WL Craig: The Moral Argument for God

Shrunk · #1 by **Shrunk** » Apr 07, 2011 3:52 pm

William Lane Craig seems to be one of the most frequently discussed apolgists for theism on this board. His reputation largely rests on a series of five arguments for the existence of God, which feature regularly in his writings, public speeches and debates. Since these arguments so often arise in discussion on this board, I thought it would be a good idea to have separate threads devoted to each of these to allow discussion of these by those who support Craig, and those who would refute his arguments.

A full discussion of these arguments can be found in Craig's article here. What follows is the introductory paragraph from that article.

3. The Moral Argument Based upon Moral Values and Duties

A number of ethicists such as Robert Adams, William Alston, Mark Linville, Paul Copan, John Hare, Stephen Evans, and others have defended various moral arguments for God In order to understand the version of the moral argument which I’ve defended in my own work, it’s necessary that we grasp a couple of important distinctions.

First, we should distinguish between moral values and duties. Values have to do with whether something is good or bad. Duties have to do with whether something is right or wrong. Now you might think at first that this is a distinction without a difference: “good” and “right” mean the same thing, and the same goes for “bad” and “wrong.” But if you think about it, you can see that this isn’t the case. Duty has to do with moral obligation, what you ought or ought not to do. But obviously you’re not morally obligated to do something just because it would be good for you to do it. For example, it would be good for you to become a doctor, but you’re not morally obligated to become a doctor. After all, it would also be good for you to become a firefighter or a homemaker or a diplomat, but you can’t do them all. So there’s a difference between good/bad and right/wrong. Good/bad has to do with something’s worth, while right/wrong has to do with something’s being obligatory.

Second, there’s the distinction between being objective or subjective. By “objective” I mean “independent of people’s opinions.” By “subjective” I mean “dependent on people’s opinions.” So to say that there are objective moral values is to say that something is good or bad independent of whatever people think about it. Similarly, to say that we have objective moral duties is to say that certain actions are right or wrong for us regardless of what people think about it. So, for example, to say that the Holocaust was objectively wrong is to say that it was wrong even though the Nazis who carried it out thought that it was right, and it would still have been wrong even if the Nazis had won World War II and succeeded in exterminating or brainwashing everybody who disagreed with them so that everyone believed the Holocaust was right.

With those distinctions in mind, here’s a simple moral argument for God’s existence:

1. If God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist.
2. Objective moral values and duties do exist.
3. Therefore, God exists.

Scar · #2 by **Scar** » Apr 07, 2011 4:05 pm

1. If God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist.

Unsupported assertion. Furthermore, such morals wouldn't be objective either, for they were dependant on god's subjective views. They would only be objective in the sense that they were not contingent upon humans.

2. Objective moral values and duties do exist.

Unsupported assertion.

3. Therefore, God exists.

Does not follow.

Of course, even if 2 was true, he's done nothing to show that there couldn't be another source for those objective morals, possibly one we haven't found, yet. (note: I do not think there are objective morals).

It's just another foolish attempt at arguing something into existence. With nothing but logic, the best you can do is to show that the existence of something is plausible, but nothing more, in the absence of any actual evidence.

Shrunk · #3 by **Shrunk** » Apr 07, 2011 5:07 pm

Though it's long, I suggest people read the full section of article before replying to the brief summary I've excerpted here, to make sure you are not raising a point that Craig has already addressed.

Scar · #4 by **Scar** » Apr 08, 2011 4:31 am

Does he at any point demonstrate that objective morals indeed are real? Can he give an example of such a moral value?

hammiesink · #5 by **hammiesink** » Apr 08, 2011 1:14 pm

Scar wrote:Does he at any point demonstrate that objective morals indeed are real? Can he give an example of such a moral value?

He appeals to general moral experience. In the same way it might be difficult to argue that the external world is real; you might just have to resort to saying, "Deep down we all know the external world is real." And people would generally agree.

Same with premise 2. Most people would generally agree that raping babies is wrong, even if everyone believed it to be right. Thus, objective.

Most ethicists lean towards objective morality, so I think attacking premise 2 is an uphill struggle. I think the more attackable premise is 1.

Byron · #6 by **Byron** » Apr 08, 2011 6:28 pm

The "moral argument" for God is just the authority fallacy rebranded. Craig's argument goes as follows: God is a lawgiver; God is inherently good; objective mortality exists.

Bzzzt. Sorry, Bill, this don't fly.

Authority doesn't define right or wrong. Authority is amoral. A kill order isn't automatically right if a superior officer gives it. Craig, or anyone else who subscribe to this view, never explain how it creates objective ethics. Power isn't righteousness. God can be omnipotent and wrong. For "objective" ethics to exist, something inherent to the ethics must be demonstrated. Appealing to an external source to zap in legitimacy is a red herring. Value isn't transferable in that way.

