Atheists and Theists are in agreement that humankind is responsible for all atrocities that have or will happen throughout history and if a devil god exists then he is responsible.
Why are you so confused?
How are humans responsible for natural evils like tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, and volcanoes, diseases which kill thousands?
They aren’t, a devil god is.
Why not a God like the one in Isaiah 45:7 who states, “I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create evil: I the Lord do all these things"?
Why not a devil god mentioned in 2 Corinthians 4:4?
Because there’s beauty, goodness and truth in the world as well.
There is good and evil in the world just as there is good and bad philosophy science.
+=- and -=+ is bad philosophy science.Cosmology and Particle physics is founded upon this bad philosophy science which is why it has failed.
+/-=+/- is good philosophy science.Motor and Computer technology is founded upon this good philosophy science which is why it hasn’t failed.Good philosophy science reveals that we (The soul or SELF) reside within a lifeless binary processing biological machine which exists and doesn’t exist because it doesn’t possess spiritual life.
Evil & An Omnipotent, Benevolent God
Zdeněk Petráček looks at the biggest problem facing monotheism
One last question is, could virtues be developed in a world without evil? Virtues like compassion and empathy could probably still develop, as even in a world without pervasive evil there could still be more minor difficulties that would help people to understand and support each other during challenging times.
Lots of people will note things like compassion and empathy as good things. When, of course, existentially, it always comes down to who or what you feel these things for. Is it only for those who are “one of us”? In other words, the reason some go through challenging times is because it is others who created them.
“Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.”
Epicurus’ second assertion is that if God can prevent evil but lacks the willingness to do so, then divine benevolence is undermined.
The part where some suggest that, given the simply staggering pain and suffering embedded in human interactions and in “acts of God”, a God, the God may well be a sadistic monster. Then, however, those who refuse to accept this because they “just know” that everything will all be explained once they are privy to the reasons behind His “mysterious ways”.
Come on, it generally becomes as broad or as narrow as each of us individually need it to be.
Those who do believe God provides us with moral commandments and with the assurance that we will live on forever in paradise…?
In other words, what is it about God that you yourself are willing to accept in order to sustain that comfort and consolation up to and beyond the grave?
On the other hand, what part of God’s mysterious ways don’t you understand? It is there in fact to encompass, well, everything under the sun.
Or, to put it “spiritually”…
Now, you just have to “believe it”, right? Let the ecclesiastics among us wallow in all that theological stuff.
So, what do you argue instead?
Excusing God
Raymond Tallis highlights the problem of evil.
[Philip Goff] addresses the difficulty often invoked by infidels such as myself “of reconciling a loving all powerful God with the terrible suffering we see in the world.” The argument is that if God truly is both omnibenevolent and omnipotent – ideas central to Judeo-Christian belief – then he would not wish, nor indeed allow, that there should be suffering in the universe. So why is there so much suffering?
Of course, for any number of religious denominations, the answer revolves around God’s mysterious ways. After all, invoking that allows them to sustain the comfort and the consolation that comes with believing they have access to moral commandments here and now and immortality and salvation there and then.
In fact, as I often note, I’d believe in them again if I could.
On the other hand, as the Camp Mystic tragedy revealed to us yet again, even in the grip of it what else is there?
“Camp Mystic, a girls’ Christian summer camp in Texas, has a strong connection to faith, with many associated with the camp expressing that they feel God’s presence there and relying on their faith to cope with the recent devastating floods. The tragedy has led to an outpouring of faith-based support and reflection on the role of spirituality in times of crisis.” AI
Imagine if one of the young girls who died was your own daughter or sister or best friend. Without one or another spiritual denouement, you’d have to live with the “brute facticity” of a No God world.
Then this part:
Lists of earthquakes - Wikipedia’
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It’s not for nothing that Harold Kushner’s When Bad Things Happen to Good People" has sold over 4,000,000 copies.
Kushner was a Jew. He believed in the God of Abraham. Just as Christians and Muslims do. And yet over the centuries they have been inflicting God knows how much terrible pain and suffering on each other.
Excusing God
Raymond Tallis highlights the problem of evil.
Darwin’s admission that he could not persuade himself “that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the parasitic wasps with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of caterpillars” can be extrapolated to a lot of what happens in the natural world.
Over and over again, we can note truly grim, gruesome, grotesque things that unfold in the slaughterhouse that is nature. All animals [including us] are in the crosshairs regarding any number of terrible things that can come their [our] way. It’s ever and always only a matter of time.
But unlike other animals, self-conscious human beings are able to actually comment on it. And to react to it. And most either 1] think about it not at all when things are going well for them or 2] when things are going bad, instead, most fall back on God and religion for the “explanation”.
And with moral commandments, immortality and salvation on the line, how hard can it be to just rationalize all that terrible pain and suffering away? It’s merely harder for some than for others.
