Why does God permit evil????

@QuinticNon,

QuinticNon;123729 wrote:

I do understand your thinking. But no, technically fire engines can only be fire engines. We may paint them red, but that does not give them an essence of redness any more than red may possess fire engine-ness.

I understand your thinking. And it draws a parallel to what I was speaking of before about the Purity of the Immaterial Realm.

In order for X to be X, it must remain pure unto its own essence. It may be mixed with Y, but it will never be the essence of Y. In fact, purity reminds us that when mixing X and Y together, it is critical for X to remain purely X and for Y to remain pure to Y. Otherwise how will X & Y ever be mixed in the first place if they are not pure unto themselves?

---------- Post added 01-30-2010 at 02:55 PM ----------

I've never seen it happen any other way. Why then should I believe any differently? It's simple observation... the first step in the scientific method.

Observation... the same tool used to note that all codes have authors, DNA is a code... thus DNA is authored.

Inductive reasoning is a common practice in science. It's how we know of gravity, brainwaves, black holes...

Fire engines are not red. What color do you think they are. Why can't a fire engine be a case of something red without being essentially red? Why do you think that when I say that something is red, I am saying that it is synonymous with red, and not that it is a case of a red thing. "Is" has other meanings than "identical with". Where on Earth did you get this "purity of the immaterial realm" from?

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@xris,

xris;123736 wrote:

You are his puppets, you act out his creation. He created you with the inclination to sin , if had not you would be perfect. Perfection does not fail , he requires you to sin so you can beg his forgiveness , your invention is illogical.

Sin? Uh, the sin of man did not exist until Eve tasted the fruit. She expressed her Free Will. She disobeyed God. What Puppet disobeys its Puppet Master?

---------- Post added 01-30-2010 at 03:26 PM ----------

kennethamy;123739 wrote:

Fire engines are not red. What color do you think they are.

Color can be Red. FE are FE. FE can be mixed with Color, but FE is not Color.

kennethamy;123739 wrote:

Why can't a fire engine be a case of something red without being essentially red?

Because that's the world we live in. FE do not require Color to be FE. Color does not require FE to be Color. Mixing them doesn't change that.

kennethamy;123739 wrote:

Why do you think that when I say that something is red, I am saying that it is synonymous with red, and not that it is a case of a red thing.

I understand what you mean. I do really. But your wording (as is common unto all people) does seem to suggest that Red and FE are synonymous, OR, that FE requires Red to be FE, OR that Red requires FE to be Red... none of which are true.

kennethamy;123739 wrote:

"Is" has other meanings than "identical with".

Sure, "is" can also imply that two agents have been mixed together, creating an entirely new agent... Thus Yellow FE are different than Red FE... and this all depends upon Red being Red and only Red, Yellow being Yellow and only Yellow, and FE being FE and only FE.

kennethamy;123739 wrote:

Where on Earth did you get this "purity of the immaterial realm" from?

Are we not discussing an all powerful Perfect Being that dwells in a Pure realm? Is not that realm an Immaterial realm? Did I not make a case that God created a separate imperfect (impure) realm to allow imperfect (impure) entities to exist? Did I not claim that as the Big Bang... the birth of the Physical realm of energy and matter... where EVERYTHING is an impure mixture of EVERYTHING else? Did I not note this Material realm as Entropy... Noise? Did I not equate that with Evil?

But Entropy itself is not Evil. Evil is the belief that Entropy has any meaning whatsoever beyond what Humans assign to it.

1 Reply

@xris,

QuinticNon wrote:

Pain/Suffering are not synonymous with Evil

Pain/Suffering can be a source of greater good, I'm in agreement with that. And it is indeed perfectly reasonable to deny that a perfectly good God would desire to eliminate all suffering. Still how can this explain the amount of suffering in the world and the fact that in many cases this pain/suffering does not seem to produce a greater good (e.g. seem to be gratuitous suffering)? How can free will or God acting for a greater good explain the death of newborn babies/very good people due to deadly viruses, cancer and many other types of natural disasters? The answer it's not at all obvious, if a God does exist he acts in ways which we cannot really understand.
　
　

QuinticNon wrote:

If it were indeed a "plan" (even if we don't have a code to prove it), then part of that plan was to create Free Will Agents who would thus be capable of making their own "plans" within the greater "plan" of God.

The incompatibilist interpretation of free will has many conceptual problems, the most important for this subject being of how could God create 'Agents who would thus be capable of making their own "plans"', the incompatibilist free will rather suggest that the roots of consciousness are completely separated from God.

