Christian historian Dr. Wallace Marshall and I are debating whether or not enough evidence points to the existence of a god. For background and format, and Dr. Wallace’s opening statement, see entry one. For subsequent entries, see index.

We’re now closing up Dr. Marshall’s “Moral Argument” for the existence of God. Below is my final reply to his last response in defense of it.

This concludes our debate series for now. We both like the idea resuming where we left off, possibly early next year, tackling the last couple of remaining arguments and maybe even writing more general closing statements. But no guarantee. We got through three whole arguments in great depth. So it’s been a worthwhile endeavor regardless.

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That the Evidence Points to Atheism (XIII)

by Richard Carrier, Ph.D.

Dr. Marshall claims God exists from the mere observation of human moral reasoning. But he’s presented no evidence that conclusion follows. [1]

Marshall needs evidence of some kind of “objective moral values and duties” that require a God to exist. But all he’s presented is the fact that some people believe such things exist, which is not evidence they do. And what he has no evidence of, cannot evince God.

Meanwhile, insofar as any human moral reasoning exists that is empirically defensible, it requires no deity.

It doesn’t matter whether Marshall thinks the only moral values we can empirically demonstrate exist are “merely prudential” or fall short of what he’d wish. It still leaves us with no evidence of God. “I don’t like the only moral facts we can prove true” is no argument for God. But that’s the only argument he has.

The Only Facts We Have

The only moral facts we have actual evidence of are those I’ve presented, and which Marshall merely professes to dislike. [2]

Marshall dislikes it for two reasons, both false. 

• First, Marshall worries it’s untrue that all ideal agents would agree with “a universalized Golden Rule” (or UGR) without appealing to gods. But I’ve demonstrated they would—logically and empirically.
• Second, Marshall says moral truth must exactly correspond to moral phenomenology. But he’s stated no reason why it should; and I’ve shown it’s unlikely it would.

Human intuition, moral or otherwise, like all innate human perception and reasoning, is demonstrably flawed and prone to biases and errors, a consequence of our blindly evolved, ad hoc construction. So why would we deem it perfectly reliable in any domain? Marshall presents no reason to think so; nor any evidence it’s so.

Only Consequentialist Moral Facts Are Known

Marshall agrees that psychologically “it’s more fulfilling to live by the UGR,” and admits its reciprocal social consequences are preferable. But a rational agent needs no other facts to conclude they ought to live by the UGR. No God needed.

Marshall weirdly thinks “the Golden Rule likely originated as an emotive state ‘invented’ by evolution to secure cooperative behavior” for mere differential reproductive success; he even imagines this caused us to “conquer tribes deficient in this impulse.” Total pseudoscience. There is no evidence human conquest was ever driven by such a motive. Indeed “conquest” would contradict that motive, so his pseudotheory isn’t even internally coherent. Cooperation is always better. That’s why social animals have been evolving in that direction. 

But much else is amiss here.

• First, “the Golden Rule” is a cognitively constructed behavioral guideline, not an “emotive state.” The UGR was invented. It never existed biologically. Prosocial emotions evolved; but only caused behavior imperfectly approximating a UGR. Before human cognition started improving on that imperfect biology, all animals lived miserable, savage lives.
• Second, the UGR was never developed for differential reproductive success, but to improve human life; as reproduction was by then subordinate to the only actually valuable end: the pursuit of a life worth living. 
• Third, computer models show that living by a rationally mediated UGR produces the best possible outcome for all actors by that very measure. That’s a fact; how we evolved makes no difference.
• Fourth, empirical observation has repeatedly confirmed this. Cooperative societies turn out better than conquest-driven societies. Compassionate societies, better than cruel ones. Honest or just, better than dishonest or unjust. This is simply a fact.

Just like other improvements we’ve made to our flawed evolved intuitions, such as scientific method and logic and mathematics replacing our defective evolved reasoning, the superiority of the UGR was never discovered by evolution—any more than science and logic were. It was discovered by intelligent observation of how social and psychological systems actually work; and its full understanding has taken us thousands of years. [3]

Trying to get around this, Marshall imagines a society arguing for a “limited Golden Rule” (or LGR) in aid of committing genocide against “inferior” peoples. But in articulating what their arguments must be, he offers only false claims about reality. But if they are arguing for the LGR from false premises, this is not evidence for the LGR, but against it! That’s why rationally informed people conclude with the UGR. You can’t get a true morality from false beliefs.

