What is evil? Why is evil rewarded? Should we be more evil, and if so, how do we know if we've gone too far?

I think, definitionally speaking, evil is what we should not be. There may be vast and wide differences of opinion as to what exactly that is, but the question of 'should we be more evil' is tautalogically "no". If we start thinking we should be more 'evil' then it is time to reconsider what our parameters of evil are.

The houngans of the voodoo religion believe that they must practice both good and evil, as they're two sides of the same coin, and both necessary aspects of life.

But yes, I do wonder, what it is we're considering evil.

Is it suffering or destruction?
Is selfishness?
Is it imbalance or extremism?

I wonder if this is something that is really viewed as evil or if that term has just been borrowed from teh west and the division is more like the Tjapakai fire shamans and water shamans- fire shamans are healers while water shamans specialize in harm- they create 'houses' by cursing stones so that anyone who crosses the stones other than the legitimate owner or one who has been invited will take on the curse, then setting the stones in a circle. They also act as enforcers for the tribe, casting curses on those who have broken it's laws. As such their power might be described as dark or banefull but within that community and with constraint of use it is not considered evil.

Silveroak, I assume you're responding to my comment regarding houngans? From what I've read that is correct - they learn to use dark arts as a form of social control, for community-based justice (my research being the book, the Serpent and the Rainbow).

However, since we don't have a solid definition of 'evil', I don't see any reason why they or we can't apply it. I consider prison evil, but I think it's a necessary evil.

Short and semi-snarky answer: Evil is putting your own desires before those of others.

But what about the saying, "Save yourself before you save others?"

Then there are other sayings like....

"Nice guys finish last."
"Kill or be killed."
*Women play games that is why men should be players."

I really do not know if I should believe in these so-called truisms. I do not know how much people believe in these as well. There are people who say that these things are bad, immoral and unethical but in practice they think it is necessary for survival.

Remember Enron? Right now the people who blew the whistle on them are having a hard time getting a job. Why? It is because the other people who lost their jobs in Enron are now working for other companies. The people who blew the whistle on Enron did the right thing and they deserve to be rewarded. But where is their reward?

I also face similar dilemmas in the workplace. I am starting to believe that it doe snot matter if an act is good or bad. What matters is that actions have rewards and consequences. Some have more rewards and some have more consequences.

Is there such a thing as being too good? Is being too good no longer good but holier-than-thou vanity?
This message was last edited by the player at 11:12, Wed 19 May 2010.

I would have to grossly disagree with GMC's definition of evil. After all anything we do is for our own benefit, whether physically spiritually or emotionally, and in keeping with our own desires. If Mother Theresa put her own desire to help the poor above the desire of church leaders to exploit her name for publc relations is that evil? If Bush put the the desire of bank executives to get filthy rich above his own desire to have a strong presidential legacy is that good? I'm not saying that these are teh exact motivations of either person or those arround them but it clearly illustrates how this model breaks down.

I'd also have to disagree with GMC's definition. Even on the most basic level, my desire to have a sandwich drives up the price of sandwich makings overall, and permanently uses resources which could be used for other purposes. Yet, I really would like a sandwich. Is eating a sandwich evil? What about those darn uppity slaves, who put their selfish desire for freedom above the desires of their owners to make a nice profit? Evil slaves...




I don't think anyone would call them truisms. They're philosophies. Some philosophies are constructive and ultimately drive us forward, others are destructive. Philosophies should be judged on their factual and logical basis, and on the basis of the consequences of following it.



Here's the thing, some evil things ARE necessary for survival. I kill animals and plants that I might live. I take a job when there is a shortage for the same reason. Those are indeed minor evils, as they are causing harm to others. However, they contribute to a greater good - my success, and the success of everyone I serve or who depends on me. Again, prison is an evil - but the good that prison serves clearly outweighs that evil.



It sounds like perhaps you're not struggling so much with the idea of good and evil, but rather the basic application of justice in your normal life - why are good actions not rewarded, why justice isn't applied evenly and everywhere. But the truth is, justice is just something we understand as good, ideal - it isn't a naturally existing state. Natural life is intrisically unjust. Some humans profit from injustice, and seek to expand it.

The problem is, our civilization is built upon the assumption of some level of justice (as all complex civilizations are). We expect we can do business without being excessively predated upon, that we can live reasonably safely. As soon as you lift those limits, our complex and productive form of civilization begins to break down. If I think I can profit more from selling my employer's work to their competitors, no company can afford to be productive. The entire weight of focus shifts from being genuinely constructive to being predatory, parastic, or defensive - none of which ultimately further us as a species.

Perhaps it helps you to know that in the case of those Enron whistleblowers, there really was a heavy reward for their work - it's just that reward went to those they served - the general public, the investors, the people depending on retirement funds, not only at Enron, but all similar companies as well. To properly serve justice does require, to a degree, a willingness to suffer injustice.




I think this is, again, where the ideas of good and evil break down (because they're poorly defined).

Let me turn around and ask you, what is it you wish from life? To die the most stuff? To suffer and challenge yourself the least? Do you wish to leave a better world for your children? To grow into a mature, whole person? To properly experience life in all its fullness? You can't buy or cheat your way to being a full, mature man.

I don't see prion as inherantly evil. It serves a purpose f protecting teh innocent from teh dangerous by restraining that which is dangerous. It is, to return to teh Tjapakai division, banefull- it does do harm, but in teh same way that a curse-stone can provide protection (at least in the minds of those using it) and serve society teh prison can do the same, especially when considered against the alternative of killing those who present a danger to others.
Generally evil is defined by being oppositional to good rather than whether or not it does harm, personally I tend to think the idea of evil is probably the greatest example of it's actuality- defining someone or something as evil is an easy way to remove any moral consideration with regard to pursuing it's destruction, whether it is the US invasion of Iraq, the Nazi's characterization fo Jews, or the Witch trials of the late middle ages. And each of these was done for supposedly noble reasons. Even the Conquistadors (who at least admitted to motives of gold and glory) began by defining those they marched against as evil and inhuman.

Prison is evil - it restricts liberty and forces suffering and discomfort on people. However, it is a justified evil. Taxes are evil - it takes what is not earned by force. However, it is a necessary evil.

Defining evil as oppositional to good is like defining any other two abstract, made-up terms solely in relation to each other - it tells you nothing of what they are, how you test for them, etc. That's a useless definition. However, I rarely hear people say that restricting liberty, suffering, discomfort, loss of resources, etc. is "good", only that, in some circumstances, it may permit or lead to good.

I want to live a life with honor and prove to the world that good people can and should have all of the wealth, glory, success and happiness in life. I want to disprove the saying, "Nice guys finish last." If I do that, then I can say I have done my part in making the world a better place.

But when I say that, I ask myself if I am asking for too much or if I am being too greedy. I ask myself if I can obtain these things if I succumb to the temptation of doing dishonest, immoral or even misguided things.

Everything comes with a cost. Life isn't a Disney movie where, just sticking to your morals means you end up fabulously wealthy, beautiful and adored. If you want to stick to your morals, but also end up fabulously wealthy, beautiful and adored, you're going to either have to be extremely lucky, or pay somewhere else (the easy one being, work hard, go to med school at nights, work your buns off until you become a doctor, then spend your time helping sick kids - but that requires a *LOT* of work).

Otherwise ask, what is it you really wish to accomplish? How do you define your goals? I consider "wealth" meaning that I can put my kids through school and one day be able to retire to a comfortable lifestyle akin to how I'm living now. Maybe you see it as owning a BMW, or as having a mansion.

So there you go - determine your goals and what you're willing to spend to get there. Unfortunately, by that measure, morality is just another commodity, like time and money.

What I find interesting is your four stated goals, wealth, glory, success and happiness - among those four, you don't actually include "making the world a better place". If you want to make the world a better place, why don't you make that your goal, and accept that the other ones are perhaps not what will make you truly happy.

Of course nice guys finish last, it's only polite to let the lady finish first.

But really wealth, success, glory, these are all forms of power (financial influence, influence of public opinion, success is just overly generic...) and happiness is tautaological (not many people looking to be unhappy, and presumedly whatever you are looking for is what you expect to bring happiness...

...and I am willing to go through that. Actually, I chose to pursue business because it allows me to do a lot by working hard and working smart.

The problem is, I also have to deal with businessmen who think business is just about making money (sometimes by any means necessary) when they can actually do more good with it.

Like I said, it was a short and semi-snarky answer.  However, there is a lot of truth in what I'm saying.

Let's imagine a utopia, where everyone puts the needs and desires of others first.  If you want a sandwich, someone else will recognize your need and help you get a sandwich.  If someone else needs one, you'll put aside your needs temporarily and  help them get one.

Granted, that's a utopia, and not the real world.  But every act of evil can be deconstructed to someone putting their desires above the needs and desires of everyone else.  You can slap a bunch of justifications onto it, but that's what it all boils down to.

One piece of advice I picked up from my reading about buddhism that's really come in useful to me is that idea that unfulfilled expectations are the cause of unhappiness.  It's not the state of the world that makes one unhappy, its expecting it to be different that does.  There are some things you can change in the world, and some things you can't.  If you keep expecting things to be different just because you want them to be, when you have little or no control over how they turn out, you'll end up unhappy.

I think this applies in your situation.  You do have control over how you act, and can act in accordance with your expectations.  You have only limited control over how others act, so expecting them to act differently can (and seems to) lead to unhappiness for you.  Do what you can to change them (largely by setting a good example, I'd guess), and then stop fretting too much about whether or not they're doing the right thing.

Another way to phrase it, is to do whatever you can, and be satisfied that you're doing all you can, even if "all you can" isn't enough to lead to the ideal outcome.

That's a good way of putting it Tycho. Maybe I am moralizing life too much to the point that it is no longer fun for others and for me.

The problem is that is not teh case. Nazi attrocities were founded in a sense of national altruism- sacrifice of yoruself for the country and protect it from teh evil nasty Jews, gypsys, commies, etc. While there were people in the Nazi regime who did act selfishly 9as tehre are in any regime) the core problem was not in the selfish behavior but in the *selfless* behavior. An Al-Queida terrorist (or anti-IRS protester) doesn't fly a plane into a building because he is being selfish, but because they eblieve ina  higher cause and tehy are willing to sacrifice themselves, and others, to that cause. A witch hunter might be motivated by greed, admittedly, but how many more tortured and killed innocent men women and children because tehy were dedicated to eliminating Satan's minions to make the world a better place? The worst attrocities are not committed as a result of greed, they are a result of altruism which has been molded into a force of destruction.

Dude, the return key is your friend.  As is spell check.

Nazi atrocities were so they could set themselves up as the "Superior race".  An Al-Qaida terrorist kills because he believes he will be rewarded in heaven, and doesn't care about the infidels.  A witch hunter is motivated by glory, along with the other reasons you mentioned.

In all these cases, what happens is that the "evil" person gets something out of it, and doesn't care about the cost to others.  They're putting their own needs and desires above that of others.  And before you go there, the acts of the brainwashed aren't "evil", they're tragic.  Hence, Jonestown.

Oh, and I'm calling a Godwin on this one.  I win.  =P

If you're going to take it to that level than there's no such thing as altruism at all, because every act, no matter how giving, rewards the giver in some way (if only by a boost of pride because I know how great a person I am."

That is pretty much the case; selflessness is doing something at the expense of your own interest. Yet the very fact that they are doing that thing entails that there is some desire or hope that their interests will be furthered.

Stinger Missiles are selfless, if only because they have no interests of their own (or at least none we can comprehend ;P).

For everything else, Altruism might just be the perception of third-parties projecting their own interests onto a person or people who's differing interests led to sacrificing said third-parties' assertion of what those interests might have been.

Yeah, I think silveroak is on to something.  There is certainly plenty of evil that involves putting your own wants above those of others, but I also agree that some of the greatest evils involve people who are convinced they are acting selflessly in the name of a greater cause.  Many evil acts are committed by people thinking that "its for the greater good," and to a degree, that kind of evil is harder to deal with than the standard "I'm in it for number 1" type of evil.

There's the old quote "With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion."  I think it's too limited in that I don't think it needs to be religion, just a bigger cause to get behind, that is necessary to get good people to do evil.  But I think the idea carries some truth.  It's possible to get people to do evil acts out of a sense of devotion to a greater cause, as well as just thinking of themselves.  And, to a degree, I think these "greater cause" evils tend to be more dangerous than the "gimmie gimmie" types of evil acts.

Keep in mind it is also possible for evil people to do good things for evil reasons if we are defining evil (in the motivations department at least) as selfishness.
I'm a politician (hypothetically) and I'm a selfish greedy son of a biscuit. I see a building on fire, with children inside, and thinking of tomorrows headlines run inside and rescue the nearest children...

Yeah, I agree on that as well.

I was just thinking about the ABC's of Ethics.

A - Attitude (Feelings and motivation)
B - Behavior (Actions taken)
C - Consequence (Results)

If an act is motivated by good feelings, done using ethical and moral means and has good results then we can truly say that the act is truly altruistic.

The Nazis may think they have good intentions but their behavior and the consequences of their actions do not make them moral or ethical.

What you're describing is justifications.  Rationalizations, persuasion, what-have-you-- it all amounts to doing an evil act and then trying to prove it was really a good one.  The act itself is motivated by selfish desires, but the justification can be anything.  Done right, you can even convince others that you're doing the right thing for the right reasons.

I think if you believe that's the only possible case, then you're misunderstanding and oversimplifying a lot of history.  You seem to be making an assumption about other people, and I don't accept the assumption, and thus disagree with your conclusion.  If you want to convince us, you'll need to offer some evidence, I think, rather than just saying it again.  You've just said that 'done right' people can be convinced that the evil acts of others were done for the right reasons.  Why do you feel people can be convinced of the same for their own actions?

There's been no studies that I know of on rationalizations; they're just accepted by psychologists and many other people as fact.  Just like weather, we can observe justifications without fully understanding the exact science behind them.

In this case, I'll defer to personal examples.  Woody Allen said that rationalizations are more important than sex, because you can go for a day without sex.  Have you ever done something that you perhaps felt you shouldn't have, but convinced yourself it was for the best?  Then you've rationalized a small but selfish act.  I'll bet that every one of us has done this within the last week.  It could be something as small as buying something that you shouldn't, or maybe making yourself a few minutes late to something, or even spending too much time on the computer.

Practically every day, we do small things that should make us feel guilty, but we rationalize the guilt away.  This is not, in and of itself, evil.

It's late, and I'm rambling.  Let me sum up by saying that the fact that people rationalize away uncomfortable emotions is a given.  In many cases, they even convince themselves it was "for the best", and try to make themselves feel good instead of guilty.

You've never heard of teh Milford Prison expiriment? Or the MIlgram expiriment? How people will abuse and torture other people because of a role definition and mass psychology or simply because tehy are told to by an authority? Neither of these are based on selfish goals. For someone who claims to know the whole of human behavior and experience you are woefully undereducated in the field.

