What do you want?

[Trurl]

Evil is divided into moral evil and physical evil. I suspect the poster was speaking of the moral side - is it worth losing the ability to choose to do bad if we also lose the ability to choose to do good?

Problem number 1: the definition of “good” is missing. A very short summary:

1. in a lifeless universe, there is no good, nor bad (much less evil")
2. in a universe with life, “good” is what promotes life, “bad” is that inhibits life (utilitarian good and bad - still no such thing as evil)
3. in a universe with sentient life, the concept of evil is introduced: “intentionally causing harm to life”.

As such the prase “physical evil” should be avoided. Unfortunately there is no special word to describe the opposite of “intentional harm” - which would be “intentionally causing physical good” - maybe “morally good” might be used for lack of a better phrase.

You may not care why it is that I give you a sandwich if you’re starving, but that is not the same as saying it does not matter.

Matters to “whom”? Since I am the recipient of the gift, it is only my opinion that matters. The opinion of the observer does not count.

But then suffering itself become meaningless. I mean, why is it that being slowly tortured to death is bad? Primarily because the person being tortured doesn’t enjoy it?

Yes, because it inhibits life. It is not simply “bad”, it is “evil” because the act is intentional.

Choice-less physical good is no more “good” than following physical laws. A human who gives a sandwich to a human who is hungry because he is programed that way has not done any good. Physical good may have occurred, but it has nothing to do with the human involved.

So what? The person who needed that sandwich is still better off.

It makes no more sense to call such a person good than to praise the moral character of a rock for obeying gravity and falling.

Correction: “It makes no more sense to call such a person MORALLY good” - and of course I AGREE WITH YOU.

Without choice there is no intrinsic moral character at all. A robot may be indistinguishable from a moral man from the outside, but that does not make it a moral man. Whatever good comes from its actions having nothing to do with it at all.

VERY TRUE!!! the question is now: why would it matter? To whom does it matter? To whom should it matter? If I am the recipient of a “beneficial” act, for me it does not matter in the least, if the giver was “forced” to give due to its programming, or was “forced” to give by his upbringing (and do not underestimate the force of good upbringing - it might not be “programming”, but the difference is pretty darn miniscule (if exists at all). Or if he wanted to feel good about his generosity. Or if he wanted to get “brownie points” is heaven or in the society surrounding him.

Let me ask again: “if you are in need of help and someone offers this help, are you about to interrogate about his motives, and decline the help if he is oblliged (or forced) to help?”. I am willing to bet dollars to cents, that you would not care. The motivations of the person would not matter one bit to you.

And again, it’s not that choiceless following laws to bring about the best good, whether that be feeding hungry people or minimizing the area of a soap bubble, is bad. It is in fact good, it’s just that all the goodness is exterior. Inanimate matter exists, following the rules it’s supposed to, and that’s good. But it’s not moral good, and the goodness that occurs is completely independent of the object.

AGREED!

Whereas actual persons are capable making choices, and these choices can be good or bad regardless of whether or not they have any exterior effect at all. And so goodness can be attributed to these persons, even if they require assistance to make it so.

And here we lose connection. To call something “good” or “bad” without considering the effects simply makes NO sense at all. As for the rest of your post about the “angels and demons” I will leave unanswered for obvious reasons.

 

[Iron_Donkey]

Problem number 1: the definition of “good” is missing. A very short summary:

1. in a lifeless universe, there is no good, nor bad (much less evil")
2. in a universe with life, “good” is what promotes life, “bad” is that inhibits life (utilitarian good and bad - still no such thing as evil)
3. in a universe with sentient life, the concept of evil is introduced: “intentionally causing harm to life”.

I think this may be our main problem. What is life after all? I mean I know what the scientific definition is, but why would this definition necessarily yield a thing intrinsically worth promoting, and why are other things not?

This was part of the point of the first part of my post. If we stick to utilitarianism or focus solely on consequences or what have you, then there is no compelling reason stay with this definition. Why should I care if life is promoted? Easier to just define whatever happens as good and be done with it.

The definition that I actually use is (my best attempt at understanding) St. Aquinas’ “goodness is existence” sort of thing, so I would end up saying that any universe that was not some how damaged (either has no standard, no parts diagram, for how it should be, or has one and lives up to it) is perfect, and any damaged universe is good insofar as it is complete. I wouldn’t mention life at all.

We seem to agree that morality makes no sense without choice. My position, though, is that morality, the good of people actively choosing to do good things, is much more important than suffering or lack thereof. A change in what is valued (life, pleasure, power, rectangles, a specific crystalline arrangement of a particular particle, whatever) changes what counts as suffering/physical evil, but there is always a character to choosing to do what should be done no matter how “what should be done” is defined that persists. I would certainly say that the good choice could easily cause more immediately suffering than the bad choice, though I do not think that is common.

Matters to “whom”? Since I am the recipient of the gift, it is only my opinion that matters. The opinion of the observer does not count.

Matters to the nature of things. If we can talk about whether a world is good or not, then we can certainly talk about whether a choice is good or not. But to be more specific:

We can see that it matters not only to the recipient, but to the giver, because our thoughts and motivations shape who we are as people (and hence what we do in the future). This is of course only true if we have choice.

Should the sandwich, say, not actually be mine, but rather be entrusted to my care with the stipulation that I do the best I can with what is entrusted to me, then it matters to the one who entrusted it to me in the first place.

And here we lose connection. To call something “good” or “bad” without considering the effects simply makes NO sense at all. As for the rest of your post about the “angels and demons” I will leave unanswered for obvious reasons.

Not sure if it was obvious or not, but I meant exterior physical effects. All choices have effects, even if they are simply the effect of causing us to be a person who just made that choice.

If I choose to try to murder my friend for what’s in his wallet but get hit by a truck between making the choice and acting on it and become paralyzed for the rest of my life (and so never will become able to act on it), I still made a bad choice. It was a morally bad thing to do.

I know that you don’t believe in angels, but I brought it up as a thought exercise that might be worth considering if only so that you can understand what we’re talking about. After all, if we’re talking about what kind of world we would like to make, we might prefer one without matter at all, so it’s something to consider.

It should help show that evil can come into existence even in a world where creatures are simply immortal minds that can neither create more of themselves nor cause others to stop existing (which is not to say that this is all we think angels are, only that thinking of this world which is roughly analogous to a pre-matter angelic world might shed light on how we would talk about evil being built into a choice itself).

 

[Robertanthony]

Choice-less physical good is no more “good” than following physical laws. A human who gives a sandwich to a human who is hungry because he is programed that way has not done any good. Physical good may have occurred, but it has nothing to do with the human involved. It makes no more sense to call such a person good than to praise the moral character of a rock for obeying gravity and falling.
Without choice there is no intrinsic moral character at all. A robot may be indistinguishable from a moral man from the outside, but that does not make it a moral man. Whatever good comes from its actions having nothing to do with it at all.

