Suffering, prayer and god's will
Offline I ceased to believe in god when I finally let go of the idea that somehow suffering can be part of god's long term plan. After quite a lot of other sh1t happening, my 30 year old husband of 10 years suffered permanent nerve damage to his lower spine due to cancer. While he appeared to everyone else to be reasonably healthy, he was in fact unable to urinate. He also lost sexual function and partially lost bowel function. He had to self catheterize for the rest of his life. Which turned out to only be another year due to proliferation of tumours in his brain.
I am no philosopher. I find that when people are talking about hypothetical occasions of suffering and god's will, they can always come up with hypothetical ways that God could be working in the situation. So therefore, apparently, we have no right to judge it as unacceptable for an omnipotent god. I could dismiss hypothetical suffering as not being in conflict with an omnipotent god. I did for over a decade. I could, however, not dismiss the private indignity and pain he suffered daily as being somehow beneficial to something. No possible benefit could come of my husband being unable to urinate. Noone will be inspired by a situation like that, and even if they were, it is abhorrent to think that it would in any way justify the suffering and indignity he went through. It was a humiliation that brought him to depression. I lost my belief in prayer then, and my belief in god followed along accordingly.
The christians in my life had many things to say about the situation. At the time, the things were often hurtful, even as they were trying to be encouraging. Things like 'it's all part of god's plan and god is always in control. You just have to trust in him.' It rang hollow. More than hollow. Horrifying really. It was better for us to just admit that 'sh1t happens' to everyone, believer and unbeliever, worthy and unworthy. He and I faced what came with courage. And I was proud of the depths of courage he and I found in the horror that came. He died almost two years ago. And it was my strength that saw the situation through to it's conclusion. Not god's grace. I was there for our two children through all of it. We came through it. There was no'Footprints' poem moment where I realized that when my strength failed, that a magic daddy carried me. I found depths to my humanity I didn't know I had. I found wisdom in many situations that saw us through. I was proud of myself for that. And I was pround of my late husband for his dignity in facing death. I became an atheist at peace with the choices I had made given a tragic situation.
"There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must do it because Conscience tells him it is right." Martin Luther King
- Login to post comments
Offline Hey Fortitude, just did a minor quote edit on your post to fix it up...
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline There is another paragraph that jumbo wrote about mid-way through the paragraph. Sorry - my bad. I can't fix it now.
"There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must do it because Conscience tells him it is right." Martin Luther King
- Login to post comments
Offline There is another paragraph that jumbo wrote about mid-way through the paragraph. Sorry - my bad. I can't fix it now.
I could fix it if I knew exactly what you meant to quote, if it matters enough.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline Quote:If God is greater than His creation, then his uncaused existence is more of a "something from nothing" type problem than just the Universe. Eternally having "just existed" does not really avoid the principle problem - the simpler the presupposed pre-existing entity or substance, the smaller the difficulty. Therefore the "something from nothing" objection is infinitely more of a problem for the God explanation.I know you have a difficulty with accepting the idea that God is now a totally unnecessary concept, but that is not an argument. Or is your inability to see that the fact that "without God" actually is a simpler, direct explanation for manner things such as the topic here, often expressed as "why bad things happen to good people", is a reason to trash the God idea.
So you will continue with your convoluted arguments trying to find ways to justify the nonsense that is God, rather than Occamming through to the world-view that short-circuits all this argument over why a hypothetical being with hypothetical attributes would pr would not allow or instigate various things.
My arguments are not trying to prove the existence of God. Even IF God does not exist, it does not alleviate the pressure on humanity for the shit lives we are living, or the contradictions between power. Occam's razor works well with scientific explanations, but how would you apply it to the ethics, or free will? Simplest is not always best when it comes to abortion etc., therefore both your points above are irrelevant to this debate.
Start another thread if you want to talk existence.
Part of this thread involves "the problem of evil", which is a problem that only exists as a philosophical/theological problem if you assume a benevolent, omnipotent God, actually exists in the first place.
I agree that such considerations, including ideas of God, are only distractions from addressing the real problems of suffering in the world.
So lets just forget the silly God crap and try addressing real problems.
God doesn't exist except as an idea in the mind of man. So let's not waste time discussing it.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline The paragraph starting with 'god's omnipotence' is Jumbo's, not mine. The subsequent paragraphs are mine.
"There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must do it because Conscience tells him it is right." Martin Luther King
- Login to post comments
Offline The paragraph starting with 'god's omnipotence' is Jumbo's, not mine. The subsequent paragraphs are mine.
Deleted that paragraph.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline I've been reading about logical fallacies and certainly know less about them than most people here. Is this anAppeal to Bad Consequences:
(1) If you don’t believe in God then you’ll be miserable, thinking that life doesn’t have any meaning.
Therefore:
(2) God exists.http://www.logicalfallacies.info/relevance/appeals/appeal-to-consequences/
I'm new to this, so you'll have to forgive me if I'm misapplying a fallacy.
If you are saying that I am saying that "if you don't believe in God then you'll be miserable" then you have misquoted what I have said. This is known as a strawman.
Otherwise, yes, what you have written is a fallacy. Bear in mind though, that this is not what I wrote. Since we are on the topic, there are other fallacies that may be relevant to the topic. Excessive emotive force is a fallacy as well - its called an appeal to pity, as it does not address an argument, rather it provides psychological pressure (rhetoric) to accept a given conclusion. Since we are in the realm of death and pain, it is very easy to straddle the line between a logical argument, and commiting any number of informal fallacies.
That doesn't mean i can't logically decide to give up trusting god. A god I can't trust or respect is no god I am interested in.
Explain.
And once I've given up trusting god, I can evaluate why I should believe in a god. Considering this possibility is not something I could objectively do while trusting god.
Why do you have to give up trust to evaluate something? Is there any reasoning behind this statement? According to Judaism, the very word for "prayer" roughly translates as "Struggling with". This supports the opposite of what you are putting forth.
Is it a logical impossibility for an omnipotent God to alter the course of this particular instance of disease, or cause treatments to be effective in eradicating the disease?
I don't know. You said the cause of this cancer is unknown, but not lifestyle or environmentally related - so that rules out things like smoking and asbestos (not that people who smoke or remove asbestos deserve cancer). Perhaps if I knew which particular cancer you were referring to, it would help to understand whether it was lifestyle related some time ago. As with the AIDS babies, it may not be the will of your husband in contention.
Is this sort of thing supposed to be character building for the person suffering from the disease? Is it supposed to be inspiring?
I don't know how to answer this without sounding insincere. It is hard to have a "character" without some sort of trial or tribulation (Swinburne, "Epistemic Distance" ). Prima facie, Natural Evil enables virtues and vices, arguably components of a 'character". Another point is, it is not always for the sufferer that suffering occurs. I remember someone saying that bearing an illness greatly inspires others. Traditionally it is said that natural evil "provides the means by which we learn about our universe, and how to make a difference". I am far more familiar with the logical problem of evil than the evidential problem of Evil. I don't think any answer I can give you would be very satisfying, as previously stated. I also don't think there are any right or wrong answers with respect to the evidential problem of evil, it is largely a matter of subjectivity.
My guess is that you have heard all of this before, and have made the decision that suffering is not character building.
Tell me why I should place my trust and faith in god, given what has happened
The above sounds like an appeal to pity - there is nothing I can say other than I am sorry for your loss.
Tell me why I should give my money to the 'body of christ', rather than using it to support my family.
I never said give the church money. - what would God want with currency? I have my own ideas about that. One would not have to look very hard to find what Jesus thought of trading in the temples... and I don't think trading property is any different. But I digress.
I hope some of the above answers your questions. For the ones I missed or avoided, can you restate them more concisely? There are a lot of posts I am replying to at once, and I miss key things that people were placing emphasis upon.
- Login to post comments
Offline @Jumbo
Your point seems fine if you assume that certain things are necessary for proper free will to exist, but the thing that gets me is why you would assume an omnimax God could not create a system that did not include unfair suffering. To claim God had to create unfocused 'evil' for 'good' to exist you have to restrain God's omnipotence don't you?
No, you simply have to state that defining "God's omnipotence" in a premise is the logical fallacy of "Begging The Conclusion".
Somewhere in the argument is "I assert that omnipotence means ...." Who the hell said the "omnipotence" means what you've asserted it means? And who said that "All Power" trumps "All Wise"?
Several thousand years ago the question of G-d eradicating all false gods. Then someone pointed out that people also worship the Sun and Moon. Which side of this problem "proves" G-d isn't omnipotent? Keeping people from worshiping the sun and moon, or not destroying both of them?
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline mellestad wrote:@Jumbo
Your point seems fine if you assume that certain things are necessary for proper free will to exist, but the thing that gets me is why you would assume an omnimax God could not create a system that did not include unfair suffering. To claim God had to create unfocused 'evil' for 'good' to exist you have to restrain God's omnipotence don't you?
No, you simply have to state that defining "God's omnipotence" in a premise is the logical fallacy of "Begging The Conclusion".
Somewhere in the argument is "I assert that omnipotence means ...." Who the hell said the "omnipotence" means what you've asserted it means? And who said that "All Power" trumps "All Wise"?
Several thousand years ago the question of G-d eradicating all false gods. Then someone pointed out that people also worship the Sun and Moon. Which side of this problem "proves" G-d isn't omnipotent? Keeping people from worshiping the sun and moon, or not destroying both of them?
"False gods" are just mistaken beliefs. They could only be 'eradicated' by purging those ideas from people's minds, including the belief that the Sun and Moon were Gods.
The idea that eradicating Sun worship would involve eradicating the actual Sun would be very sloppy reasoning.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline Quote:The point is simply that if God knows that evil will be produced, then he acted knowing that his action would produce evil. That something other than evil may be produced does not speak to the argument I'm trying to make. Admittedly, I may not have been very clear so far in making that argument.This may be the sticking point: I think it is self-evident that evil would be anathema to a wholly good God and that, if he was able to do so, a wholly good God would not choose to do something that would produce evil. Do you agree or disagree with that?
We are really not covering any ground here. I refuse to be forced into a plurium interrogationum.
I don't like that tactic either and I wasn't trying to trick you. I want to get to the core of this discussion because we seem to be talking past each other and the conversation doesn't seem to be very useful, so far. To that end, I was trying to find out more precisely where we agree and where we disagree.