1 Reply

@QuinticNon,

QuinticNon;123741 wrote:

---------- Post added 01-30-2010 at 03:26 PM ----------

.

I understand what you mean. I do really. But your wording (as is common unto all people) does seem to suggest that Red and FE are synonymous, OR, that FE requires Red to be FE, OR that Red requires FE to be Red... none of which are true.

.

I don't find my wording misleading. Butter is yellow (But butter is not the same as yellow). Jon is intelligent. But Jon is not the same as intelligent. Lions are ferocious, but lions are not the same of ferocious. No one is misled except, it seems, for you. And event if it were misleading (because someone mistook the 'is' of identity for the 'is' of predication. so what? That does not erase the distinction between them just because someone is confused.

1 Reply

@metacristi,

metacristi;123763 wrote:

Pain/Suffering can be a source of greater good, I'm in agreement with that. And it is indeed perfectly reasonable to deny that a perfectly good God would desire to eliminate all suffering. Still how can this explain the amount of suffering in the world and the fact that in many cases this pain/suffering does not seem to produce a greater good (e.g. seem to be gratuitous suffering)?

First off, if you are granting a perfectly good God then the answer would seem self evident in that a perfectly good God would only allow that which was unavoidable towards His ends.

metacristi;123763 wrote:

How can free will or God acting for a greater good explain the death of newborn babies/very good people due to deadly viruses, cancer and many other types of natural disasters? The answer it's not at all obvious, if a God does exist he acts in ways which we cannot really understand.

Second, we are in no position to give a reasonable answer for this. However, simply because we cannot see the explanation does not mean that one does not exist. Consider this quote:

Quote:

The flapping of a single butterfly's wing today produces a tiny change in the state of the atmosphere. Over a period of time, what the atmosphere actually does diverges from what it would have done. So, in a month's time, a tornado that would have devastated the Indonesian coast doesn't happen. Or maybe one that wasn't going to happen, does. (Ian Stewart, Does God Play Dice? The Mathematics of Chaos, pg. 141)

What this illustrates is that, while we may not be privy to the long term effects of any individual circumstance or action, there are unseen effects nonetheless. So to presume that there is no purpose for the death of a newborn is to presume something which cannot possibly be known. The effects of such events may not be felt in time for hundreds of years for all we know. May I also remind you that since we are granting a tri-omni God to begin with we can safely assume that what is eternal is more than likely the overriding concern vs. corporeal needs.

1 Reply

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;123764 wrote:

That does not erase the distinction between them just because someone is confused.

Agreed. I'm just making note of the distinction.

---------- Post added 01-30-2010 at 11:28 PM ----------

Amperage;123766 wrote:

...we can safely assume that what is eternal is more than likely the overriding concern vs. corporeal needs.

Very nice.

metacristi;123763 wrote:

Still how can this explain the amount of suffering in the world and the fact that in many cases this pain/suffering does not seem to produce a greater good (e.g. seem to be gratuitous suffering)?

metacristi;123763 wrote:

How can free will or God acting for a greater good explain the death of newborn babies/very good people due to deadly viruses, cancer and many other types of natural disasters?

On the surface, it doesn't. That's why I'm glad you said:

metacristi;123763 wrote:

The answer it's not at all obvious, if a God does exist he acts in ways which we cannot really understand.

metacristi;123763 wrote:

0 Replies

@Amperage,

Amperage;123766 wrote:

What this illustrates is that, while we may not be privy to the long term effects of any individual circumstance or action, there are unseen effects nonetheless.

Actually what it points out clearly is that you get the same results if no god exists. Bad things happen, without a rescue attempt because there is no being there to do any of the rescuing.

Let's put it this way. If you are standing next to a lake, watching a person drowning, are you just going to stand there and do nothing? If you do nothing and they drown, what does that make you? A benevolent person? No. So the only way that god could be considered benevolent is that god has no idea what is going on. If god chooses to do nothing about suffering then god can not be benevolent.

But you are not arguing for a benevolent god. You say that god is both the rewarder and punisher and sometimes unjustifyer. Meaning sometimes bad things happen for no good reason. If there is a plan behind it, then it is a very convoluted plan that lacks consistency. So that can't be the case either. However; going back to your firmly held thought.

You have the same result without a god, that you are protesting that god's behavior is. Chaos, no consistency, strange things happen and it is as if no one is paying any attention.

