Here Sam Harris, apparently and in his own mind, proves that atheism most certainly does have a basis for morality “moral intuitions that are (at some level) hard-wired in us and that have been refined by thousands of years of thinking about the causes and possibilities of human happiness.” Elsewhere, Sam Harris makes reference to “fresh moral imperatives” and “conceptual revolutions.”1
First, we should ask how he knows this and secondly what it means. What is hard-wired? How did it get hard-wired? When was it hard-wired? Why is it hard-wired? Why should we heed this moral intuition? What happens if we do not heed it? Who administers this moral “law”? If I am hard-wired what happens if I short-circuit? In fact, there are atheists, like Prof. Richard Dawkins, who believe that we are just apes, “We are not, then, merely like apes or descended from apes; we are apes.”2 Moreover, Charles Darwin wrote (in The Descent of Man, p. 180, “In a series of forms graduating insensibly from some ape-like creature to man as he now exists, it would be impossible to fix on any definite point when the term ‘man’ ought to be used.”
What is of the utmost importance to note, when an evolutionary concept is appealed to in order to account for hard-wired absolute morals, is that, as Sam Harris does here, what is being told to us is a story. He does not produce one shred of evidence but merely tells us a tale and asks us to believe him that this did occur. Instead of evidence Sam Harris appeals to time, he appeals, by faith, to a time in the future when his beliefs will be proved true (see my essay The Gap Filler). This is such a common fallacy in atheistic arguments that I have termed it: the fallacy of validation by projection (see this essay for elucidation). Elsewhere he writes, “If we better understood the workings of the human brain, we would undoubtedly discover lawful connections between our states of consciousness, our modes of conduct, and the various ways we use our attention. If we ever develop such a science, most of our religious texts will be no more useful to mystics than they now are to astronomers”3 (emphasis added. Also, see the “His pseudo-scientific complex” portion of this essay to see how Sam Harris is becoming a scientist in order to find proof of that which he already believes).
When does this moral intuition apply to us and not to our less evolved ancestors? And please do not miss the greater point here: if, as Sam Harris posits, our moral intuition has be undergoing refinement for millennia this intuition is tentative. How do we know when the intuition will change, in its refining process and bring about different morals? How can Sam Harris condemn any past actions of theists or atheists since they were merely following their moral intuitions, the intuition that was refined to a certain degree? How can he condemn today’s actions since our morality is constantly undergoing this refining process? It may changing at this very moment. According to Prof. Richard Dawkins the way we know how morality is changing is that “it’s in the air” (see here). Also, note that Sam Harris argues that rape was once an evolutionarily beneficial act (see my essay Sam Harris: The Rape Comments).
Moreover, Sam Harris states that “If a person doesn’t already understand that cruelty is wrong, he won’t discover this by reading the Bible or the Quran – as these books are bursting with celebrations of cruelty, both human and divine.” Firstly, we should ask how he knows that that no one can discover that cruelty is wrong by reading the Bible. Again, and again, he is basing his comments on gross generalizations. He does this again in stating, “Whatever is good in scripture – like the golden rule – can be valued for its ethical wisdom without our believing that it was handed down to us by the creator of the universe.” But it is precisely theistic systems that have brought us the golden rule, which has influenced millions upon millions of people. What has atheism’s moral intuition brought us? “God is dead” just does not seem to be of the same caliber.
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