Atheism verse Theism: who has killed more

This entry inspired by a recent comment I read from a theist who argued that individuals following “atheistic philosophies were responsible for more deaths than any other group in human history”. Obviously he was referring to the millions who have died as a result of communism in the 20^th century. I, of course, reject this notion that there is even such a thing as an “atheistic philosophy"; furthermore I do I consider communism to be synonymous with atheism. For the sake of this discussion, we're going to grant that communism = atheism and make a comparison based solely upon 20^th century statistics.

These are just 20^th Century conflicts involving 150,000+ fatalities (per http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/warstat1.htm ). There are just too many to include conflicts involving less that 150,00 fatalities..

Deaths inflicted by predominately religious nations in the 20^th century

First World War (1914-18): 15 000 000

Congo Free State (1886-1908): 8 000 000

Armenian Massacres (1915-23): 1 500 000

Rwanda and Burundi (1959-95): 1 350 000

Ethiopia (1962-92): 1 400 000

Nigeria (1966-70): 1 000 000

Bangladesh (1971): 1 250 000

Iran-Iraq War (1980-88): 1 000 000

Sudan (1983 et seq.): 1 900 000

Kinshasa Congo (1998 et seq.): 3 800 00

Brazil (1900 et seq.): 500 000

Abyssinian Conquest (1935-41): 400 000

First Indochina War (1945-54): 400 000

Colombia (1946-58): 200 000

India (1947): 500 000

Algeria (1954-62): 537 000

Sudan (1955-72): 500 000

Indonesia (1965-66): 400 000

Uganda, Idi Amin's regime (1972-79): 300 000

Angola (1975-2002): 550 000

East Timor, Conquest by Indonesia (1975-99): 200 000

Lebanon (1975-90): 150 000

Iraq, Saddam Hussein (1979-2003): 300 000

Uganda (1979-86): 300 000

Kurdistan (1980s, 1990s): 300 000

Liberia (1989-97): 150 000

Iraq (1990-): 350 000

Bosnia and Herzegovina (1992-95): 175 000

Somalia (1991 et seq.): 400 000

Zaire (Dem. Rep. Congo), Civil War (1997) 250,000

Total: 43,062,000

Deaths inflicted by predominately communist/socialist/"atheist" factions:

Soviet Union, Stalin's regime (1924-53): 20 000 000

People's Republic of China, Mao Zedong's regime (1949-1975): 40 000 000

Tibet (1950 et seq.): 600 000

Cambodia, Khmer Rouge (1975-1978): 1 650 000

Mozambique (1975-1992): 1 000 000

Russo-Finnish War (1939-1940): 150 000

Romania (1948-89): 150 000

Vietnam, post-war Communist regime (1975 et seq.): 430,000

Cambodian Civil War (1978-91): 225 000

Yugoslavia, Tito's Regime (1944-80): 200 000

Total: 64,405,000

Note: These are the total deaths inflicted by communist regimes upon it's citizenry; includes deaths resulting from disease and starvation. Some estimate that this total is lower than the combined total of Native America's killed in the conquest of the Americas and Africans killed in the slave trade (both inflicted predominately by Christians).

Death's suffered in war's involving both “atheist” and “religious” factions:

Second World War (1937-45): 55 000 000

Russian Civil War (1917-22): 9 000 000

Chinese Civil War (1945-49): 2 500 000

Mexican Revolution (1910-20): 1 000 000

Korean War (1950-53): 2 800 000

Second Indochina War (1960-75): 3 500 000

Afghanistan (1979-2001): 1 800 000

Spanish Civil War (1936-39) 365 00

Greek Civil War (1943-49): 158 000

Total: 76,123,000

Note: The significant majority of these dead were communist killed by predominately religious nations. As it turns out, communist tend to die in far greater numbers than capitalists. Many theists wish to blame 100% of these deaths on communists, but this quite simply isn't justifiable. In many instances, the communists were attempting to overthrow overtly evil tyrannies. Of the WW II deaths, only 10,000,000 were inflicted by the Soviets, many in the act of defending themselves from Nazi aggression; meaning that the remaining 45,000,000 were inflicted by predominately religious nations.