If you are of the opinion that "something other than evil [being] produced does not speak to the argument [you are] trying to make", then you have forced my posisition.
I think we need to pick one point and work on that and then, if we both want to do so, move on from there. Would you prefer to work at that point or another one? Let's narrow the focus significantly and perhaps then we can have a better conversation. You choose.
Or, if you'd like, we could start a new thread specifically for our discussion of the argument evil, and starting with a single point and working from there.
(I'm not challenging you to a debate. I find that debates are generally not very useful -- I don't think they're a good tool for getting at truth. I think that the only thing debates are really good for is to find out who is the more skillful debater. I see debating as a type of sport and it's not one that I find interesting. Rather, I'm interested in having conversations with people.)
Reality is the graveyard of the gods.
- Login to post comments
Offline FurryCatHerder wrote:mellestad wrote:@Jumbo
Your point seems fine if you assume that certain things are necessary for proper free will to exist, but the thing that gets me is why you would assume an omnimax God could not create a system that did not include unfair suffering. To claim God had to create unfocused 'evil' for 'good' to exist you have to restrain God's omnipotence don't you?
No, you simply have to state that defining "God's omnipotence" in a premise is the logical fallacy of "Begging The Conclusion".
Somewhere in the argument is "I assert that omnipotence means ...." Who the hell said the "omnipotence" means what you've asserted it means? And who said that "All Power" trumps "All Wise"?
Several thousand years ago the question of G-d eradicating all false gods. Then someone pointed out that people also worship the Sun and Moon. Which side of this problem "proves" G-d isn't omnipotent? Keeping people from worshiping the sun and moon, or not destroying both of them?
"False gods" are just mistaken beliefs. They could only be 'eradicated' by purging those ideas from people's minds, including the belief that the Sun and Moon were Gods.
The idea that eradicating Sun worship would involve eradicating the actual Sun would be very sloppy reasoning.
Poor reading comprehension much? Did you find "Bummer. Can't destroy the sun, I guess we'll have to put up with Sun Worship for the rest of eternity!" in there somewhere?
But nice dodge -- now how about you address what I wrote, instead of avoiding it. Your argument is "Begging the Conclusion". It's also a sophomoric argument, but most arguments here against G-d are sophomoric arguments, so at least your in the center of the curve.
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline BobSpence1 wrote:FurryCatHerder wrote:mellestad wrote:@Jumbo
Your point seems fine if you assume that certain things are necessary for proper free will to exist, but the thing that gets me is why you would assume an omnimax God could not create a system that did not include unfair suffering. To claim God had to create unfocused 'evil' for 'good' to exist you have to restrain God's omnipotence don't you?
No, you simply have to state that defining "God's omnipotence" in a premise is the logical fallacy of "Begging The Conclusion".
Somewhere in the argument is "I assert that omnipotence means ...." Who the hell said the "omnipotence" means what you've asserted it means? And who said that "All Power" trumps "All Wise"?
Several thousand years ago the question of G-d eradicating all false gods. Then someone pointed out that people also worship the Sun and Moon. Which side of this problem "proves" G-d isn't omnipotent? Keeping people from worshiping the sun and moon, or not destroying both of them?
"False gods" are just mistaken beliefs. They could only be 'eradicated' by purging those ideas from people's minds, including the belief that the Sun and Moon were Gods.
The idea that eradicating Sun worship would involve eradicating the actual Sun would be very sloppy reasoning.
Poor reading comprehension much? Did you find "Bummer. Can't destroy the sun, I guess we'll have to put up with Sun Worship for the rest of eternity!" in there somewhere?
But nice dodge -- now how about you address what I wrote, instead of avoiding it. Your argument is "Begging the Conclusion". It's also a sophomoric argument, but most arguments here against G-d are sophomoric arguments, so at least your in the center of the curve.
You are the one who doesn't "get it".
Just what was "eradicated" when one eradicated false Gods that did NOT correspond to a physical object like the Sun? That is the real question.
If you can eradicate that kind of false God, which can only exist as a belief, then the same thing would be done for Sun worship, without eradicating the Sun.
I wondered after I posted it if I should have spelled that out explicitly, but I figured it would have been obvious, even to A G-d believer, but it looks like G-d believers are just as dense as God believers. 
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline FurryCatHerder wrote:BobSpence1 wrote:Poor reading comprehension much? Did you find "Bummer. Can't destroy the sun, I guess we'll have to put up with Sun Worship for the rest of eternity!" in there somewhere?
But nice dodge -- now how about you address what I wrote, instead of avoiding it. Your argument is "Begging the Conclusion". It's also a sophomoric argument, but most arguments here against G-d are sophomoric arguments, so at least your in the center of the curve.
You are the one who doesn't "get it".
I "get" it very well. What I "get" is that you don't much like having your arguments exposed as logical fallacies, so you're going to keep ignoring that.
Just what was "eradicated" when one eradicated false Gods that did NOT correspond to a physical object like the Sun? That is the real question.If you can eradicate that kind of false God, which can only exist as a belief, then the same thing would be done for Sun worship, without eradicating the Sun.
I wondered after I posted it if I should have spelled that out explicitly, but I figured it would have been obvious, even to A G-d believer, but it looks like G-d believers are just as dense as God believers.
No, because the answer ("Ignorance" and "Superstition" ) was known as the answer to that question for about the last 3,800 years of Jewish history. Or if you prefer, "Abrahamic Religion History".
Are you planning to deal with your logical fallacy or do I just declare "Victory" and move on? I realize a woman calling a man out on his seriously bogus reasoning is akin to holding a machete next to your penis and threatening to use it, but please try to be consistent and address the logical fallacy in this "God doesn't fit my definition of god, therefore god doesn't exist" argument you've constructed.
There, I laid out the #1 fallacy behind all arguments against G-d on this website in the form of an argument that most of y'all will recognize for its simplicity. And hopefully, which all of you can recognize for its bogosity.
Or as a former rabbi of mine put it -- "The god you don't believe in, I don't believe in either."
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline BobSpence1 wrote:FurryCatHerder wrote:BobSpence1 wrote:Poor reading comprehension much? Did you find "Bummer. Can't destroy the sun, I guess we'll have to put up with Sun Worship for the rest of eternity!" in there somewhere?
But nice dodge -- now how about you address what I wrote, instead of avoiding it. Your argument is "Begging the Conclusion". It's also a sophomoric argument, but most arguments here against G-d are sophomoric arguments, so at least your in the center of the curve.
You are the one who doesn't "get it".
I "get" it very well. What I "get" is that you don't much like having your arguments exposed as logical fallacies, so you're going to keep ignoring that.
BobSpence1 wrote:Just what was "eradicated" when one eradicated false Gods that did NOT correspond to a physical object like the Sun? That is the real question.If you can eradicate that kind of false God, which can only exist as a belief, then the same thing would be done for Sun worship, without eradicating the Sun.
I wondered after I posted it if I should have spelled that out explicitly, but I figured it would have been obvious, even to A G-d believer, but it looks like G-d believers are just as dense as God believers.
No, because the answer ("Ignorance" and "Superstition" ) was known as the answer to that question for about the last 3,800 years of Jewish history. Or if you prefer, "Abrahamic Religion History".
Are you planning to deal with your logical fallacy or do I just declare "Victory" and move on? I realize a woman calling a man out on his seriously bogus reasoning is akin to holding a machete next to your penis and threatening to use it, but please try to be consistent and address the logical fallacy in this "God doesn't fit my definition of god, therefore god doesn't exist" argument you've constructed.
There, I laid out the #1 fallacy behind all arguments against G-d on this website in the form of an argument that most of y'all will recognize for its simplicity. And hopefully, which all of you can recognize for its bogosity.
Or as a former rabbi of mine put it -- "The god you don't believe in, I don't believe in either."
You really do have some issues.
My response there had nothing to do with whether or not I believe in your G-d or the Christian God.
I was not trying to disprove God, or G-d.
I was attempting to point out some very confused logic.
My argument was simply that "eradicating false Gods'" was essentially the same whether or not the beliefs in question involved identifying the God believed in with a physical object or not, it was the belief that had to be eradicated, which is what applies to all Gods, whether or not the God in question actually existed in some independent sense.
The phrase "eradicating false Gods" is logically problematic to begin with. How do you eradicate something which doesn't exist? I translated the thought into the nearest expression which seemed to make sense, namely that it was the false beliefs that were to be targeted.
Once you do that, the idea of eradicating an object seen by that belief as embodying the God does not arise.
None of this targeting your belief, or anything to do with my idea of what a God is defined as. It is the belief in a God, "false" or otherwise, defined however the person chooses or assumes.
Do you not consider religions comprise specific sets of beliefs about 'Life, the Universe, and Everything'? I am not making any judgement about the validity of the beliefs in that statement, but I would be interested if you could clarify your definition of Religion and God.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline FurryCatHerder wrote:No, because the answer ("Ignorance" and "Superstition" ) was known as the answer to that question for about the last 3,800 years of Jewish history. Or if you prefer, "Abrahamic Religion History".
Are you planning to deal with your logical fallacy or do I just declare "Victory" and move on? I realize a woman calling a man out on his seriously bogus reasoning is akin to holding a machete next to your penis and threatening to use it, but please try to be consistent and address the logical fallacy in this "God doesn't fit my definition of god, therefore god doesn't exist" argument you've constructed.
There, I laid out the #1 fallacy behind all arguments against G-d on this website in the form of an argument that most of y'all will recognize for its simplicity. And hopefully, which all of you can recognize for its bogosity.
Or as a former rabbi of mine put it -- "The god you don't believe in, I don't believe in either."
You really do have some issues.
My response there had nothing to do with whether or not I believe in your G-d or the Christian God.
I was not trying to disprove God, or G-d.
I was attempting to point out some very confused logic.
You were attacking, as an argument, something that was not being presented AS an argument.
The entire point of the exchange, as well as countless exchanges in the 3000+ year history of this thing we call "Judaism", is showing that "things" aren't "gods". When Abraham went into his uncle's idol making workshop and smashed all the idols, the point WAS NOT some kind of "My god can beat up your god" contest, it was to show that G-D IS NOT A THING.
My argument was simply that "eradicating false Gods'" was essentially the same whether or not the beliefs in question involved identifying the God believed in with a physical object or not, it was the belief that had to be eradicated, which is what applies to all Gods, whether or not the God in question actually existed in some independent sense.
