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WillowOne's Positions

Euthyphro dilemma

"Is the pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it is loved by the gods?"
- Plato, Euthyphro (c. 380 BC), 10a

Overview

The Euthyphro dilemma is the question Socrates puts to Euthyphro, restated for monotheism: is something good because God commands it, or does God command it because it is good?

  • If the first, morality is arbitrary. Had God commanded cruelty, cruelty would be good, and "God is good" means only "God is God".
  • If the second, goodness is independent of God, and God is at most a reliable reporter of it. The theist's claim that morality requires God is then false.

Notes

  • The standard apologetic reply (William Lane Craig) is that goodness is grounded in God's nature rather than his commands. This relocates the dilemma rather than escaping it: is God's nature good because it is God's, or because it meets some standard of goodness? The same two horns reappear.
  • The dilemma is the main reason I reject the first premise of the moral argument. Even if objective moral values existed, a god would not be a satisfactory ground for them.
  • It also bears on the claim that without God one cannot condemn atrocity. If the condemnation depends on God's say-so, it is only as secure as the say-so; if it does not, the atheist has it too.

Also see