10/21/2008

1

Kai Nielsen

Anti-Divine Command Theorist

Kai Nielsen(1926 – Present)

The Divine Command Theory

The Divine Command Theory

x is right =df God commands x

x is wrong =df God forbids x

The Euthyphro Dilemma

10/21/2008

2

The Euthyphro Dilemma

Horn 1:

God commands x because x is already good (right,

pious, etc.)

Horn 2:

x is good (right, pious, etc.) simply because God

commands x

I spend only one

paragraph on Horn 1

because it is so

obvious!

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 1

Suppose (Horn 1):

God commands x because x is already good (right,

pious, etc.)

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3

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 1

Suppose (Horn 1):

God commands x because x is already good (right,

pious, etc.)

Then:

• Objective moral values already exist and so are

independent of God

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4

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 1

Suppose (Horn 1):

God commands x because x is already good (right,

pious, etc.)

Then:

• Objective moral values already exist and so are

independent of God:

• Metaphysically: OMVs can exist even if God does

not!

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 1

Suppose (Horn 1):

God commands x because x is already good (right,

pious, etc.)

Then:

• Objective moral values already exist and so are

independent of God:

• Epistemologically: We can come to know OMVs

even if God does not exist!

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 1

Suppose (Horn 1):

God commands x because x is already good (right,

pious, etc.)

Then:

• Objective moral values already exist and so are

independent of God

• God is not in control of everything and thus cannot be

Sovereign

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5

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 1

Suppose (Horn 1):

God commands x because x is already good (right,

pious, etc.)

Then:

• Objective moral values already exist and so are

independent of God

• God is not in control of everything and thus cannot be

Sovereign

• God cannot exist

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6

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 2

Suppose (Horn 2):

x is good (right, pious, etc.) simply because God

commands x

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 2

Suppose (Horn 2):

x is good (right, pious, etc.) simply because God

commands x

Then:

• God is free to command any set of moral values

because no objective moral values already exist

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7

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 2

Suppose (Horn 2):

x is good (right, pious, etc.) simply because God

commands x

Then:

• God is free to command any set of moral values

because no objective moral values already exist

• Morality becomes arbitrary

The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 2

Suppose (Horn 2):

x is good (right, pious, etc.) simply because God

commands x

Then:

• God is free to command any set of moral values

because no objective moral values already exist

• Morality becomes arbitrary

• Morality becomes changeable

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8

The Euthyphro Dilemma

1. Either (Horn 1) God commands x because x is already

good (right, pious, etc.) or (Horn 2) x is good (right,

pious, etc.) simply because God commands x.

2. If (Horn 1) God commands x because x is already good

(right, pious, etc.), then God cannot exist.

3. If (Horn 2) x is good (right, pious, etc.) simply because

God commands x, then morality is changeable and

arbitrary.

Therefore:

4. Either God cannot exist or morality is arbitrary and

changeable.

I spend several

pages on Horn 2.

My point is that if you

try to avoid atheism by

turning to Horn 2, you

will inevitably find

yourself back at Horn 1

and atheism despite

your best efforts!

You may say that you have

the faith of Abraham, but, if

you do, you are just fooling

yourself!

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9

If you say you have faith

that God is good and that

you have no independent

standard of moral

goodness, then, your

verbal protestations to the

contrary not withstanding,

you are simply lying to

yourself!

10/21/2008

10

G. E. Moore

(1873 – 1958)

My very important

contribution to ethics was

my study, Principia Ethica

(1903).

I gave what I called the “Open

Question” argument in

Principia Ethica to show that

the word “good” is indefinable.

Here’s the idea.

Suppose someone says that the

word “good” has the same meaning

as the word “pleasure”.

Now note that the question

“This is pleasure, but is this good?”

is a perfectly sensible question to

ask, whereas the question

“This is good, but is this good?”

makes no sense to ask at all!

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In other words, the question

“This is pleasure, but is this good?”

is an open question, whereas the

question

“This is good, but is this good?”

is not!

But if “good” has the same meaning

as “pleasure”, then the question

“This is pleasure, but is this good?”

has the same meaning as the question

“This is good, but is this good?”

But this is impossible, since the first

question is an open question that is

perfectly sensible to ask whereas the

second question makes no sense to

ask at all!

Thus we must conclude that

“good” does not have the

same meaning as “pleasure”.

We can now generalize this

argument to any other term

“X” that is alleged to have the

same meaning as “good”!

But if “good” has the same meaning

as “X”, then the question

“This is X, but is this good?”

has the same meaning as the question

“This is good, but is this good?”

But, again, this is impossible, since

the first question is an open question

whereas the second question is not!

Thus “good” cannot have the same

meaning as “what God commands”

since the question

“This is what God commands, but is

this good?”

does not have the same meaning as

the question

“This is good, but is this good?”