And if X ethical position is inherently good or bad, it can exist independently of God. Ipso facto, God isn't needed.

Mick · #7 by **Mick** » Apr 08, 2011 7:20 pm

I dislike that Craig construes his first premise as a material implication. If I wanted to call it false, say, on grounds of relevance, how would I do that?

False material implications demand that the antecedent is true and the consequent false. But, I do want to commit myself to that! I'm a catholic, after all. But if the consequent is always true, then so is the implication itself.

Mick · #8 by **Mick** » Apr 08, 2011 7:28 pm

Byron wrote:The "moral argument" for God is just the authority fallacy rebranded. Craig's argument goes as follows: God is a lawgiver; God is inherently good; objective mortality exists.

Bzzzt. Sorry, Bill, this don't fly.

Authority doesn't define right or wrong. Authority is amoral. A kill order isn't automatically right if a superior officer gives it. Craig, or anyone else who subscribe to this view, never explain how it creates objective ethics. Power isn't righteousness. God can be omnipotent and wrong. For "objective" ethics to exist, something inherent to the ethics must be demonstrated. Appealing to an external source to zap in legitimacy is a red herring. Value isn't transferable in that way.

And if X ethical position is inherently good or bad, it can exist independently of God. Ipso facto, God isn't needed.

Hi. You are misinterpreting Craig. God is not good; he is goodness itself. This is not just some might =right claim. Craig isn't arguing that because god is powerful, even maximally so, his commands are ethically binding. Rather, god is something like the platonic Good although personal. It is goodness itself which commands you, and that is just about as ethically binding as you can get.

Shrunk · #9 by **Shrunk** » Apr 08, 2011 7:28 pm

Scar wrote:Does he at any point demonstrate that objective morals indeed are real? Can he give an example of such a moral value?

One of Craig's supporters on another thread puts it this way:

Bantay wrote:
Rumraket wrote: If you think he did, could you perhaps distill the evidence he must have summarized, for the existence of said objective morality?
He summarized it in the first 10 minutes of his first presentation, namely, the observation that some moral values, like goodness, love, kindness and equality, as well as rape, unjustly killing another innocent human being are either morally good, or morally wrong, even if somebody chooses to not believe it is so. He used the nazis as an example. The nazis believed they were morally justified in doing the merciless atrocities against millions of people. However, even if the nazis had succeeded in converting or brainwashing every human being on the surface of the earth to naziism, it still would have been morally heinous to kill 6 million innocent men, women and children during the holocaust.

This demonstrates that some moral values are objective in the philosophical sense of being valid and binding, even when nobody believes them to be.The objectiveness of these moral values is obviously transcendent to those who choose to believe or disbelieve. Since in an atheist universe there would be no transcendent source of morals, it follows then that since some moral values are objective in this way, therefore we don't live in an atheist universe.

http://www.rationalskepticism.org/post7 ... ml#p797066

Shrunk · **#10** by **Shrunk** » Apr 08, 2011 7:30 pm

Mick wrote:
Byron wrote:The "moral argument" for God is just the authority fallacy rebranded. Craig's argument goes as follows: God is a lawgiver; God is inherently good; objective mortality exists.

Bzzzt. Sorry, Bill, this don't fly.

Authority doesn't define right or wrong. Authority is amoral. A kill order isn't automatically right if a superior officer gives it. Craig, or anyone else who subscribe to this view, never explain how it creates objective ethics. Power isn't righteousness. God can be omnipotent and wrong. For "objective" ethics to exist, something inherent to the ethics must be demonstrated. Appealing to an external source to zap in legitimacy is a red herring. Value isn't transferable in that way.

And if X ethical position is inherently good or bad, it can exist independently of God. Ipso facto, God isn't needed.

Hi. You are misinterpreting Craig. God is not good; he is goodness itself. This is not just some might =right claim. Craig isn't arguing that because god is powerful, even maximally so, his commands are ethically binding. Rather, god is something like the platonic Good although personal. It is goodness itself which commands you, and that is just about as ethically binding as you can get.

But then you have to answer why this "goodness" is unable or unwilling to command someone to commit murder (and I know, he actually does that according to the Bible, but for the sake of argument....)

Byron · **#11** by **Byron** » Apr 08, 2011 7:43 pm

Mick wrote:Hi. You are misinterpreting Craig. God is not good; he is goodness itself.

Same diff. "Inherently good"; "goodness itself"; God is claimed by Craig to be the source of moral understanding.

This is not just some might =right claim. Craig isn't arguing that because god is powerful, even maximally so, his commands are ethically binding. Rather, god is something like the platonic Good although personal. It is goodness itself which commands you, and that is just about as ethically binding as you can get.

