Good without God, Part One Billion Ninety-Eight

A Vacation from Morality

In the second episode of season one of Westworld, there's a scene in which a tourist randomly shoots at a glass and then proceeds to shoot Teddy, one of the android hosts of the park, who then "dies". The tourist then goes on to yell, "Now that's a fuckin' vacation!" In the context of the show, the viewer identifies with the android since Teddy is a character we've seen repeatedly and shows himself to be a "good guy." The tourist is a human shorn of context and story. He exists, as do other tourist characters, to show what can happen in this cosplay Western theme park and what humans purportedly want to do. Granted, in the show's universe, you can't kill the human beings only the androids, and visitors know that the park's characters are "only" machines. Still, Teddy writhes on the floor like any human as the bullets enter his body.

My own reaction to the scene was a surprised thought of "Why would you want this as your vacation?" Why would you want to playact killing someone? I'm not extending this idea to people who re-enact famous battles or cosplay movies and shows. Those are people who have all agreed to play a role and agreed to pretend die or pretend shoot. There's a level of informed consent there. In Westworld, sure these are machines, but their bodies take the bullets and bleed, and in this particular scene, from the tourist's point of view, Teddy didn't agree to any kind of playacting. He is shot from across the way and then up close by someone without a reason. It is that impulse that bothered me, morally, on the part of the tourist. He just wanted to kill someone for no reason.

By the way, I know it's just a show, but an examination of its underlying assumptions about humans interests me. In this scene, the tourist isn't just talking about a vacation in the usual sense: time off work, away from routine, possibly in a resort where you can relax. The vacation is also away from the social contract, moral constraints, and the usual laws governing our behavior in the world. The park in Westworld gave this man permission to be depraved.

I wanted to use the scene as a lead in to talk about morality, specifically atheist morality - my morality. The question often arises in our society about how a person can be good without god. The presupposition that theists are just good is prevalent to the extent that we don't question some of the tropes. To establish a good character, show the person praying, have them say they look to god, or show them making a sign of the cross. It is understood that this is a humble person doing good in the world.

So atheists get the question: where do you get your morals if you don't believe in god? In part, it's a strange question because I don't think Christians get nearly the amount of morality from their religion as they think. I've heard Christians say they changed churches because they didn't like the things one preacher was saying, and they sought out a preacher who echoed what they believed. If you've shopped around for your religion, I think you've done more thinking on your own than you realize. And ask around a bunch of Christians of different denominations: what's your position on marriage equality? abortion? contraception? the death penalty? euthanasia? sex before marriage? Heck, even ask how baptism is supposed to work. There are as many answers as there are denominations.

Right from the start, I think a lot of religious people get their morality from their environment and society and attribute their beliefs to their religion erroneously.

As for atheists, there isn't really an "atheist morality" for anyone to adopt. Atheism is simply the position that no gods exist. After that, you start examining your life and beliefs and different people come down on different positions.

I consider myself a humanist, and for me, right action is a product of examining the results of behavior. When considering whether to do an action or not, I ask myself if I will harm or benefit another human or if the action is neutral. To give an example of a knife: I could choose the knife to cut or even kill someone, which causes obvious harm; I could use the knife in a neutral way, to cut up vegetables for my lunch; I could choose the benefit others, cut up food to take to a neighbor or a homeless shelter.

So, really deciding right action is not hard, and by the way, I'm not trying to say I've never hurt anyone or that my choices are always the best. Part of being human is realizing that we aren't perfect and that we are going to make mistakes. The best thing then is to make amends and do better the next time.

Why would I choose right action? This is a perplexing question because it presumes that the default is we want to rape, murder and steal naturally, and I can identify with Penn Jillette when he said: "The question I get asked by religious people all the time is, without God, what's to stop me from raping all I want? And my answer is: I do rape all I want. And the amount is zero. And I do murder all I want, and the amount is zero. The fact that these people think that if they didn't have this person watching over them that they would do on killing, raping rampages is the most self-damning thing I can imagine. I don't want to do that. Right now, without god, I don't want to jump across this table and strangle you..." Indeed, I have no desire to shoot, stab, strangle or do any bodily harm to another. Like Jillette, I do all the raping, murdering and stealing I want: the amount is zero.

Even in more mundane things like saying something hurtful, I don't want to be hurtful. Sure, I might answer back to someone I think is being a jerk. I might tell someone off that I think needs it. But all those are actions I feel are justified. But I don't just want to call people names, hurt their feelings, make them feel bad without justification. I don't like seeing another person harmed. End of story.

Additionally, I want to live in a society in which, overall, people treat each other with respect. In part this is attached to my feeling that this life is it. There is no afterlife, so we get this stretch of time to live and, preferably, enjoy our existence.


If I went to the park in Westworld, I would not want a vacation from the social contract to kill, even knowing that the characters there are machines. I would not enjoy being in a simulation of realistic beings bleeding and dying.  

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