God can will nothing but will good, love etc. He can’t contradict his nature/his attributes. He has no choice but to do good. He can choose among a myriad of good, but he can’t choose evil. Do you find God unpraiseworthy (based solely on his benevolence) because that’s an integral part of his nature? Do you call God good even though his goodness is as inevitable as a rock falling because of gravity?

 

[Qoeleth]

For some reason, I don’t really care about free will. Not to have free will would, in many respects, be quite liberating.

I mean, if I was about to chose the wrong thing, I would rather some one forcibly stopped me from doing so. If God chose to cancel everyone’s free will, and to micro-manage the whole Universe, I would welcome it. Then, we could just sit back a watch things go by and say “It’s all the action of God.”

I don’t mean to find fault with the way God is doing things now- but ‘free will’ is, in my opinion, the most over-rated thing out there. God’s wants us to surrender our will to Him, just like Jesus.

 

[Trurl]

I think this may be our main problem. What is life after all? I mean I know what the scientific definition is, but why would this definition necessarily yield a thing intrinsically worth promoting, and why are other things not?

Yes, this is important. Life is “the state of affairs, which attempts to maintain its homeostasis in a changing environment”. In other words, “life” tries to stay “alive”. Why does it “matter”? Again, matters to whom? It matters to the organism, which tries to stay alive. Even if the organism is not sentient, there is the biological imperative to stay alive. It would be an invalid question to ask: “why”?

This was part of the point of the first part of my post. If we stick to utilitarianism or focus solely on consequences or what have you, then there is no compelling reason stay with this definition. Why should I care if life is promoted? Easier to just define whatever happens as good and be done with it.

Ah, but you MUST care. It is your biological nature. If you get injured, the body’s healing processes take over, and try to repair the injury, whether you want them or not. There is no “moral” consideration involved, it is simply a biological action. Now a sentient being is capable of “overriding” the body’s natural processes and commit a suicide. Is that extra option the “overriding good” you have in mind - which does not exist for a “robot”? That would be a most peculiar 'benefit", don’t you think?

The definition that I actually use is (my best attempt at understanding) St. Aquinas’ “goodness is existence” sort of thing, so I would end up saying that any universe that was not some how damaged (either has no standard, no parts diagram, for how it should be, or has one and lives up to it) is perfect, and any damaged universe is good insofar as it is complete. I wouldn’t mention life at all.

The lifeless universe cannot be “damaged”. It simply IS. A pebble on the beach gets polished by the waves. Is it “better” for the pebble to be smooth than jagged? Of course not.

We seem to agree that morality makes no sense without choice.

Yes, we do. It is important to emphasize the agreement, because it can serve as a common platform for further discussion.

My position, though, is that morality, the good of people actively choosing to do good things, is much more important than suffering or lack thereof.

I understand, and I would like to understand why do you think so? This is the central question. Why and how does the existence of “life-denying actions” create a better state of affairs? It is not “better” objectively, since - even if every person always chooses the “moral” option - it is only as good as the one where there are only “robots”. As soon as one moral agent chooses a morally incorrect action, the state of affairs becomes inferior. So how could a “worse state of affairs” become “better”? Looks like a contradiction to me.

Matters to the nature of things.

The “nature of things” is just a concept. Nothing matters to a concept.

We can see that it matters not only to the recipient, but to the giver, because our thoughts and motivations shape who we are as people (and hence what we do in the future). This is of course only true if we have choice.

And when there is no choice? The “robot” (I hate to use this word, for the negative connotations) keeps being “good, caring, loyal, helpful, friendly”… etc. It needs no reinforcement.

There are three entities involved:

1. the one who needs help,
2. the one who provides the help and
3. the observer of the event. (optional) Of these three entities the recipient of the help could not care less, if the giver helped out of the good will of his “heart”, or wanted to collect “brownie points”, or wanted to feel good about himself, or… did not have a choice in the matter.

You say that it matters to the giver (he can feel better of himself, or was recognized as a “good” person, etc…) since he reinforced his “moral” attitude, and thus became a “better person”. True, but again, it is only significant if there is a person there. You say that the person evolves and becomes better. No doubt, but the robot is already “good”. The robot needs no reinforcement. The person can become “bettter”, but the robot is already “good”. The person is always inferior, unless he can attain the perfection of the robot.

Seems like we argee that the observer (if any) does not count.

Should the sandwich, say, not actually be mine, but rather be entrusted to my care with the stipulation that I do the best I can with what is entrusted to me, then it matters to the one who entrusted it to me in the first place.

Let’s not complicate the scenario.

If I choose to try to murder my friend for what’s in his wallet but get hit by a truck between making the choice and acting on it and become paralyzed for the rest of my life (and so never will become able to act on it), I still made a bad choice. It was a morally bad thing to do.

Ah, the infamous “thought crime”.

Just a side remark. Even if every person would be programmed to be helpful, nice, caring, etc… it would not mean that the world would be without “love”. Only “agape” would disappear, eros, philia, storge would remain. And that would be a huge improvement - in my eyes, of coruse. (And all the victims of atrocities would join me, along with those who truly abhor of those atrocities - and that includes you . Only in a neutral environment - like here on the net - would people advocate maintaining the horrors, atrocities, rapes and murders - in the name of “free will”).

 

[Iron_Donkey]

God can will nothing but will good, love etc. He can’t contradict his nature/his attributes. He has no choice but to do good. He can choose among a myriad of good, but he can’t choose evil. Do you find God unpraiseworthy (based solely on his benevolence) because that’s an integral part of his nature? Do you call God good even though his goodness is as inevitable as a rock falling because of gravity?

Although this is not readily apparent from the specific text that you quoted (which is my fault, I did not speak as clearly there as I probably should have there), my position is not that there is no good whatsoever in matter following of physical laws, but that the good has nothing to do with the matter itself and is entirely credited to God.

That is, a creature created by God which only follows God’s rules because the requirement to do so is built in is indeed good, but it does not actually do good itself (or do anything itself really). A rock does not participate in the decision to fall but falls because God has decided that it should, and so while it is good that it falls, and while the rock is good, no goodness is originating from within the rock.

Whereas a creature with choice (even if in our fallen state we need God’s help even to make the right choice) in choosing to do good of its own volition is in fact actually doing good itself. Even though the ultimate source of all good is God, in the sense that it is God who enables the good choice to be made, the creature who makes a good choice is actively participating in the good by its choice and so can be said to be actually doing good itself - which is a good thing completely independently and in addition to the good that the creature chose to do.