2 Replies

@Krumple,

Krumple;123802 wrote:

You have the same result without a god, that you are protesting that god's behavior is. Chaos, no consistency, strange things happen and it is as if no one is paying any attention.

I made the same point earlier. That's why we can attribute Evil to Mankind alone and not hold God responsible for creating it or interfering with our free will to express it.

Your notation is exactly the reason why I claim this OP as a strawman question setting God up as the presupposed landlord over our free will. Take God out of the Q and the Q falls on its face.

The real question should be... "Why does Evil exist?" or "Why does Man permit evil???"

It has nothing to do with God except for his graciousness allowing us to express ourselves... even if that expression is Evil.

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@Krumple,

Krumple;123802 wrote:

Actually what it points out clearly is that you get the same results if no god exists. Bad things happen, without a rescue attempt because there is no being there to do any of the rescuing.

You have the same result without a god, that you are protesting that god's behavior is. Chaos, no consistency, strange things happen and it is as if no one is paying any attention.

It was merely an illustration about the presumptuous nature of claiming to know the real meaning behind events/the end-all-be-all effects of an event which we clearly cannot. So going back to my "firmly held thought", where did I say this was how God operates(chaos)? The point was to show that what may seem innocuous or insignificant need not be. There is a reason for everything.
So please read carefully before presuming things about my argument which I do not claim.

Krumple;123802 wrote:

Let's put it this way. If you are standing next to a lake, watching a person drowning, are you just going to stand there and do nothing? If you do nothing and they drown, what does that make you? A benevolent person? No. So the only way that god could be considered benevolent is that god has no idea what is going on. If god chooses to do nothing about suffering then god can not be benevolent.

I can only go on in information in front of me so I'd try to help. However, God does not reason like men, He thinks of eternity. Taking all of eternity into consideration would obviously hold some weight. There may be reasons beyond my understanding or beyond my scope of reference which God takes into account. So for anyone to throw a scenario where I have to save someone and then for them to try and create a corollary to God and the world is just fallacious. You are once again making a presumption to know the purpose for something which you clearly can not know.

Krumple;123802 wrote:

But you are not arguing for a benevolent god. You say that god is both the rewarder and punisher and sometimes unjustifyer. Meaning sometimes bad things happen for no good reason.

Oh but I am. God is all-loving. What I'm saying is that if it's brought on by God(and yes, pain&suffering can be brought on by God), then there is a good/justified reason.

Krumple;123802 wrote:

If there is a plan behind it, then it is a very convoluted plan that lacks consistency.

If by convoluted you mean intricate then yes I agree. I don't see how you could possibly back up your argument about consistency. Even taking in all of recorded history, in comparison to potential history to come and all of eternity it would be like trying to determine a baseball players lifetime batting average based off one pitch.

1 Reply

@Amperage,

Amperage;123808 wrote:

It was merely an illustration about the presumptuous nature of claiming to know the real meaning behind events/the end-all-be-all effects of an event which we clearly cannot. So going back to my "firmly held thought", where did I say this was how God operates(chaos)? The point was to show that what may seem innocuous or insignificant need not be. There is a reason for everything.
So please read carefully before presuming things about my argument which I do not claim.

The thought I was referring to was the one you made about god not interfering or if god does interfere it is so subtle that we would mistake it as something natural. In other words saying he doesn't interfere unless it is something we would have seen naturally. You are trying to have both sides without actually admitting to the problem with that reasoning. I was pointing out the problem with the reasoning.

Amperage;123808 wrote:

I can only go on in information in front of me so I'd try to help. However, God does not reason like men, He thinks of eternity. Taking all of eternity into consideration would obviously hold some weight. There may be reasons beyond my understanding or beyond my scope of reference which God takes into account. So for anyone to throw a scenario where I have to save someone and then for them to try and create a corollary to God and the world is just fallacious. You are once again making a presumption to know the purpose for something which you clearly can not know.

So funny that you use this argument on me, when your own argument is subjected to the same statement.

"You are once again making a presumption to know the purpose for something which you clearly can not know."

Alright then everything about god, falls into this same statement. Everything that you believe is subject to this statement. What you believe god is doing, has done, will do, or hasn't done is all pure presumption as well as his own existence. You are presuming he exists yet completely ignore your own statement. You don't see the contradiction in your statement?

Amperage;123808 wrote:

Oh but I am. God is all-loving. What I'm saying is that if it's brought on by God(and yes, pain&suffering can be brought on by God), then there is a good/justified reason.

