Philosopher of science and biology Michael Ruse explains us what is morality from the point of view of metaphysical naturalism, given the Darwinian evolutionary theory: "The position of the modern evolutionist is that humans have an awareness of morality because such awareness is of biological worth. Morality is a biological adaptation no less than hands and feet and teeth. Considered as a rationally justifiable set of claims about an objective something, ethics is illusory. (The Evolutionary Theory and Christian Ethics, in the Darwinian Paradigm, pp. 262-269. Emphasis in blue added.)
Like Richard Dawkins, Bertrand Russell, Keith Augustine and Alex Rosenberg (and many other naturalists), Ruse fully understands the implications for morality of metaphysical naturalism. They understand that, if metaphysical naturalism is true, then objective moral values plausibly don't exist. Therefore, like it or not, moral subjetivism and its relativistic implications have to be right (if naturalism were true).
Note Ruse's brilliant insight "considered as a rationally justifiable set of claims about an objective something, ethics is illusory". Ethics is illusory in this sense, because (given metaphysical naturalism) there is not reason to think that an objective realm of moral value actually exist in a world which is purely physical and material. In fact, given our current scientific knowledge of physics, matter doesn't have any moral or normative properties at all. Physical laws specify only physical and chemical properties, not normative or value-laden properties. So, we have a reason against the view that matter has normative properties.
Therefore, our moral claims don't refer to anything objective. We think they do but reflection on the premises of naturalism teaches us otherwise and this is why we're rationally compelled to conclude that ethics is illusory.
So, as has argued naturalist philosopher of science and biology Alex Rosenberg: "There is no room in a world where all the facts are fixed by physical facts for a set of free floating independently existing norms or values (or facts about them) that humans are uniquely equipped to discern and act upon."
Moreover, given that the evolutionary theory can explain why we have moral beliefs (regardless of the existence or non-existence of any objective moral realm), then we don't need to appeal to any ontologically objective morality in order to explain our morality. Therefore, if metaphysical naturalism is true, morality is (very plausibly) a purely subjective phenomenon, a projection of the human mind.
Understanding this point is essential to fully understand the metaphysical naturalist worldview and its devastating implications for ethics. In words of Rosenberg: "The process of natural selection is not in general good at filtering for true beliefs, only for ones hitherto convenient for our lines of descent. Think of folk physics, folk biology, and most of all folk psychology. Since natural selection has no foresight, we have no idea whether the moral core we now endorse will hold up, be selected for, over the long-term future of our species, if any. This nihilistic blow is cushioned by the realization that Darwinian processes operating on our forbearers in the main selected for niceness! The core morality of cooperation, reciprocity and even altruism that was selected for in the environment of hunter-gatherers and early agrarians, continues to dominate our lives and social institutions. We may hope the environment of modern humans has not become different enough eventually to select against niceness. But we can’t invest our moral core with more meaning than this: it was a convenience, not for us as individuals, but for our genes. There is no meaning to be found in that conclusion"
Many naturalists have serious problems accepting such conclusions and implications. They accept certain key premises (e.g. that "everything is physical", that "evolution is an unguided and contingent process", that "determinism is true", etc.) but don't want to accept the full implications and conclusiones derived of a fully consistent application of such premises. This is evidence of intellectual dishonesty, superficiality or, in general, flawed cognitive faculties.
Rational people try to put together their beliefs and examine their implications. Ideologues, charlatans, or simply superficial people, tend to defend proposition X and proposition B, but reject a conclusion Z (when this conclusion is not liked), without realizing that X+B implies (necessarily or plausibly) Z.
For example, a naturalist could try to block Ruse/Rosenberg conclusion, arguing that their argument shows, at most, that our moral beliefs are sensible to the evolutionary process. But that it, by itself, doesn't imply that an objective moral realm cannot exist.
But this reply is extremely weak and ignore the ontological point made by Ruse/Rosenberg.
