Constructivism and Moral Arguments for God: Exploring the Foundations of Moral Truth

Dr. Christian Miller, AC Reid Professor of Philosophy at Wake Forest University, delivers an insightful lecture on the intersections of constructivism and moral arguments for the existence of God. Dr. Miller, whose work is extensively supported by Templeton Grant projects, engages deeply with contemporary ethics and the philosophy of religion, examining the nature of moral truths through the lens of constructivism versus moral realism.

In his exploration, Miller presents a sophisticated discussion on whether moral truths are merely human constructs influenced by societal and individual responses, or if they exist independently of our constructions. This critical analysis is framed around a philosophical dilemma akin to the Euthyphro dilemma in religious ethics, challenging the foundational aspects of how moral truths are determined and their implications for philosophical theology.

The lecture is essential viewing for philosophers interested in the latest debates in metaethics and the philosophy of religion. Miller's nuanced approach not only elucidates the complex dynamics between human cognitive processes and moral normativity but also probes the potential impacts of these theories on classical moral arguments for the existence of God. His presentation is a significant contribution to ongoing philosophical discussions and is poised to stimulate further scholarly dialogue and inquiry.

The Persuasive Power of the Moral Argument (Podcast ft. David Baggett)

Frm the SAFT Podcast:

Ever wondered why we can't find any human who has kept the moral code to the letter? Where do we get the sense of guilt and shame from? And why is it that the most rational thing to do is not the most right thing to do? Wondering how these observations add up? Join us as the world's leading expert on the moral argument walks us through on how to use these realisations about morality to point towards God.

Diving Deep into the Moral Argument with Dr. David Baggett

From Free Thinking Ministries:

Dr. David Baggett is often considered the world's foremost expert on the Moral Argument for God's Existence. Dr. Baggett sits down with Tim to discuss the philosophy, history, and theology of the Moral Argument.

Think About It!

What is theistic moral apologetics, what is its aim, what is its rationale, how does it work, and how does it fit into the broader field of Christian apologetics and metaethics? I take moral apologetics in the following way.

1. Contemporary theistic moral apologetics is a specialized field in the broader field of Christian apologetics that seeks to work within, to draw from and contribute to the broader field of theistic metaethics. Metaethics, broadly considered, is understood to be the critical and comparative theory of various ethical systems. It is theory of theory and is understood as a 2nd order[1] discipline in the field of ethical theory and is a relatively modern development in the field of ethical thinking. Theistic meta-ethics is a God-centered metaethics.

2. Theistic moral apologetics seeks to critically engage non-theistic metaethical thinkers of all persuasions on all fronts at the level of technical philosophy. These thinkers might be historical and/or contemporary thinkers. This engagement typically requires answering standard objections that are often leveled against theistic metaethics as well as developing some version or element of the moral argument for the existence of God in the context of such critical engagement. This would typically be considered a venture in natural theology.

3. Theistic moral apologetics seeks also to critically engage 1st order ethical disputes by making explicit and laying bare the moral and metaphysical assumptions that are often unstated in such disputes and developing a reasoned case for a theistic ethical and metaphysical perspective concerning such disputes if such a reasoned case is relevant.

4. Christian Theistic moral apologetics also seeks to develop a distinctively Trinitarian and Christ-centered metaethical way of understanding things. Such work takes the Christian apologist beyond a generalized theism to a distinctively Christian metaethical theism. This should involve…

   1. Working deliberately from the historical events of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ with the clear understanding that Christianity never reduces to a mere system of morality.

   2. Working deliberately from the revelation of God in the Scriptures.

   3. Engaging and thoroughly thinking through Christian ethical issues and questions that are unique to the believing Christian and Christian community.

   4. Engaging and thoroughly thinking through the various distinctive areas of Christian ethical practice both within the church and within the world in which the church is situated.

These tasks should be undertaken at two distinct but related levels. First, they should be developed at the level of technical philosophy and theology, as required, and secondly, they should be developed at the non-technical lay level. This second level involves taking the complex things of the first level and making them accessible for a lay audience.

