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frankwah
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05 Jan 2008, 11:08 pm

Does anyone honestly think there was no "morality" before religion?

Phagocyte
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05 Jan 2008, 11:27 pm

Personally, I find the notion of people having no moral compass without religion blatantly offensive, not to mention illogical.

Tim_Tex
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05 Jan 2008, 11:28 pm

I always thought morality and religion were two different things.

Tim

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nominalist
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05 Jan 2008, 11:52 pm

frankwah wrote:

Does anyone honestly think there was no "morality" before religion?

"Religion" is merely a category, defined according to one's preferences. There is no such thing as religion. There are only particular constructions which would conform to your definition of the term.

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Witt
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06 Jan 2008, 12:05 am

Tim_Tex wrote:

I always thought morality and religion were two different things.

Tim

Me too.

Phagocyte wrote:

Personally, I find the notion of people having no moral compass without religion blatantly offensive, not to mention illogical.

I fully agree.

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06 Jan 2008, 2:07 pm

frankwah wrote:

Does anyone honestly think there was no "morality" before religion?

you mean like cavemen? prolly not. early humans were ruthless~! theyd eat that days dinner out of your skull

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Aspie_Chav
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06 Jan 2008, 2:12 pm

frankwah wrote:

Does anyone honestly think there was no "morality" before religion?

Who knows how NT would behave without their religions. I suspect they would a chav eventually, or they might turn Japanese.

techstepgenr8tion
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06 Jan 2008, 2:19 pm

frankwah wrote:

Does anyone honestly think there was no "morality" before religion?

No, I absolutely do. Its first and formost self protective behavior - as you do onto others they'll do unto you; therefore you don't want to cheapshot someone with rock in their sleep, appropriate their kids, steal their food, and the group will gang up on you for that because they don't want it to happen to them and they've already decided that those behaviors are deplorable because they work against the group dynamic.

So, morality is literally as old as cause and effect.

techstepgenr8tion
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06 Jan 2008, 2:21 pm

Phagocyte wrote:

Personally, I find the notion of people having no moral compass without religion blatantly offensive, not to mention illogical.

Its just a connection they themselves haven't drawn yet, it can happen to anyone I think - so I try not to get too offended unless they try to steamroll over me with it.

snake321
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06 Jan 2008, 2:26 pm

techstepgenr8tion wrote:

frankwah wrote:

Does anyone honestly think there was no "morality" before religion?

Unfortunately, as far as I can tell I'd agree with you on this one. Though many of those "religious" moral concepts have grown to become rather secular, "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" is taught in various religions, Christianity, Budhism, and others. Though it may have been taught through religion initially, I don't see this as a religious concept of morality so much as a human concept of morality.
Religion has done SOME good, however, I think by now it's doing a lot more bad, and has been for a very long time. It's ultimately a control tool, and a divisive tool for the people at the top to keep everyone under their control really.

techstepgenr8tion
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06 Jan 2008, 2:40 pm

snake321 wrote:

As dogma became more prominent - as a method for dealing with less introspective people who just wouldn't get it, the though shalts and though shalt nots god conceptually divorced from the bottom-line reason why they were created. That's how religion broke off of its anchors and became its own sort of monster without logic and to where the logic that redeveloped was completely alien to its origins; at least now a days many Christians and people of other religions are trying to reconcile the meaning to the reality - try that a couple hundred years ago and say that religion was created by the mutual need of human animals for reaffirmation of societally positive values and you'd probably be looking at a few days to live if that.

m91
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06 Jan 2008, 2:41 pm

Phagocyte wrote:

Personally, I find the notion of people having no moral compass without religion blatantly offensive, not to mention illogical.

I agree, and it's also rather ironic that many chavs have a religion.

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twoshots
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07 Jan 2008, 3:26 pm

frankwah wrote:

Does anyone honestly think there was no "morality" before religion?

It is extremely unlikely. It as been suggested that our "morality", especially basic moral virtues, are a result of natural selection; "The Moral Animal" describes such ideas, iirc.

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Awesomelyglorious
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07 Jan 2008, 3:42 pm

frankwah wrote:

Does anyone honestly think there was no "morality" before religion?

Yes, I certainly believe that. Religion is one of the easiest ways to set up a moral framework. I assume we mean "morality" to mean "moral" behavior. Really though, how do we get all sorts of people to agree without something higher than man to appeal to? We needed a metaphysical judge for our higher justice(morality). I actually think religions are more honest with their morality than other groups, because at least their source of "oughtness" is more explicit and you can know that they are leaping past reason.

Phagocyte wrote:

Personally, I find the notion of people having no moral compass without religion blatantly offensive, not to mention illogical.

Actually I disagree. I find it eminently logical.... however, as Nominalist notes:

Nominalist wrote:

This is one of the few times I agree with him as I do think that most atheists really do idolize something and thus on some level could almost be described as having a religion. I guess I sort of agree with theologian Karl Barth that everyone has a world view or philosophy or some other such, that is devoted to something that isn't material, a deity in his terms.

Tim Tex wrote:

I always thought morality and religion were two different things.

I have come to think that they really are close to the same thing. We just use religion to describe certain philosophical forms with explicit devotion to something, and an explicit source of "oughtness", rather than the implicit devotions and implicit sources of "oughtness" that seem to exist in most "non-religious" world views/philosophies.

Ragtime
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07 Jan 2008, 3:56 pm

frankwah wrote:

Bah

Humbug!

frankwah wrote:

Does anyone honestly think there was no "morality" before religion?

Who says there was a period of time before religion?

(BTW, frankwah, you look very pretty in your avatar.)

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Sifr
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07 Jan 2008, 4:11 pm

Morality and religion seem pretty interchangeable to me. Some are made aware of what is religion, others roll their eyes. Now we have plenty who laugh at religion as if it was a child's toy.

If the question was basic animal morality: no, obviously since even plants may act "morally", or at least appear to be.

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