Bill Snedden

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGG!!

Apparently I've been talking to myself for pages and pages. Where in the hell have you been?

This is exactly the point we're arguing! I'm getting really tired of repeating the same argument over and over...

Please read this entire post very carefully before replying.

You're saying that your god, by virtue of simply being god, has moral authority over us. This is pre-enlightenment thinking: the divine right of kings. The idea that one's position or status gives one the right to rule over others.

But the very point I'm arguing is that since the enlightenment, we've explicitly rejected this idea. The foundation of democratic societies all over the world is predicated on the idea that such a notion is morally bankrupt. There is simply no such right for one rational being to rule over another. Post-enlightenment thinking holds that government can only gain authority through the consent of the governed.

Therefore, god, by post-enlightenment reasoning, has no right to rule over us except through our consent. Where that isn't granted, his claim to rule over us is illegitimate. The fact that he asserts it anyway makes him a slavemaster.

Now, you assert that your god's authority is a "tautology". I assume by that you mean not to be questioned. I disagree. I'd say that to argue as you do is to commit the fallacy of special pleading. Why should your god be exempt from the same reasoning that we would apply to every other person?

What you're essentially saying is that some persons can claim the authority to rule over others, regardless of how those others feel about it. According to this, of course, the Constitution was an illegitimate usurpation of King George's rightful power and we should all fight to restore the monarchy.

Of course you probably won't agree with this and I don't blame you. However, in order to argue against it you must either deny your basic principle (Divine Right) or provide some reason why it applies to your god, but not to other persons. What would that be? The only one I've seen thus far is: it just does. Unfortunately, that's special pleading and it's fallacious.

Understand, that I don't question at all that God's creative ability gives him the power to own us. After all, I own everything I create. I'm saying that it doesn't give him the moral authority and that it's special pleading to argue that it does. There simply don't appear to be any grounds on which it can be justified.

In what country do you live? Your profile says Washington state in the U.S.A., but you seem to be ignorant of how laws are made in a democratic state. Of course we most certainly can make murder and rape legal!! All it takes is a majority of voters to agree and the laws against them can be changed. Practically speaking, of course, this will never happen because it is unlikely that a majority of voters would ever agree to do so.

This is completely immaterial to the reality that it is possible. That's what a democracy is all about.

You know, what I think is intellectually dishonest is to distort and mutilate one's opponent's argument beyond all recognition and then accuse one's opponent of intellectual dishonesty.

Your first situation is an utter strawman. In the society in which I live, people can change the laws. People can also change the consequences. Imagine that! People actually participating in the determination of their own destiny! Amazing what's possible in the modern world...

Fiach hit the nail on the head about two pages ago...this is a clash of pre-enlightenment vs. post-enlightenment thinking. If you truly believe what you claim to believe, I'll expect you to renounce your citizenship and head for the nearest monarchy...

Regards,

Bill Snedden

Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

Bill,
No Bill. You've been arguing that God is a slavemaster and we are the slaves...





...and so on.



Correct.

Incorrect. The divine right of kings that the enlightenment refers to is that of man above another man...not God.


Correct. Societies of equals. Man is not equal to God Bill.



No. By 'tautology' I mean 'necessarily true' or 'not possibly false'.

This statement is necessarily true: IF God exists THEN He does own everything and has authority over everything.




Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

Bill Snedden

And the basis for that argument is exactly as I indicated in my last post. A basis you've consistently ignored or refused to address.

Nice try. Unfortunately it is not the specific instance I'm talking about, but the principle itself: That position or status do not in and of themself convey moral authority. That is the moral basis for rejecting the divine right of kings.

But that's the very point in dispute SOMMS. I claim that Man is the moral equal of god. By what authority does he claim otherwise? His own. But wait, how is that different from human tyrants? Again, special pleading...

But that's not a tautology. Tautologies are statements that cannot be logically denied without contradiction, like "squares are square" or "A=A". Unfortunately, your statement can be denied without logical contradiction, therefore it isn't a tautology.

What it is, is a baseless assertion that amounts to no more than "might makes right". In other words, your god claims to have moral authority over us, claims to own us, by no authority other than his own word. In exactly the same manner as a slavemaster claims ownership of his slaves.

IMO, there is simply no point in continuing this conversation. Your entire "case" rests upon an axiomatic acceptance of God's authority in a pre-enlightenment understanding of how moral authority is obtained and maintained. As it's axiomatic, there is necessarily no argument that you can provide to prove it; it just is. Likewise, since I accept the post-enlightenment view of moral authority, you will never convince me that a rational being would behave in any other way. As I see it, your understanding of the creator/creature relationship is an artifact of mediaeval views of morality. Whereas I believe that the real god, should he exist, is necessarily the most Enlightened being in existence and will therefore accord his creations the moral freedom a post-enlightenment understanding requires.

Thanks for an interesting discussion, anyway.

Regards,

Bill Snedden

HRG

Only if you define God as an entity which is omnipotent, omniscient, creator etc. [b]and[/(b] owns everything and has authority over everything. Thus your claim becomes a tautology. But omnipotence etc. by themselves do not imply ownership and authority.

Of course, by adding requirements to the definition of God, you've made your existence proof more difficult. There is a conservation law behind it ...

Regards,
HRG.

fishbulb

Allow me to interject here.

Suppose for the sake of argument that God exists. Suppose further that God were to make his existence plain to all of us (not just those who already believe, but also the skeptics). Suppose also that, after making his existence plain, he asserted that he had the right to rule over all of us because he is God.

