This is by Matt from Well Spent Journey blog.
Excerpt:
Here’s a thought experiment.
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Imagine that you’re a healthy, athletic, 20-year-old male. It’s the morning after a thunderstorm, and you’re standing on the banks of a flooded, violently churning river.
You notice an object floating downstream.
As it moves closer, you suddenly realize that this object is a person. The head breaks the surface, and you see a panic-stricken elderly woman gasping for air. You’ve never met her before, but vaguely recognize her as an impoverished widow from a neighboring village.
You look around for help, but there’s no one in sight. You have only seconds to decide whether or not to jump in after her – recognizing that doing so will put your own life in significant peril.
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Is it rational for you to risk your life to save this stranger? Is it morally good to do so?
For the Christian, both of these questions can be answered with an emphatic “yes”.
The Christian is called to emulate the example set forth by Jesus, who not only risked, but sacrificed his life for the sake of others. The Christian believes that the soul is eternal, and that one’s existence doesn’t come to an abrupt end with death. Additionally, he can point to the examples of countless Christian martyrs who have willingly sacrificed their own lives.
For the secular humanist, the answers to these questions are much more subjective. When I previously asked 23 self-identifying atheists, “Is it rational for you to risk your life to save a stranger?” only 4 of them responded with an unqualified “yes”.
Biologically speaking, the young man in our scenario has nothing to gain by jumping after the drowning woman. Since she’s poor and elderly, there are no conceivable financial or reproductive advantages involved. Evolutionary biologists often speak of “benefit to the tribe” as a motivation for self-sacrifice…yet the young man’s community would certainly place greater practical value on his life than that of a widow from a neighboring village.
Secular humanists argue that people are capable of making ethical decisions without any deity to serve as Moral Lawgiver. On a day-to-day basis, this is undeniably true. We all have non-religious friends and neighbors who live extremely moral and admirable lives.
In the scenario above, however, secular ethics break down. The secular humanist might recognize, intuitively, that diving into the river is a morally good action. But he has no rational basis for saying so. The young man’s decision is between empathy for a stranger (on the one hand) and utilitarian self-interest & community-interest (on the other).
In the end, there can be no binding moral imperatives in the absence of a Moral Lawgiver. If the young man decides to sit back and watch the woman drown, the secular humanist cannot criticize him. He’s only acting rationally.
When I read this, I was of one of the questions from one of my earliest posts, where I list a dozen interview questions to ask atheists. His question is very much like one of my questions. You may like the others in my list, as well.
It seems to me that on atheism, the only answer you can give for why you would do the right thing is “because it makes me happy”. And as we see with abortion – 56 million unborn children dead – it very often doesn’t make atheists happy to save someone else’s life. Not if it means any infringement on their own happiness. Every time an atheist votes Democrat, they are voting to declare that people who get in their way should not be saved. And atheists (the “nones”, anyway) are one of the largest Democrat voting blocs. According to the 2012 Secular Census, 97% of secularists deny that unborn children have a right to life. And the 2013 Gallup poll found that “nones”, people with no religion, are most likely to be pro-abortion. (Note that “nones” are not necessarily atheists, they may have some beliefs, but they are not observant). It’s not rational to inconvenience yourself to save others on atheism. You have one life to live, be happy, survival of the fittest.
Atheists like to help themselves to a lot of beliefs that can only be grounded in a robust theistic worldview. Rationally-grounded morality is just one of those things. And I want to say to you that this is not morally neutral, or a simple failure of the intellect. It’s not just a failure to be intelligent. It’s not just simple ingratitude towards God. It’s the deliberate self-deception they engage in in order to preserve their autonomy to seek pleasure apart from any notion of objective moral values and duties. It’s very transparent if you know how to question them.
Atheists like to cash out their rejection of God as some sort of rational, cognitive process, but they typically choose atheism as a result of having their desires for pleasure or peer-approval thwarted, or maybe in university when they don’t want professors to think they are ignorant. It’s not a rational worldview, it’s just easier. Easier to pose as a “smart” person. Easier to indulge in sexual desires at college. Easier to put powerful amoral people at ease, by not judging them for their destructive views on social issues. Easier to not judge others, so that you won’t be judged yourself. Easier to speculate about untestable multiverses and unobservable aliens seeding the Earth with life, so that you don’t have to think about the judgement that comes after the self-delusion. It’s a worldview of speculate, speculate, speculate. Speculations are the way that they keep God away so they can do what they want, call that moral and feel good about themselves in the here and now. The goal is to get one more day where they can do as they please apart from God, and they’ll believe anything they have to believe in order to do that.
WINTERY KNIGHT 
Reblogged this on Jessica A Bruno (waybeyondfedup).
