I don't see why our egos would prevail in a material world; what, if anything, this prevailing has to do with the universe being something greater than a big cloud of gas that exploded (I would say a tiny globe of infinite density); and why seeing the universe as something 'greater,' as you phrase it, would invalidate materialism. Frankly, I think you need materialism, or in other words the understanding that man is nothing but his body, and when the body is harmed, imperiled or destroyed there isn't a soul which remains unscathed beneath this violence, in order to fully understand mortality and vulnerability, and in this understanding overcome your own egocentrism - there hardly is a more solid footing for morality than materialism, which implies the thought that wrongs cannot be mended, and death cannot be overcome. Ergo: don't wrong people, don't kill them, but take care of them - don't fall into extremes, because in extremes one usually doesn't take other people's existence and reasoning into account (and when you realize that all they have is their existence, their reasoning, their hopes, despairing and emotions, and that all this is easily snuffed out or otherwise disrupted, it seems to me you've found a first ground for morality much better than anything religion can provide). Above all, don't put your trust in some merciful God - you'll have to do it yourself, and more than that, when screw up there isn't anything or anyone to save your victims. Kill, or wrong, somebody - you won't drink a beer with him or her in the afterlife, walking memory lane and laughing about your old antagonisms. That somebody, when killed, is gone - fully, irrecoverably gone: not a shred remains. This materialist insight in man's mortality and vulnerability, I would say, certainly induces one to overcome one narrowminded egocentrism, one's selfrighteousness and willingness to sacrifice people to a lot of different convictions one might otherwise entertain. Like I said: materialism means as solid a ground for ethics as is to be gotten in this world - it's the thought that people have a soul eternal that makes other people shrug their shoulders regarding their fate. Harm done, well - then no harm done, cause they have an eternity ahead of them, and surely this thing I did to them, like ruining their earthly life, pales in comparison to the joys which are in store for them! Killed them, well - then that just means they move on to another life, and that's all... what's the big deal? No, give me ethics, virtue, morality, kindness - give me materialism.