And the part where that is attributed to heretics, skeptics, atheists, infidels, nihilists, heathens, pagans, etc. Or even to the Devil himself? Just not to their own loving, just and merciful Creator.
Then those who accept that it may well all revolve around their own God. But, alas, He is not omnipotent. He created the universe with the best of intentions, but then things got out of hand and beyond His control.
And when the apples are confronted with such things as this…
…and all other “acts of God”, what choice do they have but to accept that God’s mysterious ways are simply beyond the reach of mere mortals. After all, in a No God universe, these terrible things “just happen”.
Of course, here, some are at least able to convince themselves that in a No God world, there is still the capacity to make distinctions between good and evil. Philosophically, for example. I’m just not one of them. Here and now.[/quote]
The recent testimony of Professor Nick Maynard, a British surgeon who led an emergency medical team in central Gaza at Al-Aqsa Hospital, speaks for itself:
“One child I’ll never forget had burns so bad you could see her facial bones. We knew there was no chance of her surviving but there was no morphine to give her. So not only was she inevitably going to die, but she would die in agony. And there was nowhere for her to go, so she died on the floor of the emergency room.”
See what I mean? If you are this child or one of her loved ones, it’s either a God, the God, their God or…you tell me.
Finally, the part where this terrible suffering in Gaza, involving those who inflict it and those who endure it, revolves around the fact that both sides believe in the very same God!
Excusing God
Raymond Tallis highlights the problem of evil.
Then back to what I construe to be the beauty of it all for some: the fact that all they need do is to believe in Him, is to have faith in Him. Why? Because that is what makes it true. And that includes any number of truly conflicting accounts and assessments of a God, the God.
And what then seems crucial here is this: that when those who act on what they merely believe about God and religion, it can precipitate dire consequences for those who either believe in No God or the wrong God [religious/spiritual path].
In other words [and I cite human history to date] the more things change here the more they stay basically the same.
Of course, you can go from one denomination to another here and encounter any number of conflicting assessments of what their own God is either capable of or incapable of. But then, alas, how exasperating that can be for those like me with so much at stake on both sides of the grave.
Then the truly mysterious part [for me] where God is connected to the universe. In fact, some embrace the assumption that the universe itself is God. Only that gets tricky because which came first, the laws of matter “somehow” evolving into God, or God creating the laws of matter.
Finally, the part where the human brain itself is either capable or incapable of pinning this all down ontologically and teleologically.
Excusing God
Raymond Tallis highlights the problem of evil.
The problem of suffering sits on a deeper problem: the mystery of sentience. Why would a benign God create a universe that ultimately generated entities susceptible to endless, sometimes unbearable, distress, inflicted on them by nature or by their fellows?
Also: MSN
On the other hand, we appear to be hardwired in turn to “think up” one or another set of distinctions made between those deemed to be “one of us” and those deemed to be “one of them”. And, historically, this has resulted in any number of God and No God conflagrations. Suffering on steroids for some then.
It’s just that with God and religion so much more is at stake: moral commandments, immortality and salvation.
Goff’s God may not be omnipotent, but he surely must have been able to anticipate these consequences of his act of creation. And if this future were not foreseeable, one might still expect the Creator to have some insight into the limits of his knowledge, and be prudent enough to mobilise the precautionary principle, and so hold back on the creation of conscious creatures, given that, with embodied consciousness, there comes at least the possibility of suffering.
On the other hand, what does it really mean for mere mortals to speculate about God? For any number of true believers there is nothing at all that would make them change their minds. Why? Because God and religion are the only sources for attaining moral commandments, immortality and salvation.
Unless, perhaps, there is a philosophical alternative here that I keep missing.
Or did he have no insight even into the limitations of his knowledge? Has he been surprised and disappointed by how things have turned out?
I’m figuring there are only three ways here to react to that:
1] you’ll die and that’s it…oblivion and the return to star stuff
2] you’ll die and go to any particular denominations rendition of Heaven or Hell
3] Jesus [or His equivalent given other denominations] returns and sets things straight
Otherwise it is all just sheer speculation.
The perfect theodicy is the Sacrificial Dream.
Maybe God doesn’t always intervene into our primal behavior for the same reason we don’t domesticate every last living creature—and actively attempt to return them to the wild after we rescue them. Isn’t God the one who designed the primal? If they wanted them to have more self determination, they would’ve given it to them. They gave it to us, and it would be counteractive to interfere with it all the time.
Respond. Horrifying to even think it? The weight of glory.
Excusing God
Raymond Tallis highlights the problem of evil.
Now, from my frame of mind, that sort of AI would surely shake things up. Why? Because it’s one thing to communicate with an AI entity that basically consists of programming and inputs from other mere mortals, and another thing altogether if that entity really acquires some measure of autonomy. Assuming of course that we ourselves are not just nature’s own…automatons?
One word: capitalism.
If there are big bucks to be made here then, sooner or later, those interested in accumulating big bucks [and they are everywhere] will soon find a way to rationalize, well, practically anything, right? For some, think boiler rooms all the way down.
