Explain the justice of hell.

[jmvizanko]

This is an unproven generalization at best. Most of the so called atheist, that I have interacted with, make that choice as an opposition to the social consequences of a belief. I have discussed with few atheist and agnostics that are intellectually honest and they are light years apart from the rest of the crowd.

Generalization sure. But in my experience, the VAST majority have never stated “social” or “moral” consequences of belief as a reason they don’t believe. They don’t believe because of what arguments they find the most convincing. And I’m one more person on that side.

 

[jschutzm]

There are likely multiple misunderstandings here.

In general… the original question shows a very immature understanding of what Catholics actually believe. In short, these questions seem to be MORE aimed at Protestant or non-denominational Christians who have a more black n white understanding of Salvation.
What Catholics typically refer to as “Sola Fide” or “faith alone”

FIRST understand that Catholics do not believe in “faith alone” NOR in a black n white idea of: “believe in God or go to hell”

But as I said, there are multiple issues here. I’m going to focus on just 1

Why make the punishment for what people do in their life infinitely disproportional to what they have done…?

In our own justice system… WHAT was done, is not as important as WHOM is harmed. Think about this for a moment and let it sink in…

Kill a person = Bad
Kill a Child = VERY Bad
Kill an Officer in the line of duty = EXTREMELY Bad
Kill the President = WORSE STILL, possibly an act of war if you are a foreigner.

In each situation, a single life was taken. What was DONE remained the same…technically.

But in each WHO was harmed changed and it is THIS that our own justice system weighs even more so then what was done.

Let’s look at the President issue - or ANY leader of a country, really, Why is killing him/her any worse then a Police Officer? Cynically, we may even argue that the Police officer does MORE on a daily basis to make there country better. - OK, so why is the President worse then the others… it’s just 1 life. RIGHT?

Because the President represents us ALL. To kill him… is to attack us all, because that is what he represents. It is not the MAN that you harm…but the position or title.

Now continue to ramp this up, first 10 fold, then 100 fold, the a million, then a billion, keep going, slowly 'til you get to an INFINITE god. – To the MOST supreme being and who has no limits. What you harmed is not a finite being… 1 single entity. It is what that represents or what it IS.
In Christianity, God is not another being it the Universe. God is love itself. Justice itself, BEING itself, Freewill itself. God is not a thing or a representation of a thing…but the THING itself. Goodness itself.
What you harm or rebel against is not simply God…but what he is.

If the President represents ideas like Freedom, Democracy, Justice, etc. And so killing him is an afront to all of that. How bad is it to stick a knife in Love itself, Freedom itself, Justice itself… not a mere representation of the thing…but the very nature of the thing??

WHAT would be an adequate punishment for such a being who harms the very nature and reality of everything good?.. how long would it take to pay back that offense?

In our justice system… the most we can extract from a person is their life. Either life in prison OR death.

Now what if there is no time AND the life is eternal? - “Houston, we have a problem!”
How do we atone or apologize for something that severe without time or physical death?

Now you COULD say that if God is merciful, loving, and not evil, that he’d simply forgive us. TRUE!

And that is the part of Christian theology that Atheists largely ignore.

But what if the person does not WANT to be forgiven either because they don’t see that they have caused any offense OR feel justified in what they did? - then what?

Obviously you’d have to FIRST believe there is a God to begin with, or else none of the above matters.

So FIRST try and resolve your issue with whether or not there is a God to begin with.
Not argue the finer points of theology… if you aren’t FIRST vested in the idea of God to begin with.

First step is to realize that “God” is a title… not a proper name. It is a word like any other to describe something that fits a series of roles or criteria.

People also refer to God as:
The “uncaused cause”
The “unmoved mover”
“First Cause”
“esene” or “being” itself.
The most supreme being
“love itself”
“Mercy itself”
The model for which concepts like Logic, Justice, Love, etc. came from.

If you have not already, start with Thomas Acquainas’ 5 Ways - really 5 arguments FOR the existence of God - not proofs.

 

[mark_a]

Why would a super intelligent and loving being decide to punish people forever based on what they believe about what they can not be sure about or fully understand? Why does it make sense to reward faith, when its lack of basis in proof and observable certainty makes it arbitrary, and usually just whatever somebody’s parents believed? Why make the punishment for what people do in their life infinitely disproportional to what they have done, based instead on a simple black and white arbitrary qualification?

