Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie
Thank God
Comments
-
Neither do I but then I'm not God.
The argument that humans are not knowledgeable enough to understand God falls down some what when Christians say thinks like they believe all good comes from God. Why do you believe this when you claim to not be able to understand it?
Again this argument is only ever brought up when people are attacking the idea of a good God. You guys have no problem "understanding God" when proclaiming all the nice things about him.Ultimately evil is a mystery but like I said, I think love must involve free-will. Coercion or being made an automaton doesn't demonstrate love.
Says who?
You aren't God so how do you know? Who are you to proclaim that God could not have created love that didn't involve free will?
What standard are you judging God created unfree will love by?
See where all this leads ... if the rest of us are as clueless to God and what he can and cannot do then equally so must you guys be.It's clear that God allows evil but it's not at all clear that He causes moral evil. I don't know about physical evil though. Maybe hurricanes etc are punishment, who knows?
Well you guys apparently? You can proclaim you know all the good stuff, but the bad stuff is all one big great mystery. :rolleyes:0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »Answer me this: All powerful and knowing everything that happens: where in any of that says he controls everything that happens. As I said before power and control are two very different things.
The reason you're not following is because you're leaving out a key ingredient in our delicious evil-God cake: God created the universe.
God knows all, sees all and has absolute power over everything. He sees the future. He knows, before he's even made the decision to do it, that when he creates the universe a certain way then certain things will happen. He knew that little Mary-Sue was gonna get murdered. He could have made a universe where that didn't happen, but he did anyway.
God chose to make a universe where on earth the sky is blue. He knew full well the sky, when it formed would be blue. In just the same way, when he made the universe, he knew the way he made that universe would make a world where millions of infants die from disease every year before their first birthday. He could have made a different universe, where those children were loved and looked after and became poets and painters and teachers.
He chose to make the universe with millions of rotting infant corpses instead.0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »Second of all omnipotence means all powerful. He is more powerful than everything else yes, it still doesnt say that he controls everything, does it.midlandsmissus wrote: »Why do some people murder and rape and others dont - some people decide not to care about the suffering of others and some do. It's all up to choices.Ultimately evil is a mystery but like I said, I think love must involve free-will. Coercion or being made an automaton doesn't demonstrate love.
It's clear that God allows evil but it's not at all clear that He causes moral evil. I don't know about physical evil though. Maybe hurricanes etc are punishment, who knows?
I just don't get it.
Let me summarise the position and perhaps someone can clarify:
1) Either God exists or not?
2) If he does, then either God loves us and cares about what happens to us or not?
3) If he does, and since we know he has the power to intervene, then can someone please explain how he has allowed the decades long systematic child abuse and rape in this country by the very people who are supposed to be speaking in his name and spreading his word?
To me there are only 2 logical conclusions from this:
A) God doesn't existGod does exist but doesn't give a fcuk.
I think the usual and trite sidestep of "God works in mysterious ways" is not enough, not by a long shot, when faced with the enormity of the evil and betrayal that has happened to multiple generations of children in this country at the hands of the religious orders.0 -
The reason you're not following is because you're leaving out a key ingredient in our delicious evil-God cake: God created the universe.
God knows all, sees all and has absolute power over everything. He sees the future. He knows, before he's even made the decision to do it, that when he creates the universe a certain way then certain things will happen. He knew that little Mary-Sue was gonna get murdered. He could have made a universe where that didn't happen, but he did anyway.
God chose to make a universe where on earth the sky is blue. He knew full well the sky, when it formed would be blue. In just the same way, when he made the universe, he knew the way he made that universe would make a world where millions of infants die from disease every year before their first birthday. He could have made a different universe, where those children were loved and looked after and became poets and painters and teachers.
He chose to make the universe with millions of rotting infant corpses instead.
I'm some what at a loss why so many of the Christians don't get this very simple point.
Again they have no problem with the idea that God choose to create wonderful things for us. Yet they seem to think that anything bad is nothing to do with God. Why? There is no logic behind that. God created a universe with beautiful stars and he also created a universe with AIDS, skin that burns easily, lungs that can't breath under water and everything else that humans suffer through ever day.
Logic dictates that nothing happens in the universe without God knowing it will happen and approving that it will happen.
Again does not compute. We aren't all just atheists because we want to piss off our grandparents. This stuff simply doesn't make any sense. It is nonsense.0 -
-
Advertisement
-
Neither do I but then I'm not God.
