Samhain

On that same note I could ask you whether or not God gave you specific authority to speak on his behalf or on the behalf of other xtians or even more so, on the behalf of non-theists. For all of your accusations of question begging, you seem to have perfected it quite well. If you are granted this by "God's word" how then do you explain the various sects of xtian churches? All of these have authority on "God's word" also, but they all have a different interpretation of what that word means. "God's word" does not prove much of anything when even God himself says one thing and does another. So which is the more true? To follow what God says we ought to do, or follow the example that God has set? "God's word" gives you only an example to live by for yourself, not the right to speak for others on their behalf on what the word concerns.

I think you just proved my point for me. If all that there is is physical existence, and death is the reverse (non-existence), therefore, there is no afterlife, etc. When we die, that's the end, basically, then how could existence be a matter of preference? Without your god and your afterlife, existence is the only thing we truly have, and therefore self-preservation becomes something more than a preference, it becomes the only thing that man has to hold onto, so to speak. With xtians, you are assured of an afterlife of bliss or torment, but it is still an eternity of consciousness, therefore self-preservation is a preference to religious fanatics, but doubtful that any non-theists would feel that way if they do not believe in an afterlife.


Equity is: that which are equal in value. This shows an idea of a cause and effect relationship. A shoots B in the face with a gun and kills B. Equity would be that A gets killed as punishment, equal punishment for equal crime. Equality is not subjective. It basically means the same thing or there being equal to. The idea that I live and everyone else should die is not equal. The only way this could be equal would be to say: everyone else in the world has killed me (in a literal sense) therefore everyone else should die.

Once again, you are begging the question, you assume that the values of God are truth, justice, etc. and you have assumed that I follow those exact values without deviation of what God's word has "shown" us. I reject the authority of the author because so many theists have said that justice is this, or truth is that, and we know this by God's word, but we cannot understand how God can be all of these things in essence, but is not subject to these things (as far as we understand them) himself.

[ March 21, 2002: Message edited by: Samhain ]</p>

Vorkosigan

Kenny! Married! Why didn't you make a general announcement? My belated congrats! I hope you two have many wonderful years together, and grow in love and happiness in each one of them.

Michael

jpbrooks

Hello again, all.

Samhain, sorry for the long delay in responding to your post. I have been in recuperation.


Understood. But this argument could be raised from the standpoint of any type of "strict" or "hard" determinism; not just the Theistic version. And it highlights the distinction between "hard" determinism and the "softer" version of it that I favor that holds that "selves" that exist within the realm of cause and effect can be causes themselves and not just effects, and hence can be causes of choices.

You have raised a very interesting side issue. I would answer (a definite) yes to the first question. There is no logical incompatibility between the two attributes because both are delimited by what is logically possible.

However, for the second question, the answer depends on what is meant by the phrase "change one's mind". If, for instance, it means to change one's attitude about another person or a state of affairs based on new developments in circumstances, then I would say that God can "change His mind" in that sense.
But if it means, for example, changing His view of the consequences of a certain action or set of actions, I would say that God cannot "change His mind" in that sense.

Done.

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Again, there is no implication in the cited passages that God finds punishing people for their disobedience preferable to not having to do so.
Also, such punishment can be deemed "unnecessary" only by appeal to a moral standard outside that of God. But why should that standard be held to supersede that of God in authority?

Speculation on this point is unnecessary.
Eg., Matthew chapter 5 and the entire book of Revelation in the Bible.

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I still hold that the "illusion" of morality is reality for us since holding that it is a true illusion leaves the apparent reality of moral knowledge inadequately accounted for, and since it is an "illusion" that appears to be experientially inescapable for us.

However, I do think that bd-from-kg's questioning of the legitimacy of defining justice as, e.g., "fairness as decided by God", is appropriate if, as is commonly done, the term "God" is left inadequately defined. Why, for example, would it not be "just" for "God" to zap anyone with a bolt of lightning simply for kicking someone's automobile tire, if anything that "He" commands is "just" by definition? One could argue, as I would, that holding that God's character is the moral standard is connected with the idea that God is also the universe's creator. But this is to present a rather specific description or definition of God.