Ultimately the deaths inflicted by conflicts in the 20^th century are pretty evenly divided between predominately religious and communist nations. Without a doubt, communism was a scourge of the 20^th century, though it's understandable why many people sought to replace the tyrannies they lived under with communist regimes...sadly, they often merely replaced one tyranny with another. Of course, it's a total farce to suggest that “practitioners of atheistic philosophies” (still no idea what an “atheistic philosophy” might be) have lead to more deaths than any other group combined. I would argue (and the facts would easily back me on this) that predominately religious nations as a group have massively inflicted far more death in human history than “atheistic philosophies” particularly if the tales of the Old Testament are true...but this is nit picking. Now, the 20^th century enjoyed massively higher populations than did an other century (in fact the majority of human to have ever lived did so during the 20^th century), so it's not surprising to see that the wars fought during that century inflicted far more casualties (in fact the 55,000,000 killed in WWII alone would have been 1/4^th the human population at the time of Jesus). Furthermore, during the twenty century, the devices of war were far more refined and effective...it was just much easier to kill a lot of people in the 20^th than any other time. So in most ways, comparing the war dead of the 20^th century to other centuries is an extremely unbalanced comparison; however even when you do you still find that predominately religious nations killed about as many people as non-religious nations. The main difference is that almost all non-believers view the past actions of communist regimes as despicable while many theists dream of holy wars to come.

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Morality and the bible part one

