Philosophy Discussion Forums

Fanman wrote:Dreager,

you wrote:

Am I right in summarizing the pro-God argument as thus; The reasons for negative aspects of existence cannot be fully understood, and therefore we cannot understand God as the direct cause of these aspects. The reasons for positive aspects of existence cannot be fully understood, yet we can understand God as the direct cause of these aspects.

I don't agree with your pro-God argument.

From a believers perspective, there is a force of good and a force of evil in this world who are God and Satan respectively. Satan's purpose in the world is to corrupt people, so that they become evil, or at least do not seek to learn and follow the will of God. Satan also causes suffering to the innocent and is the bane of mankind. Therefore in opposition to your pro-God argument, I would argue that Satan is one of the causes of the negative aspects of existence. That said, Proverbs 3:12 describes how God is a father who corrects those whom he loves. Therefore, the correction that God subjects those he loves to could involve suffering, which is experienced by humans as a negative aspect of existence which God is directly responsible for.

In Isaiah 45:7 God states that he makes peace and creates evil. Therefore he can be held directly accountable for the negative aspects of existence. God also states in Isaiah 55:8 & 9 that his thoughts are not our (human's) thoughts, and that his ways are higher than ours. Therefore, this places us in a position where we may not be able to understand why God does what he does, due to his ways being different to ours. But again, this points to the notion that God can be held accountable for the negative aspects of existence.

I think that the difficulty that arises when negative things happen, is deciding who we attribute them to God or Satan? I think that if the innocent suffer [negative aspect of existence] then it is Satan who is the cause of it. And, if those who God views as guilty of sin suffer, then it is he who is responsible. I genuinely believe that some of God's actions may be beyond our capacity to understand or agree with, but I also believe that God knows best having an infinite amount of wisdom. I mean, God works on a universal scale, from a spiritual platform, whilst we operate on a largely, if not wholly physical platform on an earthly scale.

I find the following perspective useful in understanding suffering in the world - If God permitted his own son Jesus Christ to suffer and die, how much more will he expect the rest of humanity endure?

I believe that God can be the direct cause of positive things that occur, but I also believe that Satan can cause 'good' or pleasing things to occur in people's lives if they worship him. As we are shown in Matthew 4:8 when Satan offers Jesus the glory of all the kingdoms of the world if only Jesus would worship him. I believe that if something positive [the positive aspects of existence] is earned through genuine hard work and natural talent, then it is God who is the direct cause of it. Whereas if something positive is attained through cheating, slighting, not by natural talent or by causing suffering to others then it is Satan who is the direct cause of it. I am not ruling out though, that people can be lucky or have fortunate, chance encouters which benefit them. I would say serendipitously, but I believe that serendipity could be a form of providence.

That is different to how I understood your perspective. There are more complex contradictions in that explanation.

Negative aspects of existence can therefore be explained by god or satan. If you are bad, then your sufferring can be attributed to a correction of sorts by god. A sort of moral justice, punishment. I do not beleive in punishment of that sort, so we depart there. But with satan entering the equation, being the one responsible for unwarranted sufferring, there arises a few questions.

Did god create satan? If not, how is he omnipotent? If so, how is god good? If god is not only good, but all, why create/not override Satan and prevent negative aspects of existence/suffering, even though being all would negate the existence of satan in the first place? If sufferring has a purpose, why should I not inflict sufferring? If the purpose of some suffering is beyond our comprehension, could I not declare the suffering I inflict to be beyond your comprehension if we are going to accept the incomprehensible as reasonable? (I'm not God, I'm assuming there are some things which others may not comprehend, such as you not comprehending my perspective and I yours at this point in time)

Who declares what is good or bad? How can you rely on the bible if it is not taken literally and is open to interpretation? How do we know whose interpretation is right? Who says what is right or wrong anyway? If taken literally how do we reconcile ourselves with contradications such as "“Whoever kills any man shall surely be put to death” and rape, slavery, torture, sexism, racism, homophobia etc.

This is a ridiculous amount of questions, but to narrow my response to any fewer would be unrepresentative of the amount points you raised which are all equally inconsistent and unreasonable to me. I genuinely want to understand your point of view, I am genuinely interested in understanding the world, which includes you, and consider myself just like you - human and utterly fallible.

Together with TC I feel like this comes across as attacking, but like he says, direct is most effective.

In the beginning God farted which we now know as the "big bang". The angels scattered in every direction and Lucifer, who was particularly close to God, was so traumatized he hid underground and refused to come out. God became bored and with a wave of his hand created the universe out of the still lingering foul firmament. Then he became lonely and created Adam and Eve who promptly ran from the Garden of Eden holding their noses. Ever since the rumor has circulated that there must be something inherently bad about humanity or God would never have punished us so from the start.

Once in a blue moon the angels come back holding their noses and have promised that when the smell finally dies down enough that they can stand the stench they'll be back to help clean up the mess. In the mean time, the last anyone saw of God he was laughing his butt off and making a quick exit.

Wulliheron, you have missed out one of the actors. This is the good people who survive despite the stench and who are good because they dispel the stench each in a small place in a small time

Belinda wrote:Wulliheron, you have missed out one of the actors. This is the good people who survive despite the stench and who are good because they dispel the stench each in a small place in a small time

According to the National Science Foundation one in five Americans still believes the sun revolves around the earth. Last year an obnoxious reality TV star and huge professional wrestling fan used trash talk to convince 60% of Americans their own president might not be a US citizen. We had one politician say women could not get pregnant by rape and there should be such a thing as "legitimate" rape, one who was running for president insisting he wanted to start WWIII, and the candidate they finally chose was shocked and amazed along with the rest of the party when after insulting half the country calling them lazy bums looking for handouts he lost the election. This is comedy you can't buy and bit part actors don't interest me.

