[Jack Simth]

The problem with objective morality (technically ethics - ethics are the rules and regs (or the way to come up with them to the nth degree) and morality is how well they are followed by a given individual - but that's nit-picking) is that we have yet to truly find a way around assumptions. You want to apply logic to the field of ethics? First you will need to assume that logic necessarily applies to questions of ethics (or assume a basis on which logic is necessarily applied, or assume a basis that makes a basis on which logic is necessary, or ...) sufficent to rule out any other basis that does not come to the EXACT same set of specific application decisions in every case (if they come up with the exact same set of specific application decisions in every case, they are the same; after all, there is more than one way to prove the pythagorean theorm under the particular set of circumstances where it works). On a fundamental level, this is also true of math (and of logic - in order to apply logic, you must first (1) assume that logic necessarily applies, and (2) assume that some set of starting conditions is true; sure, you can see that one bead plus one bead equals two beads, you need to assume that what you see reflects reality - can you prove that you are not caught up in The Matrix or something like it? If not, you must assume that what you are viewing reflects reality. Sure, it's an assumption few would question, as it's opposite is rather ridiculous - yet it is still an assumption) - sure, 1 + 1 = 2, 2 + 2 = 4; but that is because of the way the symbols are defined. You can define a consistent system under which that is not the case (such as relative velocity under relativity - (1/2) c + (1/2) c < c - check with your physics professor). In order to say that 1 + 1 = 2, you must first define the value 1, the value 2, the operation +, and the operation =. In order to say that a person killing a person without sufficient cause for such an action (one definition of murder) is wrong requires you to first define "person" "killing" and "sufficent cause for such an action". The catch is that such definitions (or the method for coming up with such definitions, or the method for coming up with the method for coming up with such definitions, and so on, and so forth) is fundamentally assumed. Can you prove that a week-old newborn is a person, without first having an already proven definition that you can use to argue on the basis of? What about a fetus 3 months after conception? A grown woman of 30? A coma patient? A mentally developmentally disabled human of 15 physical years? Even if you could concretely prove every event-statement in the Bible (God said this, God did this, this happened, et cetera), you would still need to assume that the created ought to follow the rules of the Creator before you could say The Ten Commandments ought to be followed (granted, given some way to prove all such event statements, most would agree that the rules laid out in the Bible would then become authoritative - but there is still an assumption there). You will not be able to meet those three requirements under any circumstances I could imagine without an assumption somewhere along the line. If such an assumption exists, it is no longer objective, as you can't prove it in it's entierety. You can come up with stuff that is "close enough" to proven with "makes sense" assumptions, but those don't quite qualify as objective.