10/21/2008

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

The Euthyphro Dilemma
x is wrong =df God forbids x

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The Euthyphro Dilemma

I spend only one

Horn 1:
paragraph on Horn 1
God commands x because x is already good (right, because it is so
pious, etc.) obvious!

Horn 2:
x is good (right, pious, etc.) simply because God
commands x

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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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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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: The Euthyphro Dilemma:

Consequences of Horn 1 Consequences of Horn 1
Suppose (Horn 1): Suppose (Horn 1):
God commands x because x is already good (right, God commands x because x is already good (right,
pious, etc.) pious, etc.)
Then: Then:
• Objective moral values already exist and so are • Objective moral values already exist and so are
independent of God: independent of God
• Epistemologically: We can come to know OMVs • God is not in control of everything and thus cannot be
even if God does not exist! Sovereign

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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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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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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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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.

My point is that if you

I spend several try to avoid atheism by
pages on Horn 2. 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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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!

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My very important
contribution to ethics was
my study, Principia Ethica
(1903).

G. E. Moore
(1873 – 1958)

I gave what I called the “Open

Question” argument in
Principia Ethica to show that
the word “good” is indefinable.

Now note that the question

“This is pleasure, but is this good?”

Here’s the idea. is a perfectly sensible question to

ask, whereas the question
Suppose someone says that the
word “good” has the same meaning “This is good, but is this good?”
as the word “pleasure”.
makes no sense to ask at all!

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But if “good” has the same meaning

In other words, the question as “pleasure”, then the question
“This is pleasure, but is this good?” “This is pleasure, but is this good?”
is an open question, whereas the has the same meaning as the question
question
“This is good, but is this good?”
“This is good, but is this good?”
But this is impossible, since the first
is not! 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 We can now generalize this

“good” does not have the argument to any other term
same meaning as “pleasure”. “X” that is alleged to have the
same meaning as “good”!

But if “good” has the same meaning

Thus “good” cannot have the same
as “X”, then the question
meaning as “what God commands”
since the question
“This is X, but is this good?”
“This is what God commands, but is
has the same meaning as the question
this good?”
“This is good, but is this good?”
does not have the same meaning as
the question
But, again, this is impossible, since
the first question is an open question
“This is good, but is this good?”
whereas the second question is not!

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