Tag Archives: morality

A free Harvard course on morality

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With the advent of the internet, you have a near infinite wealth of information at your fingertips. It is now even possible to get an Ivy League education for free online! A lot of schools are starting to upload their courses to sites like YouTube.

My favorite online course has been a series of lectures on morality by Harvard philosophy professor Michael Sandel. The first installment explores the “moral side of murder” and introduces utilitarianism. Other episodes discuss the role of government, gay marriage, economic justice, and countless other issues through the lens of various moral paradigms.

LDS teachings on sex are contradictory and untenable

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This post is loosely a part of my general conference series, but it also makes the case that LDS teachings on sex are contradictory and untenable.

First, consider what Mormon leaders historically taught regarding birth control:

The world teaches birth control. Tragically, many of our sisters subscribe to its pills and practices when they could easily provide earthly tabernacles for more of our Father’s children. … The first commandment given to man was to multiply and replenish the earth with children. That commandment has never been altered, modified, or canceled. The Lord did not say to multiply and replenish the earth if it is convenient, or if you are wealthy, or after you have gotten your schooling, or when there is peace on earth, or until you have four children. – Ezra Taft Benson, April 1969 General Conference

God made sex, but not for entertainment. It was provided for a divinely appointed act of creation in which we, to this extent, become co-creators with him. – Mark E. Peterson, April 1969 General Conference

[I]f anything were done to postpone [the responsibility of motherhood], the Church would become a party to birth control, and the Church will have nothing to do with that evil. – David O. McKay, April 1949 General Conference

Sexual laxity among young people, birth control, and intemperance are its insidious and vicious enemies. – David O. McKay, October 1947 General Conference

Another erosion of the family is unwarranted and selfish birth control. – Spencer W. Kimball, October 1979 General Conference

We hear so much about emancipation, independence, sexual liberation, birth control, abortion, and other insidious propaganda belittling the role of motherhood, all of which is Satan’s way of destroying woman, the home, and the family—the basic unit of society. – N. Eldon Tanner, October 1973 General Conference

The above is just a small sampling of the church’s statements on birth control. You can read many others at these links.

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William Lane Craig defends the Canaanite genocide

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Last week, I challenged Mormons to defend the genocide their god committed in 3 Nephi 8 and 9. Coincidentally, someone also recently challenged Christian apologist extraordinaire Dr. William Lane Craig to defend the genocide his god condoned in Deuteronomy 20, where Yahweh orders the Israelites to kill every man, woman, and child in the neighboring territories. Craig’s response echoes many of the sentiments that were expressed by Mormons at this blog.

Craig first defends the genocide with an appeal to divine command theory. Nixon infamously said that, “When the President does it, that means that it is not illegal.” Well, Craig would have us similarly believe that when god perpetrates genocide, that means that it is not immoral.

According to the version of divine command ethics which I’ve defended, our moral duties are constituted by the commands of a holy and loving God.  Since God doesn’t issue commands to Himself,  He has no moral duties to fulfill.  He is certainly not subject to the same moral obligations and prohibitions that we are.  For example, I have no right to take an innocent life.  For me to do so would be murder.  But God has no such prohibition.  He can give and take life as He chooses.

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Honor thy father? Bad father figures in the Bible

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The Bible gives a categorical commandment that we honor our fathers. This commandment was so important to the Hebrews that they proscribed the death penalty for transgressing it. In Leviticus 20:9, we read: “For every one that curseth his father or his mother shall be surely put to death: he hath cursed his father or his mother; his blood shall be upon him.”

To be clear, it’s not wrong to honor your father (especially today, Father’s Day!). But I’m not so sure every father deserves our unconditional love, respect, and obedience. My father has certainly earned those things from me—a million times over. Other fathers, however, have not.

Steve Wells over at Dwindling In Unbelief has compiled a list of bad father figures in the Bible. You’ll have to check out his full list, but I just wanted to highlight a few examples:

Noah got stumbling drunk and passed out—naked—in his tent. His poor son Ham inadvertently discovered him in this condition. Realizing that Ham saw him naked, Noah curses Ham’s son Canaan and all the descendants thereof to be “servants of servants” (a rather disproportionate response).

Lot, the only “just and righteous man” in Sodom and Gomorrah, volunteered his daughters to be raped by a mob so as to spare his two male guests (angels). Later, his daughters would rape him and bear his children.

Abraham was willing to offer up his son Isaac as a human sacrifice, as you all know.

Jephthah killed and burned his daughter, whose only crime was to greet her father upon his return from battle.

And then of course you have Yahweh, the father figure in the Bible, who drowned millions of his children and (depending on your Christology ) sent his “only begotten Son” on a suicide mission.

Dr. Huenemann on atheism and morality

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Will Holloway, everyone’s favorite metalhead, was kind enough to record the lecture Dr. Charlie Huenemann gave before SHAFT last week. Huenemann is a philosophy professor here at Utah State University. He spoke about the difficulty atheists face in grounding their morality, especially in the wake of Friedrich Nietzsche.

The reason for his lecture was not disabuse SHAFTers of their disbelief. Dr. Huenemann is an atheist who doesn’t consider theism “a live option.” Rather, Huenemann worries that many atheists (and people in general) aren’t very thoughtful about their basis for morality.

If you weren’t able to attend the lecture, or—like me— you just want to listen to it again, the lecture and the question/answer period are provided below.

Huenemann’s lecture

Q&A

An evolutionary view of morality

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Professor Kleiner for some time now has presented us student atheists a challenge to explain morality in non theological bases. In the video by Sam that was just posted by Jon it talks about how some things are more morally acceptable than others and that there does exist a basic moral right. The problem I have with the video is that it doesn’t explain how humans have come to the conclusion that there are some things that are wrong and that there are some that are right.

To deal with these challenges and issues I turned towards evolution. The reason I did so is because if any state of mind exist it first (as shown by a plethora of evidence) must have evolved that way.

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