Problem of Evil (again): Logic [intro]

[Freddy]

But also, only a recognition of the inherent sanctity/sacredness/dignity of the animal could underlie your disgust/unease/repulsion at the suffering of the lion’s prey. What, given atheism, justifies a view that animals possess such sanctity/sacredness/dignity? I agree with you that they do, but the theist has a worldview that makes sense of it. I don’t think you do, but I leave it for you to explain.

I already have. More than once. It’s simply a matter of empathy. Reread my last post.

And the natural world is as it is because that’s simply the way it turned out. A food chain will exist in any natural environment. No question about it. The question for a theist is to answer why it was designed in such a specific way (on the assumption that they will accept God has designed it thus - it’s his will that is being fullfilled).

And there is no theistic ‘worldview’ (singular) that explains it all. So far, we’ve had ‘don’t know’, ‘pet heaven’, ‘animals don’t suffer’, ‘the fall’, ‘you don’t have an answer anyway’, ‘it can’t have been any other way’, ‘balancing the ecosystem’ and maybe a couple of others that I’ve missed.

 

[Magnanimity]

Some animals! But there is no “sanctity, sacredness or dignity” involved in those cases. Simple empathy toward those animals, which are close us on the evolutionary scale.

Your belief is that all empathy is self-referential? If you see a squished turtle in the cul-de-sac, it is likely that your reaction will be one of sorrow and maybe disgust. I know the unbelievers tendency all too well to lay everything at the alter of “survival,” but there is no clear reason why you would feel sorrow or disgust at the fate of the squished turtle in terms of its evolutionary relation to you. How is the poor turtle like you?

 

[Magnanimity]

I already have . More than once. It’s simply a matter of empathy

Then right back atcha Freddy—you’ve given a non-answer as an answer. No one is asking whether you empathize. Rather, we’re asking why you empathize.

 

[Freddy]

Constructor:

Some animals! But there is no “sanctity, sacredness or dignity” involved in those cases. Simple empathy toward those animals, which are close us on the evolutionary scale.

Your belief is that all empathy is self-referential? If you see a squished turtle in the cul-de-sac, it is likely that your reaction will be one of sorrow and maybe disgust. I know the unbelievers tendency all too well to lay everything at the alter of “survival,” but there is no clear reason why you would feel sorrow or disgust at the fate of the squished turtle in terms of its evolutionary relation to you. How is the poor turtle like you?

Empathy is not an on/off switch. We empathise with most creatures to a lesser or greater degree. If I see a dead turtle it will affect me a lot less than a dead ape. It’s why you’ll eat roast chicken but not roast dog (which actually tastes like pork).

 

[Magnanimity]

Empathy is not an on/off switch. We empathise with most creatures to a lesser or greater degree.

Again, why? Your responses are evasive and not helpful—the very thing you accuse theists here of doing. Articulate why it would be that you would empathize. What would need to be antecedentally true for humans to naturally empathize with violent/brutal deaths of animals? We all know that we empathize, so let’s move on to the more interesting question of why that might be.

If I see a dead turtle it will affect me a lot less than a dead ape

That isn’t obviously true at all. I know that given the evolutionary motif you’re trying to work with, that you’d like it to be true. But my sorrow/compassion/disgust at a brutal/violent death of a number of animals doesn’t bear any obvious evolutionary “closeness” to humanity. Let’s say that you supplanted “horse” for “chimpanzee,” would that change anything for your reaction, do you think? If so, why so? If not, why not?

 

[Magnanimity]

Are you serious with that question? Insects are not “like us”. Mammals are closer. The great apes are very close.

And? I take it as self-evidently true that the overwhelming majority of all people who normally have dogs as pets would be reviled more by the brutal/violent death of a dog than a chimpanzee. And I would also be repulsed at the death of a higher-order reptile (say a Komodo dragon), just as much, if not more so, than I might be by a chimpanzee. Your empathy motif of “evolutionary closeness” to yourself leaves much to be desired.

 

[Freddy]

Your empathy motif of “evolutionary closeness” to yourself leaves much to be desired.

This post and your last makes it appear that you don’t fully understand the concept of empathy. Rather than a long and unproductive back and forth, why not read this article from our good chums at Berkeley and let us know if you have a problem with any of it.

 

[Hume]

As in interesting aside, the Jewish God was probably just that - the big being in an open universe.

It wasn’t until Hellenic influences appeared in Palestine that their god became permanently singular along with eternally and statically perfect in a closed way.

 

[Freddy]

Magnanimity:

Your empathy motif of “evolutionary closeness” to yourself leaves much to be desired.

This post and your last makes it appear that you don’t fully understand the concept of empathy. Rather than a long and unproductive back and forth, why not read this article from our good chums at Berkeley and let us know if you have a problem with any of it.

Edit: An article to which I omitted to link. My apologies: Empathy Definition | What Is Empathy

 

[Neithan]

Progressive revelation, which the church accepts prior to, but not after, Christ (until the eschaton anyway). We could also ask, Why did God allow thousands of years of relative ignorance before sending the Redeemer? Even now, there is relative ignorance for everyone. No Catholic knows doctrine perfectly well, even, at least not all at once. The PoE underlines everything really.

