Can Atheists be Virtuous...HELP ON PAPER

[livinitup]

Ok guys here is the thing, i am doing a research paper for my Philosophy class And i want to get yalls input. I was assigned this topic and had no choice this is a religion philoshopy class. The topic is:

Can Atheists be virtious, and can they be saintly?

My opinion is that an atheist def can be virtious however not saintly due to the fact that saintly refers and is defined as :

Main Entry: saint

Pronunciation: 'sAnt, before a name (")sAnt or s&nt
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Old French, from Late Latin sanctus, from Latin, sacred, from past participle of sancire to make sacred -- more at SACRED
1 : one officially recognized especially through canonization as preeminent for holiness
2 a : one of the spirits of the departed in heaven b : ANGEL 1a
3 a : one of God's chosen and usually Christian people b capitalized : a member of any of various Christian bodies;

Thanks alot for all the help with this Its due in a week and just want some insight on what the general public thinks. The Proofesser argued that virtious are defined at a religious level and then push outword to the surrounding public. Which in americas case is i think true...the whole in God we trust thing on the dollar bill shows that...and what the founding fathers of the country did, however we argued to him that an atheist society would have moral laws too...

So anyhow that is the main idea surrounding the topic please add some nice comments?

[pieisgood]

Can Atheists be saintly? That's like asking if a dead person can run a 6-minute mile. You have to be in another category altogether, and even then you have to be special. So, I say No.

Can Atheists be virtuous? Ohhhh yes. grr. I hate that question. We just don't stem our morals from a god. I, for one, direct my morals toward The Greater Good. This means that I don't believe in, for example, resting on Sunday. Resting then isn't going to help anybody; it's just going to hurt my life. However, I do believe in things like... don't murder. If I do, I am hurting humanity as a whole. As I believe in evolution, my purpose in life is to advance the human race as much as possible.

[livinitup]

Thanks, like i said i am not tring to argue these points i just want everyones opinions to help me on my paper, Thanks PIE

Keep em comming ;D

[Franc28]

A virtue is a disposition of our character which permits us to act consistently in a moral manner, that shapes our moral character in a positive manner.

As such, an atheist is more likely to be virtuous than a theist, since the atheist is open to rationality, honesty, benevolence, productivity, etc... all good virtues which the Christian cannot believe in. His doctrine promotes faith, dishonesty to oneself and others, "universal love"/hatred, and prayer instead of work.

[AuntieSocial]

livin, it's too bad you don't have some more time on this assignment, I would like to recommend a book for you to read. "Godless Morality" by Richard Halloway. Halloway was an archbishop in the church of England and his position is that all groups of people are capable of being moral. He feels that the issue of God should be removed from the question of morality altogether.

To paraphrase Halloway's position, he feels that everyone is generally ethical at their core, meaning, they do not wish to cause harm to others. It is generally inconceivable that if a person who is a Christian today lost their faith tomorrow that they would start committing crimes against their fellow man. However, if there are people who believe that the only reason they respect others is because of thier belief in a God, we should let them continue in their beliefs (maybe even encourage their beliefs).

Those without a belief in a deity have developed some other reason for acting ethically. Although atheists may have a different concept of what is immoral from the Christians, atheists are just as unlikely to commit crimes against others as any other group is. In some ways, they are less likely to commit crimes because they have a greater respect for the secular legal system. Atheists don't believe that their wrong-doings will be absolved by some act of redemption, so they have a greater reverence for society's laws. That isn't to say at all atheists have this respect, but we (in general) feel that this is the only life to live and that we must make the best of it. By upholding a secular code of ethics, we are less likely to fall prey to similar acts against us and society is, therefore, a more orderly place to live.

I really do encourage you to read Halloway's book, even if it is after you write your paper. I think it is a great read, especially since it was written by a theist with high standing in his church. It is definitely food for thought.

[Franc28]

"Those without a belief in a deity have developed some other reason for acting ethically."

I think you made a mistake there. It should be "those WITH a belief in a deity have developed some other reason for acting ethically". Their belief in God denies them all the natural ways of upholding and developing morality, but somehow most of them are still almost as moral as we are.

[AuntieSocial]

Franc, point taken. To clarify, I was giving the perspective presented by Halloway and building upon it. Christians (and other religions, such as Islam) believe that morality is something that comes from God. Since livinitup's paper deals with whether atheists can be virtuous, I was taking the issue from a theist's perspective. When I said "some other reason", I was referring to a source other than God.

"Morality is from God" is usually one of my hot buttons. I usually go on about the subject (ad nauseum). I'm just not feeling up to the long, detailed argument these days. Maybe I will revisit this thread when I'm feeling in better spirits (more feisty), but I wanted to get some comments in here before the paper is due.

