OBJECTIVE MORALITY - 11.15.1999, 08.07.2002 (revised) - By: B. Hearn

“Objective morality is dangerous!” touted one of my atheist coworkers over lunch the other day. When I asked him why, he explained that a system of objective moral law[1] does not evolve with the rest of humanity. He also had concern for what he sees as “religious extremists having their marching orders handed down from on High.” His view as I understood it is basically this: Atrocity has been the inevitable result when freedom is bound by static religious absolutes. His alternative to an objective moral system was one of personal morality or moral relativism. My relativist coworker put it like this: "What is good for you might not be good for me, and what is good for me is my own business as long as it doesn’t harm anyone else." This free-floating approach to morality supposedly facilitates the pursuit of happiness whereas absolutes nearly always create intolerance. I was curious as to why my coworker focused on the practical rather than epistemic virtues (or lack thereof in his mind) of an objective moral law. Isn't it like conversing on Santa Claus and worldwide chimney damage and focusing primarily on the chimneys? Perhaps he doubted his relativist position after all and felt that some things really are objectively wrong.

We both arrived at the position that an objective moral law does not exist without an objective moral Law Giver, that is, God. It seems that my coworker and I agreed that from a rational nontheistic perspective; morality and ethics are relative. I appreciate his forthrightness because I’ve heard some of the rationale by nontheists for an objective moral law without God. I recall one discussion that I recently picked up off of the Internet between Ravi Zacharias and a skeptic in his audience[2]. The audience member claimed that a framework for objective moral law could be based on “the objective facts about the nature of human beings and human life.” Another view that I found at a humanities web site is: “I believe that one's life is, in itself, a value; and the objective standard for one to follow is that which advances this value.”[3] So even though my atheist colleague recognizes the absence of objective moral values without God, other nontheists would disagree. However, Jean-Paul Sartre, an exponent of existential atheism, held a tenable position in relation to his worldview: "There is no ultimate meaning or purpose inherent in human life; in this sense life is ‘absurd’. We are 'forlorn', 'abandoned' in the world to look after ourselves completely. Sartre insists that the only foundation for values is human freedom, and that there can be no external or objective justification for the values anyone chooses to adopt.”[4]

So what about the claim that objective moral law is based on “the objective facts about the nature of human beings and human life?” Given such facts, how does one prioritize and formulate them into first principles for an objective moral law? Would not the prioritization and formulation criteria be a subjective precursor without some form of foundational axiom? Such a foundation would be comprised of at least one axiom; undeniable and contextually significant for an objective moral framework. Otherwise you are working from personal preference or you end up with something claiming to be objective, but demands no obligation. The theist looks to a sovereign and righteous God as the foundation of an objective moral framework. But what does the nontheist look to? How does he arrive at an axiomatic foundation for an objective moral law based solely on the "facts of life?" He will probably tell you that "value" starts with "man's life," "man's happiness" or "the advancement of man." Although nothing obligates, say the nihilist, to accept this view. He is on the other hand obliged to take heed of a sovereign God who will call him to account for his actions on Earth. The nontheist may find this unsettling or even unfair (which is interesting in itself), but this does not change the fact that obligation is objective from the theistic view and merely self-imposed from the nontheistic view.

Go back a billion years, before man came on the scene: Was anything "Right" or "Wrong" then? Would it have been objectively wrong for an alien race to destroy the Earth a billion years ago to make way for a "hyper-spatial bypass?" To the nontheist, these aliens would be prohibiting man from developing from the lower life forms. If such an act of interstellar roadwork is objectively wrong, then we are saying that objective moral values existed prior to man. If on the other hand, such an act is not wrong; at what level of man's evolutionary development would it suddenly become wrong? Where do you draw the line, and who is going to draw it? Quite frankly, why would mankind have any objective value in an nontheist-universe where he is merely a chance-configured bag of atoms? Someone once told me: “Because I am a human being and feel that I have value, I have to reasonably accept that other human beings also have value.” This does sound reasonable at first blush, but our feelings do not give us objective value. But the good news is that we do have objective value because we are the awesome work of a Creator who made us in His image. When the Creator of matter tells you that you matter - then you do. But what about the nontheist who insists that there is a foundation for an objective moral framework based on undeniable truths relating to "human value?"

The philosophy of Objectivism, popularized by the writings of Ayn Rand, claims to offer a framework for realizing objective values. Although Rand never completed a treatise on this egocentric and optimistic philosophy, it has been refined over the years by philosophers such as Dr. Leonard Peikoff (who claims to be "Ayn Rand’s legal and intellectual heir.") Objectivism combines elements of Aristotelian rationalism, laissez faire capitalism, egoism, atheism, and optimistic humanism.[5] Upon delving into Objectivism, I was surprised to find that I had lived by and held nearly all of its tenets prior to my conversion to Christianity. To this day, I continue to subscribe to many aspects of Objectivism - such as the realist view; that there is an extra-mental realty not subject to the whims of my consciousness; that absolutes exist; that rationality and the laws of logic are a means to arrive at true belief (although the objectivist would regard this as the only means, rejecting any form of divine revelation.) In my opinion, as with other humanist philosophies, Objectivism gratuitously leaps to atheism and ends up being a big let-down existentially.

