Why does my God allow children to die? Is he evil?

[johnhanks]

With God murder without justification is actually wrong ... We need a transcendent code which makes murder actually wrong. I have it, you do not.

And has the source of your transcendent code also given you a transcendent key to decide whether a given homicide counts as murder? To say that your god has given you an absolute call on the wrongness of "murder without justification" is futile unless it has also given you a comprehensive definition of justification.

 

[1robin]

And has the source of your transcendent code also given you a transcendent key to decide whether a given homicide counts as murder? To say that your god has given you an absolute call on the wrongness of "murder without justification" is futile unless it has also given you a comprehensive definition of justification.

I did not make a epistemological point. I made an ontological one. Morals have a foundation with and only with God even if no one was sure what they are. For instance if you believe that any act would actually be wrong whether anyone agreed it was or not that requires a God. We can split hairs about apprehension or perception later if you want but it is irrelevant concerning foundations.

 

[johnhanks]

I did not make a epistemological point. I made an ontological one. Morals have a foundation with and only with God even if no one was sure what they are. For instance if you believe that any act would actually be wrong whether anyone agreed it was or not that requires a God. We can split hairs about apprehension or perception later if you want but it is irrelevant concerning foundations.

And foundations are irrelevant unless you can apply them in the real world. Your claim as I understand it is that if you and I both say "murder is wrong" (ignoring for the moment the howling tautology), only you are saying it with absolute authority; I, by your lights, am merely expressing an opinion.

But if you wish to say that a specific homicide was morally wrong you have first to make a judgement about whether or not it was justified. And your judgement on that matter is as fallibly human as mine or anyone else's.

Inhabit your moral ivory tower by all means, robin, if it makes you feel good. It has zero impact on real-world moral judgements.

 

[1robin]

Israel is a country just like any other, and should not have special privileges just because some believe: the Biblical deity, whose existence is in doubt, was crazy enough to have a chosen people!

I do not remember granting them special privileges nor could I. I said the God extended them a special relationship with him. I also said the evidence is consistent with that. Now if God did by what standard are you using to judge him wrong? God looked for a man to establish a people that would be a conduit for his revelation. He found Abraham and based on his faith made him a promise. Now it was certainly not peaches a cream. The promised was a two edged sword. For every advantage there was a higher expectation. However the issue here is foundations not whether you think (by who knows what standard) God was fair.

 

[AmbiguousGuy]

I do not remember granting them special privileges nor could I. I said the God extended them a special relationship with him. I also said the evidence is consistent with that. Now if God did by what standard are you using to judge him wrong?

Most people are able to easily see that God never extended any special relationship to anyone.

We who have spiritual eyes can clearly see that, at any rate.

 

[1robin]

I don’t associate the being you believe in with love, benevolence, charity and morality. I’ve actually read the Bible. You’ve used your own sense of morality to judge that this god is good; certainly that can’t have escaped your attention.

Well I see your back and apparently have been saving up.

I was not discussing what you believe. I was simply stating that it is an absurd notion to claim the being most associated with unconditional love as evil. There exists little connection between the reasonability of a claim and a person on no-faith's adoption of it. You might as well say you believe Everest is a small hill.

Your god does not actually allow freedom to choose by the very definition of the word “freedom”. You are supposed to follow his dictates, or else face eternal torture and punishment. If someone’s holding a gun to my head saying, “Give me your wallet or I will kill you” are you actually committing suicide by saying no? I don’t choose to go to hell any more than I choose to commit suicide in the given situation.

That is not my understanding of Hell or anything else for that matter. That was Hell Catholics invented to scare people into letting them run their lives. My understanding of Hell is separation form God eternally. You were given a life of God's making. You used it to deny your maker. You get exactly what you chose, no God. I believe it is ultimate annihilation of the soul because it's source was denied.

Morality deals with the principles concerning distinctions between right and wrong and good and bad behavior.

How are we still discussing this? I remember having this same conversation about half a dozen times so far. It ends the same way.

1. Without God morals are ethical contrivances used for convenience and not related to moral truth. Murder on this view is not actually wrong it is a useful social construct or fashion. It does not reflect truth.
2. With God morals are absolute truths and we are all absolutely accountable.
On this view murder is objectively wrong, it is not an opinion derived by the preference of it's adherents.


I realize you may not find this convenient. It may be embarrassing on some level. However it isn't going anywhere. There is no alternative. It must be so. No matter what humanity contrives or dresses up ethics as they are in the end subjective opinion derived independently from moral truth. If God does not exist I have no problem admitting this is the best we can do. Why can't you?