Okay, so this puts you about 3,800 years behind the Jewish understanding of incorrect beliefs as regards gods and other such things.
The phrase "eradicating false Gods" is logically problematic to begin with. How do you eradicate something which doesn't exist? I translated the thought into the nearest expression which seemed to make sense, namely that it was the false beliefs that were to be targeted.None of this targeting your belief, or anything to do with my idea of what a God is defined as. It is the belief in a God, "false" or otherwise, defined however the person chooses or assumes.
Pedantic much? Or rather, boy, you sure are pretty slow on the uptake, aren't you?
Do you not consider religions comprise specific sets of beliefs about 'Life, the Universe, and Everything'? I am not making any judgement about the validity of the beliefs in that statement, but I would be interested if you could clarify your definition of Religion and God.
I'm having a hard time parsing that first sentence, but yeah -- "religions" comprise specific sets of beliefs about "Life, the Universe, and Everything". You have a religion -- Atheism -- and you worship a god -- your beliefs about "logic" and what you think you can do with "logic". It's a pretty nice god you've got there, it's just not good for much of anything.
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline FurryCatHerder, you obviously use a computer.
Therefore you are relying in every post on the FACT that "logic works".
And on a lot of other things I believe in, as a "worshipper" of the honest pursuit of truth about the universe, AKA Science, as distinct from what I don't believe in ( 'God' ).
It seems like we will never connect on this, or other issues...
Pity.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline ...Goddammit, I hate the flu.
Advice: do not take Advil night time liquid gel medication if you expect them to actually put you to fucking sleep.
Forgive me, but without "Why" there is nothing else. "Why" has lead to all the greatest discoveries of mankind. It is the very ability to question that defines us as conscious beings - as human.
"Why" is reason, without reason there are no arguments, just assertions that cannot be right or wrong. "Why" has led you here, a site devoted to rational responses (some less so than others).
"why" is a journey, not altogether enjoyable but nevertheless vital.
Yeah, OK. Over the top I know. I have a question:
Why did you stop believing in God?
What the fuck?
Yeah, I'll bet Robert Goddard just sat up at night in endless Platonian contemplation, Dodecahedrons playing out a ballet on the outskirts of his vision, as he jerked himself off asking, "...Why? Why Mars? WHY????"
"How" tends to be the big motherfucker.
How do we get to mars?
How do we defeat this epidemic?
How do we figure out how old stuff is?
How do we determine the shape of the Earth?
How do we determine how the planets move around the sun?
How do we defeat the fascists?
"Why", while not always a totally useless question, is mostly reserved for philosophical circle-jerking when you'd rather not do the work involved with actually accomplishing anything.
"How" is a big problem for theists, though, so they like to pretend it's no big deal. How did God make the universe? How do you know God made the universe? How do you know God even exists at all? How do you know Jesus existed? How do you reconcile the laughable mistakes regarding the realities of the universe presented in the orthodox literature with the well established science?
You can't answer any of those questions honestly, so you'll go around and either deflect or go beat down some straw men and pretend that you're a hero for it.
When I was very little, I bowled with the "bumpers" down on the lanes so I never made a gutter ball. Eventually that got really old, I never bowled much above the 50's or 60's, and I started bowling without bumpers. That got me up to about 120. Finally I went all-out and bought my first "finger-tip" bowling ball -- the sort that in the proper hands can make all sorts of interesting hooks and physics-defying last minute jumps all over the place, which put my high game around 250.When I was carrying a 120 average, bowling was easy. Aim for the "pocket", hope for the ball goes straight. It wasn't until I was using a finger-tip ball that I had to start visualizing where the oil on the lane was, and convert that into rotational speed, angle of release and expected curve across the lane that things got to be very hard, and my scores sometimes quite high. If I visualized wrong, or if the skin of the ball was saturated in oil that I hadn't removed, my scores fell into the ditch and bowling life sucked.
Personally, I'm glad that "life without bumpers" exists.
Yeah. What a tremendously excellent fucking analogy.
Get raped in South Africa and infected with HIV?
Hey, chin up, God's letting you bowl without the bumpers!
Get paralyzed from the chest down in a vehicle accident and have to shovel out your own shit by hand for the rest of your life?
Hey, chin up, God's letting you bowl without the bumpers!
Watch your family get burned alive by insane fascists after they invade your country?
Hey, chin up, God's letting you bowl without the bumpers!
Get broken on the wheel by Catholic Inquisitors because they suspected you of witchcraft?
Hey, chin up, God's letting you bowl without the bumpers!
Guess what? Life on Earth isn't like an episode of the Care Bears. The worst fates you can have the misfortune of running into are considerably worse than throwing a gutter ball and missing your spare.
ARGH! STUPID PEOPLE!How many of you still live at home with your parents? How many of you still allow your parents to make all of your decisions? How many of you would allow your parents to interfere in your life each and every time something even remotely "dangerous" happened?
Replace "parents" with "G-d" and tell me that you'd really want G-d treating you like some kind of child who doesn't know what they are doing or can't be responsible for their own life.
God-as-puppet-master is just as horrible as god-as-super-nanny. If you don't believe in G-d because G-d doesn't give you free ponies or keep you from getting an ouwie when you fall down, you've got bigger problems than you imagine. Since most children eventually up and leave the protective cocoon of their parents' home, I can only assume that being protected and smothered all the time is not really part of the plan. And I don't think it's part of the plan whether G-d does or doesn't exist. Because Theist and Atheist kids alike all seem to agree that being able to make ones own mistakes and suffer the consequences, or enjoy the rewards, is a good way to be an adult.
So all these "omnibenevolent" arguments are bogus. And they are bogus whether or not G-d exists, which is usually the best way to determine that an argument about G-d is or isn't valid.
Well, I do still live with my parents, so you sure got me there. I'm pretty stupid, too (though smarter than to try and analogize human suffering with throwing gutter balls during a game of bowling).
Let's leave the 'free will' bullshit out of this for now. God made everything, according to you, right? And he could've made it any way he wanted to, right?
So, the way God chose to make our universe was to have it condense as a construct of gravity and hydrogen atoms out of an expansion of space-time from a singularity (which guaranteed that this was a pretty fucking short-term experiment, but let's leave that aside for now), which would produce complex carbon-based molecular entities (humans, plants, animals, perhaps extra-terrestrial analogues to these things) yet be mostly incredibly hostile to them.
So... how was this a terribly good idea, assuming God is looking out for us? He decides to make the vast majority of the universe instantly fatal to human beings and place them on a planet that is not only itself pretty hostile territory, but is going to get eaten by the sun after only a few billion years, when the sun runs out of Hydrogen fuel?
That's a terrific design proposal to you?
"Oh, yeah, I've got a great idea for this new bridge. We'll build it out of hollow aluminum tubes filled with gunpowder. Oh, and we'll like slap down some cement blocks in the center that people can walk down and hope to not trigger an explosion. Or something."
The universe being designed by an intelligent being that has our best interests in mind is simply a failed prediction. There's no way you can pretend that a place brimming with absolute zero temperature spots, black holes, gamma ray bursts, supernova (...supernovae? Whatever. It's not like the theists are going to doing anything than the same old 'YOU CANT PROVE MY GOD ISNT REALZ' bullshit anyway) and myriad other solar system sweeping hazards is a place built to suit our needs.
I'm not the least bit "sorry" for what I've been through, which has been rather significant. It's made me be the person I am today. I can TELL people what I've been through, and a lot of them gasp, and some of them would rather not know the details, but my perceptions of the world around me, of human nature, human suffering, the "Universal Brotherhood of Man" -- these all come from what have been, in my lifetime, some really crappy experiences. On the flip side, the opportunities for fully engaging the world all come from those crappy experiences. I never thought sleeping in a rat infested house was going to be "enjoyable" (I'm an upper-middle class geek), and long since got past the need to be "poor", but having had that experience, other opportunities are available in ways they'd not be -- if I'd never done that.
@ lolz
You've been raped, you've slept in a rat infested house, you've endured harrowing hardships that have reduced others to gasps of despair for your tribulations at their mere mention.
Yeah. And I was born with six penises protruding from my forehead.
It's pretty fucking disgusting to pretend you know what 'real hardship' is so you can downplay it or make it seem more palettable. This reminds me of the retarded "Bootstraps!" talk so often uttered by Republicans in freshly dry cleaned suits, right after they were done emptying their load into one mistress or another.
Guess what? Nobody is 'better' after getting paralyzed for life, or getting HIV, or getting murdered, or getting raped, or getting tortured, or getting robbed or any other number of the horrible things that happen to people all of the time. I got robbed one time; I didn't have any cash on me, but the motherfuckers took my bus pass. Did losing a 60 dollar bus pass somehow improve my station in life? Has inserting an unfair emotional bias against native Americans into my psyche made the world a better place, somehow?
You're drowning Orwellian doublethink. Well, that and you're a liar. How would not having an incredibly negative experience somehow prevent you from 'fully experiencing' the better parts of life? I presume you're aware that experiencing the better parts of life is, at the end of the day, just a matter of receiving the proper dosage of reward chemicals from your brain?
You pretty much always have access to those, no matter how rough a life you've had or not had.
It's been my experience that people for whom life has been "easy" tend not to get out all that much. They might die a nice, peaceful death, but they seldom say "I've lived a full and rewarding life and I'm ready for an extended vacation." My grandfather, the one I stood by while he died at my feet, had Malaria twice in his life. He could have moved back to Canada (and stayed there) after the first time, but he didn't. He went back to South America and did what he enjoyed doing. When he retired from the clergy, he found other things to do, including the things that kept landing him back in the hospital.
Yeah. Bill Gates never fucking gets out, and Tom Hanks is practically chained to those Beverly Hills.
You should read more books than what Rick Warren publishes.
If creating something out of nothing is logically impossible, then you have done yourself a disservice, as what would the scientific explanation involve? If the energy that existed was eternal, then all I have to do to alleviate the pressure on the logical impossibility of something from nothing; is say that God created the universe out of Himself - just as the energy condensed the universe out of itself in the scientific explanation.
And here it is. One more fucking time, we get someone who has no idea what the current scientific consensus is regarding the Big Bang theory pretending that they not only know it intimately enough to discredit it, but that somehow it's equally valid to posit a magical entity just conjuring the universe into being.
