Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Stephen T-B · 08-04-2003, 10:52 AM

If I were a Christian I would argue that Perfect Goodness is a quality of Perfect Justice; that being Perfectly Good, God is Perfectly Just, and being Perfectly Just, he is Perfectly Good.

I would argue that he had to give us Free Will in order that he might exercise his perfect Justice, and that Evil arises when a person makes a free-will choice not to obey him.
It is integral to the package, and since Evil does exist, so must a perfectly good, perfecty just god.

Thomas Metcalf · 08-04-2003, 01:24 PM

Originally posted by Nic Hautamaki :

Quote:

defense a) we deserve evil [...]

Sins pass from parents to children

This is a contingent fact, as far as we can tell. God is omnipotent; God can block the sin at any time. And further, it's just wildly implausible. We don't think responsibility for evil passes to children in any other case.

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defense b: Justice precludes happiness.

The idea here is that God has 2 alternatives: he can create a world filled with happiness, or he can create a world full of justice.

Again, it's as if God is limited by something other than logical possibility, which is absurd. It seems possible that there could be a world where terminal cancer is 10% less painful, but justice still exists.

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Not really she says, because she says the consequences (sufffering) of our choices are just as much good as evil.

Only if God isn't omnipotent. God can give us the good stuff, for the most part, without the bad stuff, by altering other things.

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Defense 3: stacked up against eternity, what happens in our world doesn't matter.

I've encountered this one, too, pretty frequently. And the proper response might be to steal this person's car and run over her dog with it. Hey, what happens in our world doesn't matter, right?

Thomas Metcalf · 08-04-2003, 01:28 PM

Originally posted by xorbie :

Quote:

What we as humans consider evil is not actually evil, we don't understand morality at all or even that evil itself does not exist (although I suspect that this goes against Judeo-Christian beliefs).

Then we have to be skeptical about God's existence. We can't say "God exists" because we don't know what we're saying. So theistic belief is ultimately and irrevocably doomed never to be knowledge, or even to be meaningful.

Thomas Metcalf · 08-04-2003, 01:29 PM

Originally posted by BDS :

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God IS eliminating evil, and the world will at some point be perfect (I think this is promised in the bible). To judge God by the state of the world RIGHT NOW is like judging an architect by the state of a half finished building. The critic might say, "The stupid blighter has forgotten to put a roof on the house."

Then God is morally imperfect. The person who helps the sufferer immediately is morally better than the person who lets the suffering go one for a few more years, all else equal.

Thomas Metcalf · 08-04-2003, 01:30 PM

Originally posted by Stephen T-B :

Quote:

I would argue that he had to give us Free Will in order that he might exercise his perfect Justice, and that Evil arises when a person makes a free-will choice not to obey him.
It is integral to the package, and since Evil does exist, so must a perfectly good, perfecty just god.

There's plenty of evil that doesn't seem to be the result of humans' free will choices, and God already constrains the results of our free will a lot with the use of natural laws. God can constrain them a little more without precluding significant freedom, if we're significantly free now.

BDS · 08-04-2003, 01:51 PM

Quote:

[i]
Then God is morally imperfect. The person who helps the sufferer immediately is morally better than the person who lets the suffering go one for a few more years, all else equal. [/B]

Really? So there's no value to education?

Also, is everything else equal? It's certainly possible that "perfection" can ONLY be attained through trevail and suffering. After all, in the Christian tradition, God himself suffered.

All of these attempts at disproving God's existance suffer from the same flaw: Who are we to know the Mind of God? Where were we when God placed the stars in the sky? Are our puny little ideals about what is "good" and what "evil" to be taken seriously?

So to say, "then God is morally imperfect" is to define "morality" differently from how a religious person would define it. The religious person would say that God's will DEFINES moral perfection. YOU (and everyone else) are judged by how you conform to that will.

You flip the traditional meaning around. YOU define moral perfection, and God is judged by the extent to which He conforms to your will.

Isn't that a bit presumptuous?

Wyz_sub10 · 08-04-2003, 03:31 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by BDS
Also, is everything else equal? It's certainly possible that "perfection" can ONLY be attained through trevail and suffering. After all, in the Christian tradition, God himself suffered.

Then it can hardly be said to be perfect. You can, if course, alter your definition of "perfection" to coincide with reality. Or a purpose could be better defined so that the idea of "perfection" makes some sense.

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All of these attempts at disproving God's existance suffer from the same flaw: Who are we to know the Mind of God? Where were we when God placed the stars in the sky? Are our puny little ideals about what is "good" and what "evil" to be taken seriously?

If you believe that you should act/think/behave a certain way, then you absolutely claim to understand the mind of god to a degree.

Further, if you believe that you comprehend the basic ideas of "good" and "evil" and act acccordingly on what you believe is god's law, then you claim to understand the mind of god.

It's simply nonsense to think there is a "right" way to do things, then throw up ypur hands and say "how can we possibly know?"

If you can't possibly know, then everything in the bible, all religious teachings and doctrines, all "personal relationships" with god are absolutely meaningless, if not outright fallacies.

