Where's God?

[doubtingmerle]

No, that passage is plainly a prophecy, not a command.

I didn't say Psalms 137:9 was a command. It is a blessing on those who commit the horrible crime of dashing babies against rocks:

8 O daughter of Babylon, that art to be destroyed, Happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee As thou hast served us.

9 Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones Against the rock.
​

Do you or do you not think it is wrong to pronounce a blessing on those who murder Babylonian babies ?

​

 

[Ed1wolf]

ed: No, I explained how the being with this objective moral character can be demonstrated using the BB theory and the law of causality.

ia: The Christian cosmological argument says nothing about the morality of the purported Big Bang Starter, and is a fallacious piece of reasoning in itself.

If I can demonstrate that the Christian God probably exists, then we can ask those that know Him if He is good. So far you have not demonstrated that it is fallacious.
↑

ed: You can also see if He is good by studying His character when He was on the earth by looking at the character of Jesus Christ. Another thing you can do is see if His moral law has brought about good on the earth and that has been confirmed because almost everything good about Western Civilzation came from Christian principles.

ia: You could see if God is good or not by examining his actions - but what do those actions show? Sadly, forum rules forbid me to answer.
Anyway, yes, that's how I determine if anyone I meet is a good person, and you could - in theory - do the same thing with God. But you've forgotten what we're debating. The question is not "Is God good or not?" The question is:
"Is an action morally good because God commands it, or does God command it because it is morally good?"
Saying that we can see that God is good because he does good things is, quite simply, asking a question you were not asked.

Huh? You have asked me multiple times how do I know if God is good. God commands an act because it is morally good. And the origination of the good that He commands comes from His character.

ed: All three of these are the ways you determine whether anyone is good, how is that circular?

ia: How is that circular?
Because we're not determining whether anyone is good or not. We're discussing how you can tell what goodness itself is.

By having a relationship with the Being that is goodness itself, ie God.

ia: Your argument - if I may remind you - is that goodness is founded upon God's moral character. This, however, is circular reasoning. You are saying that God always tells us to do good things, and we know we can trust that this is true because God is good.
That is circular logic, and therefore invalid reasoning.

No, it is not circular because we find out God is good by experience and His example on earth.

ed: I think I have addressed it.

ia: As we can see from what you said above, you don't even seem to remember what Euthyphro's Dilemma is!
To remind you, it is:
"Is an action morally good because God commands it, or does God command it because it is morally good?"
Your answer, from some time ago, was that an action is morally good because God commands it. The immediate response is, then, that your morality is no morality at all. If whatever God commands is good, then God could command anything - child rape, murder, adultery, torture, theft, anything - and it would be moral, because God has commanded it.

No, I said God commands something because it is good, and that goodness that the command is based on is His character.

ia: Your response was to say that God's morality is founded on His own unchanging and virtuous nature. But this doesn't avoid the problem, it merely relocates it. If it was in God's nature to lie, then lying would be good.
Your response to that was to say that God has never lied, and would never lie, or do anything bad. But how do we know what good and bad are? In your eyes, simply because God has told us. And so how can we know if His commands are morally worthy, as it is He who defines morality for you.
Your next response was to say that we can know, because we can test God's commands against our own moral sense, which (you then went on to invalidate your own argument by saying) God has given us. If you are using a moral sense designed and put in place by God, you might just as well ultimately be saying "I know God is good because He told me He is." Which is, of course, no use to anyone.

No, since God is the creator of everything that exists, then He created our moral conscience by definition. So ultimately EVERYTHING circles back to God. Therefore, being circular in this case is irrelevant and true by definition.

ia: In summary, Euthyphro's Dilemma is a piece of logic that strikes right to the heart of any theist who says their morality is based upon their god or gods. It's an ancient logical puzzle that has stood the test of time, despite plenty of apologists who say that it's simple to disprove, and then find it isn't.

I think I have disproven it.

 

[doubtingmerle]

I think I have disproven it.

Nice poker face.

Sorry, but evading questions and stating answers that conflict with your own answers is not a victory--not even when that victory is claimed with a straight face.

 

[InterestedAtheist]

Nice poker face.
Sorry, but evading questions and stating answers that conflict with your own answers is not a victory--not even when that victory is claimed with a straight face.