There is no scientific theory supporting the idea that, 'the energy was eternal'. We don't know at all, right now, what happened prior to the expanse of space and time. We probably never will, as all of our points of reference for measuring anything are non fucking existent prior to the expansion of the universe.
It's dishonest to take that observation ("We don't know what happened prior to the expansion of space time" ) and then posit the conclusion, "Oh, that probably means the deity described in one specific text written in the Iron Age Persian Gulf must have made the expansion of space time happen." It's just like the folks who took the observation that Venus's surface couldn't be seen and concluded that there must be swamps and dinosaurs on the planet.
Occam's razor works well with scientific explanations, but how would you apply it to the ethics, or free will? Simplest is not always best when it comes to abortion etc., therefore both your points above are irrelevant to this debate.
Yeah. Because ethics and behavior can't be scientifically examined and mathematically modeled into fields of study like Game Theory.
Oh, wait.
How does God make the field of ethics any clearer, anyway? How do you know that what a deity has told you to do is actually good? Like, with regards to abortion, since you brought it up - it's just a matter of God telling you it's bad, and that's that?
Gotta love that 'free will' your deity gave you, eh?
No, because the answer ("Ignorance" and "Superstition" ) was known as the answer to that question for about the last 3,800 years of Jewish history. Or if you prefer, "Abrahamic Religion History".Are you planning to deal with your logical fallacy or do I just declare "Victory" and move on? I realize a woman calling a man out on his seriously bogus reasoning is akin to holding a machete next to your penis and threatening to use it, but please try to be consistent and address the logical fallacy in this "God doesn't fit my definition of god, therefore god doesn't exist" argument you've constructed.
wat
I prefer the term 'iron age history', as that pretty accurately reflects the time period. In any case, Greek and Egyptian non-sun Gods predated Yahweh by centuries; it's not like the Jews in the fucking desert were the first one to conjure-up an anthropomorphic deity with awesome powers to explain stuff they saw.
The sky looks all blue and glassy. Well, Yahweh must've put a dome (or firmament) over it. The ground is solid and never tips or budges, no matter how hard you press against it or jump down it it. Yahweh must've put some impressive pillar supports under it. There's some glowing dots in the sky that come out at night. Yahweh must've put them there so we could get into wrestling matches with them later.
I'll refrain from calling the iron age Jews idiots because, well, they were just following the status quo and making shit up. They have the excuse that science hadn't et come of age.
So, what's your fucking excuse?
"Natasha has just come up to the window from the courtyard and opened it wider so that the air may enter more freely into my room. I can see the bright green strip of grass beneath the wall, and the clear blue sky above the wall, and sunlight everywhere. Life is beautiful. Let the future generations cleanse it of all evil, oppression and violence, and enjoy it to the full."
- Leon Trotsky, Last Will & Testament
February 27, 1940
- Login to post comments
Offline Since we are on the topic, there are other fallacies that may be relevant to the topic. Excessive emotive force is a fallacy as well - its called an appeal to pity, as it does not address an argument, rather it provides psychological pressure (rhetoric) to accept a given conclusion. Since we are in the realm of death and pain, it is very easy to straddle the line between a logical argument, and committing any number of informal fallacies.
I also had read about the appeal to pity fallacy, and that it is a fallacy of irrelevance. I would contend that when discussing suffering and death, the depths and reality of pain (physical, emotional and psychological) is relevant. It is when theologians deny the reality or importance of real suffering, that bringing them into touch with the world of reality is a relevant part of a discussion. If doing so evokes an emotional response, then perhaps those emotions have some relevance in the discussion.
(edit spelling)
Quote:That doesn't mean i can't logically decide to give up trusting god. A god I can't trust or respect is no god I am interested in.Explain.
Quote:And once I've given up trusting god, I can evaluate why I should believe in a god. Considering this possibility is not something I could objectively do while trusting god.Why do you have to give up trust to evaluate something? Is there any reasoning behind this statement? According to Judaism, the very word for "prayer" roughly translates as "Struggling with". This supports the opposite of what you are putting forth.
One cannot simultaneously trust and mistrust something. Since trust requires a force of will (also known as 'faith'), one cannot objectively mistrust that thing - lets call it Vince - while still maintaining by force of will trust in Vince. One can justify Vince's behavior or lack of it (theodicity), ask Vince for answers, and ask for wisdom to better understand Vince. While maintaining trust in Vince, you will only be able to absorb answers that support your trust in Vince, while explanations that would suggest your trust is misplaced are rejected. Because you trust Vince. As a choice.
So once I decided that I would try out not trusting god, given god's apparent failure to live up to my expectations, I was able to look at the situation objectively. I had no trust in anything at that point, on a trial basis.
Quote:Is it a logical impossibility for an omnipotent God to alter the course of this particular instance of disease, or cause treatments to be effective in eradicating the disease?Perhaps if I knew which particular cancer you were referring to, it would help to understand whether it was lifestyle related some time ago.
www.macmillan.org.uk/Cancerinformation/Cancertypes/Brain/Typesofbraintumours/Ependymoma.aspx
There are many cancers with genetic predispositions and this may be one of them. There is no logical impossibility problem, since it is not necessary to override anyone's will. If god is all-powerful (omnipotent), then believers would expect some respite from the misery of their situations when tragedy does strike.
I realize there are no satisfactory answers for this situation involving god. This is why I stopped looking for them.
I don't know how to answer this without sounding insincere. It is hard to have a "character" without some sort of trial or tribulation (Swinburne, "Epistemic Distance" ). Prima facie, Natural Evil enables virtues and vices, arguably components of a 'character". Another point is, it is not always for the sufferer that suffering occurs. I remember someone saying that bearing an illness greatly inspires others. Traditionally it is said that natural evil "provides the means by which we learn about our universe, and how to make a difference".
Quote:Tell me why I should place my trust and faith in god, given what has happenedThe above sounds like an appeal to pity - there is nothing I can say other than I am sorry for your loss.
Quote:Tell me why I should give my money to the 'body of christ', rather than using it to support my family.I never said give the church money. - what would God want with currency?
I'll try to make that line of thought relevant to the discussion. The institutions of all religions rely heavily on the donations and hard work of believers, who receive negligible compensation in this life. If believers do not have reason to trust that god has a sympathetic interest in their personal lives, they will generally redirect their personal resources (money and time). It may go toward the longterm welfare and happiness of themselves, their families and their friends. It may go toward less laudable experiences. It's not my place to dictate how people use their personal resources.
"There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must do it because Conscience tells him it is right." Martin Luther King
- Login to post comments
Offline This was one of my favorite hymns. Alas I couldn't even sing it now. Even though I love the song.
"Great is thy faithfulness," O God my Father,
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions they fail not;
As Thou hast been Thou forever wilt be.
"Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!"
Morning by morning new mercies I see;
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided --
"Great is Thy faithfulness,"
Lord, unto me.
Can I have a go at another analogy?
How about a fire station. You live in a town with a fire station and support the fire station. Taxes, fund raisers, etc. You do everything for the heroes at the fire station, since they will protect you. But you can't doubt the fire station, or they won't come. Ever. So you believe as best you can. Your safety depends on it.
So one day you have a fire. You call the fire station and leave a message. Many messages. And noone comes. Your child dies in spite of your best efforts. This is very strange. You start to get suspicious, in addition to being very upset and angry. Why didn't they come. So you start to check out the place a bit. Funny. There's no fire truck. There's only a facade that looks like a fire station with a picture of a fire truck on the window.
You ask the representatives for the fire station why noone came when you needed help and are forwarded to their complaints department. There are various excuses. Like 'You didn't believe in it enough'; you should not have expected their help, as you are responsible for your own fires; you must have done something to anger the firemen; someone in your household must have chosen to start the fire'. And then there's the resounding silence of the 'there's no answer' reply. Oh, and the the fire station is only visible through the eyes of faith and you cannot examine it so closely. Hmmm.
So then you start to wonder how this con works. All this money going to the fire station is really only benefitting people by making them feel protected? Should I not warn people that they have no fire protection and they will have to protect their households and neighbors as best they can. Would I like to go back to feeling protected? Not if it is an illusion.
"There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must do it because Conscience tells him it is right." Martin Luther King
- Login to post comments
Offline @Jumbo:
I'm confused, are you saying that there is no human suffering that is not a result of human action? Because...well, I guess if you are I just get to write you off as a nutjob.
@Furry:
Your argument against me bitching at Jumbo seems to boil down to, "We can't know what an omnimax God would think or do so you can't discuss or criticize it, we just have to have faith that the world is the way it is for a reason." Is that about right?
I am 100% with Bob, none of this crap is needed if you assume the universe operates without external influence or non-material laws. Once you create a God you have to ask "Why" about everything, because "How" is impossible to answer, and these questions don't even seem to have a rational, internally consistent "Why" to offer up when you drill down into them. So why not abandon the concept?
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
- Login to post comments
Offline www.macmillan.org.uk/Cancerinformation/Cancertypes/Brain/Typesofbraintumours/Ependymoma.aspx
There are many cancers with genetic predispositions and this may be one of them. There is no logical impossibility problem, since it is not necessary to override anyone's will. If god is all-powerful (omnipotent), then believers would expect some respite from the misery of their situations when tragedy does strike.I realize there are no satisfactory answers for this situation involving god. This is why I stopped looking for them.
I wish I could offer something, but I have nothing. Disease is a terrible thing. I sometimes take God out of the picture to gain clarity on such a horrible topic as suffering. Many Christians would shun me for even saying that, but I wonder - in the face of severe suffering - whether they would do the same. I read a book entitled "Fear No Evil", written by Dave Watson - a pastor who was diagnosed with (what turned out to be terminal) cancer. It is a very real insight into the questions one asks about God while their body slowly decays.
Personally, I have never suffered to any extent - but I have held a dying man in my arms as I've made futile attempts at saving his life. It's strange, I can't even remeber his name, but I can remember ever so clearly what I was thinking.
I still believe in God.
- Login to post comments
Offline FurryCatHerder, you obviously use a computer.
Therefore you are relying in every post on the FACT that "logic works".
Yes, Bobby. I rely on the "FACT" that Logic works every time I use a computer. I also rely on the "FACT" that I need to fix a broken mutex in a piece of Java comm code I'm writing before I get out for coffee. Google "mutex". Lemme know what you learn about my skills since I obviously "use a computer".