As for applying this to God - God’s goodness is inevitable, but it has its source in God. God is different from the rock not because He could do evil, but because the good He does comes entirely from within Himself (and the creature with choice is different from the rock because the choice is, at least partially, credited to the creature even if in our fallen state God must enable us to make the right choice before we can choose to do so).

 

[Iron_Donkey]

Yes, this is important. Life is “the state of affairs, which attempts to maintain its homeostasis in a changing environment”. In other words, “life” tries to stay “alive”. Why does it “matter”? Again, matters to whom? It matters to the organism, which tries to stay alive. Even if the organism is not sentient, there is the biological imperative to stay alive. It would be an invalid question to ask: “why”?

Ah, but you MUST care. It is your biological nature. If you get injured, the body’s healing processes take over, and try to repair the injury, whether you want them or not. There is no “moral” consideration involved, it is simply a biological action. Now a sentient being is capable of “overriding” the body’s natural processes and commit a suicide. Is that extra option the “overriding good” you have in mind - which does not exist for a “robot”? That would be a most peculiar 'benefit", don’t you think?

Part of the issue here is (amazingly enough) that I believe in God and (so far as I can tell) you do not. That is, I believe in an ultimate reality, a sense in which things can just “matter”. If asked “matters to who,” I would say “matters to God,” though that is qualitatively different from mattering to one of us and because it does not sound so I would not normally use that language.

It is my view that if this ultimate mattering, that is not mattering to a specific creature is removed, then everything become pointless, or nothing “matters”. I do not see individual “mattering to me” or biological imperatives or any such thing as being capable of rising to take the place.

That is, I recognize that I have a biological imperative to stay alive, but by itself I do not see that as important (which is not to say that it isn’t important, but that I do not think it can generate its own importance).

The lifeless universe cannot be “damaged”. It simply IS. A pebble on the beach gets polished by the waves. Is it “better” for the pebble to be smooth than jagged? Of course not.

A house is lifeless, it has a shape in which it was put and in which it is meant to be. If a wall falls over, it is damaged.

Also, I would argue that you could say the same thing about life. We tend to think that it’s better for a human to be healthy than unhealthy, but why? I mean, obviously he thinks it is, but what does that matter? (And again, if it can only matter to a single creature or collection thereof, I don’t consider that to make any difference whatsoever as far as good or bad goes.)

I understand, and I would like to understand why do you think so? This is the central question. Why and how does the existence of “life-denying actions” create a better state of affairs? It is not “better” objectively, since - even if every person always chooses the “moral” option - it is only as good as the one where there are only “robots”. As soon as one moral agent chooses a morally incorrect action, the state of affairs becomes inferior. So how could a “worse state of affairs” become “better”? Looks like a contradiction to me.

I do not consider the “state of affairs” to be limited to the current configuration of the physical universe, but rather absolutely everything, past, present and future, physical and non, that will ever exist.

All suffering is therefore just a blip, an extremely transitory thing that will pass away sooner rather than later.

Which is not to say that we shouldn’t minimize it. We should aim for perfection after all. Rather, in the view where the soul is eternal, things that effect the soul must matter more than things which pass with time. And in the view where nothing is eternal, I tend to think that nothing is important at all.

Which also addresses your three entity thing. Physical good is as transitory as physical evil.

Seems like we agree that the observer (if any) does not count.

Only in a robot world, but then I’d say neither of the other two count either.

Let’s not complicate the scenario.

Well, that’s the question isn’t it? Is this complicating the scenario, or is ignoring this possibility over-simplifying it?

Ah, the infamous “thought crime”.

Yes, of course. Even in a purely materialistic worldview, you’d have to admit that thought crimes, despite the phrase being used mostly accuse people of brainwashing, are very real. The person who purposefully nurtures hatred of one group of people in his mind until he gets to the point where he would harm them would be committing a thought crime even in your view, at least as far as I understand it.

Just a side remark. Even if every person would be programmed to be helpful, nice, caring, etc… it would not mean that the world would be without “love”. Only “agape” would disappear, eros, philia, storge would remain. And that would be a huge improvement - in my eyes, of coruse. (And all the victims of atrocities would join me, along with those who truly abhor of those atrocities - and that includes you . Only in a neutral environment - like here on the net - would people advocate maintaining the horrors, atrocities, rapes and murders - in the name of “free will”).

The love thing - yes but those three are transitory. Less important.

And of course I disagree with the rest.

 

[Trurl]

Part of the issue here is (amazingly enough) that I believe in God and (so far as I can tell) you do not.

Correct. The point is that whether one believes or not, it does not matter here and now. The alleged continuation has no retroactive bearing on this reality. If someone is a good person it matters here. Or if someone is a bad person it matters here. I understand that you believe in the “hereafter” but since that is merely a belief, I cannot take it into consideration.

It is my view that if this ultimate mattering, that is not mattering to a specific creature is removed, then everything become pointless, or nothing “matters”. I do not see individual “mattering to me” or biological imperatives or any such thing as being capable of rising to take the place.

If you get sick, it is a temporary matter, and yet, you do not shrug it off, saying that it does not matter in the greater scheme of things. So, I must “accuse” you of having a double standard, one that you promote with your words, and the one which you actually endorse with your action and the two simply contradict each other.

A house is lifeless, it has a shape in which it was put and in which it is meant to be. If a wall falls over, it is damaged.

In a lifeless universe there can be no “houses”. There can be caves, and its walls might “cave-in”.

We tend to think that it’s better for a human to be healthy than unhealthy, but why? I mean, obviously he thinks it is, but what does that matter?

As soon as you will do what you preach (do not go to a doctor when you have a health problem) I will consider your point of view of being worthy of consideration. But so far I only see a contradiction, you say one thing, but do something else.

I do not consider the “state of affairs” to be limited to the current configuration of the physical universe, but rather absolutely everything, past, present and future, physical and non, that will ever exist.

I have absolutely no idea what that means, and how is that pertinent. It was your argument that “having freedom to perform atrocities is ‘superior’ to the state of affairs where there is no such freedom”. I am asking you to tell me, why do you have this opinion. Could you explicitly explain please?

All suffering is therefore just a blip, an extremely transitory thing that will pass away sooner rather than later.

As soon as you forego your dentist appointment because such a pain is “extremely transitory”, I will take you seriously.

Which is not to say that we shouldn’t minimize it. We should aim for perfection after all. Rather, in the view where the soul is eternal, things that effect the soul must matter more than things which pass with time. And in the view where nothing is eternal, I tend to think that nothing is important at all.

Of course the “eternal soul” is just as unsubstantiated as the existence of “ultimate reality”.

