The moral world is something that humanity has been trying to find the universal truth about for millennia. Some truths are universally agreed on, such as "it is wrong to kill except in self defense." The problem is that the moral law cannot be entirely discovered through experimentation, as the physical laws, nor through contemplation alone as evidenced by the wide range of traditions around the world defining for themselves what is right and what is wrong.
This "moral" law is what I was referring to actually as being "subjective." I think you'll agree with me when I say that our sense of moral compass is factored by our upbringing within our culture. Like wise, when you look at religions, the moral compass that is prescribed within the texts of ancient books vary from religion to religion.
In fact the example you gave as being universal: "It's wrong to kill people" is even agreed upon within tribes and cultures that do no believe in god, or perhaps believe in many gods. There are some commonalities that exists within our moral structures that is shared by many cultures. Why so? Well, it's not really because of god. Science has an explanation of this as well; evolution explains this very clearly.
Let's break down that universal law: It's wrong to kill people. Why would it be wrong to kill someone? Well our ancestors were tribes of hunters and gathers. Survival depended upon cooperation of every tribe male and female. We were a close knit group. Thus killing someone meant great danger for this small society as the whole group worked together to help one another. Thus evolutionary psychology explains very well as to why a lot of our moral compass is shared by not only many cultures of today, but also from many centuries ago. Long before even Abraham himself walked into the scene.
Now those are just basic moral things we all share. In fact if you take a look at the ten commandments, it's no different than what some of the hunter and gatherer tribes of the Amazon jungle today abide by. Moses certainly never gave them a visit, and yet their basic moral values reflect that of the ten commandments. This why I'm not very impressed when I read the ten commandments. Sure, they give instructions for having a "moral" society, but that's not something special that it NEEDS to be coming from a god or gods. Humans are very very capable of prescribing such laws themselves.
Thus, if God exists, and if He wants us to do things and to stay away from things, He must tell us. He certainly did. Many times. He selected people who were role models of morality and integrity and revealed to them the truth about Him, in scriptures, and commanded them to convey His message to people, which they faithfully did, may peace be upon them.
You know, this bit represents the Euthyphro dilemma:
Is a conduct moral because it's commanded by god, or is it commanded by god because it's moral?
Allow me to answer that bit of your argument with this video a friend of mine made. I believe his argument applies to the Islamic belief as well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UvnxGTOG0c&feature=channel_page
Not quite. It means that one is strongly convinced of it in one's heart and mind. The Quran defines three plateaus of certainty: Knowledge of certainty (Ilm-ul Yaqeen), sight of certainty (`Ayn-ul Yaqeen) and truth of certainty (Haqq-ul Yaqeen). The latter two will only happen in the hereafter! Thus, all we can achieve in this life is knowledge of certainty. And we would never have reached that level had God not sent down His scripture.
So in other words, blind faith...
That is one of the things the Quran calls Al-Ghayb, the hidden things or things that are beyond our senses or comprehension. We know from human history that many things were incomprehensible to us which currently are well understood. We also know that many things were beyond our senses until we developed tools to sense them. Thus, it stands to reason that there may be things out there which will always be beyond our senses or comprehension. Since some of these things are questions that constantly bother us, such as "what happens after we die?", God in His mercy has answered that question for us because we cannot possibly find the answer on our own.
Actually no. That just goes back to what I originally said. All religions has a satisfying answer for what happens after we die, thus a religion can't really be a religion unless it provides a satisfactory answer to that question. Islam is no different.
You're right though when you say that we have found answers to questions that were incomprehensible before. Science has given us that gift. Science is the reason why we don't attach the phenomenon of a lightning storm as the anger of Zeus.
But still, there are things that we do not yet know, but doesn't mean we wont ever know them. Perhaps not in the life time of you and I, but how can we know for sure we won't ever know them? The best answer to give in my honest opinion when someone asks me what happens after we die is simply "I don't know." I don't know what happens after we die. If I had to guess, it's a lot like how it was before I was born because it's the closest explanation I have. And yet, I won't say for certainty that I do know for sure.
You can apply this logic to questions such as "How come we exist?", "Why are natural laws so consistent?", "Why are so many things in nature so beautiful?"
I'm not sure what you're getting at here. I think you may have misunderstood my original quote. By basic assumptions I meant that we all have to assume that we exist, the universe exists, and all the functions of the universe exists.
The problem with this basis is that thought is not entirely reliable. Our thought process is affected by many factors, such as upbringing, peer pressure, the environment, education, and even nutrition. Therefore, while thought is very important, it isn't sufficient. Science is more reliable but it too is insufficient because its domain is the physical world only. Something else is needed to explain the moral and spiritual worlds which we all feel but cannot prove.
You're right, science's domain is the physical world, but as I said before, that's all we have to say and can all agree that it exists. The physical world is something we all have to make an assumption about since we can all sense it within in some context of our physical senses. Any other "feeling" that one may propose is the evidence of a spiritual world, is in my opinion dives into imagination. Not that I'm declaring spirituality isn't important. There is no denying that prayer and other forms of meditation doesn't have a profound benefit for our brains, but it's silly for someone to declare they know a spiritual world is part of reality because they themselves have felt it. What you call spirituality and what you feel as being spiritual is no different than the same feeling a Hindu or a Buddhists feels when they meditate. Like wise, it's doesn't make their religion any less false because they have failed to provide adequate evidence that all can agree on. Science is then the only reliable thing we have for studying something that which ALL OF US can agree exists.
Thank you for your well thought out response by the way
to this great Forum, The Skeptic. Enjoy your stay here! 