Humans can produce the closest thing to moral truths, as we are the ones who care about our morality to begin with. Some of this can be done objectively, as previously discussed, but it isn’t all as black and white as you make it out to be (which we’ve also discussed before too, with examples of moral quandaries that don’t necessarily have a clear right or wrong answer to them). We can (and do) look at things that occur in the natural world, as the result of our actions and make determinations about what is a right action and what is a wrong action based on such observations. This is how we know battery acid is bad for one’s health, even if health itself is something that requires some subjective input. In other words, the system of morality we actually use is data-driven and subject to change. Which is what we see over the course of human history and what we would expect to find if morality does in fact come from ourselves. So, without god, existing morals can have relationship to truth. The truth about moral interactions with other human beings isn’t based solely on individual opinion or a single mind, rather it’s based on the collective evidence that human beings have accumulated throughout the course of our interactions during the history of our time on this planet. And we’re still learning.

I can't believe we are still discussing this. I am only going to be brief.


Tel me how you know moral truths and what they are that enable you to determine that humans are best able to construct ethics that mostly accurately reflect these mysterious (non-existent without God) moral truth's.
What natural law makes murder wrong? What natural law dictates our happiness is justified at the expense of other biological anomalies misery?

You can't talk reality into existing.

Continued:

 

[1robin]

Your model of morality (if you can even call it that) is not data-driven, as it is merely a system of obedience to an authority figure who decides FOR US what is right and what is wrong with no explanation. It basically amounts to “Because I (god) said so.” I still don’t see under that method, how you are actually exercising any kind of morality and how you do not consider that subjective, based on the whims of your god at any given moment. You still haven’t addressed this. Never mind the suppposed fact that your god ultimately only really cares if we believe in him, over whether or not we actually carry out moral behaviors or not. That kind of puts a wrench in your argument, don’t you think?

We are not discussing my moral model. I have not given any such thing to be evaluated at all. IN apologetics it is well understood fact that atheists will not allow an ontological argument to remain one because they have no foundations that allow for a defense. They must invariably turn it into a new argument about epistemology which is not on their side either but contains enough ambiguity to hide in. This is a constant truth in theological debates. It happens every single time. If I mention moral foundations only exist as truths with God (as even Jefferson knew so well) the first thing that is claimed is that I am saying atheists are immoral, and second that apprehension has anything to do with foundation. Of which neither are relevant and neither will go away. You must remain in irrelevant epistemological realms because ontological grounds leave you no footing. I am worn out explaining this.

And the words moral and ethical are not separate things. They go hand in hand; they’re practically synonymous.

They are similar but have an all important difference. Ethics applies to social conventions and morals apply to truth.

Have you ever stopped to think that YOU might be emotionally invested in your position? I’ll tell you a little secret: We all are, to some extent. As I’ve pointed out before, if the area of our brain which regulates emotion is damaged, we become incapable of making moral decisions.

It is irrelevant whether I am or not. The argument stands on it's own merits regardless of your genetic fallacy.

Sure we can. I don’t even know how you can dispute that. We can know whether something is good for human flourishing based on whether or not humans flourish if we carry out a particular action. If morality is about anything, it’s about well-being, and if we’re talking about morality in the first place, we’ve kind of already conceded that. There’s nothing arbitrary about it. There is, however, something arbitrary about following the commands and/or whims of some far-removed deity.

I did not say we cannot determine if something produces human flourishing. I said we have no way to know if human flourishing is objectively good. Your are redefining morality as being human flourishing without any justification for doing so. It is a selfish determination and not rooted in truth unless humans have intrinsic worth greater than other species. I can justify supposing humans have sovereignty, you must selfishly assume it. Following a deity that is the source and locus of moral truth is the exact opposite of arbitrary. Assuming selfish truths that have no basis in known reality is the definition of arbitrary.

And for the 900th time without a response, YOUR position is the one that might makes right. God is the mightiest, so he’s right, despite whatever we may think.

It has nothing what so ever to do with might. If God created the moral fabric of the universe and was so weak as to not be able to effect anything what so ever physically his moral dictates would be no less factual.

However since your views are no more than opinion the strongest people's opinions are enforced on the weaker. In any conflict about opinion (like between the US and Germany or the West and Islam) it is always the opinions of the strongest that are imposed on the loser. Did Hitler's opinions or ours prevail? Did Osama's opinions or ours win out.