[ March 23, 2002: Message edited by: jpbrooks ]</p>

Jayhawker Soule

The quotes below are, of course, from Exodus. In 32:9-10, God's pretty pissed off at these 'stiffnecked' Israelites that get got out of Egypt. He tells Moses to let him alone so that He can consume them. (He never quite explains how he will "make of [Moses] a great nation" based on a consumed population, but that's a different topic.) Fortunately, Moses convices God that He's overreacting, and He therefore repents.

There are no new developments in circumstances" here. Moses essentially says: "What kind of a Dummy would go to all this trouble to orchestrate an Exodus and then kill the people involved? Not only that, what about all those nice things you said to Abraham and Isaac? Stop this nonsense and act your age!"

Later, in Exodus 33, God makes clear that He doesn't fully trust Himself. They remain, after all, a stiffnecked people, and God can't be absolutely sure that he won't change his mind again.

Samhain

Hey jpbrooks, I hope that you are feeling better now. Food poisoning is nasty, is it not? Anyway, I hope that you're doing well now.

Of course it can. My point is not that we necessarily have free will without a god, but that with an omnimax creator it is not possible to have it. You must either sacrifice the idea that a god exists or you must sacrifice the idea that this god is omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, etc. if this god has any possibility to be "just" (in the human understanding/sense of the word) in any kind of punishment.

Ok, I hope I am understanding you correctly in this. Yes, the fact that one exists is the underlying cause of any effect which they do or which is done to them, but after the point of being born, it cannot be proven that anything which that person does is not in some way effected by previous actions taken by them or done to them by others. Hence, going back to the "fingers of God" analogy, the fact that God grows another "finger" (our actualization into the world) does not prove that we are not still controlled by God. Our existence is only that, but in this case our essence precedes our existence, and therefore we are not able to choose any of our actions just by the fact that we exist.

Granted. Both are not, in any way, logically possible by human understanding, thus we really have no comprehension of how these things could possibly exist by themselves, let alone at the same time within the same "being."

Read ReasonableDoubt's post for some quick reference.
It just seems funny to me on how it could truly be possible to change one's mind if you already know what exactly you will change it to, and when exactly you will change it to. It just seems to me that if you know everything about everything you know that you will "change your mind" at a certain time under certain circumstances, but how can that be at all shown to be "changing one's mind" since you are already following a set path for yourself. Being an omniscient being means not only that you would know what everyone else would do, but that you would know everything that you would do, and at the same time, be held to those actions. Is God's own omniscience limited by his own existence? Is this even possible with omniscience (knowing EVERYTHING)? This diverts a bit, but I think it's a good point, and worth examining.

Obviously he must if everything which they have done and will ever do was already known by God, and in fact, caused by God. The fact that these men were actualized by God in order to complete certain deeds (namely, that which God punishes them for), shows that God has a choice of whether or not to punish these men or not according to those actions which were, in effect, caused directly by God, himself. Therefore the only possibility here is that God just wants to punish them for the sake of punishing them, not for them doing any action which could even (in the smallest sense) could be proved to be their own.

This line of argument is absurd. This perpetuates the illusion that is life if God exists. How can an objective morality be proven if God exists outside of this? Not only that, but this proves human morality to be entirely false if God is the personification of all that is moral. Therefore if God is this personification, any action which God commits must be considered as good or moral, and the fact that we as humans do not attempt to carry out those actions, shows that we, ultimately would be immoral creatures in any sense. Basically because, by God's standards of morality (since he is the personification of morality, and any action that he takes is moral), we must be immoral, since we do not follow God's actions.

You were doing so well, too. As has no doubt been stated numerous times before, the Bible is a Faulty Authority. Just because it says it in the Bible doesn't make it true, even if God did, in fact, exist.

As I stated, if anything which God does is automatically moral, then this destroys all of our perceptions of what morality is. Therefore, we are not leading our lives morally, by God's standards, because God is the ultimate personification of morality. Our perceptions of any kind of objective morality stated in the Bible would then be proven to be entirely false since God is an exception, and even more, because God is, in essence, morality. This means that human morals and morality are just an illusion and nothing more, and that our perceptions of justness are entirely warped, and nothing which we "know" to be moral can be counted as true in any form.

[ March 23, 2002: Message edited by: Samhain ]</p>

jpbrooks

Sorry for the late replies.