Natural Theology and Christian Apologetics 

Natural theology and Christian apologetics are related but nevertheless distinct enterprises.[2] While natural theology arguably reaches all the way back to ancient Greek philosophy[3] and embraces a wider range of theological positions than traditional theism, Christian apologetics must trace its origins and purposes back to the beginnings of the person of Jesus Christ. Apologetics necessarily involves the defense of the veracity of the message and meaning of Jesus and the content of the Christian faith.[4] Theistic moral apologetics, although part of natural theology, is not necessarily distinctively Christian. It can certainly serve as an important step towards a distinctively Christian theism, but it deliberately limits its arguments to Theism proper.

This limit provides certain polemical advantages. As a part of natural theology the argument boasts a wide umbrella and could be endorsed by any theist whatsoever whether they are Jewish, Islamic,[5] even non-religious or non-traditional theists. In this respect the moral argument for God’s existence is broader than Christian theism and can be appropriated by a much larger audience. This makes the argument much more versatile and serviceable across the various areas of philosophy, metaethics, and various other disciplines. As such it can be pitted readily against various versions of atheism. It is versatile in that it can be joined with other arguments for God’s existence to generate a much stronger overall cumulative case for Theism. This also gives the argument a much wider applicability.[6] In any area wherein human moral concerns are central the moral argument for God’s existence is relevant; for example, in the various human sciences, as well as the field of political and economic philosophy. The argument fits well with questions involving the nature and basis for law and justice, or the basis for human rights, or endorsing human dignity, or our understanding of aesthetics and beauty, religious experience, and even engaging in the rough and tumble of the practice of politics and economics as well.

The moral argument, if successful, also fills in a considerable amount of detail concerning who God is and the kind of God the argument might endorse. A too vaguely thin Theism will not suffice for the moral argument. The thicker character and being of God that the argument leads to is strongly relevant to the whole content and nature of the human moral domain in which our lives and experience is immersed. Furthermore, given the intense debates concerning the moral order and the moral nature of humanity, it would be unconscionable that Christian philosophers would not challenge the current various secularist moral systems of our time as well as abandon our duty to guard fidelity, the content of the faith, and the pastoral responsibilities that are a regular and ongoing part of the life of the church in the world.

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[1] The distinction between 1st order and 2nd order moral theorizing is a common but important distinction in metaethics. The focus of a 1st order moral proposition is the question, what is moral? An example of a 1st order ethical/moral/normative truth would be that murder is wrong; it is immoral to murder, it is moral to refrain from murder. 2nd order metaethics focuses on the question of the nature of morality itself; what morality itself is and not particularly on the content of 1st order moral truths. Typically, metaethics concerns questions of moral ontology (the nature of morality), moral epistemology (knowledge of moral truths), moral language (the meaning of moral terms), and a cluster of related questions like the connection between morality and rationality, or morality and motivation.

[2] For useful overviews of the history and concepts of natural theology, see Russell Re Manning, John Hedley Brooke, and Fraser N. Watts, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Natural Theology (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2013); James Brent, “Natural Theology,” Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, n.d., accessed September 11, 2021, https://iep.utm.edu/theo-nat/; Andrew Chignell and Derk Pereboom, “Natural Theology and Natural Religion,” ed. Edward N Zalta, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Stanford, CA, Fall 2020), accessed September 11, 2021, URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2020/entries/natural-theology/>; also see Charles Taliaferro, “The Project of Natural Theology,” in The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology, ed. William Lane Craig and J.P. Moreland (Oxford, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012), 1–23. C. P. Ruloff and Peter Horban, eds., Contemporary Arguments in Natural Theology: God and Rational Belief (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2021).

[3] Werner Jaeger, The Theology of the Early Greek Philosophers: The Gifford Lectures, 1936, trans. Edward S Robinson (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2003/1936).

[4] See Jude 3, where Jude exhorts Christians to “…contend earnestly for the faith once for all handed down to the saints” (NASB). For a good overview of the history of Christian apologetics see Benjamin K. Forrest, Joshua D. Chatraw, and Alister E. McGrath, eds., The History of Apologetics: A Biographical and Methodological Introduction (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Academic, 2020).

