On Hell and Forgiveness

[Peebothuhlu]

At work.

Hello!

Uhm....... isn't the point being that we don't define things into existance, but instead find things in existence that we then have to create definitions for?

[polymath257]

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You do, however, need a partial order that has a largest element. The problem is that 'greater' isn't well defined. Even if it were, there is no reason to think there is a greatest element.

So, at the very least, you need a consistent definition of 'greater'. Since there is more than one variable on which you want to measure (power, goodness, knowledge, etc), you have to find a consistent way to guarantee a maximum on each variable at the same time. This is usually impossible, even when each individual variable has a largest element.

Nope. Concerning God, the concept of 'greatest' does not require us to know what is actually the greatest. You are confusing ontology with epistemology.

Yep. Without a definite concept of 'greater', there is nothing else that can be concluded. For example, does your version of 'greater' actually have a 'greatest' element? Not all partial orders do. Some have maximal elements (none greater) that are not 'greatest' (all lesser). That depends on whether you have a linear order. But it is very far from clear that there is a well defined linear order that merges all the characteristics you seem to want to lump into a deity.

You want to claim the existence of a greatest. But a greatest need not exist for most partial orders. Even for linear orders there may not be a greatest.

So, you are just ducking the central issue: what does it mean to be greater in this context? How do you know there must be a greatest in that definition of greater? How do you know there isn't more than one 'maximal'? All of these are very relevant questions that need to be addressed *first*, before any claims of existence can be demonstrated.

[Abaddon_ire]

It's not an epistemological problem, Steve, as was already pointed out to you in that thread.  As well as the problem that this results in your God's values being arbitrary and thus not an example of moral perfection in an independent thread.  Regardless, we're back to God is good because you say so.  And I'm the most beautiful woman in the world because I say so.  Big deal.  You can assert shit without reason.  So can anybody.  For the claim that God is morally perfect to have any value, it would have to be coherent.  It isn't, so you're just muttering incomprehensible gibberish and hoping that nobody notices.

The Christian God is defined as the greatest possible being (scripture-informed Perfecting Being Theology). If you cobble together some lesser characteristics and say "your God could be this way", you are redefining the word. For this conversation and every one after, I do not grant the redefining of the term 'God'. There is nothing incoherent about the standard definition. You can easily glean attributes of God from the Bible and then systematize them into a doctrine using philosophy/logic. The concept has been discussed since Augustine. 

Closer to the Truth has a nice series of interviews I just listened to https://www.closertotruth.com/series/wha...g-theology

We can glean god's attributes from the bible? Well that makes your god out to be an evil, genocidal megalomaniac.

You do, however, need a partial order that has a largest element. The problem is that 'greater' isn't well defined. Even if it were, there is no reason to think there is a greatest element.

So, at the very least, you need a consistent definition of 'greater'. Since there is more than one variable on which you want to measure (power, goodness, knowledge, etc), you have to find a consistent way to guarantee a maximum on each variable at the same time. This is usually impossible, even when each individual variable has a largest element.

Nope. Concerning God, the concept of 'greatest' does not require us to know what is actually the greatest. You are confusing ontology with epistemology.

You OK with genocide? Your god is.

[The Grand Nudger]

A god who commits multiple genocides is greater than a low energy god that only commits one.

[SteveII]

If God were to appear to everybody everywhere as unmistakably real, undoubtedly a few more people would believe in God and the redemption of Christ than do now.  Perhaps some who believe now would turn away, but it's more sensible to presume that more people who didn't previously turn to God then would do so than would turn away from him.  The consequence of those few turning toward God would result in eternal happiness for them.  The gains are thus infinite.  Moreover, Steve has repeatedly said that people who believe in God are more moral than those who don't.  So this is something that God could do which would be infinitely better for people as a whole, and which he chooses not to do.  So God is choosing a world that is infinitely worse than the one we could have.  How is a hidden God good again?

First, I don't think I have ever said those that those who believe in God are more moral than those who don't. 

Second, again, as evidenced by the billions and billions of people who believe in God, it would seem that he is not hidden. The atheist is really making the argument "he is hidden from me." 

Third, you claim that some sort of appearance would increase belief in God. That would increase the belief that God exists, but that is not what God wants. I think that the undercutting defeater to your argument would be that God is evident in the world and if someone wanted to find him, it is obvious they can. So, at best you express an opinion as to what God would do (which I mentioned is the place most atheist start--pasted below) and then that people would then take the further step to a personal relationship (the actual goal). 

For those that don't go back a dozen pages, here was my argument:

You are talking about the concept of what should we expect God to be like or to do. To answer that, we can't start with, "well, if I were God, I would...". We have to infer our list from revealed information, the concept of God, and the natural world.

1. From the concept of God, we get he is worthy of worship. This is a foundational concept. If a very powerful being exists and he is not worthy of worship, he is not God.

2. Is it not the case that God is hidden from everyone. There are countless testimonies of people's experience of God. There are no defeaters for these billions of experiences so the claim really is: God is hidden from me when atheist demand or surmise that God would show himself if he were real.

3. God provided substantial evidence of himself in the person of Jesus and the events of the early first century. This is exactly what you seem to be asking for. God himself lived among us for 33 years and did many miraculous things culminating in the death and resurrection--with has huge existential meaning in both salvation and the possibility of a personal relationship through the Holy Spirit.