Rosenberg has given an argument to think that, given a world fixed by purely physical facts (and physics doesn't predict for matter any moral or normative property), there is not room for an independent realm of objective moral value. So, the burden of proof is for the naturalist who believes that such objective realm of value exists.
Moreover, even if such realm exists in a naturalistic worldview, the naturalist even would have to explain how our purely physical brain can grasp and discern such purely conceptual and non-physical realm of moral value and cosmic normativity.
The naturalistic worldview is essentially inmoral, in the sense that its basic and essential premises (physicalism; determinism; unguided, contingent and largely accidental evolutionary process; materialism about persons, etc.) imply the destruction of any objective morality, ethics, normativity and value.
Some smart naturalists trained in sophistry, try to appeal to emotions, red herrings and other fallacies in order to avoid this conclusion. For example, they can say that they love their children or that murder is wrong. Period.
These red herrings are evidence of the faulty cognitive faculties of the naturalists arguing like that. What's at stake is not if loving our children is good, or of "murder is wrong", but whether objective moral values are objective and metaphysical naturalism provides an ontological foundation for such objectivity. This is the issue.
In words of Rosenberg: "The problem for naturalism is to explain why a process of blind variation and natural selection landed us with what naturalists think just happens to be the right core morality of mankind. There are two ways to do this, neither of which are satisfactory. There is one way to explain the correlation away, which is perfectly satisfactory. The trouble is it produces nihilism about ethics.
Like Richard Dawkins, Bertrand Russell, Keith Augustine and Alex Rosenberg (and many other naturalists), Ruse fully understands the implications for morality of metaphysical naturalism. They understand that, if metaphysical naturalism is true, then objective moral values plausibly don't exist. Therefore, like it or not, moral subjetivism and its relativistic implications have to be right (if naturalism were true).
Note Ruse's brilliant insight "considered as a rationally justifiable set of claims about an objective something, ethics is illusory". Ethics is illusory in this sense, because (given metaphysical naturalism) there is not reason to think that an objective realm of moral value actually exist in a world which is purely physical and material. In fact, given our current scientific knowledge of physics, matter doesn't have any moral or normative properties at all. Physical laws specify only physical and chemical properties, not normative or value-laden properties. So, we have a reason against the view that matter has normative properties.
Therefore, our moral claims don't refer to anything objective. We think they do but reflection on the premises of naturalism teaches us otherwise and this is why we're rationally compelled to conclude that ethics is illusory.
So, as has argued naturalist philosopher of science and biology Alex Rosenberg: "There is no room in a world where all the facts are fixed by physical facts for a set of free floating independently existing norms or values (or facts about them) that humans are uniquely equipped to discern and act upon."
Moreover, given that the evolutionary theory can explain why we have moral beliefs (regardless of the existence or non-existence of any objective moral realm), then we don't need to appeal to any ontologically objective morality in order to explain our morality. Therefore, if metaphysical naturalism is true, morality is (very plausibly) a purely subjective phenomenon, a projection of the human mind.
Understanding this point is essential to fully understand the metaphysical naturalist worldview and its devastating implications for ethics. In words of Rosenberg: "The process of natural selection is not in general good at filtering for true beliefs, only for ones hitherto convenient for our lines of descent. Think of folk physics, folk biology, and most of all folk psychology. Since natural selection has no foresight, we have no idea whether the moral core we now endorse will hold up, be selected for, over the long-term future of our species, if any. This nihilistic blow is cushioned by the realization that Darwinian processes operating on our forbearers in the main selected for niceness! The core morality of cooperation, reciprocity and even altruism that was selected for in the environment of hunter-gatherers and early agrarians, continues to dominate our lives and social institutions. We may hope the environment of modern humans has not become different enough eventually to select against niceness. But we can’t invest our moral core with more meaning than this: it was a convenience, not for us as individuals, but for our genes. There is no meaning to be found in that conclusion"
Many naturalists have serious problems accepting such conclusions and implications. They accept certain key premises (e.g. that "everything is physical", that "evolution is an unguided and contingent process", that "determinism is true", etc.) but don't want to accept the full implications and conclusiones derived of a fully consistent application of such premises. This is evidence of intellectual dishonesty, superficiality or, in general, flawed cognitive faculties.