I like what Father Groeschell says about hell: Hell is the kindest place for people who cannot accept the love of God.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Except I can’t choose what I believe is true or not. I don’t choose to go to your god’s hell any more than you choose to go to the hell of the god of the Muslims. You just don’t think their religion is true, just as I don’t think your religion is true. I couldn’t choose to believe that your religion is true any more than I could choose to believe that 2+2=5.

Being an atheist, as you profess to be (and I believe you) I would have no expectation that you would see any justice or logic in anything theological. That’s why people are atheists.

I don’t have any particular expectation that the following will have any meaning to you, but just perhaps. I’ll be leaving after this for awhile (Lent and all) so I wont see your response.

Ste Therese of Lisieux is considered a Doctor of the Church. Her words, then, are, to a Catholic, worthy of respect.

In her view, when we die we do see in full and total clarity the sins we have committed. Not just their immediate nature, but the nature of how they affect others, outbound and outbound, like ripples on a pond. Our minds are clear, and the view is terrible. We are then offered forgiveness, but to accept it, we must acknowledge the true nature of our acts and how dependent we really are on forgiveness and the love that underlies it.

Then, with a clarity we do not possess on earth, we choose. We choose to accept what we have been, no excuses, no rationalizations. And we choose to be forgiven out of a love we do not, in ourselves, deserve. Alternatively, and with total clarity as to what it means, we tell God we do not accept this affront and that we choose ourselves for all eternity; knowing full well, as Satan did, what that means. We will be forever cocooned within our self-worship, choosing it even while knowing that self-worship can never be satisfactory, even that the unsatisfactoriness will burn like fire.

Now, even on her terms, it is difficult to imagine a person doing that. But it isn’t impossible to imagine it. We do see self-worship so profound now and then that we can (barely) imagine how the self-worshipper might just do it. Ste Therese didn’t see it in terms of “Oh, there’s a nice garden over there and fire over here and I’ll choose the fire.” No, it was “I choose me. Not a perfect situation, but I will not worship and love the One who exposes me to the reality of my imperfection and dependency, and has the audacity to offer me Himself as the alternative to me. I will love only myself, forever. And knowing as I do that my rejection hurts Him, and that He wants me, I will deprive Him of myself forever.”

So, what’s the point of repenting here or doing good things here, if we don’t fully comprehend the evil we do and the good is fleeting? Well, we either learn to love outside ourselves or we don’t. We either manage to accept it, bit by bit, that we are not worthy universes in ourselves or we build hard fortresses as temples to ourselves. If we spend a life of self-worship, then will we choose it later?

And why, one might ask, would one who, here and now, sees only imperfectly, be in any way “formed” by what he does to reject the ultimate good at a time when he can see with perfect clarity?

Because we know a good deal better presently than we let on, oftentimes even to ourselves. Without even having to think of it very much, we know instinctively that we are, in every way “built for infinity”. We do not “fill up” with beauty or knowledge or love so that we can’t absorb any more. We know we’re insufficient for ourselves, no matter how much we try to think, and act otherwise. We’re nowhere near as stupid as we pretend, sometimes, to be. We know the deal now, and we’ll know it then.

To all the posters whose acquaintence I have enjoyed, I’m going to bid a fond, but temporary farewell. (I think) I’m going to try to give up CAF for Lent. Won’t be easy, and I might succumb, so I’ll ask for potential forgiveness and understanding in advance.

I wish you a holy and insightful Lenten season.

 

[Deus_lo_vult]

Why would a super intelligent and loving being decide to punish people forever based on what they believe about what they can not be sure about or fully understand? Why does it make sense to reward faith, when its lack of basis in proof and observable certainty makes it arbitrary, and usually just whatever somebody’s parents believed? Why make the punishment for what people do in their life infinitely disproportional to what they have done, based instead on a simple black and white arbitrary qualification?

People ‘choose’ Hell in the same way that an addict chooses addiction or an obese person chooses obesity. Those people may object, saying, “I didn’t choose to blow up my body like a balloon, I just love to eat!” But the fact remains, after a certain point you have to KNOW that such is the ‘reward’ for your actions.

Human beings are distinguished from animals insofar as we have the cognitive ability to calculate the consequences of our actions. Though Hell is divinely revealed knowledge, we should still plan accordingly.

