God, the schizophrenic?

Originally posted by The Chess Express
Originally posted by dottewell
[b]The original point you were making was that there could be no heaven without hell (or vice-versa, I forget). This does not follow from the fact that without good there could not be evil, or vice-versa.

Look at it this way. There are only two possible ways that people can do good. 1. They’re forced to ...[text shortened]... sus describes and then he forgot. It may be that evil has to exist as a reminder. Who knows?[/b]

I shall take that as a 'yes, god allows evil to exist so that he can run a test that, being omniscient, he already knows the answer to. Humans are so insignificant to our divine creator that he will willingly allow them to send themselves to hell, for this very test.'

Cheers

Originally posted by scottishinnz
I shall take that as a 'yes, god allows evil to exist so that he can run a test that, being omniscient, he already knows the answer to. Humans are so insignificant to our divine creator that he will willingly allow them to send themselves to hell, for this very test.'

Cheers

In fact, God thinks us to be so insignificant that he came to earth to die a horrible death for us so that we would have a chance to be reconciled with him once again.

Originally posted by whodey
In fact, God thinks us to be so insignificant that he came to earth to die a horrible death for us so that we would have a chance to be reconciled with him once again.

Came down to earth to die a horrible death? That shall be his undoing I fear!

Probably why we've heard so little from him for the last 2000 years though. Seems we've answered this thread then!

God is dead, long live the god!!!

Originally posted by scottishinnz
I shall take that as a 'yes, god allows evil to exist so that he can run a test that, being omniscient, he already knows the answer to. Humans are so insignificant to our divine creator that he will willingly allow them to send themselves to hell, for this very test.'

Cheers

Uh…not quite. Let me summarize for you. God allows evil to exist so that good can exist. He gives us free will so that we can experience both good and evil, and ultimately realize that evil is wrong and good is the only way that leads to our lasting happiness. Once we get to the point where we have free will, and we’ve learned our lessons and choose good all the time (as Jesus does), God brings us back to him and lets us stay in Heaven where we belong. Some go through hell whether it be here on earth or in the afterlife, but all eventually return to God; and God, being omniscient, knows that this will be the end result. Amen.

Evil is just a necessary part of the equation. Look at it this way, every time we suffer we grow. Usually we suffer as much as we choose to anyway. People have far more control over their lives than they’ll often times admit to.

Originally posted by scottishinnz
Came down to earth to die a horrible death? That shall be his undoing I fear!

Probably why we've heard so little from him for the last 2000 years though. Seems we've answered this thread then!

God is dead, long live the god!!!

Why are we then still talking about him? It seems to me that you are hearing from him today.

In all seriousness though, what is it that you believe? From the impressions I have gotten from you I would say you are an atheist. Am I correct? If so, do you still consider yourself a spiritual person? If not, why do you post on this board? Are you a seeker of truth or do you merely enjoy questioning those who are?

Originally posted by whodey
Why are we then still talking about him?

Some people are horribly stuck in the past.

Originally posted by DragonFriend
Whew, that was a long one. You brought up some good points though (as I'll discuss in a moment). To conserve space, I've omitted your post.

So if I can summarize your "God out of the box" premise...
God started with nothing and created everything, including the laws that govern everything. Therefore, everything is ultimately God's responsibility/fau ...[text shortened]... 'll have to check into that further. Thanks for the new perspective.

DF

So if I can summarize your "God out of the box" premise...
God started with nothing and created everything, including the laws that govern everything. Therefore, everything is ultimately God's responsibility/fault. I think I got that right.

The problem with this agrument is that it negates the responsibility that goes along with free will.

Any properties of free will, including a necessary association with responsibility, were created by God, not respected by him ex ante.

