Sam Harris is a popular atheist who makes an argument that human flourishing is a good thing.�How can Frank argue with that?�Of course, human flourishing is a good thing!�The problem is not Sam's conclusion, but his starting point.�What is the basis to define what is good and what will make humans flourish?�Check this out!
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@Ozzyman200 Says:
Morality has always been a huge problem for religion. A religious person can be moral, but they have no way to explain, through faith, why any act is right or wrong. See how badly apologists fail on this. Or can any apologist manage it? All true morality is humanistic.
@I_Am_Monad Says:
In the Bible, women have half the value of men. Now we seem to value women equally with men. Which one of these moral standards is objectively anchored to Yahweh's divine morality? DOES ANYONE KNOW THE ANSWER TO THIS?
@flyingmax9029 Says:
It seems to me that if you cause pain/suffering to the people in your community they will kick you out.
@ChrisFineganTunes Says:
I don’t think objective morality has been demonstrated by anyone, theist or atheist.
We only have evidence for subjective morality. And the evidence is overwhelming.
@portisheadjumpropeclub2276 Says:
Frank has an opinion on this but that is all it is ? It is a personal opinion on the basis of morality. It is so so convenient to say it’s God given because it can’t be proved or disproved as there is no evidence to back it up.
It is just a belief in something and a belief in something is a reaction to something you don’t know. Truth is Frank does not know if what he says is true or not. It is just a belief that you either choose to have or not
@albertdepeal9658 Says:
What I don't get is how a purely physical existence could produce such abstract concepts as morality, emotions, imagination, or logic. Just seems there must be another ingredient to life to produce those concepts.
@FlyingGentile Says:
"I THink"
@Ozzyman200 Says:
Theists individually can be moral, but they have no way to explain through faith why any act is right or wrong. Unless someone can manage it?
@Uouttooo Says:
The neantherthal aren't flourishing, the denisovans aren't flourishing.
@MrJeffrey316 Says:
Can someone answer me this thought. I have heard people say that we have good and bad because it's helps society grow and keep our species alive. Obviously if we were to murder, then that would be bad for all of society, or lying, or stealing, etc., so that's why we shouldn't do it. Our species would die out. How would Frank respond to this question?
It just makes sense not to do these morally wrong things or we'd die out.
I firmly believe in God, but I can't figure out a good response back for this question that it simply helps our species stay alive. Thanks.
@trumpbellend6717 Says:
*I'M AN ATHEIST* tell me why is it whenever I engage with Christians in a discourse about morality are they to TERRIFIED and hypocritical to acknowledge the subjective nature of their own moral perspective?? 🤔🙄
@kushgodd4108 Says:
If you need someone to tell you not to harm someone then you can't label yourself as moral 😂
@jonmichaelgalindo Says:
But the atheist argument for morality is "we want to not feel pain", and they claim there is no meaning behind that "want" other than evolutionary selection.
@BigIdeaSeeker Says:
Whether or not Turek wants to grant atheists’ grounding for morality makes no difference to the fact that his own god is grossly immoral by Christian standards (or those of some other god). Saying the atheist doesn’t get to take part in the argument does not dismiss Yahweh’s horrific actions. This dismissiveness is a very funny thing about apologists, and a sad state of Christendom.
@alejandrojoselizano Says:
Men can flourish without a god.
@hensonleon4427 Says:
I think this guy thinks a lot
@oddoutdoors Says:
Like everything else you say your title is misleading. Morality isn't objective and you demonstrate that every time you lie about the bible in order to attempt to reconcile your morality regarding slavery with what the bible says about slavery. The real moral problem is that you claim morality is objective and gid given but can't demonstrate either to be true. You actually actively demonstrate that morality is subjective.
@JD-lt7uv Says:
Frank thinks he has an unchanable moral authority to turn to in God, but what do you say to those who claim that even the morals in the Bible have changed?
Leviticus 25:45-46 allows Jews to purchase foreigners as slaves and keep them forever as their personal "property."