This is a presumption as well. You are assuming this to be the case because you want and need it to be the case but you have absolutely no way to verify if it is the case.

Amperage;123808 wrote:

If by convoluted you mean intricate then yes I agree. I don't see how you could possibly back up your argument about consistency. Even taking in all of recorded history, in comparison to potential history to come and all of eternity it would be like trying to determine a baseball players lifetime batting average based off one pitch.

Actually the funny thing is, that is exactly what baseball statistics does but I'll let it go because that is not what I was talking about anyways when I said lack of consistency. I was referring to a reactionary behavior or the way in which a choice is weighted or made. But you like to use the argument that gods behavior can not be known, alright then I will accept that argument only if you accept the same argument that god can not be known at all. Not known to be good or bad, not known period. The only thing that can be known is that it is just some vague concept in the minds of humans. If you can't give that statement then your own statement is also not valid.

1 Reply

@Alan McDougall,

1 Reply

@Pepijn Sweep,

If you dont accept that the question is illogical then you will continue this thread forever....

Who thinks that god is not capable of creating the perfect person ? a person with great knowledge and great moral value, imbued with the ability to understand suffering , free will and all aspects god wishes for humanity to obtain so that he can stand next to him with equality of values. Who will deny god this ability?

1 Reply

@xris,

xris;123836 wrote:

If you dont accept that the question is illogical then you will continue this thread forever....

Who thinks that god is not capable of creating the perfect person ? a person with great knowledge and great moral value, imbued with the ability to understand suffering , free will and all aspects god wishes for humanity to obtain so that he can stand next to him with equality of values. Who will deny god this ability?

Many people would deny that a person can have free will, and yet be perfect so that he is not tempted to do wrong. They might even argue that a perfect person would be a contradiction, and therefore, a logical impossibility, like a triangle with five sides.

1 Reply

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;123839 wrote:

Many people would deny that a person can have free will, and yet be perfect so that he is not tempted to do wrong. They might even argue that a perfect person would be a contradiction, and therefore, a logical impossibility, like a triangle with five sides.

But the question does not pose impossibilities, it does not restrict gods power. If you claim God cant do as I suggest , just say so. From a religious perspective Gods aim for mankind is perfection, do you deny that to?

1 Reply

@xris,

xris;123842 wrote:

But the question does not pose impossibilities, it does not restrict gods power. If you claim God cant do as I suggest , just say so. From a religious perspective Gods aim for mankind is perfection, do you deny that to?

Well, creating a five-sided triangle is not something God can do, but that does not imply he is not omnipotent. So, it may be that creating a perfect person is also impossible, and does not restrict God's power either. Yes, I am saying that God cannot create a figure with both three sides, and five sides, and, also, may not be able to create a perfect person for the same reason. (Or, can create a perfect person, but could not create one that would logically fit into the best of all possible worlds). It may be that God's aim is for people to be as good as they are capable of being. But I am not an authority on God's aims.

1 Reply

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;123843 wrote:

Well, creating a five-sided triangle is not something God can do, but that does not imply he is not omnipotent. So, it may be that creating a perfect person is also impossible, and does not restrict God's power either. Yes, I am saying that God cannot create a figure with both three sides, and five sides, and, also, may not be able to create a perfect person for the same reason. (Or, can create a perfect person, but could not create one that would logically fit into the best of all possible worlds). It may be that God's aim is for people to be as good as they are capable of being. But I am not an authority on God's aims.

If your not an authority on Gods aims why deny something that most Christians will maintain. Im not talking about five sided triangles , its pentagon not a triangle. If your argument against my logic is the naming of a pentagon , I give up, your not up to speed yet.

In the scheme of gods, its maintained man wil reach perfection and stand in worship of him, forever, if you did not know. Now if this suffering is not to attain perfection what are the trials for? Im afraid with this logic you display, you cant have it both ways.

1 Reply

@xris,

xris;123846 wrote:

If your not an authority on Gods aims why deny something that most Christians will maintain. Im not talking about five sided triangles , its pentagon not a triangle. If your argument against my logic is the naming of a pentagon , I give up, your not up to speed yet.

In the scheme of gods, its maintained man wil reach perfection and stand in worship of him, forever, if you did not know. Now if this suffering is not to attain perfection what are the trials for? Im afraid with this logic you display, you cant have it both ways.

