Yep, insisting that he be subject to logical norms which are observations of the behavior of our cosmos. Are you willing to stick to that, all the way to the tearful end?
(can you tell I've been here recently? Skep where you at bro...are you seeing this...guffaw!)

(September 21, 2014 at 4:46 pm)Little lunch Wrote: It's really built up my character knowing that millions of children have died of starvation.
Now I don't waste food as much. Thanks god.

God didn't set up the system that millions of children ought to be starving. We have enough resources to feed them. This is our own doing. We also set up a system in which third world countries don't have much of a chance. But again, this us doing it. Not God.

The alternative would be for God to nanny us when we get things wrong. But that world, our own moral responsibility would not be there as much, and we would expect God to do all sorts of things for us. A world where he interferes contradicts the design of the world for character building.

However that said. The suffering will be trivial to infinite bliss, so the character building is worth it.

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(September 21, 2014 at 4:49 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Yep, insisting that he be subject to logical norms which are observations of the behavior of our cosmos. Are you willing to stick to that, all the way to the tearful end?
(can you tell I've been here recently? Skep where you at bro...are you seeing this...guffaw!)

All I'm saying for all we know, the system he designed (our universe) is the best one for character building. Yes there can be a best system. If there can't be a best system, then you will say, are you saying it's impossible for God to create the best system. Not omnipotent. That's called having your cake and eating it too.

The problem of evil as proposed by theologians and philosophers exists because of belief in god. The question is why would god allow evil. Without god the existence of evil is not a riddle, just a natural occurrence and the only real question is what should we do about it. Saying wouldn't it be nice if god accounted for it in the next life, is just lazy. Much better to deal with it here and now.

(September 21, 2014 at 5:02 pm)Jenny A Wrote: The problem of evil as proposed by theologians and philosophers exists because of belief in god. The question is why would god allow evil. Without god the existence of evil is not a riddle, just a natural occurrence and the only real question is what should we do about it. Saying wouldn't it be nice if god accounted for it in the next life, is just lazy. Much better to deal with it here and now.

I think it's part of dealing with the here and now to acknowledge there is wisdom behind it all.

(September 21, 2014 at 3:55 pm)MysticKnight Wrote: I think in an attempt to a find a solution with the problem of evil, it's necessary to invoke the possibility of a afterlife that is perfect and everlasting.

If it is everlasting and of high happiness, in about a trillion years from now for example, any suffering in this world would be made trivial to the experience of bliss of a trillion years. This even more so as it goes on to infinity.

Now the only thing that is required for benevolence of a wise creator is some purpose to the suffering in this world.

Well I think a world where we can build character that comes before a world were we enjoy eternal bliss, is better that no one world at all.

More so, whatever makes the system over all better to character building and moral choosing, is a worthy of a sacrifice of trivial suffering because of an infinite reward that is gained by it (the character building and goodness).

Death would have to have natural causes, and it seems also, that a system were God is not constantly intervening is better then a system that he is intervening. this is because in a world were he constantly intervened, it would be counter productive to character building. It can also be invoked that diversity of intelligent life in the universe is one of the goals of the universe. Evolution therefore perhaps is a natural best way in which God would spread intelligent life in the universe. He would also not constantly interfere in the world as that would go against a better world set for character building and free-will.

I think this solves the issue of the problem of evil. Let me know if there are any flaws.

There's no flaw, but don't you see that it's yet another example of god using a system which from living humans perspective makes it look like there might aswell not be a god.

There's quite a few of these systems in place that god seems to use in all religions.

God writes a book, only he doesn't directly just slam a book down to earth, he tells an angel to tell a man to write it, so basically you might say it could have just been the man who wrote it.

God doesn't stop evil, or stop good people, or promote good people, or promote bad people, in fact he doesn't do anything, you could come to the conclusion that he might just not be there.

He performs all his big important miracles in the past for example turning sticks into snakes, freeing slaves, flooding countries while telling a guy to build a boat, helping people win wars and so on. So you could come to the conclusion that none of that stuff actually happened and it's all just a collection of old myths.

But there's no flaw in believing that he did all this stuff on purpose it just seems unlikely to me.

(September 21, 2014 at 4:52 pm)MysticKnight Wrote: God didn't set up the system that millions of children ought to be starving. We have enough resources to feed them. This is our own doing.

Actually...we didn't until very recently, as in 60 or 70 years. We fought tooth and nail to figure that out after spending the majority of our time here in the dark. You telling me that god always knew about ag but he failed to explain that to us, leading to 240k years of starvation and a minor speedbump for the same -starting- only 10k years ago? What do you think I'm going to say about that?

Quote:The suffering will be trivial to infinite bliss, so the character building is worth it.

Go...play....blocks...with...children.

Quote:All I'm saying for all we know, the system he designed (our universe) is the best one for character building. Yes there can be a best system. If there can't be a best system, then you will say, are you saying it's impossible for God to create the best system. Not omnipotent. That's called having your cake and eating it too.

Your "for all we know" ignores a hell of alot of what we know, but lay that aside. I'm saying no such thing. I don't know whether or not "god" could create a better system (I've left that up to you), all I know is the system that we have and what -I- could create given a similar level of power that you claim for said "god". If there's something that god cannot do (and even more pedantically something that he cannot do that I -could- in his shoes), I'd say that that puts the nail in the coffin - he isn't "all-powerful" - at the least.

Again, are you willing to stick with the limit you've placed on god?

(September 21, 2014 at 5:07 pm)MysticKnight Wrote: I think it's part of dealing with the here and now to acknowledge there is wisdom behind it all.

I don't see any sign of that "wisdom behind it all." If acknowledging that means condoning or ignoring evil, it's a cop-out.

Evil is ultimatelly subjective to our experiences and social/moral desirability, that is obviously human psychological construction. God as the creator of everything reflects necessarily everything he created, so god is ultimatelly as evil and as good as one can grasp, he certainly wouldn't share humans' morality as the eternal, omnipotent and intelligent being it should be.

I think that such a conception would be unsatisfying to many believers...but....



(3:35...lol)

So, the only way for you to address the problem of evil is to make shit up? Shit for which you have no evidence. Shit you can't possibly know?