedom, and immortality.

Since action in accordance with the moral law requires an autonomous will, we must suppose ourselves to be free; since the correspo ...[text shortened]... beyond the reach of pure reason, turn out to be the three great postulates of practical reason.

You should cite your sources, else it looks like plagiarism:

http://www.philosophypages.com/hy/5i.htm

Also, see above.

Originally posted by whodey
You are correct in that the initial motivation for coming to God may involve a self interest in self preservation. When one comes to God, however, God has a way of changing your heart. You then start to love others who have nothing to offer you in return. You also begin to love those who may wish you dead. This is a supernatural kind of love. This is because God is the source of all love and it naturally flows when he comes into your life.

Still trivial, no matter how much God transforms your heart.

Originally posted by bbarr
Read this, from the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

[b]This theory has seemed to many to be Kant's vain attempt to save his personal faith from his own scathing critique of metaphysics.

[/b]Always seemed like that to me.

The important point for this discussion, surely, is that one could adopt a Kantian theory of morality without God.