Morality and God

I'm currently reading a book for our church's small group study by Lee Strobel called The Case for Faith. In the second chapter interviewee, William Craig, argues that God must exist because we have objective moral values - basically the ability to tell right from wrong.

"If God does not exist, then objective moral values do not exist." he says.

I tend to take on the view of an example he gives from philosopher, Michael Ruse, to refute this statement. "Morality is a biological adaptation no less than are hands and feet and teeth." It is "just an aid to survival and reproduction... any deeper meaning is illusory."

I believe it's in our best interest as a species to live in relative harmony if we want to not only survive, but thrive. If we go around attacking, raping or killing one another this will never be achieved. And if someone tried to do this to us or someone we cared about we'd obviously be upset about it. It's basic biological behavior by humans and even less advanced species.

Like humans there are a lot of animals that have to live together in groups. To survive they must learn not only to get along well together, but work together as a unit. Take meerkats for instance. For those of you who don't know, meerkats are small mammals. They are burrowing members of the mongoose family who live in South Africa. They live in large family units in arid areas. To survive they work together to gather food for their young. They post sentries to look out for predators. If they see a hawk they will sound the alarm and everyone will dash for cover. If there is a poisonous snake that's threatening the group they attack it together. And if a member of the meerkat family doesn't follow the rules of the clan they will be banished from the group. Unfortunately that's pretty much a death sentence for the lone meerkat. For it can't survive on it's own trying to gather food safely while avoiding predators.

So, I'd argue it's basic animal instinct for survival that drives them to live in harmony. And I believe we achieved our objective moral values in much the same way. It's a basic survival instinct. Nothing more, nothing less.