The Crippling Effect of Divine Command Theory on Moral Reasoning
Summary
TLDRIn this discussion, Ozzie explores the appeal of Divine Command Theory, particularly among religious individuals, suggesting that it offers a simplified approach to moral reasoning. He argues that adherents to this theory bypass the complex, introspective process of moral deliberation by focusing solely on what they believe to be God's will. This reliance on divine commands often leads to a limited moral imagination, making it difficult for them to understand how non-religious individuals arrive at moral decisions. Ozzie emphasizes the intellectual demands of moral reasoning without divine guidance, contrasting it with the 'quick and easy' path of Divine Command Theory.
Takeaways
- 🧠 Religious believers often insist that moral reasoning presupposes a God, influenced by divine command theory.
- 📜 Divine command theory claims that morality is based solely on God's will or commands.
- 😌 A psychological appeal of divine command theory is that it simplifies moral reasoning, removing the need for deep deliberation.
- ⚖️ Non-religious moral reasoning requires careful consideration of multiple factors, including consequences and consistency with previous beliefs.
- 💭 Developing a consistent moral philosophy is an ongoing process involving reflection, reading, observation, and dialogue.
- ⏳ Moral deliberation is challenging because it often occurs under time constraints and limited information.
- 👥 Adherents of divine command theory focus primarily on determining God's will, which can lead to less consideration of real-world consequences.
- 🤔 The belief that 'the Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it' is an example of how some avoid complex moral reasoning.
- 💡 People who follow divine command theory may find it difficult to understand how non-religious individuals arrive at moral conclusions.
- 🔍 A lifetime of divine command-based moral reasoning can lead to a lack of imagination and emotional capacity in considering alternative moral systems.
Q & A
What is divine command theory?
-Divine command theory is a moral philosophy that asserts that moral values and obligations are dependent on God's will. According to this theory, actions are morally good, bad, obligatory, or prohibited solely based on God's commands.
Why do some religious people insist that morality presupposes a God?
-The speaker suggests that religious people may feel that morality presupposes God because divine command theory allows them to avoid the complex, introspective process of moral reasoning. By relying on God's will, they can bypass the hard work involved in moral deliberation.
What is the 'hard work' of moral reasoning referred to in the script?
-The 'hard work' refers to deeply reflecting on various factors, considering the interests of those affected, being consistent with previous moral decisions, and self-examining one’s biases. This process requires ongoing deliberation, emotional and intellectual effort, and revisiting one’s beliefs.
How does divine command theory spare individuals from moral deliberation?
-Divine command theory spares individuals from moral deliberation because it simplifies moral reasoning to the question: 'What does God want me to do?' This allows individuals to bypass the complexities of evaluating moral situations and instead rely on their interpretation of God's will.
What are some potential dangers of divine command theory according to the speaker?
-The speaker warns that divine command theory can lead to harmful actions being justified if they are believed to be divinely commanded, such as killing an 'infidel.' Since the individual's moral reasoning is centered on obedience to God, they may ignore the consequences of their actions.
What is the significance of the slogan 'The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it' in this context?
-This slogan exemplifies the mindset of divine command theory followers who do not engage in deep moral deliberation. They believe that whatever is written in their sacred text is the ultimate truth, leaving little room for personal moral reflection or discussion.
Why does the speaker believe that divine command theory hinders moral imagination?
-The speaker argues that divine command theory hinders moral imagination because it reduces moral reasoning to the interpretation of sacred texts, leaving individuals with limited intellectual and emotional tools to consider moral issues outside of a religious framework.
How does the speaker describe the process of reaching moral conclusions without divine command theory?
-The speaker describes it as a lifelong project involving constant reevaluation, self-examination, and exposure to new arguments and evidence. The goal is to form moral convictions based on thoughtful reflection, not just passive acceptance of cultural norms.
What does the speaker mean by 'reflective equilibrium' in moral reasoning?
-'Reflective equilibrium' refers to a state where a person's moral intuitions are consistent with their principles after careful reflection, adjustment, and revision. Achieving this balance is seen as a long-term goal of moral reasoning.
What is the speaker’s objective in discussing divine command theory?
-The speaker aims to explain why many religious people feel that morality is impossible without God. This belief stems from their reliance on divine command theory, which constrains their ability to understand non-theistic approaches to moral reasoning.
