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Are Religious People more Moral than Atheists? Here are the Facts | Phil Zuckerman - Feddit (feddit.de)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/atheism

56 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Crosspost from [email protected].

An overview of studies which investigate correlations between morality and religious vs. secular / atheist ideologies presented by Phil Zuckerman who is a professor of sociology and secular studies at the Claremont colleges in California, USA.

Summary: Atheists / secular people not only have morals but are even more moral than religious people.

Note: Of course moral is a matter of perspective. In this context we agree that compassion and empathy are our foundations of moral.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

In which one do compassion and empathy make someone more moral?

Morality is a judgement on someone’s actions. You can be empathetic and immoral, like a sadist. Sadists can score very high on empathy scales, because they want to create feelings in their targets, just bad ones.
Not very moral.

Now, compassion and empathy can be tools to help someone act in a more moral way, but they are not in and of themselves moral or good.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

In which one do compassion and empathy make someone more moral?

For example in the following:

Utilitarianism
Ethics of Care
Virtue Ethics
Altruism
Humanitarian Ethics

Morality is a judgement on someone’s actions.

Are you sure?
I think morality can also encompass the inner states and views of a person and not just their actions. Or do you think, for example, that someone who kills someone else by accident is equally bad as someone who does this intentionally?

Sadists can score very high on empathy scales, because they want to create feelings in their targets, just bad ones.
Not very moral.

Wouldn't you agree that sadists are more extreme and more rare individuals than the general population?
You don't need to answer that, since what I said above would apply to such extreme cases as well.

Now, compassion and empathy can be tools to help someone act in a more moral way, but they are not in and of themselves moral or good.

Depends on your ethical framework. Often these emotions are the origins of a larger ethical constructs. And as I pointed out they can indeed be significant for the moral judgement about someone.

However, I didn't claim in my post and parent comment that those emotions alone are an isolated moral framework. I just wanted to point out that the studies in the video use moral frameworks as a tool of measure, which have their origins in such emotions. Thereby excluding other ethical frameworks which root, e.g., in dogmatism.

[+] [email protected] -9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why are you citing a bunch of consequentialist ethics? At the very least you could try to pick ethical theories that don't focus on outcomes, but instead you are so incompetent that you can't even find a superficial defence.

What you actually need to show is not that compassion and empathy can be a motivating factor, but that they are a necessary factor for morally good behaviour even within these frameworks.

"I didn't claim in my post ... that these emotions alone are an isolated moral framework"

Nobody here is accusing you of that. They are accusing you (and presumably the video by extension) of choosing an insufficient basis for the conclusion.

Nobody is confused by what you are claiming, it's extraordinarily trivial and simply false.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Why are you citing a bunch of consequentialist ethics?

I was asked for ethical frameworks in which compassion and empathy play an important role. I delivered.

At the very least you could try to pick ethical theories that don’t focus on outcomes

Didn't I?
From the Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

Virtue ethics is currently one of three major approaches in normative ethics. It may, initially, be identified as the one that emphasizes the virtues, or moral character, in contrast to the approach that emphasizes duties or rules (deontology) or that emphasizes the consequences of actions (consequentialism).

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ethics-virtue/

The only consequentialist ethical framework I listed is utilitarianism. The others don't strictly fit the definition of a consequentialist ethic.

instead you are so incompetent

Thank you for these kind words. They really shed a light on your character.

What you actually need to show is not that compassion and empathy can be a motivating factor, but that they are a necessary factor for morally good behaviour even within these frameworks.

And why do I need to do this? My whole point was to hint to the origins of such ethical concepts.

choosing an insufficient basis for the conclusion

In case you mean the selection of ethical frameworks, which serve as a basis to judge moral behaviour in the studies reviewed in the video, it wasn't my intention to provide an elaborate definition. You can probably inspect those within the studies themselves. I just wanted to provide a hint towards those which are used and thought it was sufficient to abbreviate it the way I did.

it’s extraordinarily trivial and simply false

You keep making claim after claim and while I am defending my words, refuting your accusations, you don't prove yours.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 year ago

"empathy and compassion play an important role"

No. You were not asked about "important", you were asked about "necessary". Empathy and compassion may play a role, but they are not required in the majority of the ethical theories you cite.

Remember saying that a group is more moral than another based on X property, requires that X property be necessary for morally good action (or necessary for greater moral action). These two properties claimed (compassion and empathy) are not necessary for greater moral action, you have admitted this yourself. Therefore the conclusion is false.

"While I am defending my words... you don't prove yours"

You realise that all of my claims are linked together to a unified refutation? You have utterly failed to even address the criticisms I and others have lodged against you. You just say "well of course..." as if agreeing and then go back to asserting the very claim that these criticisms refute.