Ultimately, every aspect of human behavior and morality (even empathy) can be (and have been) explained in purely physiological and psychological terms. Of course this does not mean that there is not a God, but absolutely and undeniably morality would exist with out one. Of course, Christians insist that this is false and that without an intimate knowledge of the holy bible and an abiding fear of the afterlife no human can be consistently and honestly moral. But what can be said of the fact that millions and millions of atheists behave “morally” and do good works without the benefit of a belief in a god and whose behavior can not be attributed to a fear of being eternally tortured by an all loving being? Theists insist that while saintly atheists do in fact exist, their behavior is none-the-less inconsistent with their world view; that they're behavior is in fact influenced by the teaching of Christ and the holy bible whether they know it or not. So...let us consider the possibility of this claim, that the bible is in fact the only true source of knowledge, truth and morality that we have. Is this true? Is the bible in fact our source of our morality? To test this claim, I'll pit our present moral axioms against the teachings and actions found within the bible and determine if we do in fact get our morality from this book.Genocide:According to international law, genocide is defined as: any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part a national, ethical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.Now, to most people, there's nothing to disagree with as this definition and this concept is universal: attempting to destroy an entire culture is wrong regardless the motives. Seriously, who disagrees with this? Well, as it turns out, the god of the bible was not at all adverse to urging his followers to commit acts that would easily fit within the accepted definition of genocide; in fact, he himself on more than one occasion committed the act we know as genocide.In the biblical tale of the Great Flood we have the most famous incident of genocide in history. This atrocity was committed because God was angry with the humans he had created because they were guilty of some unspecified wickedness, and what is it that the god of Christianity does to people when he's angry...he brutally kills them. Of course in this instance he brutally killed what would have been millions of humans, and destroys dozens if not hundreds of cultures. Bizarrely, this act of genocide is held up by most Christians as a superb example of god's love, mercy and justice since the 99.99999% of humans who had displeased god somehow deserved the cruel and unusual punishment that they received (as did what would have been billions of animals) and god did after all opted to spare the tiny tiny faction of one percent of us who did not fill him with hatred and loathing. Sure, some people will argue that maybe god could have handled the situation a little differently and that drowning 20 to 30 millions humans and billions of animals isn't the solution to every problem; but fortunately when it was all over, god apparently figured this out and promised to never drowned everyone again.Sodom and Gomorrah: God's hatred for humanity returns when he decides to destroy the pretend cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Angered by the wicked behavior (read sexual immorality) of the residents of these proud cities, God can no longer suffer their existence and plans to destroy the cities outright. Fortunately, the prophet formerly known as Abram successfully negotiates god into agreeing to spare the few righteous men that might be found in the cities (women are given no such consideration). As a result, God sends two angels disguised as human males into Sodom to investigate the situation Christians claim that this demonstrates god's mercy but in truth merely serves as proof that their god is in fact not omniscient. The angels immediately run into the hero of this tale: the godly Lot. Lot urges the two strange men to spend the night at his house, and eventually they agree. Shortly after arriving at Lot's residence every male in the city, both young and old, show up and literally insist upon having sex with the strangers. Allow me to repeat, every male in the city (this including infants) show up at Lot's house and demanded to have sex with the newly arrived strangers. The authors of this tale make certain to clarify that it was in fact every male in the city (again regardless of age) who demanded to rape the men. This fact allows the authors to justify the slaughter of the children who were to perish in god's fiery wrath since after all they were just as guilty as everyone else. The fact that two year old boys demanding to rape someone is patently absurd seems to be given less consideration that the fact that god needed to seem justified in committing acts of infanticide. Anyway...Lot, being the good father that he was, tosses his two daughters to the crowd and urges the crowd to rape them rather than the two men that he had met just minutes prior. Ultimately, this incident is all the evidence that God needs and he decides to destroy the two cities post haste (Lot is allowed to flee his fiery wrath). Apparently Sodom was so evil that god felt justified in reneging on his promise to search Gomorrah for a righteous man and he destroyed it as well simply because of it's proximity to Sodom. The cities were destroyed in a hail of fire and brimstone and sadly Lot's wife made the horrible mistake of looking back and was turned into a pillar of salt...this is a sin which for some reason failed to make the 10 commandments (Thou shalt not look as god doth commit genocide). Later in the tale, Lot's daughters (who had to be still dealing with the trauma of being offered up for rape by their father) they trick dad into getting them pregnant (?). Amazingly, these are the people god opted to save.The Amalekites: Next on the list for extermination were the Amalekites, whom God hated. Apparently as the Israelites were making their exodus from Egypt to the holy land, a band of Amalekites attacked a group of Israelis who happened to be lagging behind the main group. Naturally, god felt that genocide would be the only proper response. After a very lengthy series of military campaigns (one in which Moses was for some inexplicable reason obligated to hold his staff above his head) King David was eventually able to fulfill god's demand to and I quote “kill both man and woman, and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey”. (1 