Ultimately evil is a mystery but like I said, I think love must involve free-will. Coercion or being made an automaton doesn't demonstrate love.
It's clear that God allows evil but it's not at all clear that He causes moral evil. I don't know about physical evil though. Maybe hurricanes etc are punishment, who knows?
To go back to the point of the thread, you can't take anything good in the world and call that evidence for god, then dismiss all the bad in the world, calling it a "mystery". It's only a mystery if you want to say God is doing the good stuff. Once you stop doing that you end up with a perfectly logical conclusion: sh!t just happens and god is making neither the good nor the bad happen0 -
-
Yes but you do proclaim to some how know or believe that while you cannot see the good in that happen there must be some some where. Which seems even more illogical.The argument that humans are not knowledgeable enough to understand God falls down some what when Christians say thinks like they believe all good comes from God. Why do you believe this when you claim to not be able to understand it?Says who?
You aren't God so how do you know? Who are you to proclaim that God could not have created love that didn't involve free will?
What standard are you judging God created unfree will love by?See where all this leads ... if the rest of us are as clueless to God and what he can and cannot do then equally so must you guys be.Well you guys apparently?You can proclaim you know all the good stuff, but the bad stuff is all one big great mystery. :rolleyes:0 -
I'm some what at a loss why so many of the Christians don't get this very simple point.Again they have no problem with the idea that God choose to create wonderful things for us. Yet they seem to think that anything bad is nothing to do with God. Why?
And as regards natural disaster, disease etc, I would speculate that God would prevent these things if we were obedient to His commandments. Divine justice doesn't allow sin to go unpunished. Whether we pay now or later is up to God. I'm convinced that if the majority of us loved God, He would prevent all disasters.0 -
Zillah's four step guide on how to think like a believer!
Step 1: Conclude that God exists and that he is good.
Step 2: Say absolutely anything in defense of Step 1. It doesn't matter if it makes no sense, just remember, you're only pretending to be rational!
Step 3: If anything appears to confirm Step 1, repeat it endlessly. If anything contradicts Step 1, either ignore it or call it a mystery.
Step 4: Never ever be afraid to sound absolutely ridiculous.0 -
Advertisement
-
-
-
Munin, obviously.0
-
I have faith that God is good because He was good enough to create us and when we insulted our Creator by sinning against Him, He didn't ask us to pay the price but instead sent His only beloved Son to die for us.
Yeah, lets leave the "beloved Son" bit to the side for a moment (there is only so much illogical stuff I can deal with at a time :pac:)
Who is to say that God didn't have an evil reason for creating us? You?
You say that while many of the horrible things God has done appear bad there is a good reason why he did them, just one that we cannot see or understand.
Surely the flip side of that argument is that it is just as likely that for the good things God appears to have done there is actually an evil reason he did them.
You think creation appears good. I think the Old Testament appears bad. You say to me that it is arrogant of me to judge God as being bad based on the Old Testament because I'm not aware of all the facts and I don't have access to a God sized knowledge bank.
Surely that applies to you as well.
Is it not equally arrogant or illogical for you to suppose that you have the ability to judge God is good based on your assessment of the things he is supposed to have done?The good part is easy to understand. The problem is understanding evil.
But that is an assessment based on your own need to be comforted by this concept. Logically there is no more reason why a good god would exist than an evil god.
If God is in fact good and doing what appears to be evil for unknown but righteous reasons we have no more the ability to assess this than we do the ability to assess it if God was in fact evil and doing things that appear good for some unknown but evil reason.
It makes no more sense for you to suppose that we should consider the idea that God has a good reason for the evil he apparently does than it does for you to consider the idea that God has an evil reason for the good he apparently does.
The reason you don't consider this is not because it is a less logical position, but again because an evil God serves no purpose to you.Of course God could have made us incapable of evil and we'd probably be very happy etc. But maybe God had a better way?
Or maybe he is just evil.
Maybe he created us to suffer. We certainly do an awful lot of it and it would have been just as easy for God to create life that cannot suffer as it would have been for him to create life that does, given that he is omnipotent.To me anyway, giving us free will shows a greater love for us. God demonstrated His love for us by creating us out of His goodness and wishes us to respond to His love so that our love will be true and unforced.
The whole point is that God didn't demonstrate his love for us by creating us because he created us in such a way that we suffer greatly.