[5] Robert R. Reilly, The Closing of the Muslim Mind: How Intellectual Suicide Created the Modern Islamist Crisis (Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2011). Reilly has shown that some of the elements of orthodox Islamic theology make it very difficult to square with a strong moral argument; particularly the tendency of reducing Allah to sheer divine will as well as a tendency, as a result of this, toward  impersonalism.

[6] For a very useful summary overview of the relation of the arguments concerning God and the moral order, see Anne Jeffrey, God and Morality (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2019); Peter Byrne and Stephen Evans, “Moral Arguments for the Existence of God,” ed. Edward N. Zalta, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Stanford, CA: The Metaphysics Research Lab, Spring 2013).

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C. S. Lewis’s Christian Apologetics: Part Three: The Moral Argument (Outline)

Editor's note: Choo has provided a helpful outline of the chapter on C.S. Lewis' moral argument by David Baggett and Erik Wielenberg. If you are interested in the full chapter, you can find the book information here.

Welcome to the Sawdust Trail: Campmeetings and the Moral Argument

Dr. Baggett felt inspired to write this book about a Michigan campmeeting when his mom was sick and in the hospital in Lansing, Michigan about nine months before she died. As he walked the grounds at the Eaton Rapids Campground in Eaton Rapids, Michigan, thinking about her physical decline, he felt nostalgic thinking about his parents’ love of the place and its formative role in his upbringing. The idea occurred to write a history of the 130 year old holiness campmeeting, and now, four years later, the book by him  and his wife, with Joelee Bateman, is done and available for purchase. It’s called At the Bend of the River Grand, and available at, for example, Amazon.com. The price currently listed on Amazon.com is 45 dollars, but that’s going to change to 31.50 very soon. For those acquainted with campmeetings, you’ll appreciate reading the book and may well recognize much of what’s discussed; for those less familiar, we hope the book brings a little bit of campmeeting to you. Before too long we at MoralApologetics.com may feature a Campmeeting writing contest, the winner of which will receive a free copy of the book. If you’re wondering how campmeeting connects with moral apologetics, that will become clear in the course of the interview, but quickly: campmeeting is about both evangelism and living a victorious Christian life. So it touches in a very practical way on what we here at the site call the performative variant of moral apologetics: how by God’s enablement we are made able to live victoriously, finding victory over sin, and, ultimately, being conformed entirely to the image of Christ.

Podcast: Understanding C.S. Lewis' Moral Argument with Dr. David Baggett

On this week's episode, we hear from the co-author of Good God, Dr. David Baggett. Dr. Baggett explains how Lewis' moral argument works, what makes it effective, and the impact it has had on contemporary moral apologetics.

Image: "The Lion, the Witch . . . - geograph.org.uk - 317441" by Albert Bridge. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Lion,_the_Witch_._._._-_geograph.org.uk_-_317441.jpg#/media/File:The_Lion,_the_Witch_._._._-_geograph.org.uk_-_317441.jpg

Podcast: David Baggett on 7 Important Distinctions for the Moral Argument

On this special IHOP (yes, as in "International House of Pancakes!") edition of the podcast, we sit down with David Baggett who helps us understand seven important distinctions to make when articulating and defending the moral argument. There's a lot going on in this podcast, so here is a handy chart from Good God that will help make it more clear:

Argument for God from Moral Intuitions

I think that, if our moral intuitions are to be regarded as true, then God is the best explanation for those moral intuitions being present. Not only that, but I think that the best explanation for those moral intuitions being true is God’s action in our lives. So, the argument would go as follows:

1. If our moral intuitions are true, then God is the best explanation of this fact.

2. Our moral intuitions are true.

3. Therefore, God is the best explanation of this fact.

4. If God is the best explanation of moral intuitions, then He exists.

5. Therefore, God exists.

(3) and (5) are logically entailed conclusions. What do we make of (1)? We should only deny this if we think that while our moral intuitions are true, there is a better explanation. Notice this claim is much more modest than saying that God is the only explanation of moral intuitions being true. All we are claiming is that, for however many explanations there are, God is the best one. Without getting into a lengthy discussion as to what makes a good explanation (though that is surely important here), let’s cover some of the features. First, an explanation needs to fit all the facts. Let’s consider the facts: God’s creating in us a sense of moral knowledge (moral intuition) is certainly possible (it’s not unknown, or even unlikely, for example, that God possesses this power). It also seems likely that God (taken to be the monotheistic God of perfect being theology) would ensure that our moral intuitions are generally reliable. Why would he do that? Simply because an all-good God would want to ensure creatures made in his image generally had the opportunity to do the good (and thus, to be significantly free moral agents). This is not possible if they can’t very well even recognize the good. In a sense, God has told us, via our conscience and moral intuition, what is good and thus what we ought to do.