Sam 15:2-3). Interestingly, King David became the King of the Israelites because his predecessor King Saul hesitated to enact god's will with a satisfactory level of brutality and he was thus relieved of his rank (which is unfair as he did “put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys”). Unfortunately for Saul, he foolishly opted to spare the Amalekite king and some of their healthier cattle and sheep, and this failure horribly grieved god who at the time had no taste for acts of mercy and was not about to make an exception here. Saul, for his failure to sacrifice every animal to god in a burnt offering (which god doth delight in) was removed from his position as King of Israel. Christians are of course content with God genocidal verdict as the Amalekites did, after all, attack the afore mentioned straggling Israelis; obviously no other solution was acceptable in this situation...all of their women and children had to be killed.The Mideans: The Israeli treatment of the Mideans was particularly sick and tragic, as it was the Mideans who took Moses in when he originally fled from Egypt. Moses, who left Egypt after he killed an Egyptian guard, lived amongst the Mideans for 40 years. It was there that he met his wife and raised his children and was treated as an equal by the Mideans. It was also there that he met the Midean volcano god Jahveh (Yahweh) and under it's direction he conspired to free the Hebrews from their enslavement within Egypt. During the Israeli sojourn amidst the Midians, god inflicts upon the Israelis a plague as punishment for their association with the sexually immoral Midanites. God then instructs Moses to take vengeance upon the Midianites for the plague which god himself inflicted upon the Israelis. Moses in response summons an army made up of 1000 warriors from each of the twelve tribes and they descend upon the unsuspecting Midianites. They fought against Midian and killed every adult male and this anger god greatly; but it was not the ruthlessness of their attacks that angered him. Yahweh was infuriated by the fact that there were Midian children and women who still lived. He then instructed Moses to give his generals a furious tongue lashing: "Have you allowed all the women to live?" Moses asked them. "They were the ones who followed Balaam's advice and were the means of turning the Israelites away from the LORD in what happened at Peor, so that a plague struck the LORD's people. Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man”. (Numbers 31:15-18). One can not help but wonder how much worse was the eventual fate of the girls who were spared that day.Amazingly, later in the bible the Midians seem to have shook off their extermination and returned to further bedevil the Israelites in the book of Judges. There, under the leadership of Gideon, 300 Israelis slaughtered 120,000 enemy soldiers (which coincidentally is the estimated population of the entire region at the time), 15,000 of which were slaughtered personally by Gideon after they had surrendered. For some reason, to accomplish this slaughter, god required the Israelites to blow horns and smash pottery which seems to have been the source of god's destructive power.The City of Jericho: The destruction of the city of Jericho was probably the single most unjustifiable act of genocide in recorded human history, as god did not even bother to accuse the residents of Jericho of sexual immorality or a crime of any variety. The residents of Jericho had done nothing to the Israelites and were peacefully minding their own business behind the walls of their proud city. Jericho's sin was to have had the misfortune of having been in the path of the Israeli horde as it traveled toward it's promised land, and for that sin death was the only response. To accomplish this destruction, god instructed Joshua to: “March around the city once with all the armed men. Do this for six days. Have seven priests carry trumpets of rams' horns in front of the ark. On the seventh day, march around the city seven times, with the priests blowing the trumpets. When you hear them sound a long blast on the trumpets, have all the people give a loud shout; then the wall of the city will collapse and the people will go up, every man straight in." For some reason blowing horns is again a prerequisite to genocide in the bible. Once the walls of Jericho went down, the Israelis poured in and “They devoted the city to the LORD and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it—men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys”. The entire city was sacked and everything within destroyed or killed. As was typically the case, the servants of the Lord showed no mercy and the Lord was pleased.The flood of Noah, Sodom and Gomorrah, the Amalekites, the Midians, Jericho; these are just some of the example of genocide committed at the insistence of the god of the bible. Thankfully our modern attitudes towards genocide do not come from this book, and this is just one example of a justification for evil found in the bible. Most Christians desperately seek to justify the slaughter of entire cultures by claiming that the victims were somehow deserving of their fate, even (if not particularly) their women and children; this while at the same time abhorring genocide themselves. In fact, despite their hesitance to admit that their god was in fact wrong to order these barbaric attacks, I dare say that you could not find more than a handful of Christians among western culture who themselves would agree that genocide is even just occasionally acceptable. No...now days, with the exception of the most truly demented of their numbers, western Christians would be as vigorously opposed to genocide as any other sociological category; none-the-less, it cannot and must not be claimed that this attitude can be found anywhere within the bible and without exception Christians who do rightfully oppose genocide do so despite of what the bible has to say on the topic. Sadly, both the Christians and particularly the Jews would become very intimately familiar with religiously justified persecution and violence in later centuries.Let's take the matter a little further shall we. Let examine one of these actions in light of the Roman Catholic doctrine of a just war. Well respected and considered a moral imperative by many (theists and non-theists alike) the Just War Doctrine defines the conditions under which a war can rightfully be declare and prosecuted. Now according to this doctrine (and