hedonologist

What if they want to torture themselves?
Hehe we are all retarded compared to an omniscient being.
The only problem is defining misfortune. Is someone more fortunate to be able to decide for themselves what is torturing themselves? (Like a masochist)

echidna

From last week (been busy) ...

Then similarly you are then precluding anyone from the freedom and the choice to commit evil and impose any amount of suffering, no matter how small, on another being, intentionally or otherwise.

This is largely contrary to the paths offered by several of the eastern philosophies which view life as a series of lessons, life experiences which gradually teach us wisdom.

Personally I value, fear and respect my freedom to create evil or not. I feel a personal strength when I can resist a primal urge to respond in anger, and I can self-chastise my weakness when I succumb to hostility. But I value the responsibility which I have.

Without the freedom to create evil, I have no free moral responsibility with regards to other beings. I would live in a sterile and closed world, safe from nay tiny external danger, but only by virtue of an insular paternalistic bubble. It’s a legitimate choice for others, but for me it trivialises our significance and is not how I would like to live my life.

And of course when I leave myself free to commit evil, so too do I leave others free to commit evil on myself. And yet I can confidently say that I am a better person for living in this world than one where I am locked in a Soma-induced prison.

I am not clear on your motives for the worlds which you would create. As your name suggests, why not simply maximise pleasure and minimise suffering ? Your god-task would be easy, create a being incapable of suffering and only capable of feeling pleasure. In fact there’s no need to be god, simply take Soma. The escapism which some drugs offer simply strikes me as being another form of death.

Seems quite valid, but also somehow unsatisfactory. (No need for remarks from the peanut-gallery. The scenario is sufficiently self-parodying already.)

In contrast to rape, your subsequent post reads : ” Lesser sorts of problems may seem nice because solving them is fun. People even play games and puzzles which essentially make problems for themselves to solve.”

IMO, in removing our moral freedom to commit evil, unfortunately you have also tyrannically removed much of that-which-makes-us-human. And maybe with your good intentions you have paved a road to hell for us, even if it’s only a hell made from never-ending backgammon played against the Brady Bunch.

Unfortunately the corruption I was referring to was yours, in creating a world where we no longer have moral freedom, we simply become moral automatons. This is why the problem of free will and evil are so difficult. No free will, no evil, no problem. Another variation might be, no free will, no consciousness, no point.

hedonologist

(edited to add a little to the end)
This assumes that suffering is necessary for wisdom. Wisdom seems to me to be a state of mind, which may come about through unwilling suffering, but this wouldn’t necessarily be the only way it would come about. If this were the only way to achieve wisdom, wouldn’t it be to someone’s advantage to torture them, if gaining this “wisdom” is more beneficial than the suffering is harmful?

I would think a God who could arrange matter any way he wanted could arrange the mind/brain such that a person could have a similar experience of “wisdom” without suffering.
If someone broke into your hose and was obviously attempting to rape your daughter, but he respected or enjoyed the freedom to self-chastise his weakness after he raped her, would you let him rape her right in front of you (assuming you could easily stop it)?

Having the power to hurt others is valuable to me in this world, to protect myself or those I love, but would I need this power if no one could hurt us? Only if I wanted to force my will on someone else.
I’m not sure what you mean by a “free moral responsibility”. You could still do the “evil” of trying to seduce them into whatever or torturing yourself, in the world I suggested as being optimized for consensual freedom.

But what is more valuable, to let a rapist have a “free moral responsibility”, or to protect one of their victims, if the rapist were doing the rape right in front of you?
You would live in a world of your own choosing, rather. You could choose to be vulnerable to who ever you wanted. You could enter a world where the entry contract states that you can not leave, and the only end destinations are paradise or eternal torture, based on whether or not you make the right choices.

I suppose you could call a government that protects us, a paternistic bubble. Without someone to (help us) protect us, we are sitting ducks for whoever wants what they can take from us.
But you could make a world like this and invite everyone who feels as you do. How would the God be preventing you from living as you like?
In this real world you have some degree of choice of how vulnerable you will be. You do not necessarily have to make yourself vulnerable to do “evil”, depending on the “evil”.

In the hypothetical world that is optimal in terms of consensual freedom, you would have to make your world more attractive to some, than any of the other worlds, before anyone would choose to enter. If you would want to try to attract them with your vulnerability, in exchange for theirs, that might get them to come. Seems pointlessly sadistic to me.
It seems you either don’t understand the hypothetical or you don’t want to talk about it. We don’t have a choice but to live in the real world. In the world I would make we would have the choice of where to live. Of course I’m not God, and I don’t live in my hypothetical world. It is a philosophical question to address the issue of whether the idea of a loving God is incompatible with the real world and more importantly what is beneficial or IOW what do we really want/need.
The motive of the “consensual-world” is to fulfill my desire that everyone have freedom to choose for themselves what they want. The motive of the “pleasure-world” would be my desire that they have pleasure regardless of whether they choose it. I have been only making the case for the first world—the “consensual-world”, because it has everything that people say they like about the real world, besides the ability to force one’s will on other people, because I don’t have the desire to force my will on anyone else, if this is not necessary for my survival, etc, and it wouldn’t be in that world.

