Science Explains Morality Better Than God - Michael Shermer Debate - Part 1

Science Explains Morality Better Than God - Michael Shermer Debate - Part 1

In this debate Michael Shermer argues that science in the 21st century is much better able to explain why we are moral beings than the woo woo alternative explanation that we need a deity to justify our morality.

Michael Brant Shermer (born September 8, 1954) is an American science writer, historian of science, founder of The Skeptics Society, and editor-in-chief of its magazine Skeptic, which is largely devoted to investigating pseudoscientific and supernatural claims. The Skeptics Society currently has over 55,000 members. Shermer engages in debates on topics pertaining to pseudoscience and religion in which he emphasizes scientific skepticism.
Shermer is producer and co-host of the 13-hour Fox Family television series Exploring the Unknown which was broadcast in 1999. Since April 2001, he has been a monthly columnist for Scientific American magazine with his Skeptic column. He is also a scientific advisor to the American Council on Science and Health
Shermer was once a fundamentalist Christian, but ceased to believe in the existence of God during his graduate studies. He accepts the labels agnostic, nontheist, atheist and others.

[wassilykandinsky]

26:25 "Hello McFly" Lol! Turek in the role of the bully Biff. A Freudian slip that reveals his character.

[joshua.merrill]

Michael Shermer has an incredible opening statement, but his responses and behavior during the cross-examination is terrible. His disregard of the debate structure hurts his position, even though I understand he was just trying to make points; he could've had a much more effective delivery, had he asked the hard questions that religion rarely even attempts to answer.

The question that prompted Turek's answer where admits that he's never heard from his god is the exact type of question that needs to be asked.

[fionagregory]

So why has nobody clicked my comment up?

[chrisgraham]

My life has taught me to trust the KISS Scenario (Keep It Simple Stupid). Morality predates the Christian religion or any other religion that exist now, or that preceded them. No God is required. Morality has to have evolved for humans through evolution because many, if not all creatures, exhibit morality to some degree. Morality is the great struggle between Good and Evil, but at the most basic level, morality is the struggle between Pain and Pleasure. Anything that causes pain, whether it is physical or mental pain, from the most horrific degrees of pain to the most minor of inconveniences are not preferred and all creatures wish to minimize or eliminate that pain and will gravitate away from the cause. Anything that causes pleasure, whether it be physical or mental pleasure, from the highest level of extasy to the most minor giggle or smirk, we will gravitate towards and we will make every effort to maximize and repeat that pleasure experience. Pain is WRONG and Pleasure is Right. From this, humans have built the laws of their civilizations, just as a pride of lions, a pack of wolves, a hive of bees, a colony of ants, a troop of monkeys have very specific rules to be followed within their hierarchy. Those who follow the rules/laws are rewarded and those who disobey the rules/laws are punished. This display of morality is imperative for any species that consists of individuals collaborating with other individuals and they do so in order to seek and maximize Pleasure and minimize Pain. This collaboration, this quest to seek Pleasure can also be interpecies. Some display of Pain and Pleasure exists in all organisms, from paramecia to humans. It ain't rocket science...and it ain't God."

[dUBfROMwATERHOUSE]

I hate this kind of moral relativism from Turek. The reason Hitler and Stalin was wrong is because it HARMED people. Harm can always be objectively proven. Therefore harm is always wrong.

[courtneycaswell]

If you don't believe there is a God allocating which families, countries, and circumstances people are born into, then it follows that you ascribe your consciousness as the person you are, in your particular time, family, country, circumstance, etc. to be basically down to chance. This also can be a source of empathy. We can read about people in the past and realize their life could have been ours. We can watch the news and realize that we too could have been victims of that disaster by sheer bad luck. This is why the argument that Stalin or Hitler had morals falls flat. They set themselves apart from the rest of the human species by imagining they were fundamentally special and different, and could treat others as inferior and disposable. The Golden Rule does not depend on the existence or nonexistence of God. We can understand the golden rule by simply understanding that the circumstances of our birth are the result of chance, and therefore understand the sufferings and needs of others as being due to chance, and not divine decree. Treat others as you would want to be treated, because you could have been them.

[fidenful]

The Bible thumpers are so obtuse, they don't realize how hateful some of their positions are.

[komlajean-pierreahonsu]

Not interesting debate and most people applaud from emotions not upon a convicing argument

[leslumieres]

What Nazis did was wrong for the same reason that it's wrong for me to go on a killing spree in my community: we could not sustain life in viable communities like that. If it's morally acceptable for Nazis to kill whomever they don't like, it will be equally acceptable for any other nation to just annihilate whole of Germany if they so wish (eg. US nuking Germany just because they don't like them). What's true in smaller communities is also true on a grander scale.

And if "God is to adjudicate", that doesn't solve the problem, does it? How can we trust a God that seems to be changing mind every few decades or centuries? Right, we just say that it's misinterpreted (that's exactly the same argument put forward today by many Muslims). It's rather hypocritical to accuse the secular view of moral relativism and argue that morals based on scriptures are objective and yet resort to some sort of relativism ( ie. scriptures are misinterpreted) when it suits your goals. Absolute nonsense!

[lotsabirds]

Mr turok contradicts himself. He said slavery was misinterpreted, it wasn't really slavery...if that's so, why did Jesus come to set the captives free? Makes no sense! His nazi example made no sense, he basically said nazis thought they were right in killing jews because 8t made them hzppy so how do you determine its wrong!? Nazis killing people should have been right, based on his logic....I would have asked turok, if it made me happy to punch him in the face, would it be right? He would say, No! He then would have understood that someone else's view of happiness does not excuse immoral actions.

[saifulhaque]

How could Quran tell about moon, star and sun 1400 years ago, when your science couldn’t tell anything even 200 years ago. Read the the science books of 200 years old, you’ll find how ignorant people were then. Now the God has given you a tiny bit of knowledge, but you don’t believe in the GOD. What an irony!

[wassilykandinsky]

Trumpism and the applauding evangelicals go hand in hand. The USA has an obesity problem, an opioid problem a religious problem and a political problem.