And on a lot of other things I believe in, as a "worshipper" of the honest pursuit of truth about the universe, AKA Science, as distinct from what I don't believe in ( 'God' ).It seems like we will never connect on this, or other issues...
Pity.
Bobby, we will never "connect" on this because you're dishonest and have no ethical values worth squat. There is a thing called a "Rhetorical Question". When I ask you a ... rhetorical question ... about a field of science that you just don't understand, my ... Rhetorical Question ... isn't an invitation for you to make a fool of yourself. It's usually an invitation for you to consider that perhaps -- just maybe -- trying to use the 2nd Law to argue the existence (or not) of G-d is a BAD IDEA.
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline You have a religion -- Atheism -- and you worship a god -- your beliefs about "logic" and what you think you can do with "logic". It's a pretty nice god you've got there, it's just not good for much of anything.
Ugh...
I've asked for definitions for "religion" and "God" from you before, but you just said that it was against your religion. I find that to be extremely frustrating and suspiciously convenient.
I'm curious as to how you determine whether something is a God/religion or not without any working definitions. It seems...impossible. Could it be that you're allowed to have precise definitions, but you're not allowed to inform others about these definitions?
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
- Login to post comments
Offline Guess what? Life on Earth isn't like an episode of the Care Bears. The worst fates you can have the misfortune of running into are considerably worse than throwing a gutter ball and missing your spare.
Yup, and you want G-d to have created a universe in which there is some upper limit, and that upper limit is pretty low. You want to be able to explore the universe in your pajamas, presumably by hopping on some explorermobile and going for a jaunt, maybe walk on the surface of a black hole and marvel at the absolute flatness of neutron degenerate matter on such unimaginably high levels of gravity. Gravity that doesn't affect your magical explorermobile or rip your Care Bears pajamas from your body and crush them.
Quote:ARGH! STUPID PEOPLE!How many of you still live at home with your parents? How many of you still allow your parents to make all of your decisions? How many of you would allow your parents to interfere in your life each and every time something even remotely "dangerous" happened?
Replace "parents" with "G-d" and tell me that you'd really want G-d treating you like some kind of child who doesn't know what they are doing or can't be responsible for their own life.
God-as-puppet-master is just as horrible as god-as-super-nanny. If you don't believe in G-d because G-d doesn't give you free ponies or keep you from getting an ouwie when you fall down, you've got bigger problems than you imagine. Since most children eventually up and leave the protective cocoon of their parents' home, I can only assume that being protected and smothered all the time is not really part of the plan. And I don't think it's part of the plan whether G-d does or doesn't exist. Because Theist and Atheist kids alike all seem to agree that being able to make ones own mistakes and suffer the consequences, or enjoy the rewards, is a good way to be an adult.
So all these "omnibenevolent" arguments are bogus. And they are bogus whether or not G-d exists, which is usually the best way to determine that an argument about G-d is or isn't valid.
Well, I do still live with my parents, so you sure got me there. I'm pretty stupid, too (though smarter than to try and analogize human suffering with throwing gutter balls during a game of bowling).
Let's leave the 'free will' bullshit out of this for now. God made everything, according to you, right? And he could've made it any way he wanted to, right?
Yup. And pretty much has the same kind of free-ranging choices that many parents have with the children they raise. Make life a happy-fun-time and they learn nothing, or expose them to limited risks which increase with age and maturity, or toss them out on the street to fend for themselves or die.
Quote:I'm not the least bit "sorry" for what I've been through, which has been rather significant. It's made me be the person I am today. I can TELL people what I've been through, and a lot of them gasp, and some of them would rather not know the details, but my perceptions of the world around me, of human nature, human suffering, the "Universal Brotherhood of Man" -- these all come from what have been, in my lifetime, some really crappy experiences. On the flip side, the opportunities for fully engaging the world all come from those crappy experiences. I never thought sleeping in a rat infested house was going to be "enjoyable" (I'm an upper-middle class geek), and long since got past the need to be "poor", but having had that experience, other opportunities are available in ways they'd not be -- if I'd never done that.@ lolz
You've been raped, you've slept in a rat infested house, you've endured harrowing hardships that have reduced others to gasps of despair for your tribulations at their mere mention.
Yeah. And I was born with six penises protruding from my forehead.
I hope you had them removed. Because, uh, yeah -- ages 12, 14, 17. Perps were older brother, friend of his, friend of a friend. I was "saved" at age 14 after 2 solid years of being chronically suicidal between Rape #1 and rape #2. A nice Christian couple actually gave a damn about me.
Rat infested houses? Lower Ninth Ward, New Orleans LA, off and on from about December 2005 until May or June 2007. Don't have photos of the rats, but can tell fun stories about how the mother of a cat I rescued used to bring me dead rats in the morning as "presents". Cats are stupid that way, but very endearing. Her name was "Rat Cat", her daughter was named "Scrapper". Scrapper's dead body (Feline Leukemia) is fertilizing trees in my back yard. The circle of life just keeps on circling.
It's pretty fucking disgusting to pretend you know what 'real hardship' is so you can downplay it or make it seem more palettable. This reminds me of the retarded "Bootstraps!" talk so often uttered by Republicans in freshly dry cleaned suits, right after they were done emptying their load into one mistress or another.
I'm not downplaying it, I'm pointing out that what is horrible to you, isn't horrible to others. When I was doing Katrina relief I ran into people who'd grown up with a silver spoon in their mouth. Being forced to sleep in a convention center with 8,000 other displaced people was absolute horror to them. In your magical fantasy universe, every gets to live in a luxury hotel? But because everyone doesn't, you hate G-d?
Guess what? Nobody is 'better' after getting paralyzed for life, or getting HIV, or getting murdered, or getting raped, or getting tortured, or getting robbed or any other number of the horrible things that happen to people all of the time. I got robbed one time; I didn't have any cash on me, but the motherfuckers took my bus pass. Did losing a 60 dollar bus pass somehow improve my station in life? Has inserting an unfair emotional bias against native Americans into my psyche made the world a better place, somehow?
They took your bus pass? So, in your magical fantasy universe, everyone gets a free bus pass, lives in a luxury hotel, and can talk on the surface of a black hole without losing their PJs.
You're drowning Orwellian doublethink. Well, that and you're a liar. How would not having an incredibly negative experience somehow prevent you from 'fully experiencing' the better parts of life? I presume you're aware that experiencing the better parts of life is, at the end of the day, just a matter of receiving the proper dosage of reward chemicals from your brain?
Yes, I'm well aware that we all live inside our skulls and that "pleasure" and "pain" are just different neurochemicals impinging upon different receptors. I'm also aware that having had a suck-ass life as a kid that what is "good" and "bad" is relative to what one has experienced as "good" and "bad". The rich people who didn't want to have to sleep with 8,000 other smelly displaced Katrina victims had the same exact experience in the moment as the poor people who'd literally lost EVERYTHING, but didn't expect free-ponies-from-heaven-god to give them a luxury hotel room for the rest of their life. Having had such a suck-ass life as a kid that my experiences had me praying I'd die before I woke up the next day -- and I did that just about every night for two solid years -- has taught me that life is relative. So, no. I'm glad I learned that lesson. It was an expensive and painful lesson, but it's allowed me to do things like sleep in rat infested houses so that people who were screwed by the Army Corp of Engineers might have a chance at having a life.
You pretty much always have access to those, no matter how rough a life you've had or not had.
I wish that were true, but we're CONDITIONED creatures. Which is how I can tell that Mommy and Daddy probably lead a pretty middle to upper-middle class existence in your household. Though the "They stole my $60 bus pass!" comment was a big clue.
Quote:It's been my experience that people for whom life has been "easy" tend not to get out all that much. They might die a nice, peaceful death, but they seldom say "I've lived a full and rewarding life and I'm ready for an extended vacation." My grandfather, the one I stood by while he died at my feet, had Malaria twice in his life. He could have moved back to Canada (and stayed there) after the first time, but he didn't. He went back to South America and did what he enjoyed doing. When he retired from the clergy, he found other things to do, including the things that kept landing him back in the hospital.Yeah. Bill Gates never fucking gets out, and Tom Hanks is practically chained to those Beverly Hills.
I actually know a billionaire or two. I've met their kids. I've listened to their kids speak from such positions of absolute complete and total privilege that most of the people I spoke to afterward were shocked at how clueless their kids are. Sort of like you and the horror of losing a $60 bus pass.
Quote:No, because the answer ("Ignorance" and "Superstition" ) was known as the answer to that question for about the last 3,800 years of Jewish history. Or if you prefer, "Abrahamic Religion History".Are you planning to deal with your logical fallacy or do I just declare "Victory" and move on? I realize a woman calling a man out on his seriously bogus reasoning is akin to holding a machete next to your penis and threatening to use it, but please try to be consistent and address the logical fallacy in this "God doesn't fit my definition of god, therefore god doesn't exist" argument you've constructed.
wat
I prefer the term 'iron age history', as that pretty accurately reflects the time period. In any case, Greek and Egyptian non-sun Gods predated Yahweh by centuries; it's not like the Jews in the fucking desert were the first one to conjure-up an anthropomorphic deity with awesome powers to explain stuff they saw.
I asked a simple question. Your argument appears to be based superficially on the observation that you got your bus pass stolen and G-d didn't keep that from happening. That's the fallacy of "Begging The Conclusion" -- you've decided that a "real" G-d would have kept you from having your bus pass stolen, but super-protector-nanny-god didn't, therefore there's not such thing as "G-d".
The sky looks all blue and glassy. Well, Yahweh must've put a dome (or firmament) over it. The ground is solid and never tips or budges, no matter how hard you press against it or jump down it it. Yahweh must've put some impressive pillar supports under it. There's some glowing dots in the sky that come out at night. Yahweh must've put them there so we could get into wrestling matches with them later.
You think you can do better in 8 words when explaining the sky to a Bronze Age people? Do you start with "what is an atmosphere" or "why gravity keeps the air on the planet" or "the sky is blue because of the emission spectrum of the gasses which make up the atmosphere." Where do you start, in your 8 word quest to re-write Gen 1:8 so it is "scientifically accurate". You've got 8 words. Go! And remember -- your target audience is Bronze Age people.
So, what's your fucking excuse?
Don't have or need one. I don't live with my parents (both of whom are deceased, so that would be gross), and I don't think that G-d needs to give me some kind of lap-of-luxury-life.
