Philosophy Now Forum

I don't believe we are required by God to believe something that is morally repugnant to us.

Dubious, thank you very much for posting and explaining Van Gogh's "Starry Night". This picture shows more exactly what I mean than any other explanation I have seen, not excluding the narrative of what Christ said when He was on the Cross, about forgiveness compared with eternity.

"Starry Night" shows eternity in the form of the whirling sky full of light, and the sad navy-blue human world below with its dark little church with paltry steeple terminating in a point that has no dimensions at all.

(actually, if one needs a phallic symbol for illustrating the way to eternity, a lighthouse is better than a steeple).

Greta wrote:

The question I was wondering about earlier is whether there is any the significance for us in reality being "one big absolute thing". IC focused on prosaic misapplied examples of everyday "absolutes". It is a question I wonder about because that "one big absolute thing" seems more remote from us than any of its internal relative aspects, in which case I wonder what the fuss is about.

The view from eternity may be deceptive, but then so may be the view from this relative world. As a practical proposition I'd keep the view from eternity to oscillate with the view from the relative world. I infer that one point made by Dubious by his posting "Starry Night" is that some art is a lot more wholesome than many churches and their carryings -on.

thedoc wrote:

Greta wrote: Nobody is claiming that God is impatient. How in tarnation did you get that from my post? I would be interested to know.

Not from your post, everything is not about you. And there are some who claim that God can't be patient, they are anthropomorphizeing because they are impatient.

You reply to my post and when I question the odd reply you patronise me with "everything is not about you?". That is just silly.

Reflex wrote:I don't believe we are required by God to believe something that is morally repugnant to us.

"For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled." -Revelation 17:17, a description of the beast with 7 heads and 10 horns in chapter and verse.

Dubious wrote:...the probability of that being less than minuscule...

Calculated by you, by what method? I'm just interested to know how you've arrived at this certainty...and it must be considerable, by your own account, if you regard the probabilities as "miniscule."

...which is another way of stating that what you believe to be the truth becomes the TRUTH!

That's your version. I would never say that.

Belief becomes the criteria for truth...which makes sense since that is the modus operandi of all theism. There exists no other means to make its "truth" assertions.

Now, you seem offended by what you attribute to me as some kind of dogmatism. But look at how dogmatic your statement above is...to say nothing of prejudicial. "All Theists operate dishonestly," you appear to say, and (your words now) "there exists no other means to make its truth assertions." How have you attained to this level of certainty?

And did you intend to advance it as a truth claim, or were you only saying, "relative to my perspective, Theists are not honest"? Indeed, what would "honest" even mean, except "to tell the absolute truth"? And why would it be bad not to tell the truth IF, as you assert, all truth is, as you assert, relative to perspective anyway?

Greta wrote:(noting that our deaths are trivial events).

Not to us.

And not to God.

The Earth is far from moribund - it is an extraordinary and magnificent entity that is simply maturing and developing as it's always done.

Hmm...blind, blind optimism. Everything we know from science, and in particular from both physics and cosmology, says the very opposite. It says the universe is entropic, and running down to heat-death. The Earth is on a short lease, and will be gone long before the universe it's in is dead. But dead it will be.

We are part of that development and, in evolutionary terms, humans became sentient enough to understand what roughly what they were doing about a minute ago. How can humanity be judged for failing to become immediately experienced and wise?

You're mistaking a very temporary physical or technological "progress" (equivocal as it truly is) with moral or intellectual progress. But mankind is clearly getting smarter without getting morally better. We killed more human beings in the last century, and by more savage means, than in all the previous centuries combined. And now our "progress" threatens the planet itself. Yet you pitch for "progress"?

inexorable march of evolution

Ah, I see...your optimism is prophetic and creedal, not rational or scientific. That's a common move for people faced with the reality of where the Earth is actually headed. It's intolerable to recognize it's doomed, in the face of no salvation from that. So we can look for that rescue, or die in the dark, singing.

It's not rational to assume that the Earth is a form of hell. It's growing pains. It's the pain of change, of restructuring.

It's not rational: it's creedal.

Not only that, but do you realize your story makes "evil" an unreality? Nothing then is "evil": rape, child molestation, war, disease, murder, injustice and every form of sadness and debasement -- including those you feel you have experienced yourself (for we all have) -- are nothing but "growing pains," so we should just accept that we have the bad luck to be born as the dross of evolutionary development...

And again, die in the dark, singing.

Immanuel Can wrote:

Not only that, but do you realize your story makes "evil" an unreality? Nothing then is "evil": rape, child molestation, war, disease, murder, injustice and every form of sadness and debasement -- including those you feel you have experienced yourself (for we all have) -- are nothing but "growing pains," so we should just accept that we have the bad luck to be born as the dross of evolutionary development...

Which is is the default, evil or good?

If evil is the default, which you seem to be claiming, is it better to do what the Buddha said and learn to avoid suffering, or is it better to strive to make the world less evil, as Nietzsche said we should.

If good is the default does it make any difference to whether you choose the Buddhist passive way, or the Nietzsche -recommended active way?

Belinda wrote:Which is is the default, evil or good?

Why would we assume there was a "default," a metaphor drawn from computer programming? Why not think both were present? But why assume that the existence of good "excuses" evil, anymore that the presence of some corner of unstained cloth on an otherwise dirty shirt makes it "okay to wear"?

