Answering Atheists

[paarsurrey]

Luke is one of those 4 gospels, correct?

Well, here's what Luke has to say:

Luke
Introduction
1 Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, 2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3 With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.



In other words, Luke himself was not an eyewitness. He says so himself.

Let me know if you have anything else to offer... thats just as invalid.
Thx.

I agree with one.
None of the 4 Gospels was an eye-witness of the event of Crucifixion, please.
Paul and the Pauline-Church had the mission, I understand, to deviate the simple minded followers of Jesus from the Path Jesus followed. Right?

Regards

 

[Scoop]

One of the Atheists argument is as follows :-

1. If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect.
2. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil.
3. If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists.
4. If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil.
5. Evil exists.
6. If evil exists and God exists, then either God doesn’t have the power to eliminate all evil, or doesn’t know when evil exists, or doesn’t have the desire to eliminate all evil.
7. Therefore, God doesn’t exist.

Is this the correct argument? I heard it before, but some of this sounds a bit strange.
However, the gist is somewhere in there.

Why can God not exist (as a morally perfect entity, who is all powerful, all knowing and all wise), where evil exists, although God knows when evil existed, and although God wants to do something about it?
The argument is not a sound one.

Romans chapter 8 verses 20 and 21 says this... "For the creation was subjected to futility, not by its own will, but through the one who subjected it, on the basis of hope that the creation itself will also be set free from enslavement to corruption and have the glorious freedom of the children of God."

Allowing suffering for a permanently lasting freedom from corruption, seems pretty moral to me.
How can that not be moral?
It would actually be evidence too of one who is all knowing, all wise and all powerful. Isn't it?

Okay, I see your point. Let's go through this step by step. Is God capable of preventing human suffering?

 

[Sheldon]

How can that not be moral?

Hypothetically, if an omnipotent, and omniscient deity existed it would have limitless choice, if it was also claimed to be omnibenevolent or possessed limitless mercy, then it would be inconsistent to imagine it would allow, let alone create, a world with ubiquitous suffering.

One has only to take a cursory look at the suffering caused by disease and predation, and imagine a being designed and created that, and had limitless choice to create any world it wanted to. I'm glad I don't believe such a deity exists, as it could only be a barbaric and sadistic being, and much of the bible depicts just such a deity.

Though this argument from evil was addressed by Epicurus long before humans created the Christian religion. It of course applies only to a very specific type of deity.

 

[rational experiences]

When men just think they ignore their body presence.

Looking back first claiming thought shifted time. To where bodily no human is.

God as a topic became a review consciousness of a human the man.

Who acts as if he is not embodied instead just of spirit. Lied. Science of man theists who built his science machine.

Machine science life's destroyer.

At his side instead of a female human life partnership. Man built science the machine.

Proved his lies. Machine at his side sacrificed hurt life by causes.

Father mother human never was his life.

Sperm ovary. Little cells. Life of any human today beginnings.

Father mother two separate lives.

Sex O ovary created two babies.

We became as brother sister new adults. We were life paired.

Parent died.

Man's conscious identity direct as baby back to his human mother O ovary.

Now his father was life recorded spiritually as he lived life. Recorded voice image in gods status.

His identity of self man adult God his father. Atmosphere recording only.

So he has a relationship sexual with his sister. Sex impregnates her body.

Who does he sexually identify with?

The new man baby? No...the adult memory.....

God the father man life in heavens. Just a spirit record.

Why he lied when he said God the father conceived a human baby in his mother's sisters womb. Magically.

As the bible inferred his father had sex with his sister. As God inferred reasonings. Why it is not real. As he is self possessed by the heavens state.

What you ignore as a natural human science is the only liar. The theist.

Creation theorising by living self owned is just humans. Not gods.

Now if you say God only owns in human life the highest greatest God states. It would only be two of. Oxygenated water.

Nature garden tree of life oxygen of water. Atmospheric. Gods heavens supporting natural humans.

The human owned two greatest states of God. The human is living is the theist bible creation science themes.

By theme O earth and it's pre owned god heavens....is not man's heavens the hierarchy in creation ownership all things was with God.

So if you care to reason by natural human self identity first. The God father human life recording occurs by a state that only the heavens body owned.

Is not owned by the human body.

Referencing God the father by theme in science is one hundred percent fake.

As father lived as a human man first with God having his life living recorded.

When he died he then became just a heavenly memory as the father.

Science hence said in living bio life the human scientist is only allowed to claim an ape is the closest body. Not God the father memory.

Why modern human theists state I am the most correct by human science status yet your status is human chosen.

So the natural human says to science as the highest correct human. I am only human and it is about time you accept presence only and not egotism.

Was the natural human science taught observation a human living with their nature.

Once was the only correct and advised human science story.

A human baby man never owned a theory how a human was created by an inferred human science theory.