Numbers 31:17-18 and Deut. 21:10-14 permits the Israelites to take capitive virgin women they find attractive to be their "wives."
Lev. 20:13 commands God’s people to stone homosexuals.
Deut. 21:18-21 commands parents to kill rebellious children.
I don't know any Christian who still believes any of that is "moral." Doesn't that mean even the Biblical concept of morality is malleable?
@marvenlunn6086 Says:
Morality is subjective that is why they change over time if Morality was objective and given to us by god they would have never changed
@christopherfedele6081 Says:
Always trying to dig deeper than necessary.
Eventually you will fall into the pit you dug.
@NotedPine Says:
But we don’t live in a world with the most imaginable amount of pain possible, we live in a world with morals. So the question in it’s self is falsehood.
@davidplummer2619 Says:
Harris never answers the question, why SHOULD humans flourish? It appears to be just a tacit assumption on his part. But it can't be true unless human life has intrinsic value.
But if naturalism is true, there is no reason to think the idea that human life has intrinsic value is true and every reason to think it's false. If that's not so then what chemical element or light wave do we consult to find out whether to do this and not do that? Will gravity or magnetism light our path?
We are just combinations of matter that are just here til we're gone, like familiar shapes in clouds that create the illusion of meaning but quickly blur back into shapeless reality. A 150-lb man has no more intrinsic value than 150 lbs of sand or dead leaves. All pretenses toward morality and flourishing, religious or secular, are just that -- make-believe.
@jlockette Says:
Atheistical? Okay Jack.
@loddyda Says:
Jack makes a good point though because the empathy that we have for the feeling of pain in our bodies is an innate response to evil. There is some objective morality to our pain that we feel in an evil world, but why does that pain exist? Why don’t we feel good when pain is inflicted on us psychologically or physically? Clearly, there is a fundamental structure of morality beyond that, that good and evil exist therefore we feel both. So where did good an evil come from? It can continue to be deduced until you get back around to God’s creation of objective morality.
@danielanthony8373 Says:
If you want to get rid of pain and suffering in this world pleasure and joy have to go
@krumplethemal8831 Says:
If there is no god, it's true, morality is subjective. It's something we debate on common grounds. It isn't based on my pain is more important than yours, it's a shared agreement morality.
Now are there grey areas and exceptions to this base line? Yes of course. We don't need an overseer..
If god is the author of mortality, then certain objections get ignored in favor of atrocities that go unquestioned..
We evolved past slavery, not because a god commanded it but instead it was secular / political insight.
If anti-slavery was written on our hearts by god then it had been ignored for thousands of years..
@Bi0Dr01d Says:
I know that there are atheists out there who don't believe in objective morality and things like that come up but I really hope that they're listening to this video to understand that empathy, us being social creatures, pain, well-being, and evolution don't answer the issue. This is the standard answer that many have in response to the moral argument, but this response does not seem to accurately interpret the point of the moral argument. The point has nothing to do with how we come to understand pain or suffering, or whether or not we are able to empathize with others, or even that evolution has given us the ability to cognitively be aware of these things. That's not the issue. The issue is what grounds morality, not how we come to know it or even that we're able to do it. For example, if the human value does not objectively exist beyond human opinion, then whatever a person concludes is moral which presupposes the human value not to cause suffering or harm but instead pleasure or well-being, the direct opposite of that very conclusion is equally valid because a person can simply not presuppose the human value and conclude that suffering for humanity is good. The fact that we can empathize more in one aspect does not mean that the alternative is wrong, and for us to appeal to empathy already presupposes the human value which does not objectively exist according to the atheistic worldview, and that's why there is no basis for any moral judgment or action.
The moral argument is typically brought up *after the fact* that the atheist has already implied objective morality exists by judging other moral positions, and you would think that this is where the conversation ends because the atheist has already implied its existence, but it's from here that the atheist begins asking for evidence, and that does not seem to accurately represent the scenario the atheist has just witnessed when he himself has already implied its existence. The response should be to either concede that it exists, or to live consistently with an atheistic worldview in which objective morality does not exist, but one cannot both imply that objective morality exists and then challenge objective morality when he himself is implying it and then concluding when one doesn't meet his challenge (even though the atheist himself is implying it) that there is no evidence for God.