You know what? I don’t understand the scientific basis behind say, for example, lime disease-- I’m not a medical professional, and I don’t understand the microbiological processes at work when lime disease invades the body, but when I go hiking I still plan accordingly…I tuck my pant legs into my boots, and I check for ticks.

Since no human being holds all knowledge, you defer to ‘expert’ opinions every single day of your life. What’s wrong with taking the doctrine of Hell on faith and planning accordingly?

Read Cicero’s De officiis. He’s my favorite non-Christian philosopher.

 

[jmvizanko]

I like what Father Groeschell says about hell: Hell is the kindest place for people who cannot accept the love of God.

Yes, that’s a nice way of saying, “if you don’t believe what I do, you sure do deserve to be tortured forever.” And most people going there aren’t going there for not accepting the love of god. They are going there for not accepting the love of your god, one of many gods believed in.

 

[jmvizanko]

There are likely multiple misunderstandings here.

In general… the original question shows a very immature understanding of what Catholics actually believe. In short, these questions seem to be MORE aimed at Protestant or non-denominational Christians who have a more black n white understanding of Salvation.
What Catholics typically refer to as “Sola Fide” or “faith alone”

FIRST understand that Catholics do not believe in “faith alone” NOR in a black n white idea of: “believe in God or go to hell”

Yes I understand that Catholicism’s version of salvation is faith plus works. But why faith should even be a part of the equation is what is being questioned here.

In our own justice system… WHAT was done, is not as important as WHOM is harmed.

How can an omnipotent being be “harmed.” Saddened perhaps, but how does me swearing actually harm it? You can’t “murder” god like you can murder a president And even though I don’t think your argument that the status of the victim determines the punishment (murder is murder) is valid, how could it possibly be considered an infinitely evil action to do even the slightest tiny thing, no matter who it is being done to? And god is never the victim anyway, he’s an observer!

Now continue to ramp this up, first 10 fold, then 100 fold, the a million, then a billion, keep going, slowly 'til you get to an INFINITE god.

And I never found the whole divide by zero and get infinite argument for eternal hell convincing. If you step back and ask why an infinitely powerful being wants to punish somebody for even 1 slight wrongdoing, it makes no sense. Justice scales to what the wrong doing is, not if there is a wrong doing. If you multiply by infinite, saying one swear word is as bad as murdering somebody, and that’s ridiculous, and we know so by the fact that our punishments for each action are about as different as they could get. Why? Not because our justice is so insane compared to god’s, but because it doesn’t get more basic than a tiny offense never deserves a ridiculously huge punishment, and vice versa.

But what if the person does not WANT to be forgiven either because they don’t see that they have caused any offense OR feel justified in what they did? - then what?

If I have no way of knowing logically or through observation that I have caused offense to an invisible being, I don’t even know I am supposed to be forgiven by it, let alone wanting that forgiveness? And I’ll give you the latter of that OR, if you are talking about somebody that is truly evil and doesn’t care. But I for one am an atheist that feels very bad about any wrong I do, its just that, once again, I don’t have any reason to think I need to obtain forgiveness from anybody other than the people I have harmed.

 

[jmvizanko]

People ‘choose’ Hell in the same way that an addict chooses addiction or an obese person chooses obesity. Those people may object, saying, “I didn’t choose to blow up my body like a balloon, I just love to eat!” But the fact remains, after a certain point you have to KNOW that such is the ‘reward’ for your actions.

Eating is a choice and you can easily know that it can make you fat. Going to hell is not a choice because you cannot know without arbitrary faith that hell is even a possible “reward.” You cannot choose what you think is true.

What’s wrong with taking the doctrine of Hell on faith and planning accordingly?

Well if I’m just taking it on blind faith, should I take the Muslim doctrine of Hell of faith or the Christian doctrine of Hell on faith? There are expert Muslim and expert Christian theologians. Can you help me make the arbitrary faith choice?

 

[Deus_lo_vult]

Eating is a choice and you can easily know that it can make you fat. Going to hell is not a choice because you cannot know without arbitrary faith that hell is even a possible “reward.” You cannot choose what you think is true.

Yes, I think most people understand that obesity is a natural consequence of eating without moderation and exercise, but I doubt nearly as many people have a sound understanding of the physiological processes that bring about the transformation of obesity.

In other words, people intuitively accept that obesity is a consquence of excessive eating but most people don’t have a complete scientific understanding on WHY this occurs.

