A = a;
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@MarcB said:
@Heron said:
That's what sin is - willful disobedience to God's commandments - and God was nice enough to provide a way for us to return to his presence through his son Jesus Christ.
I ain't getting involved in this discussion, too many minefields, but seeing this brought to mind a bit of stand-up comedy I saw recently.
The performer was going on about how Jesus had died for our sins, and pointed out "if you don't commit any sins, that means Jesus died for nothing, so get out there and start sinning."
Speaking of comedians, I always liked this question from George Carlin: "If God is all powerful, can he make a rock big enough that he himself can't lift it?"
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@asuffield said:
@djork said:
I love trying to talk to "argument geeks." Any statement you can think of will be shot down by cries of "straw man!" or "red herring!" or "moving the goal posts!" There's just no reasoning with these ultra-reasoners.
Just because you are incapable of reasoning does not mean that nobody else can do it either. It's really quite simple, but first you'll have to accept that you don't reason by repeatedly stating what you want the answer to be.
Ah, a graduate from the Slashdot School of Debate. Regardless of the topic, the rebuttal is to use the word fallacy a lot and link to random Wikipedia articles. ;)
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@Cap'n Steve said:
...Slashdot School of Debate. Regardless of the topic, the rebuttal is to use the word fallacy a lot and link to random Wikipedia articles.That'll be because people on slashdot usually have neither correct elementary facts nor correct reasoning. A 'fallacy' is nothing more than a well-documented error, and on the internet it's always preferable to reference the online documentation than to duplicate what it says. It occurs in every topic because people spouting stupid non-logic are not subject-specific. It occurs all the time because people commit fallacies all the time.
You appear to be mixing up cause and effect. Stupid non-logic is the cause. Somebody pointing out that it's a well-known fallacy is the effect.
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@Heron said:
So you're saying that it's a WTF to let my son do things I don't want him to do? Say, for example, I want my son to avoid alcohol. Rather than force him to abstain from alcohol (by restraining him, for example), it's far better to let him choose for himself. This has one of two results. Either a) he'll drink alcohol and figure out for himself why I wanted him to avoid it in the first place, or b) he'll think about it beforehand and decide against it. Both of these results are preferable to restraining him because both ways, he learns something from the experience. The Real WTF(tm) would be forcing him to do what I want him to do, rather than letting him choose for himself.
It's the same with God - rather than force us to make only good decisions, He wants us to actually learn. The best (and really, the only) way to learn is through someone's experience, whether that experience is my own or of someone I observe.
There's a pretty big difference between my son, and my creation. My hypotethical son is already human, his nature is already defined, and I can't change that. He's not under my control, I can't define his attributes, and I can't shape him however I want, because I didn't create him. I don't have access to his implementation, so the best I can do is to use his external interfaces to attempt to guide him in whatever direction I feel is better. Which would still be based on pre-existing concepts of good and evil, which again, were not created by me.
But more importantly, I don't have an inherent purpose for my son. I would have a son not because I want my son for some specific purpose, but because that's just how God made the cycle of life.
On the other hand, God had a complete range of choices as to how we should be implemented, and what worldly concepts would exist. He specifically created the concept of evil, and he specifically wired our nature to be corruptible. These concepts did not exist before he created them. The "he wants us to actually learn" argument falls apart when you consider that he defined the range of things we can learn, and among those things, he included evil, and he defined what evil is. That shows purpose and intent.
The argument would make sense only if the same concepts of good and evil also applied to God, and it was impossible for him to create sentient life forms without them. That would however imply that there's something even greater than God to have defined those concepts even above him, which means that God isn't omnipotent, and that opens up a whole new can of worms.
But ultimately, it again comes down to purpose. If I'm going to create something, it's for a reason. When I create a computer program (over which I'm God), I create it with some kind of purpose in mind. Alex would probably beg to differ, but the greatest measurement of my success as a programmer is whether or not the program fulfills the purpose I designed it for. If you imagine that God's purpose for us is for us all to be "perfect", then he failed completely, and I fail to see why I have to go through all the hard work of fixing myself for him.
On the other hand, if you consider God infallible, it means that we're actually fulfilling our purpose right now, probably even without realizing it. I doubt that it's actually possible for you not to be fulfilling your purpose. In which case, there's no such thing as sin. Just things that we interpret as good or bad according to our own human-established standards.
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@Heron said:
@ShadowWolf said:
So you accept the portions of the Bible you particularly find convenient and then subsequently discount decades of research and consensus by storied theologins whose works and studies are strutinized on a daily basis by thousands? Original Sin is a fundamental doctrine within the Christian religion and denial of it is denial of the very premise upon which the entire religion is born. You can't simply redefine it because you feel like it. What you describe is much similar to what is preached by Mormons.
You missed the part where I said I'm Mormon ;) However, I can redefine a doctrine that is held by many Christian sects, given that their interpretation of said doctrine is wrong. Who cares if there are "decades of research and consensus by storied theologins whose works and studies are scrutinized on a daily basis" if said works and studies are wrong? In science, if we find that something we have believed to be fact for decades is flawed, we accept the change and move on. In religion, God's opinion trumps Man's opinion, end of story. Just because a man or a group of men says "Original Sin is 100% correct according to the Bible" does not mean it is.