This is the same point Marshall fails to grasp when he says it’s “hard to see why” Jacques the Art Thief would be happier being a different person “given Jacques’ desires and calculations.” His “desires and calculations” are all based on falsehoods and ignorance. Once you replace those with true beliefs it’s easy to see why he’d be happier being a better person. That’s why anyone is a better person.

When we look instead at empirically proved facts, atheism doesn’t “take away” the “psychological satisfaction” of living by a rationally mediated UGR. To the contrary, we’ve confirmed everyone who does is comparatively happier, especially absent false beliefs about themselves or the world. Nor does atheism “take away” the reciprocal benefit of cooperative behavior (a “commitment to securing the best outcomes for all”) compared to antagonistic behavior (e.g. selfishness; individual, ethnic, or nationalistic). That differential benefit has been abundantly proved.

No Argument Left

Marshall continues to cite no valid argument for the morality of retributivism. It’s simply false that consequentialism “severs [the] link between offense and desert.” To the contrary, it’s the only thing establishing that link. People can only deserve things for reasons. And the only reasons we can empirically prove exist are consequences.

Marshall’s cited study of children distinguishing prudential from moral norms defines “prudential” as self-serving (caring only for direct consequences to oneself or immediate inconvenience to others) and “moral” as caring about the feelings and welfare of others. Both are self-interested; one is just more fully aware of the consequences to oneself of behaving a certain way, of being a certain kind of person. [4] 

Once aware of “how we affect others,” we can become aware of how we feel about that (“Do I like the kind of person this makes me?”) and what the overall consequences are (“How will others most likely treat me if I treat them a certain way?” and “Would I really prefer to live in a whole world that acted that way?”). This is what the study Marshall cited proved children can tell the difference between. It’s pricisely the difference I’m talking about as establishing moral facts without God. [5]

Marshall asserts “when someone says ‘It is evil for you to steal from the poor!’ [that] is a different thing from the prudential counsel ‘…there will be bad outcomes for you and others’.” Yet Marshall produces no evidence that statement is true but for that being the very reason—because there is no evidence that makes the first statement true other than the second statement being true. [6] Likewise every other such assertion he makes: he asserts without evidence, what all the evidence we have proves false. I follow the evidence.

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Such is my last reply on the Moral Argument for God. 

We have concluded this debate for now. But if we ever resume it, the next entry will be linked here and in the debate Index.

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[1] Per my Opening Response to Marshall’s Moral Argument:

Whether “objective moral values” exist depends on how one defines “objective.” In the sense of “exists even when minds do not,” there is no evidence any such values exist. In the sense of “what all rational and fully informed minds would follow,” they exist necessarily (as the realizable potentials of any given universe); therefore no God is required (as I’ve explained in The Real Basis of a Moral World).

[2] Per my First Reply, my Second Reply, and my Third Reply. The analytical, empirical, and scientific facts and sources for everything I am arguing here are presented there.

[3] See, again, Richard Carrier, “How Can Morals Be Both Invented and True?” (21 August 2017). And for a comparative example: Richard Carrier, “Why Plantinga’s Tiger Is Pseudoscience” (20 September 2017).

[4] More recent science surveying this evidence (which includes the older study Marshall cites) includes Audun Dahl and Lizbeth Kim, “Why is it Bad to Make a Mess? Preschoolers’ Conceptions of Pragmatic Norms,” Cognitive Development 32 (October-December 2014): 12-22.

[5] See Hing Keung Ma, “The Moral Development of the Child: An Integrated Model,” Frontiers in Public Health 1 (2013) and Hing Keung Ma and Chau-Kiu Cheung, “A Cross-Cultural Study of Moral Stage Structure in Hong Kong Chinese, English, and Americans,” Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology (1996). Again, that adult moral reasoning can fully understand this: Roger Bergman, “Why Be Moral? A Conceptual Model from Developmental Psychology” in Human Development 45 (2002): 104-124.

[6] Once again, I formally proved this under peer review in Richard Carrier, “Moral Facts Naturally Exist (and Science Could Find Them)” in The End of Christianity, ed. by John Loftus (Prometheus 2011), pp. 333-64, 420-29.