Second, the explanation needs to be relatively simple. It won’t do, for example, to claim that the best explanation of our moral intuitions being true is seventeen gods—at least not without argument. One God is simple enough (after all, the entire “God-of-the-gaps” charge is based at least secondarily in how simple it is).[1] Competing explanations won’t cover it as well as a theistic one: for instance, it just seems fortuitous that these moral intuitions turn out to be true. For instance, animals don’t need true moral intuitions in order to survive, so the mere postulated fact that evolution occurs and we are here isn’t a sufficient explanation for why we have moral intuitions and they are true. So it seems (1) is a pretty good candidate to keep around.

Perhaps an opponent will then bite the bullet and reject (2). “You’re right,” he may say. “God is the best explanation of moral intuitions being true, but I’ve got news for you: they aren’t.” There are two different objections that can be presented to the second premise. The first objection is to claim that moral intuitions aren’t always true. They’re false sometimes, and, in some cases, plenty of times.[2] But the response back can be two-fold: first, in (1), we just mean generally true, not universally. Second, simply because some intuitions are wrong sometimes, it doesn't follow that they are all suspect.[3]

The next objection is that all moral intuitions about moral facts fail because all moral facts are false. That is to say that there just are no objective moral values or duties, and so any intuitions about this are illusory. Now this is entirely consistent with a naturalistic account of obtaining a sense of objective moral values (or moral intuitions). However, while it is consistent, it is wildly counterintuitive (literally!). Most people cannot shake the feeling that certain things (e.g., racism, homophobia, beating up the elderly, bullying, torturing babies, etc.) really are wrong, and their moral intuitions are not deceiving them. One might suspect that even the objector does not really believe that nothing is really wrong. But then it will follow that God is the best explanation of our moral intuitions being true.

It seems to be an obvious truth of logic to infer that if God is the explanation of moral intuitions being true, then he exists. In any case, I don’t know what it would mean to claim that God is such an explanation, but he doesn’t exist! If that’s the case, we have an epistemic variant of the moral argument for God’s existence that can be used.

[1] Consider, in fact, that people often say that naturalism is sufficient to account for the way the world is, and thus a God is wholly unnecessary—in short, naturalism is a simpler explanation for the way the world is (so the charge goes).

[2] There are a great many people, for example, that claim to intuit homosexual behavior as permissible, whereas many others intuit it as impermissible. One set of intuitions, if this is true, is definitely false (as a whole).

[3] One cannot show a possible area of knowledge to be unreliable just by showing one error (or even a few more): simply because some people reason incorrectly, it wouldn’t follow that no one reasons correctly!

Photo: "Lake Crescent Sunset" by Kevin Dooley. CC License. 

A Sketch of a Moral Argument Cumulative, Abductive, and Teleological

Three features of moral apologetics are particularly powerful means, individually and collectively, to make the case for God’s existence. The first is its cumulative potential. Cumulative case arguments in apologetics typically conjoin arguments like the teleological, cosmological, and historical arguments—or some such combination. Such cumulative cases are great, but here I mean a cumulative moral argument in and of itself. The most common sort of moral argument puts the focus on moral facts like moral values and duties, and perhaps under the penumbra of such concepts fall a constellation and cluster of other important moral dimensions in need of explanation like rights, agency, ascriptions of responsibility, human dignity, an human equality; but in addition to such facts, think also about something like moral knowledge. This expands the focus from metaphysics and ontology to moral epistemology, and thinkers like Mark Linville, Angus Ritchie, J. P. Moreland, and R. Scott Smith have done an admirable job fleshing out this aspect of moral apologetics.