[livinitup]

AuntieSocial said:

but I wanted to get some comments in here before the paper is due.

Thanks this has really given me some great insight, on things, Keep it up guys.

[Franc28]

Indeed. I see where you're coming from.

[zoul]

ok morality is one of those things like science and the very earth we live on..... it is continusley changing. from the earliest writings ( the Homarabi code ) which pre dates the hebrews by over 1000 years. morality is basicely rules and regulations set to keep a society safe within that society. also consider the prison population you would think that all things being equal the population inside a prison would reflect the outside population. with the population outside the prision comprising of just 8% atheist in america you would think in jails the population of atheist would be 8% also but states show that atheist's in jail the population is 0.2% . so what dose that tell us ? either atheist's are more moral or they just don't get cought for the crimes they do.
and as for saintley depends how you define saintley. if someone dose immense good for someone or even another country for no profit or personal gain. to help someone just coz it's the right thing to do. without the idea of having a better place next to a god would that person be a saint ? or just a very good person ?

[Yaw]

I'm personally wary of the atheists-and-jail argument.

The problem I can see is that a statistical argument like this can only prove correlation. It can not prove causality. The best you can get from the statistics is, "There's a lower percentage of atheists in jail than in the population as a whole. Why?"

The reason isn't necessarily that atheists are somehow more virtuous. The statistics don't say that. It's entirely possible that there's some other factor that simply hasn't been factored into consideration.

I would tend to explain the correlation this way. Most convictions in America are for drug offenses. These disproportionately jail poorer people. Since these are less likely to be atheistic than the middle class or rich (lower education rates), that leads to less atheists in jail. At any rate, this explanation is plausible, and does not include any mention of whether or not atheists are more or less virtuous than any other group.

To clarify what I mean about correlation, here's an example. If you were to graph the number of storks observed in Hamburg against the population of the city for various years, you'd find that there is a positive correlation (the population generally increases as the number of storks increases). If this indicated causality, you'd have to conclude that the storks are delivering babies, which is a ridiculous conclusion. There could be any number of reasons for the correlation. The math simply can't tell you what they are.

[Franc28]

Yaw said:

I'm personally wary of the atheists-and-jail argument.

The problem I can see is that a statistical argument like this can only prove correlation. It can not prove causality. The best you can get from the statistics is, "There's a lower percentage of atheists in jail than in the population as a whole. Why?"

I wonder why exactly you think you should give us a lesson in logic. Most people no doubt know that correlation is not causation. So what ?

I would tend to explain the correlation this way. Most convictions in America are for drug offenses. These disproportionately jail poorer people. Since these are less likely to be atheistic than the middle class or rich (lower education rates), that leads to less atheists in jail. At any rate, this explanation is plausible, and does not include any mention of whether or not atheists are more or less virtuous than any other group.

How exactly would your explanation prove that atheists are not more virtuous ? You are only making our point. What a red herring !

[Yaw]

Franc28

I wonder why exactly you think you should give us a lesson in logic. Most people no doubt know that correlation is not causation. So what ?

Well, if you look at zoul's post you'll see he's at least implying that the jail statistics are sufficient for a causal argument. Besides which, with the diverse group of people that read this board I'm not willing to assume any level of knowledge about technical subjects. No doubt people with some level of statistical knowledge know that correlation is not causation. But that doesn't mean that everyone here can be expected to have that level of statistical knowledge. I don't go around assuming everyone knows how to do linear regression for the same reason. I feel it's better to address a common audience and make sure they understand my points, instead of assuming a level of technical knowledge that may not be present, which would result in my point being unheard.

Franc28

How exactly would your explanation prove that atheists are not more virtuous ? You are only making our point. What a red herring !

So you think that education and wealth are the same as virtue? I think you'll need to back that one up.

[Superhappyjen]

statistics are useless. 68% of people know that. ;D

[pieisgood]

yes, and did you know that 87% of all statistics are made up on the spot?

Zoul, I have to disagree with your definition of morality. The "founding fathers", for example, broke England's laws. They were under the english government. Does that mean that they were immoral in rebelling? I sure don't think so. They stood up for what they thought was right and because of it, the got what they believed. I think that they were very moral people. Just because they didn't follow the rules doesn't make them wrong.

I have to agree with Yaw on the second part. You said it yourself, Franc-- most people know that. Isn't taking a few seconds worth bringing that extra 1% of the audience into the convorsation?

And, Yaw never said that Atheists AREN'T virtuous. He just said that you can't tell by the math.