 

[Hume]

As is the religious explanation for the believer, yes.

 

[MPat]

How does one produce evidence that one doesn’t believe in something?

I don’t think you understood me correctly.

My point is that many atheists tend to present no evidence about things that are not supposed to have much to do with atheism.

As in this case, there were such claims:

I am neither a psychopath or a sociopath.

to weed out the psychopaths and sociopaths

Yes, it would curtail or limit the freedom for a small percentage of humanity. But since the overwhelming majority does not want to perform rape, torture, mayhem, etc… what is the problem??

The first case is explicit, the other claims (that were distributed among two quotes) would look like this:

1. The number of “psychopaths and sociopaths” is small.
2. People who are not “psychopaths and sociopaths” do not do evil deeds.

Please note that none of these claims are weakened, qualified in any way.

Now, isn’t it natural to support such claims with some evidence? Doesn’t one get a desire to offer evidence? And is it hard to find such evidence? Like some paper estimating the number of “psychopaths and sociopaths”?

Perhaps that evidence would be fake, misleading, weak, misinterpreted. But here we have no evidence at all.

Or, if one has nothing to support any of his claims, why not qualify those claims, make them weaker? Why not say things like “I think the number of psychopaths is small.”?

Or, alternatively, why not explain why no evidence is presented?

But no, claims are being made with great confidence, and without a tiniest shred of evidence.

And such an interesting peculiarity seems to be strangely common among atheists (at least one kind of them).

And isn’t that even more interesting, given how often the atheists claim that it is the theists who believe without evidence?

Have you ever noticed that yourself? Do you have an explanation?

 

[Freddy]

Do you have an explanation?

Yes. And it’s the same as Constructor’s.

I think that if someone suggested that the majority of people were relatively good and did not want to murder, rape and pillage then it would be accepted as a given and move on. Someone wanting evidence for that would probably find the discussion cut short.

 

[o_mlly]

I think that if someone suggested that the majority of people were relatively good and did not want to murder, rape and pillage then it would be accepted as a given and move on. Someone wanting evidence for that would probably find the discussion cut short.

The OP requires not evidence but logic. Can you give a principled argument that concludes why those acts are universally considered to be intrinsically evil? If not then it is you, not your examiners, who cut this discussion short.

 

[Freddy]

Can you give a principled argument that concludes why those acts are universally considered to be intrinsically evil?

Because I would rather not be violated and I believe that other people agree with me.

 

[o_mlly]

Because I would rather not be violated and I believe that other people agree with me.

So, you do not argue that the acts are evil in themselves.

Rather, you argue as a social contract principle that for the sake of an ordered society those acts are to be avoided just as driving on the left hand side of the road is to be avoided where prohibited by law.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

Because I would rather not be violated and I believe that other people agree with me.

So, you do not argue that the acts are evil in themselves.

They are ‘evil’ (however you might define that) only if there are negative consequences.

I don’t want to be raped therefore rape is bad. I can’t see how there could be an argument against this.

 

[goout]

Welcome to another day in your God-search secularists. Pull up a coffee, relax, and spend the day here.
Thank God for the God who fills the bulk of your day with meaning and purpose.
It is good to be alive eh?

 

[o_mlly]

They are ‘evil’ (however you might define that) only if there are negative consequences.

I don’t want to be raped therefore rape is bad. I can’t see how there could be an argument against this.

So your argument is one of self-interest only. If that is your principle then you could and would rape if you were an absolute monarch. Or were in any circumstance that allowed you to have no fear of reprisal.

 

[aThomist]

““Assumption (1): God exists.
Assumption (1a): God is all-knowing.
Assumption (1b): God is all-powerful.
Assumption (1c): God is perfectly loving.
Assumption (1d): Any being that did not possess all three of the above properties would not be God.””

All of this assumptions is correct
(Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omnibenevolent)

“Premise (2): Evil exists.”
:Wrong Evil does not Exist.
Evil is simply a coined word for the absence of Perfection. For Example A Men with one leg,
a One Leg Man truly Exist? no
That Man only lacks the actuality of the Potency to Have Two Legs.

Premise (3): An all-knowing being would be aware of the existence of evil.
:Yes

Premise (4): An all-powerful being would be able to eliminate evil.
:Wrong,An All Powerful being Cannot Eliminate Evil
For Free will cannot exist without a consequence.
Omnipotent comes from to word Omni which is all and Potency which is possibility
So is it possible for Free will to exist without Evil and the answer is simply No.

Premise (5): A perfectly loving being would desire to eliminate evil.
: Yes we can observe this at the Gospel where God desires all men to be saved

Conclusion (6): Evil does not exist. (from (1),(3),(4),(5))
Contradiction: But evil does exist. (from (2))
:wrong Premise 2 is flaude

Conclusion (7): There is no being that is all-knowing, all-powerful, and perfectly loving. (from (2),(3),(4),(5))
:wrong Premise 2 and 4 are flaude and also at 3 if you observe it carefully

Conclusion (8): God does not exist. (from (7),(1d)

“Conclusion:the Premises are flaud and thus Conclusion (8) is False”