The assertion that this is necessary for free will doesn't stand up. It isn't necessary for free will. I do not need to be able to burn in order to have free will. I do not need to be able to drown in order to have free will. I do not need to have a physical body that can feel pain or suffering in order to have free will.
You look at life and (for some reason I can't fathom) conclude that God loves us. Everyone else here concludes, based on how frail and easily hurt humans are, that God if he exists at all, hates us.
Your only response to that seems to be to suggest that we assume that there is some unknown reason explaining why he actually does love us but he had to create us like this. The question on everyone else's lips here is Why?
Why assume that? Why not simply assume the far simpler conclusion the he either is evil or doesn't exist.There are lots of things that haven't been definitively revealed by God and I believe there is good reason for that.
Maybe there is an evil reason for it.
Maybe God knows that if he reveals to much about his evil plans we will realise this and all rebel against him?
Of course such a concept of God serves no purpose to religious people so is not considered.Not quite. I said that God doesn't cause moral evil. The physical evil (disasters etc) is a mystery.
But you don't know God doesn't cause moral evil. You assert this and then when some one challenges it you claim they lack the ability to make this assessment. If they do why do you not?It's not simple, there are unknown quantities at play! There is some speculation involved.
No there isn't because by your religion's definition of God he is all knowing and all powerful. There are no external issues that constrain him, so there are no unknown quantities.
The only way there would be unknown quantities is if your god isn't what you believe him to be.Why can't you accept the idea that all bad/evil comes from us?
We come from God, from the moment of creation, and so under the logic so does everything we do.
Before God created the universe he knew everything that would happen in that universe. He created it anyway. He could have created any universe he wanted to, he created this one. If he didn't like everything in this universe, from the atomic bomb to a child dying of cancer, he would have created a different universe. He had access to an infinite number of universe, and in that set would have been one where we didn't create the atomic bomb and the child didn't die of cancer.
He picked this one over that one.Having the ability to sin doesn't cause us to do so.
That is irrelevant from God's perspective. He knows we will. Having a choice is irrelevant if you already know what choice we will make. It then just becomes something you do/did. It is like looking back in the past. "Choice" has no meaning when looking back in the past. There is just what we did. The future would look the same to God.And as regards natural disaster, disease etc, I would speculate that God would prevent these things if we were obedient to His commandments.Divine justice doesn't allow sin to go unpunished. Whether we pay now or later is up to God. I'm convinced that if the majority of us loved God, He would prevent all disasters.
Again that makes him evil. Killing a child in a tsuamni because I don't go to church on Sunday is evil. The fact that God does this, a being with unlimited power, makes it infinitely evil. Slapping "justice" on to it doesn't make it justice.0 -
If God is in fact good and doing what appears to be evil for unknown but righteous reasons we have no more the ability to assess this than we do the ability to assess it if God was in fact evil and doing things that appear good for some unknown but evil reason.
The reason you don't consider this is not because it is a less logical position, but again because an evil God serves no purpose to you.
Nice.0 -
I'm not following. If God doesn't do anything in response to prayers how does that give someone who is praying peace of mind?
But surely that is him doing something? If he is going to interact with the world to give this woman strength then why not save children in Africa?
But that's the whole point! Religion/God is meant to impact you spiritually,soothing your spirit.
If you don't believe in God surely you can still see how praying could give some-one peace of mind - essentiallytalking out their problem with some-one0 -
That is ridiculous. It would be as easy for God to create life in such a way that one life form cannot harm another as it would be for him to the the opposite. He choose to do this this way (assuming he exists).
As Dades says, does not compute
Right so how could you create life with free will, without there being the potential to kill some-one.
But then I take it you're choosing to believe we don't have free will.
So posters on here are saying it is written that God is all powerful. It is also written that we have free will.
Why is the first constantly brought up,and the second totally dismissed out of hand?
Just because it helps your argument more?0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »Right so how could you create life with free will, without there being the potential to kill some-one.
But then I take it you're choosing to believe we don't have free will.
So posters on here are saying it is written that God is all powerful. It is also written that we have free will.
Why is the first constantly brought up,and the second totally dismissed out of hand?
Just because it helps your argument more?