Most people live just fine knowing intuitively that Hell is a real possibility after death, even without knowing all the ‘why’ or ‘how’ about it.

Well if I’m just taking it on blind faith, should I take the Muslim doctrine of Hell of faith or the Christian doctrine of Hell on faith? There are expert Muslim and expert Christian theologians. Can you help me make the arbitrary faith choice?

No, I can’t. Faith is a gift. Besides, you’re an ‘ex-Catholic.’ You received the gift and gave it away.

Your saying that non-Catholics go to Hell is an oversimplification, by the way. The Catholic Church has never taught this. Those who died before the coming of the Messiah awaited his arrival in Purgatory; it’s what is meant in the creed when we say “He [Christ]descended to the dead.”

Non-Christians have a perfectly “fair shot”, as President Obama would say.

Unfortunately, people in your own situation do not escape the obligation to live according to that which was revealed to you, ie to live as Catholics. I’ve spoken at length regarding the Old Covenant with the Jews, as I find that it helps people to understand what I’m getting at here.

Try and look at it in the light of God’s original covenant with the Jews. The Jews had a relationship with God that no other people on earth had. They were honored with the privilege of bearing God’s revelation to the rest of the world, but because God had a special affinity for the Jews, he expected more from them than from the Gentiles.

While the Jews were constrained to observe 613 mitzvot (or laws), Gentiles were only required to observe the Seven Noahide Commandments:

1.Prohibition of Idolatry
2.Prohibition of Murder
3.Prohibition of Theft
4.Prohibition of Sexual immorality
5.Prohibition of Blasphemy
6.Prohibition of eating flesh taken from an animal while it is still alive
7.Establishment of courts of law

(Gen 2:16)

This hasn’t changed since the New Covenant, insofar as those whom have been initiated into the Church have a greater obligation.

 

[onemangang]

A lot of terms are getting thrown around here, and are often used by atheist, that should be of limits to the atheist.

Here are a Few

Logic
Reason
Truth
Good
Evil

All of these terms presuppose the transcendent.

Logic is a Law that posits a Law giver.

** The Laws of Logic**: Laws of thought and reason that are immaterial, aspatial, atemporal, universal, obligatory, necessary, immutable, and absolute. They are independent of human minds and are ubiquitous throughout all experience. All rational thinking (and communication) presupposes and uses the laws of logic.

Reason: The ability to understand and explain cogently, based on evidence and according to logical principles; ** One must use the Law of Logic to invoke Reason. To remove God from the equation, Reason must appeal to logic for proof and you end up with a circular argument. **

Truth What is truth? Again to posit a claim on truth,** one must appeal to the Law of logic and reason to do so.**

Good also presupposes the transcendent, otherwise things must simply BE, no good, no evil, just being, and existence or being itself cant be explained away in an atheistic world view. One must presuppose God in order to do so.

Justice? Really, can an atheistic world view account for justice? It implies** morality of right and wrong, Good and Evil, and VALUE**. All of which posit a ground for such things that transcend man, ie: God

Why should any Christian have to defend the** JUSTICE **of hell to atheist? First the Atheist must provide a framework that can explain Logic apart from God.

 

[ricofall]

Well if I’m just taking it on blind faith, should I take the Muslim doctrine of Hell of faith or the Christian doctrine of Hell on faith? There are expert Muslim and expert Christian theologians. Can you help me make the arbitrary faith choice?

What about studying the Early Church? Please Christ was the only person that was foretold in the old testament.

 

[mark_a]

Yes, that’s a nice way of saying, “if you don’t believe what I do, you sure do deserve to be tortured forever.” And most people going there aren’t going there for not accepting the love of god. They are going there for not accepting the love of your god, one of many gods believed in.

Don’t listen to Fr. Groeschel much, do you?

 

[Julian0404]

Why would a super intelligent and loving being decide to punish people forever based on what they believe about what they can not be sure about or fully understand? Why does it make sense to reward faith, when its lack of basis in proof and observable certainty makes it arbitrary, and usually just whatever somebody’s parents believed? Why make the punishment for what people do in their life infinitely disproportional to what they have done, based instead on a simple black and white arbitrary qualification?

As a declared “implicit atheist”, why worry about it? There isn’t a GOD any way, right?

 

[LilyM]

It is a truth universally held that appropriate punishment for an offense depends at least in part upon the circumstances of the victim.