ReasonableDoubt,
Or another possible interpretation would be that God doesn't really desire to destroy the people, and is trying to show, through events in the scriptures, how He handles conflicts between His desire to punish His people with destruction and His desire to bring about a fulfillment of His plan for His people's future.

And, in addition to other possible interpretations for the passages cited above, there are other passages like Job 23:13 and Malachi 3:6 that indicate that God doesn't change.

Such things make Biblical interpretation extremely difficult.

Samhain,

Thanks. Yes, it is nasty. But this time, it was more of a learning experience for me.
You see, I didn't like the attitude of the doctor that was first assigned to my case. So, as a result, I ended up getting through it without medication. The nurse who monitored my blood pressure and heart rate was quite helpful, however. When I got home later, the difficult part was avoiding dehydration and maintaining my electrolyte balances. In the beginning, when I didn't know how to do that, my heart rate went over 100 (beats per minute), my blood pressure dropped to 95 over 55, and the nurses were acting as if I were about to drop dead on the spot! I felt ok though.

You are quite right about the incompatibility between the language of preordination and the language of morality.
But, if we assume that moral responsibility is fictional, the most we would (thus) have to sacrifice is the idea that God's actions can have moral significance.


No, I'm not taking a position, one way or the other, on whether essentialism or existentialism is true. It doesn't matter at all if the sequence of causes and effects extends unbroken back to God. My point is that since choices are effects, and "selves" can be held to be causes, then "selves" can be held to be causes of choices, period.

I agree. But given that we already have posited versions of a being with such attributes, we don't gain anything by assuming that its existence "transcends" the scope of logic.

(I like diversions.)
But your comment above is an indication as to why I said before that the answer depends on how you define "change one's mind". If it simply means a change in one's attitude, then it doesn't necessarily lead to the problem that you alluded to above, although it could.

But if morality is fictional then God's interactions with His creation can have no moral significance at all.

I'm not sure I understand your objection. God's punishment is held to be "unnecessary" according to what moral standard? If the standard is God, (His "nature" or "character", etc.), then how could any of His actions be deemed "unnecessary" according to the standard?
On the other hand, if the standard is not God, then on whose moral authority does it apply to God? And why should that moral authority be held to supersede that of God?

No, I'm not arguing that the extant copies that we have of the Bible are perfect renditions of "the word of God" as dictated from "heaven". My point has little, if anything to do with how flawed the Bible happens to be. The point is that the Bible is the origin of beliefs about the God that we appear to be discussing. So citing its passages is relevant to this discussion.

No, it doesn't follow from the assumption that all of God's actions are moral that moral evaluations cannot be applied to human actions. There is no reason to assume that all of moral language is necessarily specific to one particular individual and that there can be no general moral principles that apply to all beings that are capable of having moral knowledge. If this were not the case, no one could have ever come to acknowledge that God's actions should all be held to be "moral" in the first place.

[ March 23, 2002: Message edited by: jpbrooks ]</p>

Samhain

I'll admit this to be true. A person cannot do an action unless they exist, correct? While I will say that, in this regard, "selves" are a cause, I still do not see how this proves anything regarding the original topic.

Just because we can define omniscience and omnipotence and know what they mean, does not mean that we can understand how any being could possibly have even one of these things, let alone all of them.

Granted. I find it hard to really disprove that one. As long as you accept the possibility that it could possibly happen.

Not quite. As I stated before: moral knowledge is completely possible (regardless if it is warped or changed by God). We can know what is moral or immoral, obviously (or else this would not be a discussion), but if God exists, then moral responsibility fades for humans (and arguably, for God, too, since he {perhaps} may be held by his own omniscience). We know what is considered right and wrong (from the objective view of the Bible), but we know that God does not hold to this, and at the same time, with God's presence, we cannot be held responsible for our actions.

