OK, the votes are all counted and the results are in: There are only two reasonable positions on the existence of God, atheism and deism. Either God doesn’t exist, or He only watches from the shadows and doesn’t interfere via supernatural miracles and revelations in order to maintain our free will. From our standpoint in this natural universe, we can’t tell the difference.
So why bother to choose? There’s only one reason I believe in deism over atheism, Hope. If you don’t care, that’s your business. But I hope that my life and the lives of others have some meaning and purpose beyond our threescore and ten here on Earth.
I like the way you put that. That’s one of the only reasons I believe in a god as well. My view is that if we don’t have something to live for, what’s the point in living? It doesn’t have to be a god, it can also be a loved one or work or success. I just choose to believe and live my life for the Creator. That’s just my opinion.
I think it’s a real downer that we could work our whole lives, successfully or even worse, unsuccessfully, only to die and that’s it. And what about those who live their entire lives in fear, pain, depression or crushing poverty. How can I not hope that they can still have something to live and endure for?
The two positions you propose here are faces of the same coin. That, is the painful truth. But what is it that you hope for? And how could the existence of God either act or take away from the value of life?
My point is that the existence of God is not enough in itself to convey value to human existence, nor the lack of a God (or the belief that there is no God) enough to rip value from a human life.
From our standpoint here in the universe, yes. But not beyond.
If God exists, there is the probability of spiritual continuity by implication–the probability of meaning continuing beyond our existence here vs. nothing.
It sounds almost as if you are leaning towards Pascal’s Wager, but more for the possibility of a positive afterlife than the fear of eternal suffering.
Though the popular assumptions on either side would tend to suggest otherwise, there is no more reason to assume that a reality of deism (or for that matter, theism) provides for an afterlife than there is to assume that a reality of atheism precludes the same. Indeed, insofar as one might consider Buddhism as ultimately atheist, afterlives are precisely the problem! Likewise, it would all depend on the whim of the deity as to whether the multi-billions or more of “lives” it made possible are also to share celestial space with It forever. Perhaps the Deity is not into eternal company. And alternatively, again, perhaps the godless universe has evolved to produce a constant revolving of self-resurrecting “lifeforce” through-onto its future… how exhausting eternity must be. Much more definitive meaning in a finite sentence.
Semi-Pascal–“Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because if there be one he must approve of the homage of reason more than that of blindfolded fear.”–TJ
That would be to ignore God’s motivation for creating the universe in the first place–to spawn other sentient beings with free will.
I’ve never understood why mortality is treated as such a terrible thing. Everything dies, everything ends, and yet by way of simple transformation of matter and energy, nothing dies and nothing ends. Mortality as we tend to see it is very narrow in scope and very self centered. The thought that our actions and experiences need to somehow exist forever in order for them to matter at all is incredibly strange to me. I do not understand why life must have some sort of secondary layer to it.
As far as those living in pain just to die, death seems like a sweet embrace. A release from a life of hardship. I’ve heard of many accounts where people begged for death throughout history so that their suffering would end.
I guess my real question is what exactly about our species is so special that it should be exempt from the finality of life that seems to encompass everything else in the universe?
As to your question, why would I not?
I disdain the idea that my life is somehow being recorded and evaluated based on terms that I am, and always will be, unaware of. Given the number of different religions that exist, the different ideas of right and wrong, there is absolutely no way for me to establish an accurate and correct way of living my life in order to be granted some sort of desired eternity. The only thing that I CAN do is try to live my life by what I consider to be just and fair, which ultimately removes the need for any kind of god to begin with, since I’ve simply broken everything down into terms that I agree with so that my life can fit accodringly and I can sleep at night. I’ve never known of anyone who willfully followed and believed a religion that meant for their complete destruction in the end.
As my brother in law once put it, “I believe because I have to.” I think that is entirely true. People can and will only believe in what they are able to believe. And since everyone is different, several different beliefs will come of it. Personally I hope for everyone’s sake that every god that was ever thought of in the universe exists and that everyone gets to go to their version of the afterlife.
Although; I would add that the value that people want life to have; the purpose, the weight; the “worth it all”…this is invalidated by eternity, yet paramount by finiteness.
If eternity is available, then experiences are menial.
The interest of leaving a permanent impact; mark; or crossing time with one’s “spirit” (as in, the political spirit of Thomas Jefferson, for example), seems rather healthy and unhealthy equally.
And again, for my thoughts on the matter, the self centered view of our perspective of mortality is a good thing.
As each person is each the focal interest of their existence; of their reality of experiences; this is good.
But I agree with you; it’s really nice to read someone else sharing the same vantage point.
O- But here is the discrepancy. You wrote earlier, in the OP: “But I hope that my life and the lives of others have some meaning and purpose beyond our threescore and ten here on Earth”. But “meaning”, “purpose” are not given by mere existence. Your existence could be without purpose and without meaning even if you were immortal.
That’s contradictory, and you end up hoping for afterlife after all.
Your desire for everyone to get the god they want not only appears to be moral relativism in the extreme, it suggests there’s value in all the evil gods including those of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
I use only one assumption as the basis for one very simple, universal moral code: that life is of value, and human life (because of our sentience) is of ultimate value. From this is derived, in one iteration or another, what was there at the start of nearly all religions and cultures, the Golden Rule. As I put it–Morality is honoring the equal rights of all to their lives, liberty and property to be free from violation through force or fraud. All other “morality” is individually determined and justified virtue. Most may agree that courage is a laudable virtue, but it isn’t necessary for all to think so or to act courageously. Same for compassion and all the other virtues. Call it virtuous relativism. We hold others to be superior to ourselves for living up to the virtues we value, but are unable or unwilling to live up to them ourselves, whether we admit it to ourselves or not.
