Naturalism and Ethics

Welcome to Every Thought Captive, I’m Phil Steiger.

What happens when we remove God from ethical reflection?  If God does not exist, what happens to morality?  In his recent book, The Right Darwin, Carson Holloway argues that it is hard, if not impossible, to judge ethical behavior or set ethical standards if God does not exist.  In a system like Darwinistic Naturalism, all measures of ethical behavior are reduced to individuals and what comes naturally.  As a result, we cannot necessarily judge individual humans for their behavior by pointing to a moral law or a moral gauge, and therefore it is hard to judge right from wrong behavior.

In essence when a Moral Lawgiver is removed from the system, moral laws that apply to all people disappear as well.  But this is not our inherent sense of ethics and responsibility.  We rightly believe we are responsible to an ethical system higher than ourselves, and that points us toward the existence of a Moral Law giver.

This has been Every Thought Captive. I’m Phil Steiger, pastor of Quail Lake Community Church and Director of Dayspring Center for Christian Studies.  For more information please visit everythoughtcaptive.org.