Atheism

I agreed with his entries and added a new one.

Yes, sorry, I shouldn’t have had that third shot this morning.

But more importantly, what happened to edgar's avatar? Did he get taken down for copyright issues? I’ll miss it.

By your definition of omnipotence, all the power that exists doesn't constitute omnipotence.

What I've tried several times explaining is that there is a difference between the power to imagine the impossible and the power to create all that is possible. Yes, the power to imagine beyond what's possible is part of the power of the universe, but the power to constrain what is possible is also part of that power.

So, for example, it's not possible for someone to erase you out of existence by wishing you gone; but it's also not possible for someone to have done so to Hitler.

So you're complaining that God should have used omnipotence to eliminate and/or otherwise stop Hitler, but if that power existed, then it would also exist for evil and then Hitler could have multiplied himself infinitely to escape erasure, or evil could have erased whoever was sent to kill Hitler.

So the kind of omnipotence you are imagining, if it existed, still couldn't shift the balance of good and evil in favor of good; i.e. because creative power fundamentally becomes either good or evil. You are saying that if omnipotence existed and it was good, then it would eliminate evil, or at least shift the balance in favor of good over evil; but in a way it does by providing various avenues of spiritual transcendence of evil.

When people are being tortured/killed, for example, they automatically spiritually withdraw and/or die to escape the torture. They don't do so by choice but by deliverance, i.e. by God's will despite whatever their own efforts are doing in their struggle with evil (for and/or against it) up until the moment of withdrawal. You can say that God is terrible for allowing the torture to happen at all, but the reality is that part of omnipotence includes the satanic power to pervert creative power to evil ends. So because evil commands omnipotence as well as good, there have to be other means of transcending evil than just stopping it at a material level, because otherwise evil could also just stop good at a material level.

So what can your not-so-omnipotent god do then, beyond thoughts and prayers? Not much, it seems.

What you're essentially asking is, "what is possible in the universe?"

The way you're asking it is with a lot of anti-theist connotations and attitude.

When you say, "not much, it seems," all you're really saying is that you can imagine a lot of things that aren't possible," which in itself is a testament to God's power.

Now, why don't you try to imagine all the things that could be possible if evil had access to the kind of omnipotence you're chastising God about not creating?

Salad, anyone?

Topic, anyone?

Originality, anyone?

certainly not from you.

So what can and what can't he do then?

Well, like I said there is this mixing between the objective/material level and the subjective/experiential level that makes a lot of things possible that aren't possible at the material level alone.

So, for example, you pointed out that at the material level evil is able to create Hitler and nazism and holocausts, etc.; but at the spiritual/subjective level you are able to imagine the possibility of God stopping such atrocities, and that gives you hope if you believe (or undermines your possibility of experiencing hope if you focus on the impossibility of miracles).

What some people do is use their imagination like you do, only they imagine how things could be worse than they actually are, and that helps them put reality in perspective. E.g. you drop something on your foot and it hurts like hell but you realize you could have broken a bone and then you thank God that it wasn't that bad.

So at the objective/material level, what happens happens; but because of the role subjectivity plays in experiencing and filtering it and giving meaning to it, and even controlling how much pain you feel, when you lose consciousness, when endorphins kick in to cause euphoria during an otherwise traumatic situation, etc. that gives God a lot of power to deliver people from suffering.

Of course it also gives evil/satan a lot of power to make people miserable in their dreams, thoughts, reactions to objective events, emotions, etc.

There is this wonderful things, though, which is that when you're really going through hell subjectively, you can pray for deliverance and get it. It might take a little while, but you will get relief in some form or other. If you don't believe me, try it; but realize that when it happens you're be able to explain it away if you choose, because that is just part of the power God gives us to create and believe our own explanations.

Jesus ******* wept--this is a thread about atheism. If any of the clowns at this site want to discuss their idiot notions of theology, they should start their own thread, rather than trashing this one. Attention whores begone!

Write shorter lectures please. Brievity is the essence of wit, and I don't have all night.

You're describing a non-intervensionist god, which is a version of the idea that I am fine with. But once again, no moral code can be got from this guy. We're on our own.

This I think is good news, because moral codes derived from gods are often unflexible -- think shariah -- whereas our sense of morality is in fact extremely plastic and evolutive, and for good reasons. Life is constant change. Gods tends to be carved in stone.

They can't leave. The very notion of atheism scares the **** out of them and stirs them to act nuts like this.

In summary, it is impossible to logically derive a moral code from strict monotheism. One god who created everything including the best and the most evil has literally no moral ground. If you stick to logic you must conclude that these things are far more important to us than to him.

Or you can pull it out of your behind and end up with something completely fucked up, as Chai discovered and described in the post at the origin if this sub-thread.

Any theology trying to square a unique god and a sense of good and evil is necessary illogical, and generally obscene -- hence "fucked up" is adequate -- in that it sells philosophical snake oil to us poor souls lost in this humongous and largely contingent universe.

Atheism, and the smartest versions of theism, say that we are on our own. God ain't helping. In the best versions, he gave us tools, and we spend our life learning to use them, clumsingly. That's just the best possible scenario.

The rest is worse than literature, worse than word salad: it's snake oil for the soul.

In further summary, I like moral codes better when they are human-based, not god-based, thank you very much.

Christ I'm glad that was in summary and further summary, and hope there won't be a residual summary.

If there was any "sub thread" it was brought about, as had been said, by whoever couldn't figure out if they wanted to talk about theism, to start a theism thread.

Seriously you 3, (or maybe it's 4, I don't know) If ya'll want to discuss anything to do with gods, go somewhere else FFS.
Just click on Forum, and then "start a discussion" and off you go.

You're all really goddamn annoying people I'll tell you what. No joke.

I've got a notion ya'll think that you've been interesting, clever and thought provoking.

Nope.
You haven't been.
Not one bit.
Can't speak for anyone else, but I haven't read any of your stuff past the 1st line or so.

Maybe to yourselves you're interesting. All the more reason to stop talking about theism on an atheism thread.
Each of you have been inconsiderate and rude, and if you have to ask why, you're a damn idiot.

No fancy language or edumacated words on my part, just make like an egg and get outta here.

I haven't read a word they've posted in a long time. Just waiting for them to get writer's cramp or otherwise get incapacitated. It's threads like this that make me wish we had more hands-on moderators.

In case anyone needs to read the post that started all this...

Fear of the very concept and existence of atheism is what drives them to be obnoxious and persistent. Doesn't matter how nice or mean you approach it, these fleas make for the body.