I understand your point about Adam and Eve not understanding evil through experience, but iit fails to respond to twhitehead's original argument which you quoted. Before eating of the tree, Adam and Eve could not know that disobeying God's order was wrong. Such a concept would be lost on them. Under your formulation, the fruit of the Tree was not what endowed Adam and Eve with the knowledge of good and evil, but rather it was the experience of disobeying God, but this runs counter to the Bible which claims that the Tree does give the knowledge of good and evil.

Second, it doesn't matter when God created humanity. Perfect foresight means that he always knew that he would create humanity, and he always knew, including before creating Hell, that many many humans would reside there.

Your final section troubles me. Earlier in this thread you argued that perfect and imperfect things could not be together. This was an ex ante rule that even God had to respect. But here you claim that on Earth this law does not apply! Did the Earth loophole, as I call it, apply even before God created? More importantly, if perfect and imperfect things can coexist on for thousands (billions?) of years then why can't they coexist in Heaven?

Maybe scotty can confirm this for us, but isn't salt and water in the ocean a mixture just like grains of sand on a beach?

Originally posted by telerion
[b]So if I can summarize your "God out of the box" premise...
God started with nothing and created everything, including the laws that govern everything. Therefore, everything is ultimately God's responsibility/fault. I think I got that right.

The problem with this agrument is that it negates the responsibility that goes along with free will.

An ...[text shortened]... us, but isn't salt and water in the ocean a mixture just like grains of sand on a beach?[/b]

Re salt water,

Yes, essentially. If you take the unit of salt to be the ion, rather than the salt crystal. The unit of sand is essentially the grain, since it has far lower solubility.

Originally posted by The Chess Express
[/i][b]First off, whatever the nature of free will, God authored it. He is the designer. He was not constrained by any of it's current characteristics.

To the second part, free will does not necessitate a choice of good and evil actions. Here is a definition of free will.

If an agent chooses action A in the state of nature S, then the agen ...[text shortened]... , it just means that God created the universe in the best way to achieve the ultimate goal.[/b]

I will try a different approach to explaining free will. I was not trying to deliberately confuse you. I'm used to speaking in terms of sets and think it's a simple and concise language. That's why this method is also a common way in to approach the issue of free will in analytic philosophy. Essentially, my definition says that the state of nature does not determine an individuals decision. Let me try an example. Say a person is is faced with the problem of picking up one of three balls from a table. One ball is red; one is yellow; and one is blue. Without loss of generalization, let's say that we observe the individual pick up the yellow ball. A determinist would claim that the combination of all events in nature up to the point of selection (i.e. the state of nature) caused the individuals choice. Really the individual never could choose any other ball than the yellow one.

An advocate of free will would disagree and claim that while the state of nature may have had some influence on the individual's choice, it did not determine the choice. The individual could have chosen the red or blue ball. This is a simplification of the whole issue, but that's the crux of the matter.

Yes, it is evident that we cannot make choose to do any sort of action. If we do have free will, then limiting our set of choices to a number (bigger than one) cannot remove it. Yes, God did not need, as many xian apologists contend, to allow choice of evil actions. Certainly, this doesn't make the remaining choices meaningless. The choice of a spouse or a lover. The choice to donate to a needy family. This choice to read to a child. How can you say these are unimportant?

The ice cream example was to show you one very simple, obvious way free will can exist even when evil is not an option. Personally, I prefer the description with sets, but that was clearly not effective.

You say ice cream is meaningless. Fine. Even if you do think these choices are "meaningless," that does not negate the fact that I have refuted the misconception that free will necessitates a choice over evil actions. A xian apologist cannot with honesty continue to claim that God decision to endow us with free will, even in its present design, constrained him to allow evil choices. Case closed.

You claim that evil must exist for good. Fine, but certainly the evil that exists could be limited to a choice not to do a good action. In mathematical terms we might call this the null. Take reading to a child. A good action. What would be the evil counteraction associated with this? Not reading to the child? This may not really be 'evil,' but rather "non-good." Now a definite evil action would be raping the child. In Creation, we all have such a choice. But why? As I've already shown, it is unnecessary even if you believe that the option to commit some "non-good" action is worthwhile so that we can distinguish good.

