theistic metaethics

Link: “Slavery, Southern Conservatism, and Darwinian Natural Right” by Larry Arnhart

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“Some of the opponents of Darwinian moral naturalism insist that morality requires a transcendent source in religious belief. But in this debate over slavery, we see that such religious belief–at least as coming from Biblical revelation–does not provide us reliable moral guidance. Cobb was able to show that the Bible–both the Old Testament and the … Link: “Slavery, Southern Conservatism, and Darwinian Natural Right” by Larry Arnhart

Why the moral argument fails

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Of all the arguments for the existence of God, there is one argument (or one style of argument) that I have never had any sympathy with and never understood why anyone has any sympathy with, and that is the moral argument. It seems to me and has pretty much always seemed to me (at least … Why the moral argument fails

God’s nature does not make his commands non-arbitrary

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Many modern defenders of the divine command theory frequently claim that God’s commands are not arbitrary because they flow from his essential nature. Their argument is bad. That a commander issues consistent commands based on his/her own character does not mean that those commands are not arbitrary. Whether a command is arbitrary depends on whether … God’s nature does not make his commands non-arbitrary

Euthyphro Dilemmas

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As I explained on page 25 of my Primer in Religion and Morality I think there are multiple dilemmas floating around under the name “Euthyphro Dilemma” (hereafter, ED). ED: The literal, original formulation of the ED is this: “Is the pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it … Euthyphro Dilemmas

Moral Arguments for God and Coining a Name for a Common but Fallacious Objection

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In response to Wintery Knight’s recent blog post on the plausibility of objective morality on atheism, I posted a comment in the combox on his site. The comment consisted solely of a link to my YouTube video, “Naturalism, Theism, and Moral Ontology: A Reply to William Lane Craig.” In response to that link, WK wrote … Moral Arguments for God and Coining a Name for a Common but Fallacious Objection

Naturalism, Theism, and Moral Ontology: A Reply to William Lane Craig

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(Reposting since this seems to be so popular. So far as I am aware, neither WLC nor anyone else has responded to this.)Abstract: This paper considers William Lane Craig’s metaethical argument for God’s existence. Roughly, the argument is that the existence of objective moral values provides strong evidence for God’s existence. I consider one by one … Naturalism, Theism, and Moral Ontology: A Reply to William Lane Craig

Preliminary Remarks Concerning Euthyphro-style Ojections to the Divine Command Theory

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This post is meant to set the stage for a follow-up post in which I will argue that the Euthyphro Dilemma provides a definitive (or as close to definitive as we can reasonably expect to get) objection to divine command metaethics (even the modern so-called modified divine command theories associated with Robert Adams, Edward Wierenga, … Preliminary Remarks Concerning Euthyphro-style Ojections to the Divine Command Theory