The "problem" of evil

Quote: Nareed

Poor Euthyphro lives on. An action is right because a non-existent deity says it is.

Cool reference. An action is right because a perfectly good and loving God who we need for existence itself says it is.

Quote: FrGamble

Cool reference. An action is right because a perfectly good and loving God who we need for existence itself says it is.

Not we, it's you who needs the crutch of
god for your daily existence. Have you
ever read what Freud said about religion
and god and the psychology behind it?
I'd advise you to stay far away from
Sigmund, he makes way too much sense.

Quote: FrGamble

Cool reference.

Careful. You're too close to admitting ethics existed before your idol Jesus was even an itch in Joseph's great-great-great-grandfather's crotch.

Quote:

An action is right because a perfectly good and loving God who we need for existence itself says it is.

So morality is entirely subjective, only it's at the whim of a non-existent deity.

Good to know.

Quote: Nareed

Careful. You're too close to admitting ethics existed before...

Of course it did.

Quote:

So morality is entirely subjective, only it's at the whim of a non-existent deity.

You really don't seem to understand the concept of God. First of all remember that God has to exist if anything else is to exist. The first cause, unmoved mover, non-contingent being, impossibility of an infinite regress - any of this ring a bell? You should probably refrain from saying God doesn't exist until you have some answer to the logical necessity of His existence.

Anyway, another part of the concept of God you don't seem to grasp is the all-good or perfect part. If God is the essence of goodness, the form if you will, than what God chooses as moral is not on a whim or subjective but rather the very truth of what goodness is and it could not be otherwise.

Quote: FrGamble

You really don't seem to understand the concept of God.

You don't seem to grasp that it's as relevant to every day life as the concept of Phlogiston, spontaneous generation, or eugenics. There are many wrong and discredited ideas out there. Deities are just one kind among many.

Quote:

Anyway, another part of the concept of God you don't seem to grasp is the all-good or perfect part.

Judging from the Bible, its deity fails the "all-good" test. And he's too dumb to be "perfect".

Quote: FrGamble

You really don't seem to understand the concept of God. .

I don't understand the concept for most
comic book heroes either, which is all god is.
If I don't think something exists, why
would I care what the details of it's
non existence are. You and other religious
types while away your lives making up
details for beings that are in your imagination.
I have better things to do.

Quote: Nareed

You don't seem to grasp that it's as relevant to every day life as the concept of Phlogiston, spontaneous generation, or eugenics. There are many wrong and discredited ideas out there. Deities are just one kind among many.

You couldn't be more wrong. How we understand God or if we believe in God(s) is one of the most relevant and important ideas that affect us in everything we do every day. It is one of the biggest questions we all have to answer and depending on that answer determines how we see the universe, ourselves, each other, our meaning and purpose of life, and our future individually and as humanity.

This is why I don't get why Evenbob continues to claim atheism is nothing and based on nothing. It is just a lack of belief. That is a very simple understanding of atheism and it doesn't even begin to touch the logical and reasonable consequences of what it means to not believe in God. He and his friend are living examples of what makes me upset about atheists. Namely that they don't really embrace it and grasp what it means logically and how it impacts their life. It seems more like a game for Evenbob (who by the way really likes you and wants to be friends again).

Quote: FrGamble

This is why I don't get why Evenbob continues to claim atheism is nothing and based on nothing. It is just a lack of belief. That is a very simple understanding of atheism and it doesn't even begin to touch the logical and reasonable consequences of what it means to not believe in God. .

I laughed, snickered, and guffawed all at
once, not easy, don't try it. Ever the snake
oil salesman, chronicling what will befall
the patient if he doesn't buy your elixir.

The game is yours, not mine. You have all
the rules and moves written on the lid
of your Parker Bros board game called
Xxtionity. You have the game box full
of icons; rosaries, crucifixes, little vials
of holy water, statues of saints, pics of
Mary, Jesus with his sacred heart, there
is even a portable sacrament kit. I
have nothing, not even a shred of belief.

My purpose in life changes with my mood.
Yours is decided by someone else. But
you like that, no original thinking needed
on your part.

Quote: Evenbob

My purpose in life changes with my mood.

How horrible, I'm sorry to hear that.

Quote:

Yours is decided by someone else. But
you like that, no original thinking needed
on your part.

The oldest purpose in life is yours. I just do whatever I want. That is not creative or original, in fact it is pretty much just animalistic. My advice would be to think long and hard about what you value and love, what fulfills you and makes you feel like the person you were created to be. Then commit yourself in a new way, no matter your mood may be, to live in a manner that brings you closer to this best version of yourself.

Quote: FrGamble

You couldn't be more wrong.

Of course I could. I could adopt any religion and work my way down. Or take up Communism, which is pretty much the same thing.

Quote:

How we understand God or if we believe in God(s) is one of the most relevant and important ideas that affect us in everything we do every day.

Do I need to bring up Spiderman again?

Ideas have a great deal of relevance in every day life. But the wrong ideas simply get in the way, at best, and bring you down at worst.

Consider the problems faced by systems which rely on heat transfer to work. This is a major consideration in all types of combustion engines, water heaters, ovens, molding machines, foundries, furnaces, etc. How well would the engineers who design, build and maintain these things fare if they relied on the theory of phlogiston rather than on the laws of thermodynamics and of chemistry?

The notion of phlogiston wasn't illogical or unreasonable, you know, for all that it required negative mass (some theories require more outrageous things, and we've seen many of these). It was actually a good explanation for combustion, given the state of knowledge at the time. It was just wrong.

But let's assume some bright rocket designer thinks otherwise. Why, then you could launch the heaviest cargoes into space without worrying about the need to lift any fuel at all!(*) Just add that phlogiston, which you need to make the fuel burn, and its negative mass balances out and the fuel effectively weighs nothing! Therefore orbiting the Empire State Building, would be as cheap as the BTUs in fuel needed to accelerate it to orbital speed. And we can use the cheapest fuel we can find, as mass is no longer a limitation!

We just need to refine, bottle and transport phlogiston in massive amounts, something no one has bothered to do because until now no one believes it to exist.

Do you think it would be wise to invest half a rusted penny on such a scheme?

You're selling something remarkably similar, as in that it's not supported by factual evidence.

To begin with, given our knowledge of vary basic biology and evolution, there couldn't have been an Adam and Eve, nor a safe way for two humans to exist in a state other than sheer savagery with nature. Therefore the very foundation of Christianity, the infamous Fall from grace or whatever you call it, is 100% unsupported by facts or evidence, and in fact is contradicted by tons of facts and evidence, such as all of paleoanthropology.

No fall means no original sin No original sin, means no reason for Jesus to die and resurrect to atone for it.

That's just for starters. But for me that alone would be enough.

And you're not asking for a small investment, but rather for the whole of my life, everything I own, and everything I am.

No, thanks.


(*) Hell, just add a Manhattan-mass of phlogiston to Manhattan, and you can lift the island whole into orbit, buildings, people and parks and all else, without any fuel at all.