If through your fault you run over and seriously and permanently injure a young child, who in all likelihood will need many many decades of care thereafter and will lose many opportunities as a result of your act, you will accordingly be asked to pay a heck of a lot of compensation. If you cause exactly the same injuries to a 98 year old man who was already wheelchair bound, then the difference your act has made to his quality of life is far less and so you will pay far less in compensation.

This is fair because part of the purpose of justice is restorative - as far as you are able you put the victim in the same position as they were before your act. And in this example it doesn’t matter a bit that you didn’t know beforehand all the possible consequences, or what lengths you might be asked to go to to make restitution.

An offense against an infinite being is also infinite. Just as you can expect an injured child to suffer for longer than an injured 96 year old, so an eternal God will suffer - well, eternally. So the only appropriate restitution is one that is also eternal.

As an additional afterthought - who says we need to really understand a punishment for it to be just? Someone who has never been inside a prison, or been strapped into an electric chair, has little to no concept of what imprisonment or death by electrocution really means. Yet we think it appropriate to sentence many first-time offenders to imprisonment, and some to electrocution.

 

[AndyF]

We are then offered forgiveness, but to accept it, we must acknowledge the true nature of our acts and how dependent we really are on forgiveness and the love that underlies it.

This may be wishful thinking(all due respect for the saint), but those who “die” in capital sin(by it’s definition), ie: not absolved have no such option. I don’t think this is De Fide teaching anyway, maybe others disagree.

If someone finds himself not in heaven, then he may be in a hell like state, but still with comfort from the saints and angels who will stay with him giving him hope until his temporary duration. Only here is where the scenario the saint explains could I feel play out if at all. There is a sense of desolation but not complete abandonment.

If he finds himself in utter black morbid surroundings with senses going burzirk, and no one comforts him then he is in hell. Anyway, he will know he’s in hell since true hopelessness will be felt. There is no way-point for decision making as far as I know. The testing ground occurs on earth.

 

[iloveangels]

God respects human beings. If a person really demonstrates over and over that they don’t want to go to heaven and they don’t want to be with God, why would he consign them to heaven against their will???

 

[Perplexity]

You’re confused about the nature of heaven. It is not “bliss” - it is complete spiritual union with Jesus Christ - like a marriage, only much deeper. This is appealing only to someone who loves Jesus. If you have rejected Jesus, being united to him for all eternity WOULD be a punishment.

A person who has rejected Jesus doesn’t WANT to be in heaven, where he is eternally united with Jesus.

A Saint (can’t remember which one) once said, “Nobody will be dragged into hell kicking and screaming that there has been some mistake.”

I don’t think I’m confused about the nature of heaven, I just disagree with your notion of it. But, even granting your notion of Heaven, the same results follow so I’m not sure the point is very significant. This is because a rational person could never value eternal conscious torment over union with Jesus. That’s just craziness.

 

[Perplexity]

** The Laws of Logic**: Laws of thought and reason that are immaterial, aspatial, atemporal, universal, obligatory, necessary, immutable, and absolute. They are independent of human minds and are ubiquitous throughout all experience. All rational thinking (and communication) presupposes and uses the laws of logic.

You’ll be wont to find any such understanding of logic from logicians. Folks, a “logic” is just an interpreted formal language augmented by axioms or rules of inference. Logics don’t carry any interesting metaphysical implications per se. They’re just mathematical languages. They’re only relevant in the way onemangang wants once you interpret them metaphysically; and there are numerous conflicting interpretations. So, I don’t think theists or atheists should take this first claim very seriously. As anyone familiar with logic knows, you get various logics by playing with which axioms are included in the system, or how truth-values are assigned. So, the laws of logic he’s probably referring to, are rejected in numerous non-classical logics. Some reject non-contradiction, others excluded middle etc. No logician would say there’s anything wrong with doing this. They might say such logics are weaker or don’t reflect reality; but, then they’re into metaphysics.

Reason: The ability to understand and explain cogently, based on evidence and according to logical principles; ** One must use the Law of Logic to invoke Reason. To remove God from the equation, Reason must appeal to logic for proof and you end up with a circular argument. **

If logic is necessary and absolute, then it doesn’t depend on any cognizer, God included. You can’t have your cake and eat it too.