Unless, perhaps, all of this does unfold given the only possible reality. Then they’re off the hook too?
Compare this frame of mind to my own considerably more fractured and fragmented mentality.
Given a No God universe/multiverse. But this seems “here and now” to be the equivalent of the animal rights folks insisting that no harm should be done to animals. Now, what, that commitment is extended so that no harm shall be done to artificial human beings?
On the other hand, if anyone here comes across a source that explores this more in depth, please link it to us.
Excusing God
Raymond Tallis highlights the problem of evil.
Here, however, given my current frame of mind, as long as “a God, the God, my God” continues [by far] to be the font most mere mortals choose to put all of those terrible things into perspective, don’t expect God and religion to go away anytime soon. After all, in regard to morality, meaning and metaphysics it all comes back to God for many. And it’s not like there is a philosophical or ideological – secular – equivalent. Or none that I am aware of. Sure, those such as Ayn Rand insisted that morality and meaning are grounded metaphysically in Objectivism. But a lot of good that does those of her ilk in regard to immortality. Let alone salvation.
To wit:
This is the part that matters most to me. In fact, I still recall the first time I really began to think about it. I was reading a book about Jean-Paul Sartre. I believe it was a printed companion to a film/documentary about him.
In it, the author spoke of a friend of Sartre’s who had traveled to the Soviet Union to experience first hand the so-called New Man that was being created by the Marxist Revolution. Only when the discussion got around to death – to oblivion – it turned out that the New Man was really no better off than the Old Man. Sure, one might manage to think him or herself into believing that they “lived on” after death through the Revolution. For some that worked.
But, for others, who was kidding whom?
No God? No religious path? Forget about it. You die, disintegrating back to star stuff. Both Communists and capitalists.
In other words, back to the part where some believe “in their head” particular things about their own God while others believe “in their heads” particular things regarding human interactions in a No God world.
Then what? People believe what they do about God and theodicy. The part I root existentially – historically, culturally and experientially – in dasein. In part, perhaps, because there is that which we believe about something in the either/or world because in fact it’s true for all of us, and there’s that which we believe about something in the is/ought world because first and foremost, it comforts and consoles us to believe it.
Or, from my perspective, many come up with something, with anything, God or No God, that keeps them from having to accept that this little girl’s terrible suffering and death is essentially meaningless and purposeless.
We can explain the presence of evil quite easily until we bring an all-powerful god into the picture. The appeal to the supernatural does not bring clarity to any issue.
And I don’t agree that the problem of evil is the most important issue relating to “God.” The relationship between this proposed god’s consciousness and any objects it is aware of is the most fundamental issue and therefore, the most important. Answering this question will make the problem of evil a moot issue.
Individuals lie.
They claim to be a misrepresentation of reality (an illusion).They claim that they don’t exist even though they need to exist to claim it.
Excusing God
Raymond Tallis highlights the problem of evil
More to the point, however, is that in the absence of a God, the God, good and evil themselves are largely existential constructs rooted historically, culturally and experientially in dasein. After all, it’s not for nothing those like IC here will insist that in the absence of a God, the God, their God, Good and Evil are beyond the reach of mere mortals. Instead, they are derived largely from one or another sacred text. Moral commandments that then revolve around immortality and salvation. In other words, depending on which One True Path you are on, these commandments might pertain to any number of ofttimes contradictory assessments of conflicting goods.
Again, however, back to the part where any number of these folks…
…will insist that only their own assessments actually count.
And really what are the odds that of all these assessments of “beauty, wonder, love, nobility, pleasure, happiness” etc., your own is always going to be the one smack dab in the bullseye?
As I [and other moral nihilists] point out, however, any number of moral objectivists [God and No God] will insist that, on the contrary, you are either “one of us” or…
…“or else”?
Thus this part…
…is no less problematic.
Still, “in reality” they are performed all the time. The objectivists’ “calculations” are derived from the assumption that their own One True Path to Good and Evil had better be the one that others choose. It’s then only a matter of just how fiercely dogmatic they are in insisting on it. And here we can go all the way to…to the reeducation camps, the gulags or the gas chambers.
Go ahead and ask them to explain that.
Excusing God
Raymond Tallis highlights the problem of evil.
Then the part where all of these folks…
…either are or are not able to concur regarding the existence of [and then the description of] this Christian God. Even in regard to the Bible itself there are Christians all up and down the political spectrum:
Of course, for any number of men and women eager to sustain their own moral commandments all the way to the grave, comes the part where that is rewarded with immortality and salvation. And what part of God’s “mysterious ways” does that not justify Original Sin? And anything that happens to all the other animals is clearly justified by something written somewhere in the Bible.
Okay, but given all that is at stake on both sides of the grave, millions still manage to make that leap of faith. Or, figuring they’ve got nothing to lose, make that wager. I’d do it myself if I could figure out how.