(December 14, 2013 at 1:13 pm)Godschild Wrote: What problem with evil, you need to explain this before you make the assumption that this problem is a reason not to believe in God. You've thrown out a thought to dismiss God and never gave any kind of reason that there's are problem with evil. So as I see it the statement," God has morally sufficient reason to allow evil."
Natural suffering, such as disease and natural disasters are a good reason to not believe in god, as if there is no god you'd expect to see this kind of thing. This isn't a problem on naturalism, as you'd expect to see a chaotic world like this if it wasn't guided by a deity.
Quote:No it's not, the statement "God works in mysterious ways" is an explanation of why God does things we do not understand. The statement "God has morally sufficient reason to allow evil" is a statement made from knowledge. The reason lies within the pages of scripture.
No it's not, what knowledge? No one has actual knowledge regarding what goes on in the mind of god, but we can determine with our limited knowledge what god is not, or if this god can exist. "God has sufficient reasons, but we don't know what they are" is an blatant appeal to the unknown. It doesn't have anything like that in the bible, the only thing the bible has to say about suffering is that it is a punishment directly from god for sin, or from demons, both explanations are terrible.
Quote:Just exactly how do you reason we can't know the mind of God, why do you think He gave use the Bible. It's true we can't know the complete mind of an omniscient and omnipotent God, our minds would not be able to comprehend that kind or amount of knowledge.
Evidence for this? Absolutely none. There is zero reason to think the bible is divinely inspired in any way shape or form. The bible gets everything wrong about: Biology, geology, physics, chemistry, astronomy, biology, and pretty much everything we know about the natural world, it is a colossal failure of a book if it's meant to be inspired by an omniscient, omnipotent deity.
Quote:Where did you get your information that God gives babies AIDS, last I checked it was the irresponsibility of the parents that caused the babies to contract this disease. Again where did you get your information that God aborts children, if you're talking about miscarriages that's a physical problem with the mother or fetus. By your stance on believing God causes abortions and you believe He is evil in doing so, I take it you're... no it would mean by necessity you are against abortion. Good to hear that.
Is your god omnipotent and omniscient? Did he design the world, including everything in it, including aids and malaria? Then your god is personally responsible for every single baby diagnosed with aids, every single case of disease/virus/bacteria, every single famine, every single bit of natural suffering on this entire earth, because he created everything with complete foreknowledge. And did god design the mother's body? Then god is responsible for every single miscarriage as a result of the poor design. Your god is the equivalent of someone injecting the HIV virus directly into all of his children, and then going around with a vacuum cleaner sucking out fetuses. The only intellectually honest position someone can take on this god is he is either evil or not omniscient or just non existent.
Quote:They who, seems you're speaking for some unknow persons. We have scripture to determine that God has morally sufficient reason to allow evil. You are trying to turn your reasoning on Christians, to support your ideas, that's dishonest at best. Christians know they can go to scripture to find out God's thoughts on evil and why it exists and is necessary.
Not really, this is the typical response from apologists, like William Lane Craig. This is not my reasoning, this is the reasoning of most christian apologists. The bible has very little to say on suffering, except for that it is a direct punishment from god.
Quote:You are trying to make philosophy a truth, when it's only a persons idea that can't be proven. You also have changed the subject of the original OP of evil to suffering. What makes you believe the two go hand in hand, why is suffering evil, you believe in a naturalistic world where evil and suffering are not the same.
Evil: causing or threatening harm or distress; wicked.
Suffer: to feel of endure pain --- suffering: pain, misery, hardship
The organism that causes malaria does not try to cause harm or distress, without the intention to cause there is no evil. Evil is an intentional thing not accidental or a result of sickness or misfortune.
That's not true, the problem of evil and suffering are really the same issue. 'Natural evil', is just a term used to describe the ills that are brought about by nature, even though evil is usually used to describe evil actions performed by agents. When you say "Evil: causing or threatening harm or distress; wicked" that only proves my point, nature can cause great harm and distress. The problem of evil and the problem of natural suffering are really parallel, but slightly different issues.
Quote:This is the very reasoning you were trying to apply to Christians to satisfy your need to win an argument, winning is what you care about, when learning should be the goal.
That's not true, I've already discussed this. These arguments are from christian apologists. And learning shouldn't be my goal, getting down to the truth is.
Quote:The burden of proof you believe Christians do not have is in reality found in scriptures, so the reasons are known and by your reasoning God is real. You apparently do not know the scriptures and at best you've only read through the Bible without any real study.