Those studies aren't on rationalizations.  I'd suggest you read more carefully next time.  And for the record, I know psychology, not the "whole of human behavior and experience".  Thank you for assuming it is so, but only the woefully uneducated make that mistake.

The Milford Prison experiment, IIRC, demonstrated selfishness in the desire to wield authority.  Milgram's experiment did demonstrate rationalizations: "I did it because he told me to." but was mainly concerned with other things.  So, your own examples prove my point instead of yours.  As far as I know, there are no studies on rationalizations themselves, since they're largely an internal process and difficult to examine directly.

The Milford Expiriment shwoed nothing about desire to weild authority, it demonstrated the reponse to having it. There was no gain of authority to be had by doing what they did in those roles, and considering that it could be looked back upon in future job situations their behavior was more likely to result in a loss of potential authority positions rather than a gain.

It "schwoed" nothing.  It "showed" that simply having authority led to a desire to abuse it.  Using authority is the same as "wielding" it, although the connotations are different.

Maybe this will help move the conversation forward, and give us a position we can both agree on, GMC.

From what I understand, you're saying that person A will only ever commit an evil act against person B if person A puts their own wellbeing/needs/wants/whatever above those of person B, yes?

I propose another situation in which person A can commit an evil act against person B, without the above assumption being met:  Introduce person C to the mix.  Person A values both person B, and person C more than they do themselves (ie, person A puts both of their needs above his own).  However, Person A happens to put person C's needs/wants/whathaveyous above those of person B.  Thus, A will be willing to commit an evil act against B because doing so benefits person C.  He's harming B not to help himself, but to help another, whom he values more than person B (even though he happens to value person B more than he does himself).

Do you believe such a situation is possible?

That depends on rather or not you believe in altruism.

What I've observed in personal experience to happen is that Person A stands to gain from the evil act, it's just that Person C stands to gain more.  So, Person A can justify the evil act by saying: "Look, this isn't really evil, look how much person C gets from it!"

What makes an act evil is indeed hard to quantify.  I really seldom hear of someone doing an "evil" act without a rationalization.  Torture is evil, but I don't hear of normal people torturing without some justification: they were ordered into it, as Milgram proved, or they're doing it for "the greater good", as in the recent waterboarding cases.

And you don't think that contradicts your orriginal statement? If everyone performing an 'evil' act does so under orders or for what they believe to be the greater good doesn't that negate teh idea that selfishnes is the root of all evil? At least people who are operating purely from selfish motives do not have such justifications and thus do not engage in such 'evil' activities... It might in fact require some blend of selfishness and altruism, but if you take away the altruism the attrocities go away as well, and from your position the selfishness can never really go away, so altruism is the only factor that can really be focued on.

No.  As I said before, People do evil deeds for selfish reasons, and then justify it.  Altruism is often just one justification.  You are aware of what a rationalization is, right?  You use them all the time.

Yes, I am aware of what rationalizations are. But aside from your stating it as if it were an axiom where is your evidence? All evidence expressed here points to the opposite conclusion and all you offer as a rejoinder is to restate your belief that all evil stems from selfishness. I can just as easilly state with equal conviction *plus* evidence that all evil stems from people believing their actions are justified and that those who insist that evil stems from selfishness do so in order to avoid having to examine the possible effects of actions they take themselves stemming from their own convictions. After all where industry is productive and has made life easier for the vast mojority of the people on this planet those who would oppose it need something to support tehri self-righteousness and justify attempting to make lives harder for those whose lives have been improved by industrialism and greed based companies.

Heh, fair enough.  I suppose if you start with the assumption that altruism doesn't exist, then yes, it follows that altruism can't lead to acts of evil.  For those of us who don't make that assumption, it would seem your argument doesn't hold up, though.

I think if you don't believe in the existance of altruism as a fact then you still have to acknowledge that it exists as an idea and that that idea, whether as justification/rationalization or as it's own selfish motivation (I want to be seen as altruistic) remains the underlying common factor of the great atrocities.
Also  would say that if you do not believe in altruism then saying that evil is caused by selfishness is a meaningless statement since you believe that everything is caused by selfishness. You might as well say that evil is caused by breathing.

I do think silveroak is onto something with that statement. Under a belief of psychological egoism, that people (or indeed all beings) are incapable of doing anything that doesn't benefit them in some manner, altruism is indeed a sham. But, at the same time, doesn't that sorta negate the meaning of evil?

If beings are incapable of doing anything but evil actions, doesn't evil sorta become meaningless? The stigma of evil is that we choose to be selfish at the expense of others. If we can't choose otherwise, what is evil? Does it have any real meaning anymore?

Incidentally, as a psychology student myself, I'm not sure we came to the same conclusion of what the Milgrim experiments legacy was. I personally saw it not through the lens of the power the subjects had over the alleged victim, but rather, in the manner of their relationship to the experimenter, the authority figure. Indeed, the variations in the experiment in which the authority figure was not seen or in the room (via phone or through a proxy), the results tended to be much less extreme.

There have been many variations of the experiments done to this effect, but I think the most extreme, in my view, hint towards this relationship as well. In the early 70s, there was a belief that the subjects of the original might had suspected the victim was fake. So, they tried a variation that used a real victim, in this case, a puppy, receiving real voltage.

But, nonetheless, despite being able to see the effects for themselves, the proportion wasn't significantly different from the original. This was in spite of having a much more visible emotional reaction. Some of the subjects, particularly the women, openly cried at the sight and sounds, but seemingly felt obligated to follow through. I'm not sure such emotional pain would be reflected in an instance where the real issue of importance was the subject's desire to flex it's muscles, so to speak, unless you believe that these reactions were being faked.

There are different definitions of evil. Psychological egoism would defeat the definition of evil as selfishness (or, alternatively, would indicate that every action by a conscious being is necessarily evil). But it would not eliminate other evil things. I believe we can agree that Katrina, or the suffering caused by it, was a form of evil, even though it was not the result of conscious choice.

FRom a human perspective yes. From the perspictive of life forms which have existed in teh area for millions of years whose life cycle is dependant upon the period hurricaine to upset the soil and otherwise disturb the area I'm sure we are the evil.

I don't think Natural Disasters are evil, nor do I think the suffering caused by them is evil either, because I don't think any entity knowingly causes them to happen.  Even if someone came up with a weather machine and used to summon natural disasters, that still doesn't make the natural disaster evil, or the suffering evil.

But then I don't think Good and Evil are any more than subjective. That doesn't necessitate that there aren't ways to reliably determine what the human mind considers Good and Evil on average, but Evil is not physical, it's a human concept.

Nature is Amoral.
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:33, Wed 26 May 2010.

Natural evils are a possible exception, of course. But most people aren't asked to resolve themselves of natural evils, unless you'd like to say that having a disease is sinful, or that higher beings inflicted the ailment intentionally. Such are the domain of moral evils. We humans play a much lesser, if any, responsibility for the evils we cannot control or that don't result from our decisions. Aside from dealing with the pain they cause, I don't believe many of us would say they're something we need to concern ourselves with.

And, as the previous posters argue, I don't necessarily think that most of us can agree such disasters are evil. For myself, evil has to derive from some manner of intent, be it malicious, self-serving, ignorance, negligence, or something along those lines. The result of deliberate decisions. I have a hard time seeing natural disasters as evil, unless I were to think they were result of some action taken by a sentient being. In my view, natural disasters like Katrina or the quake in Haiti are not evil; they are, however, very tragic and unfortunate.

Of course, if psychological egoism was true, and every being cannot help but act selfishly, regardless of whether or not Katrina was evil, I feel it might have rather unfortunate implications about the beings that create such an existence. Let's just say that it would not surprise me if said deity were to intentionally set natural evils about, upgrading them, so to speak, to irrefutable evils.
This message was last edited by the player at 08:43, Wed 26 May 2010.

Natural disasters are evil by definition, they are "harmful" and "injurious".

I'm not really getting the point of this discussion, evil as it applies to people has to do with being immoral or wicked, and it is fairly cut and dried. You can argue that what is considered evil in one society might not in another and vice versa, but that's splitting hairs and you pretty much know what evil is in modern western morality.

It's not the same as law, selfishness, putting yourself first or greed, although those can lead to evil.

Fixed your statement. ;)

But in seriousness, that is only one defintion. To decide what constitutes evil requires a common acceptance of the definition of that word. I don't quite equate all the Merriam-Webster definitions of evil with the same weight, particularly when matters of morality and injustice are being discussed.

Adding a qualifier to my statement isn't a fix, the word has a definition and there is no need to qualify every word used by referring to the fact words have definitions.

A pink wall is pink because pink is defined. Evil is evil when it meets the definition of evil. It really is that simple. It doesn't matter if one definition has more "weight" in your mind than another, all definitions in the commonly accepted reference for the language in use apply.

There are gray area's, some might consider abortions evil, some might argue they are not, but these gray area's are few and far between and honestly most can be defined with certainty by definition as well, even if some people might be uncomfortable with the outcome.

"It doesn't matter if one definition has more "weight" in your mind than another, all definitions in the commonly accepted reference for the language in use apply."

Debatable.

In matters of morality and reward therefrom, 'evil' is going to have a much broader definition than in other instances. The reason dictionaries have multiple entries for words is that one definition does not always apply.


For example, take the word 'weasel.'

There will be cases in which one definition carries more weight than another. If say, I call the BP execs handling the oil-spill in the Gulf 'a bunch of weasels,' you can likely be sure I do not mean that they are small carnivorous mammals nor are they amphibious vehicles.

In such a manner, the discussion of evil and the rewards which individuals or societies gain from said evil acts requires a defining of terms, for not only do differing cultures/societies/philosophical systems have differing opinions on the meaning of the word, so too might different people.

And that matters not one whit to the point of them being weasels or not being weasels. Either they are weasels by definition or they are not.

Same with evil, either something is defined as evil or it is not. It doesn't matter if one definition has more "weight" in your mind than another, all definitions in the commonly accepted reference for the language in use apply to the use of that word, if one of the definitions of weasel applies to the execs then they are, by definition, weasels. That's what words are all about. If you want to omit some of the definitions of a word in use then you need to use adjectives that do so or some other modifier to make the definition more pointed.

In reply to Astron (msg #50):

I beg to differ and I'll leave it that.


In any case, back to the matter, natural disasters are not, in my mind, evil. They may be unfortunate and deadly and disasterous to those living in their path, but may also be part of the natural system of the larger world/environment and therefore removed from the dichotomy of good/evil.

Good/evil, such that we perceive it exists, is largely a matter of perspective and human ethics/morality. Perhaps even a uniquely human condition (given the current absense of evidence of other developed cultures in the universe).

Natural disasters that cause harm are by definition evil. That is simply a fact of word definitions.

Evil is also defined by morality, obviously, since the definition of an evil act is usually defined along the lines of being morally reprehensible or immoral.

Then, by that same definition, nearly everything is evil because nearly everything is harmful to something else.

Perception is everything. Harm itself is a matter of perspective and perception.

A hurricane is "evil" because it causes harm to the shoreline, the ecosystem, animals (including humans) living in its path.
A hurricane is "good" because it can be relied on. They behave in a similar manner over time. They bring rains to areas of drought. They wipe clean areas affected by depredations, over-building, and pollution.

By encompassing both sides of good and evil, what is it?

Perhaps a hurricane (or a flood, a natural fire, an earthquake, a meteor strike) is a natural force with no will or intent acting in a manner proscribed by the system in which it exists.

Sunlight is harmful in excess, so too much sun is an evil thing, but that doesn't make sunlight in general evil, just harmful instances of sunlight evil, in the same way a hurricane that doesn't cause harm is not evil yet one that does is. Something is only evil when it is harmful, it is not evil when it is not harmful.

That is how a definition is applied, it does require some common sense, as opposed to a motivation to take things to absurdity without the benefit of common sense because you don't agree with Webster.

actually urricains clear polution and re-start teh ecosystem, being overall generally benign to teh ecosystems which ahve develoepd with a consistant (over millenea) presence of hurricaines.

Hurricanes might have some benefits in some instances, but generally they cause a lot of pollution rather than clearing it much of the time, and a gentle rain can clear pollution with much less harm. The ecosystem isn't "restarted" by a hurricane to the extent that an atomic bomb "restarts" it, and "restarting" an ecosystem isn't a good thing in and of itself. Hurricanes are not generally benign, they are violent and destructive, I've been through several and aside from the eye they are not much fun to be in.

There is no doubt that a hurricane that causes harm is evil by definition. Not all hurricanes cause harm, but very little good comes from their violence and those that do cause harm are certainly evil.

Hurricanes also redistribute heat energy.  If they refused to do so, the heat would accumulate in one place, which would violate the laws of thermodynamics, which would in turn upset all of known physics, and that would lead to the breakdown of the universe as we know it.  That would be bad, right?

The philosophy of ethics generally holds "intent" as the prime factor in morality.  Ergo, good samaritan laws, you are not a murderer if, in trying to save someone's life, you accidentally kill him.  Hurricanes, as far as I know, show no intent.

Now, had you said Tornados, that would be different, because we all know they go for trailer parks.

no, actually the ecosystem in areas regularly affected by hurricaines has a life cycle which is dependant on the hurricaines to prevent stagnation, in which cetain plants only flourish soon after teh hurricain goes through and tehse prepair the soil for the plants in the next stage and so on. yes on teh macro scale it looks liek a disaster and it is certainly inconvenient to humans but it is as much a part of the cycles of nature in those areas as spring and fall. Actually given teh lattitude of those regions it is generally *more* of a part of those cycles.

There are many successful ecosystems without hurricanes so obviously hurricanes are not needed for ecosystems in general, so I'm sure there would still be a thriving ecosystem on the Atlantic and Gulf coasts without hurricanes, especially since there are stretches of it that haven't had hurricanes for quite a while and still have ecosystems.

Can you show some basis for this claim about ecosystems and hurricanes?

Aside from that, being a "cycle of nature" means nothing where the definition of evil is concerned, a hurricane that causes harm is evil by definition.

There are no successful ecosystems known on planets without hurricanes.  At most, you can show local regions that have not been directly struck by them, however, the indirect effects are global.

ALL tropical oceans generate cyclonic storms.  It is physics in action.

Science!

Even other planets get them.

if we agree that evil=causes harm, then I must confess to being an evil steak eater harming cattle.
And an even more evil brusher of my own teeth slaying millions of bacteria.

Which means nothing since we know nothing about the vast majority of planets, and more to the point  correlation does not equal causality. For instance there are no successful police departments known on planets without rapes, but that doesn't mean if we managed to end rape that police departments would fail. We do need weather, we do not need harmful hurricanes.

And back to the point a hurricane that causes harm is by definition evil.

Yeah, see... back to the point I made. I will agree that under some definitions evil means to cause harm, but I don't think that's the sole definition, nor even necessarily a definitive quality of "evil."

Actually we do, to redistribute heat, but that's another story.

