The Hitchens' Challenge
I have to confess that I am a late comer to this particular question. That aside, there is really nothing to be done for it.
Hitchens' has made a challenge, and the challenge is this: a religious person must perform a moral action or make a moral statement that an atheist cannot also affirm.
The thrust behind Hitchen's challenge is, therefore: is there anything a religious person would claim as good that an atheist would not agree with? The underpinning assumption that if the answer is no, atheists and religious people both arrive at morality. Since the atheist arrives at morality apart from God, God is not necessary for morality. One swift application of Occam's Razor, and God is removed from the paradigm.
There is an easy response to this that has been boldly stated on various blogs as an answer, namely the first half of Jesus' summary of the Old Testament Law: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind (Luke 10:27)." I think that even answering Hitchen's challenge, however, does not really answer his challenge. Confused yet? Quite simply, Hitchens is asking the wrong question. Furthermore, I don't see Christian Thinkers making any such claim as he seems to be responding to.
The question being asked is not can atheists agree with good moral codes that come from religion, but rather: "How does an atheist postulate a morality which serves as an ontic point of reference for all of humanity?" The question should be asked with the addendum: "How can this point of reference be arrived at, by the atheist, without subsuming the morality of various religions?" It is far too easy to claim to have established a certain moral code that affirms many Christian points of morality at the tail end of two thousand years of Christian history.
What is the criteria? Reason? I believe it was Kai Nielson (although I could be misquoting here) who said that reason alone, even with a good grasp of the facts, does not take one to morality.
However, the atheist might counter that "there is no such thing as an ontic morality, and this talk of a point of reference for all people smacks of objective morality which I reject." Well, if that is the case, then on what grounds does Hitchens' make his claim? Let me explain this in a different way.
There is a classical atheist argument that asserts since God, who is all good and all knowing, exists and evil exists, that claiming the two is a contradiction. The contradiction being that if there were such a God, He would not tolerate such a thing as evil. Therefore, either God is lacking in some capacity, or He does not exist. However, if the atheist denies the existence of evil in the first place (or states that there is no such thing as objective morality), then on what grounds can the above problem be asserted?
You see, the questioner must always answer his own question before asking it.
The question Hitchens, and other atheists, need to answer is this: why be moral? And what is the point of reference for this morality?
Hitchens' has made a challenge, and the challenge is this: a religious person must perform a moral action or make a moral statement that an atheist cannot also affirm.
The thrust behind Hitchen's challenge is, therefore: is there anything a religious person would claim as good that an atheist would not agree with? The underpinning assumption that if the answer is no, atheists and religious people both arrive at morality. Since the atheist arrives at morality apart from God, God is not necessary for morality. One swift application of Occam's Razor, and God is removed from the paradigm.
There is an easy response to this that has been boldly stated on various blogs as an answer, namely the first half of Jesus' summary of the Old Testament Law: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind (Luke 10:27)." I think that even answering Hitchen's challenge, however, does not really answer his challenge. Confused yet? Quite simply, Hitchens is asking the wrong question. Furthermore, I don't see Christian Thinkers making any such claim as he seems to be responding to.
The question being asked is not can atheists agree with good moral codes that come from religion, but rather: "How does an atheist postulate a morality which serves as an ontic point of reference for all of humanity?" The question should be asked with the addendum: "How can this point of reference be arrived at, by the atheist, without subsuming the morality of various religions?" It is far too easy to claim to have established a certain moral code that affirms many Christian points of morality at the tail end of two thousand years of Christian history.
What is the criteria? Reason? I believe it was Kai Nielson (although I could be misquoting here) who said that reason alone, even with a good grasp of the facts, does not take one to morality.
However, the atheist might counter that "there is no such thing as an ontic morality, and this talk of a point of reference for all people smacks of objective morality which I reject." Well, if that is the case, then on what grounds does Hitchens' make his claim? Let me explain this in a different way.
There is a classical atheist argument that asserts since God, who is all good and all knowing, exists and evil exists, that claiming the two is a contradiction. The contradiction being that if there were such a God, He would not tolerate such a thing as evil. Therefore, either God is lacking in some capacity, or He does not exist. However, if the atheist denies the existence of evil in the first place (or states that there is no such thing as objective morality), then on what grounds can the above problem be asserted?
You see, the questioner must always answer his own question before asking it.