Quote:

The religious person would say that God's will DEFINES moral perfection. YOU (and everyone else) are judged by how you conform to that will.

In other words, there is no such thing as absolutely morality - right and wrong have no value and every act is contingent upon god's personla interpretation, correct?

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You flip the traditional meaning around. YOU define moral perfection, and God is judged by the extent to which He conforms to your will. Isn't that a bit presumptuous?

That's because we do define moral perfection. We define god as well, to be quite frank. Dozens of Christians do it every day on this site.

BDS · 08-04-2003, 04:08 PM

I don't really disagree with much of what you say, Wyz. Except isn't it incumbent on the person who argues that the existance of evil disproves an omnibenevolent God to at least take a crack at talking about how we determine what is "good" and what is "evil"? It is, after all, essential to the subject.

Also, it seems to me that to the Christian it is fruitless to talk about whether God is "good", because "good" is defined in terms of God. "God is good" says no more than "God is God". God is not "omnibenevolent" on the basis of some outside criteria, but by definition and a priori. It is we secular types who posit some general "moral rules", with which God's behavior can be either consistent or inconsistent. So it seems like atheists are arguing against a straw man: either they must argue that "God is not God", or they must use a different definition of "good" than religious people do, in which case the argument never really gets anywhere, because the opponents can't even agree on how the terms are dfeined.

I would guess that most Christians would say that God's personal interpretation is immutable and absolute, so, yes, they would think there was an absolute morality (although they would admit they don't know exactly what it is, unless they are Fundamentalists). By the way, I don't really feel comfortable arguing the Christian case, but it seems to me SOMEONE has to do it.

Thomas Metcalf · 08-04-2003, 06:06 PM

Originally posted by BDS :

Quote:

Really? So there's no value to education?

You seem to be a closet atheist. You are presupposing that God does not exist, because you are presupposing that God is not omnipotent. God can educate us without suffering.

Quote:

Also, is everything else equal? It's certainly possible that "perfection" can ONLY be attained through trevail and suffering. After all, in the Christian tradition, God himself suffered.

Again, your atheism is showing. You think God isn't powerful enough to give us perfection without suffering.

Quote:

Are our puny little ideals about what is "good" and what "evil" to be taken seriously?

If you deny we can understand what good and evil are, and identify them, then you must admit there is no way to know that "God exists" is true or even what it means.

Quote:

So to say, "then God is morally imperfect" is to define "morality" differently from how a religious person would define it.

Part of what God has defined is that it's better to minimize gratuitous suffering. Right?

Nic Hautamaki · 08-04-2003, 08:52 PM

"quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
defense a) we deserve evil [...]

Sins pass from parents to children
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is a contingent fact, as far as we can tell. God is omnipotent; God can block the sin at any time. And further, it's just wildly implausible. We don't think responsibility for evil passes to children in any other case."

The christian who advanced that theory does believe that sins pass from parents to children, morally speaking. He says that our current morality is just wrong and that any morality not taken from the bible is simply erroneous morality. Society and people don't know what right and wrong is and have poor intuitions on it. Only the bible knows what good and evil really are.

"quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

defense b: Justice precludes happiness.

The idea here is that God has 2 alternatives: he can create a world filled with happiness, or he can create a world full of justice.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Again, it's as if God is limited by something other than logical possibility, which is absurd. It seems possible that there could be a world where terminal cancer is 10% less painful, but justice still exists."

You're giving the wrong response to this defense, this defense is not meant to show that the world wouldn't be any better with 10 percent less suffering. This defense is meant to show that it's a logical impossibility for there to be justice in a world without evil. Evil is required for justice to exist logically. This defense only shows that at least some evil must exist, it doesn't try to justify the quantity of evil.

"quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Not really she says, because she says the consequences (sufffering) of our choices are just as much good as evil.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Only if God isn't omnipotent. God can give us the good stuff, for the most part, without the bad stuff, by altering other things."

I'm curious because it seems that you've read a lot more into this defense than I have. What good and bad stuff are you referring to? It would appear you're arguing against the idea that a tangible good comes from evil, or that evil is necessary for that tangible good. That's really not her position though. Her position is that if you remove the consequences of doing an evil act, than you remove the free will to commit an evil act. In order for free will to truly exist, people must be able to be hurt by it. If instead, everytime you tried to hurt somebody, a lightning bolt came and smited you, you really wouldn't have free will would you? If you wanted to cause a great deal of pain, but you only had the ability to cause a little, that would be a barrier to your free will. Therefore, the more evil we can do, the freer we are. Therefore, if you have a world with less suffering, you have a world where people are less free, and if you have a world with more suffering, you have a world where people are more free. It's a sliding scale, and you can't say that any world is better than any other. That we have the amount of suffering/free will we do could be just the whim of God. Her point is that it doesn't matter either way.

"quote:
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Defense 3: stacked up against eternity, what happens in our world doesn't matter.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I've encountered this one, too, pretty frequently. And the proper response might be to steal this person's car and run over her dog with it. Hey, what happens in our world doesn't matter, right?"