Outlines
🧠 Exploring Divine Command Theory and Moral Reasoning
In this introduction, the speaker discusses the idea that religious individuals often claim moral reasoning requires belief in God. The focus is not on philosophical arguments about the ontology of morality, but rather on the psychological reasons behind why religious people may subscribe to divine command theory. Divine command theory posits that moral decisions are based solely on God's will or commands, which simplifies the complex process of moral reasoning for its adherents.
🤔 The Challenges of Moral Reasoning Without Divine Command
The speaker elaborates on the demanding nature of moral reasoning without the framework of divine command theory. It involves weighing multiple factors, considering long-term consequences, and striving for consistency across decisions. Moral reasoning requires deep reflection, self-examination, and an ongoing process of aligning one's beliefs with new evidence. This is contrasted with the simpler approach of divine command theory, which bypasses much of this effort by relying on God's will.
🧐 Consistency and Moral Intuition Through Reflection
Moral intuition, the speaker argues, should not merely be the product of cultural conditioning but rather emerge from thoughtful reflection. Achieving a consistent moral framework is an open-ended project requiring continuous reassessment. Moral beliefs should remain flexible and open to revision, rather than ossifying into prejudices. The speaker cautions against the temptation to dismiss objections from others, as doing so can prevent moral growth and understanding.
⚖️ Divine Command Theory’s Simplification of Moral Decision-Making
This paragraph delves deeper into how divine command theory simplifies moral decision-making by focusing on one primary question: what does God want? The speaker contrasts this with the complexities of secular moral deliberation. The divine command theorist may adhere strictly to religious teachings, even when those teachings could result in harmful consequences. The certainty provided by this belief system allows the individual to act without considering the broader implications of their actions, often resulting in a lack of deeper moral reflection.
🛠 The Consequences of Limited Moral Imagination
Here, the speaker explains how adhering to divine command theory can limit a person’s moral imagination and their ability to engage in comprehensive moral reasoning. By focusing solely on religious texts and theology, proponents of divine command theory may struggle to understand how non-religious individuals form their moral beliefs. This limitation leads to a failure to recognize that morality and moral knowledge can exist independently of belief in a deity.
📚 Moral Inquiry Beyond Divine Command Theory
In this concluding section, the speaker emphasizes that divine command theory is not being disproven, but its limitations are being highlighted. Many religious individuals who subscribe to this theory often believe that morality is impossible without God. The speaker suggests this belief stems from their narrow experience with moral reasoning, which lacks the complexity and reflection required in secular moral deliberation. The conclusion points out that divine command theory leads to a limited understanding of moral reasoning practices outside religious frameworks.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Divine Command Theory
💡Moral Reasoning
💡Reflective Equilibrium
💡Moral Intuitions
💡Psychological Factor
💡Moral Deliberation
💡Moral Calculus
💡Self-Serving Beliefs
💡Moral Knowledge
💡Failure of Imagination
Highlights
Religious people often insist that moral reasoning presupposes a God due to psychological factors, not just philosophical ones.
Divine command theory states that morality is determined solely by God's will, making moral reasoning a simpler process for believers.
Divine command theory spares believers from engaging in the hard work of deep moral deliberation.
Moral reasoning, for those not subscribing to divine command theory, involves weighing numerous factors, including interests of those affected, precedents, and self-examination.
Arriving at moral conclusions requires ongoing introspection, revision of beliefs, and alignment with new evidence and arguments.
Achieving reflective equilibrium in moral reasoning is a lifelong process that requires emotional and intellectual effort.
A divine command theorist's moral reasoning is limited to interpreting what God wants, which simplifies the moral decision-making process.
Divine command theorists may act on commands they believe come from God, even when such actions may have harmful consequences.
The phrase 'The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it' reflects the simplicity of moral reasoning under divine command theory.
Divine command theory can lead to moral actions that ignore the suffering or consequences inflicted on others.
Believers in divine command theory may experience emotional and intellectual detachment from the real-world consequences of their moral decisions.
Such believers may justify harmful actions with the belief that God's commands are ultimately good, regardless of temporal suffering.
A lifetime of relying on divine command theory can impoverish a person’s moral imagination and hinder their understanding of non-religious moral reasoning.
For those who subscribe to divine command theory, the prospect of moral deliberation without God's commands seems daunting and hopeless.
The failure of imagination, resulting from lifelong divine command reasoning, leads some religious people to believe morality is impossible without God.