Truth What is truth? Again to posit a claim on truth,** one must appeal to the Law of logic and reason to do so.**

Cf. previous remarks.

Good also presupposes the transcendent, otherwise things must simply BE, no good, no evil, just being, and existence or being itself cant be explained away in an atheistic world view. One must presuppose God in order to do so.

If there are intrinsic values, then they’d exist regardless of whether God did or not. Happiness is intrinsically good, rape is intrinsically bad etc. You’d have us believe otherwise (perhaps unwittingly though).

Justice? Really, can an atheistic world view account for justice? It implies** morality of right and wrong, Good and Evil, and VALUE**. All of which posit a ground for such things that transcend man, ie: God

Of course it can. One way is if ethical propositions are necessarily true. If they’re necessarily true, then their truth isn’t contingent upon any being, including God.

Why should any Christian have to defend the** JUSTICE **of hell to atheist? First the Atheist must provide a framework that can explain Logic apart from God.

No one should agree with this, if the Christian is the one making the claim, she should be able to defend it. If we’re testing the internal consistency of claims made by the Christian, it’s irrelevant what the non-Christian believes.

 

[onemangang]

You’ll be wont to find any such understanding of logic from logicians. Folks, a “logic” is just an** interpreted**** formal language** augmented by axioms or rules of inference. Logics don’t carry any interesting metaphysical implications per se.** They’re just mathematical languages**.

Lets take a look at what you are saying, many of us (me included) are not “philosophers” but I think I may be able to decipher what your saying.

" logic is just a greater way of explaining meaning, ** using a set of words, and drawing a conclusion, based on a ** confident belief or assertion, by processing, and diciphering the information given, to determine a truth value

interpreted ) interpret |inˈtərprit|
verb ( -preted , -preting ) trans. ]
1 explain the meaning of (information, words, or actions)

augment
verb |ôgˈment| trans. ]
make (something) greater by adding to it; increase

axiom |ˈaksēəm|
noun
a statement or proposition that is regarded as being established, accepted, or self-evidently true

premise |ˈpreməs|
noun
an assertion or proposition which forms the basis for a work or theory

Rule of Inference, inference rule, or transformation rule is the act of drawing a conclusion based on the form of premises interpreted as a function which takes premises, analyses their syntax, and returns a conclusion (or conclusions).

A formal language is a set of words—that is, strings of symbols drawn from a common alphabet

They’re only relevant in the way onemangang wants once you interpret them metaphysically; and there are numerous ]conflicting interpretations

.

I posit that God is the ground of all logic, being, laws and reality. It is not a mere interpretation, but truth, being that He has revealed Himself to men, through His Church His word, and in the person of Jesus Christ.

You have an interpretation, why should anyone accept yours?
Or mine for that matter?
I am not interpreting logic, I am merely attesting that God has revealed Himself, He tells us what truth is, through His Church, His Word, and the Person of Jesus Christ!

So, I don’t think theists or atheists should take this first claim very seriously. As anyone familiar with logic knows, you get various logics by playing with which axioms are included in the system, or how truth-values are assigned.

Interesting, various logics on assessing truth values? Probably because they have removed God from the equation. God is the ground and being of all truth, Jesus attested it, scripture bears witness to it, and the Church proclaims it.

So you talk of truth value being assigned, by who? You? Other Philosophers? No, I reject your premise in interpreting reality. God assigns value, what philosophers try to do is recognize value, Re-Cognize, or think again that which was already thought into existence by God, in the first place.

So, the laws of logic he’s probably referring to, are rejected in numerous non-classical logics. Some reject non-contradiction, others excluded middle etc.** No logician would say there’s anything wrong with doing this. They might say such logics are weaker or don’t reflect reality; but, then they’re into metaphysics.**

Reality, there is a concept. How can a philosopher define it? Some logics are better reflections on reality than others. I agree, one that posits God is far stronger than, one that does not. Those logics that remove God, just don’t fall into the weaker category, but the utter nonsense category, being that laws of logic can only be, if there be a law giver.

If logic is necessary and absolute, then it doesn’t depend on any cognizer, God included. You can’t have your cake and eat it too.

How do you arrive at such a claim? If it is necessary and absolute, than that is only because God is the grounds and being of all logic, we only think the laws of logic again, or recognize them.

Cf. previous remarks.