If you believe God created the universe in the best way possible (already this suffers from questions of higher ordering over even God, but given that you are uncomfortable with sets, I won't go into spaces), then you must believe that allowing adults to choose to rape a child is better than not allowing them to. God must have thought it wise not to allow us the ability to extinguish the sun, but just couldn't think of any better Creation than one where adults may rape children.

Originally posted by whodey
Telerion,
When you say that my definition of evil is contrived, it is probably because I am only refering to the Biblical definition. It says in Romans 14:23 that whatever is not of faith is sin. I did not make this up and it is not contrived. You are right in that it can also be refered to as disbelief or even doubt. I therefore conclude that sin is evi ...[text shortened]... e in the same. If you reject one, you reject the other. This rejection is considered evil.

'Whatever is not faith is sin' is not a definition of evil. You've taken extreme liberty with the text. That is what is contrived. This whole tangent about sin is a complete red herring. I will not bother to answer your irrelevant question.

Where do I use a wikipedia definition??? What confuses me most in your posts isn't the double-speak, its the way you jump from one irrelevant statement to the next. Frankly, you made a mistatement when you said that evil is 'merely lack of faith in the Word of God.' Clearly, you think evil is much more than that. Simply put, 'lack of faith in the Word of God' is not identical to 'absence of God's love in one's heart.'

I have already shown how such a loose use of the word 'good' is inconsistent with everyday usage and with that used by God himself in the Bible.

Your next section about free will is all "God in a Box." If you insist on claiming that God being of love necessitated him designing and endowing us with free will and further this necessitated his creating evil as an option, then please be open and tell us who or what authored this rule. You continue to take it as given that these relationship between love, free will, and evil existed before creation. Giving that these rules are not logical axioms, I demand to know where these rules came from and why God was compelled to respect them.

Yes, I know that whole story of David's exploits with Bathsheba. It is totally irrelevant to the "God in a Box" arguments you continue to put forth.

Quick question. You have claimed in another thread that evil does not actually exist. It is actually just the absence of good, which does exist. You tell us here that murder and adultery are evil. Are you willing to stand by your earlier claim and tell us that murder and adultery do not actually exist, while the 'absence of murder' and the 'absence of adultery' does exist?

Originally posted by whodey
Why are we then still talking about him? It seems to me that you are hearing from him today.

In all seriousness though, what is it that you believe? From the impressions I have gotten from you I would say you are an atheist. Am I correct? If so, do you still consider yourself a spiritual person? If not, why do you post on this board? Are you a seeker of truth or do you merely enjoy questioning those who are?

I am an athiest, a scientist and a university teacher. I seek not just truth, but also to dispel ignorance.

Originally posted by scottishinnz
I am an athiest, a scientist and a university teacher. I seek not just truth, but also to dispel ignorance.

Beggin your pardon, my esteemed friend, but how is it you consider your inflammatory postulation about the Christian theology to be 'despelling ignorance'? 😉

p.s. My apologies for not responding in the other thread a while back. I have been on a bit of a hiatus.

Originally posted by Omnislash
Beggin your pardon, my esteemed friend, but how is it you consider your inflammatory postulation about the Christian theology to be 'despelling ignorance'? 😉

p.s. My apologies for not responding in the other thread a while back. I have been on a bit of a hiatus.

What an ironic error. lol.

Dang, wish I had caught that while I could edit it. 😀

Originally posted by telerion
'Whatever is not faith is sin' is not a definition of evil. You've taken extreme liberty with the text. That is what is contrived. This whole tangent about sin is a complete red herring. I will not bother to answer your irrelevant question.

Where do I use a wikipedia definition??? What confuses me most in your posts isn't the double-speak, its the w ...[text shortened]... , while the 'absence of murder' and the 'absence of adultery' does exist?