I just showed that we can demonstrate that certain things are good or bad based on the results they produce where I discussed the results of drinking battery acid. It doesn’t matter what someone’s opinion is on the matter, ingesting battery acid is harmful to one’s health. And we can say that despite the fact that “health” is a fairly subjective thing.

No you showed that you can invent definitions for good out of thin and air and see if results produce more of them. Ingesting cholesterol and salt is bad for your health, it is not usually punished as a moral failure. Liberals even go so far as to mandate that those who did not do so must pay the bills for those that did. Abortion is about the worst thing for human health possible yet your side not only defends it but claims it is some sacred right a women has to deprive another human of. That is what happens when morals are not tethered to actual truth. They land whether the strong want them and produce self contradictory results.

And you have no means to ever know if what you think god wants is true. Whether you can see it or not, it’s still subject to your own opinion, as I’ve pointed out before. You have a 2000 year old book that declares it so (a book that is far removed from the society we currently find ourselves living in). So what?

This is another epistemological off ramp. Even if no one ever knew what God demanded they would be no less objectively true. IOW even if no one knew it murder would still be morally wrong, in your view it can't ever be anything but unfashionable.

You really didn’t even respond to my claim here, which was this:
You are saying that any conclusion we can make is invalid unless it comes directly from the boss man.
You are saying that, right?

I am saying moral truths require a moral truth giver. It will not make any difference if you try and argue by terminology and call him a boss man. That is liberal tactic number two.

1. If you defend human life in the womb then your are said to hate women's rights.
2. If you do not like a practice that produces 60% of the aids cases in the US and has no compensating gain you are a homophobe.
3. If you value economic responsibility then you hate old people.

It is argumentation by terminology and is the tactic of failed positions.

 

[jtartar]

This was brought out many times by Atheists and agnostics, I would like to discuss it with you in a rational and respectful manner. My disclaimer is I am a true 5 point Calvinist and If that is offensive to you,You are free to close the thread now. If I may suggest , we leave out all slander against My God in the process of this discussion, slander being pre-defined as name calling as If he were real and present.Questioning scriptures depiction of God however you interpret is allowed. Example: Is God evil? Fair enough?

Here is my premise,
this is my belief based upon my scriptures.
God not only allows children to die, He has pre-ordained them to die. Hard for us to fathom, granted, but True nevertheless in Scripture. If we say he did not cause it and only allowed it to happen then God would be reacting to free will of man to accomplish their own destruction, thus putting too much power in men and essentially tying God's hands. God ordained for this latest tragedy for his own purposes, we cannot know them, we are not our creator, so The bible tells us we must accept that their is a divine plan and God is in control completely.

So you have asked, where is the comfort in that? Why do religious peoples comfort families of these tragedies with this premise of a God in control? Well let me ask you Atheists would you attempt to comfort these mothers with your precept that there is no God? No heaven and no hell? That their children are reduced to dust as they came? That the man who murdered them who took his life is also Dust and there is no justice for them either? Both parties cease to exist, one guilty, one innocent, both have the same fate in the end.

Or could it be more comforting that a God in control is with their babies now, that they know no suffering,feel no pain have no more tears and the man that took their life will be punished by a Just and perfect God. Where is the evil in my premise and the lack of evil in yours? I find evil in evildoing going unpunished.I find evil in a life given for no purpose but to die and cease to exist.
What say you?

