(July 31, 2016 at 12:34 pm)Lek Wrote:

(July 30, 2016 at 5:19 pm)Jörmungandr Wrote: (underlining mine -- I think you're arguing from a personal theology here.  It isn't clear to me that the God of Christianity has this right except by interpretation.)

Nowhere in the bible is there a rational defense of God having the right to do what he wants.  The closest you get is Job.  The clay / potter analogy is a lousy analogy.  Clay isn't an autonomous being so the analogy doesn't address relevant moral points.  It would be a closer analogy to say that a parent doesn't have to ask the son or daughter for permission; they can treat them however they like.  And this analogy points up the flaw in the argument that God "has the right" to do whatever he wants, because no parent has cart blanche to do what they want to their children regardless of age.   Where did he acquire this right?  How are you defining a 'right'?  These are valid questions which you're just sweeping under the rug with an analogy and some bare assertions.  How do you know God has this right?

Following is the clearest statement among many that declare this:

Psalm 115:3New International Version (NIV)

3 Our God is in heaven;
   he does whatever pleases him.

This verse refers to his right to do so:

Romans 9:21New International Version (NIV)

21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?

God has existed infinitely.  There was no one else to give him his rights.  He is the creator of all things.

Revelation 22:13New International Version (NIV)

13 I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.

This is the God of christianity.  You may disagree with what the bible says, but if you are discussing the God of the bible, this is part of how he is defined. In this case, it is a valid point for me to say that God has the right the right to do what he wants.  It is clearly one of his attributes.  It is a facet of who God is.

Simply because you buy that load of horseshit doesn't mean that speaking in such terms regarding morality is apt. You've yet to address the fact which I brought up earlier that most Christians regard your god as the author of objective morality, and yet here you are definitely basing your argument here on subjective morality.

If morality is objective, the your god must abide by it too.

If there are different moral codes based on who you are, then morality is not objective.

You cannot have it both ways ... which is clearly what you're trying to do here.

I'm surprised how willing some people are to accept a single tyrant accountable to no one.

Yahweh might be given the right by other gods to do whatever he wants with this reality. That doesn't mean humans have given him the same right. Rights are granted, not taken, and can't be granted by one's self. Nor are they inherent, it doesn't even make any sense.

If I successfully created a sentient being capable of experiencing joy and pain, I think it only follows that I should hide my existence from it and indirectly express my desire to torture it endlessly if it does not accept certain propositions which I could make plainly known if only I had the desire.

(July 31, 2016 at 1:21 pm)robvalue Wrote: I'm surprised how willing some people are to accept a single tyrant accountable to no one.

Yahweh might be given the right by other gods to do whatever he wants with this reality. That doesn't mean humans have given him the same right. Rights are granted, not taken, and can't be granted by one's self. Nor are they inherent, it doesn't even make any sense.

What do you mean rights aren't taken? Of course they are. That's literally how everyone got their rights a couple centuries ago, because of violent revolutions to shake the old system's foundations. You could say Napoleon had a hand in it, but it was such a multifaceted historical event that you can't attribute it to any one person or group of people and you certainly can't say they were granted by anyone in particular. People care for their rights now. You go ahead and try and take some of them away from them for no good reason at all and see how it goes.

I do agree they aren't inherent though, nor are they "self-evident" as some ridiculous notions would have it. Rights are definitely not natural. They are the outcomes of a particular system of living we came up with historically, is all. Rights might change dramatically in nature and scope in the future, even though some presumably will always stay the same, like the most basic ones everyone needs. But that still doesn't make them anything but an enforced human creation, a particular philosophy forcefully shoved down people's throats. And this ties back to what I've said again and again in the past, laws protect our rights and laws, in their turn, are part of an enforced morality of the society focusing on the individual and the lesser group. It is the only form of "objective" morality there is. Inb4, stupid remarks again, that makes it neither the only available morality, nor the only possible one, nor does it make it the best possible one. But it is objective since everyone has to abide by it.

(July 30, 2016 at 5:19 pm)Jörmungandr Wrote: (underlining mine -- I think you're arguing from a personal theology here.  It isn't clear to me that the God of Christianity has this right except by interpretation.)

Nowhere in the bible is there a rational defense of God having the right to do what he wants.  The closest you get is Job.  The clay / potter analogy is a lousy analogy.  Clay isn't an autonomous being so the analogy doesn't address relevant moral points.  It would be a closer analogy to say that a parent doesn't have to ask the son or daughter for permission; they can treat them however they like. And this analogy points up the flaw in the argument that God "has the right" to do whatever he wants, because no parent has cart blanche to do what they want to their children regardless of age.   Where did he acquire this right?  How are you defining a 'right'?  These are valid questions which you're just sweeping under the rug with an analogy and some bare assertions.  How do you know God has this right?

*emphasis mine*

And herein lies the hypocrisy. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you are pro choice. In being pro choice you agree with giving women carte blanche to terminate a life simply because "it's her body", yet when someone says that God has supreme authority over his creation, THAT is somehow evil...

So which is it?

(August 1, 2016 at 10:47 am)Huggy74 Wrote: And herein lies the hypocrisy. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you are pro choice. In being pro choice you agree with giving women carte blanche to terminate a life simply because "it's her body", yet when someone says that God has supreme authority over his creation, THAT is somehow evil...

So which is it?

Fetuses aren't children.

(August 1, 2016 at 12:41 pm)Alasdair Ham Wrote:

(August 1, 2016 at 10:47 am)Huggy74 Wrote: And herein lies the hypocrisy. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you are pro choice. In being pro choice you agree with giving women carte blanche to terminate a life simply because "it's her body", yet when someone says that God has supreme authority over his creation, THAT is somehow evil...

So which is it?

Fetuses aren't children.

#thingsyoushouldn'thavetoexplaintoadults

Yeah.... like "There isn't a dude in the sky watching over everyone and doing fuck all."