You are conflating two definitions.  "Causing harm" is ONE definition of evil but not the one we use when talking philosophy and ethics, where morality enters int the picture.  Two very different things.

A definition is what something means.  Definitions change.  To say that something means something because that's what the definition says it means is an appeal to authority.  Dictionaries can only go so far in describing a word that has millions of books dedicated to it.

It's an old word with old meaning, which means it's based on old perceptions of the world, and is probably not very accurate, as Astron shows.

If evil means "something that causes harm", then surgery is evil, childbirth is evil, curing diseases is evil. If an icicle hits me on the head when I'm out walking, that icicle is evil.

Clearly, either this definition of Evil is idiotically wrong, or Evil is a vague concept and should be discarded.  It's one of the Oldest Buzzwords, and doesn't really mean anything anymore.

We have words like "Harmful", "Disobedient", "Disruptive", "Selfish", "Sadistic", and others to describe each of the types of things we find morally reprehensible, I don't think Evil covers anything that another word wouldn't, save for hypothetical concepts that only exist as nightmares and fantastical imaginings.

I can't even *read* that mess of a run-on sentence.

Fact is, rationalizations exist, as do rationalizations for evil/selfish acts.  This is as much a given as gravity.  I think what you're getting at is that evil is in the intent.  That is to say, the act is neutral; it's the intent that maters.  Thus, natural disasters aren't evil, since there's no intent.  Profiteering from a natural disaster is evil, since it is a selfish act designed to harm other people.

No, actually that is completely *not* what I am saying, in fact it would tbe the polar opposite of what I am saying.
Someone who profits from a disaster because they are bringing relief to that disaster is not evil. If I had a fresh water well just outside the New Orleans Disaster and began pumping water furiously and selling it to FEMA, the Red Cross, and so on at a profit I would still be contributing to aiding the situation. At the same time the people in the Milgram expiriment were not administering shocks because tehy wanted to hurt someone. Intent is completely neutral in this.
Also the statement you quoted was not a run on sentance, it was punctuated correctly. However to simplify- a lot of evidence has been provided that people with noble causes are responsible for great attrocities, where is your evidence of *just* greed being the culprit?

This is a common conversation, and really is good that it comes up so often (I admit, I did specifically hope it would come up in this thread, because the original post was unclear on the point).

Before we can discuss, we need to define our terms. Evil (and less so, good) are very difficult terms to handle because we have no fewer than 14 meanings for this word, and many of them overlap (while still being distinct).

So silveroak might be talking about how a particular act is unethical (evil), and I might be talking about how an act is harmful (evil). We are both correct, but unless we recognize that we are talking about different meanings for the same word, we won't understand each other.

So far the conversation has mostly been about people profiting from unethical actions (rewarding evil behavior). That is a legitimate question.

I was sort of pushy and asked about profit coming following harmful circumstances (rewards following evil). Almost the same words, but a very different meaning.

My intent was to bring this back to the original post - what does our poster define as evil? I don't know that he has a set understanding, which will lead to confusion. Is he asking if we should undertake behaviors which are unethical, or behaviors which are harmful? I don't think it is unethical to eat a ham sandwich, but it is, to a slight degree, harmful, so clearly we need to establish what we're talking about here.

Definitions don't change rapidly enough to effect the current discussion, that's a red herring on your part.

You are also completely wrong that referring to a reference on word meanings is an "appeal to authority", an appeal to authority would be saying Bill Clinton's definition of "it" was the one that mattered because he is Bill Clinton so he's right. Webster isn't right because he is Webster, Webster records the word meanings as a common reference. There is no fallacy in saying an authority is true in his field of study. You are free to argue that Webster is wrong of course, but that would be a pretty futile effort on your part, simlar to falsely claiming a logical fallacy on mine here.

Evil is a very simple thing to qualify, a hurricane that causes harm is evil, so is the immoral corruption in New Orleans that increased that harm by taking the money for and the responsibility of maintaining pumps and seawalls, then failing to maintain them properly.

There may be some corner cases where people have disagreements on if something is evil or not, but usually it's the motivation behind the opinions rather than applying the meanings of the term to the situation fairly that are at issue.

Actually, definitions can change fairly 'rapidly' depending on context (for example: a "mouse" is something different to most teenagers than it is for octagenarians). Too, words such as 'awful' (which originally did mean full of awe), 'artificial' (which meant created with art or skill), 'manufacture' (which meant created by hand), 'couterfeit' (which meant a perfect copy), or 'tell' (which meant to count) have all shifted meaning in a relatively short span of time linguistically speaking.

When discussing a concept like 'evil' it is true that for most folks that definition is not going to change drastically during their lifetime. However, most dictionary companies do not often change or update their older entries. Case in point, the OED - regarded by many as the source for entymology and meaning - had an error in one of its definitions that had stood for decades and was only spotted and corrected recently. In that particular case, the definition hinged on scientific understanding.

For any discussion of something as nebulous as "evil," a discussion on exactly what that word means is pertinent and relevant to that original discussion.




Webster (the original individual and the subsequent company that continues to publish dictionaries) can easily be wrong, as stated above. Furthermore, I'll put forth the suggestion that Webster's definitions are also shaped by culture, time, and circumstance. In other words, he recorded a definition of evil based on his own time and place in history, and thus it may not be complete and accurate for every instance of that word.


In your mind, perhaps, but the fact that we've several people here who are hesitate to accept "causing harm" as the sole defining quality of evil would seem to indicate that it is not so simple.


I disagree that any natural disaster is evil. My motivation is not to profit from them, nor to inflict them (as if I could), but with the meaning of the term. There is no motivation behind that other than clarity, exactitude, and truth.

The Authority always has to be a person?  Using the Bible or a Dictionary is an appeal to authority as well.




I persist in claiming the fallacy; I challenge that definition of the Bible, and I've already posited the reason why I feel the definition is incorrect.  You can prolong the fallacy by saying that my objection doesn't matter because the dictionary says I'm wrong, or you can answer my complaints.

The definition of evil as "anything that causes harm" is incorrect, because evil must have intent behind it.  An icicle that hits me on the head while I'm out walking is not an evil icicle, because icicles aren't alive, and I'd have to be living in the stone age to think that an icicle was evil.

Earthquakes aren't evil, they're a force of nature.  The destruction and harm brought by one is not evil, it is a disaster, a tragedy.

The kidnapping of Haitian children by Christian missionaries following the earthquake could be considered by some to be evil, and it qualifies as such because there is intent. There is a mind behind the act.

You are still throwing out red herrings like crazy and making less and less sense.

I figured it out though, your words don't mean what the dictionary says they mean, so really you are saying I'm right and your wrong, in your own words.

Glad you came around!

Please do watch the tone and snide comments. We want a place where we can discuss and debate comfortably - even with people we don't agree with (or perhaps even, don't understand). Snide comments do not help create that environment.

I see you're unwilling to defend your conclusion to any extent beyond pointing at a book you feel has the final authority on any matter, so should we bother debating further with you or proceed as if you have nothing to contribute to the discussion?

Ah, let me translate your words again, since using the dictionary definition would be, in your opinion, wrong and an "Appeal to Authority",

Your last message translates as : I, Sciencemile, do solemnly swear that I eat paste, and like it!

Is that right, or do your words instead mean what the dictionary says they mean?

Words precede Dictionaries.

Which is absolutely meaningless since we no longer live in the age where there was no written reference. Silence precede words so if you truly want to regress along those lines simply remain silent and leave the debate to those of us that live in 2010, where we have dictionaries that serve as a reference on the meanings of words.

OK, so...

If we use the premise that Evil requires Intent, how does that factor into those who are rewarded/profit from evil behavior?

In other words:
1) if I intend to act in an evil* manner, and profit thereby, am I evil?
alternately:
2) if I intend to act in a good* manner, but evil results, and I profit thereby, am I evil?
3) if I intend to act in a good manner and profit thereby, but my actions are later interpreted as evil, am I evil?

*without further defining good/evil in this instance.

As a tangent perhaps (and if so, perhaps requiring a separate thread)... are good and evil a polar dichotomy or a sliding scale wherein some actions are both good and evil?

If you do act in an evil manner, then you are, in that moment, evil, and the act was an evil act.

Other than that I don't understand the point of your questions. If you profited or did not profit doesn't matter, it you attempted to rob a person and got shot trying you did an evil act in the attempt, it is fairly straightforward.



You already set a qualifier for your questions that "we use the premise that Evil requires Intent", right? So isn't it blatantly obvious under your qualifier what the answer is?

You tell me, I don't know your intent.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:45, Thu 27 May 2010.

Dictionaries define the meaning, they do not determine it. Definitions can and do become less correct as time goes on.  Some definitions very quickly.

And you are correct that silence precedes words; you may say you are happy, but if you face shows a meaning that proves otherwise, I know your words to be incorrect.

The Dictionary is not my dictator, and is not only not infallible, but is inevitably wrong, else there would be no need for new versions.
-------------------------------------



This again comes down to perspective; if people view your acts as evil, then you would be evil.  If they view them as good despite you doing them with an evil goal, they'd view you as good.

But I can't think of anybody that truly intends to be evil, hence we go to your next example.



Yes, it all comes down to the third perspective.  Generally, everybody intends to act in a Good manner; Hitler was serving his interpretation of Christ's will and the Greater Good of Germany, but we don't really view him too highly.



Yes.  You may be seen as a hero at your present time, or even as the ultimate force of good by the people you leave.  But your actions may be thought of as horrible in hindsight as perspectives change.  Certainly, the people of Germany had seen the Nazis as being as evil as we think of them today, they wouldn't have been elected in the first place.

In reply to Sciencemile (msg #80):

But if everyone intends to do good, and evil requires intent, where then does the determinant lie?

If evil is reliant on third-party perspective, that then removes some measure of intent, does it not?



To turn that third example around somewhat...

I undertake a course of actions. Society deems them and myself as evil. After a great deal of time passes, history is re-examined and society nows deems my actions not only as good, but insightful and ahead of their time.

Alternately, instead of the passage of time, a neighboring culture decries the condemnation and says immediately that my actions are good and not evil.

How does that impact evil?

Does evil become merely a matter of societal perceptions? And if so, can it ever be adequately defined?

Exactly, glad you admit you are wrong and I am right!

As far as your concern over word meanings changing over time, if you find me using a definition from, say, Websters 1840 2ndedition and the word meaning has changed then please feel free to point that out.

Otherwise words mean what they are defined to mean in a current edition, your incorrect definitions aside.

Evil is reliant on the third-party, as is the perspective of intent.  Thus, if people thought that a Storm had intent, the Storm would be evil.

Intent has to be perceived, thus as our understanding of what a storm was grew, it lost its intent, and most people no longer see storms as an evil force.

It is still common for us to curse at a piece of furniture for stubbing our toe against it, but no longer do we actually think the piece of furniture knowingly assaulted us.



It shows that it is very much based on perspective, not an objective thing that can be measured.

Great artists might not be thought as such in their times, because the importance of Art is subjective.  Likewise, Good and Evil are determined by their beholders.



It's a good question; it counts on knowing if our perception of Good worldwide is somehow becoming more refined.

In essence: will a time ever come when Hitler is thought of as a great person by the general public?

I do not know the answer, but I do know that there are some who still do think of him as a force for Good.
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:06, Thu 27 May 2010.

In your suppositional question you said "evil requires intent", so the determinant lies solely in intent. If you think with the intent to do evil it's an evil thought, if you act with the intent to do evil it's an evil act.



Then nothing is evil in this instance because you already said that for this set of questions evil requires intent. I don't understand why you are confused when you laid it out plainly.

I'm really confused about the dictionary thing. The dictionary has multiple, different meanings for these words. when we use a word, we have to determine which meaning is appropriate from context. If the context is not clear, that doesn't mean that EVERY meaning applies - it means that the message is just unclear.

So we come back to, how do we, as a group, define evil for the purpose of discussion.




I disagree with this bit, that doing an evil act makes you evil. I mean it works from a POV of using nice rhetoric, but from an ethical standpoint, I don't know that we can say that a person is evil (or not) based on what he is doing at that particular moment.



Well clearly several people disagree. I myself asked, is evil measured by INTENT, or by actual HARM. (Or are you specifying "under the definition of evil where evil requires intent"?)

I guess I'd have to clarify that Evil requires a perception of intent.

It's not necessarily a definition, though, but it is a qualifier.

I'd concede that at certain points in time people thought of natural disasters as conscious beings and they would have thought of them as Evil, but 'I' do not, and thus don't see them as Evil, knowing more accurately what they are.
-------------

Is there a case where something has been done which was both perceived to have caused no harm, but nevertheless was perceived as evil?

As an aside, while some of the definitions of evil do not require intent, the definition of sin almost always does. Hence, for simplicity, it may be desirable to shift from using the word 'evil', which may or may not imply intent, to 'sin', which does.

I do feel that a natural disaster may properly be called 'evil' or causing evil. I don't feel it could properly be called sinful.

Sin is a rather touchy word as well, since in a Theological sense, certain Gods have not committed this act, though by the definition that we are using, they have:

Since certain Gods intend to do everything they do, those actions can be perceived as sinful if sin is based on the third party perception.
----------------

Which is why I don't like the term Evil or Sin to begin with;  it's more appropriate to divvy up actions into more appropriate, more specific descriptions.

For instance, a kid beating up another kid on the playground for his lunch money is the same as a man murdering his wife and children before killing himself under both definitions being discussed combined.

Clearly, however, one might be more accurately attributed to greed, while the other might be more appropriately attributed to psychopathy, based on the assumed intent.

Really? Can you give an example of a substantive difference in definition between current dictionaries on evil? As far as multiple meanings it's simply a fact of life that words do have multiple meanings. "Evil" as a word isn't that complicated though. Can you point specifically to what is confusing you in the definitions? I see a lot of people claim vast differences but no one has pointed out one.



That is not what I said, is it?

I said it makes you "in that moment" evil. If you paint a wall pink, it's pink, if you paint blue over the pink it's blue and no longer pink, or more to the point a man who is in the middle of molesting a child is an evil man. He might stop his behavior, do some good in the world, repent, etc... and might no longer be an evil man at some point in the future, but while he is molesting kids he is evil, by definition. (and please no silliness about societies where molesting kids is OK or other red herrings)



In the questions I was answering writermonk stated they should be taken with the premise that evil required intent.



In the questions I was answering writermonk stated they should be taken with the premise that evil required intent. Not that that is not the accepted definition of evil, just writermonks limitations on the definition for those particular questions.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:35, Thu 27 May 2010.

I can get behind that as an idea.

Words, many words, carry all sorts of connotations that can make communication difficult between people from vastly different backgrounds and experiences.

And yet, they are often our easiest tool for communication.

That's what dictionaries are for. You can see some are better than others but they all pretty much agree.

