Do we really have a choice or are we just inherently evil

On reflection, the world would be a better place if God actually prevented certain evil acts on people, animals and this earth.

I mean, why did God, (the all seeing God), for example, see the atrocities being perpetrated on the Jews and allow it. He gave man free will, but even a child has to be halted in some of the things he/she does and shown the error of their ways.

Why not have caused Hitler to die of a heart attack in 1936, preventing the damage he wielded of his own free will, which caused so much misery to the world and its people.

With hindsight you can ask what value is there in being significantly free to choose when choices like this are made.

Or is there another angle. Is all this evil the result of a Satanic influence.

Who really is at fault here? God, Satan or Man.

Or something else.

Our Pastor says Jesus came to man to teach, but also so that God can learn to know his own creation, because our pain is Gods pain!

What is your pain?

What if we don’t have a choice and we’re inherently good? What if all the things people think are evil are really just necessary but ugly parts of nature or how the world has to work?

It’s really hard to describe… in my heart I have this pain about being abandoned. And when I was young I was treated without respect. Also I have to work hard to satisfy the demands placed on me, every single day I have to sweat because I am a woman.

:orcs-cheers:

Like people think that fracking is sooo bad. But the alternative is to tell people who live in cold places to give up all their money for overpriced gas or to freeze during the winter.

Mr R wrote:

If there was no difference, no good or evil, no choice to be made, as Henri Bergson wrote, what distinguishes the living from the mechanical, robotic as it were, is spontaneity, which is what life is.

WE have broken harmony with nature, because of man’s aggression against it.

SM wrote

Is “man’s aggression” a generalization including both sexes hence the WE?

Do you “understand” when you are being evil? Do you “understand” when you are being selfless?

:confused: it’s about Love. You all lack it and I can see it thats why theres conflict.

I agreed with god and that’s why I see the truth.

SM, you can have choices that aren’t between good and evil. So I think that ties up the first bit.

What do you mean harmony with nature? You can’t be separate from nature. Do you think that fish beat themselves up emotionally because they shit in the ocean? Man’s aggression against nature? Tell me what you mean.

In the first place, it impossible for a real God to exists. As such whatever that is recognized as evil has nothing to do with God nor is there a God to deal with it.

I define ‘Evil’ as any human acts that are morally net-negative and hinder the progress and well-being of the individual[s] and the collective.

All human beings has evolved from creatures which are beasts.
Thus all human beings has the potential [embedded in the DNA] to do what beasts do naturally but within humanity some of these acts are termed evil when driven by the human part of the brain within the prefrontal cortex.

What is natural is a percentile of humans (a good guess of 20%) of humans are born with active evil tendencies. These % of human has looser impulse control to inhibit and modulate the embedded beastly acts of fight [fight or flight], kill, maim, injure, violence, aggression, etc.

All humans has the potential to be evil but only a % has inherently active evil tendencies.

Hello Shield

If this life is all there is, then yes, the child has to be stopped, but Christianity says that this life is not it, that we are just travelers on a journey. Millions have gone to sleep, but their history, the history of their souls is not complete and they will have a day of judgment.

It would have taken more than the death of one person to prevent the Holocaust because it took more than one person to cause it. Some made decisions to kill, others simply made decisions to look the other way–which would deserve to die more?

The life that is led matters then. A life that is free of suffering among androids lacks value. Jesus asked about the value of loving your friends when even bad people do it-- it is in loving your enemies that value is generated and that could not exist without free will. It is free precisely because it goes against the grain, against what is expected, reasonable. A life without such capacity, or risk, would mean less in the end.

No.

Ultimately it is God’s Creation and Design so all “fault” would be His. But the question is: Is it really a “fault” or only such from your perspective?

=D>

Evil is the long term. Its like, if I punch someone in the face for no reason, I am not evil. If anything I have made them a stronger more vigilant person. I am just getting them acquainted with Inertia, the Lord of fluids.

But if I constantly do a set of actions that cause someone to be depressed, unhappy their whole lives, then I am evil.

Mr R wrote:

With any choice, good, bad or in-between, there is usually the thought, “what are my intentions” for making this choice good, bad or otherwise?

So you are referring to Pantheism.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin wrote this:

Although the form is not yet discernible, mankind tomorrow will awaken to a “pan-organized” world.

The outcome of the world, the gates of the future, the entry into the super-human—They will open only to an advance of all together, in a direction in which all together can join and find completion in a spiritual renovation of the earth

…we human beings are already forming but one single body…our thoughts are tending more and more to function like the cells of one and the same brain.

This type of worldwide amalgamation is being proposed in the United Nations. The danger begins when anyone tries to oppose the one-world government or one-world religion. Those who refuse comply will be trampled by those racing towards a “pan-organized” society.

Humans are altering the dynamics and functioning of the Earth system to a degree never before seen. You see and read about this every day. The earth is an interdependent and interconnected system, we cannot cater exclusively to the humans and not respect the rights of nature, i.e. the right to regeneration. Humans have the right to a healthy life, so too does nature, without it there is no basis of survival for all species including humans.

Nowadays, there are many large fish with sharp teeth that roam the oceans seeking what they may devour. But as they feed on smaller fish and shrimp, their mouths begin to accumulate food debris and parasites. Lacking recourse to a toothbrush, how is such a fish going to clean its teeth?

For several kinds of fish, the answer is a visit to the local cleaning station. These are special areas usually marked by the presence of certain shrimp and small, brightly colored fish, such as wrasses and gobis.

Often fresh from chasing and eating other small fish and shrimp, a predatory fish may periodically swim over to take his place in line (literally!) at the nearest cleaning station. When his turn comes, he opens his mouth wide, baring the vicious-looking teeth.

You might suspect, of course, that such a sight would frighten off the little cleaner fish and shrimp. But, no. Into the jaws of death swim the little cleaners. Now even a friendly dog will sometimes snap at you if you try to pick off a tick, and it probably irritates the big fish to have a shrimp crawling around on its tongue and little fish picking off parasites in the soft tissues of the mouth. But the big fish just hovers there, allowing the cleaners to do their work. It even holds its gill chamber open so that the shrimp can crawl around on the gill filaments picking off parasites!

At the end of all this cleaning, the second miracle occurs. You might think the fish might respond, “Ah, clean teeth; SNAP, free meal!” But. no. When the cleaning is done, the big fish lets the little cleaner fish and shrimp back out again. Then the big fish swims off—and begins hunting again for little fish and shrimp to eat!

The fantastic relationship just described is called cleaning symbiosis. :slight_smile:

Nature’s Challenge to Evolutionary Theory

by Gary Parker, Ed.D.