according to the Wikipedia entry of the Just War Doctrine), an entity (normally a state but for our purposes and god) must meet the following conditions before taking belligerent action:I. Just cause: The reason for going to war needs to be just and cannot therefore be solely for recapturing things taken or punishing people who have done wrong; innocent life must be in imminent danger and intervention must be to protect life.II. Comparative Justice: While there may be rights and wrongs on all sides of a conflict, to override the presumption against the use of force, the injustice suffered by one party must significantly outweigh that suffered by the other.III. Legitimate authority: Only duly constituted public authorities may wage war.IV. Right intention. Force may be used only in a truly just cause and solely for that purpose—correcting a suffered wrong is considered a right intention, while material gain or maintaining economies is not.V. Probability of success: Arms may not be used in a futile cause or in a case where disproportionate measures are required to achieve success.VI. Last resort: Force may be used only after all peaceful and viable alternatives have been seriously tried and exhausted or are clearly not practical.VII. Proportionality: The anticipated benefits of waging a war must be proportionate to its expected evils or harms.Now before comparing these criteria against god's actions, we are going to assume that god meets criterion 3 and 4. In other words, we'll assume that god is a legitimate authority and possessed a rightful intention. Now, with the remaining 5 criteria, let's examine whether god met the current Christian notion of a just war when causing the Great Flood.The Great Flood:I. Just Cause. The principle of just cause clearly indicates that hostile action cannot be justified by the desire to punish people who have done wrong, which was clearly god's motivation for having committed this act. Many Christians will argue that it was not god's desire to inflict harm or to punish, but rather he sought to correct an error that he had made when he created us. The humans (and apparently the animals as well) that god had created were wicked and god was really hoping for non-wicked humans when he made us; the flood was merely god's method of eliminating this embarrassing error. While one cannot argue with the fact that a god who created the universe and everything contained within would certainly have the prerogative to undo what he had done; one can certainly argue with the method he opted to use to carry out this act when one considers the options he had at his disposal. The fact that god opted to drowned hundreds of millions of humans and animals when he could have eliminated them in a pain and terror free manner serves as a pretty clear indication as to god's true intentions. The act was intended to punish the objects of his failed design, and thus god has failed to meet this particular criteria when he opted to make use of an unnecessary level of brutality as no amount of brutality was even necessary to carry out his desire to eliminate life on the planet. In addition to having failed to meet the criteria regarding the motive for resorting to mass acts of violence, god also failed to abide by the mandate that violent intervention be necessary to protect innocent life. Clearly this was not the case as not only were no innocent lives at risk if god failed to take this action, he undeniably killed countless children who are universally considered to be innocent (and no telling how many pregnant women were killed in the flood).II. Comparative justice. The principle of comparative justice mandates that the injustice being suffered by the party contemplating the use of violence must outweigh the the harm that one must inflict to put an end to said injustice. Again, god comes nowhere near meeting this standard as he personally was not being harmed or affected in any manner by the actions of the humans and animals he opted to brutally kill.V. Probability of Success. Hostile action cannot be taken unless the violence has a realistic probability of success. A nation cannot even opt to defend itself from an invading force unless there is a legitimate chance that such actions are not in vain. While one would assume that an all-powerful god would be successful in any endeavor it undertook, god none-the-less laments after the flood waters had receded that his efforts had in fact failed; and that humanity (the few of us that remained) was still wicked, and inherently so. Interestingly, two paragraphs after admitting this, god reaffirms that he made man in his own image. One does not need to be Sherlock Holmes to deduce what this implies about god's nature. Ultimately, god's purpose for this act was, in addition to causing pain and suffering, the elimination of human wickedness; an omniscient god would have been that his efforts would met with failure. Just another criteria god has failed to meet.VI. Last Resort. As the name of the principle implies, hostile action must be avoided until all legitimate efforts to avoid violence have been exhausted. As god is described as having made no attempts to resolve the situation peacefully, one must concluded that god failed to meet this criteria as well. Now one might ask just what is it that god could have done to resolve the matter peacefully? Now being omnipotent and omniscient, one should assume that god did in fact have some methods at his disposal. Being neither omnipotent nor omniscient myself, I can personally think of at least one thing he could have done: instead of slaying all living breathing creatures right off the bat, god could have made an effort to communicate to us his expectations. Instead, humanity was left to ponder just what it had done to deserve it's fate as the species disappeared beneath a planet consuming flood. There is no indication made within the bible that god made any effort to educate our ancestors as to his expectations; nor is there any reason to believe that the victims of this cruel act had any reason to believe that they somehow deserved their fate.VII. Proportionality. I personally cannot find any significant difference between this principle and principle number 2. The comments I made there apply equally here.You'll find, I sure, that none of the afore discussed acts of genocide fare any better under the Just War Doctrine than did the Great Flood as each are completely unjustifiable in light of todays accepted attitudes on genocide and the justification for acts of violence.