The thing which many people don't seem to understand is that if god wanted to create free will, and still not let people murder and whatnot, he could have. If he was (assuming he exists) infinitely powerful - as is always stated - then it would have been no harder for him to create free will without the possibility of murder as it would have been for him to create free will with the possibility of it. Our understanding of free will with the possibility of murder is based on limited intelligence: that doesn't mean a system of free will without murder wouldn't have been possible: because how can something not be possible for an infinitely powerful being? It's a contradiction, and one of my many reasons for believing that if a god existed (which I don't believe) then he is malevolent.0 -
The reason you're not following is because you're leaving out a key ingredient in our delicious evil-God cake: God created the universe.
God knows all, sees all and has absolute power over everything. He sees the future. He knows, before he's even made the decision to do it, that when he creates the universe a certain way then certain things will happen. He knew that little Mary-Sue was gonna get murdered. He could have made a universe where that didn't happen, but he did anyway.
God chose to make a universe where on earth the sky is blue. He knew full well the sky, when it formed would be blue. In just the same way, when he made the universe, he knew the way he made that universe would make a world where millions of infants die from disease every year before their first birthday. He could have made a different universe, where those children were loved and looked after and became poets and painters and teachers.
He chose to make the universe with millions of rotting infant corpses instead.
Not following - Au contraire in my opinion!
I'm listening to what everyone is saying and trying to come back with a valid point of my beliefs.
So God knows eveything that everyone does,that doesn't mean you don't have control over what you. How could it possibly? Again you are picking and chosing phrases, you agree with 'Omnipotent,Omniscience' but don't agree where its said we have free will.Why agree with the first two and not the third?A little biased? I think so.
As regards all the bad things you mentioned I think suffering is necessary for us to go through to learn. You suffer, you empathise with suffering.
Mary Sue's murderer chose to make that decision.0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »Right so how could you create life with free will, without there being the potential to kill some-one.
I would use my INFINITE POWERS to create a world that has both free will and murder.
It's like one of those old paradoxical questions, but not: Is God so powerful that he can create a universe that has both free will and no murder? Yes. Yes he is.So posters on here are saying it is written that God is all powerful. It is also written that we have free will.
Why is the first constantly brought up,and the second totally dismissed out of hand?
Just because it helps your argument more?
1 - In my post (which was directed at you and which you ignored by the way, classy) I used disease as my example, so free will has nothing to do with it.
2 - Freewill is not a thing. This is an entirely new argument and one that would highjack this thread, but suffice to say, not only am I saying we don't have freewill, I'm saying that this word "freewill" people keep using is gibberish.0 -
Advertisement
-
I would use my INFINITE POWERS to create a world that has both free will and murder.
It's like one of those old paradoxical questions, but not: Is God so powerful that he can create a universe that has both free will and no murder? Yes. Yes he is.
1 - In my post (which was directed at you and which you ignored by the way, classy) I used disease as my example, so free will has nothing to do with it.
2 - Freewill is not a thing. This is an entirely new argument and one that would highjack this thread, but suffice to say, not only am I saying we don't have freewill, I'm saying that this word "freewill" people keep using is gibberish.
Zillah I had about three posts coming at me at the time, and that post was very brief anyway, I have replied to you since but take it how you want!
Getting off topic, if you would be so kind as to see ourselves outside the atheist/religious boundary for a min, I've just noticed that you are in Canada. I landed here yesterday! I love it!0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »Zillah I had about three posts coming at me at the time, and that post was very brief anyway, I have replied to you since but take it how you want!
Well yes, we can be like a pack of dogs that way. I was referring to this post where I explain your question about power/control.
EDIT: Oh wait, there's a post up there I missed. D'ohGetting off topic, if you would be so kind as to see ourselves outside the atheist/religious boundary for a min, I've just noticed that you are in Canada. I landed here yesterday! I love it!
PM sent0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »As regards all the bad things you mentioned I think suffering is necessary for us to go through to learn. You suffer, you empathise with suffering.
Mary Sue's murderer chose to make that decision.
Again, free will has nothing to do with this. I'm using disease as my example.
So basically you're saying that the fact that God is responsible for billions of infant deaths doesn't mean that he is evil because in some way the suffering and death he inflicted on those three week old children let's them learn?0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »'Omnipotent,Omniscience'
Mary Sue's murderer chose to make that decision.
Yes and if god exist and he is both omnipotent and omniscient creator of the universe then he created a universe in which that would happen knowing full well it would happen.0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »Right so how could you create life with free will, without there being the potential to kill some-one.