Webster online:

1 a : morally reprehensible : sinful, wicked <an evil impulse> b : arising from actual or imputed bad character or conduct <a person of evil reputation>
2 a archaic : inferior b : causing discomfort or repulsion : offensive <an evil odor> c : disagreeable <woke late and in an evil temper>
3 a : causing harm : pernicious <the evil institution of slavery> b : marked by misfortune : unlucky

Dictionary.com:

1.morally wrong or bad; immoral; wicked: evil deeds; an evil life.
2.
harmful; injurious: evil laws.
3.
characterized or accompanied by misfortune or suffering; unfortunate; disastrous: to be fallen on evil days.
4.
due to actual or imputed bad conduct or character: an evil reputation.
5.
marked by anger, irritability, irascibility, etc.: He is known for his evil disposition.

Cambridge online:

1. morally bad, cruel, or very unpleasant

By definition 2c, we're all evil for disagreeing with you, I like that.
-----

Anyways, as can be seen, it reaches a point where people can't handle certain words anymore and we have to change to new ones to describe what we're talking about.  Otherwise they can be quite fanatic about it.

I think the difficulties with continuing to use the word Evil, as Astron shows, far outweigh the difficulties we may face using words that would better describe what we're talking about.

After all, it's not enough that we know what we're talking about; we can either ignore those who insist on not understanding, or compromise and use different words.

No, because being disagreeable is not the same as simply disagreeing (look it up), and as listed and shown in the example it is an archaic use so it really isn't applicable to a discussion of the nature of evil using today's definition of the word.

It's a difference between a dictionary being prescriptive or descriptive. That one is descriptive.

Sure! Thank you for even providing the definitions for me :)

There was an evil dog poop on the sidewalk. Three people stepped in it.

This of course, references your 2nd and 3rd dictionary.com definitions:
harmful; injurious
characterized or accompanied by misfortune or suffering


However, the poop did not engage in any conduct, nor does it have any character, so
"due to actual or imputed bad conduct or character" does not apply.
Poop is also not immoral. It is amoral - i.e., it does not act contrary to ethical behavior, it has no ethical behavior. Nor is it wicked. Ergo, "morally wrong or bad; immoral; wicked" does not apply.

It may have been evil of someone to leave the poop on the sidewalk, but that is a commentary on that person, not on the poop itself.




The definitions make sense. However, not every definition applies in every case. When I say "I got a wicked splinter in my finger", you probably understand it not to mean that the splinter was of an evil character, or was involved in immoral behavior (as it has no character, and engages in no behavior).

The thread so far has focused very heavily on the concept of intent. Must an action have intent to be evil? No! HOWEVER, the sub-meaning of evil they were talking about, the answer seems to be yes (which is why I suggested the word 'sin' instead, since that is a more specific subset of the greater meaning).



I do feel that my summary properly characterized what you said. I feel that calling someone an evil person is rhetoric, an oversimplification. Saying someone is "bad" or "good" is sort of goofy. We're all bad AND good, basically all of the time. Saying someone is evil suggests they are not good, which can't possibly be true.

I don't think evil requires intent but it does require awareness. The hurricaine is not evil because it smashed people's houses, the people were stupid to build houses where hurricaines are known to come ashore.
On the other hand the conquistadors may have had teh intent of saving the poor native's souls but they were certainly aware that they wre breaking and destroying their bodies in the process.

I suppose that's a more accurate word to use; intent is more commonly first person, which wouldn't be perceivable by the 3rd party.

I was looking around for an appropriate word, and the closest I can come up with is "Agency", whether in reality or concept.

So that I could consider a character in a book to be bad, though he doesn't exist and his actions never took place, yet in concept he is bad.
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:23, Thu 27 May 2010.

In the context of the book they are aware, are a person, and are bad. They aren't really bad simply because that context isn't real.

Right, that sounds better.

No it doesn't. Not under the general definition of evil. It requires an basically immoral act or harm.



You need to have some common sense about things. Stepping in poop for instance isn't truly injurious, and doesn't really cause harm. I've walked for miles with poop on my shoe without even knowing it, it isn't the same stepping on a sharp spike that rips your flesh. If you step on a sharp spike and it goes through your foot, the spike is evil by definition. I know a few people here disagree with that, but they are wrong, as the dictionary proves despite their objections to the meaning of words. It's not the same evil a child raper shows, but it is still evil. They just don't want to admit they are wrong so they carry it to absurdity.



I think you are not really comprehending the meaning of the word still. Take John Garner, he went to jail for molesting a young teenage girl, served five out of six years, got out and raped and killed at least two more teenage girls. Gardener is an evil man. He is immoral, he causes harm. If he tithed at a church it doesn't make him not evil, because he is still immoral in thought and deed. People can be evil and still have a little good in them, and people can be good and still have a little evil in them. People are complex, a lot of things are complex.

If you have a blue sky with one white cloud, it's still a blue sky, if you have a pink wall with one small red spot on it it is still a pink wall. If you have a guy who lives to rape and kill teenage girls he is still evil, even if he returns his library books on time.

And yes you can argue where the line is where you would call someone as a person evil rather than just an act, but even that isn't really much of a debate except for the people who chose to be absurd by claiming dictionaries are wrong or poop is the same as a hurricane. Most people who are described as evil are blatantly so, they make immorality and harm the center of their lives. People who commit evil acts but are not evil in nature are more the drunk drivers, the abortionists and those that have abortions, the careless who cause injury and such, people who are often troubled, sometimes pathetic, who cause evil but their nature is not evil.

It's not a difficult line to draw. Not at all.

By Jove, I think you just might qualify for a nomination in the Cardinal Mercier Prize of International Philosophy :P

Your statement that inanimate objects devoid of Moral agency are capable of being evil is absurdity.

A dictionary proves nothing; the common usage of the word in this Community Chat does not seem to be the definition you wish to use, and you're just getting around trying to prove that it should be used this way.

Clearly, if evil was as black and white as just going to a dictionary to see what someone else says it means, then all current philosophical discussion and research on the matter across the world is just as wrong, and you're right, they just don't want to admit it.

I think you're projecting your own inability to admit the absurdity of your arguments onto us, as can be seen by your inability to recognize how silly a "evil spike" is.

Take your own advice and have some common sense about those things; if a spike can be evil, than so can poop.

Wrong, it is quite within the proper use of English as it is spoken today to say "Dude, that was one evil spike you stepped on."

The fact that you don't like the use has no bearing on it being proper or not.

You are simply wrong and not willing to admit it. Not an unusual character flaw I suppose.

That's the slang they had in the 80's; nobody talks like that anymore.

We're not using slang to define what evil is.  Heavy means "serious" in 80's slang too, but when we're having a discussion about what it means to be heavy, we're not talking about seriousness.

Your argument is very lacking and has no point to it.
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:23, Thu 27 May 2010.

Wrongo oh ye of little word comprehension, it is proper, not slang english to refer to something that caused great harm as evil.

I'm really really sorry you and dictionary don't agree on this, but dictionary>you :)

That is one evil attitude you have given yourself though!

Why don't you prove that the dictionary > me?

Until then, I reject your use of the word, since it's contrary to common usage.

Easy, the dictionary has the correct definition, you do not.

And you can reject that as well, it doesn't change the facts :)

Let's try throwing this one out:

Evil is doing something wrong or harmful, with the intent to harm others.

A rationalization may or may not be applied.

I agree with both of those definitions in conjunction with each-other.

But what if the evil is done out of neglect?

Hmm, is a child evil if he forgets to feed his hamster and he dies?

Perhaps to the hamster;  Is the intent perceived by the third party, or the first party?

Again, this is why I bring up Moral Agency; the ability to do otherwise would change things.

For instance, if the child was in the room every day and was just too busy playing the computer to feed his pet, that's certainly different than if he had a horrible injury and as a result of his hospitalization he was unable to feed it.

Sigh, another obvious answer if you use common sense.

Starving an animal to death is an evil act. An evil act doesn't make the sum total of a person evil, that's pretty obvious.

It really is simple.

So, by your definition, being born in a desert is evil.

Gotcha.

Firstly the moderator stuff... The back and forth "you're wrong and you don't want to admit it", "no YOU'RE wrong and YOU don't want to admit it" isn't getting us anywhere. If your entire argument is "you're wrong because of a serious personal flaw", don't bother posting it - EVERYONE ELSE already knows that, and if it goes on long enough, we'll talk about it in PMs and agree not to engage that person any more. Your pointing it out just paints you with the same brush.





You can replace 'poop' with whatever you like. I prefer poop over spikes because it's funnier.




I feel like this line is very, very important.

So the child rapist shows a different sort of evil compared to an evil spike. Can you please expand on that?



I think you're applying a common-use term to a specialized discussion :) I feel like you're posting on a diesel forum talking about putting gas in your engine. The dual-meanings lend confusion.




Well he clearly doesn't cause harm RIGHT NOW. He's in prison. Right now the harm he's doing is pretty limited.

I suppose my problem is you're reducing the full complexity of a human being, with his loves, desires, failures, goals, motivations, fears, etc., to a single attribute, and worse, applying that attribute to his entire existence, to every stage of his life, even though the person he is at 15 or 50 is a clearly different person, joined tenuously by a few biological and legal consistencies. I know that my psychology right now is hugely different from when I was say 12, and will be hugely different again when I'm 50. TO have all of that reduced to a single label based on a single (or a few acts) seems facile and simplistic. It's data loss through reduction (to use the programming terminology).



Get out more :) Most of the people described as evil are those who cut others off in traffic, pursue a career in law or politics, disagree with the speaker, work in law enforcement, etc. Also, easily 99% of the time, the person describing someone else as evil does not actually know that person. You read about a single action the person has, or have a single interaction with him, and assume you can reduce his entire life, experiences and psychology to a single, convenient label? Not outside of fiction can you accurately do that.

It depends. If the person is responsible for something, knows he is responsible, and through intent neglects to attend to it, then he has committed an evil act (and this responsibility cascades - if I buy a tiger, it is my responsibility to educate myself on what my responsibilities are. If the tiger eats someone, I can't say "I didn't know I needed to keep it in a cage!")

A person who is not responsible for something (for instance, I'm not responsible for teaching your child about God), nor able to attend to it, is not committing an evil.

If we are going to be talking about evil in terms of reference materials lets at least graduate to an encylopedia entry: http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Evil

LOL, thanks for that, not only does it agree with the dictionary definition, it proves all the people who claimed evil must have intent and couldn't be a hurricane completely wrong.



I have already answered that a couple times, as well as the other points you bring up. What do you serve by not reading my answers and just bringing the same points up over and over? Especially when you chide people for the "you're wrong and you don't want to admit it" argument but you feed it by ignoring points.



Are you really saying his appetite for raping and murdering teen girls isn't still squirming around in his mind? Isn't the definition inclusive of thought, particularly following several immortal deeds. I admit there is a possibility his evil nature has subsided, but the likelihood is so small that absence of any evidence on your part that he has rehabilitated himself I feel confident in claiming the greater possibility by far is that he has not, especially for the purpose here of giving an example.

However since you seem to have a problem with that, lets just assume for the purpose of the example that in his mind he is still hungering for pretty teen girls to rape and kill, OK, since that's all it was, an example of an evil person.

Also do you really think prison limits your capacity for evil? Really? Donovan State Prison where he was incarcerated about a week ago has been described as hellish, in the past decade I can remember at least one murder and at least one riot there, with only a couple thousand people average in the last decade I'm sure the violent crime rate there is astronomical compared to the outside. I don't think his capacity for evil in thought or deed is diminished by much, only his supply of pretty teen girls.

But again, he is just an example. If you want to focus on the "if's ands and buts" that don't really matter to the main point rather than on the point itself I guess that's what you want to do. A nice way to avoid the point I guess.



That's in the definition I provided with two parts, the first being basically immoral behavior, the second being the causing of harm. Did you not read that?



I'm sorry, I don't know how to help you with that at this point, it seems very clear to me. A lot of words have two or more meanings, many of them similar but not exact, and it's something most English users learn to deal with early on.



Sigh, no I'm not, you just are not following for what ever reason.


I've said a lot, given examples, you choose to ignore them and that's you, not me.

Now, you and I both know that you get a lot of people who say a lot of stupid things, like "people are called evil who cut people off in traffic" sort of crap, but we are both smart enough to know that "evil" isn't usually what you call someone who cuts you off in traffic, and that some politicians are called "evil" it's not really a mainstream thing, a few brainless bush-bashers for instance do not make Bush evil, any more than a couple people who don't like a valid, correct definition prove it wrong because the Bible is wrong or because words change over the centuries or any other silliness. OTOH most people agree that Hitler and serial killers and such are evil. There really isn't a lot of debate in these issues other among than those fringe agenda's that don't reflect the mainstream and the people who like to argue while making no sense just to argue, is there?
This message was last edited by the player at 21:39, Fri 28 May 2010.

At the same time it demonstrates the flaw in your own argument because teh context of teh conversation here is clearly about moral evil where you are discussing natural evil.
In fact aside from teh section on natural evil te concept even within te encylopedic reference is largely ignored, certainly teh paragraphs on the critereon of evil or discussing free will and concience would have no application to natural evil. Aside from mentioning that it can be a way that teh word evil is used the concept of natural evil is then ignored for teh remainder of the discourse.

Nope, sorry, but when you were in high school did they tell you anything about context because you seem confused. Clearly when discussing a hurricane one is discussing "natural" evil, right? I mean the word "hurricane" sort of makes the context so obvious that one would likely have to be impaired in some way to miss that, right? :)

Your comments alone do not define the context of the conversation. If you chose to have your own conversation and go talk with yourself then you can define teh context of teh conversation, but as to the rest of us we were discussing what was clearly moral evil before you decided to jump in and start declaring that you had all the answers because you owned a dictionary and that hurricaines and Hitler were apparently comperable forms of evil.

Um, I hate to break it to you, but my context was clear, and you responded to that context even acknowledging that the subject was hurricanes and how the term evil applied or did not.

You were wrong, even your own link about "natural" evil proves you were wrong. Calling a hurricane evil is a perfectly valid use of the term. Are you really not man enough to now admit it? Do you really have to struggle this way with more red herrings and misrepresentations of the discussion?

What do you think that says about you? Is it a moral evil on your part to misrepresent things this way rather than just admitting being incorrect?

The descriptions of huricaines as evil is apparently valid, though not one I have seen often, and also not one which fit the context of the conversation. Linguistically you are correct that term evil can be applied to hurricains. However the overall discusioon is whether the moral concept of evil which is a distinctly different conversation than the proper linguistic use of the word, applies within various contexts and, as teh encylopedia artcle clearly illustrates every concept of evil aside from natural evil does require a moral agent, which requires something cpabale of thought. I would even go so far as to suggest that the concept of natural evil is derivitive of such attitudes as Falwell (who ascribed the Haitian earthquake to haiti's moral failure) and the Imam who ascribed immodest dress in women as the cause of earthquakes, and is in fact largely fallling out of usage because that perception of the natural world a a reflection of the spiritual or moral world is one which is no longer prevelant.

And I rest my case.

It seems that Astron does want to have a 1-person conversation in the context of evil meaning harm.