origins of morality

To most theists, Christians in particular, the notion that humanity could exist under the aegis of a moral code that did not originate in their god is utterly inconceivable. Without a code of behavior defined by their god, by what means could we possess a moral standard; how could concepts of good or evil possible be known to any of us in a universe that is void a higher power? Of course, this attitude exists under two very false assumptions: A) That a code of morality requires an objective predefined source; and B) A god can be trusted to develop a code of behavior that has our (not his) interests at heart. Now, in case A, they have a point...not necessarily a good point, but a point none-the-less...where does morality come from if not a god? We'll in a sense, our morality does have an objectiveness to it; that being the human condition...we're all human, we all share a a large number of things in common and a basic realization that in order to achieve even our most minimal desires we have play by the rules that will get us there. Now, if we could achieve our goals by killing, robbing and raping everyone we come across, then perhaps that's how we'll behave; but of course a species that incessantly preys upon itself can only go so far in a Darwinian sense. In truth, there is within the majority of the members of our species an intrinsic abhorrence of chaos, wanton violence and what we would call anti-social behavior in general. The Christians assert that this innate avoidance of disorder and selfishness could only come from god; but they make this claim despite the obvious fact that this innate “mortality” can and does come about via evolutionary mechanisms. Again, a species that preys upon itself has a greatly reduced chance to survive as a whole and a species that can act collaboratively and act in unison to meet it's goals and overcome its challenges; a species that can do this increases it's odds of surviving exponentially. This is achieved to a large extent via our emotions, which are nothing more than bio-chemical reactions to certain stimuli. Love, pride, jealousy, remorse, fear even altruism and empathy combined with our natural maternal and paternal instincts are again nothing but bio-chemical responses to stimuli which at one time or the other had and still have an effect upon our our survivability as individuals and as a species. This is a biological fact, our emotional urges are physical rather than spiritual in nature; now, maybe a god gave us these urges (along with virtually every other mammal on the planet), but the existence of a god is not necessary to explain why we have them; however what is easy to see is just how maternal and paternal instincts as well as our emotions can be and are the foundations upon which our morality is based. Maternal and paternal instincts can lead one to have what would otherwise be an irrational attachment and concern for another members of one's species (specifically one's child). Fear of death and injury can lead one to form partnerships with others who share their circumstance and characteristics;with the understanding that existing in unison with one's clan or tribe can greatly increase both their and their child's chances of survival. Individual acts of altruism and heroism can lead to the strengthening of the species as a whole in manners which should be obvious to us all. Guilt can make us hesitant to do harm to fellow members of our species even when we would benefit as an individual but the species would suffer as a whole. I could go on. These are all, known bio-chemical realities and while one may insist upon attributing their existence to a god; god is a none-the-less unnecessary inclusion as their existence can be explained without a single mention of a first cause (i.e. a god). Now, precisely how these emotions actually developed is and will remain a mystery as there is no means by which the circumstance behind their origin can be recreated; however science can tell us just how they could have developed. Each of these bio-chemical reactions drove our forbearers to exist in unison in a world where death and dismemberment was a day to day reality; aided by our intellect humanity slowly evolved a code of what is considered acceptable behavior...a code which appears to have at it's heart the survival of our particular individual sociological groups (from family to village to nation to species). In truth, our behavior is probably effected as much by our intellect as our emotions. Virtually every conscious creature on the planet shares with us to varying degrees the same emotions that we feel (even altruism studies have shown); however none of these other species can be said to have as elaborate sense of morality as does ours. Most of the other inhabitants of the planet seem to base their actions largely upon instinctive responses to stimuli (although it's wholly inaccurate to think that cognition plays no role in their behavior); whereas, our behavior seems to be effected as much by our intellect as any other factor...why is this? Even as emotional responses played a key role in our survival as a species (particularly early on); they are at the same time limiting when they control us. One of the factors that can be said to separate humans from the animals is our ability to overcome our emotions. For good or bad we can elevate ourselves above the base emotions that we share with nearly each of our fellow mammal brothers and sisters. It's the ability to, in a sense, define our response to a situation rather than to allow the situation to define us. It is true that among multi-celled organisms on this planet, humanity has achieved