Which also addresses your three entity thing. Physical good is as transitory as physical evil.

Moral good and moral evil are just as transitory. There will be no “moral good ot evil” in heaven.

Well, that’s the question isn’t it? Is this complicating the scenario, or is ignoring this possibility over-simplifying it?

I will be happy to analyze the more complex scenario, once the simpler one is exhausted.

Yes, of course. Even in a purely materialistic worldview, you’d have to admit that thought crimes, despite the phrase being used mostly accuse people of brainwashing, are very real. The person who purposefully nurtures hatred of one group of people in his mind until he gets to the point where he would harm them would be committing a thought crime even in your view, at least as far as I understand it.

As long as it stays within the realm of fantasy there is no problem. IF it spills over into action, it ceases to be a “thought crime”. The problem is not a fantasy, the problem is the reality of the action.

The love thing - yes but those three are transitory. Less important.

As if “agape” would not be equally transient.

Something to ponder:

Consider a hospital, where the doctors and the nurses are all “robots”. Here are a few advantages: “these beings never get tired, never get inattantive, cannot be impatient, are always ready to help, if (for some strage reason) they would have to sacrifice their existence, they would not hesitate to do it.” in other words, they would act and behave like “saints”. We are all aware that “real” human beings cannot act in such a manner. So, tell me what are the disadvantages of having a “robotic personnel”? I tried to come up with something, but failed. There was one possibility, which looked “promising”. The humans can feel “real compassion”, while the robots can only “fake it”. Of course you could never be certain if those humans were “genuinely concerned” or were “just faking their compassion”. So, hard as I tried, I could not find even ONE feature of “morally free” humans over the “robots”. Maybe you can do it, let me know what you find. By the way, when the doctors take the Hyppocratic oath, they effectively “foreswear” their freedom. They take the oath to treat everyone to the best of their abilities, they swear that they will treat even their mortal enemies. So, in a very good sense, they attempt to become “robots” in that respect.

If you could please elaborate why is the existence of “moral evil” preferable to lack of moral evil, I would appreciate it. Please concentrate on that, if you wish to reply.

 

[Iron_Donkey]

Correct. The point is that whether one believes or not, it does not matter here and now. The alleged continuation has no retroactive bearing on this reality. If someone is a good person it matters here. Or if someone is a bad person it matters here. I understand that you believe in the “hereafter” but since that is merely a belief, I cannot take it into consideration.

I don’t think we could say that the future, alleged or not, has no effect on the present. For one thing, I could phrase things in the opposite way. I understand that you believe there is not a “hereafter”, but since that is merely a belief, I cannot take it into consideration. See Pascal’s wager (which is explained in a more full way than you normally see it here).

Whether the thing is true or false certainly matters now. There is no rule that says that we can ignore anything that we do not know with certainty to be true.

For example: the axiom of choice is neither provable nor disprovable in standard mathematics, yet the truth of the statement is crucial. (Which is not to say that I don’t think the existence of a God is provable, only that even if it weren’t this would not mean that it would have no effect).

If you get sick, it is a temporary matter, and yet, you do not shrug it off, saying that it does not matter in the greater scheme of things. So, I must “accuse” you of having a double standard, one that you promote with your words, and the one which you actually endorse with your action and the two simply contradict each other.

As soon as you will do what you preach (do not go to a doctor when you have a health problem) I will consider your point of view of being worthy of consideration. But so far I only see a contradiction, you say one thing, but do something else.

In fact I do try to shrug it off as a temporary matter. The fact that it will pass is one of the things that makes it more bearable. I do also try to treat it while I have the illness, but this is consistent with what I said previously. Treat the present problems, but know that in the grand scheme of things they just aren’t that important (for their own sakes and independent of eternal stuff).

But I certainly did not say we should not try to fix suffering. Only that doing so is not priority one. Priority one is eternal stuff (though there is some - in fact, an awful, awful, lot - of overlap). From priority one, we derive priority two, which derivation was summed up by Archbishop Chaput as “If we don’t love the poor [the suffering in general], and do all we can to improve their lot, we’re going to go to Hell.”

As soon as you forego your dentist appointment because such a pain is “extremely transitory”, I will take you seriously.

Well, it wasn’t a dentist appointment, but yesterday I was puking my guts out, was shivering even though I wasn’t cold, and felt like my head would explode every time I turned it to look at something. But I didn’t go to a doctor, because I knew I would feel better soon.

And lo! it has come to pass. For today my head is free of ache, and my guts detest not their proper position. Nor are my hands trembling without provocation and yay, verily, I can walk even so far as the bathroom without falling over.

Seriously though. See above. I never said we should ignore suffering.

In a lifeless universe there can be no “houses”. There can be caves, and its walls might “cave-in”.

Ah, yes, but I was talking about an arbitrary world. An arbitrary world which is built by a designer to have a certain range of configurations is damaged insofar as it differs from those allowed configurations. If there is no designer or if the designer doesn’t care, then it can never be damaged. I do not think that the opinions of creatures in the world matter at all taken independently of everything else, at least on the level of coming up with an “ought” sort of thing.

I have absolutely no idea what that means, and how is that pertinent. It was your argument that “having freedom to perform atrocities is ‘superior’ to the state of affairs where there is no such freedom”. I am asking you to tell me, why do you have this opinion. Could you explicitly explain please?

Not sure what else to say here. The state of affairs where there are robots who produce no good but simply live out their programmed goodness is indistinguishable from pebbles on a beach magnanimously being rounded by the waves. With no choice, the only possible way to say that the world is good or bad is to say that it does or does not agree with a design it may or may not have. With no design, you could say it was good by default (in the same way that if 1=2 all elephants are pink), but it’d be nearly meaningless.

The state of affairs where some creatures choose to do good things, and some creatures do not has the good of the creatures making good choices. These creatures are in some limited sense creating good and adding it to the world, where as in the other option they are merely reflecting any good which may already be in the design (or if there is no design, they are just kind of chillin’ to no real greater purpose).

With no design, goodness is meaningless. With design and no choice, the only good is direct reflection of the will of the designer. Creation itself adds nothing. With design and choice, there is the good of the will of the designer and the good of those following the design. Substitute whatever basis of goodness you wish for the design if you must, but I think this still stands.

As for the thought crime thing: I thought we might have some common ground where it appears that we do not, so it may be best to jettison that line of argument entirely. I am not nearly as utilitarian as you are, it appears.

 

[Iron_Donkey]

Trurl:

Something to ponder:

Consider a hospital, where the doctors and the nurses are all “robots”. … So, tell me what are the disadvantages of having a “robotic personnel”?..

