Gods responsibility

[Thief]

Yeah, it's clearly stated that humanity is the imago dei, not that God is in our image. I don't see how a statement that "God is in our image" can make any theological sense.

Reflection in mind and heart.
(not flesh)

 

[Thief]

The OP is a truly fascinating question.

The more I think about it, the more impossible it seems to give a straight answer.

Does the scientist know the consequences of free will? Does anybody?

To my mind free will is a positive, it is what makes life meaningful - but that is an opinion, not a knowledge claim. So I can only conclude the solution that has the most benefit - the most practical effect.

I would tell the robots that the responsibility is theirs, because an intelligent being of free will who BELIEVES that is more likely to take mitigating action. Taking responsibility for ones actions must at the very least improve the survivability of an intelligent species with free will.

Oh good!....we now move to consequence!

You get to spend the rest of eternity with everyone that thinks and feels just like you do.

How else to be fair?
How else to be happy?

The question then would be......can you be happy living with yourself?

 

[Thief]

A person's choice of religion is an expression of their values. Just as someone will use their political affiliation or even the choice of car they drive as an expression of who they are, people use religion the same way.

It's like the Prius: Toyota makes a hybrid Camry as well, but the Prius always outsells it. Why? It's not because the Prius is more practical, more fuel efficient, more reliable, or made by a better company; the Camry's the equal or better of the Prius in all those categories. It's because the Prius has a distinctive body style. If you drive a Prius, not only do you get the benefits of a hybrid car, but you also get much more recognition from others for the fact that you drive a hybrid.

I think that religion is often like that: it's just as much about being seen as holding particular beliefs as it is about actually holding them. In that respect, it makes perfect sense that people would choose a God that reflects what they want to express of themselves to the world.

I rather think the 'choice of religion' is a matter of territory.
Born there.....and the influence will be there.

Just try the switch in territories not so liberal.

For that matter...forsake your church and see how the social consequences come around.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I rather think the 'choice of religion' is a matter of territory.
Born there.....and the influence will be there.

Just try the switch in territories not so liberal.

For that matter...forsake your church and see how the social consequences come around.

That kinda speaks to the same point I was making. In that case, religious affiliation expresses that you're "part of the tribe". It's still expressing something about your identity to others. Maybe it's expressing a false facade, but it's still an expression.

 

[sojourner]

f a child dies of meningitis, and God is the first cause of all subsequent causes and their effects then God is responsible for that child’s death. It would be utterly absurd to say either the child is responsible for its own death or that the heartbroken parents were the cause.

That wasn't the argument of the OP. The OP never mentioned "design flaws that cause the demise of the robot." The OP mentioned the robot's actions.

It is the core definition!

No. it's not. It's one description around which one logical argument can be posed.

Well we don’t all derive our idea of a creator God from Genesis; it is a universal concept, a hypothesis that does not require any particular religious affiliation and is understood even by atheists.

Well it had to start somewhere! The description of God-as-creator came directly from the cry first words of Genesis: "In the beginning, God created..."

 

[Thief]

That kinda speaks to the same point I was making. In that case, religious affiliation expresses that you're "part of the tribe". It's still expressing something about your identity to others. Maybe it's expressing a false facade, but it's still an expression.

I might agree that religion is false.....and I have none...
and weekend participation is a false crutch....for sure.

But to say it is 'choice'....might be too much.

Tribal influence can be stiff.
Some people will cut your head off!

 

[sojourner]

A person's choice of religion is an expression of their values. Just as someone will use their political affiliation or even the choice of car they drive as an expression of who they are, people use religion the same way.

It's like the Prius: Toyota makes a hybrid Camry as well, but the Prius always outsells it. Why? It's not because the Prius is more practical, more fuel efficient, more reliable, or made by a better company; the Camry's the equal or better of the Prius in all those categories. It's because the Prius has a distinctive body style. If you drive a Prius, not only do you get the benefits of a hybrid car, but you also get much more recognition from others for the fact that you drive a hybrid.

I think that religion is often like that: it's just as much about being seen as holding particular beliefs as it is about actually holding them. In that respect, it makes perfect sense that people would choose a God that reflects what they want to express of themselves to the world.