Finally, I wanna point out that since this is a standard response to the moral argument, it's implying that people are not really thinking through these issues and are not closely listening to the point being made about the moral argument but are instead seemingly repeating talking points to respond to an argument one hasn't fully interpreted. I wanna cast doubt on the atheist idea of confidence in his unbelief, because if this is the case for the moral argument, this may also be the case for other arguments for God as well in which standard responses are not as strong as an atheist may assume, and that he should look and arguments or evidence for God with a fresh set of eyes so that perhaps he could potentially come to an alternative conclusion that there is sufficient evidence for God's existence.
@Alex-cq1zr Says:
Kinda weak argument ngl. What drives morality? Well, the net positive and negative, dictated by lack or existence of a certain suffering, which is a signal of danger, which, if continued to increase, leads to extinction of a species, making it unable to reprodduce and thus making species which are better at avoiding suffering as a group (hence altruism and individual members of a species often no needing to reproduce, since other members might have more or less the same genes) more prominent.
If qe follow this idea, human is, at the core, powered by thirst for group suffering being decreased, group survival guaranteed, group prosperity achieved.
A human is a bit more complex and all, but that's a very simple and kinda obvious basis, which explains why god is not necessary for morality, especially since religion often tries to instill bad morality. Rather than be tolerant and not be bad towards over people due to them being weird (even if not harmful and all), a better thing for humanity is to be good to them and respect their rights.
Many religious people though, if a person is gay, trans, pagan, etc. would try to harm the person directly (violence, insult) or indirectly (stripping away rights, promoting hateful rhetorics, spreadin disproven information to harm the group), which creates more suffering, than good. Thus, such an action is bad. However, such people believe they are saving the person (by denying reality) or just don't care. Such people believe that's moral. I, as an atheist with morals, believe it's not moral, unless you have warped morality.
Countless cultures with or without gods have a lot of moral similarities.
Sense of morality today might be more nuanced, but no god is needed to rell a person that an object is round.
God is not needed for anything i see in the world.
Tbh, i am more inclined to believe in pagan non-perfect gods than a god so perfect that it literally couldn't create free will without maiming itself, making itself non-perfect.
Before you go "how can you understand god? It's more complex", i say "How can you know your god isn't actually acting out of malice or that it's doing things at random? It's beyond our understanding in such an argument and, thus it's both impossible to make an observation of it and not does it matter, since believing in such ideas would be essentially forcing you to, logically, believe in all ideas, which would literally be impossible. You can't worship all of the versions of god a human mind can create at the same time, since even some singular versions would require impossible tasks.
@landonpontius2478 Says:
Not only do atheists have a grounding for objective morality, it's the exact same grounding that theists have.
All that is needed to prove this is for Frank to turn his questions about grounding back on himself and follow it to the logical conclusion by repeatedly asking "why does that matter?"
The inherent value of concsious experience, and eventually well-being, is the grounding of morality because it's the grounding of value itself.
You simply cannot defend the relevence of moral truth claims without eventually appealing to the value of experience well-being.
If God gave us objective morality, then that only matters if following his rules results in rewards (well being) because it serves our ultimate self interests and fullfills our ideals. and if disobeying those rules has consquences (suffering). This is also the basis of the appeal to the afterlive in Heaven or Hell, it's a pure appeal to the value of experience.
There are obviously differences in the details between the atheist and theist positions at times but the foundation is exactly the same because it is the only coherent foundation on offer.
@unicron99999 Says:
Even as a Christian I find that argument Frank keeps making about humans having a sense of knowing good and evil being proof of God to be so silly. Obviously we know good and evil because we can literally see how others react to bad things done to them, and know we wouldn't want that to happen to us, thus we know it is wrong, just as we know kind acts and giving make people including ourselves happy, so duh, that's good. Frank says so many interesting smart things, but then there is that...