I would be perfectly happy with robot doctors helping to take care of real people. People are valuable, suffering should be avoided, just not at all costs. What I don’t see is anything particularly praiseworthy with robot doctors fixing robots, aside from the generic “things are functioning as they should and that is good” goodness that has nothing to do with the robots and everything to do with whatever rules they are following.

It is of course true that I think humans can get benefit from helping patients, and I would hope that if more efficient robot doctors were developed that that benefit could be found some other way.

If you could please elaborate why is the existence of “moral evil” preferable to lack of moral evil, I would appreciate it. Please concentrate on that, if you wish to reply.

This is like saying that “please elaborate on why trains running late is preferable to trains running on time” in reference to a specific government run by he of the memorable mustache. It is not that moral evil is preferable to its lack. It’s that moral good is preferable to its lack, and that moral good, as we’ve said already, requires choice. The fact that choice requires the possibility that some people not choose the most good option is simply a consequence.

(It is also worth noting at this point that, in the view of goodness as agreement with a plan and evil as deviancy from it, evil is not a thing in itself, but rather a lack of a thing. So it’s not a matter of some good being added and some evil being added, and there being some cancellation, but rather of a lot of good being added and then some people perverting some of it to be less than it should be.)

 

[Trurl]

I would be perfectly happy with robot doctors helping to take care of real people. People are valuable, suffering should be avoided, just not at all costs. What I don’t see is anything particularly praiseworthy with robot doctors fixing robots, aside from the generic “things are functioning as they should and that is good” goodness that has nothing to do with the robots and everything to do with whatever rules they are following.

Looks like there is no way to see eye-to-eye. Do not take the word “robot” verbatim. The stipulation is that those doctors and nurses are perfectly free to make decisions in all respects, EXCEPT they cannot choose NOT to treat the patients according to their best ability. **In that respect **they have no choice.

This is like saying that “please elaborate on why trains running late is preferable to trains running on time” in reference to a specific government run by he of the memorable mustache.

That is precisely the point (except the mustache, which is not relevant). It was your contention that “free will” which allows moral atrocities is “superior” to the state of affairs where no one is allowed to perform such atrocities, HOWEVER everyone is perfectly free in every other respect.

It is not that moral evil is preferable to its lack. It’s that moral good is preferable to its lack, and that moral good, as we’ve said already, requires choice. The fact that choice requires the possibility that some people not choose the most good option is simply a consequence.

Again, the question is: “why would the morally good choice be preferred”? That is what I have been asking.

 

[Iron_Donkey]

Again, the question is: “why would the morally good choice be preferred”? That is what I have been asking.

In short, because its presence is better than its lack. I think we may have just run into a brick wall though. Let me see if I can summarize (I apologize if I am simplifying your positions, but this is the core of what I’ve picked up. I am open to correction on your views, obviously):

Your position seems to be more or less that everything is material, and that the goodness of choices is judged solely by how well their effects (or possibly intended effects - we didn’t get into that and there’s really no reason to now, but in any case on exterior grounds) advance life. Thus you see free will as little more than adding the possibility of doing evil and messing things up. If such were the case, I would agree with you, but:

My problems with this position are 1) that I don’t believe that the world is purely material, but that while I am willing to entertain the idea that it is for the sake of argument under such assumption I 2) don’t see any real reason to consider anything to be either good or bad in any morally binding sense. So under the assumption of materialism, I tend to think that choice (while probably impossible) is completely irrelevant as there is no meaningful way to say what is good and what is not.

That is, I agree with Bertrand Russell that in a materialistic world, “only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair can the soul’s habitation be safely built,” however I think it quiet clear that nothing can actually be built on the foundation of unyielding despair and I think that any attempts to do so are doomed to fail. Philosophy, ethics, good and bad, etc mean nothing at all.

My basic position is that the world is not merely material, but the creation of a Designer, and that how good anything is is measured by how well it agrees with His design. Therefore, I consider ideas to be good insofar as they are true, decisions to be good insofar as they would good to act on (more or less), and fantasies to be good insofar as they are lawful - whether or not they have any noticeable external manifestation at all.

I therefore see the possibility of choice as the ability for creatures to create (sort of create anyway, but I don’t think details on this are terribly important to us at this moment) good and add it to the universe, and this ability is good in itself.

Thus, I see a world without choice as merely having the good of its physical components following their designs (whether this include the promotion of life as it appears to in our universe, or the destruction of absolutely everything which, curiously, also appears to be the case in our universe). But I see the world with choice as having that good and also this other good.

Now, unfortunately this other good has the side effect of allowing people to work against the design, but they tend to lose.

Your problems with this are, of course, that you disagree with the basic non-materialistic world view, and that you don’t seem to accept a non-utilitarian idea of good. (And possibly others, but those are the main ones I saw.)

 

[Trurl]

In short, because its presence is better than its lack.

The “lack” needs to be specified. I would agree that the “morally evil” is worse than “morally good”, but I reject that “morally good” is better than “morally neutral” because I see no argument why “morally good” - which is also “physically good” should be preferred. The point is that the moral aspect simply does not add anything to the “physical” good. This is what the “hospital” example was supposed to show. Whether the doctors and the nurses “choose” to as as good professionals as they can be, or they are unable to be less than perfect professionals because they are “forced or created” to be good, does not change the “physically good” aspect of their behavior or their performance. I wish to emphasize that apart from this “kind of restriction” the personnel is as free as they can be.

I think we may have just run into a brick wall though.

Seems so, for sure. But at least it is a friendly disagreement.

Your position seems to be more or less that everything is material, and that the goodness of choices is judged solely by how well their effects (or possibly intended effects - we didn’t get into that and there’s really no reason to now, but in any case on exterior grounds) advance life. Thus you see free will as little more than adding the possibility of doing evil and messing things up. If such were the case, I would agree with you…

Almost 100% agreed. The only difference is that “free will” NEVER means absolute freedom. We are NOT free to do a lot of things, either “good” or “bad”. As such the question arises: "just how much freedom" should there be? Don’t forget that “more” is not necessarily “better” and “less” is not ncessarily “worse”. There is always an optimal arrangement between the extremes. If I look at the “greater picture” and look at God as the designer and creator (or constructor), there is a simple line of thought:

1. God needs to be considered a rational being.
2. God had some “goal” in mind for the creation.

Now a creator (or constructor) can choose several “implementation methods”.