Rational people try to put together their beliefs and examine their implications. Ideologues, charlatans, or simply superficial people, tend to defend proposition X and proposition B, but reject a conclusion Z (when this conclusion is not liked), without realizing that X+B implies (necessarily or plausibly) Z.
For example, a naturalist could try to block Ruse/Rosenberg conclusion, arguing that their argument shows, at most, that our moral beliefs are sensible to the evolutionary process. But that it, by itself, doesn't imply that an objective moral realm cannot exist.
But this reply is extremely weak and ignore the ontological point made by Ruse/Rosenberg.
Rosenberg has given an argument to think that, given a world fixed by purely physical facts (and physics doesn't predict for matter any moral or normative property), there is not room for an independent realm of objective moral value. So, the burden of proof is for the naturalist who believes that such objective realm of value exists.
Moreover, even if such realm exists in a naturalistic worldview, the naturalist even would have to explain how our purely physical brain can grasp and discern such purely conceptual and non-physical realm of moral value and cosmic normativity.
The naturalistic worldview is essentially inmoral, in the sense that its basic and essential premises (physicalism; determinism; unguided, contingent and largely accidental evolutionary process; materialism about persons, etc.) imply the destruction of any objective morality, ethics, normativity and value.
Some smart naturalists trained in sophistry, try to appeal to emotions, red herrings and other fallacies in order to avoid this conclusion. For example, they can say that they love their children or that murder is wrong. Period.
These red herrings are evidence of the faulty cognitive faculties of the naturalists arguing like that. What's at stake is not if loving our children is good, or of "murder is wrong", but whether objective moral values are objective and metaphysical naturalism provides an ontological foundation for such objectivity. This is the issue.
In words of Rosenberg: "The problem for naturalism is to explain why a process of blind variation and natural selection landed us with what naturalists think just happens to be the right core morality of mankind. There are two ways to do this, neither of which are satisfactory. There is one way to explain the correlation away, which is perfectly satisfactory. The trouble is it produces nihilism about ethics.
The two unsatisfactory ways: Either, natural selection is so smart (to use a Fodor-like trope) that it was able to filter for the right morality among all the other wrong moralities, the way it was able to filter for the best hereditary system (using DNA) among all the other less reliable ones. Or, by filtering for the one core morality we share most widely around the world, natural selection made that morality the right one. The first alternative is unsatisfactory because the process of natural selection is notoriously unable to deliver true beliefs, only ones that enhance the survival of our genes (and memes, if there are any) in the local environment. The second alternative is unsatisfactory, since a set of norms’ wining the genetic or memetic fitness-race is no reason for it to be certified to be true, right, or correct.
The way to deal with the correlation of putative correctness of our moral core and its winning the Darwinian struggle for survival, is simply to deny it is correct, right, or true. Since we don’t think any of core morality’s incompatible alternatives is true, right or correct, we naturalists are committed to nihilism. Ways to escape nihilism: deny that there is a universal moral core, reject the view that our moral core has far reaching consequences for survival and reproduction, give up naturalism about morality. These alternatives are so implausible, I’d rather be a nihilist—a nice one, since nature has selected for it."
It's very important to think about it, because if these arguments are solid, then we know that naturalism is a deeply inmoral worldview. But, if we have independent reasons to think that moral values are objective, that actions like torturing little babies or raping atheists are objectively and intrinsically wrong and bad, then we have a powerful reason to think that naturalism is plausibly false (on purely moral grounds).
If we add the evidence for consciousness, psi phenomenon and the afterlife, then we can be reasonably sure that naturalism is certainly false.
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