ible

Are you making the claim that there would be a lot less hatred in the world if we all assumed there was no such thing as free will? I guess you are. That seems incredible.

I suppose we wouldn't be able to hate, because we would be taught to not hate, mm? We would be conditioned from little babies to get along with everyone else, and have no arguments.

Johnny Skeptic

No, that is not what I meant. I am a determinist. I sometimes get mad at people, but after further consideration, I always arrive back at the understanding that if free will does not exist, no one has any control over what they do. Regarding murderers, I do not hold them accountable for their actions from a moral perspective, but I approve of separating them from society because 1) I do not have any choice except to approve of that, and because 2) even if I did have a choice, it still makes sense to separate murderers from society. If a God exists, if he did not have free will, and was not able to make humans able to have free will, he would not hold humans accountable for anything that they do.

If you did not believe that free will exists, you would not have the same opinions about murderers that you do now.

If free will exists, and everyone in the world did not believe that it exists, there would still be hatred, but people who were more logical and intelligent would be more likely not to hate other people.

At any rate, since the vast majority of people believe that free will exists, and since I cannot reasonably prove that it does not exist, I prefer to assume for the sake of argument that free will does exist, which means that I should not have not replied to what you said about free will.

ible

That's an interesting position, thanks for sharing.

I have an itch with your last point, though. "People who were more logical and intelligent would be more likely to not hate other people"--if they did not believe in free will. I think that people would hate each other less, but I think they would treat each other worse, less like humans as we know them. E.g. People wouldn't hate a murderer for what he did, he would only be separated from society because he couldn't help his actions. At this point, either (A) we completely forget about him, because we do not believe he can change, or (B) we condition him to be "good" through some psychological regimen. In either case, I don't think we are treating him as a human, but as some pet who should behave to get treats.

And one other question: Who decides what is "good", and do they have free will to decide that? I suppose you would say society says what is good, and that society couldn't have a thing like free will. But I'm interested in hearing what you have to say.

Johnny Skeptic

The opposite happened with me. When I became a skeptic after being a fundamentalist Christian for over 30 years, I soon became a determinist. I am now much more committed to the welfare of humanity than I was when I was a Christian.

Historically, many non-Christians have been much more peaceful and loving than the typical Christian has been. Noted skeptic Bible scholar Dr. Robert Price once told me that during the first century, which was a time when most Christians endorsed slavery, some Sophists and Stoics opposed slavery.

if fundamentalist Christians did not try to trample on the rights of other groups of people, and actually practiced "live and let live," I would not be debating fundamentalist Christians. An example of what I mean is that President Bush once tried to get an anti-same-sex marriage amendment passed. His attempts failed, and embarrassing for him, even the majority of people who oppose same-sex marriage opposed his amendment and said that it should be a states' rights issue.

Another example is the court case 'Lawrence versus Texas,' 2003. Two gay men were arrested in Texas for having sex in a Houston home. The men sued the state of Texas, and eventually the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in favor of the men. The three dissenting justices were predictably Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas. Scalia and Thomas as conservative Christians. Rehnquist, who died, was also a conservative Christian. As a result of the case, the U.S. Supreme court overturned anti-sodomy laws in Texas and twelve other states. It is not surprising that eleven of the states are Southern Bible Belt states, and that the two other states, Utah, and Idaho, have high percentages of conservative Christians. Such an atrocity could only have happened in a state that has a high percentage of conservative Christians.

Another example is that when the U.S. Supreme Court ordered busing, the state of Virginia closed down the public school system so that white children would not have to go to school with black children. Such an atrocity could only have happened in a state that has a high percentage of conservative Christians.

Another example is when creationism use to enjoy exclusivity in public schools. At that time, most Christians would have opposed a balanced approach where creationism and evolution would have both been taught in public schools. Today, however, since conservative Christians know that they cannot get away with being bullies anymore, they would be quite pleased to accept the very same balanced approach that they would have disapproved of back then.

It is interesting to note that the largest geographic empire by far under a single religion was conquered by Christian nations by means of persecution, murder, and theft of property. The victors often warred among themselves for the spoils of victory. There is little doubt that the vast majority of today's Christians would have approved of colonization if they had lived during colonial times, and slavery and the subjugation of women as well. Christian missionaries had just motives, but Christian missionaries were not responsible for colonization. The primary motives for colonization were the acquisition of land and resources.

Lest some Christians bring up the issue of the good that Christianity has accomplished, I wish to state that although Christianity has accomplished a lot of good, a man's character is best judged by the truth that he knows, which means that if the Bible is true, skeptics win the battle over who has the best character hands down since Christian history has not even remotely resembled what Jesus taught. Ghandhi was a far more moral man than a large percentage of Christians were and are.

Oh no, that is completely false. Many criminals become honest people while they are in prison, or after they leave prison, sometimes without being influenced by religion. If free will does not exist, criminals who become honest while they are in prison, or after they leave prison, are in the same boat as non-criminals who do bad things and regret what they did, and in the same boat as people who never commit a crime since no one would have any choice except to do what they do.

It is impossible to know what is good in all cases, or possibly in any cases because there have never been an agreed upon set up criteria for evaluating what is good, and what is evil. If you were to ask "Who can rule the universe?," the correct answer is "Anyone who has enough power to enforce rules of his choice on other beings without any dissent from anyone." If you were to ask "Is there is necessary correlation between power and good character?," the correct answer is "No, and that would apply to all beings. A being is not good because of who he is, but because of what he does. This is analogous to our legal system, where no one is supposed to be above the law."