The "moral authority" would have to be ourselves. Most of us have a basic sense of moral knowledge, whether it be from a societal or a religious perspective. Most adhere to the same set of morals (with a few diversions), regardless of religious belief (these things are socialized). So one can only say that it could only be from our moral authority, since we cannot know any other authority. We cannot know the morals of a bear, or a lion (if they had them, ok? ), the only morals which we can know is our own societal or religious morals (which may be subjective anyway). Let's base this off of the ten commandments, though, since we are speaking mainly of the Judeo-Christian God. If we go off of the morals of the ten commandments, then this is what we should adhere to, and this is our moral reality. But if God does not conform to our moral reality, then his actions can be seen as immoral in comparison to the morals of the Bible. Just because God's morals are subjective to ours does not make them moral in any sense which we can understand. Therefore how can God be moral in any sense of the word as we know it as humans?
Of course, if God is the standard for morality, then we should conform to God's actions, and thereby the morals stated in the Bible are extremely warped. This is a "follow what I say, not what I do" situation. How can it be possible to say that we have one moral standard, and God has a completely different standard. Morality as we know it could then be deemed insignificant, showing that morals are not, in any sense, objective, thereby destroying credibility for the ten commandments and the Bible.

Only if we want to focus our whole argument off of the Bible. The original question was if God was an omnimax creator would punishment be just, regardless of the Bible. If we threw out the Bible and said that God was just an omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent creator, so how could it be just to punish something which he actualizes, it doesn't matter whether or not the Bible states something. We are only dealing with the justness of punishment by an omnimax God, not anything having to do with the Bible and God's "plan." Just because the Judeo-Christian God conforms to this doesn't me we are necessarily speaking of that God in particular (although some of the arguments will divert in that direction, I admit, since it is really the only evidence out there for God's existence).

Perhaps I'm not following this correctly, clarify if you think I misunderstood something (it's late, and I'm tired). If God is the basic definition of morality since all of his actions, by definition, must be moral, then God's actions or examples would be the total moral standard which one must live by in order to live a moral life. You can't have black and white on this one, either God conforms to a set of morals and has the possibility of breaking those morals, or he does not break those morals, by definition (since he is not capable of being immoral) and we are proven to not understand what true moral knowledge is, since ours is different than God's.

jpbrooks

Well, if the choices that are caused by a particular "self" are contrary to what is moral (which, of course, depends on what moral standard is used), with full knowledge, on the part of the "self", of the fact that causing those choices is contrary to what is moral, then that "self" is culpable for those choices.

Again, I fully agree with you on this point.
However (again) we are faced with supporting or refuting the already existing versions of a being who has such attributes. And assuming that those attributes can "transcend" logic makes the task of supporting or refuting such a being difficult, if not impossible.

Yes, I agree. It's "definition dependent".

But the idea that God is the cause of all things means that He is the cause of moral knowledge in humans. So, it is not possible, assuming that that idea is true, for our knowledge of morality to diverge from what God desires it to be. So, if a divergence is posited, how is its existence to be explained?

If God's actions can be contrary to a theistic version of morality (viz., Biblical morality), then it cannot be true that theistic morality must hold that God's actions define what is morally right.
But, at the same time (on the same assumptions as above), morality (like everything else) has to be a product of God. This means that morality derives (again, on the above assumptions) from some other aspect of God than His actions. But if this is the case, then there is no problem involved in assuming that there are some actions that are morally right only for God Himself to perform.

But since God is supposed to be the cause of all things, morality can only have come from Him originally. No other "authority" could have been the original source of morality. So "we" can't be the ultimate moral authority(ies) in this case.

But how can we have come to acknowledge "ourselves" as the "moral authority" on the assumption that God controls all of our thinking, in the first place? On that assumption, any "authority" that we appear to have is illusory.

See my comment above on this issue.

Not necessarily. Again, see my comment above.

I agree. But this is precisely what Theistic (hard) determinism leads to.

Then in what other sense could morality be shown to be "objective"?

This implies that the "God" that is being discussed in this argument is not necessarily any version of God that is actually held to exist by anyone since, for example, terms like "justice" need to be specifically defined, and are usually so defined, in religious discussions, by religious texts.

What about, God does not break the morals because He simply lacks a desire to deviate from what He holds to be right? In fact, it would be the existence of such a desire and its compatibility with God's other desires and attributes that would be problematic.

[ March 24, 2002: Message edited by: jpbrooks ]</p>

Samhain

Not if God determines that that is what he wills that "self" to do. One may know it is moral, but it matters not since they are determined to choose those actions anyway by God's ultimate position. Do you see what I am saying? Regardless if they know whether or not those choices are moral, God still chooses the action, using the "self" as the instrument.

Do they "transcend" logic, or is it just that they are logically impossible? It's hard to say, the omnimaxity (omnimaxity? ) of God is one of those things dependent on faith. I find it hard to believe that God has these things, but that it is just impossible for us to comprehend how he could. It just doesn't seem possible in any form, theres too much room for fallacy.

