[QUOTE=begbert2]
And I can answer these questions: there is definitely not an all-powerful, all-knowing God that considers reducing the suffering of most/all living humans to be a goal worth achieving.
[/QUOTE]
I don’t believe reducing human suffering is God’s goal.
[QUOTE=Endless Flight]
If we follow that line of reasoning, why wouldn’t God stop a heart attack from happening in the thirty year old professional athlete? Or perhaps alter that child who’s got Down’s Syndrome before they are born?
Hell, if we are going that far, why doesn’t God nudge that pedestrian off the sidewalk before he becomes a victim of the drunk that just left the bar down the street?
I can’t answer these questions.
[/QUOTE]
I can. I can give you four perfectly good reasons why God doesn’t do that:
Which one best matches your God?
[QUOTE=Endless Flight]
I don’t believe reducing human suffering is God’s goal.
[/QUOTE]
Then why does he punish us if we create suffering in others?
Just to cover all the bases.
God’s goal isn’t to maximize human happiness.
[QUOTE=Miller]
I can. I can give you four perfectly good reasons why God doesn’t do that:
Which one best matches your God?
[/QUOTE]
How about this one:
He exists, and cares about what happens to us, and might help us even if we are unaware of it. He may or may not want us to suffer because of our condition and knows there is a reason for it.
[QUOTE=Endless Flight]
God’s goal isn’t to maximize human happiness.
[/QUOTE]
Why isn’t it? He claims to love us.
[QUOTE=begbert2]
5) He exists, and cares about what happens to us, but helping us with ‘minor’ mortal pain is in fact counterproductive to his overall goals. He allows us to suffer because assisting would have worse consequences in his opinion.
Just to cover all the bases.
[/QUOTE]
Which is exactly what you’d expect God #4 to say!
[QUOTE=Miller]
Which is exactly what you’d expect God #4 to say!
[/QUOTE]
Aye, and anybody who says they’re not lying must be a liar lying about not lying. Right?
[QUOTE=Revenant Threshold]
Then why does he punish us if we create suffering in others?
[/QUOTE]
When a parent punishes their child, does the child believe he is suffering when he can’t go out and play with his friends?
[QUOTE=Endless Flight]
When a parent punishes their child, does the child believe he is suffering when he can’t go out and play with his friends?
[/QUOTE]
When a parent punishes a child, does he tell the child why he’s being punished?
The good ones do, at least. So where’s God’s explanation for cancer?
[QUOTE=Endless Flight]
When a parent punishes their child, does the child believe he is suffering when he can’t go out and play with his friends?
[/QUOTE]
Yes.
What lesson does having cancer teach us, exactly?
[QUOTE=Miller]
When a parent punishes a child, does he tell the child why he’s being punished?
The good ones do, at least. So where’s God’s explanation for cancer?
[/QUOTE]
Did the parent cause suffering in their child by punishing them? If so, I’ve brought suffering upon my daughter countless times. Does that mean I don’t love her?
[QUOTE=Revenant Threshold]
Yes.
What lesson does having cancer teach us, exactly?
[/QUOTE]
What lesson does having the common cold teach us?
None of these are reasons for God not existing.
[QUOTE=Endless Flight]
What lesson does having the common cold teach us?
None of these are reasons for God not existing.
[/QUOTE]
Certainly they are. They’re examples needless suffering. A vital component of God is that he is all-loving, and thus would want to spare us needless suffering, and that he is omnipotent, so he could spare us needless suffering. In addition, if he created the world and everything in it, then he created the common cold, and thus is the creator of the needless suffering himself.
The common cold, and needless suffering, are certainly reasons for God not existing.
[QUOTE=Endless Flight]
Did the parent cause suffering in their child by punishing them? If so, I’ve brought suffering upon my daughter countless times. Does that mean I don’t love her?
[/QUOTE]
That’s not the question I asked. Sure, you punish your daughter. If you catch her stealing candy at the store, you give her a spanking, and explain to her why she got her spanking: what she did wrong, and why it was wrong.
So again, where is God’s explanation for cancer? If God lets us suffer because suffering is ultimatly good for us, what is this good that we are suffering for? Why is it necessary that we suffer? How are we supposed to learn from the correction, if we are not told what we are being corrected for?
For God in general? No. For an all-knowing, all-powerful, all-loving God? I think they’re pretty damned good reasons for not believing in that particular God. I don’t see anyway that God could have more than two of those characteristics at the same time, given the world we live in.
[QUOTE=Endless Flight]
God’s goal isn’t to maximize human happiness.
[/quote]
It would be if he were omnibenevolent.
[QUOTE=Endless Flight]
Did the parent cause suffering in their child by punishing them? If so, I’ve brought suffering upon my daughter countless times. Does that mean I don’t love her?
[/QUOTE]
It would if you could have achieved the your end without causing her suffering. (which you could do if you were omnipotent)
[QUOTE=Miller]
For God in general? No. For an all-knowing, all-powerful, all-loving God? I think they’re pretty damned good reasons for not believing in that particular God. I don’t see anyway that God could have more than two of those characteristics at the same time, given the world we live in.
[/QUOTE]
I beg to differ. All one needs to presume is that our time on earth is punishment for misdeeds in heaven. Or that earth is something persons in heaven do for fun, like some kind of massively-multiplayer videogame. (If you win at the final judgement, you get to enter your initials!)
[QUOTE=begbert2]
I beg to differ. All one needs to presume is that our time on earth is punishment for misdeeds in heaven. …
[/quote]
How does that get around an all-loving god causing suffering?
This gave me a chuckle. I like it. But if we’re just avatars for heavenly gamers, then god really doesn’t care about us avatars.
[QUOTE=the PC apeman]
How does that get around an all-loving god causing suffering?
[/QUOTE]
Because we needn’t assume that it feels like 80 years to the punished individual when they come out, and because it opens the possibility that, after the ‘spanking’, God then carefully explains to the troublesome person why their heavenly misdeed required punishment, and encourages them not to do it again.
[QUOTE=the PC apeman]
This gave me a chuckle. I like it. But if we’re just avatars for heavenly gamers, then god really doesn’t care about us avatars.
[/QUOTE]
Oh, I dunno. I gather that persons can become quite attached to their gaming avatars in those sorts of games, and become quite aggrieved if they’re damaged in some non-recoverable way. “Aw, dangit! My dude had just leveled up to “almost self-supporting” with the “emotionally stable” bonus, and then got whacked by that darned Cancer event! That torques me off. I’m gonna ressurect him as an accountant this time and see if he can do better.”