Strong downvote from me. 5000 words and not worth reading. If there was a point in there, I couldn’t find it. A lot of talking and not a lot of insight. Wondering about nonsense with not enough criticism. Maybe this this kind of thing passes for philosophy in academia, but I expect better on LessWrong. Philosophy is a diseased discipline and Theology most of all. I am not categorically opposed to discussing some these topics, but is this the best we can do?
Ironically, I also thought “lots of words and nothing new” because I am familiar with Christianity [EDIT: perhaps more importantly: familiar with Chesterton], and I have already heard all of this, and… hey, can we admit that it actually doesn’t answer the original question?
We start with: “If God is so loving and powerful, why do people suffer?”
Then the smarter people have to admit that all standard answers suck, because they are mostly “God is stronger than you, therefore shut up” (which makes sense, pragmatically, but it’s actually evidence against God being good… I mean, if this is the best argument you can make for God’s goodness, then you simply admit that you don’t have any good arguments), or “you are too stupid to distinguish real good from real evil” (which is a motte-and-bailey, because yes there are some ethical dilemmas I have a problem with, but God is obviously failing even in situations where a 3 years old child should be able to distinguish between right and wrong), or “it is a trade-off, allowing evil in universe is a price for human freedom” (which doesn’t make sense, because human freedom is limited in all kinds of ways all the time, for example God allows person X to kill person Y, to prevent limiting X’s sacred freedom, apparently not realizing that the successful murder limits Y’s freedom)...
Then everyone starts using poetic language, to sound deep beyond deep...
And finally, the Stockholm-syndrome solution: given that this is the only reality we have, and we don’t have any choice about that anyway, we better believe it is good, even if such belief doesn’t make sense, because facing the reality is not helpful. (Except, of course, it is not enough to describe it like this using words, you have to actually feel it. The poetic language is probably an efficient tool to get there.)
Also, describe how humans can love each other. Sure, but we already knew that humans are capable of love and goodness… the question was whether God is, and we still have less than zero evidence for that.
(Atheism just allows you to get out of the dilemma between “good God doesn’t make sense, given evidence” and “evil God doesn’t make sense”, by offering an alternative “there is no God”.)
Strong downvote from me. 5000 words and not worth reading. If there was a point in there, I couldn’t find it. A lot of talking and not a lot of insight. Wondering about nonsense with not enough criticism. Maybe this this kind of thing passes for philosophy in academia, but I expect better on LessWrong. Philosophy is a diseased discipline and Theology most of all. I am not categorically opposed to discussing some these topics, but is this the best we can do?
Agreed.
This is your atheism talking. Those of us from a different background have gained something from it.
Ironically, I also thought “lots of words and nothing new” because I am familiar with Christianity [EDIT: perhaps more importantly: familiar with Chesterton], and I have already heard all of this, and… hey, can we admit that it actually doesn’t answer the original question?
We start with: “If God is so loving and powerful, why do people suffer?”
Then the smarter people have to admit that all standard answers suck, because they are mostly “God is stronger than you, therefore shut up” (which makes sense, pragmatically, but it’s actually evidence against God being good… I mean, if this is the best argument you can make for God’s goodness, then you simply admit that you don’t have any good arguments), or “you are too stupid to distinguish real good from real evil” (which is a motte-and-bailey, because yes there are some ethical dilemmas I have a problem with, but God is obviously failing even in situations where a 3 years old child should be able to distinguish between right and wrong), or “it is a trade-off, allowing evil in universe is a price for human freedom” (which doesn’t make sense, because human freedom is limited in all kinds of ways all the time, for example God allows person X to kill person Y, to prevent limiting X’s sacred freedom, apparently not realizing that the successful murder limits Y’s freedom)...
Then everyone starts using poetic language, to sound deep beyond deep...
And finally, the Stockholm-syndrome solution: given that this is the only reality we have, and we don’t have any choice about that anyway, we better believe it is good, even if such belief doesn’t make sense, because facing the reality is not helpful. (Except, of course, it is not enough to describe it like this using words, you have to actually feel it. The poetic language is probably an efficient tool to get there.)
Also, describe how humans can love each other. Sure, but we already knew that humans are capable of love and goodness… the question was whether God is, and we still have less than zero evidence for that.
(Atheism just allows you to get out of the dilemma between “good God doesn’t make sense, given evidence” and “evil God doesn’t make sense”, by offering an alternative “there is no God”.)