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline FurryCatHerder wrote:You have a religion -- Atheism -- and you worship a god -- your beliefs about "logic" and what you think you can do with "logic". It's a pretty nice god you've got there, it's just not good for much of anything.Ugh...
I've asked for definitions for "religion" and "God" from you before, but you just said that it was against your religion. I find that to be extremely frustrating and suspiciously convenient.
I'm curious as to how you determine whether something is a God/religion or not without any working definitions. It seems...impossible. Could it be that you're allowed to have precise definitions, but you're not allowed to inform others about these definitions?
Defining G-d limits G-d. As soon as you say "G-d is Good" (what Christians say), you've negated "G-d is Bad". It's a human problem with definitions, they create limitations on the thing being defined. Look at my argument with Kevin-what's-his-name (the guy born with 6 penises on his head). He's defined god as some kind of free-ponies-from-heaven-life-is-always-safe kinda deity and because he got his bus pass stolen, he is an Atheist. Glad I never got =my= bus pass stolen.
Why do I say that Atheism is a religion? Because I look at a website like this, with all the dogma about "Atheism" and having belonged to a religion or two, it looks like a religion. I've done, and still do, a lot of computer programming. I think Windows is miserable, but I don't have an entire website dedicated to me and my friends talking about why Windows is horrible and how anyone who believes in Bill Gates is an idiot, even though no one can PROVE Windows is a pathetic excuse for an operating system and Bill Gates is utterly evil.
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline Kevin R Brown wrote:Guess what? Life on Earth isn't like an episode of the Care Bears. The worst fates you can have the misfortune of running into are considerably worse than throwing a gutter ball and missing your spare.
Yup, and you want G-d to have created a universe in which there is some upper limit, and that upper limit is pretty low. You want to be able to explore the universe in your pajamas, presumably by hopping on some explorermobile and going for a jaunt, maybe walk on the surface of a black hole and marvel at the absolute flatness of neutron degenerate matter on such unimaginably high levels of gravity. Gravity that doesn't affect your magical explorermobile or rip your Care Bears pajamas from your body and crush them.
Kevin R Brown wrote:Quote:ARGH! STUPID PEOPLE!How many of you still live at home with your parents? How many of you still allow your parents to make all of your decisions? How many of you would allow your parents to interfere in your life each and every time something even remotely "dangerous" happened?
Replace "parents" with "G-d" and tell me that you'd really want G-d treating you like some kind of child who doesn't know what they are doing or can't be responsible for their own life.
God-as-puppet-master is just as horrible as god-as-super-nanny. If you don't believe in G-d because G-d doesn't give you free ponies or keep you from getting an ouwie when you fall down, you've got bigger problems than you imagine. Since most children eventually up and leave the protective cocoon of their parents' home, I can only assume that being protected and smothered all the time is not really part of the plan. And I don't think it's part of the plan whether G-d does or doesn't exist. Because Theist and Atheist kids alike all seem to agree that being able to make ones own mistakes and suffer the consequences, or enjoy the rewards, is a good way to be an adult.
So all these "omnibenevolent" arguments are bogus. And they are bogus whether or not G-d exists, which is usually the best way to determine that an argument about G-d is or isn't valid.
Well, I do still live with my parents, so you sure got me there. I'm pretty stupid, too (though smarter than to try and analogize human suffering with throwing gutter balls during a game of bowling).
Let's leave the 'free will' bullshit out of this for now. God made everything, according to you, right? And he could've made it any way he wanted to, right?
Yup. And pretty much has the same kind of free-ranging choices that many parents have with the children they raise. Make life a happy-fun-time and they learn nothing, or expose them to limited risks which increase with age and maturity, or toss them out on the street to fend for themselves or die.
Kevin R Brown wrote:Quote:I'm not the least bit "sorry" for what I've been through, which has been rather significant. It's made me be the person I am today. I can TELL people what I've been through, and a lot of them gasp, and some of them would rather not know the details, but my perceptions of the world around me, of human nature, human suffering, the "Universal Brotherhood of Man" -- these all come from what have been, in my lifetime, some really crappy experiences. On the flip side, the opportunities for fully engaging the world all come from those crappy experiences. I never thought sleeping in a rat infested house was going to be "enjoyable" (I'm an upper-middle class geek), and long since got past the need to be "poor", but having had that experience, other opportunities are available in ways they'd not be -- if I'd never done that.@ lolz
You've been raped, you've slept in a rat infested house, you've endured harrowing hardships that have reduced others to gasps of despair for your tribulations at their mere mention.
Yeah. And I was born with six penises protruding from my forehead.
I hope you had them removed. Because, uh, yeah -- ages 12, 14, 17. Perps were older brother, friend of his, friend of a friend. I was "saved" at age 14 after 2 solid years of being chronically suicidal between Rape #1 and rape #2. A nice Christian couple actually gave a damn about me.
Rat infested houses? Lower Ninth Ward, New Orleans LA, off and on from about December 2005 until May or June 2007. Don't have photos of the rats, but can tell fun stories about how the mother of a cat I rescued used to bring me dead rats in the morning as "presents". Cats are stupid that way, but very endearing. Her name was "Rat Cat", her daughter was named "Scrapper". Scrapper's dead body (Feline Leukemia) is fertilizing trees in my back yard. The circle of life just keeps on circling.
Kevin R Brown wrote:It's pretty fucking disgusting to pretend you know what 'real hardship' is so you can downplay it or make it seem more palettable. This reminds me of the retarded "Bootstraps!" talk so often uttered by Republicans in freshly dry cleaned suits, right after they were done emptying their load into one mistress or another.I'm not downplaying it, I'm pointing out that what is horrible to you, isn't horrible to others. When I was doing Katrina relief I ran into people who'd grown up with a silver spoon in their mouth. Being forced to sleep in a convention center with 8,000 other displaced people was absolute horror to them. In your magical fantasy universe, every gets to live in a luxury hotel? But because everyone doesn't, you hate G-d?
Kevin R Brown wrote:Guess what? Nobody is 'better' after getting paralyzed for life, or getting HIV, or getting murdered, or getting raped, or getting tortured, or getting robbed or any other number of the horrible things that happen to people all of the time. I got robbed one time; I didn't have any cash on me, but the motherfuckers took my bus pass. Did losing a 60 dollar bus pass somehow improve my station in life? Has inserting an unfair emotional bias against native Americans into my psyche made the world a better place, somehow?They took your bus pass? So, in your magical fantasy universe, everyone gets a free bus pass, lives in a luxury hotel, and can talk on the surface of a black hole without losing their PJs.
Kevin R Brown wrote:You're drowning Orwellian doublethink. Well, that and you're a liar. How would not having an incredibly negative experience somehow prevent you from 'fully experiencing' the better parts of life? I presume you're aware that experiencing the better parts of life is, at the end of the day, just a matter of receiving the proper dosage of reward chemicals from your brain?Yes, I'm well aware that we all live inside our skulls and that "pleasure" and "pain" are just different neurochemicals impinging upon different receptors. I'm also aware that having had a suck-ass life as a kid that what is "good" and "bad" is relative to what one has experienced as "good" and "bad". The rich people who didn't want to have to sleep with 8,000 other smelly displaced Katrina victims had the same exact experience in the moment as the poor people who'd literally lost EVERYTHING, but didn't expect free-ponies-from-heaven-god to give them a luxury hotel room for the rest of their life. Having had such a suck-ass life as a kid that my experiences had me praying I'd die before I woke up the next day -- and I did that just about every night for two solid years -- has taught me that life is relative. So, no. I'm glad I learned that lesson. It was an expensive and painful lesson, but it's allowed me to do things like sleep in rat infested houses so that people who were screwed by the Army Corp of Engineers might have a chance at having a life.
Kevin R Brown wrote:You pretty much always have access to those, no matter how rough a life you've had or not had.I wish that were true, but we're CONDITIONED creatures. Which is how I can tell that Mommy and Daddy probably lead a pretty middle to upper-middle class existence in your household. Though the "They stole my $60 bus pass!" comment was a big clue.
Kevin R Brown wrote:Quote:It's been my experience that people for whom life has been "easy" tend not to get out all that much. They might die a nice, peaceful death, but they seldom say "I've lived a full and rewarding life and I'm ready for an extended vacation." My grandfather, the one I stood by while he died at my feet, had Malaria twice in his life. He could have moved back to Canada (and stayed there) after the first time, but he didn't. He went back to South America and did what he enjoyed doing. When he retired from the clergy, he found other things to do, including the things that kept landing him back in the hospital.Yeah. Bill Gates never fucking gets out, and Tom Hanks is practically chained to those Beverly Hills.
I actually know a billionaire or two. I've met their kids. I've listened to their kids speak from such positions of absolute complete and total privilege that most of the people I spoke to afterward were shocked at how clueless their kids are. Sort of like you and the horror of losing a $60 bus pass.
Kevin R Brown wrote:Quote:No, because the answer ("Ignorance" and "Superstition" ) was known as the answer to that question for about the last 3,800 years of Jewish history. Or if you prefer, "Abrahamic Religion History".Are you planning to deal with your logical fallacy or do I just declare "Victory" and move on? I realize a woman calling a man out on his seriously bogus reasoning is akin to holding a machete next to your penis and threatening to use it, but please try to be consistent and address the logical fallacy in this "God doesn't fit my definition of god, therefore god doesn't exist" argument you've constructed.
wat
I prefer the term 'iron age history', as that pretty accurately reflects the time period. In any case, Greek and Egyptian non-sun Gods predated Yahweh by centuries; it's not like the Jews in the fucking desert were the first one to conjure-up an anthropomorphic deity with awesome powers to explain stuff they saw.
I asked a simple question. Your argument appears to be based superficially on the observation that you got your bus pass stolen and G-d didn't keep that from happening. That's the fallacy of "Begging The Conclusion" -- you've decided that a "real" G-d would have kept you from having your bus pass stolen, but super-protector-nanny-god didn't, therefore there's not such thing as "G-d".
Kevin R Brown wrote:The sky looks all blue and glassy. Well, Yahweh must've put a dome (or firmament) over it. The ground is solid and never tips or budges, no matter how hard you press against it or jump down it it. Yahweh must've put some impressive pillar supports under it. There's some glowing dots in the sky that come out at night. Yahweh must've put them there so we could get into wrestling matches with them later.You think you can do better in 8 words when explaining the sky to a Bronze Age people? Do you start with "what is an atmosphere" or "why gravity keeps the air on the planet" or "the sky is blue because of the emission spectrum of the gasses which make up the atmosphere." Where do you start, in your 8 word quest to re-write Gen 1:8 so it is "scientifically accurate". You've got 8 words. Go! And remember -- your target audience is Bronze Age people.