Lady-B,
I hope that you really want to know the answer from the Holy Scriptures.
You seem to be sincere in your question, but I would like to know a little more about you.
You mention YOUR GOD. If He is your God you surely are close enought to Him to know His Personal, or Proper NAME. What is it???
I will answer your question, taking for granted you are talking about Jehovah God, the God of Abraham, Issaic, and Jacob, Whose spirit was used in writing the Bible, the God who created Heaven, Earth and all things, Acts 17:24-28, Rev 4:11.
As for the death of little children, Our God hates the death of any people, but God has determined a set time for His taking over the earth and bringing about a paradise, where perfect people will live forever.
The very primis of your question was inaccurrate, for it is not The Almighy God that is ruling the earth at this time. When Adam and Eve rebelled against God and showed that they would follow Satan, God determined that He would allow Satan and mankind a period of time to determine whether they could bring about a world that was good to live in, 2Cor 4:3,4, 1John 5:19, Rev 12:9. Jesus even said that Satan was the ruler, when he was on earth, John 12:31, 14:30,16:11. There are many prophecies in the Bible and one at Dan chapter 4 speaks of a great tree that is cut down and banded, for seven times. In the first fulfillment it was about Nebuchadnezzar being taken from his Kingdom, but the longrange prophecy was about God's Kingdom, a period of 2,520 years. This was from the time that Bebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem and the great Temple that Solomon had built, 607BC. At that time, because the Israelites kept turning against God, He took away His ruling in there Temple. The prophecy in Daniel poinst specifically to the year 1914 as the date that God would take over ruling, with Jesus ruling. As the Bible says, Jesus would, for a while Rule in the Midst of his enemies. It has been 100 years since Jesus was installed as King of the Kingdom, so it is very close to the time that Jesus will take control of earth's affairs, Matt 16:27, 24:29,30, 25:31.
Prophecy tells us that when Jesus first takes his seat as the King, there would be much trouble on earth, because when Jesus came in 1914 he threw Satan out of Heaven, down to the earth, Rev 12:7-12. We have seen nothing but trouble since that time!! Rev 6:2-8, is also the same time period, speaking of wars, famine, pestilence, and death of all kinds. This is what the God of this world has done, NOT the God of Heaven, who will shortly bring about the end of Satan's authority, and correct all the wrongs that have been done because of the rule of Satan and men. He will then set up a Kingdom that will turn this earth into a paradise, and bring back most of the ones who have died, All will live a 1,000 year Judgement Day, and after that will be given everlasting life, John 5:28,29, Acts 24:15,Rev 20:1-7, 21:34.
Interestingly, a word Pansatanism, means that thisw world manifests the personality of it's god Satan. I do hope that you know that the Loving Father in heaven that gave His Beloved son for the Ransom, so that we could live. Jesus died for all who would truely believe in him, Matt 20:28, 1Tim 2:3-7.

 

[1robin]

We’ve already discussed this, and how your definition isn’t exactly accurate, and I’ve touched on it above, so I’m leaving it alone here.

I think we have discussed every aspect of morality and the lack there of possible.

The only thing you’re adding to the equation that I’m not using is your interpretation of the supposed words of a deity that is assumed to exist. I can determine what is in accordance with fact and reality, same as you can (and everyone else).

This is another epistemological off ramp. Do you see how rampant and consistent these tactics are. This is at least the third time in two posts you have tried and derail the discussion. I am not discussion apprehension but foundation. With God morals have objective foundations. Without God they do not. They are contrived conveniences. That will be true even if no one ever knew a single moral truth, ever.

Okay, so you’re employing your own moral judgment, same as everybody else.

No there is no judgment here. With God morals are objective. I judge God exists but what is true if he does is not a judgment. It is a necessary logical deduction. My claims have always been propositional. If X then Y.

We don’t have to invent anything and there’s nothing arbitrary about it as the word arbitrary indicates random choice, free from reason. Every person, by virtue of being alive has an understanding of the value of life and why they don’t want it lost. There is nothing random about that.

I am not going to look up arbitrary. I do not need to. I have explained over and over what I mean by arbitrary. Criteria used independently from truth. I do not care what word you use, your criteria have nothing to do with truth, they can't because they have no source for moral truth. Another semantic off ramp.

I have it. The only difference being that you think your foundation comes from a divine authority.

Finally and if true then this makes night and day differences in moral foundations. I would be happy if we simply agreed on this proposition deduction. Everything else flows directly from it.

We need an idea of a soul to form a foundation for the sanctity of life? I think not.

No, but the soul is a logical reason for concluding life has value. For example a human life in the womb for some completely arbitrary and contrived reason is said to have no value before some date. This is complete crap without God. It not only is unknowable it can't possibly be true. However of that life was given a soul at conception then good arguments exist to suggest it has objective value and worth.

Let me make it more clear. Why were thousands of entities (other arrangements of organic material) you have killed and/or eaten in your life justifiable. Why are they objectively less valuable that you? Can you not see how without God this is convenient, selfish, speciesm as wrong as racism ever could be?

Some people think slaughtering pigs is wrong. And that’s based on the fact that pigs can apparently feel pain and suffer, and have some demonstrable level of intelligence. That’s called reasoning.

This is what I mean. Morality just shape shifts, drifts around, and lands where ever a person feels like. Pain is not immoral. Doctors cause pain every day. Immorality is not equal with pain, human flourishing, or happiness. Pain is actually very beneficial even if it sucks. Is immorality therefor beneficial even if it sucks?

I don’t think we have to imagine that life has some holy or divine component to understand that life has value. Especially considering that life is all we have and without it we are nothing.

I do not care what is imagined. The fact is value is either objectively a component of truth or exists simply as contrived convenience. Even if I value you, that has no power to endow you with actual value any more than faith has the power to endow concepts into existence.

