Ch.

2: Morality and Religion

Reminder: chapter 1
• Ethics tries to determine
which choices are good
choices
• (or what kind of life is a good
life)
• studies the reasons or
principles that make our
choices good
• « good » in the unconditional
sense (not good for a certain
purpose, good « without ifs »)
 How can we find out
what is good or bad?
• by religion
– what does the Catholic Church / the Bible / the
Kuran / etc. says about this ethical question?
• philosophical ethics
– just by « reason »: intelligence, capacity of
understanding of all human beings
 A common observation
• Disagreements on important ethical matters
typically correspond to differences in
religious creed
– problem: if that is true, why should we try to
study ethics independently from religion?
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 1: Divine Command Theory
– if there is no God, then nothing is right or wrong
– because God is the Creator of Morality
• Objection 2: Ethical Fideism
– even if God is not the « Creator » of Morality, he is like
the perfect « thermometer » knowing infallibly what is
right and wrong
– so we need his revelation to know what is right and
wrong
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 1: Divine Command Theory
– (1) God is the ultimate « source » of Morality
– (2) if God is the ultimate source of Morality,
then the only way to know what is right or
wrong is to ask Him
– therefore
– (C) the true principles of ethics can only come
from revelation by God (Religion), not from the
use of our own reason (Philosophy)
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 1: Divine Command Theory
– (1) God is the ultimate « source » of Morality
– (2) if God is the ultimate source of Morality,
then the only way to know what is right or
wrong is to ask Him
• even if God has « invented » the Moral Code, He
might have inscribed it in each one of our hearts, in
our nature
– see next chapter on Natural Law.
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 1: Divine Command Theory
– (1) God is the ultimate « source » of Morality
– (2) if God is the ultimate source of Morality,
then the only way to know what is right or
wrong is to ask Him
– therefore
– (C) the true principles of ethics can only come
from revelation by God (Religion), not from the
use of our own reason (Philosophy)
 Divine Command Theory
• Is God really the « source » of morality? (cf. SL
p.7-9)
– « if God doesn’t exist, then everything is permitted »
(cf. The Brothers Karamazov)
  sounds like a natural thing to believe for a religious
believer: God is the source of everything, including
morality
– … and yet rejected by most religious philosophers or
theologians (in the Christian tradition)!
 The Euthyphro dilemma
• Socrates’ dilemma against Euthyphro:
– Which one of these sentences is true?
• (i) God commands us to do some actions (e.g. loving one’s
parents) because they are morally right,
• (ii) actions are morally right because God commands them
– NB: they can’t both be true!
• that would be circular
– (ii) = God as source of morality (divine command
theory)
The Euthyphro dilemma
• Duns Scotus’ Divine
Command Theory
– first table of the Decalogue
(love God) = necessary
– second table of the Decalogue
(murder, theft, adultery, etc.) =
freely decided by God
• … i.e. for no other reason than
that God decided so and so
 God could just as well have
decided otherwise
The Euthyphro dilemma
• Two objections
– (1) God’s decisions are not
arbitrary
• that would be an imperfection
– (2) it’s unconceivable that rape,
murder, torture, adultery, etc.
« could » just as well have been
morally right (if God had
decided so)
• it’s necessarily in the nature of
murder / rape, etc. that they are
wrong, it’s not contingent on
anyone’s decision
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 2: Ethical fideism
– (1) God alone is omniscient and infallible
– (2) our reason is limited and fallible
– therefore
– (C) the true principles of ethics can only be
known from revelation by God (Religion), not
from the use of our reason (Philosophy)
• (definition: Fideism = the thesis according to which
all knowledge comes from faith alone)
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 2: Ethical fideism
– Definition
• (General) Fideism = the thesis according to which
all knowledge comes from faith alone
• Ethical Fideism = the thesis according to which
ethical knowledge comes from faith alone
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 2: Ethical fideism
– NB: Shafer-Landau (p.10-11) even finds
problem with a much more modest thesis:
• (strong thesis) religion is the only possible source of
moral guidance (excluding reason) = ethical fideism
• (modest thesis) religion can be one source of moral
guidance (in addition to reason)
– SL’s objection: that would require being justified in
accepting a particular religion (and this religion providing
clear moral advice)
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 2: Ethical fideism
– (1) God alone is omniscient and infallible
– (2) our reason is limited and fallible
– therefore
– (C) the true principles of ethics can only be
known from revelation by God (Religion), not
from the use of our reason (Philosophy)
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 2: Ethical fideism
– (1) God alone is omniscient and infallible
– (2) our reason is limited and fallible
– therefore
• objection: even if God is the only one who has
infallible ethical knowledge, He might have decided
to give us a sufficiently reliable and natural
capacity to know what is right or wrong
– see next chapter on Natural Law.
 Two objections against doing
philosophical Ethics
• Objection 2: Ethical fideism
– (C) the true principles of ethics can only come from
revelation by God
• a) it seems that there are moral universals that all human
beings, with or without religion, have always known (murder
is wrong, honouring one’s parents is good)
• b) unacceptable consequence: if true, it would be impossible to
discuss moral matters and try to find truth between people of
different religions
• c) unacceptable consequence: if true, people with other
religions (or no religion at all) would be innocent of any
crime, because they couldn’t know that what they’re doing is
wrong!
 Conclusion
• We can study Ethics with the use of our
Reason (Philosophy) because:
– even if there is a God, He hasn’t “arbitrarily
decided” what is right or wrong (there are
reasons for what is right and wrong)
– even if infallible knowledge comes only from
Revelation, still God may have given us, in our
nature, a sufficiently reliable Reason to know
what is right or wrong.