Transcripts
hi Ozzie here I thought it shares some
polemical thoughts about everyday moral
reasoning and specifically some thoughts
I had about why I think religious people
so commonly insists that moral reasoning
presupposes a God and I'm not talking
about the stated philosophical reasons
about the ontology of morality but
rather a kind of psychological factor
which is operating in people who
subscribe to something called divine
command theory and which influences
their attitude about how moral knowledge
can be acquired and before I proceed
though it's important to recognize that
not all religious people subscribe to
divine command Theory the expression
divine command theory is used in moral
philosophy to refer to any one of
several related ethical theories which
have in common that they take God's will
to be foundational to morality according
to divine command theory things are
morally good or morally bad or
obligatory or permissible or prohibited
solely because of God's will or commands
now in my view the broad appeal of
divine command Theory morality stems
from the fact that such a moral position
spares a religious person from having to
do much of the hard work that would
otherwise be involved in moral reasoning
what's this hard work I'm referring to
well if I'm asked what's the correct
course of moral action in such and such
a situation well I'll be forced to think
deeply about the situation if it's one
I'm not considered in order to identify
and way to the best of my abilities all
the relevant factors that seem to me to
be relevant to arrive at a correct moral
decision I'll take into consideration as
many of the short and long term
interests I can imagine of those who
will be directly and indirectly affected
by whatever courses of action I might be
evaluating I'll consider the sort of
precedent I'm setting for myself and for
others
I'll also strive to make my moral
decisions consistent with my previous
moral decisions in commitment
in the process I might find that I have
strong moral intuitions on the matter
sometimes even competing moral
intuitions and I may be forced to revise
my existing royal beliefs and jettison
some of them as a result of those
deliberations and as if that wasn't hard
enough I will commonly find myself under
the constraints of real time that is I
won't have as much time as I'd like to
deliberate on the matter I won't have
all of the informational and attentional
resources I would like to have about
what the intended and unintended
consequences of my action would be who
will or will not be affected and how
much such things are going to matter
further I'll have to strive toward an
unflinching self-examination of my own
interest and whatever moral intuitions I
already have to determine to what extent
my moral intuitions and inferences are
merely self-serving as opposed to
principled and I'm biased because we
operate under such constraints of time
and limited information and bias our
deliberations are frequently truncated
they're cut short or they're postponed
indefinitely in the worst cases when
we're lazy and we want to avoid the hard
work of moral deliberation we simply act
on whatever moral intuitions just bubble
up to the surface of our minds in that
moment
often in predictably self-serving ways
which contributes to the formation of a
highly inconsistent standard or position
out of a whole patchwork of mutually
contradicting decisions actions and
intuitions it takes years of serious and
deliberate and conscientious effort in
the form of introspection and reading
and observation and conversations and
sustained arguments with others before a
person can achieve a condition of
reflective equilibrium on moral
questions
so clearly producing workable and
durable moral convictions which are both
emotionally and intellectually
satisfying is an open-ended ongoing life
project so we owe it to ourselves to
deliberately expose whatever moral
conviction
we presently hold to new evidence and
new arguments other views on moral
questions as we work towards the ideal
of enduring principles that have wide
cross cultural and transgenerational
applicability it is no easy thing to
constantly reevaluate one's moral
conclusions in this way revising them
and adjusting our moral intuitions into
conformity with one another and with
whatever ideals were striving to emulate
one of the goals in all of this is to
reach a point where our moral intuitions
are not just products of what's being
passively pickled into us by our culture
but the product of the thoughtful
reflection analysis and evaluation until
our moral intuitions move us to speak
and act in a consistent way that feels
natural and automatic so that we're not
always engaged in a elaborate and
sophisticated rational process of
deliberation a permissive condition for
achieving any of this is to keep in mind
that one's moral conclusions
however hard-won and robust they might
feel to us at the moment are
nevertheless provisional and subject to
error and revision just like the most
robust scientific theory is patting
ourselves on the back and declaring that
the personal and collective enterprise
of moral inquiry is complete can only
hamper in this life project we have to
resist the tendency to dismiss
objections put forward by those whom we
disagree with or possibly regard as
moral retro sorry it reprobates because
they threatened to contaminate our
existing world vision the temptation to
