[MD] The End of Faith Ethics

[Steven Peterson]

Hi DMB, All,

>dmb says:
>How about the classic reply of moderates, "but my belief in the MOQ gives my life a sense of meaning". As Sam Harris tells it, this is a very common sentiment. To expose the goofiness of this form of reasoning, he replaces belief in God with the belief that there is a diamond the size of a refrigerator buried in his back yard. When challenged about the unreasonable nature of this belief he replies, "I just wouldn't want to live in a world where there was no giant diamond in my yard". Let's say you persist and ask for some kind of reason or evidence of this priceless miracle. He says he just knows for sure that his belief in it has improved the quality of his life and that alone proves the belief worthy. If you then dug up the yard and showed him there was no giant diamond, he'd sue you for malicious destruction of private property. But at least you would have proven him wrong about the diamond. You will have also destroyed his claim that belief leads to an improved quality !
 of
>  life. Cause now his yard is a wreck and he has to hire a lawyer.

Steve:
This may be an example of where basing ethics on human suffering and happiness goes awry. People can easily make the claim that it is wrong to argue that gods don't exist, because if you were successful in convincing people, they would be less happy.

The MOQ moral hierarchy says that "truth" is a higher level value pattern than this sort of comfort people find in believing.

Regards,
Steve