The proponents of Objectivism (who claim their atheism is merely a side effect of this wider view) reject the existence of God based on what they see as convincing undeniable truths. From "existence exists" Objectivism attempts to build a dichotomy between all consciousness (including an ultimate Mind) and existence (that which is perceived by consciousness.) But this dichotomy is really a road to nowhere with respect to the existence of God. Somehow we are supposed to reject an ultimate Mind by the "primacy" of existence over consciousness. In other words, because an extra-mental material reality exists, and necessarily so prior to any human consciousness observing it, we are to leap to the conclusion an ultimate Consciousness cannot exist prior to matter. I don't want to appear to hand wave this off, but this really smacks of black and white fallacy to me. Does the objectivist honestly expect the theist to believe the consciousness of God is limited in the same way as man's? Let us be frank here; I don't know of any theist who claims to know the attributes of God in the sort of metaphysical way the objectivist seems to understand. We should not be surprised to find man endowed with a consciousness or mind that functions in a material universe that God created prior to man. But this in no way leads to a rejection of an ultimate Mind.

Objectivism rejects the virtue of sacrifice and promotes egoism and selfishness. As Ayn Rand states in her work The Virtue of Selfishness (VS): "The creed of sacrifice is a morality for the immoral - a morality that declares its own bankruptcy by confessing that it can't impart to men any personal stake in virtue or values, and that their souls are sewers of depravity, which must be taught to sacrifice." For a philosophy that claims: "Truth is the recognition of reality; reason, man's only means of knowledge" (VS) - Objectivism sure fails to recognize the practically universally recognized virtue of sacrifice and seems terribly out of touch here. For example: place together a hundred men and women from various cultures around the world and have them watch a video of Arland Williams' last few minutes of life. Arland was a survivor of the crash of Air Florida Flight 90 which smacked into a bridge and plunged into the frozen Potomac river. As the rescue helicopters raised survivors, Arland passed up the lifeline several times and helped others until he finally vanished into the river. He was the only person to drown that day. Now if you honestly believe that even a significant minority would consider this act of heroism to be a foolish sacrifice and not a virtuous act, then Objectivism should appeal to you. The problem here is not so much that Objectivism promotes the wrong value, but rather it fails miserably to deliver what it claims to: and that is to deliver real objective values by observing reality and using reason to arrive at the truth. Regardless of faith or creed, most of us recognize the reality of whether sacrifice or selfishness is a virtue, and which is a vice.

My skeptical colleague was not concerned whether or not objective moral law exists without God because he saw all systems of morality as relative. His point rather, as I understood it, is that morality based on religious dogma is empirically unsatisfactory compared to that which is based on our free will. He then brought up Christendom's violent history as an example. I mentioned to him that those who committed violence in the name of Christ were not acting in accordance with His most basic teachings. In other words, it wasn’t Christianity that had run amok; it was man and the evil within him. But a good case for relativism cannot be built by simply attacking the history of Christendom. What about the infamous murderer Stalin who not only held an atheistic worldview but also acted within its scope? Keep in mind that ethical systems based on personal preference aren’t necessarily required to consider the starvation of millions as a morally unacceptable act. Christianity however would classify such an act of barbarism as, “objectively wrong.” But the relativist is put in a difficult position here if he is asked to judge Stalin’s horrific crimes because moral relativism cannot adjudicate between conflicting moral beliefs.[6] In other words, moral relativism offers no solid philosophical footing for moral criticism. If someone bases his or her own personal morality on first principles derived from Nietzsche[7], how can the relativist counter? When challenged with the idea that only the strong should live and the weak should perish, what can the relativist offer as a defense other than his opinion?

Of course the relativist probably feels an asserted belief in absolutes is just another opinion too. In fact, if it all boils down to individual opinion, how far can we really get with the notion of an objective moral law? The first step is to recognize that there are objective moral values. At some point the relativist must be challenged with the question: Are some things objectively wrong? Unless one can honestly say, “I don’t believe anything is objectively wrong” then he or she is actually an absolutist (or perhaps a closet-absolutist). Surely torturing babies for pleasure is objectively wrong? But the relativist may try to argue that certain universal wrongs are realized through an intrinsic genetic mechanism or handed down through tradition. Therefore such wrongs, although they may be deeply felt by most of us, are not objectively wrong. But I don't believe this to be an acceptable explanation and I would direct the reader to C. S. Lewis' book “The Abolition of Man.” [8] Lewis looked at moral values across history and culture and his rationale goes beyond a mere compilation of what various cultures have considered good and bad and challenges chance-mechanisms like evolution to satisfactorily explain objective moral values.

Ultimately, objective moral law must originate with an objective moral Law Giver. The Bible tells us that God is beyond space-time, immutable, sovereign and perfectly good and just:

• Beyond space-time – “He is before all things and in Him all things hold together.” (Colossians 1:17)
• Immutable – “I the Lord do not change…” (Malachi 3:6)
• Sovereign – “…the Most High is sovereign over the kingdoms of men and gives them to anyone He wishes.” (Daniel 4:25)
• Good – “…No one is good – except God alone.” (Luke 18:19)
• Just – “God is just…” (2 Thessalonians)

God has the ideal resume and qualifications to establish and govern what is Right and Wrong. Furthermore, He has provided us with a clear and straightforward roadmap of morality - it is called the Bible. But how does the relativist navigate the sea of values and moral choices before him? He will tell you that he has his intellect and experience to draw from and guide him. One can only hope that in such a world we would all make good decisions. But relativism often leads to a battle of opinions where “might makes right.” Ideas lead to actions and those who are in control will act accordingly. History has its examples; the ethnic genocide by the nihilistic powers of Nazi Germany and Stalin’s murderous rein, just to name a couple. Man's intellectual prowess alone has often steered him wrong, and in the end, atheists like Kai Nielsen concede: ”Pure, practical reason, even with a good knowledge of the facts, will not take you to morality.”[9]