4. God provides substantial evidence of himself in nature that is easily reflected on and has been for millennium. Why is there something rather than nothing?

5. God gives everyone a sense of himself: Sensus divinitatis

6. Every bit of evidence suggests that God's purposes are personal in nature. God desires a personal relationship with each person--NOT recognition that he exists. To treat the question does God exist as a science question to be analyzed is to miss the point. Experiencing God is not a proposition that can be examined outside each person. The end purpose of God is to bring your mind to a place where it desires a relationship with God. This necessarily takes time and a different path for each person. To say it another way, knowing God exists is not the goal. Satan, demons, angels, etc. know God exists.

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Cue the ‘God doesn’t want to violate our free will’ argument.

Somehow, acknowledgement and worship doesn’t seem to count for Yahweh unless it’s performed by people who don’t have good, compelling reasons to do so. Slavish credulity, offered as an act of “freedom” is the ridiculous alleged bottom line.

Christians want to have it both ways.  They want to suggest that the evidence is sufficient to compel belief in a rational person, but at the same time claim that by providing sufficiently compelling evidence, God isn't compelling people to believe.  You can't have it both ways.  Either belief is a result of unreason or ignorance, or God is violating our free will by coming to earth and performing miracles and resurrections.  Even Steve admits that reason alone isn't sufficient to bring a person to God.  If what brings a person to God isn't reason, then belief is by definition irrational.

I never said the evidence is sufficient to compel belief. Only that such belief is rational given the evidence. There is a huge component of Christianity that revolves around experience.

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A god who kills innocent babies for no reason is greater than one who does not.  I defy any Christian to prove me objectively wrong.

You conflate two things: God's actions and our moral reasoning/duties (for which you want us to judge God's actions). They are not the same thing.

That being said, God, conceived as the paradigm of Goodness, could never kill innocent babies for no reason. It would be an impossible conception of God and therefore describing a being who is not God.

[robvalue]

At work.

Hello!

Uhm....... isn't the point being that we don't define things into existance, but instead find things in existence that we then have to create definitions for?

Not round here matey

[Peebothuhlu]

At work.

Hello!

Uhm....... isn't the point being that we don't define things into existance, but instead find things in existence that we then have to create definitions for?

Not round here matey

I just re-read (And the re-re-read) Stevell's latest reply.

O_o

Blergh!

So much mixing of terms and 'Flipping' of meanings...... Often both at the same time in the same sentence.

I'd need a good amount of sleep then free-time and a keyboard to unscramble it all.

[SteveII]

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Nope. Concerning God, the concept of 'greatest' does not require us to know what is actually the greatest. You are confusing ontology with epistemology.

Yep. Without a definite concept of 'greater', there is nothing else that can be concluded. For example, does your version of 'greater' actually have a 'greatest' element? Not all partial orders do. Some have maximal elements (none greater) that are not 'greatest' (all lesser). That depends on whether you have a linear order. But it is very far from clear that there is a well defined linear order that merges all the characteristics you seem to want to lump into a deity.

You want to claim the existence of a greatest. But a greatest need not exist for most partial orders. Even for linear orders there may not be a greatest.

So, you are just ducking the central issue: what does it mean to be greater in this context? How do you know there must be a greatest in that definition of greater? How do you know there isn't more than one 'maximal'? All of these are very relevant questions that need to be addressed *first*, before any claims of existence can be demonstrated.

What are you talking about? 

When talking about characteristics of a conscious being, there are definitely 'greater than' determinations that can be made. 

It is greater to be all-powerful or limited?
Is it greater to be eternal or finite?
Is it greater to be all knowing or limited in knowledge?
Is it greater to be Good or Evil?
Loving or hateful?
Creative or destructive?
Just or unjust?
Holy or unholy?
Immutable or fickle?
Keep promised or break them?
Merciful or unmerciful? 

In case it isn't clear to you, it is clear in the Bible that the former is greater than the latter in this list. Therefore a biblically-informed Perfect Being Theology is entirely coherent, rational, and not particularly hard to understand. The fact you can dream up a mathematical set that has no greatest member is sooooo irrelevant.

[The Grand Nudger]

Is it greater to commit one warcrime, or two?

lol.

The whole reason that jorg posited babykilling greatness is demonstrated again, above. "Magic books says that greatness is x y and z, and that's what the god in magic book is!" Well, ofc magic book says that, it would.

What if a person objected to any item in magic books self serving description? What if it -were- greater to be limited? Isn't a limited god that somehow digs deep and finds a way to be competent greater than an infinite god who can or does do no better? What if breaking some promise -was- the greater course of action?

There's no obvious reason why any of these things are on one side of the list instead of the other, and it doesn't take too much to make an argument to the contrary... only a statement of belief in their placement. Great fairy is the greatest because his magic book says so.

[Peebothuhlu]

At work.

There Stevell goes again.

Changing from definitly objective terms to subjective.

Also conveniently dropping the 'Maximaly' term.

Such as "Better to be 'Maximaly' good instead of 'Maximaly' bad."

Urgh....... teeth hurt, need bheer.......