Question for freethinkers

[tackattack]

[diffidus]

[tackattack]

I didn't sidestep anything. You still refuse to answer my questions, but I'll happily answer yours.

i)With my limited knowledge and my human perspective I would have averted it
ii) There are lots of reasons to this. You no doubt answer it with, because he doesn't exist, because you see no justifiable reason for their death.

Here's a few -
a)Someone had to pay the consequence for human action. From a life after death perspective, why not take the innocents so they can be spared hell and blame so that the living guilty could atone.
b)What would make the more impact on a community to learn their lesson? they already realized it could be a disaster, but apparently didn't care enough to protect their children.
c)He only interferes with human choice and desires and not natural laws or consequences
d)He's doesn't see death (especially of innocents) as inheritly bad and would rather have the innocents in heaven with him then have another generation of people that ignored him and common sense.
e)There could have been the next Jeffrey Dahmer in that school house, and he wanted to clear him away while he was still innocent.
I could come up with more probably if you like or even
f)He's apathetic

I'm sure I could come up with more, but I don't really know his reasons and this is all conjecture that I can see from my finite little perspective. None of it is evidence against God. You can't take someone's/something's inaction and use it to disprove their existence. I've never eaten an ugli fruit, they must not exist right... That's my main problem with the P.O.E. is that it's using instances of inaction and trussing up a moral delima with it and using it as evidence of the unlikeliness of God's existence.

[Anymouse]

But why did He stand and watch the Aberfan disaster? If you had the power, what would you have done?

I dunno, I'm not a Christian, nor have I ever been. Must be that part about "creating evil" in Isaiah. Maybe he did it?

Diffidus:
Sorry anymouse, my mistake - I meant this post for pel.

That does bring up a question in my mind, whether directed at me or not. If God is omnipotent (as held out by Christianity and Islam), and God creates evil (as held in Isaiah), perhaps the Aberfan disaster was caused by God? That, though God could have chosen to allow/push a slag heap onto a school before dawn, he chose to do it during the school day. It does say in Isaiah that he creates evil. Not the folk that pile up slag heaps, but God himself.

[Epimethean]

As a creator character, god was a stuff-up.

[diffidus]

I didn't sidestep anything. You still refuse to answer my questions, but I'll happily answer yours.

i)With my limited knowledge and my human perspective I would have averted it
ii) There are lots of reasons to this. You no doubt answer it with, because he doesn't exist, because you see no justifiable reason for their death.

Here's a few -
a)Someone had to pay the consequence for human action. From a life after death perspective, why not take the innocents so they can be spared hell and blame so that the living guilty could atone.
b)What would make the more impact on a community to learn their lesson? they already realized it could be a disaster, but apparently didn't care enough to protect their children.
c)He only interferes with human choice and desires and not natural laws or consequences
d)He's doesn't see death (especially of innocents) as inheritly bad and would rather have the innocents in heaven with him then have another generation of people that ignored him and common sense.
e)There could have been the next Jeffrey Dahmer in that school house, and he wanted to clear him away while he was still innocent.
I could come up with more probably if you like or even
f)He's apathetic

I'm sure I could come up with more, but I don't really know his reasons and this is all conjecture that I can see from my finite little perspective. None of it is evidence against God. You can't take someone's/something's inaction and use it to disprove their existence. I've never eaten an ugli fruit, they must not exist right... That's my main problem with the P.O.E. is that it's using instances of inaction and trussing up a moral delima with it and using it as evidence of the unlikeliness of God's existence.

Diffidus:

I would have replied to this earlier but I have been on holiday.

From your first answer, you are more compassionate than God.

From the list of rationalisations, I agree with your final conclusion - that you 'don't really know His reasons.'

I am not trying to use this argument to say that God does not exist or, in fact, anything at all about the probability of God's existence.

Here is my view (based upon the Aberfan incident): If God existed( and this is a big if) then

Maybe

God does not involve Himself in Human affairs - He has created a universe and then lets it run its course. But this impersonal God seems seems to be malevolent since, if He is omnipotent, He should have saved the children of Aberfan. This, also, does not answer the age old question that Epicurus posed. But there is an answer to the problem of evil; an answer to Epicurus' riddle:

If God exists he is not omnipotent. This possibility is given by Epicurus but it is usually passed over since, by definition, God is supposed to be omnipotent.But what if He has all the attributes necessary to create a certain type of universe but that for every positive creation there infiltrates strong evil forces. God would be continually in battle against these forces of evil but sometimes He loses, because he is powerful but not omnipotent - this would explain Aberfan.

[Epimethean]

So, how do you feel about intelligent design?

[Darth]

Problem of evil exists when you have omnipotence (and thus omniscience) as well as omnibenevolence. Take one of those away and the problem no longer exists. But is that really how you want your god to be? Still, best to take off the omnipotence before you take away the omnibenevolence I suppose.

[Epimethean]

I think there is a very good reason why "goddamn" is common in the vernacular whereas "godsave" is rather unheard.

[tackattack]

@diffidus-

Then you claim God is immoral because he doesn't allow us to face the consequences of our actions. The scenario you posed as God being powerful but losing to "evil" sometimes would theoretically be possible. I don't think it is the God I understand and know, but it's possible. Here's my response to your P.O.E..
People knew it was just a matter of time before something bad happened. People still refused to leave there, thus denial of the risk.
People knew that putting a school that close to the mine could invite disaster. Failure to create safety even though similar things have happened.
Land near a mine is cheap for a reason and I'm sure it was easier to build a school there. Cutting corners and greed are not good ethical practice.

Above are just 3 ways that they denied what was morally and ethically right (even from an outsider). Denial of what is right is rejection of the laws God places on each of our hearts.
Therefore denial of what is right is a denial of God adn the Holy Spirit. That saperates you from God. Rejecting God's love does not make him less all loving, it just keeps you out of his good graces. I would say if any supernatural entity had a say in what went on here (I would say none) it was Satan. Satan is the moral opposite of God, yet you still blame God for allowing this to happen?
The victims didn't. I've shown where they've rejected commone sense, societal rightness and by default God's plan.

Let me ask you something . If I tell my kids to not run with scissors. They run with scissors and get hurt am I to blame? Perhaps for not watching over them closely enough, but certainly not the majority. Now what if my kids have grown up and are 20 and the do the same thing? I don't think anyone would put any blame on me for that. I don't think people who have heard the message of God as many times as people in today's society have, can be considered children with little knowledge and understanding to be watched and coddled over.