1. Fully deterministic model. The “created” product performs exactly as planned, no deviation is allowed from the “blueprint”. (A simplistic analogy: a car which can never veer off the road.)
2. Partially free, partially deterministic model. The freedom is limited, in that it cannot destroy the creation, but the constructor does not have to micro-manage every little detail. The creation will work “pretty much” as the creator intended, however there might be some minor discrepancies from the “blueprint”, but the discrepancies are carefully “allowed” not to destory the whole creation. (Analogy: a car which can choose to get off the road if there is a compelling reason, but can NEVER drive into a crevasse).
3. Highly free, somewhat determined model (what we see as our reality). We do not have absolute freedom, but we have FAR TOO MUCH freedom to do harm, and FAR TOO LITTLE freedom to to do good. The freedom allowed is capable to “thwart” the creator’s plans - whatever they might have been (if any!). (Analogy: a car which can do whatever it damn well pleases - crash into another one, drive across the cliff, though it cannot fly up in the air).

Obviously the best option is number 2), followed by number 1). Number 3) is only allowed if the creator does not care at all about the fate of the creation. If this conversation would be about any other constructor / creator, there would be an agreement. Bur when it comes to God, there is this knee-jerk reaction from the believers, because they are scared to “criticize” God.

And that is the number one problem. I can come over to your side and incorporate God into my framework, and see where that leads. The believers, however are unable to be objective and conemplate: “well, maybe God is not so good, or perfect”. That is a mental block that I have never seen a believer to conquer. Obviously, since that would be a major, mortal sin.

My basic position is that the world is not merely material, but the creation of a Designer, and that how good anything is is measured by how well it agrees with His design.

That is exactly the kind of framework I was employing in the preceding paragraph. Looking at the actual state of affairs, there can be two assessments:

1. either the world is exactly as God planned, or
2. God allowed the control to slip, because he chose model number 3.

And I am not sure which is worse.

But I see the world with choice as having that good and also this other good.

This brings up the same question: Where is the balance? Does the moral good MORE THAN OUTWEIGH the moral bad? Of even is there is one flyspeck’s worth of moral good opposed by a tsunami’s size of moral bad, was it still “worth it”? You cannot escape the measurement. The physical sum of “moral good” + “moral bad” can be negative (and I assert that it is), but the “morally neutral” is always “good” on the physical side.

 

[zro_x]

Obviously the best option is number 2), followed by number 1). Number 3) is only allowed if the creator does not care at all about the fate of the creation. If this conversation would be about any other constructor / creator, there would be an agreement. Bur when it comes to God, there is this knee-jerk reaction from the believers, because they are scared to “criticize” God.

And that is the number one problem. I can come over to your side and incorporate God into my framework, and see where that leads. The believers, however are unable to be objective and conemplate: “well, maybe God is not so good, or perfect”. That is a mental block that I have never seen a believer to conquer. Obviously, since that would be a major, mortal sin.

All right, I’ll come over to your side to the extent to which you have come over to ours. I’ll suppose that God isn’t perfect and see where that leads.

If God isn’t perfect as good as it seems, That would be a horrible scenario indeed. it would mean that God is prone to weakness and vice, and if we are still assuming that God is omnipotent, his less-than-omni bonevolence combined with his omnipotence might mean terrible things for us. The trinity would likely break down, because complete and total love would not exist between the three persons. Jesus probably would not die on the cross for our sins, and we could be sentenced to a place of fiery torture before we even die, if we would not comply with his arbitrary demands.

Would it be a moral good to worship such a God?

one may see an objective good in rejecting and rebelling against such a God in principle, but remember that a successful rebellion is impossible against an omnipotent God. (Perhaps this is one of the better ways to see the usual tri-omni God from the perspective of the souls and demons in hell. Forever futilily rebelling against an omnipotent dictator.)

in short, such a world might be even worse then a world with no God at all.

Or perhaps you were just considering a God that is just so imperfect that he mistakenly gives us free will, when a better action would be to make a universe with limited free will. Such a God would be consistent with the observations of the physical world, and is within the realm of logical possibility. Perhaps Christians falsely ascribe to God his usual tri-omni description, out of awe or fear.

I think that such a God is much less logically possible, and makes much less intuitive sense. If God exists, he probably has necessary existence and transcendence. It is easy to draw the line from a necessary, transcendent God to a God that is perfect in every respect. A necessary being is one that probably embodies love, goodness, etc. to their maximum extent. If God exists in this manner, I would be surprised, and I may conclude that he is unworthy of worship because of his weaknesses.

How was that? did I conquer my “mental block”?

You can assert that we religious believe in God for the personal emotional benefits of Having an endless life and/or heavenly father, or to see order in a world governed by chance. That is probably true to a small degree in all of us, and certainly true to a large degree in some of us. However, atheists are just as capable of deluding themselves as Theists are. If we delude ourselves into thinking that there is a god in order to avoid the inevitability of death and random chance, then the atheist deludes himself into believing that there isn’t in order to avoid the consequenses of his sin. Both sides can have personal reasons from running from the other.

 

[Trurl]

All right, I’ll come over to your side to the extent to which you have come over to ours. I’ll suppose that God isn’t perfect and see where that leads.

Thank you very much. These attempts to reach across the “abyss” can be very beneficial for mutual understanding.

If God isn’t perfect as good as it seems, That would be a horrible scenario indeed. it would mean that God is prone to weakness and vice, and if we are still assuming that God is omnipotent, his less-than-omni bonevolence combined with his omnipotence might mean terrible things for us. The trinity would likely break down, because complete and total love would not exist between the three persons. Jesus probably would not die on the cross for our sins, and we could be sentenced to a place of fiery torture before we even die, if we would not comply with his arbitrary demands.

Would it be a moral good to worship such a God?

one may see an objective good in rejecting and rebelling against such a God in principle, but remember that a successful rebellion is impossible against an omnipotent God. (Perhaps this is one of the better ways to see the usual tri-omni God from the perspective of the souls and demons in hell. Forever futilily rebelling against an omnipotent dictator.)

in short, such a world might be even worse then a world with no God at all.

Agreed.

Or perhaps you were just considering a God that is just so imperfect that he mistakenly gives us free will, when a better action would be to make a universe with limited free will. Such a God would be consistent with the observations of the physical world, and is within the realm of logical possibility. Perhaps Christians falsely ascribe to God his usual tri-omni description, out of awe or fear.

Yes, a good start. According to Rabbi Kuschner’s analysis in his wonderful book of “When bad things hapen to good people” - God can be omniscient and omnibenevolent, but not omnipotent. God is evolving and trying to fix the problems, but the final success is still way in the future. One may or may not agree with with this analysis, but at least it is logically consistent, and does not contradict the observable reality.

I think that such a God is much less logically possible, and makes much less intuitive sense.

Now the fun begins.

If God exists, he probably has necessary existence and transcendence. It is easy to draw the line from a necessary, transcendent God to a God that is perfect in every respect.

