[split] Are Questions About God Important?

[SimpleCaveman]

[Angrboda]

Let's see if this works. God's morality comes from:

Nature ---[which comes from]---> God's creation ---[which comes from]---> God's morality ---[which comes from]---> Nature ---[which comes from]---> .....

I think you've got a problem.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Whether you try to define it as Natural Law or human nature, it still is allegedly the creation of your creator god. It rather undermines any claims about his perfection.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Let's see if this works.  God's morality comes from:

Nature ---[which comes from]---> God's creation ---[which comes from]---> God's morality ---[which comes from]---> Nature ---[which comes from]---> .....

I think you've got a problem.

I’m dizzy just from reading that.

Boru

[The Grand Nudger]

[Bucky Ball]

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Hi Boru,

Interesting thing here. When I replied to your post, intending to quote it, it didn’t keep the portion from your previous post. I had to go back to the original post you made. Surprising. I wonder why. Maybe so we don’t have Inception moments.

Before, you had said,

But if our values come from Christian history (they don’t, but I’ll play along), then it absolutely doesn’t matter if God exists, from a moral/ethical standpoint.

Then I was all like,

I am contending that it is our Christian history that gives us our values. And, obviously to my thinking, we have that history because God exists.

<I continued with an argument about why it would still matter, from a moral/ethical standpoint, whether God existed or not.>

And you responded with,

Of course you’d have Christian history if God didn’t exist - that’s blatantly obvious. The history of a religion - any religion - isn’t dependent on whether the god(s) of that religion exist. Simply because we have Aztec history is no reason to believe that Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli exists.

You’ve take a very silly, very indefensible position.

I was very surprised. It did not appear that you got past that sentence.

Still waiting for SC to explain why Christian history proves the existence of the Christian god (my hopes are not high).

And then you said this. And now I’m sure you didn’t read or grok the rest of the post. This isn’t what you asked or what (the majority of) my post was about.

Maybe you did read it all and still focused on this point. That’s fine. And, obviously, you can respond or not respond to whatever you want in the posts. No issues there. As Chuck Berry said, “This is a free country, live like you wanna live, baby!”

I’m just saying I took you as someone who rises above the usual level of <ahem> discussion.

Pax et bonum

I read your entire post and, quite frankly, it didn’t seem necessary to reply further, as it all hinges on the bit to which I responded. Until and unless you can demonstrate that the history of the Christian faith makes it obvious that God exists, the rest of your argument is just so much white noise.

Boru

[Confused-by-christianity]

... it didn’t seem necessary to reply further, ...

I think this about the whole thread.
It's not serious any longer.
It should be enjoyed obviously - with a decent sense of humour - but truth is, no one is taking god or any of the questions seriously.
Its basically over.  :-)

[awty]

... it didn’t seem necessary to reply further, ...

I think this about the whole thread.
It's not serious any longer.
It should be enjoyed obviously - with a decent sense of humour - but truth is, no one is taking god or any of the questions seriously.
Its basically over.  :-)

Where was it stated that this was a serious thread?

I have something to tell you, Scooter, it's not your call when a thread is dead.

Let's get back to talking about things that don't exist.

[Confused-by-christianity]

Confused-by-christianity is doing a good job here, but the Euthyphro dilemma is hard. I would like to support him by adding to the discussion.

Thanks @SimpleCaveman . That is welcome since i think you seem to know your stuff

The Grand Nudger’s question is trying to get at why something is good? Let’s be honest and say that while Plato may have honestly asked the question, I’d be very surprised if the Grand Nudger is doing it for any other reason than as a trap. But no worries, it’s a good question. Interesting to think about.

Yes - it was a trap question.
I saw the dilema and thought - why not, as a brainteaser :-)
It was a good to work out the question, but i couldn't seem to get the question to make sense without fundamentally changing god. I had to reimagine god as something else to make the question fit - but then we aren't talking about god any more ??!?!?! i got into that circle.

I decided not to look up any past thinkers because i wanted to answer it myself and see how far i got. (without help from previous intellectuals)

Lets hear your take on it :-)

I do not have any problem affirming that God commands an action because it’s good. The fallacy here is in the way of thinking what good is.
Because what is good and bad for human beings is determined by the ends set for us by nature. Any behavior that facilitates the achievement of our natural ends is considered good. If it frustrates those ends, then it is considered bad. For example, the way we were created/evolved says that drinking water is a good because it preserves our life. Procreation and rearing kittens are good for cats because they preserve the species.
And so, yes! God commands all actions that facilitate the achievement of our natural ends. Those actions he is commanding are good. He prohibits actions that frustrate those ends, “bad things, man.”
In summary, for premise 3, since human nature determines what is good and bad for us, and since God is the author of our nature, affirming that God commands something because it is good does not imply a standard of goodness independent of God.

Thank you - something for me to think about :-)