supremacy. This supremacy is the direct result of the intellectual capabilities that our brain provides us, which is in turn the direct result of eons of evolution. The more complicated and capable the brain of a species is, the more complicated and extravagant it's desires become. Lower species seek only to consume, reproduce and survive, that's all they know and that's all the care about. The more complicated the brain, the more complicated the desires. A dog will seek to consume and reproduce, but will also seek to develop emotional bonds with others; sometimes they are very deep bonds. Dogs will also seek to be entertained. Humans whose brains are far more developed than a dog's will also seek these things, but will also have other intellectual pursuits when given the chance. Humans will attempt to answer questions that a dog could never even conceive of and to seek knowledge that a dog would have no interest in. Maslow does an excellent job of describing what drives the average human (individual and society) and under what circumstances a human will elevate what he perceives he has need of. Morality is the behavior that we perceive can place humanity in a position where it can pursue those needs, whether real or perceived. To one extent, whether morality affects our survivability as a species or not is somewhat irrelevant, but rather it's a consequence of our development as a species. Morality is the consensus as to what will and will not make our existence here on earth as close to pleasant as possible. We know that we don't like to be killed, so we make rules against it; we know that we don't like to be tortured so we make rules against it; we know that we don't like to be enslaved so we make rules against it. Selfishly we know that while the rules prohibit us from acting upon our every whim (if said whims involve doing harm to others) they also protect us from being the target of the whims of others; however, sometimes we selfishly protect only whose who share our characteristics (e.g. race, religion, gender, economic status, nationality) and sometimes we make the enlightened decision to protect everyone equally. Sadly, sometimes we have no say in the matter as our code of morality can be hijacked by dictatorships, religious beliefs and occasionally a constitution based law systems. Of course, some people may not care about protecting others but will at the same time understand that living within the bounds of the moral consensus is their best chance of living a happy and fulfilling life as the punishment associated with refusing will often exceed the reward. Intellect or cognition is essentially the ability to recognize the relationship between cause an effect, and while sociopaths may lack the ability to care about the impact their actions have upon others they none-the-less understand that indiscriminate acts of violence will eventually have consequence that even a sociopath would likely prefer to avoid. As a consequence a sociopath will likely curb his behavior to reflect, at least publicly, his compliance with the social mores of his particular culture. Now, some people will correctly point out that a secular based moral consensus is not consistent with anything other than the current perceptions and attitudes of society, but at the same time somethings will never change. Humans do not like being killed, tortured, disrespected, robbed...etc.; and to that extent our morality will possess a certain degree of consistency as it will likely reflect these truths. Now in a perfect world we would all be able to live our lives according to how we each see fit, and if the theist's notion that we all have an innate knowledge of right and wrong given to us by a god were true this might be a possibility. Clearly this is not the case as the majority of our urges do not fit the traditional Christian notion of righteousness. It’s a known fact that most humans (particularly males of our species) routinely experience lustful urges to engage in carnal acts with the immediate objects of our desires, and these urges give no consideration to the “morality” of their existence or to whether or not the object of our desires is our spouse. Christian theologians have acknowledged early on our “evil” and innate lusts. In fact, look at all of the seven deadly sins, they each stems from our innate tendency to offend the god of Abraham; our internal tendency to fall short of what their god demands of us. There is literally zero evidence that we have a natural knowledge of how the god of Christianity wishes us to behave or that this knowledge somehow exists in our subconscious. As is usually the case with theists, in the absence of a precises explanation as to how something could exist (in this case morality) the assumption is always that god did it. Humans have always had a need to explain the inexplicable, and in the absence of a coherent alternative explanation it can be understood why god has always been the default. From “where do babies come from” to “what is lightening” humans have never been content to admit that they just didn't know the answer. In the past god has been the answer to every question, up until the point that a plausible alternative explanation has come to light. Now, as science continues to find an explanation for everything, god is found to be no longer needed to explain anything; and in a sense, the second Darwin explained the origins of species, god died. Well, at the very least, with Darwin god's existence became superfluous.Anyway, back to morality. As well all know, frequently while in the pursuit of one's desires an individuals actions (whether intentional or not) may come to interfere with