In the meantime, I suggest that to make further progress, all in favor of only using the context of Moral Evil continue on with the discussion and refrain from being goaded further into responding to Astron.

Funny how you keep replying to a 1 person conversation :D

Anyway, my point has been proven, no morality has to be involved to define something as evil. If you want to limit the discussion to one definition of evil I'm game, what's the specific definition you feel equipped to discuss?

Would you be committing evil if you are showing neglect to yourself?  Say, if you are diagnosed with HIV but refuse to accept the reality of the situation, and as a result the disease progresses more quickly.

On the flipside, would choosing to apply this ignorance to your child by taking no precautions with breastfeeding be evil if as a result the child contracts HIV? Would it be an evil act even if the child did not contract HIV?

What if it's a less serious disease?
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:13, Sat 29 May 2010.

By which specific definition of evil?

Let's complicate this issue with a real-world example.

My cousin has a mental illness.  She requires medication to keep her from harming herself or others.  So, if she doesn't take medication, she could commit an evil act more readily than others.

Now, what if she becomes pregnant?  Suddenly she can't take medication without harming her potential child.  What if she gives birth, and wants to breast feed?  Does the potential evil of ceasing her medication counter the risk of evil via harm to the child?

Well I would mention that the above scenario actually *was* a real-world case of AIDS denialism; her daughter died of AIDS-induced pneumonia, and She also died a couple months later.

To your example:

I'd say that the chance that she *might* do something harmful to others as a result of being off medication, when compared to the known harms that being on the medication would do to her child, seems to suggest to me that going off the medication would be the better thing.

On one hand, she is in control of her medicine dosage; if it's due to mental illness that she does things that might be harmful, she cannot be morally be blamed since she is not in control.

(I hope I have not assumed too much, and I do not mean any offense if I have).

Meanwhile, the choice to breastfeed is something that would be optional.  It depends on whether formula would be less beneficial for the child, but I say at that point there is absolutely no way the child is being put into danger by her going back on the medication, so long as she doesn't breastfeed.

During the pregnancy, it was absolutely essential that she stop taking the medicine, while-as now the matter is coming down to choice.

What if we inverted the question.... What are the detriments or risks of being good or doing the right thing? Are they worth doing?

I would say:
re HIV: moral harm to ones self is a very personal issue- if a person has HIV and chooses not to seek treatment for religious or financial reasons hen they have judged, for whatever reason, that treating the disease does more harm to themselves (opr their families) than letting it kill them. However if this is the case then they also have an obligation to ensure against the spread of teh disease- which means informing any sexual partneers (including informing them you are not being treated), taking all steps possible for protection, and not nursing.

re mental meds: I think if a person needs medication to maintain safe behavior then if they are going off teh meds they are likewise responsible to find other means of controling their behavior to ensure they do not become violent or otherwsie do what teh meds are used to guard against. Whther this means checking into a clinic while pregnant/nursing, using physical restraints or simply having someone who is capable of restraiing you along whenever you go out in public would depend on the condition being treated.

There are ussually alternative ways to deal with a situation, it is the decision to simply not deal with it that is a banal form of evil.

This gets into the morality of mental health medication.  IANAL, but if you know you have a mental illness, and voluntarily go off your medication, you are held legally and morally responsible for any acts you do under that state.  So, murdering someone because you wanted their wallet and murdering someone because you went off your meds and thought they were the antichrist are considered the same under the law.

Yeah, the question of self-harm is a difficult one. Is it immoral to cause yourself harm? Is that complicated by things such as mental diseases (such as depression, chemical imbalances, etc.?) Is it immoral to smoke (by yourself, in a closed room)? By the Christian standard, sin (moral evil) is anything that drives you away from God, but that things done resulting from disease are at least less immoral.

I know in Catholicism any decision to not embrace life is considered immoral and decisions to embrace life are considered moral, despite the fact that dying hypotheticaly gets you closed to God a lot faster...

Because the point is not merely to return to God's presence, it's to return with honor. ;)

Unless you worship Cthullu, then you need to return with snacks...

Depends on the particular 'act of good', and on ones particular valuation of various things.  Should you run into a burning building to save your child?  Should you run into a building full of slightly unpleasant people to save your child?  The risks change from scenario to scenario, and usually are fairly clear.  Are they worth doing is a more difficult question that depends on what is important to you.  Is it more important to you to be rich, or to have a clean conscious, or to benefit others, or to do the least harm to others, or...

Many good acts are worth doing, because they provide you with something you value (a sense of purpose, a clean conscious, happiness derived from helping others, etc.) but that depends on your own value system.  Also, some good acts probably aren't worth doing, because of the opportunity cost of doing them (eg, it might be a nice thing to do to buy everyone you know a happy birthday card, even if it's not their birthday, but you can probably do more good with your time and money than that if you try).

One thing to keep in mind is that sometimes (often times?) the optimal situation over the long term is different from the optimal situation in the short term, and the long term solution requires cooperation and trust in order to work.  The prisoners dilemma problem comes to mind.  In any given 'match' of the prisoners dilemma, the player will always do best if they screw the other person over...but if both players adopt that solution, they both do very poorly.  If both players adopt a cooperative strategy (ie, take a course that is not optimal for the given match) they can both do better over the long run.  In other words, sometimes the 'good' action is actually the most successful, even in a 'selfish' sense.

It sort of seems like we're dealing too much with generalities here to be of much use.  Is there a specific situation or situations you had in mind that we might be able to consider a bit more closely?

I propose we move the discussion out of OOC and over to here...or somewhere more appropriate if you know of a place.

I'm going to take a short break due to a headache (unrelated to this discussion, though it's probably not helping the discussion or my headache)

And since your god thinks everyone is bad, I don't really respect his opinion.



That tends to happen when you have a fundamentally flawed concept.  There are plenty of other interpretations of the Afterlife even in Christianity that aren't so flawed as this particular one you've decided to get behind.

The LDS God has a system of afterlife-justice vastly superior to this one.




We're not going to go any further on this specific branch until you answer this: What gave you the idea I ever used to be a Christian?

We're not going to go any further on this specific branch until you answer this: What gave you the idea I ever used to be a Christian?
</quote>
I was pretty sure I read in one of the older threads that you said you grew up believing, or following, or being dragged along by your parents. Can;t remember when or where, but I thought I read that a long long time ago.

Was I mistaken?

I was taught that 'God knows best' when it comes to hell/wrath/judgement, and that we as finite human beings 'just don't get it'

If that line of reasoning is true, then how is it fair to expect anyone to want to trust that God when he hides logical evidence and signs of fairness from us finite human beings.

Punishing a finite being with infinite burning torture is not fair by any stretch of logic whatsoever, and yet we are told that it's simply true and to suck it up and accept it.

Well, if this God wants to convince anyone that it is not completely and utterly full of horrific evil then perhaps shedding some light on that whole idea would be prudent.

As a 'used to be conservative evangelical' I have no choice but to fully reject the God who would torture people eternally for any sort of finite life choices - no matter how evil they are.

Annihilationism at least makes some sense here.  So does a form of Universalism.  Both can be argued in some degree from the Bible.

The God of Calvinism is, in my mind, and from my experience in teaching in churches and working in youth ministry, wholly and completely evil in every sense of the word.

Ray Comfort lives in a world where he is comfortable with the 'bad guys' burn forever in a tortuous existence, but he's 'A Ok' with it because he sees himself as the good guy who will not have to be there.

I presented this point before with Tycho. Maybe it will help.

Imagine a child being punched by an adult male
Imagine a woman being punched by an adult male
Imagine a fighter being punched in the ring by an adult male
Imagine the president of the USA being punched by an adult male

Which one would go to jail the longest?
This message was last edited by the player at 03:55, Tue 06 Nov 2012.

The adult male punching the actual criminal?

(The President)

LoL. :)

Right. I wouldn't have phrased it that way, but yes.

The punishment is related to the person being offended.

Now the President is just a person, but anyone who attacked the President would be treated differently than any other person.

God, who is infinitely more important than the president has a much larger punishment for the one who offends.

Ultimately, People think God is love, and that means we all go to heaven. But we have to keep in mind God is also completely just and righteous, and that means He will judge righteously. And that may mean a punishment that we would not want to face ourselves.

And that is why christian go into the world, and spread the good news that there is a way, a path where we can accept that we are sinners, and need Jesus in our lives, and follow Him.

If a person commits a crime, and the judge sentences them to their punishment, who's at fault? The criminal, or the judge?

So the 38 year old Nicaraguan who lived his entire life in the dumps of La Chureca dies and then deserves to burn in eternal torment because he didn't ave the Four Spiritual Laws read to him by a missionary?

That's the classical Christian view of God and it's as evil as anything that we could possibly dream up and yet individuals are supposed to see that as love?

An eternal punishment to a finite being does not make sense at all.  It just doesn't.  It's the very definition of evil.  I am saying this as someone who used to believe in that.  As someone who used to hand out tracts downtown and on University campuses.  As someone who used to hold to that line of thinking entirely.

There comes a time in life when an individual needs to back up and truly examine the beliefs that they are holding to try and see them for what they are.

Trust in the Lord, I would implore you as someone who has been there, to take a weekend and to silently examine your beliefs and decide whether that God is truly loving and kind.

It could radically change your life and your view on everything.

No, they went to hell because they deserved it for their actions. They also rejected God.

Romans 1:18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

And there's more. Not only is this known, but I feel you are mistaken about how wide spread Jesus is known. God knows where these people are, who they are, and what they need.

Revelation 7:9 After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands.



I'd have to say, as a former atheist, I have been willing to look at many angles of the equation. I have found the more I depend on Him, the more my faith is strengthened.

I am sorry but I find the interpretation of God that you hold to to be utterly repulsive and truly evil in every way.  I fully reject the interpretation of the Bible that you hold to.

I hope one day you can hold a different view that does not contain such a hateful and evil God.

I know where you are coming from since I was there once, and I know that there is hope that you can change.

Keep on taking your faith seriously (as I am sure you currently do), and keep pursuing truth and love.

Your analogy fails as is to be demonstrated:





Our justice system is based on reasonable morals, and you'll get a stiffer punishment for punching a kid than the president, because the president can defend himself.

Here's a better analogy; according to the Treason Act of 1351, we're (Americans) all traitors to the crown, guilty of high treason towards the King/Queen of England.

Here's what I have to say to that; fruit the King/Queen of England and his/her treaty, I don't recognize the authority or judgment of a dictator.  USA, USA, USA.
This message was last edited by the GM at 06:53, Tue 06 Nov 2012.

I have never been a Christian, nor a Hindu, nor a Sikh, nor any other religion.  My father is Roman Catholic, and my Mother is Atheist (although I don't agree with her reasons).

When you're a child, you experience the preying of religious evangelicals a lot more than as an adult; they are attracted to the young, assuming them to be less thoughtful and more easily manipulated.

Even then, their beliefs seemed silly to me, although it wasn't until I was older and in my late teenage years that I was able to put words to why I found their arguments to feel wrong or not make sense.  Sometimes I still can't, I have difficulties describing my thoughts to others.

I am not perfect, I have been caught up in certain rhetorical hysterias while I was in my late teens.  But when my anger management teacher in middle school had this dialogue with me:

Teacher: "Well, I believe from nothing nothing comes, so God must have created the Universe"
Me: "Where did god come from then?"
Teacher: "That's beyond our understanding" or "God has always existed." (I distinctly remember having this conversation more than once)

I knew there was something wrong about this argument, but it wasn't until I was older that I found out what.

Yes!  Very well put, Doulos!

And the answer is the same as before:  who would be punished isn't necessarily the same as who should be punished harshest.  The punishment given out isn't necessarily just.

So let's try it this way.  Say the judge said to all these people, "you've all punched some one, so you all get the same punishment:  we're going track down all your families, rape and torture them before your eyes.  Then we're going to force YOU to torture them, and pick which of our guards rapes them next.  We'll do this over continuously until they die of dehydration."  Is this justice?  Is this reasonable or fair, or loving, or good?  Clearly not.  It's horrific, evil, sadistic, and completely out of line with the crime committed.  But insane and evil as the above 'justice' is, it's still better than sending someone to hell, because what they get there is worse than all that, AND it never ends.

And to drive home the flaw in the point you're trying to make, under the system you're supporting, the punishment for EVERY crime is exactly the same.  It doesn't matter if you think an angry thought about the president, or if you rape a child, you still get the same, infinite, punishment.  So the whole "which of these gets the worst sentence" misses the fact that in your system they all get the same punishment.  The fact that we can see that a boxer punching another boxer in the ring is totally a different situation than someone beating a child seems to be completely missed on God.  He doesn't see any difference between the two.  That doesn't sound "all knowing" to me.

Again, go back to the Ray comfort movie.  Hitler did horrible things to the jews for being jews (ie, members of the wrong race/religion).  Those that stayed Jewish to the very end (ie, didn't convert to christians with their dying breath) receive (we're told) something WORSE than what hitler did to them, for pretty much the same reason (ie, being members of the wrong religion).  You can't really say that hitler was evil for kill the jews for being jews but god is 'loving and good' for doing even worse to the jews for being jews.  If what hitler did was wrong (and we all agree it was), what you're telling me god does to the jews is even more wrong.  The fact that god is supposed to be "all powerful" doesn't make his crime not evil, it makes it even more inexcusable.  Just as we view it as worse to attack the weak and helpless, rather those who could fight back, God dumping infinite pain and suffering on those who pose no threat to him whatsoever is just abusing his power, not acting with love, justice, or patience.

Let me put it this way:  if God were actually evil, how would you know?  How would you be able to tell if you were following an evil god that just claimed to be good, rather than a good one?  What evidence would you look for to answer that question?  Would you ask what the evil god said about himself (remember, he's evil, so has no problem lying)?  Would you ask what the followers of the evil god said about him (they might be fooled by the evil god's lies, or might lie themselves)?  Would you just accept that "hey, he's a god, so who am I to judge whether he's evil or not?"  Or would you look at the actions he's purported to take, and think "does this seem like the kind of actions evil people take, or good people take?"  How could you know?  How could someone following an evil god ever realize it, TitL?

Furthermore, even if you could somehow justify the warped notion that a crime against an infinite being deserves infinite torture, there is the little problem that God himself created these finite beings with the knowledge that He would torture great numbers of them for eternity.  It would have been better not to create them at all if he knew that they would be created only to burn in hell forever.

Also, if you're a Calvinist you go even further and believe that he created individuals SPECIFICALLY to be burned and tortured for his glory.

Pure insanity.  I say this as someone who actually still holds out belief in the Bible and the person of Jesus Christ.

Interpretation? You don't think it says that in the bible?
What happens to people who are judged as rejecting God?

Apparently you don't know what it says in the Bible, TITL, since you think there are no good people other than Jesus, or else it would defeat your little self-loathing narrative that doesn't pan out if you've actually read it.

Nor does it matter if the Bible says your God is Good if it's apparent by his actions that he is not.