What Kant referred to as “moral faith” broached two other features of morality: whether achieving the life of virtue is possible, and whether, even if it is, it’s consistent with happiness. John Hare puts a great deal of emphasis on these aspects of moral apologetics. The Moral Gap, for example, discusses both; the notion of the “gap” that God enables us to cross is all about our need for moral transformation and, especially, God’s grace and assistance to meet the moral demand, something we can’t do otherwise. The second part of moral faith, pertaining to the ultimate correspondence of happiness and virtue, has to do with nothing less than the ability to believe the moral life is a fully rational enterprise—a solution to what Sidgwick called the dualism of the practical reason. Classical Christian theism impeccably and best sustains both of these aspects of Kantian moral faith, and thus these additional aspects of morality allow for two additional variants of moral apologetics. Put all four parts together—moral facts, moral knowledge, moral transformation, and moral rationality—and the result is a powerful cumulative moral argument for God’s existence.

In addition to being a cumulative case, it’s arguably preferable for numerous reasons to advance an abductive moral argument. An abductive case is an inference to the best explanation. This form of argument need not deny that other alternative explanations of the range of moral facts (just discussed) are entirely deficient with nothing to add to the discussion. Numerous among them may well be able to do some measure of explanatory work. Consider the world in which we live. Especially if theists are right that this is a rich, fertile world imbued with all sorts of value and significance, and populated by creatures made in God’s image and invested with a range of powerful epistemic faculties, theism would predict that the resources of this world will provide powerful insights into its ubiquitous moral features. It would be altogether surprising if it were otherwise. The reason that morality provides evidence for God is not that the world alone can explain nothing about morality, but rather that the world and theism together can provide the considerably better explanation of those realities. An abductive case builds on the common ground shared by believers and unbelievers alike and invites a conversation about what can better explain the full range of moral facts and can explain them robustly, without domesticating them, watering them down, or subtly changing the subject.

My preferred approach to moral apologetics also features a strong recurring theme of teleology. If theism is true, and we have been created for a reason and purpose, we have been imbued and invested with a telos: a goal or aim. This makes excellent sense of the ontology of both goodness and oughtness. God as the ultimate Good, and the one in whose image we have been created, is both the source and goal of our lives and, ultimately, of any goods we enjoy.

Teleology also facilitates the acquisition of moral knowledge. So long as the operative meta-narrative of the human condition is that we’re pushed and pulled around by the ineluctable forces of the material world, we are hard pressed to maintain confidence in our belief-formation processes to reliably track the truth, moral or otherwise. But if God designed us in such a way that our cognitive apparatus puts us in touch with reality and makes real knowledge possible, then we can take the deliverances of our deliberations and reflective processes veridically.

Teleology functions at the foundation of Kantian moral faith as well, bolstering the two variants of moral apologetics resting on its foundation. If God created us for fellowship with him—to love God with all of our hearts and souls and mind and strength, and our neighbor as ourselves—we simply have far better reason to think that total moral transformation is possible. If this world is all there is, and the resources of naturalism exhaust the tools at our disposal, morality seems to stir a desire within us that can’t be satisfied, a thirst that can never be quenched. For this life and world will end without anyone ever having achieved a state of moral perfection. But if Christianity is true, then our desire to be delivered entirely from every last vestige of sinfulness and selfishness is no futile pipe dream, but an intimation of things to come, an echo of eternity, when all is set right, all tears are wiped away, and we will be changed entirely to conform with the One who made it possible. And in that state, if Christianity is true, we will find our deepest joy—when holiness and happiness not merely conjoin or cohere, but kiss and consummate. This was God’s intention and our God-invested telos all along.

So, construct a powerful, patient abductive moral apologetic, wrapped with a robust teleology that encompasses every part of the cumulative case for God’s existence, and you’ve got the makings for a formidable argument indeed—one that can illumine the mind, stir the heart, and move the will.

Photo: "Construction" by A. Levers. CC License. 

Audio Lecture: Four Ways God Best Explains Morality

In this lecture, Dr. Baggett shows how theism provides a better explanation of morality than naturalism.