But the bit part actors is all we have to combat the human and natural disasters. Still, I heartily commend your pessimism of which much more is needed in the public media.

Belinda wrote:But the bit part actors is all we have to combat the human and natural disasters. Still, I heartily commend your pessimism of which much more is needed in the public media.

That's romantic twaddle. Many of the greatest people of all time were standup comedians including Socrates and Lao Tzu whose impact is still felt to this day. The Tao Te Ching is a mere 5,000 words, takes half an hour to read, and you can find at least twenty English language versions of the text online for free, yet it is the third most published book of all time and people say it takes a lifetime to understand. Einstein was a nice guy, but no saint, and changed the world for everyone. The list goes on and on with the occasional martyr or whatever, but it is the comedians that obviously keep this world spinning round.

I am sorry that we misunderstood each other. By bit parts I thought you meant the sort of individuals you mention, besides the obscure ones that are forgotten after their deaths. I am even more sorry that despite such individuals the world still stinks. The moral is surely that we must not rest upon the attainment of such as Socrates but press on in this present situation, with their help of course.

While I endorse that comedy is good for polemic and can be good at balanced discourse, as Lao Tsu, I hope that your worthy allegory is aimed at more than vaunting the uses of comedy.

Belinda wrote:I am sorry that we misunderstood each other. By bit parts I thought you meant the sort of individuals you mention, besides the obscure ones that are forgotten after their deaths. I am even more sorry that despite such individuals the world still stinks. The moral is surely that we must not rest upon the attainment of such as Socrates but press on in this present situation, with their help of course.

While I endorse that comedy is good for polemic and can be good at balanced discourse, as Lao Tsu, I hope that your worthy allegory is aimed at more than vaunting the uses of comedy.

The moral is people need to work on their sense of humor big time. Westerners in particular are infamous among Asians for having severely stunted and warped senses of humor. These are the people who instead of laughing at such outrageous clowns as Donald Trump actually believe the crap coming out of his mouth because it is taboo or anathema or whatever to even consider the crap to be funny. Comedians can play practical jokes or whatever, but I never heard of them organizing things like the KKK.

I think God is more of an idea than anything else. Within the realms of our senses it is probably impossible to clearly draw out the origin of a universe or the idea of causality at the root of the matter. As far as, our sensory perception is concerned, it appears to me that causality forms a basic principle of the universe. I wonder if time ever existed and whether we are bound to a terminal end because while we may observe that the universe is extending or life flourishing, one wonders the space it occupies and extends to. The dynamics of a changing universe may be evolving but then there has to be space for something to evolve. I wonder what the empty space could be? If I could rationalise the universe as omnipresent and everlasting then one could come to a conclusion that the universe is not expanding but is simply flowing like a jelly fish in an aquatic dense. The question of creation could very well be goofed up. What about continuum and the concept of eternity? If there could be an origin then what if it was an infinite origin and an infinite destruction? Then the question of a God would be irrelevant and the answer to it would be quite obvious.

God is an idea that is continually proving itself to be capable of surviving, or not, as the case may be. Many gods are failed gods. If a god survives despite unpopularity with the more adaptable classes of people that god will be one that is artificially supported in situ by the ruling elite.

cynicallyinsane wrote:If there is a god, why doesn't he prove that he exists? Why does he leave us without any compelling evidence of his existence?

Didn't you just answer your own question?

Maybe proving is a human or egoic interest, not an interest of God's. Maybe God simply is -- all and everywhere -- if we have eyes and heart to see.

Pritesh123 wrote:

What about continuum and the concept of eternity? If there could be an origin then what if it was an infinite origin and an infinite destruction? Then the question of a God would be irrelevant and the answer to it would be quite obvious.

The Trimūrti (English: ‘three forms’; Sanskrit: त्रिमूर्तिः trimūrti), Tri Murati or Trimurati, is a concept in Hinduism "in which the cosmic functions of creation, maintenance, and destruction are personified by the forms of Brahma the creator, Vishnu the maintainer or preserver and Shiva the destroyer or transformer."[1][2] These three gods have been called "the Hindu triad


I wonder if Hinduism will ever be popular in the west. Hinduism takes a lot of non-literal comprehension, and I guess that many actual Hindus are practical , not intellectual , Hindus. However, in a philosophy forum there should be little problem with understanding Hindu philosophy.

cynicallyinsane wrote:If there is a god, why doesn't he prove that he exists? Why does he leave us without any compelling evidence of his existence?

Scientific evidencing works by a way of copying from nature, resulting in a model. You are basically asking to copy God to some model, which is nonsense. You cannot copy God, just as well as you cannot copy somebody's emotions. All what chooses, be it emotions or God, is inherently a matter of opinion. A subjective issue, not an objective issue.

But then there is still a subjective sort of evidencing. If you subjectively opine anything to be "divine", then obviously that proves God exists to you. And that is the regular mode of evidencing in respect to God's existence.

cynicallyinsane wrote:If there is a god, why doesn't he prove that he exists? Why does he leave us without any compelling evidence of his existence?

Because then people who don't like God or want anything to do with him would be forced into a relationship they didn't particularly therefore their freedom of choice to reject God is violated.