How do Christians resolve the Euthyphro dilemma?
It is common amongst Christians to claim that God's omnibenevolence necessitates the goodness of his actions and commands, a view called "Divine Command Theory". The Euthyphro dilemma is one demonstration of an incompatibility between the perfection of God and his commands. For one, Divine Command theory claims that morality is meaningless unless it is derived from God yet fails to answer who made God moral and whether his moral commands could be considered objective rather than arbitrary. Put in the context of Divine Command Theory, the Euthyphro Dilemma results in two unpalatable conclusions: 1) God is not the greatest, as he must call upon a standard of good greater than himself. 2) God's commands are arbitrary, grounded on his whims, and thus could be commands that we ourselves find morally abhorrent. The first conclusion results in the view that God cannot change what is right and wrong. Killing and stealing are inherently bad, so God, being inherently good, cannot command them. Yet if right and wrong are inherent to the action, regardless of God's decree, then God has nothing to do with the process. God doesn't set moral standards; he follows them, and is therefore only indirectly related to moral commands. The second conclusion shows that God is free to decide what is good, and it is good by virtue of his decree. If this is the case, then God has no higher standard to answer to, and therefore his will may be seen as genuinely arbitrary. Although God once decreed that murder and theft are morally wrong, he might have declared the opposite just as easily, so then murder and theft would be right. How do Christians resolve the Euthyphro dilemma? I asked this question before, but only got nonsensical answers - one that simply said "there is no dilemma", and two that seemed to be answering a very different question without addressing mine.
Euthyphro's Dilemma" for Divine Command Theory is the problem of what determines right and wrong for atheists?
False, it has no meaning for atheists or only a hypothetical meaning.
How can Christians effectively answer the Euthyphro Dilemma?
As either answer proposed in the dilemma proves unsatisfactory, there must be either a synthesis, or a third alternative. I join with those who propose the later.Obviously, if a thing is good because God said it is, there is a certain amount of subjectivity in that description. I belive that God would not steer us wrong, but there is that technical possibility. Also there is the issue of change of mind: if God said X is good, does that mean that NOT X would have been just as good, if only God had said so? Does good and not good have no real quality, other than divine approval? On the other hand, if good and evil are express reality other than endorsement, is God also subject to that reality? Is this reality not therefore more primary than God - since even He is subject to it?The path I find most compelling is that the nature of "good" arises from the character of God, not simply from His endorsement. They are not good because He approves of them, they are good because they are like him.It would then remain to show that God is good. I understand that this is a hurdle for some, but perhaps it will make more sense if we didn't think of "Eric ' God", or the "Christian God" or anything else pre - made. Just in the absract. I have a hard time thinking of evil as anything other than ruined good. It requires good even to be evil, as a shadow needs light, even to be what it is. Evil seems derivative. Good is primary. Thus God, envisioned as THE primary, must be good. Anything like Him would also be good, in proportion to that likeness.
Is the Euthyphro Dilemma the strongest philosophical argument against Christianity?
Because God could do something does not mean that He did. The dilemma assumes that things can only exist as commanded, and never change. The story of creation tells us that God did indeed create good things, but then also gave mankind free will, and did not make impossible for man to depart from that goodness. Man is not a robot, but a person who can make choices. We are in a cosmic play. It has a beginning -- God created -- and an end -- God reconciles. We're in the messy middle, when man's will makes for good or evil outcomes in the things he interacts with. Forgive me. /Orthodox
Does Socrates give an answer to the euthyphro dilemma?
I think he only said he was wise because he knew that he knew nothing.
How do secular moral relativists respond to the Euthyphro dilemma?
What Plato has really done is identify two of Lawrence Kohlberg's stages of moral development. What one believes has directly to do with what stage one is at.It is easiest to see if we slightly recast the question and take the religous aspect out.Is a behavior moral because an authority says it is? Or does an authority have to live up to a set of behaviors to be considered moral?If you believe the first, then you are at a pre-conventional stage of moral development. If you believe the latter, then you are at a post-conventional stage of moral development.Moral relativists tend to be post-conventional as a rule, but they certainly do not have to be. If you believe that morality is defined by authority, but that different groups can have different authorities, thats still moral relativism.
The Euthyphro Dilemma and contemporary philosophy?
It's not really a Dilemma when you consider GOD is nothing but a myth. It is perfectly possible to be a moral,upstanding person and not have a god to believe in.
What was Kant's fundamental dilemma?
What was Kant's fundamental dilemma?This really sounds like a homework question, and if so, I really hope you’re not going to just copy my answer verbatim but understand why I’m saying it.As I understand it, Kant’s fundamental dilemma was as follows:It’s essential to show that minds come into contact with facts about the real world and that we can reason from sensory perception to truth. There is no way to have an effective ethics (beliefs about why certain things are right and wrong), epistemology (beliefs about why certain things are known), or ontology (beliefs about how things actually exist) without this.By Kant’s time, there was lots of reason to think that the mind cannot come into this kind of direct contact with a real world. In particular, David Hume had argued rather convincingly that instances of causal reasoning (ie: “a causes b”) were really instances of inductive reasoning (ie: “it’s been that way before, so it will be again”), which isn’t based on facts about the natural world discovered through reasoning.
How do moral realists respond to the evolutionary Euthyphro dilemma?
The only properly philosophical answer to this question is to suggest that following moral principles means conforming to the true essence of human nature; that being moral means being a fully evolved human. But that will not make sense to anyone who does not understand and accept that the conventional human behavior we see around us does not constitute the true essence of humanity. Someone who believes that the human ideal is the selfish, reactive, animalistic behavior that most of us consider ‘normal’ — who believes that humans should best retreat to primitive primate life, grasping and snuffling after personal gains, and throwing poop at each other whenever we get frightened or frustrated — such a person cannot rise to moral discussion.It doesn’t really matter to me how one conceives this, and it has been conceived in myriad different ways:The Jewish/Christian/Muslim model that imagines a unique human soul that must be idealized and protected and elevatedThe Hindu model, that imagines a godhead we all strive to attainThe Buddhist/daoist model that tries to convince people to release and relax into ‘natural’ behaviorThe model of Liberal philosophy that imagines reason as the ultimate force for constructing a moral worldThe Nietzschean/existentialist/phenomenologist model that looks for moral truth in full individual authenticityThe various developmental approaches of academic psychology that try to outline the correct trajectory of cognitive evolutionThe modern social theoretical approaches that see individuals as enmeshed in social communities, and sees the moral advancement of the individual as synonymous with the moral advancement of the social contextWhatever case you want to choose, the idea that there is a human ideal built into our very nature, and that we have to reach for it and develop it in order to access it. The only real sin (to borrow a term from the Abrahamic faiths) in all of these cases is to fail to reach: to fail to have ideals, or to seek out development, but to collapse into a valueless, meaningless nihilism. The only human sin is to not try to be human. Take it as you will…