But then I take it you're choosing to believe we don't have free will.
So posters on here are saying it is written that God is all powerful. It is also written that we have free will.
Why is the first constantly brought up,and the second totally dismissed out of hand?
Just because it helps your argument more?0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »But that's the whole point! Religion/God is meant to impact you spiritually,soothing your spirit.
Again, how does it "impact" you if nothing happens or can happen?
I've yet to hear someone praying "God please protect my little Jonny as he goes around South America for the summer. I know you won't do this but merely by praying to you out loud I feel better, despite knowing you won't do anything and my little Jonny is as vulnerable as if you didn't exist"
or
"Dear lord, please help my mother to recover from her cancer operation. I know you won't, and that my mother's recovery is purely up to the chaotic nature of this natural world, but despite knowing you won't do anything in response to this prayer and everything will continue on as if I hadn't prayed or you simply don't exist or interact with the world, it still makes me feel better
Even the word prayer itself means to ask something of God.midlandsmissus wrote: »If you don't believe in God surely you can still see how praying could give some-one peace of mind
I can see how praying would give someone peace of mind if they believed that praying can actually do something Otherwise...midlandsmissus wrote: »- essentiallytalking out their problem with some-one
Who are they talking it out with? Themselves?0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »Right so how could you create life with free will, without there being the potential to kill some-one.
By making life indestructible, obviously. He does have completely control over the universe after all.
The free will argument that he could not do this is bogus. There are billions of things that God in his infinite wisdom doesn't allow you to do based on the physical laws of the universe that do not stop you having free will.
Can you walk barefoot across the surface of a star? No? Clearly you don't have free will then :rolleyes:midlandsmissus wrote: »But then I take it you're choosing to believe we don't have free will.
No more than you are because you can't breath in space, or survive in a bikini at the North Pole.
Your argument appears to be that if God restricts us in anyway he is not giving us free will. But as I said he has already restricted us in a billion different ways by the way he has constructed us and the universe around us. And apparently we still have free will.
So what is the justification for the argument that he must allow me the opportunity for my skin to burn off in a fire for me to have free will? Or the opportunity for me to crack someone skull with a baseball bat in order for me to have free will?
For fun I think we should start a list of all the things God has decided not to allow us to be able to do ...midlandsmissus wrote: »Why is the first constantly brought up,and the second totally dismissed out of hand?
The "need" for free will does not require that God produce humans out of easily damaged or hurt cells of water and carbon that are so easily destroyed.0 -
midlandsmissus wrote: »So God knows eveything that everyone does,that doesn't mean you don't have control over what you.
Think of it this way. A an actor will take 10 or 15 takes to do a scene in a movie. The editor or director then picks the one take that he likes and puts it in the final movie. Neither the editor nor the director makes the actor choose the way he does each take. The actor has free will do to the take as he things, but the director decides which one of these ends up in the final movie.
The universe is the finale movie. God does not make us choose what we do, but he does choose the universe. In universe A I choose to eat an apple for breakfast, in universe B I choose to eat a banana. In universe N to the infinite I'm a sea slug instead of a human. God picks which version of these universes by setting the initial moment of creation. If in this universe I freely choose to eat an apple that choice is approved by God. The only way that the universe where I pick a banana exists is if God approved that. There are two potential universe, one where I choose to eat an apple and one where I choose to eat a banana. God chooses which universe becomes this universe.
The director doesn't control the actors mind but nothing from the actor's choices or possible choices gets into the movie without the director's approval. The director picks the finial movie from all the possible movies it could have been.
God had access to an infinite number of possible universes and he choose to create one, knowing exactly what would happen based on him picking that particular universe. Nothing gets into this final universe without God knowing and approving it.0 -
People thank God for a multitude of reasons. The important thing is not to get worked up by it, in the same way that religious people should not get worked up by people not thanking God. People in general can not be convinced either way of God's existence by rational debate or argument. It might be frustrating but that is the way the human mind works.0
-
Advertisement
-
People thank God for a multitude of reasons. The important thing is not to get worked up by it, in the same way that religious people should not get worked up by people not thanking God. People in general can not be convinced either way of God's existence by rational debate or argument. It might be frustrating but that is the way the human mind works.
I think I spotted an error in your logic.
People should not get worked up about people raping people, in the same way they should not get worked up by other people not raping people.0
Advertisement