Nope, this is where we disagree. If one stipulates God as the ultimate creator, there is only ONE feature that follows in a logical manner: “God is so powerful, that he could create the universe”. Nothing else follows logically. The creator could be loving and caring, but could also be indifferent, and could even be malevolent. From the existence of power literally NOTHING follows. And the concept of “perfect in every respect” is simply undefined.

A necessary being is one that probably embodies love, goodness, etc. to their maximum extent. If God exists in this manner, I would be surprised, and I may conclude that he is unworthy of worship because of his weaknesses.

Well, the concept of “necessary existence” is verbal trickery, if you wish we could go deeper into analyzing it. The other part: “perfect in every respect” is filled with problems, also we could go an analyze it deeper. (Just a short criticism: the concept of “maximally perfect” is subjective.)

How was that? did I conquer my “mental block”?

You did very well, thank you for the time and effort. There is ground for continuation.

You can assert that we religious believe in God for the personal emotional benefits of Having an endless life and/or heavenly father, or to see order in a world governed by chance. That is probably true to a small degree in all of us, and certainly true to a large degree in some of us.

Yes, and don’t forget the enormous effect of having been exposed to the idea in the formative years, when the children have absolutely no critical thinking yet, and they accept almost everything they are told. This has a much more profound effect than a “hope”. Just remember that children follow the religion of their parents.

However, atheists are just as capable of deluding themselves as Theists are.

No doubt. No one has dibs on being irrational sometimes.

If we delude ourselves into thinking that there is a god in order to avoid the inevitability of death and random chance, then the atheist deludes himself into believing that there isn’t in order to avoid the consequenses of his sin. Both sides can have personal reasons from running from the other.

A correction is in order: atheist do not even believe in “sin”. A huge portion of what is considered “sinful” coincides with “criminal” and most people (both theists and atheists) avoid those.

But another huge portion of what is considered “sinful” is seen as perfectly normal behavior, and there is nothing wrong with it. So the atheist’s lack of belief does not come from “rationalizing their own sinful behavior”, it comes from the genuine belief that there is simply no God “out there”. This is why you see many “demands” for God to “show his face”. If atheists would secretly believe that they are sinful, why would they ask for God to manifest himself and have their own nose “rubbed” into their own… ahem…whatchamacallit ?

 

[zro_x]

This brings up the same question: Where is the balance? Does the moral good MORE THAN OUTWEIGH the moral bad? Of even is there is one flyspeck’s worth of moral good opposed by a tsunami’s size of moral bad, was it still “worth it”? You cannot escape the measurement. The physical sum of “moral good” + “moral bad” can be negative (and I assert that it is), but the “morally neutral” is always “good” on the physical side.

I’m going to try and tackle this from a utilitarian perspective. First of all, I think that your assessment of the physical sum of moral good and moral bad is too pessimistic, but let’s assume for now that it is negative.

Being omnibonevolent, God wants to bring out the greatest possible good, good being defined as happiness and joy. If physical happiness were the only type of happiness God is concerned with, then you’re right; Choosing world number three is an irresponsible move. However, physical happiness is not the only type of happiness there is. Spiritual happiness also plays an important roll in God’s calculations. Spiritual happiness may or may not play a role in our Earthly happiness, but it certainly plays a role in our life after death. At that point, it becomes the only type of happiness we have. When God wieghs each person’s overall happiness, our spiritual happiness matters literally infinately more than our earthly happiness, since we spend eternity in our life after death, and a finite time on earth. God’s first priority, then, is to maximise our spiritual happiness. Apparently, our spiritual happiness and joy is maximised when we reach a state of agape love. You might object to this, but if nothing else, one can not deny that there is no logical contradiction in this claim. Though it may be difficult to immagine, it is still plausible. One of the necessary ingredients of agape love is that it be freely excercised, which means free will. A necessary consequence of free will is that people are free to choose to reject God. in order to reject God, there must be some possibility to carry out a rebellious, damaging act. Thus, Earth, the arena in which people choose to either accept God or reject him. After we die, perhaps we will see how trivial all our pains on earth really were. Of course an objection can be made that Hell signifies negative spiritual happiness, but some thologians claim that the joys of heaven far outweigh the sorrows of Hell.

This is why the Greater Good defense and the Free will defense are two sides of the same coin, and are not two completely different ball games.

 

[zro_x]

Thank you very much. These attempts to reach across the “abyss” can be very beneficial for mutual understanding.

Something that should be mentioned is that I agreed to reach across the aisle on your terms. a true converse of your statement would be something along these lines:

And that is the number one problem. I can come over to your side and incorporate certain aspects of atheism into my framework, and see where that leads. Atheists, however are unable to be objective.

Many theists* are *able to consider the atheistic perspective, and see where it leads. For example:

IF the universe were 100% physical, then everything anyone ever did and all events since the big bang were completely governed by physics. Every time you think that you are thinking or feeling or choosing, it’s just inevitable and unchangeable movements of atoms in your brain. ON EVERY LEVEL. You would be a “meat computer”.

whether or not this argument is valid, it is still shows that we have the ability to consider things from more than one angle.

Nope, this is where we disagree. If one stipulates God as the ultimate creator, there is only ONE feature that follows in a logical manner: “God is so powerful, that he could create the universe”. Nothing else follows logically. The creator could be loving and caring, but could also be indifferent, and could even be malevolent. From the existence of power literally NOTHING follows. And the concept of “perfect in every respect” is simply undefined.

I did not mean to argue that a tri-omni God necessarily follows from necessary existence. merely that the necessary existence of god combined with tri-omni qualities makes an intuitive sort of sense. (Though perhaps it does follow logically? I touch on this later in the post)

Well, the concept of “necessary existence” is verbal trickery, if you wish we could go deeper into analyzing it.

I’m not sure what you mean by verbal trickery. When I say that God necessarily exists, I mean that it is logically impossible for God to not exist, in the same way that it is logically impossible for a circle to have corners.

The other part: “perfect in every respect” is filled with problems, also we could go an analyze it deeper. (Just a short criticism: the concept of “maximally perfect” is subjective.)

you’re right. I’m sorry for the ambiguity. To clarify without going into too many details(it’s getting late), a necessary God must be “stable” and a tri-omni God is one of the most stable possible Gods that I can think of.

Yes, and don’t forget the enormous effect of having been exposed to the idea in the formative years, when the children have absolutely no critical thinking yet, and they accept almost everything they are told. This has a much more profound effect than a “hope”. Just remember that children follow the religion of their parents.

and of course, this is also true for atheists, is it not?

A correction is in order: atheist do not even believe in “sin”. A huge portion of what is considered “sinful” coincides with “criminal” and most people (both theists and atheists) avoid those.

