In response to Brian's post 'Metaethical Concerns' (5/7/2013):
In his post, Brian mentions the fairly common belief that one must be religious in order to be moral. While he does not agree with this view, he states that it may have a grain of truth, since without an all-powerful authority figure imposing rewards and punishments for good and bad behaviour, why should humans be moral?
To some extent, I can certainly see the point of this argument. The basis of morality may indeed be constructed. Yet statistically speaking, irreligious people are no more likely on an individual basis to commit crimes or act negatively than religious people. On a group or national basis, they are considerably less likely. If religion helps justify morality, why is this so?
I think that there are several reasons. To begin with, not every irreligious person is a critical thinker, and so may not even consider why or why not they should act morally - and since moral behaviour is conducive to the well-being of society as a whole, the 'default' stance is to act morally. Many irreligious people have other systems of ideology, whether political, 'spiritual,' or social, which impose moral systems in a similar manner to religion. I think that only a small percentage of irreligious people look towards philosophy for moral guidance, and of those who do, a number of them probably never investigate metaethics in particular, which is where this problem of basis for morality lies.
The small number who do investigate metaethics, and the smaller number who come to the conclusion that morality rests on a construct, are still more likely to act morally than not. Since humans are social animals, it is programmed into most of us, I think, to act in a way which will contribute to a smoothly functioning society. Therefore, even those people who conclude that they have no objective or exterior reason to act morally will probably act morally anyway. The percentage who do not is so tiny as to not register in large-group statistics.
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