This might fly if Craig had even attempted a substantive definition of "good". Problem is, for Craig, "good" appears to be "whatever God wills". It's might = right at its crudest.

Craig's defense of the Canaanites genocide is Craig's "good is whatever God says it is" mantra at its starkest. "On divine command theory, then, God has the right to command an act, which, in the absence of a divine command, would have been sin, but which is now morally obligatory in virtue of that command." Craig flaps around about the Canaanites' supposed evil, but really, he's sunk himself here, snared by the need to uphold biblical inerrancy (although, TMK, he's yet to state his position on this explicitly).

Even if Craig comes up with a substantive definition of divine goodness, he needs to explain the mechanism whereby that goodness transfers to a given ethic. "Murder is wrong" must be able to stand on its own. If it lacks self-contained worth, it's just the authority fallacy. And if it has self-contained worth, you don't need God to make it objective in the sense Craig means.

A divine lawgiver is a tempting proposition. Like every resort to the authority fallacy, it cuts out the grubby work of arguing your case. But it's a chimera.

Mick · **#12** by **Mick** » Apr 08, 2011 9:09 pm

Byron wrote:
Same diff. "Inherently good"; "goodness itself"; God is claimed by Craig to be the source of moral understanding.

No, actually, it's not. When we say God is goodness itself, we are using 'good' as a singular term. When he say that God is inherently good or good, we are using it as an adjective. To be good inherently is just to be good intrinsically without any external factors. That doesn't even come close to suggesting that it'd be goodness itself.

This might fly if Craig had even attempted a substantive definition of "good". Problem is, for Craig, "good" appears to be "whatever God wills". It's might = right at its crudest.

[/quote][/quote] Craig doesn't define 'good' at all. But even if he did define it in this way, we could understand it our obligations are just what goodness itself commands us to do. There is an autoritative sense to do this but it seems justified. We're not talking about Joe Blow commanding us to do stuff; we're talking about goodness itself.

PhiloKGB · **#13** by **PhiloKGB** » Apr 08, 2011 10:34 pm

Mick wrote:When we say God is goodness itself, we are using 'good' as a singular term. When he say that God is inherently good or good, we are using it as an adjective. To be good inherently is just to be good intrinsically without any external factors. That doesn't even come close to suggesting that it'd be goodness itself.

I don't suppose that might be because declaring something to be "goodness itself" has approximately the same semantic content as calling it "yellowness itself" or "heaviness itself"?

Craig doesn't define 'good' at all. But even if he did define it in this way, we could understand it our obligations are just what goodness itself commands us to do. There is an autoritative sense to do this but it seems justified. We're not talking about Joe Blow commanding us to do stuff; we're talking about goodness itself.

Good luck convincing the non-sympathetic that "goodness itself" means anything. On the other hand, it's becoming clear why you're trying so hard to avoid defining anything.

Byron · **#14** by **Byron** » Apr 08, 2011 11:19 pm

Mick wrote:When we say God is goodness itself, we are using 'good' as a singular term. When he say that God is inherently good or good, we are using it as an adjective. To be good inherently is just to be good intrinsically without any external factors. That doesn't even come close to suggesting that it'd be goodness itself.

The terms aren't mutually exclusive. A god who was "goodness itself", ie, goodness personified, or the whole of goodness, would, as a corollary, be inherently good. Just as, if God is being-itself, he must, as a corollary, have being. The greater claim might exceed the lesser, but it doesn't preclude it.

The moral argument doesn't go into the finer points of God's nature. The claim that God is inherently good is all that's needed for the matter at hand.

Craig doesn't define 'good' at all.

No, he doesn't, because his laughable house of cards would crumble if he attempted such a definition. For Craig, "good" is "whatever God says 'good' is". It's an amoral ethical code. If this cackhanded voluntarism is the sum of "objective" ethics, give me subjective ethics that actually has some content, any day!

But even if he did define it in this way, we could understand it our obligations are just what goodness itself commands us to do. There is an autoritative sense to do this but it seems justified. We're not talking about Joe Blow commanding us to do stuff; we're talking about goodness itself.

And without a substantive definition, meaning is sucked out of goodness. To modify PhiloKGB's objection to "goodness itself", if "goodness" is reduced to "what God says it is", you might as well argue for "fruit itself". It has no meaning.

Craig's attempt to create an ethical magnetic north backfires spectacularly by making ethics void. That's what happens when you try to dodge systematic thought with glib soundbites. How this guy ever earned degrees in philosophy is a mystery to me. Guess I must have faith.

Mick · **#15** by **Mick** » Apr 09, 2011 6:00 am

PhiloKGB wrote:
Mick wrote:When we say God is goodness itself, we are using 'good' as a singular term. When he say that God is inherently good or good, we are using it as an adjective. To be good inherently is just to be good intrinsically without any external factors. That doesn't even come close to suggesting that it'd be goodness itself.

