Sam Harris on Divine command theory
Harris argues that grounding morality in God's commands makes ethics arbitrary and renders moral reasoning impossible.
Harris regards divine command theory as perhaps the most dangerous religious idea — the notion that actions are good because God commands them, and that God's commands constitute the only objective moral standard. If this were true, Harris argues, then God could command genocide and it would be moral by definition — and indeed, the Bible records God doing exactly that.
He presents the Euthyphro dilemma as decisive: either God commands things because they are good (in which case goodness is independent of God) or things are good because God commands them (in which case goodness is arbitrary). Either horn is fatal to divine command theory as a metaethical position.
Harris contends that moral truths are discoverable through reason and empirical investigation — specifically, by examining the consequences of actions for the well-being of conscious creatures. This approach grounds morality in facts about the world rather than in the edicts of an unverifiable authority.
“If you are right that morality depends on God, then there is no moral objection to God commanding the slaughter of children. And that is a reductio ad absurdum of your position.”