If there are intrinsic values, then they’d exist regardless of whether God did or not. Happiness is intrinsically good, rape is intrinsically bad etc. You’d have us believe otherwise (perhaps unwittingly though).

You start off with IF, I do not have to start of with** IF**. So you really can’t lay claim to any REAL and absolute Value of being. I know happiness is Good and Rape is bad, because the ground of all truth, logic, and being has revealed it through His Church, and His word when He revealed Himself to men, through the person of Jesus Christ.

Of course it can. One way is if ethical propositions are necessarily true. If they’re necessarily true, then their truth isn’t contingent upon any being, including God.

Again, same answer.

If it is necessary and absolute, than that is only because God is the grounds and being of all logic, we only think the laws of logic again, or recognize them.

No one should agree with this, if the Christian is the one making the claim, she should be able to defend it. If we’re testing the internal consistency of claims made by the Christian, it’s irrelevant what the non-Christian believes.

The Christian is not making a claim. Truth has been revealed, so it is God stating reality! The Christian is merely, attesting to that fact. The atheist is merely rejecting reality, at this point. God simply IS, and needs no explanation for His existence.

 

[Perplexity]

" logic is just a greater way of explaining meaning, ** using a set of words, and drawing a conclusion, based on a ** confident belief or assertion, by processing, and diciphering the information given, to determine a truth value

Note that I didn’t mention ‘logic’, as in the field of study, but ‘logics’ as in the systems used in the field of logic. The field itself is actually quite hard to characterize. Some say the point of logic is to give an account of the notion of validity. [1] Others say it’s to analyze and appraise arguments. [2] etc. [3] The following is my favored understanding:

“Logic is the study of arguments, and the various methods of logic are used to investigate the structure of arguments and to classify them, in terms of their structure, into those that ought to be persuasive and those that ought not to be persuasive. Although the primary purpose of logic is to evaluate real arguments in natural languages, the term has grown to encompass much more than this. The reason for this broadening of the application of the term “logic” is not hard to isolate. Over the past century powerful mathematical tools have been developed for studying the structure of arguments, leading to the development of the field of mathematical logic. These tools, however, have proven to be useful in areas on the than their original domain-in particular, in computer science and in the foundations of mathematics.” [4]

I’d regard the definition logic you provided as a definition for critical thinking.

interpreted ) interpret |inˈtərprit|
verb ( -preted , -preting ) trans. ]
1 explain the meaning of (information, words, or actions)

As to formal languages and their interpretations: A formal language in logic is a stipulated language consisting of arbitrary symbols representing statements, with its own stipulated grammar telling us when what strings of such symbols constitute meaningful statements (known as wffs or well-formed formulas, pronounced woofs). To interpret such languages is to assign each wff a truth-value. Some logics only accept two truth-values: true and false. Others three, still others infinitely many. Some logics have wffs which don’t end up getting truth values, these are known as gaps. Other wffs get too many truth-values assigned, known as gluts.

I posit that God is the ground of all logic, being, laws and reality. It is not a mere interpretation, but truth, being that He has revealed Himself to men, through His Church His word, and in the person of Jesus Christ.

In order for something to be necessary, it can’t have any grounds other than itself. This is why you’d say nothing grounds God: it’s 'cause he’s necessary. Well, if it’s true that God grounds logic, then logic isn’t necessary.

You start off with IF, I do not have to start of with** IF**. So you really can’t lay claim to any REAL and absolute Value of being. I know happiness is Good and Rape is bad, because the ground of all truth, logic, and being has revealed it through His Church, and His word when He revealed Himself to men, through the person of Jesus Christ.

I claim there are intrinsic values, just like anyone else would. I merely used the conditional for explanatory purposes. Again, if there are any intrinsic values in things like happiness, or rape, then these values aren’t contingent on God.

[1]:

Priest, Graham. An Introduction to Non-classical Logic: From If to Is. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2008. p. 3.

Sider, Theodore. Logic for Philosophy. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2010. p. 1

[2]:

Gensler, Harry J.* Introduction to Logic*. 2nd ed. London: Routledge, 2002. p. 1

[3]:

“Logic is the study of the methods and principles used to distinguish correct from incorrect reasoning.” - Copi, Irving M., and Carl Cohen.* Introduction to Logic*. 12th ed. New Jersey: Pearson Education, 2005. p. 4

[4]:

Cook, Roy T. A Dictionary of Philosophical Logic. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2009. p. 174