So far I the only benefit you have mentioned of having the freedom to remove freedom from others, as far as I understand, is something about it making you feel more important (less “trivial”) to have such power over others. So in answer to the question which is the room topic, I wonder why you would not want to enslave us, since you seem to think that by us being forced into suffering, we are somehow better off.
That is one ideal. There is no apparent end to how much pleasure one could have so it would be more like the God would be creating as many souls as he could, and giving them all the pleasure he could. But I think I would rather have the choice to cause as much pleasure for myself as I wanted, so long as I was in my right mind, which I always am , so I think the world in which the God would just give us this consensual freedom may be more beneficial.
You don’t think that would lead to suffering, eventually? I like having clear thoughts, and something to look foreword to.

Would your ideal be better fulfilled if we opened the doors of the prisons and gave them back the freedom to rape, rob, murder, etc?
Escapism prevents people from meeting their needs, thus leads to suffering or death.
Huum what could be dissatisfactory about armies of stupid, mind numbed slaves, drooling on themselves and fighting over the last little bit of drug? Does this sound like hedonism to you? Maybe it is the best road to a shorter-term peak of pleasure, but I prefer something more powerful and lasting.
How so?
If you exercise your moral freedom to stop a rape in progress, to the extent that you have stopped it you have prevented the moral freedom of the rapist. The same would be true of the God.

If God were helping to make us “more human” by allowing a person to rape, wouldn’t we be helping to make us “more human” by allowing a rape in progress?

What desirable human quality would necessarily be removed, to the extent that God (or anyone else) prevented a rape?
I was referring to the way in which people want to have “problems”, so long as they consider them bearable and receive a feeling of fulfillment for solving them, etc. The “games” wouldn’t have to be so painless or pleasureless, if you prefer. More would be at stake than what we have in the real world, if that were your choice. If you have not reached a level of suffering or slavery that is enough to be enough for you, create all you want.
So?

What would you prefer?

If I were allowed to leave this world for another and you were allowed to stay, you and those who willingly stayed would suddenly become “moral automatons”?
I asked this before, and this has been the point of this thread. What is evil? Is it suffering? Is it lack of freedom for consenting people to do what they want? Is it (also) lack of freedom to force one’s will on others?

One point I am making is that no matter which of these definitions you choose, if a God existed, he could make a less “evil” world than this.

If (an) “evil” is the lack of freedom to force one’s will on others-- IOW (in other words) if it is “evil” (or corrupt) to refuse to grant someone the freedom to take freedom away from someone else, wouldn’t it be even better if we all had infinite power to torture each other eternally? It seems that any benefit that would come from us having such a freedom could only be intensified this way, but I’ll wait to see whether you describe a benefit to allowing rape, for example.

Good to meet you echidna, and thanks for playing.

[ December 30, 2001: Message edited by: hedonologist ]</p>

Prax

i think i'd create a world exactly like ours and sit back and laugh at all the puny humans...it must be very entertaining...maybe id even appear cleverly disguised as a burning bush every few thousand years just to change the rules on them...to keep 'em on their toes...


/doda

[ January 02, 2002: Message edited by: D.O.D.A ]</p>

hedonologist

doda, if you didn't have any empathy, hatred, etc, for us, why would we be entertaining?

Prax

i dont understand the assumption that i wouldnt have empathy?
i would think bothering to create something would presuppose the motiviation or desire to create said something and once created it would then be a legitimate 'creation' which i would be inherently 'empathetic' to...i would need to be in order to be entertained...i guess i agree with you...but i didnt assume empathy wouldnt be there.
did i miss your point? i have a tendency to do that.

/doda

[ January 04, 2002: Message edited by: D.O.D.A ]</p>

emphryio

It would seem to me rather obvious that you can't take away pain from the world and still have pleasure.
So as much as I strongly dislike many, many aspects of reality, I can't think of any good changes worth making. I mean any pain you take away will simply make us less able to handle the other pains left over. Until the tiniest pain will be horrible just from the expectation of it.

But I must say that being god might be very horrible. (No challenges left, no worthwhile games, ultimate boredom.)In other words, no pain, therefore no pleasure.

So if I was god, I'd make it so that the earth can't be destroyed by an asteriod or a caldera, and then maybe just turn myself back into a mere mortal with maybe a bit more wisdom with which to
see the good in pain and REMEMBER PERMANENTLY how it is forever connected with pleasure.

Hmmm but even the forgetting of the good of pain is a part of the pain. Oh I don't know.

Oh and as god, I'd make sure that when entities die, they don't cease to exist.

hedonologist

If you had empathy, why not give them what they needed and reveal that you exist, instead of not interacting with them?

hedonologist

Obvious? What is your proof?

Is this because infinite power can't exist? Isn't this just a matter of power-- if you had infinite power, wouldn't you be able to bring infinite pleasure to infinite beings?
Sounds like a painful challenge. hehe
If you were to, for example, give me all your money, would this lead to just as pleasurable a life for you?
So if you prevent a rape (take away pain) that you could see were about to happen, this will only make the potential "victim" less able to handle painful things?

All opinions are welcome here. Feel free to say what you really think or believe, lest it fester in the darkness.
So? Why cause anyone the tiniest pain?
hehe Would death be just for pain? Why have them die at all?

chickensoupforthebowl

I would eliminate humans.