@Ozzyman200 Says:
Religious people individually can be moral, but faith can't give them a framework to explain why anything is right or wrong.
@HiThereHeyThere Says:
Frank, I think this faq needs to have a video explaining the issue and answer clearly. Cuz ive watched 3 videos on your moral arguments today, and im not connecting the dots on what the issue is and answer around atheists argument. Can you make a clean video 411 on this?
@dbz739921 Says:
Jack has way too many things in his pockets
@FLAC2023 Says:
This guy looks like a Con man
@brucedambrosio4270 Says:
The problem with Dr. Turek's reliance on God being the ultimate authority on good and evil is that unless you communicate directly with God, you are being told what God thinks is good and evil by mortal beings, who can claim they have some supernatural connection to God, but could be lying or mistaken as mortals tend to be. The result is that you follow what makes sense to you, and the community you live in will either support or discourage those beliefs. Because your actions will rely on what makes sense to you, God's existence will not be a factor.
@cygnusustus Says:
What is Frank's basis to define what is good?
How does he justify that basis? Can he show that it is objective? Can he show that it exists? Is there a place for human flourishing in it?
Nope, nope, and nope.
@cygnusustus Says:
Uhm....Frank?
If there is a God, why not dolphin flourishing?
@gowdsake7103 Says:
What mistake do theists make ? NEVER PROVING their fairy tale
Never proving morals come from anything but social necessity ! Ignoring that EVERY society had different moral values is utterly dishonest
Asking WHY is a DUMB question, as for flourishing who says humanity is flourishing ?
More to the point supportuing a book of myths that gloryfire rape, genocide, murder, slavery, child abuse, mysogomy and homophobia. You expect me to support those ?
@amykunkle6864 Says:
It’s like a board game, there has to be a purpose to the game, an Objective. Otherwise, what is the purpose of having rules?
@avi8r66 Says:
What theists get wrong about atheists... Atheists do not believe the god you claim is behind all your other claims even exists. Until we think such a being even can exists we aren't going to consider that they are responsible for or the source of anything. 1) Demonstrate ANY god exists. 2) Then, demonstrate the one you believe in, the god defined in the bible, exists. 3) Then we can have a discussion about that god's relationship to morals. Failing step one or step two means there is no need to have the discussion about step three.
The bible lays out a simple test. Matthew 18:19. Get two believers to ask for something and see if they can reliably get results. To date all such attempts yield no better results than any other method, like random chance.
@Powerful9315 Says:
this is awesome!!
@BayesTheorem78 Says:
"Why human flourishing, why not Dolphin flourishing?" - The two are not mutually exclusive.
"You cant say this behavior is better than that behavior if there is no purpose to life" - To reduce suffering. There don't need to be goals external to life itself.
@ZenWithKen Says:
Always the 'no purpose to life' and 'how do you tell right from wrong' crap. Morals are driven by well being. Your desire to hurt ends at my desire not to be, it's that simple. I can show you people with morals, can you show me a god that's responsible for them?
@senorpoopEhead Says:
I'm *VERY* concerned about cowboy flourishing. Please let Frank know.
@CheesyChez421 Says:
"Why is it wrong to inflict pain on people?"
Because human suffering is not good for the species to continue to exist. There is not anything in history that can disprove that. Especially when it comes to the RELIGIOUS killing of people that Christianity among other fairy tales has on its hands.
@naturalisted1714 Says:
God's morality would be just as arbitrary as Sam's, because God's morality wouldn't come from anything higher than himself. He just arbitrarily made it up.
@Ozzyman200 Says:
Morality has always been a huge problem for religion. Religious people can be moral, but their model simply can't explain why anything is right or wrong.
@redfaux74 Says:
I wish Frank would stick to this instead of his son. Or the lady.
Frank nails it. The others are cotton candy. I want the beef. Thank you Frank.
Cut the bologna out, pitch it. Give me beef. Now.... like this video.
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