insulate one's beliefs from
contamination is always strong and never
stronger than the moral beliefs are at
issue but we yield to that self-serving
and self-congratulatory temptation at
the risk of letting our moral beliefs
ossified into mere prejudices so all of
this is a heavy cognitive
a person operating under divine command
theory by comparison does not have to
exercise that much more muscle the
divine command theorists moral reasoning
is trained ultimately on only one
question what does God want me to do so
the advocate of divine command theory is
engaged in reading the mind of a
supernatural being and so the proponent
of divine commentary's and moral
reasoning is centered on trying to
understand what his theology can tell
them about what God wills if he comes to
believe that his theology says preach
the sinfulness condom use then that's
likely what he'll do more ominously if
he comes to believe his theology says
kill the infidel well then he will feel
he has a moral duty to kill the infidel
if you were to trick such a person into
believing some made-up moral preachment
was to be found in his holy texts and
thus issued from his God you probably
wouldn't need any other argument here's
a slogan you might have heard the Bible
says it I believe it that settles it
there's not a lot of moral deliberation
going on there yet some people have that
very slogan glued to their car bumpers
because a subscriber to divine command
and theories moral reasoning is
constrained in this way he's not
specially troubled by the potentially
devastating consequences of his actions
upon others both predictable and
unpredictable any suffering inflicted on
himself or others which might ensue from
this quick and dirty style of moral
reasoning is completely trumped by a
conviction that the action is right
despite any consequences which might
otherwise have intruded on his
subjective feeling of moral certainty if
he wasn't committed to the belief that
the Divine Will is the only relevant
factor in rural reasoning so long as the
proponent of divine commander is
convinced that his theology successfully
reads the mind of God he can sleep
easily at night no matter what harm he's
done no matter how much mischief he may
have done through unnecessary meddling
he will sleep well because he is adopted
into his belief set the self-serving
belief that God would never instruct him
to do anything that was not ultimately
good no amount of temporal suffering in
the here-and-now
or mischief no matter how predictable it
might be will impress him in his moral
calculus because these are all
outweighed by supernatural approval and
could even result in other worldly
rewards such as heaven now as I
described earlier producing and
intellectually and emotionally it's a
satisfying moral level
capable of guiding one's actions is a
lifelong endeavor that imposes serious
intellectual and emotional demands on a
person but by contrast the believer in
divine command theories entire style of
moral reasoning and the theological
discourse he's engaged with and reliant
upon steers him away from any of this
kind of moral calculus leaving him with
less actual experience in weighing
morally relevant factors and leaves them
with a paucity of emotional and
intellectual resources to even imagine
how moral reasoning can proceed without
divine marching orders instead all of
his intellectual and emotional resources
and energies have been diverted to a
narrow focus on what this or that sacred
text says or what this theologian or
theological tradition says about what a
supernatural being expects him to do
moral deliberation is thereby reduced to
a kind of psychoanalytic speculation
into the inscrutable preferences of a
super being a lifetime of crippling
one's moral capacities in this manner
would be enough to make anyone despair
when asked to ponder how non-theist
arrives at his or her moral beliefs it
should come as no surprise to us
therefore that people whose moral
imagination is constrained and
impoverished in this way find the
prospect of moral deliberation without
divine marching orders to be utterly
daunting and even hopeless so it's no
mystery why fundamentalists and others
who subscribe to divine command theory
reflexively repeat the Metra that
without a god morality and moral
knowledge is impossible now nothing I
said here should be construed as an
argument disproving divine command
theory though clearly some of the
liabilities i've alluded to will serve
to further discredit that style of moral
reasoning in the minds of those who
aren't given over to divine command
theory already but my objective here was
to make explicit why i think so very
many religious people feel in their very
bones that morality can't even exist
without a dog and that moral knowledge
is impossible without positing the dog
it's because they're quick and dirty
approach to moral reasoning when
practice over a lifetime results in a
failure of imagination with regards to
the moral reasoning practices of the
non-religious that's all for now and
thank you for watching
浏览更多相关视频
PHILOSOPHY - Religion: God and Morality, Part 1
PHILOSOPHY - Religion: God and Morality, Part 2
Divine Command Theory: Crash Course Philosophy #33
The Euthyphro Dilemma: Religion and Morality (Divine Command Theory)
Oliver Perater: Teaching Demo (Introduction to the Deontology Ethics of Immanuel Kant)
How Will God Judge Someone Who Has Never Heard the Gospel?
5.0 / 5 (0 votes)