I see what you're saying, although from a theological standpoint, it would seem that we choose what we want to express of ourselves based upon our concept of God.

 

[sojourner]

Reflection in mind and heart.
(not flesh)

Aaaaand... back to Plato and Aristotle we go...

"Bodies bad/mind good."

 

[Thief]

Aaaaand... back to Plato and Aristotle we go...

"Bodies bad/mind good."

When I read it....the formation of Man was a good thing.

That we can be a disappointment.......ooops!

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

That wasn't the argument of the OP. The OP never mentioned "design flaws that cause the demise of the robot." The OP mentioned the robot's actions.

The robot's actions are a consequence of its design.

... or its use, but in this case, the "user" was designed by the same person.

 

[Thief]

The robot's actions are a consequence of its design.

... or its use, but in this case, the "user" was designed by the same person.

Don't believe in freewill?
(but you will post again.....you can't stop your program....can you?)

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Don't believe in freewill?
(but you will post again.....you can't stop your program....can you?)

I think free will is irrelevant here. If a person's behaviour can be foreseen, then the person who enables that behaviour shares in the responsibility for it whether the person committing the act has free will or not.

 

[sojourner]

I think free will is irrelevant here. If a person's behaviour can be foreseen, then the person who enables that behaviour shares in the responsibility for it whether the person committing the act has free will or not.

That stance necessitates God to be closely involved in human affairs. That's one theological stance, but it's not the only one.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

That stance necessitates God to be closely involved in human affairs. That's one theological stance, but it's not the only one.

No, it doesn't. It just requires that whether God decides to be involved in human affairs or not, he made this decision deliberately with full foreknowledge of the consequences.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Well, what is the question, then? The question that was asked is;

Is that the robots fault or the scientist who let it loose on the world?

My point was, it depends on the attributes of the scientist...and then I asked is the scientists omni-benevolent, which is a question that one would need answered if one is answering a question regarding morality.

But this doesn't matter for responsibility. The scientist caused the deaths of those people by building the murderous robot. The only way that the scientist's character enters into the question is in deciding whether the scenario is logically coherent: in the scenario, the scientist DID commit an evil act, so if we try to slap the assumption on that the scientist is also good, we'll have a logical disconnect somewhere: either our assumption of goodness is wrong or the facts of what happened must be different than was given.

When we're deciding whether a person is responsible for an act, the question "is he a good person?" is irrelevant.

Well, then on that same note, if morality is subjective and even if neither God nor the scientist are omnibenevolent, they are both "justified" in committing any action that they want, just like the robot is.

... but I would still be justified in calling them evil, just as much as I'm justified in calling something ugly. The fact that someone else might find it beautiful wouldn't undermine my position at all.

Not at all. I believe that God is omnibenevolent based on what I believe are good arguments for the case.

IOW, you have a standard external to God that you measure God against.

If God omnibenevolent, then his actions would reflect his character.

Right. And in the OP, the actions are not in question: the scientist knowingly created a killing machine. These actions are not the actions of an "omnibenevolent" person, so we can conclude that this scientist is not omnibenevolent.

Yes, because I believe that we have this thing called "free will", and when you exercise your free will to commit any given act, you are responsible, whether good or bad.

As I've said many times, responsibility is not a zero-sum game. A hit man is entirely responsible for his crimes, but so is the person who hired him, even considering the hit man's free will.

Makes no sense. God cannot guarantee that people will always make the right decisions with the free will that they are given. He is just by instilling every human being with the acknowledgement of right and wrong, and he is equally just by making people answer for the bad choices that they make.

So your God is not omnipotent.

Seeing how I predict the behaviour of entities with free will for a living (I do traffic engineering and transportation planning), you're not going to be able to convince me that this can't be done.

 

[mystic64]

No, it doesn't. It just requires that whether God decides to be involved in human affairs or not, he made this decision deliberately with full foreknowledge of the consequences.

"he made this decision deliberately with full foreknowledge of the consequences."