Well, exactly.

I think I have disproven it.

Ed, you have done a magnificent job of disproving your own arguments. No, I'm afraid you haven't managed to disprove Euthyphro's Dilemma, and I very much doubt you ever will. But you have, in giving us flawed arguments that we can expose, done a fine job of exposing the Christian inability to handle it.

If I can demonstrate that the Christian God probably exists, then we can ask those that know Him if He is good. So far you have not demonstrated that it is fallacious.

No, the fallacy is yours. you say "If I can demonstrate that the Christian God probably exists." Fine. Well, if you can, then you have something to work with. Since you have tried and failed to do so, I think it's safe to assume that you can't.

Huh? You have asked me multiple times how do I know if God is good. God commands an act because it is morally good. And the origination of the good that He commands comes from His character.

Which brings us back to Euthyphro's Dilemma, the argument you claim to have solved. As we can see here, you haven't even addressed it. All you've done it pushed it a bit further down the road.
You say that good originates from God's character? Okay. How do you know that it is good? You attempt to answer this a little further down and, as we shall see, your attempt does not end well.

By having a relationship with the Being that is goodness itself, ie God.

You haven't yet proved that God is good, only asserted it.

No, it is not circular because we find out God is good by experience and His example on earth.

Ah! Most interesting. So, you're saying that we can determine what is good by how we interact with it and our experience with it in this reality that we call "life on Earth." Fine. I agree.
The problem is, you have now said that we can determine goodness by looking at the results of our actions. In other words, no God is needed.

No, I said God commands something because it is good, and that goodness that the command is based on is His character.

In other words, circular reasoning. God commands good things, and we know they are good because they were commanded by God.

No, since God is the creator of everything that exists, then He created our moral conscience by definition. So ultimately EVERYTHING circles back to God. Therefore, being circular in this case is irrelevant and true by definition.

But we are still left with an unanswered question: how do we know that God is good? You haven't even attempted to answer it, except by saying that we know God is good because He's God.
The only way that you can know if something is good or not is by assessing it against some standard. And if you are judging God as "good" (and remember, all judging means in this case is assessing, or forming an opinion, not passing judgement on somebody) then you must have some standard to measure them against. You cannot use God as a standard, because that is the thing that you are assessing. Essentially, you would be saying "God is good because He's God," which is, as I've pointed out a number of times now, circular reasoning.
And if you insist that your moral conscience comes from God, then you are unable to use that to measure His goodness as well, since it was provided by Him and you have not yet proved that His goodness is, well, good.

 

[Ed1wolf]

ed: All three of these are the ways you determine whether anyone is good, how is that circular? It is how you determine whether your friends are good, right? How is that circular?

dm: You continue to argue in a circle. As @InterestedAtheist pointed out to you, you tell us good is defined by God's character. When we ask you how you know God is good, you compare his character to goodness itself. So the real meaning of goodness is something other than what God is.

No, I said we discover that God is goodness itself by having a relationship with Him just like you determine if any one is good or not. How is that circular?

dm: Luke 11:37-40

And as he spake, a certain Pharisee besought him to dine with him: and he went in, and sat down to meat.
And when the Pharisee saw it, he marvelled that he had not first washed before dinner.
And the Lord said unto him, Now do ye Pharisees make clean the outside of the cup and the platter; but your inward part is full of ravening and wickedness.
Ye fools, did not he that made that which is without make that which is within also?

Is this any way to talk to a man who invited you to his house for dinner?

It is if you are the God they purport to obey and He is exposing their blatant hypocrisy. Some things are more important than being nice.

dm: And third, even if the gospels are true, and they always portrayed Jesus as good, how would that make God good? As we have seen, when the gospels speak of Jesus and God, they speak of them as being two different "persons", not the same "person". See KJV Search Results for "jesus" AND "god" (blueletterbible.org)

Yes, but they are the same being as I demonstrated earlier in this thread.

dm: Another thing you can do is see if His moral law has brought about good on the earth and that has been confirmed because almost everything good about Western Civilzation came from Christian principles.
Now you turn to the pragmatic argument. Christian morals work. Sure, and so do a lot of other morals.

And as you have been told and ignore, Western morals came from many sources.