Kevin R Brown wrote:So, what's your fucking excuse?Don't have or need one. I don't live with my parents (both of whom are deceased, so that would be gross), and I don't think that G-d needs to give me some kind of lap-of-luxury-life.
"Into every life a little rain must fall."
What is G-d's purpose behind all this suffering ? Some of us will endure, others will not. What does it matter to G-d ?
- Login to post comments
Offline BobSpence1 wrote:FurryCatHerder, you obviously use a computer.
Therefore you are relying in every post on the FACT that "logic works".
Yes, Bobby. I rely on the "FACT" that Logic works every time I use a computer. I also rely on the "FACT" that I need to fix a broken mutex in a piece of Java comm code I'm writing before I get out for coffee. Google "mutex". Lemme know what you learn about my skills since I obviously "use a computer".
BobSpence1 wrote:And on a lot of other things I believe in, as a "worshipper" of the honest pursuit of truth about the universe, AKA Science, as distinct from what I don't believe in ( 'God' ).It seems like we will never connect on this, or other issues...
Pity.
Bobby, we will never "connect" on this because you're dishonest and have no ethical values worth squat. There is a thing called a "Rhetorical Question". When I ask you a ... rhetorical question ... about a field of science that you just don't understand, my ... Rhetorical Question ... isn't an invitation for you to make a fool of yourself. It's usually an invitation for you to consider that perhaps -- just maybe -- trying to use the 2nd Law to argue the existence (or not) of G-d is a BAD IDEA.
What is it with you and your determination to respond to honest queries with insult and ignorant presumptions about me, what I know, what I think, etc.
I have never remotely attacked you in such a way.
I have never made any conclusions or assumptions about your skills in any specific area, apart from your demonstrated gross deficiency in understanding or 'reading' other people and what they may actually be thinking or believe.
And you seem very averse to making any honest concessions that you may have misread something I have said, or may have not stated something something clearly enough to get your ideas across. Instead you jump on any arguably less than exhaustively defined and specified account of a scientific theory and its application on my part as demonstrating my total lack of understanding of it...
And then when I simply attempt to clarify what I meant, I am "back-pedalling".
Where have I been dishonest?
How the hell do you deduce I have "no ethical values worth squat"??
I understand Thermodynamics, Cosmology, Physics, and even written "CreateMutexEx" several times as part of my work programming apps on Windows. Are you trying to impress me with that bit of irrelevance? I am currently wrestling with CSS, Javascript, AJAX, PHP, DHTML, etc to develop a Web app for iPhone. Have you written an export plugin for Illustrator, or a template class for C++, involving pointers to member functions? Do you realize how your confident assumption that computer programming concepts would be beyond such an "idiot" as me makes you appear to me? You must be quite fit with all the jumping to conclusions you do at the slightest excuse.
For what its worth, the generalisation of the Second Law beyond explicit flows of thermal energy and "work" into information theory can be applied to many more things than simply chunks of macro-scale matter.
Spontaneous emergence of ordered structure requires a flow of available energy, ie a flow of energy from a more organized state to a less organized state, from a state where there are regions of concentrated and less concentrated energy, such as objects hotter than their surroundings, to a state where energy is uniformly distributed, as envisaged in the "heat death".
The insight that saw the correspondence between the flow of energy in the form of "heat" and "work", and the transfer of "information" as in Shannon's work was quite profound. This is what allows the Second Law to be at least plausibly applied to much more abstract ideas, not tied to our particular physical universe of matter and energy.
We have strong justification for expecting sentience to require some very complex underlying structure, whatever substance or multi-dimensional or 'super-natural' analogue of underlying 'matter' you could imagine any conceivable 'entity' to be composed of. Once you are into organised structure , and the flow of 'information' which any form of 'thought' involves, you can apply the Second Law in some form.
If your concept of 'God' can't be mapped to this concept in any way, ie it either doesn't 'think' or process information in any way that corresponds to our understanding of such things, or is not structured in some complex form, is maybe some 'pure' will or awareness, you are into pure speculation, because we have the gone beyond anything we have any experience to base our ideas on, even in the most tenuous analogy.
Have ever considered the faint possibility that you may have made some BAD assumptions?
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline If you have no definition of 'G-d', in some form, you have just a collection of letters. You are talking utter bilge, crap, shit, whatever you want to call it.
You seem to be into this binary mode of thinking. If I seem to mis-apply the Second Law in some way, obviously I am an "idiot" who knows nothing about the subject.
Defining what we are referring to by the word "God", does not mean specifying it in every detail. It in no way "restricts" God.
I would agree that asserting that God has specific attributes could be objected to in that way.
But you still need some indication of what is being referred to. Even if it has to be by some indirect analogy, or even things like "God is that which ... " caused the universe to exist, or is the source of our morals, even if logically indefensible, IMHO, this still constitutes a form of definition, athough very vague and open-ended. To simply assert we can't define it is just dumb, or misunderstands what we mean by definition. We don't require a detailed, exhaustive definition, just something to distinguish it from the infinite number of other concepts in the universe of non-definition.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline FurryCatHerder wrote:Kevin R Brown wrote:So, what's your fucking excuse?Don't have or need one. I don't live with my parents (both of whom are deceased, so that would be gross), and I don't think that G-d needs to give me some kind of lap-of-luxury-life.
"Into every life a little rain must fall."
What is G-d's purpose behind all this suffering ? Some of us will endure, others will not. What does it matter to G-d ?
Who said it mattered to G-d?
What mattered to my parents was that I grew into a mature, responsible and decent adult human being capable of dealing with life as it came. Having had a sucky childhood -- and believe me, if I could have swallowed the blue pill and just magically absorbed all the horrible experiences and life lessons and had a happy childhood, I'd have done it -- made me who I am.
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline If you have no definition of 'G-d', in some form, you have just a collection of letters. You are talking utter bilge, crap, shit, whatever you want to call it.
Am I mis-reading this somehow? Because you've asked if there is a chance I am "misreading" something, and then you present me with this?
You seem to be into this binary mode of thinking. If I seem to mis-apply the Second Law in some way, obviously I am an "idiot" who knows nothing about the subject.
When someone basis an argument on flawed assumptions and asserts that their conclusions are valid, and then writes things like
If you have no definition of 'G-d', in some form, you have just a collection of letters. You are talking utter bilge, crap, shit, whatever you want to call it.
I'm not all that convinced the person has a clue.
Defining what we are referring to by the word "God", does not mean specifying it in every detail. It in no way "restricts" God.
And yet, all over this board are "disproofs" of G-d's existence based on your (plural) definitions of words like "omnipresent", "omniscient", "omnibenevolent". How are your (plural) definitions -- which you use so proudly to disprove G-d not ... limitations?
But you still need some indication of what is being referred to. Even if it has to be by some indirect analogy, or even things like "God is that which ... " caused the universe to exist, or is the source of our morals, even if logically indefensible, IMHO, this still constitutes a form of definition, athough very vague and open-ended. To simply assert we can't define it is just dumb, or misunderstands what we mean by definition. We don't require a detailed, exhaustive definition, just something to distinguish it from the infinite number of other concepts in the universe of non-definition.
Okay, I'll give you one. G-d created everything there ever was, is and will be.
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline Okay, I'll give you one. G-d created everything there ever was, is and will be.
Just out of curiosity, how can you create something that is not yet real, but will be at some point? For some reason reading the last part of that saying struck the metaphysical side of my brain lol
- Login to post comments
Offline
When someone basis an argument on flawed assumptions and asserts that their conclusions are valid, and then writes things like
Quote:Bob - If you have no definition of 'G-d', in some form, you have just a collection of letters. You are talking utter bilge, crap, shit, whatever you want to call it.I'm not all that convinced the person has a clue.
depends on god being real - something that's obviously quite clear to you but it's scarcely provable to the rest of us. I assume from what you're saying god for you exists in a manner
and way utterly beyond our comprehension with the proof of his existence reflected in the grandeur of the built universe - an argument so big and shiny we can hardly miss it.
But FurryCat, god must somehow intrude into our world or speculating anything whatever about him and his designs is fruitless unless we are just meant to sit around like teenagers
on cadet camp smoking our first joint and stargazing by the campfire, saying: "Maaaate look up there - woooow".
The idea of a vague god existing somewhere out of focus and at very low resolution does not work for me. It goes without saying that arguing about a first cause god who may or may
not exist in some vanishing way outside of anything we can ever prove is probably a waste of time and we should all go hug our mothers or something constructive.
I can understand why Bob wants more from god - so do I. Whether or not it's comprehensible to you, I want answers. I'm not going to worship a minute possibility.
Nor am I going to accept that your old religion somehow saw the truth 5000 years ago. They obviously came up with a cool theology based on the mysteries o the day but we are
immeasurably better informed. As far as I see it the rightness or to put it better, the possibility of the rightness of your position, depends entirely on us not knowing where the
universe came from and subsequently discovering that it had one and possibly multiple beginnings. This sounds like the god of gaps to me.
Then there's the fact judaism is hardly faith by remote control. It has rules and laws, and morality and stuff you have to do. Where did all that come from if not from men?
Did god really part the red sea and send plagues? Burning bushes, pillars of smoke? Exactly where does your need to believe begin and end - is it in the stars or back here on earth
with your nation's neat mythology?
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
- Login to post comments
Offline BobSpence1 wrote:If you have no definition of 'G-d', in some form, you have just a collection of letters. You are talking utter bilge, crap, shit, whatever you want to call it.
Am I mis-reading this somehow? Because you've asked if there is a chance I am "misreading" something, and then you present me with this?
You apparently are misreading, because what I said there is the bleeding obvious. A word without a definition is, by definition, meaningless. To assert anything else is nonsense.
I would apologise for my slightly intemperate language there, if you weren't so keen to throw the epithet "idiot" around as you do.
BobSpence1 wrote:You seem to be into this binary mode of thinking. If I seem to mis-apply the Second Law in some way, obviously I am an "idiot" who knows nothing about the subject.When someone basis an argument on flawed assumptions and asserts that their conclusions are valid, and then writes things like
Quote:If you have no definition of 'G-d', in some form, you have just a collection of letters. You are talking utter bilge, crap, shit, whatever you want to call it.I'm not all that convinced the person has a clue.