Your interpretation of what God is is the exact opposite of what loving and good is, and is a petty tool of earthly tyrants to control people for their own selfish ends.

EDIT:  Yes, your interpretation TITL; what, did you think you could seize the infallibility of god for yourself just by reading a holy book translated and transformed thousands of times over thousands of years by mere men as imperfect as you are?
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:52, Wed 07 Nov 2012.

I don't know what happens.  I have seen some very convincing arguments straight from the Bible that seem to indicate conscience burning torture, as well as annihilationism (you die and then are 'snuffed out of existence'), as well as Universalism.  There are also some in between theories as well that can be argued for straight from the Bible.

I personally don't know, so I choose to base my understanding of the character of God on the individual and person of Jesus Christ and then filter all doctrine (including Hell) through that.

So I read all Scripture with the understanding that love is always going to win in the end end, also understanding that in some way justice will be a part of that for evil.

I am quite comfortable leaving it at that and choosing to try and simply live the best life I can in step with the person of Jesus Christ (as I understand it).

Uhm, what? So anything that you don't like with the view you have, you just think they lied about that part, but were honest about the parts you liked?

I don't think I said that at all.

I merely am stating that very intelligent people have argued all sorts of theories about what happens after death and done so straight from the Bible.

The way I personally choose to interpret those theories is through the "lense" of the character of Jesus Christ.

I know you didn't say that. But you know what the words say. You used to believe it too.

Were the words there before, and now because you believe something else the words have changed?

Let me be more specific. You're not a muslim, and Jesus was a fraud. Allah is real, what does the koran say about you going to hell?

What I'm trying to ask you, do the words say anything about hell, and who goes there? Would you have any warning written about who goes to hell?

Not all Muslims have the same idea of Hell, Trust.  There are plenty of different denominations of Islam who have different interpretations of the Koran, as well.

Go with this for a moment.....

What I don't get is what pink bubble gum has to do with hell. Why did you bring that up science? And what I don't understand is how you altered the meaning of wine to refer to desks. It seems confusing to me.

Oh, someone just came behind me and pointed out I have the wrong interpretation of what you said. They say that you said something else. Since we disagree, then I guess it doesn't matter what is written, there is just no way we could read the words, and figure it out. So both must be correct.

Back to non sarcasm. Forgive me for the jest, but I think it seems reasonable we can understands words by using their meaning. A dictionary for exampe, we can read it and know what something means. That's why we have words, to understand what is being said.

Because I believed one interpretation of something in the past does not by default then make it true.  My interpretation of things have changed, as I am sure some of your own have.

I don't know anything about the Koran so I cannot speak to that.

The intricacies of metaphor, the slippery nature of historical texts and interpretation, and a changing understanding of the very nature of what God is like based on my current understanding of Biblical texts have all cast doubt into what hell may or may not be like.

If God is evil and chooses to cast mortals into everlasting conscious torment, then what I believe is meaningless anyways because our pitiful little excuses for life lie in the hands of a sick and sadistic murderer who created billions of people with the sole purpose of torturing them forever so he can appear glorious.

If God is actually defined by love, then I can trust that whatever my interpretation of the Biblical texts might be, that that love nature will trump it all and make it all make sense.

I choose a God of love and a "Who knows" interpretation of hell rather than a dogmatic view of hell a God that is sadistic and evil.  That's my choice and if I am viewed as being too liberal or loose with the Bible than so be it.  However, I also treat the Bible seriously and wrestle with what it says on a constant basis.

Dealing with the horrific evils of the OT is a struggle, and yet I have had some recent interesting views shared with me on how it might fit in with the nature of Jesus Christ.

Again, for me that's the kicker.  Everything, from the interpretation of hell, to the role of women in leadership, to gay marriage, to non-violence, and to OT violence and nationalism, is held up against the character of Jesus and then examined for its worth.

If it fails then it is, as Paul would say in Colossians 2:17 "A shadow of the things to come", and the "reality, however, is found in Christ."

That's the way I interpret the Universe, my relationships, the doctrine of hell, and everything else in between.

Except that metaphor, thousands of years of change in culture and history, and all sorts of other factors DO make it tricky to always just 'read the words and understand what is being said.'

That's why you don't believe that God has wings (Psalm 17:8).  Because you can't simply read it at face value and say 'Well that's what it says!'

What I think I wanted to be clear on was this Doulos.



I think it's clear. I understand you believe some things, but when you have to alter the meaning of the words to match your own beliefs, well, one of them is likely wrong.

If you're right, well, that means Jesus didn't have to die. If you're wrong, what I am worried about is you are are depending on a lie.

In the end I cling mightily to the hope that love will triumph over everything else.  If that's not true then either all of life is utterly meaningless, or we are all living in a world ruled by a sadistic twisted God and what I believe is meaningless anyways (well there could be other options based on other religions/beliefs as well, but I personally rank the likelyhood of those as lower than an atheistic position, so I don't include them for myself personally)

I also don't believe for a second that you don't alter the meaning of words to match your beliefs.  Everyone who interprets the Bible in some way does it.
This message was last edited by the player at 04:32, Wed 07 Nov 2012.

You speak as if from a position of authority.  But the truth is, you alter the meaning of the words to match your own beliefs as well.

That's what an interpretation is.

To throw your words back at you, when you have to alter the meaning of the words "Good", "Just", and "Loving" to match your own beliefs, one of them is likely wrong.

Hey guys, let's try to tone it down a bit here too, okay?  Remember, go after ideas, not the person holding them.  It hasn't gotten as bad here as in the OOC thread, but it seems like it's getting close, so please just take a deep breath before posting and keep it civil, eh?


TitL, not sure if it got overlooked, or if you were just busy with the other folks, but I did ask a question in my last post which I think would be interesting to hear your answer on:  How can a person know if they're following an evil god that just claims to be good, rather than a good god?

Next point, you've said "I think it seems reasonable we can understands words by using their meaning. A dictionary for exampe, we can read it and know what something means. That's why we have words, to understand what is being said." Which I think is oversimplistic, and fairly evidently not true (if it were, we wouldn't have all the disagreement over what the bible says.  There wouldn't be different denominations, there wouldn't be arguments and wars throughout history over things like whether the wine turns in to REAL blood or just metaphorical blood, or whether women can be priests or not, or all the other stuff.  As nice as it might seems like it would be if it were true, human beings just aren't great at being machine-like in their specificity.  Human languages aren't like computer code, where there's one and only one way to interpret the meaning.  It's part of the reason that we can make computers pronounce sentences from our languages, but haven't got all that far with making computers able to understand the meaning of a sentence.  Even using dictionaries like you suggest doesn't get us that far, because most words have multiple definitions.  Some words have over 100 definitions!  What we do when we interpret was people say is to make judgments (usually without even realizing we're doing it) about which definition for each word makes the most sense given the other words they've said, and about what we know about the person speaking, etc.

Some examples of interpreting the meaning of "clear" words in the bible for you might include:
1. The example given in the OOC thread recently, of Jesus saying 'why do you call me good?  Only God is good.'  If that was the only thing a person had ever heard about Jesus, they'd naturally conclude that Jesus is saying that he isn't God, and that he isn't good.  If Peter had said those exact same words, that's how you'd interpret them.  If you said those words, that's how everyone here would interpret them.  But when Jesus says it, you and many others reach a different conclusions, because you already know/believe many other things about Jesus that influence how you interpret his words.
2.  When Jesus says "this generation will not pass before..." a straight, dictionary-reading, interpretation of those words means that the generation he's talking to will still be around when these things happen.  But you and many chritians today interpret it to mean "this generation (that I was just talking about a second ago) will not pass..." because that fits in better with your beliefs about what Jesus meant.  Even though the people who lived at the time interpretted it to mean the second coming would be within a few years of Jesus' death, people today take an approach of "well, he must have meant it this other way, because it didn't happen back then."
3.  Another example we've mentioned here quite a while back now is the idea of Moses having horns.  This came from the fact that the word for "horns" in hebrew can also mean "rays," and when Moses comes down from the mountain after talking to God he's describe with "XXXXX coming from his face," which most translators now take to mean rays of light (which does seem to make more sense from rest of the story), but which for a long time was translated as horns (which also makes a bit of sense, since the jews were described as being frightened of Moses because of his appearance).  When I was in Lithuania this past summer, I noticed a statue of Moses at the cathedral there which had horns.  This is a case where just 'looking it up in the dictionary' led to the translators getting it wrong.  Everywhere else in the bible (so I'm told, I don't read Hebrew) that this word appears, it's translated as "horns," it's just this one place that it's supposed to mean rays.  Either interpretation is grammatically possible, so we just have to figure out which is meant based on what makes sense with the rest of the story.  There is a "correct" answer (ie, the one the writer intended), but there's no fool-proof way to know which it is in this case.  Using the dictionary, and nothing else, gives us two different options, either of which could be the 'right' one.  Its only by looking at the rest of what's said, and making a judgment call about what seems to make the most sense can we decide which of the two was intended.  In this case, I think we'll all probably (today) reach the same conclusion, and thus feel pretty confident in our interpretation, but that doesn't mean we didn't have to do interpretation at all.  Context matters, tone matters, other unstated/unspoken information matters.

The thing to remember is that people can be wrong while being sure that they're right.  This has happened so many times that it seems like it doesn't even need stating, but it seems people still seem to miss it.  The important fact is that being sure you're right means neither that you are right, nor that everyone else thinks you're right<i>.  It doesn't mean you're wrong, either, but it's import to keep in mind that just being sure ourselves is different from everyone agreeing with us, and both of those are different from being correct.  When we start saying things like 'this is so obvious, all these people who claim to disagree with me must actually see that I'm right and just be pretending not to be troublemakers,' we're forgetting the difference between <i>feeling correct and people agreeing that we're correct.  We might still be right, but that doesn't mean the people who are wrong know it!  But we might also be wrong.  Feeling that it's obvious that we're right doesn't make it so, especially when the people who disagree with us feel just as strongly that they're right!  When you make claims that "we should all be able to agree what it says," I feel like you may be forgetting this.

One thing that might be useful:  have you ever been wrong about something, but at the time been very confident you were right?  Have you ever been 'so certain' you'd put your keys in place X only to find them in place Y?  Or been 'absolutely sure' that you'd locked the back door, only to find that you hadn't?  or anything like that?  I certainly have, and I think most people have too.  The thing that these situations show us is that it's possible to be very confident that X is true, but still be wrong.  And this teach us two things:  First is that we should always be open to the possibility that we're wrong, no matter how sure we feel.  Second is that we shouldn't assume that just because people are wrong, that they actually know they're wrong!  They can be completely sincere in holding to their incorrect belief, and they can be completely convinced they're right even when they're not.  And the only way to change their mind is to actually show them how they're wrong.  Just asserting that they're wrong and they know it won't really change their mind.

I realized while looking at the other thread that the best evidence against the "meaning of words are clear; just us a dictionary" idea is actually all the back-and-forth over what TitL meant by a "good person."

In the faith and works thread, TitL said:


I looked up 'good' on dictionary.com and didn't find that definition.  I knew, from reading what TitL was saying, that he was using 'good' to mean 'never having sinned.'  If I had went to the dictionary instead, I wouldn't found that definition.  (Maybe that's the cause of all the fuss in that discussion?)



 GMC and sciencemile were using the "morally excellent; virtuous; righteous; pious" definition of "good" but TitL was using a different one that isn't in the dictionary (at least not the one I checked).  I think that's a pretty clear refutation of the idea that everyone just uses the words as defined in the dictionary, so there should never be any confusion about what one means.  At the same time, I think TitL's meaning WAS pretty clear from the context of what he was saying (though at least two people seem to have not understood him, so I'm less certain of just how clear it was).  If TitL (who is a strong advocate of the 'just go to the dictionary' view) can find himself using a definition other than whats in the dictionary, surely it's no stretch to think that biblical authors (who didn't have access to dictionaries at all!) could run into the same thing.  Just as I needed to interpret what TitL said in light of other things he had said in order to grasp his intended meaning, there's no real avoiding of interpreting the words in the bible to find their intended meaning.  The dictionary, just by itself, isn't going to get us there, and it's not really reasonable to expect it to, in my opinion.

I want to back up to something that trouble me here though.

So if, according to certain beliefs, all humans are created evil, and all evil are blocked from salvation, then how can children be exempt?

I honestly don't get that.

And if there is some exemption, then at what point do they lose that exemption?  A certain age?  A certain developmental stage? So confusing...

In reply to Doulos (msg # 168):

My understanding of the position is that it comes from Mathew 19:14--


Does seem somewhat inconsistent with other things said about salvation, but it's got the whole "Jesus said it, so who are we to question it?" thing going for it.  As for when they exception ends, I guess they'd say "whenever Jesus decides it does."

Sufficiently vague enough to probably be exactly the verse used.

Too many questions. I'll stick with this one for now. If you're really interested in other questions, let's keep it simple and fewer.

How do I know I'm following a good God, and not an evil God? I suppose I'd use logic.

I'd argue that if God is evil, and omnipotent, then what purpose would he have for us? Like He could do whatever He wanted, including forcing us to do things we don't want. No actual thing would be beyond him.

I suppose a God that is evil, and had limited powers, such as controlling the future to make it appear that prophecy happened so that he might use his limited power to fool us so that one day we might follow someone who is false. In the end, that might lead to multiple views of religion all wrong, and false. So that in the end, in the afterlife, we will all be forced to endure whatever this limited power God might want to do with us anyway, and therefore, every single person on Earth to ever exist will learn we were wrong.

As an exercise, I suppose it wouldn't matter if evil, since then everyone is wrong.

I'd argue that a good God, His attributes, unable to lie, faithful, merciful, just, patient would be known as qualities of good, regardless of how it's defined.

There would be no purpose in an evil god, but there is truth, history, and prophecy in a good God.

Seems somewhat reasoanble what you're saying to build an argument about contradiction, with the exception that science and I had just finished going over the idea of good from the 180 movie, where we discussing the ten commandments test from ray comfort to see if you matched God's view of good.

I mentioned what view of Good was science using, and was he using God's standard in post 235
Science mentioned it, post #236, understanding he was not using the Ray comfort standard.

Clearly, this was no misdirection on my part. Science read it, and I am confident by his comment about it, that he understand the context.


Yea, adding to the fact that we both mentioned the concept, and that I actually did point out that Doulos was correct on my meaning, and that added fact that I think Science picked up on far earlier and that was why he stopped trying to prove there was a contradiction, but switched it that the guilty should prove their innocence format, we were left with just Cain "misunderstanding" it. However since he continued on after I stated Doulos had it correct, .......

Okay...this sort of sounds just like a good omnipotent God to me.  In what way is this different, or impossible?  And, going back to the original question, how do you know that's not what your God does?


Okay, again, same question.  How is this different from what you've said about God (other than the fact that 'some' people get to find out that they were right in your view)?  How can you tell this is not the case?


But couldn't some people be right about an evil god?  Or be rewarded for being evil, or whatever?  And again, how can you tell this is not what is actually going on?


