Problem of Divine Freedom

[fr0d0]

2. That's the story we're addressing. God had to cure the species by pruning the dead wood. Is genetic inheritance true? Then inheritance of a genetic fault could be catastrophic.

Are you suggesting that sin has a genetic component?

No

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Please elaborate further on this genetic element you're suggesting. Any scientific backing would be helpful too. Educate me as much as you can on it, pretend you're talking to someone who knows nothing about it.

Thank you, I know it's a tedious request. Atheists do have empathy.

I'd have to educate myself first Senshi I won't insult your intelligence by trying to retrofit science. Unless you realised that and wanted me to anyway, which is fair enough. I will try if that's what you want.

I'm suggesting that we know of genetic imperfections that can be detrimental to survival. It's natures way of pruning dead wood, is it not?

Species naturally die out. Say the environment changes so that the species is no longer viable. Mother nature commits genocide.

With theology it's more purpose that is trying to be understood. The point behind the story is the cleansing of the earth from corruption. God is starting over, reproducing the conditions of creation. Justice is served.
This isn't anything unusual for the cultural context. Everything is seen as God working, his purpose to be taken from that.

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You are confusing logical with actual impossibility and so are undermining the very point on which your argument was supposed to turn.

I, as a human being of limited powers, might easily find myself in a position where in order to cure one evil, I was obliged to enact another (but in my judgment lesser) evil. To save a life, I have to amputate a limb (or to save the ants from total annihilation, I have to subject almost all of them to annihilation to use your analogy).

But that is not a logical requirement. Saving a life without amputating a limb or saving a group of ants from extinction without killing any of them are both logical possibilities. The amputation and the ant massacre are both means to an end. As limited non-omnipotent beings, we do not have the luxury of achieving all our ends without having to go through means, sometimes pretty unpleasant ones. But the same cannot be true of an omnipotent deity. If he wants to save a life, save an ant tribe or prevent the spread of evil, he only has to will it.

If you want to preserve your argument, you will have to do much more work on making out a case for why God was LOGICALLY unable to achieve his end without the drastic means of killing people.

Hi there.

I think you're joining two separate points. We were talking about the idea that God could do evil. I say that God by his nature is good, and that it's a logical impossibility that he can act to the contrary (reasons given above).

So how God achieves justice is best known to him (given that he is all knowing). Your suggestion is a logical possibility. We know (from the text) that this isn't what is claimed to have happened, so would assume the greater knowledge of God meant that justice was best served in the way that it was.