Morals

I hold that no such things as morals exist and, being a pantheist, they certainly would not have transcended from God if, in fact, they did exist. As such, nothing is inherently "evil".

Indeed, if we have no freewill, we need never worry whether anything is "evil". We are just being carried along the stream of life by time. If, on the other hand, we do have freewill and can choose our actions, how do we determine whether they are "good" or "bad"?


What we do have are cultural customs within a social group. These meta-ethical customs define the "goodness" and "badness" of all actions in both man and nature (of which man is an integral part). The genocide of Jews, for example, was accepted as a "good" thing in Nazi Germany while being accepted simultaneously as a "bad" thing in most other societies at that time. And, as happened in Nazi Germany, events can result in the reversal of unacceptable "bad" things to acceptable "good" things when social attitudes change.

This gives rise to questions of the nominative relativism of the morals of different social groups. Does one social group have a "right" to interfere with another social group on the basis of "morals", regardless of the "goodness" or "badness" of the other's actions? I hold that they do not so long as the actions of one group do not dictate the actions of the other. Homosexuality is an example of such a "moral" issue that is currently quite active.

Meta-ethical morals are a great source of conflicts between social groups, especially when based on religions. In fact this one source of conflict has resulted in more wars and deaths than conflicts of any other kind.

Bob Dyan perhaps said it best:

Oh my name it is nothin'
My age it means less
The country I come from
Is called the Midwest
I's taught and brought up there
The laws to abide
And the land that I live in
Has God on its side.

Oh the history books tell it
They tell it so well
The cavalries charged
The Indians fell
The cavalries charged
The Indians died
Oh the country was young
With God on its side.

The Spanish-American
War had its day
And the Civil War too
Was soon laid away
And the names of the heroes
I's made to memorize
With guns on their hands
And God on their side.

The First World War, boys
It came and it went
The reason for fighting
I never did get
But I learned to accept it
Accept it with pride
For you don't count the dead
When God's on your side.

When the Second World War
Came to an end
We forgave the Germans
And then we were friends
Though they murdered six million
In the ovens they fried
The Germans now too
Have God on their side.

I've learned to hate Russians
All through my whole life
If another war comes
It's them we must fight
To hate them and fear them
To run and to hide
And accept it all bravely
With God on my side.

But now we got weapons
Of the chemical dust
If fire them we're forced to
Then fire them we must
One push of the button
And a shot the world wide
And you never ask questions
When God's on your side.

In a many dark hour
I've been thinkin' about this
That Jesus Christ
Was betrayed by a kiss
But I can't think for you
You'll have to decide
Whether Judas Iscariot
Had God on his side.

So now as I'm leavin'
I'm weary as Hell
The confusion I'm feelin'
Ain't no tongue can tell
The words fill my head
And fall to the floor
If God's on our side
He'll stop the next war.