The adversary is within

@sonship said
The compass points to true North and true South and so forth.

Magnetic fields vary.

@fmf said
Of course it can be different. This is "true" for you: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind". Morally speaking, there isn't anything "true" about it.

There cannot be a true standard that says everyone gets to make up their standard, so there can be no absolute standard for everyone. Because saying there is a standard that is true for everyone having their standard is an absolute standard that would be true for everyone, so if true, it is wrong.

@fmf said
Magnetic fields vary.

They react to the forces that play upon them nothing more.

@kellyjay said
There cannot be a true standard that says everyone gets to make up their standard, so there can be no absolute standard for everyone.

In debating this issue, you keep using the words "true" and "absolute" in a disingenuous way. It's only you who is insisting your opinions on moral matters are an "absolute standard for everyone".

@kellyjay said
They react to the forces that play upon them nothing more.

Your religious dogma is a "force" that "plays upon you" and nothing more.

@kellyjay said
saying there is a standard that is true for everyone having their standard is an absolute standard that would be true for everyone, so if true, it is wrong.

It is you who is saying "there is a standard that is true for everyone".

@fmf said
Magnetic fields vary.

So nobody's compass is reliable because magnetic fields vary?

And nobody's "moral compass" points to objectively true moral direction because moral directions vary.

Was Joseph Stalin's moral compass good for him as your's is good for you?

@kellyjay said
This reminds me of an example of love given here years ago. Some love their neighbors, so they do kind and good things to them; others love their neighbors because they are tasty. Do you have a preference?

It is you Kelly who are tied up in religious and moral absolutes. For me, morality is shaped in the society and time we grow up in and affected by factors in our individual makeup. Most societies tend to align on the really important stuff (murder is wrong etc) but likewise may differ in moral outlook.

So I can not say that cannibalism is absolutely wrong according to the cosmos, but only that it is wrong in the moral framework that governs my life. This doesn't relegate that morality to opinion, and is not akin to an ice-cream preference.

@sonship said
So nobody's compass is reliable because magnetic fields vary?

Everyone's moral compass is unique and reliable to differing degrees. Indeed, the degree of reliability is a matter that can [and must] be viewed using one's moral compass.

@sonship said
And nobody's "moral compass" points to objectively true moral direction because moral directions vary.

There are some moral topics about which we can make objective statements, like what the law defines as morally wrong in this country or that country.

But neither your moral compass nor my moral compass points in an "objectively true" moral direction.

It is all in the realm of subjectivity; this is why we need our moral compasses: to navigate our own way through this realm.

@sonship said
Was Joseph Stalin's moral compass good for him as your's is good for you?

My moral compass tells me that Joseph Stalin was an almost peerlessly evil man. Doesn't your moral compass tell you the same thing?

@FMF

My moral compass tells me that Joseph Stalin was an almost peerlessly evil man. Doesn't your moral compass tell you the same thing?

Yes, in that he recognized no authority over himself. None.
His authoity was absolute (so he thought). What he wanted was what he wanted was what he wanted. After his wife died he said his heart became like a stone.

Most people would probably say such a murderer was absolutely wrong.
His moral compass condoning his murders could not be excused on shifting
magnetic direction rationale.

There must be absolute right and wrong.
We may not be able to live up to it.
That is another issue.

We may not always perfectly understand it because we are not omniscient and know all of the facts. That too is a different matter.

But this moral compass of the conscience within all people is like a breaking system designed to prevent us from going off completely into wrong doing AND confirming us when we go in the right direction.

It informs us that there is objective moral truth.
There is objectively a real transcendent moral standard.
How did such an "organ" come to be in human beings?

@sonship said
There must be absolute right and wrong.

You subjectively insisting "there must be", notwithstanding, I think the nearest we get to this "absolute" thing is [1] being completely certain, beyond doubt, that something is right or wrong, and/or [2] everybody [or nearly everybody] in a given context being "absolutely" certain that a particular action is right or wrong.

@sonship said
This moral compass of the conscience within all people is like a breaking system designed to prevent us from going off completely into wrong doing AND confirming us when we go in the right direction.

It informs us that there is objective moral truth.
There is objectively a real transcendent moral standard.
How did such an "organ" come to be in human beings?

Of course.