We only need to understand that life is all we have. We know for sure that we get one life to live on this planet. That’s more than enough to go on.

It is plenty to establish ethics for convenience, and not a fraction of enough to produce moral truth.

Everyone else does so with justification as well. You can’t see it because you’re stuck adhering to this obedience to authority mentality.

Your are stuck defining morality in obedience to nothing. Lawful systems necessitate authority. Your denying it is a symptom of lacking any foundations greater than your opinion.

I don’t think we have the right to sentence people to death for committing crimes. I also see it as somewhat hypocritical to declare that since a person has taken a life, we should take his life in retaliation. If we’re talking about a war zone or something, it’s more a matter of self-defence than anything else and so the reasoning would be different.

That was bizarre and is another typical example of the moral insanity opinion produces. It is a sacred right to kill the most innocent form of human life in existence for the mistakes of others but it is not acceptable to take life for it's own sins and including the preventative aspect. That is about the best and most obvious example of moral failure and ambiguity possible. This is just the very reason that I claim morality without a foundation is about the worst evil possible. If I was to think of the most conclusive example of moral failure this would be it.

So then morality is not objective, as you keep trying to argue. It’s subject to the opinions of the god you worship.

Another off ramp into semantics. Objectivity has a whole bunch of meanings. The most relevant is free from the opinions of a moral systems adherents. God does not dictate morals into existence. They are a part of his nature. A nature that has sovereignty over everything else and has never been untrue. If you wish to claim God's morals subjective then nothing is objective. It is self contradictory intellectual suicide. It is also a modern favorite claim of liberal scholars. Kids are being taught in universities that truth doe snot exist. Is the claim that no truth exists, true?

I don’t think the Bible is particularly moral either. And I don’t think your defence of the immoral actions contained within the Bible is moral. In fact, I find it somewhat disconcerting.

By what standard if the bible is true can you know it is immoral? What higher standard exists to judge it by? I have no problem with you claiming you do not agree with it (I disagree with the Quran). However if true I have no standard capable of judging it. I have an advantage over you however. My worldview has a justifiable standard capable of judging the Quran if the bible is true. You have no God given conscience to appeal to. Actually you do but your views do not include it.

You said the collective experience of all of these people (who you are in reality imposing your own experience upon) indicates that they are onto something. That it is evidence for the existence of the god you worship.

Everyone considers universal or very pervasive intuition as indicative of truth. Democracy is based on it.

Contrary to what you believe, this world is exactly what we would expect to find if morality weren’t all based on absolute, objective truths. We would see nuance, we would see morality change over time, from person to person and from culture to cultures. There are some aspects of morality we consider objective and universal but it isn’t all black and white as you seem to be claiming. That’s why you have people protesting the death penalty, for example.

That is just wrong. Jefferson alone is proof your are incorrect. Traditionally the universal belief is that things are actually wrong independent of human agreement. For example it is almost universally the Nazi's would have been wrong even if they had won and eradicated al opposition. The world at large believes that morals are objective, depends on them, and acts as though they were. Even if they disagree about what they are at times this is still consistent with my position and not yours. Yours is one of those modern think tank view points that is only at home in parlor conversations but is never fully embraced by anyone.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I do not remember granting them special privileges nor could I. I said the God extended them a special relationship with him. I also said the evidence is consistent with that. Now if God did by what standard are you using to judge him wrong? God looked for a man to establish a people that would be a conduit for his revelation. He found Abraham and based on his faith made him a promise. Now it was certainly not peaches a cream. The promised was a two edged sword. For every advantage there was a higher expectation. However the issue here is foundations not whether you think (by who knows what standard) God was fair.

The Holocaust is a piece of evidence that is not consistent with that.

 

[1robin]

And foundations are irrelevant unless you can apply them in the real world. Your claim as I understand it is that if you and I both say "murder is wrong" (ignoring for the moment the howling tautology), only you are saying it with absolute authority; I, by your lights, am merely expressing an opinion.

No they are not. I for one would want to know that at least human life has actual value before I recommended the sentence.

There are two issues here. Foundations for moral truth which your views do not possess so of course you are switching topics to an independent issue. Application or apprehension has no effect on existence. Pluto existed as a fact before anyone was aware of it. Gravity was obeyed before Newton described it.

Since I will not be able to get a discussion of foundations out of you then let's switch to epistemology where I still have an enormous advantage.