 

[ecco]

One of the Atheists argument is as follows :-

1. If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect.
2. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil.
3. If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists.
4. If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil.
5. Evil exists.
6. If evil exists and God exists, then either God doesn’t have the power to eliminate all evil, or doesn’t know when evil exists, or doesn’t have the desire to eliminate all evil.
7. Therefore, God doesn’t exist.

Is this the correct argument?

Can you show which atheist uses this "argument"? It sounds more like a Christian strawman.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Can you show which atheist uses this "argument"? It sounds more like a Christian strawman.

It is an attempt to reproduce the refutation of God using the problem of Evil argument. New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman who began as an evangelical Christian became a general theist due to studying the Bible seriously. He learned the languages and intensely studied the New Testament and the history of that time. Later he became an agnostic atheist due to the Problem of Evil argument.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

One of the Atheists argument is as follows :-

1. If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect.
2. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil.
3. If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists.
4. If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil.
5. Evil exists.
6. If evil exists and God exists, then either God doesn’t have the power to eliminate all evil, or doesn’t know when evil exists, or doesn’t have the desire to eliminate all evil.
7. Therefore, God doesn’t exist.

Is this the correct argument? I heard it before, but some of this sounds a bit strange. However, the gist is somewhere in there.

That's close to the argument, but it doesn't include line 1. Just drop the first line and start with line 2. The ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus framed it thusly:

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?"​

These are arguments that if a god exists, it isn't omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent.

Here's a more modern formulation of the same argument from Sam Harris that looks a lot like your line 6. Notice that neither of these quotes is an argument for atheism. They're arguments against the existence of a tri-omni god:

"Either God can do nothing to stop the catastrophes, or he doesn't care to, or he doesn't exist. God is either impotent, evil, or imaginary. Take your pick, and choose wisely."​

Allowing suffering for a permanently lasting freedom from corruption, seems pretty moral to me. How can that not be moral?

And this is a theodicy:

"Theodicy means vindication of God. It is to answer the question of why a good God permits the manifestation of evil, thus resolving the issue of the problem of evil. Some theodicies also address the evidential problem of evil by attempting to make the existence of an all-knowing, all-powerful and all-good or omnibenevolent God consistent with the existence of evil or suffering in the world."​

Here's an excellent example of the difference between critical thinking and faith-based thinking. The reason and evidence path looks at the problem of suffering to serve no apparent purpose, looks at the three statements, and declares them mutually exclusive and therefore logically impossible, just as a married bachelor is logically impossible because one can be either married or a bachelor, but not both at once in the same sense. And so, the critical thinker eliminates these possibilities from further consideration. There can be no tri-omni god in a world where there is so much grief and suffering.

But the faith-based thinker starts with the assumption that this impossible god exists, and tries to reconcile the suffering with the existence of the tri-omni god.

Yours is an example of Divine Command Theory, which posits that whatever the deity says or does is moral, and so, somehow, the coexistence of a tri-omni god and suffering is moral. Somehow, it's not gratuitous suffering - it's deserved, or it's constructive and salutary as you suggest. The danger here is coming to conclusions like yours that somehow, permitting suffering is good. Maybe you've seen Mother Teresa's take on that:

"There is something beautiful in seeing the poor accept their lot, to suffer it like Christ's Passion. The world gains much from their suffering." and "You are suffering like Christ on the cross. So Jesus must be kissing you."​

If you can't see the danger in that kind of thinking, recall that she headed a series of hospices, whose mission is ordinarily to ease suffering, not to praise it as a gift from God.

The only suffering that it is moral to cause or permit is for constructive purposes, like giving a child a vaccine, or going hungry to lose weight, or clipping your dog's nails if he hates it. Causing or allowing a child to acquire and die of leukemia is immoral.

This is from the call-in cable show The Atheist Experience:

"You either have a God who sends child rapists to rape children or you have a God who simply watches it and says, 'When you're done, I'm going to punish you' .. If I were in a situation where I could stop a person from raping a child, I would. That's the difference between me and your God." - Tracie Harris​

She thinks critically, and let's reason take her to it's inevitable conclusion - this god, if it exists, is immoral. Then the Christian caller says,

"True to life, you portray that little girl as someone who is innocent. She's just as evil as you."​

He did what the Bible writers did. If God did this to her, she had it coming. If man must walk the earth scrounging for a living, it's because he deserves it thanks to Eve. Noah's contemporaries were all evil except him and his family, so they deserved the flood. The denizens of Sodom and Gomorrah must have been evil if they went extinct. And this caller says the same thing - if his good God allows a child to be raped, it must have deserved it.

 

[nPeace]

Okay, I see your point. Let's go through this step by step. Is God capable of preventing human suffering?

The Bible tells us Yes.