Just as no one has a monopoly on irrationality, no one has a monopoly on rationality either. though ultimately only one of the two view can be true, there are rational people on both sides that are genuinely trying to seek the truth. There are are religious people who are not religious simply because of the emotional benefits and because they were raised that way as children. Some are religious because the evidence or philosophical arguments they are aware of seem to point to God. Likewise, there are atheists who are atheists because they don’t want a God with a lot of rules to ruin all their fun.

But another huge portion of what is considered “sinful” is seen as perfectly normal behavior, and there is nothing wrong with it.

In some cases, yes, but I get the feeling that there are some things considered perfectly normal behavior, which you think are perfectly fine, yet are actually sinful.

So the atheist’s lack of belief does not come from “rationalizing their own sinful behavior”, it comes from the genuine belief that there is simply no God “out there”.

true only for the rational atheist. Not true for the atheists that aren’t.

This is why you see many “demands” for God to “show his face”. If atheists would secretly believe that they are sinful, why would they ask for God to manifest himself and have their own nose “rubbed” into their own… ahem…whatchamacallit ?

I don’t think that a lot of atheists really know what they are asking for. I’m going to give you a challenge roughly equivelent to the one one you gave out. How would you react if God’s existence was epirically or philosophically proven irrefutably tommorow? Suppose that a message stating “God exists” is etched into test tube glass every time two particular chemicals are mixed, other than that, the world continues on as normal. What would be the consequences around the world and within your own mind?

 

[Linux]

Who cares about "love…

You evidently don’t.

 

[Trurl]

I’m going to try and tackle this from a utilitarian perspective. First of all, I think that your assessment of the physical sum of moral good and moral bad is too pessimistic, but let’s assume for now that it is negative.

Being omnibonevolent, God wants to bring out the greatest possible good, good being defined as happiness and joy. If physical happiness were the only type of happiness God is concerned with, then you’re right; Choosing world number three is an irresponsible move. However, physical happiness is not the only type of happiness there is. Spiritual happiness also plays an important roll in God’s calculations.

Unfortunately I am unable to reply, since I have no idea what this “spiritual happiness” might be.

Spiritual happiness may or may not play a role in our Earthly happiness, but it certainly plays a role in our life after death. At that point, it becomes the only type of happiness we have. When God wieghs each person’s overall happiness, our spiritual happiness matters literally infinately more than our earthly happiness, since we spend eternity in our life after death, and a finite time on earth. God’s first priority, then, is to maximise our spiritual happiness. Apparently, our spiritual happiness and joy is maximised when we reach a state of agape love. You might object to this, but if nothing else, one can not deny that there is no logical contradiction in this claim.

I cannot find out if there is a contradiction or not, since the whole proposition is without meaning for me.

Though it may be difficult to immagine, it is still plausible. One of the necessary ingredients of agape love is that it be freely excercised, which means free will. A necessary consequence of free will is that people are free to choose to reject God. in order to reject God, there must be some possibility to carry out a rebellious, damaging act. Thus, Earth, the arena in which people choose to either accept God or reject him.

The logical problem here is that from the existence of free will it does not follow logically that there will be anyone who actually rejects God. Sure, the ability and the possibility follows logically, but the actuality does not. In other words, there are infinitely many possible worlds and in infinitely many of them EVERYONE accepts God, and NO ONE rejects him. And since God is free to actualize any one of them… you draw the conclusion.

After we die, perhaps we will see how trivial all our pains on earth really were. Of course an objection can be made that Hell signifies negative spiritual happiness, but some thologians claim that the joys of heaven far outweigh the sorrows of Hell.

Oh… it is easy to endure someone else’s misfortune.

This is why the Greater Good defense and the Free will defense are two sides of the same coin, and are not two completely different ball games.

Only in one sense they are equal: they are equally incorrect.

 

[Trurl]

And that is the number one problem. I can come over to your side and incorporate certain aspects of atheism into my framework, and see where that leads. Atheists, however are unable to be objective.

That is a pretty serious accusation.

I did not mean to argue that a tri-omni God necessarily follows from necessary existence. merely that the necessary existence of god combined with tri-omni qualities makes an intuitive sort of sense.

But the tri-omni qualitiy is the one which is contended. So you cannot present it as an “axiom”.

I’m not sure what you mean by verbal trickery. When I say that God necessarily exists, I mean that it is logically impossible for God to not exist, in the same way that it is logically impossible for a circle to have corners.

This is far from evident. How do you plan to prove it?

and of course, this is also true for atheists, is it not?

Certainly.

There are are religious people who are not religious simply because of the emotional benefits and because they were raised that way as children. Some are religious because the evidence or philosophical arguments they are aware of seem to point to God.

I am sure there are.

true only for the rational atheist. Not true for the atheists that aren’t.

Why would we be concerned about irrational people?

I don’t think that a lot of atheists really know what they are asking for. I’m going to give you a challenge roughly equivelent to the one one you gave out. How would you react if God’s existence was epirically or philosophically proven irrefutably tommorow? Suppose that a message stating “God exists” is etched into test tube glass every time two particular chemicals are mixed, other than that, the world continues on as normal. What would be the consequences around the world and within your own mind?

Excellent challenge. I will have to give you more than one answer, since God’s attributes are notoriously ill-defined. I mean, if I ask ten theists about the attributes of God, I will get (at least) eleven answers (and all of them are honestly given).

Of course I cannot answer for the world, but I can answer for myself.

Answer number 1: Suppose that God is like the one I imagine him: someone who created the world, and then observes it without ever interfering. He knows that any interference ruins or contaminates the experiment. Obviously in this case my behavior would not change at all.

Answer number 2: Suppose that God is like the “relatively liberal” christians assert: someone who usually does not interfere, only in dire circumstances, who expects people to be decent, kind, loving, helping… and when someone fulfills these requirements, then will be rewarded. The fate of those who do not, is usually not mentioned. But these apologists cannot reconcile infinite torture with finite “misdeeds”. In this case, again, I would not change a bit. I already try to be as “good” as I can, so there is nothing to be afraid.

Answer number 3: Suppose that God is like the die-hard super-orthodox people assert. Then I would be in real trouble. First, I could try to fake a change of heart, could try to engage in “worshipping” practices, but God would know that I am dishonest, and simply try to avoid infinite torture. As such these attempts would be futile - one cannot outsmart God. Of course the God - as depicted by these apologists - is the most horrible, despicable being ever invented, not just infinitely cruel, but also wishes to bask in the light of his own “goodness” - as all the tyrants did across the ages. Fortunately, this scenario is impossible. The concept of this ultra-hard God is filled with internal contradictions (I will mention only one here: justice and mercy are contradictory. A judge can be either merciful or just when issuing a sentence, but cannot be both), so he is as impossible to exist as a married bachelor.