No, most Western morals came from Christianity.

dm: So no, you have not shown that God is good, and you have not shown us a consistent definition of good.

From my experience with God, He has shown Himself to be goodness Himself.

 

[InterestedAtheist]

From my experience with God, He has shown Himself to be goodness Himself.

Got it. God is good. How do we know? Because Ed1wolf's definition of goodness is "according to the character of God."
It all fits. One beautiful line of argument, going round and round forever.

 

[doubtingmerle]

One beautiful line of argument, going round and round forever.

Once again, I feel like we just keep walking forward, only to find that our opponent ran to the other side of the ring.

He tells us that God wants people to suffer. When we address that position, he tells us God does not want people to suffer. When we address that position, then we find out he wants them to suffer, then no he doesn't, then yes he does, then...

Likewise we find that good is defined as whatever God wants, unless we address that position, then good is defined external, until we address that position, then good is defined by what God wants, and round and round we go.

Are you starting to feel like the big guy in this video?

 

[InterestedAtheist]

Once again, I feel like we just keep walking forward, only to find that our opponent ran to the other side of the ring.

He tells us that God wants people to suffer. When we address that position, he tells us God does not want people to suffer. When we address that position, then we find out he wants them to suffer, then no he doesn't, then yes he does, then...

Likewise we find that good is defined as whatever God wants, unless we address that position, then good is defined external, until we address that position, then good is defined by what God wants, and round and round we go.

Are you starting to feel like the big guy in this video?

I certainly do feel like that. And yet, I think we're actually starting to make some progress! Ed has now started to mention that we can work out what goodness is for ourselves. Whether he realises it or not, this is a huge concession. At this point, he's basically given up on the argument.

 

[Ed1wolf]

ed: You are not fully understanding my point. I am referring to how would you convince the Nazis that what they did was wrong.

dm: The Nazis were wrong. If there were applicable international laws, I would take the Nazis to court and try them in a court of International law. Else I would appeal to the need for human decency in order for people to have good lives.

The Nazis thought they were having good lives. So at the foundation, you and the Nazis have the same basis for morality. They were doing what they thought was giving them good lives and you do what you do to have a good life.

dm: How would you convince us that the Nazis were right or wrong?

I would demonstrate to them that there is an objective moral standard and they are violating it and will be held accountable in this life and the next.

ed: The Nazis would not think that that picture showed any of those things. They would think the jews deserved it, how could you convince them with an objective argument?

dm: I would tell the Nazis that the Jews were innocent until proven guilty. I would then put the burden of proof on them to make their case for guilt. That is the way courts work.

Yes, in courts based on Christian principles. As evolutionists they would probably argue that their view is based on evolutionary principles. Survival of the fittest. They would say that they have the power and the jews are weak and easily destroyed, therefore according to evolutionary principles they deserve to have all the resources of the lands that they conquer and they can eliminate the jews in order to access all of it.

dm: How would you convince us that the Jews did or did not deserve it?

The same as you, but also I would demonstrate using logic and evidence that they of infinite worth and should be treated so until proven guilty of some crime.

ed: You could only say that you feel human beings, all human beings, should be treated well and fairly as you state above.

dm: False. I have told you the objective reasons that we need morality many times. You simply ignore what I say.

All those reasons are just based on your feelings about having a decent life as I stated above. If there is no God then decency can mean anything as I demonstrated above the Nazis felt like their lives were decent and happy too and those things would increase if they wiped out the jews.

dm: If you are going to clamp your hands over your ears whenever I
talk, then it is not my fault that you are not hearing me. And you cannot come back and then make up things that I was not saying.

That is not fair.

I didnt make them up, see above.

ed: And they would say well those are your feelings, but they feel differently and that not all humans should be treated well.

dm: I would still hold them accountable. The only way to have any kind of a meaningful life is if people choose to cooperate. If the Nazis feel they do not need to cooperate, then we we can lock them up.

On what objective basis can you lock them up? You can only lock them up for having different views on what a decent life is, which is subjective just like your view.

ed: So you both use your feelings to justify your actions.

dm: That's what you hear when your hands are clamped over your ears. Why don't you take your hands away from your ears and listen to what we are actually saying?

