What if we're all wrong though?

[Minimalist]

The fact people attribute actionable thinkgs like vengeful and balme their own inequities and percieved injustice/evil and natual disasters on God still baffles me.

That fact that humans have to invent gods in the first place baffles me, tack.

P-O-V is everything.

[Thor]

I don't think I have the perspective to correctly answer every instance. I'll give an example of what I think and give it my best shot. We'll continue your father analogy:
1- Father sets rules to follow (laws of nature, morality, forgiveness)

What are these "rules of morality"? Because even devout believers will disagree on what is and isn't moral.

and provides a home withing those rules. Child learns about his enviornment through trial and error (volcanoes go boom, nuclear waste is bad, killing is bad, breaking the rules makes life harder). When we're talking enviornemtal issues (natural disasters, mortality, etc.) we're still haven't become masters of our enviornment. In fact, we're quite toddler like in our destructive tendencies toward our enviornment.

This does nothing to answer the question why this deity allows natural disasters that kill and injure people, and destroy homes.

You're assuming that God see's death as a bad thing.

No, I'm saying that WE see death as a bad thing. Particularly when it is a young person or child.

From a transcendant perspective with eternity as your lifespan, that doesn't follow that mortal death is any different than a snake shedding it's first skin.

I have no reason to believe that there is anything beyond this life. Happy platitudes about death leading to something better mean nothing. Unless you have some evidence to indicate there is something after this life.

2-A premature death from an omniscient perspective could be preventative. Maybe they'll grow up to be a hitler,

This makes no sense. If this is true, then why did this deity allow Hitler to grow up? (Not to mention Stalin, Pol Pot, Jeffrey Dahmer, Charles Manson, Ted Bundy, etc, etc...)

Perhaps a lifetime of suffering would be worse than a relatively short life.

Sorry. Makes no sense. Again, this deity could eliminate someone's suffering. Why do you assume an early death or a lifetime of suffering are the only choices?

Perhaps the sheeddding of the mortal coil teaches others who are still alive to appreciate life more, to ease other's suffering, to provide for other's needs more actively.

Great. So this deity allows some children to suffer and die so that others can learn a lesson. Would you set one of your children on fire to teach your other children that you shouldn't play with gasoline and matches?

3- Let's use that same scenario and work on the interactions between several billion of those children..Children by nature are learning to overcome their instinctual self-serving survival instincts to form communities. We learn things like empathy and develop social structure. We identify laws which develop the whole and punish crimes. We learn that there are consequences for self serving problems (like crackheads making babies that are addicted to crack, deformed, etc.) and develop into a more mature society.

I don't quite understand what you're trying to say here.

I think a major point of contenction between atheism and theism is a willingness to accept there is more after we die.

The idea that there is "more after we die" is simply a notion with nothing to back it up. The thought that loved ones are happy in an eternal paradise is comforting, but it has no basis in reality. I must ask if you think Neanderthals are in heaven? What about our early human ancestors? They were more primate than human. At what point did humans become human enough that they were allowed into heaven?

[Minimalist]

At what point did humans become human enough that they were allowed into heaven?

That's easy. At the point where they invented the "collection plate."

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

The promise is 72 virgins, there is no mention of gender.

Does it mention 'human'? 72 virgin olives seems like a lot to give up one's life for....

Olives? I thought it was actually raisins

[paintpooper]

What is so good about a virgin anyways. They have no skills. Id rather have 72 sluts... imagine the things I would learn!

[tackattack]

---

The fact people attribute actionable thinkgs like vengeful and balme their own inequities and percieved injustice/evil and natual disasters on God still baffles me.

That fact that humans have to invent gods in the first place baffles me, tack.

P-O-V is everything.

---

I agree min. I don't hink I'm inventing or wishfully thinking God into existence. From a timeline stanpoint I agree that it seems that the concept of God was invented by humans. So was the concept of blue. Whether the observation came first then the expliation, I don't believe is the question. To be rationalizing something you need to come up with a concept then observe it. Some p[eople today do wish that there's life after death and that their loved ones will be seen again. They want it so bad they'll see God in a piece of cheese. I don't think that's the case for every Christian though.

---

I don't think I have the perspective to correctly answer every instance. I'll give an example of what I think and give it my best shot. We'll continue your father analogy:
1- Father sets rules to follow (laws of nature, morality, forgiveness)

What are these "rules of morality"? Because even devout believers will disagree on what is and isn't moral.

and provides a home withing those rules. Child learns about his enviornment through trial and error (volcanoes go boom, nuclear waste is bad, killing is bad, breaking the rules makes life harder). When we're talking enviornemtal issues (natural disasters, mortality, etc.) we're still haven't become masters of our enviornment. In fact, we're quite toddler like in our destructive tendencies toward our enviornment.

This does nothing to answer the question why this deity allows natural disasters that kill and injure people, and destroy homes.

You're assuming that God see's death as a bad thing.

No, I'm saying that WE see death as a bad thing. Particularly when it is a young person or child.

From a transcendant perspective with eternity as your lifespan, that doesn't follow that mortal death is any different than a snake shedding it's first skin.