Hypothetically, if an omnipotent, and omniscient deity existed it would have limitless choice, if it was also claimed to be omnibenevolent or possessed limitless mercy, then it would be inconsistent to imagine it would allow, let alone create, a world with ubiquitous suffering.

No. Not necessarily.
A foolish person has limitless choices within his limited abilities.
A wise person only has so many choices,,, unless he breaks the barrier of wisdom. Then he is not wise.

One has only to take a cursory look at the suffering caused by disease and predation, and imagine a being designed and created that, and had limitless choice to create any world it wanted to. I'm glad I don't believe such a deity exists, as it could only be a barbaric and sadistic being, and much of the bible depicts just such a deity.

You started with a wrong premise, so it's not surprising you would end with one.

Though this argument from evil was addressed by Epicurus long before humans created the Christian religion. It of course applies only to a very specific type of deity.

Like many ideas, Epicurus' is just one more.
Like the merchant that separates the good fruit from the bad, Epicurus' ideas can be categorized along with the other bad ideas.
Feel free to review it though. We can look at it together, if you like.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

...

No. Not necessarily.
A foolish person has limitless choices within his limited abilities.
A wise person only has so many choices,,, unless he breaks the barrier of wisdom. Then he is not wise.
...

Well, I don't believe in your kind of wise. So am I foolish?

 

[nPeace]

That's close to the argument, but it doesn't include line 1. Just drop the first line and start with line 2. The ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus framed it thusly:

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?"​

These are arguments that if a god exists, it isn't omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent.

Here's a more modern formulation of the same argument from Sam Harris that looks a lot like your line 6. Notice that neither of these quotes is an argument for atheism. They're arguments against the existence of a tri-omni god:

"Either God can do nothing to stop the catastrophes, or he doesn't care to, or he doesn't exist. God is either impotent, evil, or imaginary. Take your pick, and choose wisely."​

And this is a theodicy:

"Theodicy means vindication of God. It is to answer the question of why a good God permits the manifestation of evil, thus resolving the issue of the problem of evil. Some theodicies also address the evidential problem of evil by attempting to make the existence of an all-knowing, all-powerful and all-good or omnibenevolent God consistent with the existence of evil or suffering in the world."​

Here's an excellent example of the difference between critical thinking and faith-based thinking. The reason and evidence path looks at the problem of suffering to serve no apparent purpose, looks at the three statements, and declares them mutually exclusive and therefore logically impossible, just as a married bachelor is logically impossible because one can be either married or a bachelor, but not both at once in the same sense. And so, the critical thinker eliminates these possibilities from further consideration. There can be no tri-omni god in a world where there is so much grief and suffering.

But the faith-based thinker starts with the assumption that this impossible god exists, and tries to reconcile the suffering with the existence of the tri-omni god.

Yours is an example of Divine Command Theory, which posits that whatever the deity says or does is moral, and so, somehow, the coexistence of a tri-omni god and suffering is moral. Somehow, it's not gratuitous suffering - it's deserved, or it's constructive and salutary as you suggest. The danger here is coming to conclusions like yours that somehow, permitting suffering is good. Maybe you've seen Mother Teresa's take on that:

"There is something beautiful in seeing the poor accept their lot, to suffer it like Christ's Passion. The world gains much from their suffering." and "You are suffering like Christ on the cross. So Jesus must be kissing you."​

If you can't see the danger in that kind of thinking, recall that she headed a series of hospices, whose mission is ordinarily to ease suffering, not to praise it as a gift from God.

The only suffering that it is moral to cause or permit is for constructive purposes, like giving a child a vaccine, or going hungry to lose weight, or clipping your dog's nails if he hates it. Causing or allowing a child to acquire and die of leukemia is immoral.

This is from the call-in cable show The Atheist Experience:

"You either have a God who sends child rapists to rape children or you have a God who simply watches it and says, 'When you're done, I'm going to punish you' .. If I were in a situation where I could stop a person from raping a child, I would. That's the difference between me and your God." - Tracie Harris​

She thinks critically, and let's reason take her to it's inevitable conclusion - this god, if it exists, is immoral. Then the Christian caller says,

"True to life, you portray that little girl as someone who is innocent. She's just as evil as you."​

He did what the Bible writers did. If God did this to her, she had it coming. If man must walk the earth scrounging for a living, it's because he deserves it thanks to Eve. Noah's contemporaries were all evil except him and his family, so they deserved the flood. The denizens of Sodom and Gomorrah must have been evil if they went extinct. And this caller says the same thing - if his good God allows a child to be raped, it must have deserved it.

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?"

Is God both willing and able to prevent evil? Then why does he not do so?
What makes you think he is not doing so?
Is it wisdom to look at the runner in a race who is trailing several runners, and conclude that he is unable to cross the finish line ahead of all the runners? Then wisdom is not very virtuous.