But if you wish to say that a specific homicide was morally wrong you have first to make a judgement about whether or not it was justified. And your judgement on that matter is as fallibly human as mine or anyone else's.

Ok, let's say a homicide took place and two panels wished to determine the guilt or innocence of the act. One a Christian panel and one a atheistic panel.

The Christian panel.
1. Has the very likely potentiality of having both the Holy Spirit and a God given conscience as an objective guide in considering the justification.
2. Our views include a justifiable reason to endow human life with sanctity and value.
3. Our views include a potential of a historical record of objective decisions concerning what is justifiable or not.
4. Our views include an absolute justification for the moral correctness or incorrectness of the act of taking life.

The atheist panel
1. Will use purely arbitrary (with respect to moral truth) determinations to conclude an opinion based decision about legality which only has sufficient justification as it's bases that which they have excluded based on preference. They can only determine if the act was socially unfashionable and have no ability to determine whether it was actually wrong. IOW their opinion is independent of fact and can't help but be.

Inhabit your moral ivory tower by all means, robin, if it makes you feel good. It has zero impact on real-world moral judgments.

Well that was fast. It usually takes your side a few posts to go straight to attempts to create reality by semantics.

1. I never said anything about my moral superiority. I have said quite a bit about the typical of a failed argument tactic of ignoring the argument in favor of claiming anyone said atheists were morally inferior. It never ever fails.
2. The objective foundations that are virtually universally accepted for moral truths have had more of an impact on human history than any other moral issue. Almost everyone including you, (unless your a psychopath) intuitively believes moral truths exists. societies rely on them, in every emergency they are constantly referred to as justification.

When Hitler was wimping out Jews based on an evolutionary based belief in genetic superiority, Churchill and Roosevelt did not justify our actions against him by atheist socialist contracts that do not bind others except by self contradiction, they appealed to objective rights and wrongs. Regan did not call the USSR the relatively socially unfashionable nation, he called them the objectively evil empire.

Whether God exist or not (and Christians have subjective proof he does) objective moral values have been a cornerstone of human society at every level. So your just plain wrong and throwing around irrelevant semantics about ivory towers pulled out of thin air is no remedy.

 

[1robin]

Most people are able to easily see that God never extended any special relationship to anyone.

We who have spiritual eyes can clearly see that, at any rate.

When you include at least a debatable attempt at evidence for your assertions (like I have in 750,000 of the most scrutinized words in history) then a discussion may be justified.

 

[AmbiguousGuy]

When you include at least a debatable attempt at evidence for your assertions (like I have in 750,000 of the most scrutinized words in history) then a discussion may be justified.

Umm... so the fact that lots of people have read the Bible... that is evidence that you are right and I am wrong?

Yeah, that's the sort of reasoning which I've come to expect from you.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Well I see your back and apparently have been saving up.
I was not discussing what you believe. I was simply stating that it is an absurd notion to claim the being most associated with unconditional love as evil. There exists little connection between the reasonability of a claim and a person on no-faith's adoption of it. You might as well say you believe Everest is a small hill.

You’re right, we were discussing what you believe. And you believe that the god you worship is the being most associated with unconditional love, goodness, etc. I don’t see any reason to believe that. My opinion is that you are adopting faith to believe that, in the face of what your Bible actually demonstrates about this supposed being.

That is not my understanding of Hell or anything else for that matter. That was Hell Catholics invented to scare people into letting them run their lives. My understanding of Hell is separation form God eternally. You were given a life of God's making. You used it to deny your maker. You get exactly what you chose, no God. I believe it is ultimate annihilation of the soul because it's source was denied.

Okay, so does your answer change if we insert your version of hell into my post?

Your god does not actually allow freedom to choose by the very definition of the word “freedom”. You are supposed to follow his dictates, or else face eternal eternal separation from god. If someone’s holding a gun to my head saying, “Give me your wallet or I will kill you” are you actually committing suicide by saying no? I don’t choose to go to hell any more than I choose to commit suicide in the given situation.

Maybe my maker should have made his existence more obvious, because as it is, I see absolutely no reason whatsoever to assume that “he” exists at all. But if “he’s” all good and unconditionally loving and all that, maybe he’ll understand why I couldn’t force myself to believe in something for which I found no evidence. Or not. Whatever.

How are we still discussing this? I remember having this same conversation about half a dozen times so far. It ends the same way.

Yeah, it’s like banging your head against a wall, isn’t it?

1. Without God morals are ethical contrivances used for convenience and not related to moral truth. Murder on this view is not actually wrong it is a useful social construct or fashion. It does not reflect truth.