Why do you think that?  From what you've said before, 'good' is whatever God says it is.  So if a God says 'lying is good' then (in your view) it would be objectively good and right to lie.  When God told Moses to commit genocide, you tell me that it was good and right for Moses to commit genocide, not evil, because God told him to do it.  You say that God is "just" but we're debating whether he is "just" or not, so it's not obvious to everyone that that is the case.  You fall back on the fact that He claims He is just, and is God, so it must be true.  But an evil god could claim the exact same thing, right?  A lying God could say "I never lie," right?

What your statement seems to be saying, is that there is some objective definition of 'goodness' that we can apply to God, and see if he matches it.  Lying is objectively bad, so a god that lies would be bad.  Justice is objectively good, so a just god would be good, etc.  But that implies a measure of goodness outside of 'good is whatever God says it is,' which you've called impossible in the past.

For what it's worth, I think this is the right angle to take.  We should judge a deity by it's actions, rather than by how it describes itself.  So the question is, is God just?  If not, by what you're saying, He wouldn't be a good god, right?  I assert that applying infinite and eternal torture for any finite crime is not just.  I assert that setting up a system in which the deity knows in advance that some of his creations will be subject to eternal torture is not merciful nor loving.  Other than using a "well, God does it, so it must be god" argument, how do you counter those assertions?


But an evil god could tell the truth from time to time, no?  He wouldn't have to lie at every moment, right?  So there could still be truth under an evil god.  History would still exist under an evil god.  And you've just said above that an evil god could create the appearance of prophecy, so it still look like there was that too.

So, at the end of things, it mostly looks like you're saying "there'd be no 'point' to an evil god, so any god would HAVE to be good."  It's an argument based on pure reason, rather than on evidence.  It doesn't matter what the god does, because the argument doesn't really depend on what he does.

It seems we have to possibilities:
1.  it's possible to judge a god by its actions, and determine whether they are good or evil based on what they do, independent of what they claim about themselves.
2.  it's not possible to do so, and we cannot tell if a god is good or evil.  (You seem to add to this that we just have to assume they're good no matter what they do).

Would you agree that those are the two possibilities?  If so, which do you think is the correct one?  If the former (that's the one I think is right), what actions would you look for to determine if a deity were evil?  What kinds of things would an evil deity do that would tell us they were evil?
This message was last edited by the GM at 11:59, Sat 10 Nov 2012.

According to Catholocism, children are NOT exempt. (Human) children are born with original sin, and require baptism (the classic kind you're thinking of, or other spiritual baptism which perhaps God does and you only see the effects of) in order for Heaven to be open to them.

Unbaptised babies and children don't go to Hell proper, since obviously they don't deserve that. Instead they go to Purgatory or Limbo, which is more like the foyer of Hell, and ultimately quite dull, but sort of spiritually neutral.

I don't think we know 'at what age' or 'at what threshold' does someone get booted from Purgatory to Hell. The RCC offers some vague guidelines, but honestly, it was never a topic of great importance to Jesus's campaign on Earth, so we just don't have very many answers right now. It's also not clear if a soul in purgatory is stuck there forever, or if it's more of a 'on the knife's edge' thing, where the soul still has the potential to fall to one side or the other. The last judgment isn't until the end times. In the end though, all of these things are up to God, and the best we can do with our very limited information is pray.

As an aside, I'm also very intrigued by TitL's answers to Tycho's questions. It does seem like a bit of a pickle.

Sure, a lying god could.

But there are some things are we're hard wired for.

Do you think rape is wrong? Murder? Beating up children? Lying? Adultery?

Now, is it subjectively wrong, or objectively wrong?

Like have you told a lie? Is it wrong to lie?
Have you taken anything that didn't belong to you? Is it wrong to steal?



I think you're making it more complicated than it is. We obviously understand good acts are a goal to aim for.

I've never heard you mention having children, but if you did have a child, and they lied, and stole, and beat other children up, would you praise them, or discipline them?

I suspect that you would agree with me here that you would discipline them. From the past, I know you argue excessive punishment is wrong, so I think you have a clear grasp of good and evil, and that evil is wrong or bad.

So, moral character alone shows we already accept that good is better than evil.

God, who created us, would be the designer of this objective sense of morals.

You assert it's not just? So God is evil because of your assertion? So, then by the same assertion, you don't feel heaven is just, because it's an infinite reward for a finite action?

Mercy and justice are equal. Without one, you can't have the other. If He wasn't infinitely just, then it wouldn't be infinitely merciful.

For what purpose? Why would an evil god who can do anything, create people for a lie?

I'd say the argument is that good is better than evil, and really, we'd only have the absence of good to know what evil is.

So without good, we wouldn't know how to qualify evil.

Since we have good, then we can describe evil.



I suppose in the end, do I agree that those are the two possibilities? no.

I could think of another possibility, so, no, those aren't the two possibilities you can conclude.

Example, If God is infinitely more intelligent, then there might be some actions we cannot understand, so therefore, how can we come to the correct answer by knowledge?

Yes (though we could probably come up with extreme situations for most of those where they'd be considered 'good'--the classic example would be lying to the SS officer who's asking you if you have any jews hiding in your attic.  But I think we agree on the general principle that all of those are generally bad).


Definitely it's subjectively wrong.  Whether it's objectively wrong or not is another whole can of worms.  We can get into that if you like, but it's probably something for another thread, and it doesn't seem as though your argument hinges on the answer, so I'll leave it aside for now.  If you want to pursue it though, just let me know and I'll be happy to do so.


Yes to all of them (again, with the caveat that we could probably come up with odd cases where we wouldn't call them wrong).


No, I don't have kids.  I suppose I'd discipline them, but an important part of that is that the punishment would be proportioned to their level, not mine.  So if a 5 year old stole a cookie, for example, I wouldn't give them the same punishment I'd give 35-year-old child rapist [EDIT--on re-reading this I realized it sounded like I was calling myself a 35-year-old child rapist!  Just to be clear, I'm neither 35 nor a child rapist!  Just chose an example of someone whom I would choose to punish very severely].  I wouldn't send a 10 year old to federal prison for lying.  If I gave out a punishment, my goal would be to change their actions in the future, rather than to get revenge.  I also wouldn't punish a child for something they had no ability to prevent, either.  So I wouldn't ask them to bring me something I knew was far too heavy for them to carry, and then punish them for failing to do it.


Yes, I think we can agree on that. :)


Ah, okay, perhaps this is a problem.  I think you're carrying a few more assumptions than I'm asking you to.  It might be easier to follow if you considered not just your god, but the deities followed by others as well.  So don't just think of God when answering these questions, but also Allah, the Mormon version of God, the Hindu gods, etc.  Also keep in mind the idea that we're wondering if some god we're considering could be lying.  So we don't know if they created us, even if they might claim to have done so.  So whatever our 'objective' sense of morals, we don't know for certain if it came from the god we're considering yet.

I agree we have a sense of morality, and while it varies somewhat from person to person, there do seem to be strong commonalities across humanity, so that sense of morality had to have come from somewhere.  You and I will probably disagree on where that somewhere is, but for this discussion, we may not need to agree on that.  As long as we can agree that we look at various things and think "hmm, that seems very wrong to me," I think we can discuss the issue, even if we don't necessarily agree on why we think that.


Er...no.  My asserting it doesn't make it true, I'm asserting because I think it's true.  Maybe I should have used a different term, if that one is confusing things.  Another way of stating it would have been to say "how do you address the points I've raised here?"

As for whether I think heaven is 'just', no, I wouldn't say so.  Infinite reward for finite action isn't just.  However, that could be merciful or loving, so the 'injustice' on that side of things isn't so objectionable.


Hmm, I guess I disagree pretty strongly on that.  Mercy and justice aren't just not equal, I would argue, but in fact are opposed.  I don't agree that you can't have one with out the other, either.  If you put a suffering animal out of its misery, that's merciful, but really nothing to do with justice.  Giving someone a parking ticket because they've parked in a handicap space is justice, but doesn't really have much to do with mercy.

As for the last statement, I don't think sending people to hell is just at all, let alone infinitely just.  And letting anyone go to hell means He's not infinitely merciful, since His mercy clearly has a limit.



Well, he may not have created people, but maybe he did just to torment them.  He is evil, afterall.  Maybe he was just bored and needed entertainment?  Who knows, really.  But if it helps things, you can think about 'other gods' that you think are evil, and ask why you think they do whatever it is you think they do.  Why does Allah try to lead people away from your God?  What does the god of Mormons (who, I've heard you say, you feel is a different God from yours) try to convince people that he's the real God?  We don't need to know, really.  "They're just evil, so they do that kind of thing" is a sufficient answer for this discussion at this point.  Unless you're saying 'it makes no sense for an evil god to try to mislead people into thinking they're good', which would be a real counter argument to the point I'm making, but you'd need to back it up with some reasoning, because right now that doesn't seem obvious to me.



Okay, the "we can describe evil," is sort of what I'm looking for.  On the other hand, it doesn't seem to match up entirely with other stuff you're saying.  Let's try to pin it down a bit more specifically:  would you say that "since we have good, then we can describe actions that would be evil for a deity"?  That's really the heart of the matter that I'm trying to get at.  Does the fact that "we have good," give us enough information to look at a deity (and remember, we're not just talking about your god here, but any deity at all) and say "hmm, that doesn't seem like what a good being would do.  It looks evil to me, not good."?





Hmm, to me that sounds like it fits under case 2.  Am I misunderstanding you?  It sort of sounds to me like here you're saying we can't tell whether an action of a deity is good or evil, because they're infinitely more intelligent.  Is that what you mean?  If you're just in the "we can't tell if a god is good or evil" camp, that's fine, just let me know if that's what you're saying.
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:14, Tue 13 Nov 2012.

I hope you'll forgive me for adding a few lines back in here. These nested replies often don't leave enough context to work from.

First, I'd like to comment on the confusion here between god and God, since you seem to be alternating between them. There is at most one omnipotent being, who is referred to most commonly in English as God, but also as Allah and Yahweh. They all refer to the same being. This omnipotent being is of a different category to the gods, who are beings of finite power.

On to morality...
If God does not exist, there is no morality, since we then live in a brutal world governed only by survival of the fittest.

If God does exist, then (by Thomist reasoning) objective morality that applies to God would contradict his omnipotence. So morality is subjective, created by God and applied by him to us. God is then neither good nor evil, because the morality he created for humanity does not apply to himself.

I'm not qualified to comment on the third possibility (that of there being gods but no God) and what that means for morality. I only have the most rudimentary knowledge of polytheism.

I think it's also important to qualify, the question extends beyond an 'evil' god; that seems to imply Disney-villain behavior. But an ambivalent god, or a self-serving god are both options as well. When I boot up sims and watch my little sims live in their houses with no toilets or beds and radios in every room, well ... I'm just being mean. It's fun. But I still understand morality, and I don't just kill everyone. That would be boring. Similarly when I play Civilization and destroy cities just for my own amusement. I still help my 'chosen people', but the entire setup exists for my enjoyment.

I think it would be very easy to make a case from the bible that God is a totally vain and prideful character, to the point of him being sinful. If we imagine for a moment that God wants everyone to think he's fabulous, handsome, fearsome, etc., and created humans for that purpose of complimenting and being in awe of him. This god lies when it's necessary to get what he wants; butchers people when it's appropriate; threatens and cajoles; sets out fervent missionaries to establish name recognition, etc. Reading the bible and imagining that as god puts a very dark, depressing spin on the whole thing. I'm not saying at all that it's true, just that it has an internal consistency. And with that in mind, we come back to Tycho's question; how do you know your God isn't that god?

I think Hako leaves out a third possibility:

There is an objective morality independent of God, but which we do not fully comprehend in our mortal states, and therefore we are dependent upon God to provide us moral direction to the best we are able to handle.

This alternative is the one I personally believe in.

The other thing that is being ignored is the issue of promise.  When you enter into covenants with God, he provides covenants in return.  Thus, it is a two way street.  God's purpose is to bring us to the most fulfilled and joyful state we can become after this life through the promises, and our promises are demonstrating faith that God will lead us there even when we don't fully understand it.

Also what seems to be missing is the fact that hardships and difficulties make us stronger.  Just as a parent you teach your child independence, the importance of chores and respect, and occasionally have to discipline the child, so too can God be said to be making us a stronger people.  This is what is often referred to as putting people through the "refiner's fire."

See:
Zechariah 13:9: And I will put this third into the fire, and refine them as one refines silver, and test them as gold is tested. They will call upon my name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘They are my people’; and they will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’”

Malachi 3:1-18: “But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the Lord."

Isaiah 48:10: Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tried you in the furnace of affliction.

Job 23:10: But he knows the way that I take; when he has tried me, I shall come out as gold.

And from LDS Scriptures, we get the following, which reminds us about the suffering of Christ and to remember his suffering to atone for our sins -- I think of this as the LDS version of "That which does not kill me makes me stronger":

I say let's go over this. As I think it critical to have the same wording here in our question.

You're asking how do I know if God is evil or good. But if you are describing good by your view, and I'm describing good from a different view, I could easily say good means this, and you'll say that's evil.
So the question I'll ask first, if good and evil are subjective, your question was how do I know I'm following a God that is good, or evil. But if the term is meant subjectively, who's setting that bar then?

In reply to Heath (msg # 180):

Challenges are opportunities for growth ... if you are strong enough for them. There are plenty of examples of challenges which are simply too much for any person to come away better for it, no matter how hard they try. A survivor of prolonged torture is not likely to ever be a better person for it, even with years of therapy.

'What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger' is a platitude that not only isn't true, but also minimizes the reality of those who were killed by the suffering.

Always glad to have more in the discussion! :)


Sorry about that, I'm a bit lazy with capitalization when I'm online.  I try to use God to mean the christian god, and god or 'a god' to mean any generic, non-specific deity, but I'm sure I've been lazy and used 'god' when I've meant 'God' more than a few times.  For this discussion, I'm trying to focus on the god version, of any given deity one might want to look at.  TitL tends to think of God as that god, but what I was saying in my post is that it might be more useful for him to consider other gods instead, since I'm asking the general question.  Also, while I know most people consider God, Allah, Yahweh, etc. to be the same god, TitL in the past has made clear his view that they are not the same god at all.  So, from his point of view, God is one god, Allah is another god, the Jesus the Mormons talk about yet another god, etc.  I tend to view them as the same god, just different understandings/interpretations/whatevers about them, but that difference isn't hugely important for the discussion, I don't think.  There are different gods that people believe in, and we can consider the question of whether someone can tell a 'good one' from a 'bad one' as it were.


I wouldn't say there's no morality if God doesn't exist, it's just that it doesn't result in any change in our afterlife.  Morality doesn't 'do' anything outside of a thinking entities head.  There are not morality particles or the like.  But still feel things are right or wrong, even if we're 'just' in a world of survival of the fittest.


