The lack of an objective basis or authority for morality/ethics is often used to argue against atheism and secularism. Many presume that if there is no God, or perhaps if we don't live as if there were, then mankind would decline into mass chaos and no one to put order.

Here's some background on that from St. Anselm's College philosophy blog:
There’s a famous passage from “The Grand Inquisitor” section of Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov in which Ivan Karamazov claims that if God does not exist, then everything is permitted. If there is no God, then there are no rules to live by, no moral law we must follow; we can do whatever we want. Some philosophers, like Jean-Paul Sartre, have assumed that Ivan is right; without God there is no moral law that tells us what we ought to do. But is Ivan right? If God does not exist, then can we do what we wish? Another way to put the question is, does ethics require God?

It is important to recognize that there are at least two distinct interpretations that could be offered for Ivan’s claim that if God does not exist, then everything is permissible. First, it could be read to mean that without God we would have no motivation to be ethical. Unless we had the motivation of divine judgment or divine approbation, then we would not really care about being ethical because we would not face any ultimate accounting for our actions, neither on earth nor in heaven.

However, Ivan’s claim could also be taken to mean that God serves as the source of our ethical obligation. That is, without God, everything is permitted because there would be no ethical obligations without God. The only reason we must follow the moral law is because someone (God) says that we must.

Your thoughts, please!

I won't say that morals require God because anyone can come up with any standard. So let's get that out of the way.

Instead I want your view on the following:
1. Do objective morals require God's existence?
2. Can society function without objective morals?

Let's debate!
 
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