And I believe that the universe is indistinguishable from a giant quantum computer, enabling and thus recording, every quantum event since time began–which includes all of our thoughts. What the implications of that are depends on whether there is a God or not, or whether we might eventually be able to retrieve what’s been recorded if we can access the control panel (God?). If such is the case, I think good will be rewarded with continued fulfillment, while evil, or others not wishing to go on, will resign themselves to merciful oblivion. Whether pretty or ugly, it would be righteous. “What we do in life, echoes in eternity”.
There is only one g/God, Truth.
It would if I was good, virtuous(?), and was a receptacle of at least some Truth and a relatively small amount of untruth.
One motivation of the pursuit of Truth is determining what is meaningful. Is experiencing beauty worthless, to everyone? What is menial? I think it IS better to serve in heaven than to rule in Hell.
You said you agree, but the rest of what you said appears not to.
— It would if I was good, virtuous(?), and was a receptacle of at least some Truth and a relatively small amount of untruth.
O- That is begging the question. I challenge that immortality does not covey meaning or purpose to existence, only longetivity. You say that it could deliver meaning and purpose if it was “good”. Why, of course, since what is good will also have as a quality meaning and purpose, but the question remains: WHY?. It cannot be longetivity, so what is it?
Why? Even assuming that indeed were to be his motive, why would it entail an afterlife? Perhaps he wanted to juxtapose his own emminently singular and infinitely enduring Absolute instantiation of free will with a superfluously multiple and finitely contained Nihilist-doomed set… just to compare notes.
There is no good of infinity to the experience of the finite save for relief of the finite.
What is of value in the finite is made worthless in the infinite.
Life is no longer limited; and as such, the experiences of such are elastic into never ceasing.
There is no demand for cherishing what is at hand, for it will always be at hand beyond the mortality in the infinite life.
Infinity kills the cherishing of the finite life.
Mortal life is no longer the gift; infinite life is now the gift.
Mortal life is now the menial.
No, I’m not. The idea of any kind of after life is exhausting to me. And if you look closely, by way of what I am saying I am hoping that there is NOT an afterlife, since I do not believe in a god and do not desire an afterlife. So to hope for everyone’s version to be true also hopes for my version to be true, meaning no after life. I only say I hope it’s real to bring some amount of justification to all of the insane things people do for their gods. As little sense as it may make, I prefer premeditated acts of violence rather than the random ones.
Again, I don’t desire this, I only say it as a means to ease my own conscience. I already consider our species to be a bunch a lunatics. So while I have no affinity for lunatics I can only hope for their sake that there might be some truth in what has caused their ravings. (please do not think that I am implying this towards you either, I am being very general here) And again, the god I desire does not exist so there can be no value attached to it.
I apologize for not being more clear on this earlier.
This is where we separate entirely. I do not see human life as more important than any other life form in existence. The ability to think we are important does not make us important. And without several of the ‘lesser valued’ life forms, our own life form would not exist. Everything is equally important and unimportant in my universe.
Here we disagree again. I agree that morality is relative, however I think that all of it is man made. Murder is wrong, unless we are killing something we don’t like, then it’s fine. Life is precious until it gets in our way. God given rights are given to everyone, therefore they impede upon everyone, and ultimately violate the same rights that ‘god’ gave everyone. Everything that we hold as values can be broken down into steps with such ease, the relativity that you speak of rips it apart on its own. If morals truly did exist then we as a species would not be able to justify our way around them. There would be no gray areas.
I agree with this, but I also feel the “truth” will never be known by us. We are far too busy with opinion to reach truth… imo
It does if you started with the purpose and meaning created during your lifetime.
Because we could then interact with God–something we couldn’t do while we were proving our ability to handle free will; and He couldn’t do before us.
I certainly don’t know, since I don’t have all the answers, but one possibility could be that we may continue for as long as we continue to appreciate our situation. And after all, how does God deal with the infinite? I think He did it by creating us. My vision of God having always been is that He existed in an timeless state, and (being omnipotent) realized instantly (however you can define that term in a timeless state) the need for company–followed instantly by a/the Big Bang
Well, you hoped for it for others if not yourself.
What is the god you desire?
All life (plant or animal) or everything (rocks or “empty” space) is equally important? I think I see the source of your malaise–guilt. It’s an unsustainable position. What do you eat and how do you justify eating it? What’s really ironic is the fact that we are sentient creatures, whose self-awareness has given us the ability to choose between right and wrong. But you’ve taken that to the extreme by saying that even living is wrong. Indeed, why then would an afterlife be something seen as a reward? If you see this as an absurd take on your point, where do you draw the line?
Morality is not relative, but virtue (all other “morality”) is. And we can’t justify our way around them, with only one possible gray area exception, some of the moral problems presented by abortion.
Not all, and maybe no as many as you think. After all, both universal and relative Truth exists and are compatible.
No, not even Flew really. But to paraphrase Gandhi, “If the Truth is only known by one person, he is a majority of one”.
And are you referring to my balance between atheism and deism? After all there’ve been a lot of deists, many of whom were agnostics as well, which is pretty much what I’m saying.