I have no reason to believe that there is anything beyond this life. Happy platitudes about death leading to something better mean nothing. Unless you have some evidence to indicate there is something after this life.

2-A premature death from an omniscient perspective could be preventative. Maybe they'll grow up to be a hitler,

This makes no sense. If this is true, then why did this deity allow Hitler to grow up? (Not to mention Stalin, Pol Pot, Jeffrey Dahmer, Charles Manson, Ted Bundy, etc, etc...)

Perhaps a lifetime of suffering would be worse than a relatively short life.

Sorry. Makes no sense. Again, this deity could eliminate someone's suffering. Why do you assume an early death or a lifetime of suffering are the only choices?

Perhaps the sheeddding of the mortal coil teaches others who are still alive to appreciate life more, to ease other's suffering, to provide for other's needs more actively.

Great. So this deity allows some children to suffer and die so that others can learn a lesson. Would you set one of your children on fire to teach your other children that you shouldn't play with gasoline and matches?

3- Let's use that same scenario and work on the interactions between several billion of those children..Children by nature are learning to overcome their instinctual self-serving survival instincts to form communities. We learn things like empathy and develop social structure. We identify laws which develop the whole and punish crimes. We learn that there are consequences for self serving problems (like crackheads making babies that are addicted to crack, deformed, etc.) and develop into a more mature society.

I don't quite understand what you're trying to say here.

I think a major point of contenction between atheism and theism is a willingness to accept there is more after we die.

The idea that there is "more after we die" is simply a notion with nothing to back it up. The thought that loved ones are happy in an eternal paradise is comforting, but it has no basis in reality. I must ask if you think Neanderthals are in heaven? What about our early human ancestors? They were more primate than human. At what point did humans become human enough that they were allowed into heaven?

---

I was hoping you'd address them as a whole or at least as 3 individual concepts but we'll divy it up if we must.

1-
a-That's because morality is individual at least and currently locally societal at best. Do develop past that you have to have a measure to improve it across the board.
b-if techtonic plates didn't shift creating volcanoes then the planet wouldn't last very long. Therefore it would be better to have volcanoes than not to. You're looking at lives on an individual basis, but if you had the money would you relocate everyone who was in dangerous areas to someplace safe? Yes of course you would. Would people still try and live there? Yes they would. It's an individuals choice. It may be out of their control, but it's not out of our collective control.
c-You're saying "we" and I'm not sure who you're referencing. This could be all the life we have and all that matters and I'll do my best in this life, regardless. I don't see death as bad, merely an end. My children and those I love will live on and remember me, and hopefully my good works will stand. Death isn't bad, whether a child or not, it's an end, and it's a part of the cycle of life. It's sad when a shild dies because they haven't had the opportunitiesto enrich others. But one day of having a child for someone who can't have children could still have vrought some life in this world.

2-
a-To see the good in people and differintiate between, and better define, good a counter view is necessary.
b-life is a struggle, God does eliminate that struggle. Pain, grief and fear have the potential to twist who we are into someone resentful, hateful or cruel. He eliminates it through showing us a better way to live life. If we can't have a better life or better another life then it would be a mercy to not have to suffer through it.
c- No I would not set one of your children on fire to teach your other children that you shouldn't play with gasoline and matches. But if one of my children chose to light himself on fire I would hope that the others would learn from it. I would of course care for the one who's horribly burned and disfigured. This is the messge of Jesus, to take away suffering.

3-
a-Let me see if I can convey it better. Humans born into this world initially live off of instinct and survival. We learn to overcome our instinctual self-serving survival instincts by forming communities, empathy, social structure, laws and justice. We also learn about consequence. There are consequences for self serving problems (like crackheads making babies that are addicted to crack, deformed, etc.). We learn to serve the community rather than the self. Extrapolate that out to a societal frame of mind and we've evolved from instinctual animalistic nature to a more civilized nature, but we've not been around long enough to get as developed as we think we are as attested to by all the violence, wars, prejudices and hatred in the world.

b-At what point did humans become human enough that they were allowed into heaven? Well according to the Bible, in Hebrews people who don't know Jesus can still get into heaven. According to buddhist philosophies of Vedanta Deshika, a 14th century follower of Ramanuja:
"Lord, I, who am nothing, conform to your will and desist being contrary to it, and with faith and prayer, submit to you the burden of saving my soul"
Faith and Grace are the components when knowledge is lacking. I would say when prehistoric man developed reasoning ability and presented the first signs of Faith and selflessness by grace they were admitted to heaven. God doesn't judge without first revealing himself, through revelation or word, IMO.

[Minimalist]

From a timeline stanpoint I agree that it seems that the concept of God was invented by humans. So was the concept of blue.

"Blue" exists in nature.

God had to be invented.

[tackattack]

Blue doesn't exist other than a concept and was created to explain something we percieve to be in reality, God is the same.

[Minimalist]

Of course it does. It does not matter what word is used, the bird exists. If you want to walk around saying that "blue" is "yellow" and "yellow" is "red" just to confuse yourself then go ahead.

[tackattack]

And that's how Christians feel about God. Of course he exists, It doesn't matter your definition or concept of God, I see his hand everyday.