Hitchens' Morality Challenge

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The test really doesn't surprise me too much. I mean, yes, there are actions that can be taken by a believer that an atheist cannot do to be good, assuming the moral rightness of a deity. No, I do not think that a believer can actually do something different than a non-believer, particularly given the existence of secular cults, for example Stalinism, or the hypothetical of following Big Brother in 1984.

In any case, I'd argue that the question Hitchens proposes presupposes it's own correctness, as Hitchens is working within his own secular moral ideas and assuming that they are the only possible moral ideas.

Fitting the criteria: Anyone who speaks/acts not because they've considered the right/wrong of what they're doing, but because they believe god(s) have commanded them to do it, or that they'll get brownie points with god(s) for doing it. Whether or not the saying or action is moral will always, like beauty, be in the eye of the beholder. I imagine a lot of acts are performed which the person would otherwise find morally wrong, but manage to justify it by claiming it's the will of their god(s).

E.g.; "Despite my perverse love of power and torturing people, I still have this pesky conscience that is a little squeamish about labeling this woman a witch and drowning her, but my church and my god say it's ok, so woo-hoo! I'm in the clear!"

Or; "Prop 8 is awfully hateful and sets a dangerous precedent where the rights of any group, including mine someday, can be taken away just because another group doesn't like us. But on the other hand, if I don't support it my family will tease me, so I'll support it to please them and our definition of god."

Or; "I really don't want to work at the soup kitchen around all those stinking poor people, but if I do, god (and the chick I'm trying to score at my church) will like me better."



Same answer. Are you doing it because you believe god wants you to?

- Jo

What of the Stalinist purges and show trials? Remember, the biggest mass murderer in human history was an atheist, so don't try to pull that Spanish Inquisition crap on me. Give me one single example of an immoral act that can only be religiously motivated. You can't, because there isn't one.

Well, what if we said "any horrible dead done entirely out of religious reasons". Then BAM! religion loses.

Really, this whole challenge is a huge load of hogwash.

Then similarly religion wins "any virtuous deed done entirely out of religious reasons" and its rather pointless without examples of specific acts that can only be carried out by the religious. Besides, most "horrible deeds done entirely out of religious reasons" have, on closer examination, ulterior, earthly, motives as well.

He's an American journalist. The Mother Theresa book was written when she was very much alive. Have you actually examined Hitchens' argument? Mother Theresa gave moral support to some pretty heinous regimes. She called abortion the greatest threat to peace in the world, she considered suffering a gift from God, she forcibly baptised the dying people in her hospices, her hospices which provided little more than mattresses while the millions she raised went on founding convents & proselytising her hard-line, fundamentalist version of Catholicism.

Also, if we must reduce a person's motivations to pop-psychological terms, I still think you're completely wrong - anytime I've seen Hitchens on any panel programs, or in a debate, he never seems to feel comfortable unless the audience are really against him, in fact he always strikes me as bored otherwise. & even if I knew nothing about him, what's the more likely psychological explanation for someone writing a book about how awful Mother Theresa is? You'd have to be a weirdly poor judge of human nature to think that would make everyone love you.

Last edited by ducasse on 30 Dec 2008, 6:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Well, I mean yes that's why this whole challenge is stupid.

However, we might try to get around this and limit the discourse to those horrible deeds which can be caused by being atheist/religious. Then, since atheism not being a philosophical doctrine in and of itself it wins by default because it doesn't cause any actions by itself. Hence you have good deeds that both an atheist and religious individuals *could* do, but bad deeds which are caused by being religious (sorta). Hence religion is a dangerous superfluity. This seems to be how many atheists approach this problem. But then we have the obvious consequence that we have equal potential for "causing bad" for non "religious" beliefs as well (e.g., as is the classic example, the secular evils of the 20th century).

Last edited by twoshots on 30 Dec 2008, 5:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Well, no it doesn't. "any virtuous deed done entirely out of religious reasons" can also be done - can it not? - by a secular person, & for reasonable reasons. & though "horrible deeds done entirely out of religious reasons" might well have ulterior earthly motives, the existence of a religious justification enormously facilitates the person who has these motives.

But the point is, it is easy to imagine a sincere religious person behaving immorally, or in a way he would consider immoral if he had not already accepted a whole bunch of crazy propositions as a priori truths, precisely because he felt he was compelled to act that way by the dictates of his faith.