Everything you have said is based on subjective and meaningless things like fairness and decency if there is no God.

ed: Generally most people want to live according to objective reality. So they would be much more likely to listen to your objections to their behavior if you could demonstrate that there is an objective moral standard and they are violating it

dm: I have stated my reasons many times. We need people to live in cooperative, moral ways in order to have any kind of a decent life. (Please listen to what I say.)

See above about how decency is meaningless if there is no God.

ed: and will be held accountable for it...

dm: Yes, the Nazis should be held accountable. We agree.

Many including Hitler basically got away with what they did if there is no hell.

ed: ...either in this life or the next.

dm: So you need to scare people with hell to make them do right?

For many people that is what it takes, especially if they did not have good parents.

dm: Then why would God give Christians a free pass out of hell, if the only way to make them do right was to scare them with threats of hell?

Christians only get a free pass because they accept God's gift of a substitute to experience hell for them. People convert for many reasons sometimes it is evidence like myself, others it is fear of death and hell. Others are attracted to the love of God.

 

[All Becomes New]

1. I need trusting relationships with others in order to survive.
2. Morality is the only good way to build those trusting relationships.
3. Therefore, if I want to survive, then I must choose morality.

And please don't reply by asking me one more time why I don't commit suicide (while patting yourself on the back with a huge grin at the supreme cleverness of your retort). If you ask me that, you will get the same answer I gave you every time you asked.

In addition to that objective reason, I have a subjective reason that, to me, is also very strong: Because I love people.

So you have no reason not to lie out of self interest when there is a pivotal moment to do so. Hence, morality is subjective for you.

 

[InterestedAtheist]

I would demonstrate to them that there is an objective moral standard

Please tell me how you would demonstrate this objective moral standard to the Nazis. Without using circular logic, of course.
Seriously. What would you say to them?

 

[InterestedAtheist]

The Nazis thought they were having good lives. So at the foundation, you and the Nazis have the same basis for morality. They were doing what they thought was giving them good lives and you do what you do to have a good life.

The Nazis persecuted the Jews because they thought that the Jews were a secret underground conspiracy out to destroy the world. Perhaps if it had been possible to convince them that the Jews were not a secret conspiracy to destroy the world, they would have not wanted to destroy them.
If you have a morality grounded in experience and reality, you can (at least in principle) reason about such things. For you, however, goodness is whatever God says it is. If God told you that the Jews were evil and had to be destroyed, how could anyone ever persuade you otherwise?
It's not us who have the problem with morality. Our morality is based on human nature and the world we live in. Your morality, however, has no roots at all; no foundation; no basis. It's the ultimate in subjectivity and relative ethics.

Many including Hitler basically got away with what they did if there is no hell.

Yes. They did. So what?

Christians only get a free pass because they accept God's gift of a substitute to experience hell for them. People convert for many reasons sometimes it is evidence like myself, others it is fear of death and hell. Others are attracted to the love of God.

Hitler could be in heaven right now, couldn't he? All he had to do was sincerely repent and accept Christ in the last few seconds of his life, and he would go to heaven.
Sorry, but that is not justice.

 

[InterestedAtheist]

So you have no reason not to lie out of self interest when there is a pivotal moment to do so. Hence, morality is subjective for you.

Hello again TC,
Lying is not necessarily a moral act. It can be a moral act to tell a lie.

 

[All Becomes New]

Hello again TC,
Lying is not necessarily a moral act. It can be a moral act to tell a lie.

That really depends on the nature of the lie, doesn't it? There is this idea in Judaism that it is better to do a lesser sin than a greater sin if you are put in the position where you have to choose. That is how I would rationalize it. So even in the case I have to lie to someone in order to help people survive, for example, then I might be justified in doing so. But so far, in my life, I have never been placed in a position where I had to willfully sin, lie in this case, in order to meet a greater good.

 

[InterestedAtheist]

That really depends on the nature of the lie, doesn't it? There is this idea in Judaism that it is better to do a lesser sin than a greater sin if you are put in the position where you have to choose. That is how I would rationalize it. So even in the case I have to lie to someone in order to help people survive, for example, then I might be justified in doing so. But so far, in my life, I have never been placed in a position where I had to willfully sin, lie in this case, in order to meet a greater good.