'Whatever is not faith is sin' is the Biblical definition of sin and I have provided the text that says so. I am not contriving the definition. You may say that the Bible is contriving such a definition. I feel as though I understand this definition, however. In John the first chapter it talks about God at the begining of creation. It says that in the begining was the Word, the Word was with God and the word WAS God. Here we see that God and his word are one. Therefore, if you reject his word then you reject God himself. Faith is merely trusting and doing God's word. My story about David was not irrevolent. Here we see that God equataed Davids sin with despising God personally by rejecting his moral laws. Therefore, the rejection of your creator is equated with sin. Why is this such a hard concept? After all, he created us. We came from him even though we may choose to steal ourselves away from him.

As far as the word good I am once again only refering to the Biblical definition. Jesus said that none is good except God. It also says that all good things come from God. Therefore, the everyday common usuage of the word good is not the same as it is Biblically. What we consider to be good is not necessariy good in the eyes of God. This should not be suprising. After all, it says in the Bible that his thoughts are not our thoughts. He sees the world differently and rightly so. This is because he sees the big picture and we do not.

As far as the free will issue I stated that we have free will because he is a God of love. You cannot argue the fact that you cannot force someone to love you. Have you ever tried? I think we have all witnessed this attempt at some point. In every instance though it fails miserably. As far as who authorized this rule I will simply say that it is his nature. It is simply who he has always been and he is eternal. I never said that evil existed before creation. What I am saying is that when creation was completed, he afforded his creation the option of rejecting him. How else can one have a loving relationship without the option of choosing to love one back?

As far as the question about murder and adultery not existing I would say that the evil that motivated these actions does not exist. Its like my analogy about coldness. Coldenss does not exist. You cannot measure coldness. What is measured is the absence of heat. In fact, at absolut zero all matter becomes inert and incapable of reacting at such a temperature. You may look out your window and see snow and ice on the gound. These are manifestations of lack of heat even though heat is the only thing that truly exists. This is also the case with murder and adultery.

If I may I will ask you the same question I asked Scotty. Are you an atheist as well? If so, are you a seeker of truth or do you come here only to dispell what you perceive as ignorance as well?

Originally posted by whodey
'Whatever is not faith is sin' is the Biblical definition of sin and I have provided the text that says so. I am not contriving the definition. You may say that the Bible is contriving such a definition. I feel as though I understand this definition, however. In John the first chapter it talks about God at the begining of creation. It says that in the be ...[text shortened]... a seeker of truth or do you come here only to dispell what you perceive as ignorance as well?

Quite simply because we were talking about evil not sin. While sin may be evil. Evil is not necessarily sin. They are not identical. It is not the same to claim that Hitler was an evil man and that Hitler was a sin man. Sin is a subset of evil. I will no longer respond to this red herring.

Claiming there are none good except God is not the same as saying good=God. Good and God are different concepts. Again if I say that Hitler is evil, that is not the same as me saying that evil means Hitler. You are making the same erroneous conflation with God and good. As with sin above, this conflation is leading to wild diversions in the discussion.

I have resigned myself to the fact that you will not understand "God in a Box." I suspect that because of the way apologetics was taught to you, you have partitioned your mind. If we were talking about a similar concept in a discussion about anything other than God, you would immediately understand what I'm saying. However, because God is involved, you draw upon the God-partition and repeat "love-->free will--->evil."

If I may I will ask you the same question I asked Scotty. Are you an atheist as well? If so, are you a seeker of truth or do you come here only to dispell what you perceive as ignorance as well?

I am an atheist at this point in my life. I do seek truth, however, that is not usually my intention when I come to RHP. While there are some intelligent people here, I have not found this venue to be the most efficient means to enlightenment (i.e. finding truth). I am partly motivated by the desire to dispel ignorance. When I see what I perceive to be blatantly fallacious arguments, and when I feel up to a futile enterprise, I strike up a counterargument.