Catholic Convert

If you take God out of the picture, then how do you explain evil?

There are no evil elephants or evil ants or evil butterflies.

Why is only man and only some men evil?

(Or do you see evil elsewhere in nature?)

Naruto

Two reasons:

1) Evil is a human invention.

2) Evil requires intent. A bazillion cookies to whoever gets this reference (it's paraphrased): "Should a rock slide fall down and crush a village, that is not evil, for evil requires intent. However, if a sentient being caused that rockslide, then there is evil. Death is the great justice."

Catholic Convert

I will display my ignorance and guess "Buddha."

But why did humans "invent" evil?

And why do we call it evil instead of just praising them for being good at getting what they want, like the rest of the animals?

hinduwoman

In Greek Elysium, Norse Valhalla and Hindu lower heavens you eat good foods, drink very good wine, attend dancing and singing.
Don't know about the other two, but in Hinduism you get free sex too.

And oh yeah, there is always Islamic heaven.

So who want to sign up for these.?

neorask

I think that everything having to be proven before it is accepted is both lackluster and stressful.

I don't like the word "boring" because what is and is not "boring" is defined by personal experience.

Maybe God gave humans free will just to see how dumb it would make them become. So why did God give us free will and allow evil to be in the world? Well if he is an omnimax God and we are limited, then it makes perfect sense that it is not necessary for us to know that answer.

Is the concept of heaven really so bad or is doing whatever the hell one wants better than having no pain and suffering?

As much as the atheistic view finds God to be a rediculous possibility, I find the choice of proof over possibility to be rather rediculous.

Family Man

Humans didn't invent evil; it is a concept humans to describe actions pernicious to our survival as a species.

Because, ultimately, it is the survival of the species that is at stake here. Humans do better in an orderly society than in a chaotic one, and the best way to achieve the goal of an orderly to describe some behaviors as evil and control them. For example, a society where murders are not condemned and punished will not fare as well as a society where such things are relatively rare.

And if you check the animal kingdom, you'll find that a certain amount of order is often found in groups of animals. It's not really a dog-eat-dog world out there; it's a dog eat everything else, just like humans do.

Anat

How do you know other animals do not have evil intents once in a while? How do you tell whether an animal with whom you cannot communicate is 'merely acting out of its own nature' or is being evil? Would a species of superintelligent space aliens recognize certain aspects of human behavior as being the result of evil intent or would they think we are blameless, as it is our nature to behave this way?

Chimpanzees were observed to set ambush and kill males of neighboring troups and forcing the females to join theirs. Eventually one troup managed to take over the territory of its neighbors. Were these chimpanzees acting out of evil? Would human wars look any different from this to space aliens?

What about cats playing with captured mice, rather than just finishing them off quickly?

Daggah

If you REALLY want to toss omnibenevolence in there, then the Christian god as described is impossible given the existence of THIS universe and its qualities - therefore the Christian god can't exist, making the whole point moot anyway.

But that's only if you REALLY want to go there.

WilliamB

If I were a Christian, I would think that one of the primary features of my faith would be to have genuine sensations of sympathy and pity for anyone who was suffering; and I would consider it a mission to do whatever I could to ease the suffering of others. Since I'm pretty soft and sympathetic by nature already, and cannot stand seeing another human being in pain, I would probably consider it morally imperative to keep pain and suffering to a bare minimum, even in the process of administering punishment to people who deserve it. I have no problem with hardened criminals being imprisoned; but I would never desire anyone to be imprisoned somewhere like the Dungeons of Venice, for instance, where the cells were little more than boxes, where a man could not stand up and could not even stretch out at length, where there was absolute darkness at all times. I couldn't imagine sending even Hitler to a place like that, or someone who murdered my children for his own pleasure. Putting even the most evil person in such a place for a life time would be difficult, maybe impossible, to condone: to put them there for an eternity would be utterly unconscionable. And yet I doubt the Dungeons of Venice had anything on this complete separation from God concept. I doubt that any Christian here would tell me that being condemned to Hell will not be quite so bad as being practically buried alive.

Heaven would never be boring for me, since I like to think that I would most likely be begging God for eons to show some pity and extinguish the existence of every soul in Hell, that is, if he cannot see his way clear to letting them in Heaven after, say, ten trillion centuries of teeth-gnashing. Nothing short of that would let me enjoy anything remotely resembling "bliss". The only thing that makes sense is that this moral "sense" I have now would be entirely gone if I was to go to Heaven. Some brand new enlightenment would make me realize how letting millions of souls suffer for ever and ever was absolutely necessary, and represented some type of "justice" which now strikes me as excessive and needless cruelty. In short, it doesn't seem sensible to wonder whether or not I would be bored in Heaven, since I would not be myself, in any way that I currently recognize, when I got there.

Probably doesn't matter anyway, since I'm going to the other place.

Legend

If he took away my capacity for that then I won't really be 'me'. I would be a shell of my former self. Taking anything away from me, from my very being, would be the same as changing who I am.

What I am is also consisted of the very things that brings me misery. Be it boredom, pain, suffering, etc. I would not want to change who I am even if what would be changed was something I didn't like.

The only one who should change what I am, should be ME.

Such an experience of heaven could be likened to a society where there is injustice everywhere but the people are (let us just say...) programmed to be blissfully ignorant of any misery, of any pain.

Sure there are no injustices in heaven but do you see my point here? Heaven would then become a place wherein the only reason people are happy is because God made them that way.

I may not be able to realize that boredom is still there but with such reasoning, why bother? I would be blissfully unaware of its existence so I can't really complain because there is nothing to complain about. But if I was able to observe myself (while still possessing what I really am) in such a state, I would say that I was living a lie. I would say that the person being happy right then and there, could not be rightly called by my name since he has already changed by an external force.

But then again... you would say that God need not remove our human capacity for boredom since he could just create an occasion where boredom or misery would never happen.

Yet I feel that this is illogical. It contradicts itself since given eternity, an eternity where we remain unchanged, it is assured that we would be able to do everything. Not only that, you'd be able to do everything an infinite number of times. Boredom would surely follow.

Oh... you can say that God can do anything, even illogical things but you should hear yourself say it first. Doesn't it seem like wishful thinking?

Yet I feel that a place of devoid of negativity (misery) would discourage us to have dreams... We have dreams because there are obstacles that we want to overcome. These obstacles are most always negative. We would not have goals and dreams if not for negativity. And I always felt that happiness comes in the pursuit of dreams. We would not try to reach anything if we could get anything we want...

The real heaven for me is oblivion. Complete and utter nothingness.

(I am suddenly reminded of the Lazarus Effect by Frank Herbert and Brian... something,I can't remember the last name)