I think you are misunderstanding me, I am asking for proof that god DOES have morally sufficient reasons for permitting evil/suffering, given the assertion typically said by christian apologists that god has sufficient reasons for permitting evil.
Quote:I'm not sure why you used Jesus in this statement but, I would think it's out of ignorance. No one was asking you to prove God has reason to allow suffering, the Christian is willing to do so. It's within the pages of scripture, we do not have to go any farther than the scriptures to determine God's reasons, being the Bible is about God.
It was actually alittle joke, making fun of how people make up things just to cover for their beloved Jesus. The only 'reasoning' in scriptures about suffering is that it is a direct punishment from god, and this leads us to the conclusion this god is evil, so you might want to avoid the bible.
Quote:You are not shouldering any thing, all you're doing is dancing around the real subject by equating evil with suffering. The subject you brought was evil not suffering. God does allow both and has real and righteous reasons to do so. We actually should be glad He does, the only other option is total destruction by the power of a God who hates sin. Now to challenge your suffering of man, why is it necessary to eliminate God because man brings suffering upon himself? What reason do you have to believe God can't allow suffering or evil for that matter?
Yeah I did 'shoulder anything', and that anything was a burden of proof I didn't need to fulfill. Evil and suffering are the same deal, like I said before. I'm focusing on 'natural evil' here though. You say I'm dancing around the real subject, yet you're the one playing semantic games with definitions instead of addressing the argument.
"Now to challenge your suffering of man, why is it necessary to eliminate God because man brings suffering upon himself?"
You're assuming suffering IS brought apon man by himself by a guilt complex. How the fuck does a baby bring malaria on himself?
"What reason do you have to believe God can't allow suffering or evil for that matter?"
Because god meant to be a perfect, flawless being, which is all good, and is able to prevent natural suffering and willing, yet we see this world with things like malaria, which is not brought apon us by ourselves, but through the natural world that we have almost not power in how it functions. The only few logical options is that this god either doesn't exist or is evil or incapable, and if he is incapable, why call him god?
Quote:That's pretty much a lame notion you have, again why is it God can't exist if malaria and the suffering it brings exists. Where does it say God must eliminate suffering for disease, how is that in any remote way logical? Why does God have to eliminate suffering, because you think that's the way He should work, you are saying God exists for my needs and desires, yet He being my creator means nothing if he doesn't serve me as I desire. Seems to me you're the one trying to be a god of omniscient power to make such a statement.
'Lameness' is not a pointer to how valid an argument is. I've already went over this: since god is perfect, and good, he would want and be able to to prevent all unnecessary suffering. Malaria is unnecessary suffering, therefore god does not exist. This is nothing to do with 'serving us', but acting according to his nature, and this world cannot logically be a product of an all good omnipotent, omniscient creator, as we have good examples that contradict this being's traits.
Quote:The best thing Jonny could remove is his stupidity and not put his hand on the stove. Removing malaria may or may not decrease suffering, we can not know this, malaria exist and that is what we have to deal with. Christians do not need to claim anything for or against suffering, God told Adam that suffering would always be a part of man's life, this suffering god allows because of the sin we have in our lives.
Yes we can know this. Removing a certain thing which causes suffering, in general will decrease the overall suffering, just like my example with Johnny. If he takes his hand off the frying pan (something which causes suffering), there will be an overall decrease in suffering. Of course, there are plenty of hypothetical situations where once he takes his hand off he could fall into a pit of snakes or something, but this is just appealing to the unknown. In general, removing one piece of suffering out of the equation will reduce suffering overall. So if we removed malaria for example, the overall suffering will be deceased by a significant margin, considering how many people are affected by it.
Quote:You have failed to shoulder the burden of proof as you said you would do, you have not shown why evil or suffering are pointless, God says in His word they have purpose, I've not seen your rebuttal of what God has said.
Because it causes overall more suffering, and since god would want as least suffering as possible, things like malaria shouldn't exist. All that 'god has said', if you're talking about the bible, is that suffering is a direct punishment from god. And even that still leads us to the conclusion that god is evil.
Quote:Atheist were at a loss on how to disregard God in AD 33 and have not made any progress over 2000 years.
GC
Yeah throughout the ages from people like Epicurus, Socrates, Plato, and now people like Dawkins, Hitchens and Victor J Stenger have made absolutely no progress in arguments against god. And us atheist have not went from 'executed on sight' to an 'accepted person in society' over the past few thousand years. Keep living in a fantasy land.
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