RE: Argument from evil, restated
June 3, 2013 at 11:55 pm
(This post was last modified: June 3, 2013 at 11:56 pm by Zarith.)
Quote:What I'm asking is, how do you know that good and evil are opposites? How can the founders of Christianity invent two 'opposite' accounts and have anybody understand them to be opposites? Wouldn't the ideas of good and evil have to exist from antiquity, if converts are to be made? As far as we know, they have existed from antiquity. Do you, Zarith, consider most of the popular virtues such as temperance, charity, diligence, patience and kindness 'good'? Do you consider most the popular vices such as greed, sloth, pride and envy 'bad'? They were not invented out of nowhere. People decided what was good and what was evil based on experience. Virtues tended to create a peaceful, healthy community. Vices tended to lead to hurt or war. From what I see in history, good and evil are practically built in. What do you think?Hey, you don't get to pick and choose only the stuff most people agree upon. If your moral system is absolute and timeless, you have to defend all of it.
Other than that, I agree with the claim that people can and do figure out how to live together in a better fashion i.e. one that leads to less suffering. I do not take this as evidence of anything more than our capacity to figure stuff out.
Quote:And humanity would stop hurting others and allowing hunger... why? For what rational reason? I can think of only one reason: love. But that doesn't exist. So you must be describing a world without rational reasons--a world in which we are robots or animals. Can a robot or animal judge that the sudden absence of hunger, disease and war is a change for the better? Or perhaps I should ask: Are you willing to give up your humanity in order to eliminate evil?Well ... no. You would be you, having woken up to see a great many bad things removed from existence, and retaining an understanding of what they were and why they were bad. I didn't specify why, for all I care we could assume that it was completely and totally inexplicable. Did eliminating smallpox make us "less human"? If we knew how, would eliminating the impulse that some adults have to sexually assault children make us "robots"? Would you really be the one to say, "Hey guys, maybe that's not such a good idea, after all someone needs to rape a child every now and then so that we can all understand the nature of good". These aren't supposed to be trick questions.