Yes, it certainly does depend on the nature of the lie. And while you may never have been placed in a position where lying was a virtuous act, it's not hard to imagine one.

 

[Ed1wolf]

ed: As I stated earlier, our moral conscience confirms God is correct

ia: Once again, you're in the wrong discussion. This is not about whether God is good or not.

So now you move the goalposts.

ia: This is about how we can know what goodness is. If you are asserting that God is the one who defines what goodness is, you cannot use a tool that (you claim) He gave you in order to prove your point. That would be begging the question.

Given that God created everything that exists, then by definition everything circles back to him.

ed: also because God has incorporated His moral law into the universe

ia: Prove it.

I cant prove it but there is evidence that points in that direction. If you engage in promiscuous sex, there is a good chance you will get an STD. If you engage in adultery, then you have most likely destroyed your marriage. If you lie a great deal, you will probably have no real friends. If you steal, you will most likely end up in jail. If you murder, there is a good chance you will end up in jail. If you engage in gluttony, then you life will most likely be shortened and etc.

ed; And we can look at his character as revealed by Jesus Christ.

ia: Irrelevant.

Given that Christians believe Jesus is God, a good way to see what God would do in certain situations that humans encounter, is to see what Jesus did in those situations and whether He does good.
↑

ed: In a few paltry years they very well could have converted and been saved or they could have made some discovery that saved many lives.

ia: Or they could have all grown up to become mass murderers. Who knows? Therefore, your point is invalid.

Yes, but given that they are all created in the image of the King of the Universe, they all have infinite intrinsic value no matter what they do in the future.

ed: That is why Mengele was an evil man.

ia: That's a good argument. The problem is, you're making it from my side. According to you, the only reason anything is good or bad is "God says it is." Yet here you are, saying "X is bad because it leads to Y."
Of course, if God said that killing babies was good, then you would have to say that it is. And if God said that Mengele did right, you would have to agree that he did. Don't tell me God would never do such a thing. You lost your right to make that argument long ago.

No, if I have a relationship with Him I could say that God would never do such a thing, just as you would say your friend would never murder someone.
↑

ed: But as an atheist you have no rationally objective basis for condemning him.

ia: No, that's you. As you've demonstrated repeatedly.

No, we do have an objective basis for condemning him, the moral laws of the universe based on God's objectively existing moral character. Your basis is just your personal subjective preference.

 

[Ed1wolf]

What a strange attitude to take.
Of course the Universe doesn't care about the Holocaust, or anything else.
The Universe isn't alive.
"Caring" is something that only living things can do, and not all of them.
You seem to think you're making some important point here, but if it hinges on the universe being sentient, then whatever argument you're making fails.

Thats right and if the universe doesn't care then ultimately everything is meaningless including the caring that living things do.

 

[Ed1wolf]

ed: On what objective basis would you contend that the holocaust was wrong? The universe doesnt care about the holocaust.

dm: What standard of evidence do you think courts of law should use? In America and most democracies, it goes by the preponderance of the evidence. We do not need to prove guilt with absolute certainty. We need to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt.

Beyond all reasonable doubt the Nazis were guilty. Do you or do you not agree, that, beyond all reasonable doubt, the Nazis were guilty?

But if there is no God then what were they guilty of? I know you say that they are guilty of being unfair, but you dont have an objective definition of unfairness or fairness. The Nazis thought they were fair. But if there is no objective definition of fairness, then there is no such thing as fairness and no such thing as right or wrong.

dm: Or are you going to continue to play devil's advocate, and continue to argue that possibly Hitler was just doing self defense?

No, you misunderstand. See above about fairness. .

ed: Yes, they did deserve to die they had sinful natures, they were sinners. But of course, only God had the right to take their life.
dm: You wrote this in response to these questions, "What about the Amalekite babies? You said it was OK to kill those Amalekite babies. Did those Amalekite babies have value?"

If all the Amalekite babies were sinners and deserved to die, what about the Jews in the Holocaust? Do you say the same about them?

All humans deserve to die at birth because we are all sinners.

dm: I'm sorry, you tell us people are of infinite value, and yet you tell us that babies deserve to die because babies are sinful. With infinite value like that, who needs infinity? I will stick with basic human decency. I condemn the slaughter of babies, even if you declare those babies to be "sinners"

Yes we are of infinite value because our decisions have infinite consequences, you can avoid eternal death by repenting of your sin and accepting Gods substitute for our eternal death and then receive eternal life.