another's ability to live their life in peace. A moral consensus must be developed in such situations to determine who's “rights” would take precedence. Also, there are times when a consensus must be developed when it becomes clear (or at least perceived) that a behavior which once seemed acceptable turns out to have consequences that were not originally considered. For example, violent movies. Originally, many people thought that what goes on in the privacy of one's home is nobody else's business; but what if it turns out that allowing children to watch violent movies makes them more prone towards violence when they grow up? In such a situation, a consensus could develop that such media should be strictly limited to adults or banned all together. The same thing could also happen even if in reality these forms of media had no real effect on a person's disposition towards violence at all. Sometimes a moral consensus is based on nothing more than perception.Ultimately, there are countless things that effect a communities morality; primary among these factors is where the community as a whole lies within Maslow's hierarchy. Essentially the more evolved a species' intellect is, the greater the desire of each member of the species will be to exist in an orderly and peaceful environment...and the greater it's intellect the more likely it is to figure out how to accomplish this. Morality which is the means towards that end is naught but our understanding of how we wish to live and how best to achieve that goal. Morality has nothing to do with intrinsic goods and evils. Our intellect is the result of our evolution and our morality is the result of our intellect in combination with the previously mentioned autonomous bio-chemical reactions (Freud does an excellent job of explaining this relationship in his concept of the personality (Id, ego and super-ego) which he himself based upon the Platonic concept of the soul (intellect, spirit and appetite)). If somewhere in this universe there is a species with a greater intellect than our own (not too hard to imagine) then it may have developed a better understanding of how to exist in peace and harmony; and thus one could argue that they were morally superior to ourselves. Whether that species exists or not...who knows. Of course we don't consciously make decisions based on whether or not it fits the Darwinian definition of survivability. In fact, for good or bad, I believe that the evolution of our intellect has allowed our species to move to the point where each of our actions are no longer carefully balanced instinctive and emotional responses. I differ from the majority of evolutionist in that I do not assume that every aspect of our morality is a direct result of Darwinian causality. I believe that while evolution has lead us to our current level of intellectual development; we now make decisions that go beyond the mere survival of our species. We are often inspired to act in manners that are not directed solely by our urges to gather food and reproduce. For good or bad, human intellect has risen above the meager concerns of our pre-human ancestors; in a sense we motivate ourselves. While our actions are none-the-less the result of strict determinism, the factors that influence our actions are so elaborate and incalculable and so specific to each individual that we do in fact have de facto free will. We make decisions based upon our flawed understanding of how they will benefit us and our loved ones. However, merely because our behavior seems to be influenced at times by factors no longer directly connected to evolutionary mechanics it does not mean that that those mechanics are no longer present. Evolution is always a work in progress, and never could it be said that a species has completed it's evolution. It is just a series of beneficial accidents that currently can be neither predicted nor controlled. Furthermore, evolution is not a process that leads to our “perfection” as a species; evolution is a process that is driven by our ability to sexual propagate and to the extent that our intellect enhances this likelihood we can expect our intellect to continue to evolve. Should our intellect eventually become a detriment to this process (as in some regards it appears to be) our intellect will then begin to recede and our sense of sense of morality would be effected as a result.Our present level of intellect gives us the ability to strive towards the reality we perceive as best suiting our needs, but it is not necessarily sufficient to accomplish this reality. Our efforts are still limited by many things, not the least of which are the limits of our intellect. Superstitions (religion, faith) and emotions (hatred, racism, love, fear) still control many of our decisions and cloud our perceptions of reality. Environment (both political and physical), and access to resources (food,water, fuel) also play a significant roles in our abilities to exist as we would choose. What we value is not intrinsic but rather subjective and based upon our needs both real and perceived. Obviously a man who is locked in a cell may be less concerned about his right to vote than his own physical freedom. Once freed that same man may willing re-enter that same cell if it means he'll have access to food and water if otherwise he did not. Our values are as much based upon our circumstances in this world as any other factor. But again since we all have things in common, we should expect to all have a certain number of similar values. Again, most of us a fear of death, no sane person like pain, etc. Those realities are going to influence the moral consensus of all societies to one extent or the other.