We cannot know for certain whether that is true or false. If it is false, then obviously Christianity is not a valid worldview. If it is true, fallible and imperfect humans are not in any position to judge whether or not a possible God is infallible and perfect. Regarding infallible and perfect beings, it takes one to know one, and the Bible writers were not one.

Yes.

I believe that it would be impossible even for a God to design something that did not have a design, and could act like it did not have a design.

At any rate, since the vast majority of people believe that free will exists, and since it cannot be proven whether or not free will exists, it is best for debate purposes for everyone to assume for the sake of argument that free will exists.

The God of the Bible's rules are no more reasonable than the rules of any other supposed God who might show up, or any powerful alien who showed up took over control of the earth.

arnoldo

It's my opinion if the odds are not astronomical that life exists on earth right now there are many other sentient being elsewhere in the universe at this very moment. Also it's my opinion that the book of daniel was not written after the fact. Of course other people have the opposite opinion based upon a total lack of archaelogical evidence, which according to minimalists, is required to disprove the bible.

Johnny Skeptic

Regarding my claim that if a God exists, he is probably not the God of the Bible, I request that people who are interested in discussing that issue do so in a thread at http://iidb.infidels.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=235279 at the GRD Forum that I recently started to discuss that issue.

Johnny Skeptic

But the odds are astronomical that life exists on earth.

If that is true, so what?

It is my opinion that if the book of Daniel was written before the fact, it was not because God intended to try to convince people to believe that he (God) can predict the future. If he did, he would have made many indisputable prophecies thousands of years ago that would have convinced everyone in the world that he can predict the future. If President Bush was able to predict anything that he wanted to predict, he would not have any trouble at all quickly convincing at least 99% of Americans to believe that he can predict the future. No reasonable motives why God predicts the future = no God of the Bible. If Micah had predicted that the messiah would rule a heavenly kingdom instead of an earthly kingdom, and that the messiah would heal people, and that the messiah would be crucified, buried, and rise from the dead on the third day, and that Pontius Piliate would be the Roman Governor of Palestine, and that Herod would be the Jewish King of Judea, lots more Jews would have accepted Jesus. There are not any other possible logical conclusions.

On the contrary, according to minimalists, Christians have not reasonably disproven deism and agnosticism, and the possibility that the God of the Bible is mentally incompetent. Even Attila the Hun did not kill people who loved him like the God of the Bible does.

ible

Why do you suppose that is?

Do you have evidence for this?

What about people like Stalin and Mao Zedong? You do realize that Christianity has had two thousand years to be bad, and skeptics have only had... what, a couple hundred years?

A person I was once talking to (I don't remember who it was at the moment) was talking about how all religion is bad. I asked him about Stalin, so he decided to define religion as trusting in, or believing one figure to be above the law. Would you agree or disagree with that?

I think it's sort of pointless to argue whose group of people is the best group of people, because there will always be good guys and bad guys. You hit it in on the head, though. Christian history does not resemble what Jesus taught; so called Christians often find it hard to trust in Jesus above everything else. Would you agree or disagree with the following: "Christians do evil when they do not listen to Christ, and non-Christians do evil when they hold up one of their own to glorify."?

Johnny Skeptic

I am not sure, but that is what happened. I am an agnostic and a determinist. I was a fundamentalist Christian for over 30 years. I have a friend who is an atheist and a determinist. He is a professor at a local college. He is as honest as an fundamentlist Christian who I have ever known. I pay him to critique some of my writings, but usually not writings that I use in debates. When I first asked him how much money he wanted me to pay him, he asked me to pay him whatever I wanted to pay him. When I sent him a check, he said that I had overpaid him, when in fact, I did not overpay him. I insisted that he keep the money. Now mind you, this man lives in a small one bedroom apartment and has very little extra money. If I had overpaid a fundamentalist Christian, in many cases they would believe that God was responsible and keep the money. He is a gentle man, and he most certainly does not hate Christians. You said "I think that people would hate each other less, but I think they would treat each other worse, less like humans as we know them." In my friend's case, you were definitely wrong. In addition, you were wrong in my case. If determinism is true, determinists would not have any more choice regarding how they act than anyone else would. Theists can be just as bad as anyone else can. History had adequately proved that. Of course, if the God of the Bible exists, he has killed far more people with parasites than all of the wars in history. If that has been the case, the total number of people who Hitler and Stalin killed are not even worth mentioning. If a man who has a wife and children who need him is killed by a criminal or by God, he is still dead. Unlike you, I judge what a person does, not who they are. I do not believe than any American is above our laws, and I do not believe that any God is above being moral. No being is moral simply because he asserts that he is moral.

ible

I won't deny it if some particular atheist is a good guy. Anyone can be good, anyone can be bad. However, for you as a determinist, I can't see how it would matter whether they were atheist or Christian.

Have you ever paid a fundamentalist Christian, to see if your claim is true?

Are you familiar with the His Dark Materials Trilogy? I read it, and was a bit disturbed about the portrayal of Christians. It would be one thing, if there was a single good Christian in there among the hoards of bad ones, but not a single one was good. According to this interview, Philip Pullman didn't experience bad things when he was in the Church, yet he wrote about Christians as if the only ones he knew were from the Crusades. How does this not promote negative stereotypes?

If there are two lives (The here and now vs. Eternity), I expect it makes a difference compared to if there is only one (The here and now). If there is only the here and now, it would be a travesty whenever anyone was killed without their consent. If there was a God, and there was only the here and now, we would find God more guilty than any bad human. On the other hand, if there is an eternity, if God is working to make our eternities as best as they can be, then taking us from the here and now might not always be a bad thing. It may be bringing us into glory.

Did you have an answer for this?