9-10ths_Penguin, "How can you know that?" "Do you and God hang out together and He told you this?" Basically what you are saying is that God created Adam and Eve knowing full will that they were going to sin so that He could kill millions of living things? God started the Noah experiment knowing full well that it would not work? Christian scripture is full of examples of Humankind disappointing God. Did God create Humankind so the He could be constantly disappointed?

God could not have had full knowledge of the consequences of His actions. God created a man to take care of God's garden. From there all heck slowly broke loose and went down hill. It wasn't God's fault and there is no way that He could have foreseen what happened .

If what you are saying, "that God knew full well of the consequences." then what you are saying is that God is a profoundly powerful force that Humankind needs to find a way to protect itself from. If what you are saying is true, then we are up against a God that is dangerous and a God that created us solely so that He could have an excuse to be disappointed and wrathful and destructive.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

"he made this decision deliberately with full foreknowledge of the consequences."

9-10ths_Penguin, "How can you know that?" "Do you and God hang out together and He told you this?"

No, I'm basing this on the assumptions of God's nature built into certain mainstream religious beliefs. If you don't believe in them, then what I say doesn't apply for you.

Basically what you are saying is that God created Adam and Eve knowing full will that they were going to sin so that He could kill millions of living things? God started the Noah experiment knowing full well that it would not work? Christian scripture is full of examples of Humankind disappointing God. Did God create Humankind so the He could be constantly disappointed?

That's the implication of an omnipotent and omniscient God. Such a God could never be surprised by an outcome or be forced into a particular choice. There can be no such thing as an unintended consequence for a truly almighty God.

God could not have had full knowledge of the consequences of His actions. God created a man to take care of God's garden. From there all heck slowly broke loose and went down hill. It wasn't God's fault and there is no way that He could have foreseen what happened .

So your God is not omniscient? Fair enough - there's no particular reason why a god *must* be omniscient.

If what you are saying, "that God knew full well of the consequences." then what you are saying is that God is a profoundly powerful force that Humankind needs to find a way to protect itself from. If what you are saying is true, then we are up against a God that is dangerous and a God that created us solely so that He could have an excuse to be disappointed and wrathful and destructive.

That's a fair assessment. If we're living in the fruits of "God's holy plan", then God has some issues.

 

[sojourner]

No, it doesn't. It just requires that whether God decides to be involved in human affairs or not, he made this decision deliberately with full foreknowledge of the consequences.

But if God is not involved in human affairs, then God cannot be culpable for our actions. It's not a "decision" on God's part -- it's a cosmological position.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

But if God is not involved in human affairs, then God cannot be culpable for our actions. It's not a "decision" on God's part -- it's a cosmological position.

If creation was a deliberate act on the part of God, then God has a share of responsibility for everything that results.

Consider Newton's "divine watchmaker" God: the whole reason that Newton believed that God did not intervene with miracles was his belief that if God had to continually "adjust the mechanism" of the universe once it started, this would suggest God's design was imperfect. In cases like this, lack of involvement goes hand-in-hand with ultimate responsibility.

And I question your assumption that a God that's truly uninvolved could completely divorce himself from responsibility, since this assumes no moral imperatives. IMO, the mere fact that a person didn't have a hand in creating the situation doesn't necessarily imply that they don't have a duty to step in and help. For instance, take the famous case of Kitty Genovese: she was attacked on the street and initially got free. Plenty of neighbours heard her screams, but none called the police. This allowed her attacker to find her again and rape and murder her. Are the neighbours culpable in that case? I would say yes.

Our morals are a reflection of our values, so even if we didn't cause a circumstance if we value the people affected by that circumstance, then we have a duty to intercede.

I guess what I'm trying to get to is that love all by itself can often create a duty, and if that duty is breached, then this is a failure that the person is responsible for.

 

[Nakosis]

I think free will is irrelevant here. If a person's behaviour can be foreseen, then the person who enables that behaviour shares in the responsibility for it whether the person committing the act has free will or not.

Sure God is responsible. However evil is relative. Evil is what we judge evil to be.

Some event occurs, people can freely judge it as evil. I judge my wife's dog as evil when she craps on the carpet in front of my door.

Don't understand the need for people to be defensive about this.