Did you read or understand the rest of what I wrote there? I pointed out that you were basing that assessment on your 'flawed assumptions' about the Second Law and what it could be applied to.
Even if you disagree with my argument, the intelligent response of someone aware of the limitations of human reasoning, including their own, would be to query the point of disagreement, and try to work out who was not 'getting it', rather than just assume that because my argument doesn't seem valid to you, I am obviously an "idiot".
It requires such arrogant confidence in the absolute correctness of all your views that would put the worst of the posters on this forum to shame. We rarely resort to such ad hominem until someone has made no attempt to address our arguments over an extended series of posts, despite a variety of different approaches.
If you don't have a definition of the words you use, you are talking nonsense, crap, etc. period.
Quote:Defining what we are referring to by the word "God", does not mean specifying it in every detail. It in no way "restricts" God.And yet, all over this board are "disproofs" of G-d's existence based on your (plural) definitions of words like "omnipresent", "omniscient", "omnibenevolent". How are your (plural) definitions -- which you use so proudly to disprove G-d not ... limitations?
We are showing the incoherence of trying to define God with those attributes. They are the ones using those terms to define their God. We are are therefore doing something much like you are doing here, pointing out the problems with the definitions, except that here you are assuming what you think are the definitions we have in mind.
Quote:But you still need some indication of what is being referred to. Even if it has to be by some indirect analogy, or even things like "God is that which ... " caused the universe to exist, or is the source of our morals, even if logically indefensible, IMHO, this still constitutes a form of definition, athough very vague and open-ended. To simply assert we can't define it is just dumb, or misunderstands what we mean by definition. We don't require a detailed, exhaustive definition, just something to distinguish it from the infinite number of other concepts in the universe of non-definition.Okay, I'll give you one. G-d created everything there ever was, is and will be.
At last, something a little more specific about what you think G-d is. We may be able to make a little progress in mutual understanding.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
- Login to post comments
Offline I understand Thermodynamics, Cosmology, Physics, and even written "CreateMutexEx" several times as part of my work programming apps on Windows. Are you trying to impress me with that bit of irrelevance? I am currently wrestling with CSS, Javascript, AJAX, PHP, DHTML, etc to develop a Web app for iPhone. Have you written an export plugin for Illustrator, or a template class for C++, involving pointers to member functions? Do you realize how your confident assumption that computer programming concepts would be beyond such an "idiot" as me makes you appear to me? You must be quite fit with all the jumping to conclusions you do at the slightest excuse.
No, I was trying to figure out how far you were going to go with this.
What I do care about is that you've felt like you are allowed mock and ridicule myself and others just because for some reason or other my brain is wired to believe in G-d.
"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."
- Login to post comments
Offline "Into every life a little rain must fall."
What is G-d's purpose behind all this suffering ? Some of us will endure, others will not. What does it matter to G-d ?
Who said it mattered to G-d?
What mattered to my parents was that I grew into a mature, responsible and decent adult human being capable of dealing with life as it came. Having had a sucky childhood -- and believe me, if I could have swallowed the blue pill and just magically absorbed all the horrible experiences and life lessons and had a happy childhood, I'd have done it -- made me who I am.
Of course, then none of it matters to G-d ? Excellent ! I'm catching on.G-d is simply peripheral ( non-essential ? ) ps, the quote function is f**ked up at the moment
- Login to post comments
Did God make him do it?
But seriously, of course Evil and Good are a matter of perspective. That is a large part of what I am saying. Maybe if you refine your question a little more... I think the answer is already explained further back.
Moving on:
The first half of your sentence contradicts the last, and it is an unsupported conclusion (G and E are irrelevant).
Then you concede that your machine produces more than just shoes, no?
"Creating Evil" and "Allowing Evil" mean two different things. Your supporting analogy for the former was a shoe making machine, which, when applied to the problem states that God (G) set in motion the universe (shoe making machine, M), which produces Evil (shoes, E). This assumes that M is entirely E. Your analogy states that the machine produces only shoes (evil), for how can a shoe-making machine produce half a shoe, or something other than shoes? The very fact that it is a "shoe making machine" (mutatis mutandis an "Evil making machine"
begs the question, or worse, provides no argument to accept the premise "Shoe making machine".
I have taken this one step further, and argued that in fact, M is capable of producing both E and C ("coffee" in the analogy, or "Good" in reality). Here is where free-will becomes relevant. If it were God controlling the universe (M), then humans do not have free-will. Using the analogy, if I were operating the Shoe-and-coffee machine, then I would be responsible for the shoes or coffee being produced, but I am not, because (presumably) God is controlling M.
To cut a long story short, I believe the operator of "M" is quite literally "U" (you, or Humans in general). In other words, U creates E or C, through M, not G.
I feel like I am in a one-man-band at the moment, so I'll wait for your reply.
@Jumbo
Your point seems fine if you assume that certain things are necessary for proper free will to exist, but the thing that gets me is why you would assume an omnimax God could not create a system that did not include unfair suffering. To claim God had to create unfocused 'evil' for 'good' to exist you have to restrain God's omnipotence don't you?
Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.
All this discussion continues to support the position that the idea of a God, especially an omnimax one, is the very opposite of an 'explanation' of existence/life/morality etc.
Just forget about God, and get serious.
Just on this issue, it is literally a 'no-brainer' to understand why there can be major 'unfair' suffering, AKA 'evil', in the world if it has arisen from unthinking natural forces interacting.
Ultimately, we can make more sense of these things, insofar as we can make any, by starting from current actual knowledge and understanding, and completely ignoring crap like Theology, and indeed most of the pointless uninformed speculation which passes for philosophy these days.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
The question is not "Does God Exist". "Just forget about God" may be an easy thing for you, but I would need a reason. "He doesn't Exist" is not a reason, that is a statement. Even if I gave up God, I would not be any more satisfied with "Something from nothing". Afortiori, I would be depressed as to the state of humanity, without a God.
God's omnipotence only requires that He do what is logically possible. The simple answer is that without a choice between good and evil, there is no such thing as free will. This should not quarantee the degree of evil we have become accoustomed to, though. I would need a definition of "unfair suffering", as I can only guess what you are referring to. If the question is meant to mean "Why do babies get diseases", then the ethics questions aforementioned become relevant. All I would need to do to show that God is possibly not responsible for natural evil, is find a single circumstance in which He possibly is not. Since God cannot change man's will, this single natural evil would have to be an act of will - something God cannot change without contradicting Himself (a logical impossibility).
Commonly, people use disease as an argument against free-will and suffering, and ultimately God. There are several responses, but I use AIDS as an example because it is uses "less speculation" (though still quite a bit).
The greatest number of AIDS carriers is in Africa. There is a stigma attached to the disease, meaning carriers are not forthcoming about their infection. The result is, children are born with AIDS. It is not an act of will for the baby (obviously) or the parents, but an act of omission. If the parents knowingly have AIDS (a lot don't, and you would have to ask yourself whether ignorance is bliss) and choose to conceive, are they - at least in part - responsible for the outcome, since it is an act of omission, a by-product of will (by wilfully witholding the information)? Then ask yourself whether developed coutries are doing everthing they can to alleviate the suffering in Africa. (At the time of writing, commonwealth funding for preventative measures have been slashed). There may not be a definitive answer to that question, but all I need to show is that it is possible that the result is an act of will. For those that would object to the existence of AIDS to begin with, remember that it may have eventuated from intercourse with animals - also an act of will.
If God is greater than His creation, then his uncaused existence is more of a "something from nothing" type problem than just the Universe. Eternally having "just existed" does not really avoid the principle problem - the simpler the presupposed pre-existing entity or substance, the smaller the difficulty. Therefore the "something from nothing" objection is infinitely more of a problem for the God explanation.
I know you have a difficulty with accepting the idea that God is now a totally unnecessary concept, but that is not an argument. Or is your inability to see that the fact that "without God" actually is a simpler, direct explanation for manner things such as the topic here, often expressed as "why bad things happen to good people", is a reason to trash the God idea.
So you will continue with your convoluted arguments trying to find ways to justify the nonsense that is God, rather than Occamming through to the world-view that short-circuits all this argument over why a hypothetical being with hypothetical attributes would pr would not allow or instigate various things.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
My arguments are not trying to prove the existence of God. Even IF God does not exist, it does not alleviate the pressure on humanity for the shit lives we are living, or the contradictions between power. Occam's razor works well with scientific explanations, but how would you apply it to the ethics, or free will? Simplest is not always best when it comes to abortion etc., therefore both your points above are irrelevant to this debate.
Start another thread if you want to talk existence.
I've been reading about logical fallacies and certainly know less about them than most people here. Is this an
Appeal to Bad Consequences:
(1) If you don’t believe in God then you’ll be miserable, thinking that life doesn’t have any meaning.
Therefore:
(2) God exists.
http://www.logicalfallacies.info/relevance/appeals/appeal-to-consequences/
I'm new to this, so you'll have to forgive me if I'm misapplying a fallacy.
I am not trying to disprove the existence of god, since disproving the existence of anything is an impossibility.
You are the one trying to show me that I cannot disprove the existence of god with this argument. I agree with you. I can't. That doesn't mean i can't logically decide to give up trusting god. A god I can't trust or respect is no god I am interested in. This doesn't mean I blame god for anything. And once I've given up trusting god, I can evaluate why I should believe in a god. Considering this possibility is not something I could objectively do while trusting god.
How about addressing the examples already given to you. If we can give an example of 'unfair suffering', as I did in the initial post of this thread, does this go some way toward the definition of unfair suffering? A man has a gradually debilitating form of rare cancer, which robs him of his intellect, his ability to reason, his physical capacities. He suffers from paranoid delusions as a result of his disease. There are no known lifestyle or environmental causes of this type of cancer. The cause of this cancer is unknown.
Is it a logical impossibility for an omnipotent God to alter the course of this particular instance of disease, or cause treatments to be effective in eradicating the disease?
Is this sort of thing supposed to be character building for the person suffering from the disease? Is it supposed to be inspiring?
Tell me why I should place my trust and faith in god, given what has happened. Tell me why I should give my money to the 'body of christ', rather than using it to support my family.
"There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must do it because Conscience tells him it is right." Martin Luther King