The Real WTF(tm) is you referring to "the Christian religion". There are so many Christian religions with conflicting and outright contradictory doctrines that there is no such thing as "the Christian religion". There are various Christian sects - and not all of them hold to the Original Sin concept. Original Sin is primarily a Catholic doctrine, with various protestant churches agreeing or disagreeing with it.
All this doctrinal conflict is why we need God's guidance now, not just the records of his interactions with people two thousand or more years ago. If there were a prophet on earth today, a man like Moses or Isaiah or Peter or Paul (etc), then we could be sure of what we believe (in fact the Bible says specifically that God will always send prophets before he does things on Earth, see Amos 3:7). If there are no prophets today, then either God has given up on us, or we're so good that we don't need God's guidance. I doubt you'll meet anyone who believes in God that believes either of those two things, so it is only logical that there should be a prophet on earth today.
People fight tooth and nail at the suggestion. I don't get it. You'd think [Christian] people would be happy to receive more guidance from God, instead of insisting that he's done guiding us.
Ahhh - well, that makes sense then :)
To be more clear, Christian Religion = the generic term of Christianity. I don't use Christianity often because it tends to confuse people who prefer to idolize their own Christian Sect at the expense of others (Ie, people who believe that <insert sect here> is Christianity and all other things are not, which tends to be especially true with Protestants). If you've done a lot of discussion on the topic in the midwest as I have, you really do hear it all. If you search around, you'll see it's a fairly common convention.
Regardless, I don't believe in the Christian Doctrine anyway. I just know it well because my entire family knows it well. It would be trolling for me to comment on any of the other stuff.
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@asuffield said:
@Cap'n Steve said:
...Slashdot School of Debate. Regardless of the topic, the rebuttal is to use the word fallacy a lot and link to random Wikipedia articles....
You appear to be mixing up cause and effect ...
Holy crap. That's why you can't talk to these people. They use pointing out flaws in logic as the tactical nuclear weapon of conversation.
P.S. I wholly expect a snarky comment about how I don't understand reasoning. So, go ahead. I'm ready for it.
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@djork said:
@asuffield said:
@Cap'n Steve said:
...Slashdot School of Debate. Regardless of the topic, the rebuttal is to use the word fallacy a lot and link to random Wikipedia articles....
You appear to be mixing up cause and effect ...
Holy crap. That's why you can't talk to these people. They use pointing out flaws in logic as the tactical nuclear weapon of conversation.
P.S. I wholly expect a snarky comment about how I don't understand reasoning. So, go ahead. I'm ready for it.
It's a fallacy, you don't understand reasoning http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green
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@Sunstorm said:
There's a pretty big difference between my son, and my creation.
Suppose, for a moment, that we are God's children. (We are his creations in much the same way that your son is your creation.) God could force us to do everything right, but He does not want to - because he wants us to learn. God's purpose for us is for us is, simply, "to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of Man." Before we were born on this earth, we did not have bodies. God does have a body - an immortal, perfect one - and he wants us to have one too, because we're his children and he wants us to be more like Him. So he makes an earth and sends us down here. Evil is a natural consequence of the freedom of choice - God only "created" evil in the sense that God "created" darkness when He created light. When Adam fell, God sent an angel to guard the Tree of Life so Adam wouldn't eat that fruit and live forever. Why do you think that is? Because if he had, he would have lived forever in his sins. God saw fit to limit the amount of time we would have here in which to make our decisions, and then be judged by them afterward.
(Sorry, that kind of rambled, but I don't have time right now to go reword it.)
Let me be more specific about what Evil is. Evil is anything that prevents us from returning to God's presence - and that is simply because evil cannot abide God's presence. God told us, "you need to do X, Y, and Z to come back to me," and he knew there would be decisions that could prevent us from returning to his presence. But even then, God didn't say "well if you screw up once, you're damned forever." He said, "If you screw up, I've sent a Savior for you, and through him you can recieve forgiveness and still return to my presence." Do you see how God gave us a workaround for when we screw up? But even that has to be voluntary.
@Sunstorm said:
The argument would make sense only if the same concepts of good and evil also applied to God, and it was impossible for him to create sentient life forms without them. That would however imply that there's something even greater than God to have defined those concepts even above him, which means that God isn't omnipotent, and that opens up a whole new can of worms.
It has been said that if God were to do something evil, He would cease to be God. God, being perfect, won't do anything evil. Again, Evil is simply that which cannot abide God's presence. Darkness is always where light does not fall. Thus God did not create evil, it is simply a sort of universal constant.
Think about it this way. Entropy - the universe is constantly progressing toward chaos, and it requires energy to reverse it. Without putting effort into being good, Man will simply degenerate into being evil - that's where the saying "idle hands are the devil's tools" comes from. Noone ever said it would be easy to return to God's presence, it does require a significant amount of effort.
(I don't want any "Just say you believe and you're saved" people arguing against me here. Suffice it to say that James taught "faith without works is dead" and Paul taught "works without faith are dead". They're both true. We need faith and works. 'Nuff said.)