Hmm, does God wish us to have moral knowledge to the point to which we would see God as immoral (as I see it anyway)? I find this highly unlikely, although, considering much of the Bible, I guess it's probably not as unlikely as I assume. What is the point of God giving us moral knowledge in contrast to his own?

Even if they are completely contrast to our knowledge of morality? I see your point, and I suppose that this can be considered as true, especially with the essence of God. It's just hard for me to accept that Genocide can be one of the highest evil's of man, but, at the same time, morally acceptable (and in fact, correct) for a supernatural being who created us. Which brings me back to the point before, our moral knowledge is still irrelevant if God determines everything (which can be proven by his omnimaxness, err...yea, omnimaxness {is it just me or do these terms seem a bit untechnical?}).

So why is it feasible for God to give us a different set of morals from himself? He would have to know that based upon the moral knowledge given to us, that we could view his actions as immoral. It doesn't follow.

Which is exactly my point. Either God controls our thinking since he is omnimax, and morality is (or should be) irrelevant to us since we cannot control anything, or God is not omnimax, and morality is derived from within ourselves, and God is therefore an immoral creature, in our sense of the word.

Only by the actions which we know God to have taken. Since he is the root of morality, and in essence, he cannot do something which is immoral, we can use his actions as an objective morality. Sort of like Hume's argument. If you do an action, assume that everyone else must do that action.

Given, I suppose. But it still doesn't prove much, since we cannot know what God's "plan" for the world is. It could be to create a world of chaos and strife, we cannot truly know. We see what is shown in the Bible that God has a plan, but I still hold that it is a faulty authority. I will accept that God has a plan, but not any plan depicted in the Bible. It's far to cryptic for me anyway.

How is God shown as an omnibenevolent creator in this sense? God would have the possibility of choosing the wrong action for what he believed would have a certain (good) consequence. This happens a lot. We do something which we think will lead to good ends. Something fouls and it ends up leading to evil (i.e. we burn someone's house down by trying to cook them food). It would then have to be the same for God, and omniscience would have to be a characteristic which is not possessed by him. Once again, I might be missing something, I feel that I am, since it seems so simple to me. Point it out if I'm wrong here.

jpbrooks

Sorry, but I was trying to get my reading for the weekend done.

Samhain, if there is no way that direct responsibility for the agent's (or "self's") acts can be attributed to the agent himself or herself, then that alone renders the original argument problematic. In that case, since the agent has not actually violated any moral law or principle, what happens to the agent in the future, as a consequence of God's actions (even if it's destruction), cannot be considered "punishment". The "agent's act" itself does not represent a case where a morally responsible agent is violating a law, so whatever happens to that agent after the act occurs can have no moral relationship to the act. Thus, God's act of "punishing" the agent for the act is not really an act of punishment for the "agent's act" at all, and therefore cannot be considered an "unjust" punishment for it.
(I even have a problem calling it the "agent's" act when the agent can't be held responsible for it, but I did anyway for the purpose of argumentation.)

Yes, that's the whole point! I was using the term "transcend" euphemistically. If they "transcend" logic, it doesn't even make sense to deliberate about them, much less to assume that they might exist as attributes of some being. Logical principles like "Non contradiction" don't apply to them.

Our ability to have moral knowledge in contrast to that of God seems to suggest our (moral) independence from God.

No problem. I have a habit of coining terms myself.

But again, your suggestion, if true, has the effect of removing any possibility of the applicability of morality to actions that occur in the world.

It isn't feasible. The fact that we are capable of holding the position that God's actions are immoral means that we can think independently from Him. But if we can think independently from God, then we can be responsible for actions caused by us on the basis of our independent thinking.

(Close.) Our ability to hold the view that God is immoral does not really curtail God's "omnimaxness". But I suppose that depends on how you define "omnipotence", "omniscience", etc..

And how do we know what actions God has taken?

Granted, as long as God's plan is not a relevant consideration in the argument.

God's attributes are not constrained to acting independently from one another.
So, there is no reason to assume that God's omniscience doesn't come into play in determining which actions have the best consequences, so that God always chooses the action that would maximize good.

[ March 25, 2002: Message edited by: jpbrooks ]</p>