The question Hitchens, and other atheists, need to answer is this: why be moral? And what is the point of reference for this morality?
posted by Brian at 7:51 AM
4 Comments:
Very interesting post! I apologize in advance if my post is not as clear or as well written as some of the other posts or comments I have read on this blog. It has been a very long time since I have written an academic or even pseudo-academic piece. However I found myself wanting to comment on this post in which you deftly point out the inherent flaw in Hitchens' challenge, i.e. what basis is Hitchens using for his example of morality. He does not seem to take into account the long integration of Christian morality into the culture, legal systems and governments of many western nations. It seems that if an atheist is a moral man or woman in a western country, chances are his or her concept of morality is heavily based on the conceptions of the country in which they live. Which in turn are based heavily upon Christian morality. Therefore I do not see how Hitchens' challenge would prove that God is not necessary for morality.
the luke passage would be a strategic response to the challenge. it seems to me that the theist and atheist are talking past each other in arguments over morality largely due to their inability to agree on the fundamental question of god's existence. the theist errs when he is so arrogant to claim that his version of theism is the standard for all humanity. the atheist errs when he does not first attack the huge bridge that the theist must cross to go from the existence of a god to the existence of a particular god with attributes, specific texts, and prescriptions for moral dilemmas.
what i would argue is that the starting points of theistic arguments lead to rules for human behavior which are just as capricious as the atheist arguments do using secular philosophy. even if a transcendent being exists, who claims to know anything about this being, never mind to know the specific rules and plans he has for advanced primates on planet gaia.
the merits of the theistic and atheist approach to morality must be evaluated not just on their assumptions of metaphysics and epistemology, but also on their successes and failures in this real world.
to the question, "why be moral." i would answer: because to be good benefits myself and humanity as a whole. i am confident enough to love myself and humanity for its own sake rather than to please a divine being.
Vei:
That's just it. The Christianity that the philosophers of the Enlightenment were exposed to shines thorugh in their values and ethics. Didero's Jansinist-Catholicism shines through wether he lieks it or not. Hume's (I beleive it was Calvinistic background) shines through whether he likes it or not. Kant's Lutheranism shines through whether he likes it or not. To simply come at the tail end of so many years of cultural and moral influence and say that loving one's neighbor is simple common sense ignores the great history of humanity where, for the most part, brutalizing and subjugating one's neighbors paved the road to greatness. It is easy to forget the enormous impact Jesus Christ has had on this world in our comfortable "moral" niche in history.
Rroots:
Welcome back! I always find your comments thought provoking, and I still owe you a birthday present!
Just a few points:
First, concerning the "arrogance of Theists," we all do this whenever we open our mouths and say something is true. This is simply the law of non-contradiction at work. Whenever I say something is true I immediately claim anything contrary to that to be false, and this applies to anyone whether theist or atheist. Quite simply, if someone is right, then someone who disagrees is wrong.
Now, having said that, it is important to note that there is a real need for grace in these discussions and that if we are to disagree, to do so without being disagreable. It is not without merit that many critics have noted the Christians who respond to the New Atheists are far more gracious in those responses than the latter.
Second, Chrisitanity is not about rules but it is about grace. The rules are meaningless apart from the grace, whether in the Old Testament or New. This is what sets it apart from all other religions, wherein you do something and become better. The Biblical pattern is always: God redeems, *then* God gives the rules. Jesus Christ died on the cross because we are objects of God's justice, utterly incapable of fulfilling His law. The moving hymn isn't called "Amazing Laws" but "Amazing Grace!"
Third, I agree with you that we absolutely must be aware of the "facts on the ground" as it were, how these moral codes are lived out and what their consequences are so that morality doesn't become a purely intellectual exercise. However, we can't base moral evaluation based solely on this because of the fourth point.
Fourth, If morality is evaluated purely at the functional level, then we end up making purely existential leaps, like Nietzsche made, which is why the atheist moral challenge falls apart. If morality is this existential leap, then there is no way to justify living one way over another way. This was Nietzsche's whole point, that the Super Man would decide his own right and wrong basically because he was super.
You know, a young man approached Jesus and asked himw hat the greatest law was. In the Mosaic corpus of text there were over six hundred and thirteen laws, and the moral philosophers of the day would pit them against one another and end up producing even more complex laws, ad infinitum, ad nauseum. Jesus summed up the law as such: "You shall love the lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind. And you shall love your neighbor as yourself."
Fascinating that Jesus did not reduce the Law into just one commandment, but into two! You see, we have no reason to love our neighbor unless our neighbor is made in the image of God and has essential dignity. A dignity which you seem to see in people based on your closing comment. For dignity to have meaning though, it cannot be contrived, tacked on, or otherwise an addendum to something we have already described as simply time + matter + chance. We cannot complain that some people in the world are treated as if they were animals, and then scientifically prove that they basically are animals.
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