If evil is the default, which you seem to be claiming,

Nope. As above.

... is it better to do what the Buddha said and learn to avoid suffering,

Buddha said to transcend it, not to prevent it. You have to deny its very existence, or desire will anchor you to the world of illusions, he thought.

...or is it better to strive to make the world less evil, as Nietzsche said we should.

That's funny. Nietzsche told us to make the world less evil, eh? The author of "Beyond Good and Evil" told us to be good.

Well, that's certainly not a reading I saw in Nietzsche. Apparently Hitler didn't see it either. But okay...

If good is the default does it make any difference to whether you choose the Buddhist passive way, or the Nietzsche -recommended active way?

Neither, I would say. Both are unrealistic. They share a common disbelief in the existence of evil, but also of denial of "the good." Yet must of us...yourself, clearly, included...do strongly observe both.

Ironically, both Nietzsche and Buddha would have to affirm that "will to power" or "enlightenment" (respectively) were (in some sense they'd need to explain) "good" things. However, both failed to see that paradox, that contradiction between disbelief in moral values, on the first hand, and yet advocacy or valuing of some outcome as preferable on the other -- and so both said some self-contradictory things about good and evil.

But again, the idea of "default" here is not realistic.

Immanuel, by "default" in this connection I meant is evil the absence of good, or is good the absence of evil?

Belinda wrote:Immanuel, by "default" in this connection I meant is evil the absence of good, or is good the absence of evil?

I'm inclined to put it differently.

That which we call "evil," it seems to me, is a corruption of some kind of good. I say that because I can't see that evil is in any way creative or generative; it seems to me to be wholly destructive, it's only apparent "vitality" being derived from it's corrupting of that which already has some good in it that evil impedes or corrupts. But I don't suspect that evil "produces" things affirmatively in the way good does.

If I'm wrong about that, I'm ready to hear the counter-examples. But that's how it seems to me at the moment.

I wouldn't say "absence" was the right word, though. Evil decays, preys upon, destroys, warps, mangles, and erodes things which are good, and it genuinely has theses sorts of effects; so that's not an "absence" per se: it's a reality. It's just a highly negative reality.

Immanuel Can, evil does help to generate evolution by natural selection. Creatures have to struggle to survive in an unfriendly environment and this struggle for survival helps to ensure that only the stronger individuals breed.

I think you would find that theologians either claim that good is the absence of evil, or that evil is the absence of good. Shall we try to find out which stances prominent theologians take? Clement of Alexandria, Augustine of Hippo, and Thomas Aquinas all believed that the universe is good, and that evil is the absence of good. Christian and Islamic sects all hold that the universe is good and that evil is the absence of good. The doctrine that evil is the absence of good is basically an optimistic doctrine which underlies Abrahamic theology.

Schopenhauer holds that good is the absence of evil;evil is the default state of the universe. The great advantage of this belief is that man has to work actively and bloody hard to create good, instead of trusting to the optimistic and questionable belief that God has created the best of all possible worlds.

The pessimistic belief that evil is the default state of the Universe, while it probably was not the belief of Jesus the Jew, is not inconsistent with the ethics of Jesus the socialist.

Belinda wrote:Immanuel Can, evil does help to generate evolution by natural selection. Creatures have to struggle to survive in an unfriendly environment and this struggle for survival helps to ensure that only the stronger individuals breed.

Well, isn't that a nice story? The weak deserve to die, the strong to survive and breed. The race matters more than any individual, and evil is good for that.

Is this really where you want to go with that? Historically, that's never worked out well for women, the handicapped or minorities, but if you want a society run that way, I guess you can opt for it.

It's called "Social Darwinism," or perhaps "The Third Reich."

Still want it?

I think you would find that theologians either claim that good is the absence of evil, or that evil is the absence of good.

I'm sorry, but I can't grant your premises there. "Theologians," while they are not of a single kind, have much more sophisticated ways of addressing the problem of evil than anything you suggest. Moreover, there's no monolithic "Abrahamic theology," there's no "Jewish-Socialist Jesus," and there's a real question in my mind that you've got a handle on Schopenhauer or Leibniz (whom you do not mention, but looks to me like the one you're trying to invoke by "best of all possible worlds").

I fear that you are in serious danger of creating a straw man there. Your following generalities are not just broad, but in some cases, quite, quite wrong...

So I don't really know how to respond to something so far at variance from the facts.

Immanuel Can wrote: Well, isn't that a nice story? The weak deserve to die, the strong to survive and breed. The race matters more than any individual, and evil is good for that.

Is this really where you want to go with that? Historically, that's never worked out well for women, the handicapped or minorities, but if you want a society run that way, I guess you can opt for it.

Ah, now I understand: We decide how we would like it to be and if we believe hard enough that's how it will be. Why didn't you just say that in the first place, Immanuel?

Immanuel Can wrote:

Well, isn't that a nice story? The weak deserve to die, the strong to survive and breed. The race matters more than any individual, and evil is good for that.

Is this really where you want to go with that? Historically, that's never worked out well for women, the handicapped or minorities, but if you want a society run that way, I guess you can opt for it.

It's called "Social Darwinism," or perhaps "The Third Reich."

Still want it?

Immanuel, you confuse how the universe is by how you think it should be. Don't you see that?