 

[InterestedAtheist]

So now you move the goalposts.

Not at all. If you remember, the question is about Euthyphro's Dilemma: why does God call something good?" You are the one trying to move the goalposts by changing this to a discussion of whether God is good or not.

Given that God created everything that exists, then by definition everything circles back to him.

Sure, we can assume that for the sake of this conversation. But the fact that God created the rules for morality does not prove that those rules are, in fact, moral.

I cant prove it but there is evidence that points in that direction. If you engage in promiscuous sex, there is a good chance you will get an STD. If you engage in adultery, then you have most likely destroyed your marriage. If you lie a great deal, you will probably have no real friends. If you steal, you will most likely end up in jail. If you murder, there is a good chance you will end up in jail. If you engage in gluttony, then you life will most likely be shortened and etc.

This is not the first time you've said you can't prove something but there's evidence of it. Well done for the honesty, but the evidence always turns out to be of an extremely low standard. Take this case. If you are a mountain climber, a deep sea diver or a police officer you are likely to have a shortened lifespan. Does this mean that climbing mountains, deep sea diving and stopping criminals are immoral activities?
What you have in fact done, again, is provide evidence in my favour. You've shown that we can look at the consequences of our actions and use these to construct a moral framework based on how human nature operates in the real world. Well done.

Given that Christians believe Jesus is God, a good way to see what God would do in certain situations that humans encounter, is to see what Jesus did in those situations and whether He does good.

But we are not discussing whether God is good or not. We are discussing how you can know what goodness means. So, if you see that Jesus fed the hungry or healed the sick, and you say, "See? See what a good thing Jesus did!" my question to you is: why is it good to feed the hungry or heal the sick? How do you know what goodness is? Because God told you so? How do you know He is correct?

Yes, but given that they are all created in the image of the King of the Universe, they all have infinite intrinsic value no matter what they do in the future.

But you said it was wrong to kill people because they might have converted to Christianity. Now you are saying that their lives are valuable whether they convert or not.
And why is that? Why does being created in the image of the King of the Universe mean they all have infinite intrinsic value?

No, if I have a relationship with Him I could say that God would never do such a thing, just as you would say your friend would never murder someone.

But my friend is not the foundation of my morality. I have not said that my ideas on what is and is not moral are solely based on what my friend says are. That, however, is exactly what you have said about God.
So, if God told you to kill, for killing is good, what would you say? No? You'd disagree with God?
Perhaps you'd say, "You can't be God. God would never tell me to kill." But how do you know that God's definition of goodness does not include killing in a certain time or place? You said that God makes the rules. How could you disagree with Him?

No, we do have an objective basis for condemning him, the moral laws of the universe based on God's objectively existing moral character. Your basis is just your personal subjective preference.

Let us assume, for the purposes of this conversation, that there are indeed such moral laws and that they were decreed by God. The question still stands: how do you know that God's laws are moral? Do you measure it by some external standard to check that God's laws are moral? If so, then there is a higher authority than God. Or do you just say that God could say anything, and it would be moral because He said it? If so, then God's morality is arbitrary and meaningless.
My basis, on the other hand, is human nature and shared human values. And honestly, you know and agree with this, even if you don't realise it. That's why, above, you were trying to show me that God's laws make sense because they produce good results for us. In other words, you do have a higher authority than God; you do check that God's laws make sense, and you call them good if they accord with your criteria for goodness.

Thats right and if the universe doesn't care then ultimately everything is meaningless including the caring that living things do.

Of course not. Meaning is created by thinking beings. The universe doesn't care, and the universe has no purposes, but we do have purpose because we do care.

 

[Ed1wolf]

Huh? I was not talking about my feelings.

Once again this is what you responded to (and ignored in your response):

My life is real. In order to have a meaningful life, I need to receive from others, and give to others. How is that not real?​

Do you care to respond to what we actually say, or will you just keep on repeating the same canned, irrelevant words forever?

I didnt say your life is not real, only that your definition of what a meaningful life is not. Jeffrey Dahmer felt he was living a meaningful life too. So which one is right?