I don't suppose that might be because declaring something to be "goodness itself" has approximately the same semantic content as calling it "yellowness itself" or "heaviness itself"?
Craig doesn't define 'good' at all. But even if he did define it in this way, we could understand it our obligations are just what goodness itself commands us to do. There is an autoritative sense to do this but it seems justified. We're not talking about Joe Blow commanding us to do stuff; we're talking about goodness itself.

Good luck convincing the non-sympathetic that "goodness itself" means anything. On the other hand, it's becoming clear why you're trying so hard to avoid defining anything.

The medievals have already addressed the issue of what it means to call God goodness itself.

In regards to the last sentence, you need to direct that towards Craig.

Mick · **#16** by **Mick** » Apr 09, 2011 6:09 am

Byron wrote:The terms aren't mutually exclusive. A god who was "goodness itself", ie, goodness personified, or the whole of goodness, would, as a corollary, be inherently good.

Nobody said that they were not mutually exclusive. You said it was "same difference"; and this is a contraction for "Same thing, no difference." To claim that theyre not different is not to just say that theyre not mutually exclusive.

The moral argument doesn't go into the finer points of God's nature. The claim that God is inherently good is all that's needed for the matter at hand.

No, it's not, since it is moral virtues and duties which are alleged to be grounded in God.

No, he doesn't, because his laughable house of cards would crumble if he attempted such a definition. For Craig, "good" is "whatever God says 'good' is". It's an amoral ethical code. If this cackhanded voluntarism is the sum of "objective" ethics, give me subjective ethics that actually has some content, any day!

Does this constitute an argument?

And without a substantive definition, meaning is sucked out of goodness. To modify PhiloKGB's objection to "goodness itself", if "goodness" is reduced to "what God says it is", you might as well argue for "fruit itself". It has no meaning.

Whether this is true or not, you have offered no reason to accept it.

Mononoke · **#17** by **Mononoke** » Apr 09, 2011 6:19 am

Sooo....

why do you need god in order to have objective morals. We don't see people saying you need gravity man to have objective gravity. You can have objective morals without god easily.

Tyrannical · **#18** by **Tyrannical** » Apr 09, 2011 6:40 am

Similarly, to say that we have objective moral duties is to say that certain actions are right or wrong for us regardless of what people think about it. So, for example, to say that the Holocaust was objectively wrong is to say that it was wrong even though the Nazis who carried it out thought that it was right, and it would still have been wrong even if the Nazis had won World War II and succeeded in exterminating or brainwashing everybody who disagreed with them so that everyone believed the Holocaust was right.

An emotionally laden topic is a poor example of "objective"

Byron · **#19** by **Byron** » Apr 09, 2011 7:23 am

Mick wrote:Nobody said that they were not mutually exclusive. You said it was "same difference"; and this is a contraction for "Same thing, no difference." To claim that theyre not different is not to just say that theyre not mutually exclusive.

For the purposes of this argument, the difference is irrelevant, and a red herring. All that matters for this argument is that God is inherently good. He needn't be "goodness itself" for command theory to hold: he just needs to express goodness through his commands.

Although given god's other properties, a god that was "inherently good" would likely be goodness itself.

Does this constitute an argument?

On my part, or Craig's?

My argument runs simply enough: divine command theory as a source of objective ethics fails because a "goodness" that's defined as "God's will" is arbitrary, and thus the argument is self-refuting. If its proposition that goodness can't exist without God held, it would, ironically, leave you in a worse position than when you started!

Whether this is true or not, you have offered no reason to accept it.

I think a "goodness" with zero content is a good reason. You can try to argue that I've got it wrong about voluntarism stripping ethical categories of meaning, or explain how this process is actually supposed to work.

This bankrupt argument is Craig's trump card. If God can't give you ethics, then there's no imperative to argue for his existence. All Craig's other tortured proofs become so much theological trivia.

Byron · **#20** by **Byron** » Apr 09, 2011 7:29 am

Mononoke wrote:Sooo....

why do you need god in order to have objective morals. We don't see people saying you need gravity man to have objective gravity. You can have objective morals without god easily.

Exactly.

Divine command theory is strongest not as a source for objective ethics, but as a means of discovering them (revelation). To run with the gravity analogy, it'd be like someone tipping humanity off long before Newton took the scene. The revelation variant would have to posit a code that exists independently of God. Craig hasn't attempted to outline what such a code is, since biblical ethics are inconsistent in the extreme. A code that exists outside god also has implications for god's omnipresence, and Craig couldn't have that.

I've yet to see him address divine command theory's biggest pitfall: if there is no god, it allows people to treat flawed human ideas as holy writ. And this is exactly what's happened.