We can commend all the persons that stop at line 3 (Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?), and takes a humble attitude, rather than prideful arrogance, and we do, because many have, and continue to ask the question.,, Is God both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? ...and they get the answer, which is quite satisfactory.

I hope Epicurus was one of those.

 

[nPeace]

Well, I don't believe in your kind of wise. So am I foolish?

What do you mean? Please elaborate.

 

[Sheldon]

No. Not necessarily.
A foolish person has limitless choices within his limited abilities.
A wise person only has so many choices,,, unless he breaks the barrier of wisdom. Then he is not wise.

I made no comment on human choices. My observations were on a hypothetical deity that is both omniscient and omnipotent and omnibenevolent? You seem yo be comparing that concept to fallible evolved mammals, which is silly.

You started with a wrong premise, so it's not surprising you would end with one.

You'd need to quote the premise, then explain why it's wrong, then explain why the conclusions is wrong. I can't really comment on bare denial.

Like many ideas, Epicurus' is just one more.

Indeed it is, but maybe it would more edifying if you commented on the idea, rather than making an obvious and therefore irrelevant claim?

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

What do you mean? Please elaborate.

I do wise differently than you since I am a global skeptic, so I do it in another tradition than you. But apparently you are directly connected to God, because you can judge all humans. I don't consider that wise and you do. So am I foolish?

 

[Sheldon]

We can commend all the persons that stop at line 3 (Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?), and takes a humble attitude, rather than prideful arrogance, and we do, because many have, and continue to ask the question.,, Is God both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? ...and they get the answer, which is quite satisfactory.

I hope Epicurus was one of those.

So much for the faux pretence of universal love, you seem to be revelling in the idea of another human being subjected to suffering, that's pretty sadistic.

Luckily there isn't a shred of objective evidence for any deity or any after life.

 

[nPeace]

I made no comment on human choices. My observations were on a hypothetical deity that is both omniscient and omnipotent and omnibenevolent? You seem yo be comparing that concept to fallible evolved mammals, which is silly.

Place the comment in the hypothetical, rather that separating and isolating it. Maybe then it will make sense.

You'd need to quote the premise, then explain why it's wrong, then explain why the conclusions is wrong. I can't really comment on bare denial.

Hypothetically, if an omnipotent, and omniscient deity existed it would have limitless choice
Wrong. I explained. Look at it a second time, see if you understand.
If you don't, I'll make it as elementary as possible.

Indeed it is, but maybe it would more edifying if you commented on the idea, rather than making an obvious and therefore irrelevant claim?

Like you, Epicurus assumed he has all the facts. You both don't. I pointed it out. God is all-wise.
God does not exclude his wisdom, to act powerfully.
They all work together, in harmony.

Like a skilled soccer player, who does not forget his ability to "dribble" the ball across field, just because he wants to take a shot at the goal bars. He would be off the team for being a nut.

 

[nPeace]

I do wise differently than you since I am a global skeptic, so I do it in another tradition than you. But apparently you are directly connected to God, because you can judge all humans. I don't consider that wise and you do. So am I foolish?

Since "wise" can be anything we want it to be, according to what you are saying here, I cannot answer your question, until I understand what wisdom is to you, because foolishness to you may actually be wisdom to someone else, and therefore, I would be talking a foreign language, if I said yes, you are foolish, or no, you are not foolish.

My point was, that one who is wise, acts wisely. Fullstop. Anything beyond that has no relevance to the statement... that I can see, at least.

 

[nPeace]

So much for the faux pretence of universal love, you seem to be revelling in the idea of another human being subjected to suffering, that's pretty sadistic.

Luckily there isn't a shred of objective evidence for any deity or any after life.

I don't know where you got that, or where you are forming these opinions from. They seem to be made in rivalry. No need for that.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Since "wise" can be anything we want it to be, according to what you are saying here, I cannot answer your question, until I understand what wisdom is to you, because foolishness to you may actually be wisdom to someone else, and therefore, I would be talking a foreign language, if I said yes, you are foolish, or no, you are not foolish.

My point was, that one who is wise, acts wisely. Fullstop. Anything beyond that has no relevance to the statement... that I can see, at least.

The wise to me is to admit the limits of human knowledge and that includes you, I and everybody else. But since you apparently don't accept that for you, but only everybody else, then we are doing wise differently.

 

[nPeace]

The wise to me is to admit the limits of human knowledge and that includes you, I and everybody else. But since you apparently don't accept that for you, but only everybody else, then we are doing wise differently.

...and where did you get that from?

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

...and where did you get that from?

I am a global skeptic. The wise thing to do in our tradition back to Socrates is to admit when we don't know.
And to understand that this applies to us all:
"Man is the measure of all things: of the things that are, that they are, of the things that are not, that they are not." Protagoras.
Measure is about good and bad and what matters and what doesn't.

So I don't know about good and bad, I state what I subjectively believe.