She would answer that it does matter, in 2 ways. A, now I'm probably going to hell. B, even though she cares now, once she gets to heaven and experiences a few million years of perfect bliss, she's really not going to care anymore. And even though I might have gotten a kick out of the look on her face then, after I've been burning in hell for a few eternities, I'm not going to be much comforted by it anymore.

08-04-2003, 08:52 PM	#20
Nic Hautamaki Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Surrey, BC, Canada Posts: 27	some responses "quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- defense a) we deserve evil [...] Sins pass from parents to children -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This is a contingent fact, as far as we can tell. God is omnipotent; God can block the sin at any time. And further, it's just wildly implausible. We don't think responsibility for evil passes to children in any other case." The christian who advanced that theory does believe that sins pass from parents to children, morally speaking. He says that our current morality is just wrong and that any morality not taken from the bible is simply erroneous morality. Society and people don't know what right and wrong is and have poor intuitions on it. Only the bible knows what good and evil really are. "quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- defense b: Justice precludes happiness. The idea here is that God has 2 alternatives: he can create a world filled with happiness, or he can create a world full of justice. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Again, it's as if God is limited by something other than logical possibility, which is absurd. It seems possible that there could be a world where terminal cancer is 10% less painful, but justice still exists." You're giving the wrong response to this defense, this defense is not meant to show that the world wouldn't be any better with 10 percent less suffering. This defense is meant to show that it's a logical impossibility for there to be justice in a world without evil. Evil is required for justice to exist logically. This defense only shows that at least some evil must exist, it doesn't try to justify the quantity of evil. "quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Not really she says, because she says the consequences (sufffering) of our choices are just as much good as evil. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Only if God isn't omnipotent. God can give us the good stuff, for the most part, without the bad stuff, by altering other things." I'm curious because it seems that you've read a lot more into this defense than I have. What good and bad stuff are you referring to? It would appear you're arguing against the idea that a tangible good comes from evil, or that evil is necessary for that tangible good. That's really not her position though. Her position is that if you remove the consequences of doing an evil act, than you remove the free will to commit an evil act. In order for free will to truly exist, people must be able to be hurt by it. If instead, everytime you tried to hurt somebody, a lightning bolt came and smited you, you really wouldn't have free will would you? If you wanted to cause a great deal of pain, but you only had the ability to cause a little, that would be a barrier to your free will. Therefore, the more evil we can do, the freer we are. Therefore, if you have a world with less suffering, you have a world where people are less free, and if you have a world with more suffering, you have a world where people are more free. It's a sliding scale, and you can't say that any world is better than any other. That we have the amount of suffering/free will we do could be just the whim of God. Her point is that it doesn't matter either way. "quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Defense 3: stacked up against eternity, what happens in our world doesn't matter. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I've encountered this one, too, pretty frequently. And the proper response might be to steal this person's car and run over her dog with it. Hey, what happens in our world doesn't matter, right?" She would answer that it does matter, in 2 ways. A, now I'm probably going to hell. B, even though she cares now, once she gets to heaven and experiences a few million years of perfect bliss, she's really not going to care anymore. And even though I might have gotten a kick out of the look on her face then, after I've been burning in hell for a few eternities, I'm not going to be much comforted by it anymore.

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08-04-2003, 10:52 AM	#11
Stephen T-B Veteran Member Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: Leeds, UK Posts: 5,878	If I were a Christian I would argue that Perfect Goodness is a quality of Perfect Justice; that being Perfectly Good, God is Perfectly Just, and being Perfectly Just, he is Perfectly Good. I would argue that he had to give us Free Will in order that he might exercise his perfect Justice, and that Evil arises when a person makes a free-will choice not to obey him. It is integral to the package, and since Evil does exist, so must a perfectly good, perfecty just god.

08-04-2003, 04:08 PM	#18
BDS Veteran Member Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Eugene, OR, USA Posts: 3,187	I don't really disagree with much of what you say, Wyz. Except isn't it incumbent on the person who argues that the existance of evil disproves an omnibenevolent God to at least take a crack at talking about how we determine what is "good" and what is "evil"? It is, after all, essential to the subject. Also, it seems to me that to the Christian it is fruitless to talk about whether God is "good", because "good" is defined in terms of God. "God is good" says no more than "God is God". God is not "omnibenevolent" on the basis of some outside criteria, but by definition and a priori. It is we secular types who posit some general "moral rules", with which God's behavior can be either consistent or inconsistent. So it seems like atheists are arguing against a straw man: either they must argue that "God is not God", or they must use a different definition of "good" than religious people do, in which case the argument never really gets anywhere, because the opponents can't even agree on how the terms are dfeined. I would guess that most Christians would say that God's personal interpretation is immutable and absolute, so, yes, they would think there was an absolute morality (although they would admit they don't know exactly what it is, unless they are Fundamentalists). By the way, I don't really feel comfortable arguing the Christian case, but it seems to me SOMEONE has to do it.

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