My argument is that something logically cannot be both a pentagon and a triangle at the same time. Not about the name, "pentagon". Don't you agree that a figure cannot be both a pentagon and a triangle? Could God make a figure that was both a pentagon and a triangle? Why not? In the same way, it may be that something cannot be both perfect and a person, at the same time. I don't know what you mean about denying what Christians maintain.

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@Alan McDougall,

Well first of all what are you referring to when you say a perfect person? I would have to agree with Xris on this one, it is possible to have a perfect person IF (and the "if" is most important) you can agree on what makes a perfect person. I'll go out on a limb and define it as simply as I can for this argument.

A perfect person is a person who does the correct thing always in any situation.

Now there are a few problems with this definition since, "does the correct thing" is such a vague statement and can be highly interpret not to mention subjective. But as soon as you say relative to a given standard, then by all means it is plausible. What is the standard though?

"c" is a correct response (subjective)
"w" is an incorrect response (subjective)
"i" is indifferent response but carries with it neither "c" nor "w" and could be listed either as being "c" or "w" or tossed out completely. (subjective)
"g" is good (this term reflects "c" and doesn't hold to any standard)
"b" is bad (this term reflects "w" and doesn't hold to any standard)
"e" is error or negotiable or unnecessary. (reflects "i" no standard)
"t" is total actions ever done, either said, thought, or acted out.
"p" is perfection
"n" is imperfection (didn't really need this because anything not perfect would be equal to "n")

c + w + i = t (total of all actions ever done)

(now we need to find out just how good they are by weighing the actions)

t/c = g
t/w = b
t/i = e

(comparatives)

If g < b then the person is more good aligned (note that g must be low number)
If g > b then the person is more bad aligned (note that g must be high number)
If e < (g+b) then the person does a lot of actions that are neither good nor bad. ??

However now here is the whole point of this little run about.

if (t/g) = t (then the person is perfect)

There are a few other ways to do this but I wanted to make it as easy as possible with the least amount of confusion. I could have made it shorter with fewer calculations but it would have been more confusing. Enough said.

This proves that if you can determine what are correct responses for every possible action then you can figure out if a perfect person is possible. (which it is.)

This also takes into consideration free will even though I don't believe free will exists.

1 Reply

@Krumple,

Thanks Krumps, my understanding from an untrained philosophers view point is the statement defines the logic. Powerful , not powerful, all powerful. If the term, all powerful, does not determine he is actually all powerful, IE able to do absolutely everything and anything then the definition is incorrect. Powerful might be more correct or nearly all powerful. As soon as you restrict him by putting him into a humanly formed logical existance then you redefine him. Can we ever place a god into a logical conclusive scenario? The two contradict each other.

I cant abide the faithful telling me I have to abide by human logic when debating the illogical.

1 Reply

@xris,

xris;123856 wrote:

Thanks Krumps, my understanding from an untrained philosophers view point is the statement defines the logic. Powerful , not powerful, all powerful. If the term, all powerful, does not determine he is actually all powerful, IE able to do absolutely everything and anything then the definition is incorrect. Powerful might be more correct or nearly all powerful. As soon as you restrict him by putting him into a humanly formed logical existance then you redefine him. Can we ever place a god into a logical conclusive scenario? The two contradict each other.

I cant abide the faithful telling me I have to abide by human logic when debating the illogical.

I disagree with you about an all-powerful God being able to do the logically impossible, but I agree about him being able to create perfect humans. Let's take these two issues separately.

Logically impossible actions

You argue that if God can do absolutely everything, he must be able to do what is logically impossible. In other words - God can create all things; a square circle is a thing; therefore God can create a square circle. But the second premise is incorrect: a square circle is not a thing. The combination of words "square circle" is a contradiction and therefore does not denote anything at all; it is just a meaningless phrase, like "wounded yellow question" or "rainy conversation". It's just words and nothing else.

If God could defy logic, he could make himself omnipotent and non-omnipotent at the same time. He could make himself similtaneously able and unable to defy logic; he could both exist and not exist; he could stop being God while continuing to be God; he could perform an action while not performing it; he could make you believe in him while disbelieving in him; and so on ad absurdum. The whole thing would descend into nonsense.

Human perfection

Here I agree with you. If a person has free will to do good on any particular occasion, he/she can do good on all occasions. If perfection were logically impossible, a dying person who had always done good in the past would be forced to choose evil on the final occasion. But then they would not have free will on that last occasion. Every time they did have free will, they chose right. So they died perfect; so perfection must be logically possible.

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Why does God permit evil????

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