They are related to moral truth as we understand it. We are the ones who determine what morality is for us, as we are the only ones around who really care. If we didn’t care about human (and animal) well-being, then we wouldn’t have morality to begin with.

Murder is wrong because it violates a person’s right to exist. A person has a right to exist by virtue of being alive. If everyone went around randomly murdering everyone else, we’d all live in an environment of constant fear, distrust and disharmony with each other and we’d quickly put an end to ourselves. We are the products of beings who cared about this stuff because the ones who didn’t died off. Did you ever notice that there is but a small percentage of our human population that has no empathy, and that think it’s okay to do whatever they want without consequence? Ask yourself if we accept such people into society or reject them from it.

2. With God morals are absolute truths and we are all absolutely accountable.

Unless we murder a bunch of people, then repent and accept Jesus into our hearts, and then all our sins are forgiven and we get to go to heaven while people who do their best to just be a good, kind person all their life, hold themselves accountable for their actions and never hurt a fly end up separated from god forever only because they didn’t repent. Why is that moral, exactly? Oh that’s right, because the guy who supposedly created the whole thing says it is. And if “he” changes his mind tomorrow and says murdering children is moral then it’s suddenly moral to murder children, no matter what us little humans feel about the matter.

On this view murder is objectively wrong, it is not an opinion derived by the preference of it's adherents.

On that view murder is subjectively wrong, and is the opinion of the boss man derived by his own his preferences.

I realize you may not find this convenient. It may be embarrassing on some level. However it isn't going anywhere. There is no alternative. It must be so. No matter what humanity contrives or dresses up ethics as they are in the end subjective opinion derived independently from moral truth. If God does not exist I have no problem admitting this is the best we can do. Why can't you?

It’s not embarrassing or inconvenient at all. I’m just wondering how it makes any sense to a rational person.

If your god exists, he’s not very good at getting his message across, given the number of Christian sects in existence, the thousands upon thousands of gods that have been worshipped and discarded over the millennia, and the number of other religions currently in existence, not to mention all the non-religious people. Even if your god does exist, we really have no way of knowing exactly what “he” wants anyway. And not only that, but it’s subject to your own sense of morality and your own interpretations. In other words, you’re still viewing your god’s supposed revelation through your own moral lens.

And I don’t care how many times you want to assert it is so, but blindly following orders from some ultimate authority is not an exercise in morality by any definition of the word.

I can't believe we are still discussing this. I am only going to be brief.
Tel me how you know moral truths and what they are that enable you to determine that humans are best able to construct ethics that mostly accurately reflect these mysterious (non-existent without God) moral truth's. What natural law makes murder wrong? What natural law dictates our happiness is justified at the expense of other biological anomalies misery?

I’ve already done this several times, and in several different ways. One of those times was in the very paragraph you were responding to here.

 

[SkepticThinker]

<snip>
When Hitler was wimping out Jews based on an a complete misunderstanding of evolutionary based belief in genetic superiority, Churchill and Roosevelt did not justify our actions against him by atheist socialist contracts that do not bind others except by self contradiction, they appealed to objective rights and wrongs. Regan did not call the USSR the relatively socially unfashionable nation, he called them the objectively evil empire.

I had to fix that for you. I'm tired of watching you botch it.

I thought I&#8217;d re-post this for you to, in regards to what you said above, because it sure sounds to me like Churchill justified allied actions by appealing to social constructs like human cooperation and solidarity AS WELL as by appealing to objective rights and wrongs.
Remember this?

&#8220;In this solemn hour it is a consolation to recall and to dwell upon our repeated efforts for peace. All have been ill-starred, but all have been faithful and sincere. This is of the highest moral value--and not only moral value, but practical value--at the present time, because the wholehearted concurrence of scores of millions of men and women, whose co-operation is indispensable and whose comradeship and brotherhood are indispensable, is the only foundation upon which the trial and tribulation of modern war can be endured and surmounted. This moral conviction alone affords that ever-fresh resilience which renews the strength and energy of people in long, doubtful and dark days. Outside, the storms of war may blow and the lands may be lashed with the fury of its gales, but in our own hearts this Sunday morning there is peace. Our hands may be active, but our consciences are at rest. &#8230;

This is not a question of fighting for Danzig or fighting for Poland. We are fighting to save the whole world from the pestilence of Nazi tyranny and in defense of all that is most sacred to man. This is no war of domination or imperial aggrandizement or material gain; no war to shut any country out of its sunlight and means of progress. It is a war, viewed in its inherent quality, to establish, on impregnable rocks, the rights of the individual, and it is a war to establish and revive the stature of man.&#8221;

 

[cottage]

I did not make a epistemological point. I made an ontological one. Morals have a foundation with and only with God even if no one was sure what they are. For instance if you believe that any act would actually be wrong whether anyone agreed it was or not that requires a God. We can split hairs about apprehension or perception later if you want but it is irrelevant concerning foundations.