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“but they typically choose atheism as a result of having their desires for pleasure or peer-approval thwarted, or maybe in university when they don’t want professors to think they are ignorant.”
Please post the statistics that demonstrate this claim to be accurate.
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Here you go:
http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2011/01/01/anger-at-god-common-even-among-atheists/
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Just a point of clarification: the article you linked was a survey of several different studies about anger at God. The article did not mention reasons why people chose atheism.
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Reading comprehension fail, yes it did.
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Psshh. Logic alone will suffice for this observation. No need for a statistical analysis… which can be manipulated anyhow.
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So, what did the young man do?
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Saved him, because he was a Christian theist.
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Old but notorious incident, this is what secular looks like:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/dutch-agonise-over-drowning-tragedy-in-park-sarah-lambert-looks-at-an-incident-that-has-come-to-reflect-national-unease-1463834.html
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Well said! Pulling no punches!
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Great post, WK! I tried the “would you jump on a hand grenade in a crowded room?” dilemma with an a-theist. He replied that “it was every man for himself.” I think, but cannot remember, that he affirmed this view even if some of the people in the room were relatives of his. Well, his reply made perfect sense to me, under a-theism. This life is it for the a-theist, so he would knock anyone down that he needed to in order to get out of that room. Don’t know if he was married or not, but if he was, it would be interesting to see the reaction of his wife to such a view. Perhaps she would agree – if she too were an a-theist.
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Well the room is croweded and of course majority of people would probably save themselves ,that is a natural human behavior. If it was a mother her first thought qould be to save her children first. Also its a grenade i doubt ypu have that much time to even make a decision before everyone dies
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Under a-theism, there is always a reason to not behave morally. Because as the Pope (Dawkins) and cardinals (Provine and Ruse) of a-theism have well-reasoned, there is no way to ground objective moral truths and duties under a-theism.
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Time-delay grenades are very effective, but they do have some significant disadvantages. One problem is their unpredictability: In some chemical fuzes, the delay time may vary from two to six seconds. But the biggest problem with time-delay grenades is that they give the enemy an opportunity to counterattack. If a soldier doesn’t time a grenade toss just right, the enemy may pick it up and throw it back before it explodes.
For this reason, soldiers must use impact grenades in certain situations. An impact grenade explodes wherever it lands, so there is no chance for the enemy to throw it back.
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Assume a time-delay grenade. Stop making excuses!
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It not a excuse why is ot when i bring something up that is clearly not stated in the scenario an excuse? The blogger never specified what type of grenade because some are different than others . Also another thing that would be interesting to know is why is there a grenade in the first place?
Also i don’t know too many people christian or not who jump on a grenade.
Self-preservation is behavior that ensures the survival of an organism. It is almost universal among living organisms.Pain and fear are parts of this mechanism. Pain motivates the individual to withdraw from damaging situations, to protect a damaged body part while it heals, and to avoid similar experiences in the future.Most pain resolves promptly once the painful stimulus is removed and the body has healed, but sometimes pain persists despite removal of the stimulus and apparent healing of the body; and sometimes pain arises in the absence of any detectable stimulus, damage or disease. Fear causes the organism to seek safety and may cause a release of adrenaline,[4][5] which has the effect of increased strength and heightened senses such as hearing, smell, and sight. Self-preservation may also be interpreted figuratively; in regard to the coping mechanisms one needs to prevent emotional trauma from distorting the mind
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Under a-theism, it is foolish and illogical to jump on the grenade. Under Christianity, it is virtuous, and nothing is lost, since there is a hereafter with rewards for the virtuous. Thus, it is also logical to jump on the grenade, under Christianity. But, if all we have is this life, we should all run screaming like hysterical women from any risky situation whatsoever.
When I was an a-theist, I was freaked out totally by risky situations, because I “knew” this life was all there was. How did I “know”? Carl Sagan said so. A-theism is all about said-so assertions. Surely, there must be something deeper to life?!?
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Well if i was in that scenario i would call for help,me jumping in wouldn’t do any good because I can’t swim.
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Throw a rope or grab a tree branch. Stop making excuses for being a coward. It isn’t pretty on you.
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Its not making an excuse if i cant swim i cant swim how in the world is that an excuse. So if i jump in a start screaming for help now there are two people who need help.
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Please learn to swim. For your sake and others. You don’t want to drown someone who is trying to rescue you (although this would be perfectly “moral” under a-theism) should you accidentally fall into the water. Plus, then you can be a hero and save someone’s life – instead of being a woman who shrieks and screams while someone is drowning just feet away from you. And, you will also be out of 1 excuse. 57 million more?!? :-) God bless you, Child!
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