Atheism and morality

[richardhutnik]

sapphi_snake said:

richardhutnik said:

Good morals calls upon more than just the personal opinion of someone as to right and wrong.  So, the question is where an atheist gets morals and ethics from, besides themselves?  People who get off morally justify their own morals being off by their own rationalization.  I see it now with my father, who I had personally confronted with his use of language where he is going to kill people who don't do what he says... but he doesn't mean it.  I call him on it by saying he is either a psychopath (if he does it) or a liar (if he doesn't).  It doesn't resonate and he got worse with it.  His moral system justifies it because he apparently does things around the house, so he can talk like it.  His moral system doesn't have him see what he is doing is wrong in its own right.

So, answer me this, besides one's own set of reasoning, where do atheists get their morals from?  Atheism is not a belief system, it is a lack of a belief in something.  Because it is a lack of belief, it doesn't lend to people being able to figure a positive on how to live.  It also doesn't lay out the shoulds in life, or give a moral imperative.

 A person can have good morals if he/she thinks critically and objectively and takes into consideration other people's interests other than his/her own. I assume you believe that people are so different that it's impossible for to come up with similar morals by themselves. Ration is a better basis for morals than blindly following someone else's morals even if they're attributed to a deity (regardless of wheteher the deity exists or not, one does not need to follow it).

The reality is this: A sound ethical system doesn't come out of a single person reasoning on something.  It comes from people coming together and reasoning out things, developing a concensus, and formulating opinions on things.  Even then, it isn't a guarantee of something being ideal, because there have been bad systems developed by groups to.  Eugenics and neoconservatism come out of moral imperatives argued from a certain set of ideals.  Key here is to look at the fruits hovering around belief systems, good and bad, to see if they affect change in any way and what kind of change.

I do believe that, people left to their own devices, without a common set of shared values, will produce interactions that are in conflict with one another.  People do get off track in life.  To say not is presumptive.  If you want evidence of this, I suggest you check the nature of forums like this and how people act on them.  If people happened to be all reasonable, good natured, and rational, then you wouldn't have people banned on forums on this.  Also, do you think that there isn't a need for moderators? 

In your case, do you presume it is all these vile and disgusting religious system that we just purged, we would no longer have a need for moderators on forums like this?