An Unfortunate Consideration

A good many people seem to think that only God can establish moral rules and that without supernatural fiat and sanction we wouldn’t be able to figure out what we should do or bring ourselves to do the right thing if we somehow managed to guess what that might be. This belief is problematic in a practical way. If a theological irrationalist gets up in the morning, looks in the mirror, and decides he can no longer hypnotize himself into believing he believes, a potential psychopath is born. Unfortunately, one has to be very optimistic indeed to think this is only a theoretical possibility.