Some of us--many of us--would challenge that. We would argue that simply being God does not give anyone the right to rule over anyone else. We may have little choice to submit to the will of God for much the same reason American slaves had little choice to submit to the wills of their masters, or Soviet citizens had little choice but to submit to the will of Stalin. If God has the power to coerce us, we will have to follow. But at least some people would, even while obeying out of necessity, reject the legitimacy of God's claim to rule.

If you are arguing that we can't do that, you are obviously wrong. We've all just witnessed Bill Sneden do exactly what you say can't be done. If you need more proof, I will follow suit: I reject out of hand the legitimacy of any claim to rule over me on the grounds that someone is God. So at least two people can, in fact, reject the notion that divinity confers special rights.

If you are arguing that it is irrelevant whether or not we reject the legitimacy of such a rule, that is also not true. While we may have no choice to obey, we are still making a moral statement of our own by refusing to submit willingly to the tyrannical rule of a God.

If you are arguing that it is morally wrong for us to reject the right of a God to rule, then you must explain why. You have not supported your belief. All you have done is make circular statements, stating that God has the right to rule because he is God. This is not an argument. It is a statement of belief which you have not substantiated. It is alright to make a statement of belief, but if you can't back it up with non-circular reasoning, just leave it at that. Your claim does not become more legitimate just because you re-state it over and over again, and you do not become right simply because you assume tht you are.

Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

HRG,
Correct. The common definition of God is the omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent (holy) Creator of everything.


Correct. I don't believe that omnipotence alone implies ownership and authority.




A-I haven't 'added requirements to the definition of God'. God is commonly defined as above.
B-I haven't proffered any 'existence proof'.

I was just showing Bill how outright crazy his idea that 'God is a slavemaster and we are slaves' is. It makes no coherent sense.



Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

Bill Snedden

By "showing", I must assume that you mean "making a lot of noise, but no arguments".

The problem is that the argument is completely coherent if one accepts the post-enlightenment concept of self-determination: Man as a moral agent has the right to determine his own disposition free of the non-consenting control or domination of any other rational being.

You however, have a fundamental disagreement with this. You adhere to a pre-enlightenment view that Man is not the master of his own destiny; that right is reserved to your god.

It is absolutely the same type of thinking that was used in pre-modern times to justify the ownership of slaves and the rule of kings. In modern times, we've mostly discarded this idea in favor of democractic and/or other populist versions of governing systems.

Like I said, there's really no point in continuing the discussion. You've "compartmentalized" the two ideals (democracy & autocracy) in your head and apply each only to its particular realm as you've defined it. Until you can see that their foundations stand in opposition to one another, you won't see that believing in democracy AND in your god's alleged moral sovereignty are a blatant contradiction.

Regards,

Bill Snedden

emur

You can say all you want about God having authority over us. In the end though SOMMS, it boils down to man having authority over man. You see, in practice we are supposed to submit to people who claim to speak for God, whether it be the human authors of sacred writings, pastors, seminary professors, imam's, or other religious leaders. They are all human SOMMS.

Consider a woman wearing pants in a fundamentalist church, or a Muslim speaking out against something Mohammed allegedly did. God won't show up to "correct" the situation. It will be some human being who claims to have authority from God that will act.

So it all boils down to humans over humans.

Mel

Fiach

All of the above arguments over God as a slave master are based on the assumption of an Anthropomorphic God. That fact makes SOMMS' arguments untenable. He would do better if a contrary and perhaps more plausible definition of god were made.

We have been assuming the classic type is the anthropomorphic god. This God usually has a human personality with human emotions, human virtues, and human vices. These are manifested by jealousy, anger, rage, love, mercy, capriciousness, justice and injustice, insecurity (need for adoration as assurance of his supremacy), and forgiveness. He is omnipotent, omniscient, and the creator of all reality. This anthropomorphic god can range from the minimal anthropomorphism of Monotheistic Allah, to the marked human raging Monotheistic JHWH, to the every human Jesus Christ who is a God-human hybrid in a trinity that believers pretend to be Monotheism. But we really don't know if this type of god can exist. Christians may believe in it, but it may be an impossible Frankenstein's monster of human parts.

There are relatively undefined or poorly defined gods such as the one recognised by Deists, Unitarians, and Bahai’s. This god is conscious but clearly not human. He or She may or may not have emotions. That is not defined. He/She has but one function. That is to create the universe and the rules by which it runs.

Then there is the totally undefined God, not of a particular religious school of thought. People say they believe in a god-creator but say that nothing can be known about this god. It is perhaps just one along the spectrum of Deistic views of God.

Another kind of god, believed by many American scientists, possibly to avert the charge of Atheism is the Inanimate God. This god is defined, as perhaps Steven Hawking would say, as the elementary forces of nature and the unified field theory of reality. This god is not a conscious being. It has no personality. It is incapable of thinking (cognition). It knows nothing. It is nature itself.

So for me, an unbeliever, to focus a debate such as the above, based on the most unlikely god, is patently silly. If they want to focus on the Trinity/YHWH anthropomorphic God, then Bill has decisively won the argument.

Fiach

Gary Welsh

This "clarification" only highlights one of the paradoxes in Christian belief: God is ultimately unknowable, yet you know him personally.

In some mysterious way he intervenes in your life and lives in your "heart," yet you can't sit down and have a beer with him and invite me over to the bar to meet him.