This is almost word-for-word WLC, but does point out the misunderstanding that many sceptics make - even the late, great, Christopher Hitchens, as I remember. However, the difficulty in postulating an objective moral law given by God, in which murder and rape for example are reprehensible and an abomination, is that such a postulate would seem to presuppose that God is moral goodness itself, when in fact the evidential Problem of Evil contradicts that very same presupposition. For if God were to ordain that murder and rape are an absolute wrong, but still cause those things to be possible, then by his own standard those evils would be relative and not objective.

And I can’t see any way of overcoming this conundrum since the granting of free will simply restates and confirms the contradiction.

 

[1robin]

I had to fix that for you. I'm tired of watching you botch it.

I did botch it but not in the way you suggested. I said wimping out the Jews not wiping out the Jews. That was just stupid. I never said Hitler was right. I said he was operating on his understanding of the Theory of evolution. He was actually using Huxley's evolution and Nietzsche's philosophy. You cannot not know he was wrong because there is nothing known about evolutions justifications. Evolution is the most elastic theory I have ever heard of. It can be used for any purpose. I have even seen it used to prove God. There are more reasons to credit Hitler's take than deny it. If true evolution has never produced equality, it can't. It only produces genetic inequality. Unfortunately you are stuck with a mind dependent exclusively on genetics and the mind's advancement is always the basis for genetic superiority.

I have to leave but will get to the rest of your posts soon. I just wanted to clarify this. Again!!!!

 

[1robin]

This is almost word-for-word WLC, but does point out the misunderstanding that many sceptics make - even the late, great, Christopher Hitchens, as I remember. However, the difficulty in postulating an objective moral law given by God, in which murder and rape for example are reprehensible and an abomination, is that such a postulate would seem to presuppose that God is moral goodness itself, when in fact the evidential Problem of Evil contradicts that very same presupposition. For if God were to ordain that murder and rape are an absolute wrong, but still cause those things to be possible, then by his own standard those evils would be relative and not objective.

And I can’t see any way of overcoming this conundrum since the granting of free will simply restates and confirms the contradiction.

What is a WLC? I am out of time. Get to the rest soon.

 

[cottage]

What is a WLC? I am out of time. Get to the rest soon.

William Lane Craig, more of a who than a what.

 

[johnhanks]

I for one would want to know that at least human life has actual value before I recommended the sentence.

By "actual" I assume you mean god-endowed. Humans are capable of endowing value on human life that works just as well; and human cultures are also capable of inventing divine commandments which strengthen those valuations.

Ok, let's say a homicide took place and two panels wished to determine the guilt or innocence of the act. One a Christian panel and one a atheistic panel.

The Christian panel.
1. Has the very likely potentiality of having both the Holy Spirit and a God given conscience as an objective guide in considering the justification.

The Christian panel may well tell itself it is guided by a Holy Spirit; in practice such guidance is difficult to demonstrate. And conscience is as readily explained as an evolved property of human brains as a god-given faculty. Do you really believe atheists act without conscience?

2. Our views include a justifiable reason to endow human life with sanctity and value.

You can have sanctity; atheists can endow equally effective value on human lives. And remember, it is practical outcomes I am concerned with here.

3. Our views include a potential of a historical record of objective decisions concerning what is justifiable or not.

Is this "historical record of objective decisions" biblical by any chance? If so, you are going to have to pick and choose your justifications very carefully.

4. Our views include an absolute justification for the moral correctness or incorrectness of the act of taking life.

And as my previous post indicated, this claimed "absolute justification" makes no difference at all in real terms.

2. The objective foundations that are virtually universally accepted for moral truths have had more of an impact on human history than any other moral issue.

There are very few "moral truths" that have been universally accepted throughout history and ethnography. What was moral to a 15th-century Aztec would not strike you as moral at all.

Almost everyone including you, (unless your a psychopath) intuitively believes moral truths exists. societies rely on them, in every emergency they are constantly referred to as justification.

Yes, our 15th-century Aztec was as convinced that moral truths exist as you or I, and his society relied on them as much as our cultures rely on ours. How does this help your case?