But any action which is moral can be justified on its own terms, morally & rationally, & therefore the religious or theological justification for acting that way is entirely superfluous.

Um... and "any horrible deed done entirely out of religious reasons" can then also be done. Even if I grant your claim that religious justification facilitates the person with these motives, that applies as well to virtuous actions as to evil ones. In short, you really, really suck at basic logical reasoning.


You are assuming that religion is definitely wrong, and referring to me as "crazy." Besides, atheists just as easily fall into accepting crazy beliefs as a result of other ideologies such as nationalism, communism, etc.


You are assuming a moral framework that you have no basis for. If the religious/theological justification for acting that way is completely superfluous, why are the religious generally more moral?

A religious person who uses his religion to justify an immoral action has access to a form of justification that the secular person does not have, because not only can he allow himself to behave in the way he wants, but he can convince himself God will reward him for it.

The religious person who uses his religion to justify a moral action is using his religion to do something his reason could have done anyway.

The problem is more starkly obvious in the case of the religious person who performs an immoral action, not because he feels inclined to, but because he feels he is obliged to by his religion.

One could imagine a person who feels inclined to do bad but is compelled by his religious beliefs to do the right thing, but there aren't any moral actions he will be compelled to perform that a secular person can't perform, & his status as a religious believer doesn't help his understanding of what these moral actions are. The most this case (which to me seems the hardest to square with human nature) says about religion is it might be an effective way to control sociopaths who accept religion's claims as true.

I see no logical fail there. Assumptions, yes, but no more than in the case of the person who claims morality can be justified by religion & is externally validated by the existence of God (& the person who asks "why are the religious generally more moral?" really shouldn't be griping at all about other people making assumptions, but perhaps that was put in merely as a deliberate attempt to infuriate me?)

The case is similar in the case of 'secular religions', for want of a better word, but with the important caveat that the acolyte of these systems, no matter how fanatical he is or how sincere in his belief, does not feel he is justified in the eyes of an omnipotent consciousness outside time & space that will make him feel pleasure for all eternity. In other words, this fellow will need to be pathological before he can feel as justified & self-righteous as the religious person can feel simply by sincerely believing.

& I didn't call you crazy: I called your beliefs crazy.

Humans are good at rationalizing. If you don't have religion as an excuse for doing bad things, then you come up with something else. If you are assuming that religions are all false, then there is no fundamental difference between God as justification and any other motivation.


The person who uses religion to justify an immoral action is using his religion to do something his selfishness, greed, or biases could have done anyway. I still don't see where you are finding a difference between the two.


Such as? There are at least as many examples of people performing immoral actions because they feel obliged for reasons other than religion. And you are ignoring all the people who perform moral actions not because they are inclined to, but because they feel obliged to by their religion.


Similarly, there aren't any immoral actions he will be compelled to perform that a secular person can't perform. Your position is really just complete nonsense, and I will continue to hold that view until you give me some hard justification for your claims.


Why not?


Making assumptions? I did no such thing. I have studies to back me up. I put it in partially because I knew you would object, yes.


A person who holds crazy beliefs is by definition crazy, so the distinction is moot. Please quit being such a douche.

True although you cannot deny there are some people who in their heart have actually justified their immoral actions through their God.


Depends, if your religious text literately says 'kill non-believers', I wouldn't say the person who follows that text is doing it out of greed, but perhaps because their one true text says so.


Not completely. Crazy people aren't always crazy, for example Christians aren't crazy when they aren't pretending to drink their two thousand year old messiah's blood and eat his body.

Is immoral because it teaches you to give praise to a non deserving entity.



Cracke POP!!

Actually tends to be more of a cultural thing.


Had you intended to respond to this or not?

Parse your quotes more carefully.

Here's a major issue with the challenge, there is no established moral belief that all must ascribe to, and thus there are problems saying "X is moral". If we use a set of moral rules, it is likely that a person of religion will disagree, or an atheist would disagree, and I have not seen much effort taken to prove a moral set of beliefs, whether it is utilitarianism, Kantian deontology, or divine command theory, and as such this debate becomes meaningless, as we are arguing over uncertain things, with uncertain things as well, because if secular atheistic cults are not an acceptable expression of atheism, then what ideology *is* acceptable? And if this particular branch of atheism is the only acceptable branch of atheism, then how do we know that these ethics are not just the tailored ethics of this particular branch of atheism? It would be unfair to judge a religion by another groups standards but judge that group by its own standards.

As such, this entire question seems like nonsense.