That, to me, says you're firmly in the "we can't tell a good God from an evil God" camp (capital G God here because you're position is based on Him specifically, it sounds like).  He could say "kill, rape, murder, steal!" and then it'd be good to do so, because what He says goes.  It doesn't matter how He acts, he's always 'good' under this point of view, so there's no way of telling if you're following the real God, or just some schmoe who claims to be God, because their actions don't tell you if they're good or evil.  It's a legitimate position to hold, but to me it seems pretty unpalatable.  If you can't tell the 'real' God from an imposture who wants to achieve the exact opposite, why follow Him in the first place?

Yep, definitely.  I picked 'evil' half out of laziness, and half out of the idea that if we can't tell absolute good from absolute evil, we probably can't tell anything in between either.

As you like.  It'd be good, though, if you could commit to giving an answer to my question eventually.  I'm happy to address the question, I just don't want it to become a distraction from the fairly straight forward question I'm trying to investigate.



The super short answer is: you.

The slightly longer answer is:  Whoever is looking at a deity wondering if they should follow that deity, but also thinking "I'd much rather follow a good god than an evil god."

The long-winded, overly-verbose, tycho-style answer is:
Right now you feel some things are wrong/evil, and somethings are right/good.  You believe that you feel that way because it's what God tells you, but that's not crucial at the moment.  Why you feel things are right or wrong isn't super important, just as long as you do feel that some things are right, and some aren't.  Now, imaging someone telling you about their religion.  They tell you all about their god, and the things this god is in favor of, opposed to, has done, yada yada yada.  Can you tell if their god is good or evil?  Can you look at their actions, desires, orders, etc., and determine if the god is making people better or worse?  Or, does it all just come down to "your god isn't my God, so it's evil?"

Put another way, if you had been brought up Muslim, say.  Could you look at the christian God and say "Oh, that God looks more good than the one I've been following," or would you only be able to say "God isn't Allah, so He must be evil?"

Put yet another way, is there any reason a person should ever conclude the god they happen to be following is evil, or should they always just accept that since their god gets to make the rules, their god is the best god no matter what?

But you were trying to get at the subjective/objective issue of morality, and I've sort of just gone back to my original question, so I'll try to address your point better.  First, morality is at its base, a subjective phenomenon.  Its something that happens within our heads, rather than outside of them.  There is not 'good particle' or units of evil, or the like.  If you wanted to measure evil, you'd need to look into someone's brain, and monitor how they thought/felt about an action, rather than putting up sensors around the action itself to try and 'detect' the evil.  Like beauty, morality is something that occurs only in the mind of a thinking-being, as it observes/ponders the world beyond its own mind.  That makes it subjective, because it exists purely in our minds, rather than as a physical thing going on outside our heads.  Its our mental reaction to something else.  If there were no thinking beings, there would be no good or evil.

Now, that said, we're fond of coming up with moral codes, which are our attempts to make morality objective, but constructing rules that will let people know whether we would consider something right or wrong without them having to get directly inside our heads.  Moral codes are almost always simpler than the actual moral reasoning that goes on in our heads, because they need to be short enough to write down.  They are models of what goes on in our heads, that are usually good enough to let someone predict how someone will view a given action.  Moral codes can be objective in the sense, that they can be written so that something either does or doesn't violate them, with no thinker needed to judge any subjective portions of them.  Often they're not written this way, but they can be.  That makes them objective in one sense, but they're still subjective in that a different person might write down a different moral code.  None of them is 'correct' in any universal sense.  They are only 'true' in the sense that they accurately predict how the originator of the code would feel about a given action.  There are still no good particles or evitopes that we could go out and measure or detect.

Carrying it a bit further, people feel differently about somethings, but often feel the same way about others.  There are differences in personal moralities, but also large-scale commonalities.  You and I probably won't agree about why that's the case, but I think agree that it is the case.  The stuff that we all (or mostly all) agree on is closer to being objective, in the sense that it doesn't vary from person to person, but it is still subjective in the sense that it all just exists inside our heads.  Even if God is the ultimate source of morality, its still not objective, it's just that what goes on in His head carries much more consequence than what goes on in ours, so we're forced to take His view into account.  Its a bit like when someone is pointing a gun at you.  The gun doesn't make them objectively right, but it can certainly make you treat them as if you agree with them!  Morality enforced by society can be similar.  Even though it still subjective, the view of society has enough impact on our lives that we have to take it into account.  In that sense its 'real' even though in another way it's all imaginary.

A natural question is "if it's all subjective, what makes any person's view more valid than anyone else's?"  On the one hand, nothing.  There's no good particles to go out and measure, so we can't test who is more right in any objective sense.  However, we can look at the consequences of following a given moral code, and rank the expected outcomes in someway.  That, too, is a subjective procedure, but again we tend to share some common values that help out (e.g., most of us would prefer to live than to die, have enough food rather than starve, feel comfortable rather than be in pain, etc.)  To the degree that we can agree on a set of things that are preferable to others, we can start to rank moralities based on how likely we think they are to lead to the preferred results rather than the stuff we don't like.  Yes, its still subjective, and if someone says they think everyone else suffering is a preferable, they'll end up with a moral code that's very different to ours.  But other than how we react to them and their actions, there's no real consequence of that disagreement.

Still no good particles, just the way we treat people based on how they act.  And at the end of the day, that's what it all comes down to.  Morality is about how we treat each other, and how we view each other's actions.  Its about how we get along, or fail to get along, and how we deal with people who don't do what we want them to.  It's not about the universe beyond us and our social interactions.  It can have consequences, but it's only consequences that we (the thinkers, in the widest sense) produce ourselves.  If God exists, the consequences he dishes out as a thinker reacting to us as thinkers could be pretty huge, but that's still all morality boils down to:  one thinker reacting to another's actions.  Outside of any thinkers head, morality doesn't exist.  But that doesn't mean it doesn't exist at all, nor that it has no impact, nor that it's not important.  As social animals, how we interact with others has a huge impact on our lives, and can even determine whether we live or die at times.  Even if there is no god, and this life is all there is, the fact that morality can lead to the end of our lives means its extremely important, 'objectively real' or not!

Okay, hopefully that addresses your question.  Are you able to answer mine now?

What if, in order for our universe to exist such as it does, and to actually sustain life (in the way that it does), rather than destroy it, there is a certain 'type' of morality that MUST exist in order for humanity to survive.

If God created a universe in which humans exist, and knew all possibilities for what 'could' happen (putting on my open theism hat again), then it could be plausible that this type of universe MUST contain a certain TYPE of morality in order to exist as this TYPE of universe.

Now, that doesn't really answer the question as to WHY this TYPE of universe was created by God, and sure, possibly this TYPE of universe is itself evil.  In the end I do have to agree that that question is impossible to answer (and seems to be what is being discussed more directly in this thread at the moment)

This same sort of idea comes into play when discussing miracles in Open Theism, but I won't get into that here...

My view is similar, but not quite the same.  I think our type of morality is necessary for us to be human.  We could have another type of morality, but we'd be a very different creature.  The evolutionary path we've taken has made some types of morality viable, and others not.  A big part of 'being human' is social interaction.  Much of our brain power is devoted to interpreting, understanding, and interacting with other humans.  I even think it's possible that our consciousness is actually a side-effect of getting really good at understanding others (in essence developed a model of predicting how other humans would act by coming up with ideas like happiness, anger, fear that we can read from their expressions/body language, and eventually turned the model on ourselves).  But the point is that interacting with other people is part of what it is to 'be human.'  And morality is the set of rules we use to interact with one another.  An individual could have a different set of morals, but they'd fail to have a true human experience.  Psychopaths, are an example of this, arguably.

Anyway, another way of saying what I'm saying here, is that humans could only develop into humans by having the morality that we do.  We could have had a different morality, but we would have ended up as very different animals in that case, not just humans-with-different-morals.  I realize that's not quite what you're speculating on here, but its what your words immediately brought to my mind.

For sure, that's a slightly different take on the matter, but equally viable. It also removes the possibility of God completely from the picture, which I am personally okay with.

However, what if it were possible that with any other given set of morality we might actually cease to exist at all.  Potentially with a slightly different moral structure we would have annnihilated the very planet we exist on (though we have come close to that already with nuclear war, and may yet do so with climate change)

If a God who knows all 'possibilities' knew that this type of morality would give the best chance for survival and growth, then maybe it is the best type of morality to exist.

This feels like a strange fusing of evolution and theology, and really it's of no practical value other than a "Hmmm", but it fits well with my own line of thinking (where perhaps this flawed world we exist in is still the best of all possible flawed world).
This message was last edited by the player at 21:44, Thu 15 Nov 2012.

In reply to Doulos (msg # 189):

That's a possibility.  Sort of an interesting use of the anthropic principle to explain God's behavior, I guess.  But I'd say the problem with it is that by explaining one thing, you've taken away one of the reasons for believing God exists in the first place, since that's one less thing that He now explains.  If this is the 'best' or 'only' set of morals we could have and not end up blowing ourselves up, then there's obviously selection pressure for having this set of morals, and it's the set of morals we're going to end up with naturally.  Or, put another way, those of us who end up being able to wonder about where our morals came from will end up with those morals, because those who had different morals blew themselves up before they got around to considering it.

If we limit the ways the universe can be and still have humans in it in order to explain why God doesn't do more to make things better, then we also explain why we have the morals we do without needing God to give them to us.  We 'save' God in one sense with the idea, but by doing so we get rid of one of the observations He was introduced to explain.  We take care of something that makes Him look impossible/unlikely, but in doing so have to toss out one of the things that make him look necessary/likely.  If we do this enough times, we end up with a situation where we can explain how God could possibly exist, but have no reasons left for thinking He does.  I actually think this is pretty close to what has happened to through time.  For some people I suppose 'possible but not necessary' is enough reason to believe in God, but others will take an Occam's razor approach and conclude "while it's possible He exists, there's no good reason to think He does."

I guess another way of putting it is that the possibility you raise looks to me like an attempt not to answer "which explanation looks most likely to be true," but rather "how can we make our preferred explanation fit the observations?"

I disagree with your conclusion.

The problem is that you are looking for a direct positive result from the negative, such as "no pain, no gain."  But this principle, although it certainly encompasses that point as well, also encompasses a much more difficult principle.  The principle it encompasses is akin to empathy.

Let's take the torture example.  John McCain was tortured by the Viet Cong; he cannot even now lift his arms above his head.  It has made him a stronger, wiser man who is empathetic to all in our military, especially those who have suffered.  They must respect him to some degree because of what he went through.  They can't say he "doesn't understand" because what he went through makes it so he understands it in a very personal way.

I'm sure he would have preferred not to have gone through that, but it forms a foundation of his strong personality that he has channeled into a lot of good over the years, even rising to the position of being able to run for president.

I suppose this is true if you don't believe in God or an existence that continues after this existence.  If your belief is that the spirit dies with the body and does not take memory or experience with it, then I'd agree.  But the post does nothing to dishonor anyone who suffered.  It applies also to those who die because they become stronger in the afterlife as long as their spirit/will is not killed as well.

In fact, the point of it is to hold up with respect those who suffered, including those who died.  Granted, the Nietsche saying is not a religious saying (and is in fact very temporal in nature) but I borrowed it only to summarize the point.  The real point is that anything which tests us and pushes us, even that which gives us misery, makes us stronger in spirit by helping us understand and learn how to fight it.  That which simply gives us comfort is not very challenging, nor does it push us to rise above anything.

I am of the mind, based on my current understanding, that suffering is rarely for a purpose at all and mostly just royally sucks.


Now, should there be a God who works in the lives of people it is very possible in the midst of that horrific crap that He can work and use others to potentially redeem situations, but due to the fact that human beings have free will some people will simply live entire lives that are nothing more than suffering from start to finish.

The afterlife, if it exists, can be a way of rendering judgement and 'making right' the suffering of the planet and those that exist on it (be they animal, vegetable, or mineral!), but that the suffering in life can absolutely be pointless in every sense of the word.

The belief you hold is certainly more in line with mainstream Christianity as well, but I find much of that belief (that I used to hold tightly) extremely hollow when faced with the real world of suffering.

I do agree that living comfortable lives can be ineffective as well, butthe response should be to enter into the suffering of others, and not ask for suffering for ourselves (which does not seem to be what you are saying anyways - just my thoughts).

However, seeing the 20 years of living on a garbage dump for certain folks in certain countries, as anything other than a horrific crime that will either be lost in the grand scheme of meaningless time, or redeemed in some sort of potential afterlife, seems ... odd to me now.  Though, as I have mentioned, I totally was there for a good chunk of my life.

One point I wanted to get across in this (and didn't seem to do a good job at it), was that I draw a firm line between God and god(s). The monotheistic God is not a god. Perhaps this seems pedantic to some, and confusing to many others, but I need some term to refer to finitely powerful superhuman beings, and I use god(s) for that, putting God into a category all his own, as the omnipotent being. If someone has a better term for "finitely powerful superhuman beings", I'll entertain it.



This isn't exactly the definition I'm looking for, but morality is culturally invariant concepts of good. If there are no such invariants, then there is no morality. There can still be ethics, principles constructed philosophically or culturally.



It's stronger than that. It's not that we can't tell if God is good or evil, but he is neither good nor evil, because these are concepts he invented and applied to humanity.

By instilling us with morality, God is telling us not to "kill, rape, murder, and steal." If a prophet commands you to violate any of these, it puts you in a difficult situation of determining if God is ordering an exception through this prophet, or if the 'prophet' is trying trick you in doing evil. Makes me glad I didn't live in old testament times, where I would've had to face such dilemmas.

Perhaps we need a different term for God, rather than gods?  The trouble with using God for any omnipotent deity is that we loose the ability to speak in non-religion-specific terms, since most people take God to be the christian god.  I see the distinction you're making, and am happy to use whatever terminology works best.  I just need a term that refers to 'any deity a person might happen to consider following/worshipping', without limiting the discussion to one particular religion.


Hmm, I'm not entirely convinced there is a "culturally invariant" concept of good.  There are some pretty common threads, but they always seem to be modified by cultures.  "Don't kill" is viewed as a rule in pretty much all cultures, but at the same time, all cultures seem to make exceptions to it at one time or another.  "Don't steal" is pretty common as well, but some cultures make exceptions for outsiders, or when you really need it, or if the person deserves it, or the like.  I'm not entirely sure we could find any rule of morality that some culture somewhere hasn't had an exception for.  I suppose I wouldn't entirely too shocked to see an example of one, but I really can't think of any off the top of my head.  Out of curiosity, if there is no "culturally invariant" morality, does that mean there's no God, in your view, since you're saying that version of morality must come from God?


In which case, people shouldn't say "God is good!" or "God is loving!" or "God is just!" then?  Are you also saying that its not possible for us to look at two competing descriptions of a God (say, the "Allah" version, or the "Yahweh" version) and ask "which of these two Gods is the morally superior one?"  Put another way, is the only thing that's actually wrong with Satan that he's not as powerful as God?  If he had succeeded in his rebellion against God, would that have made all the things Satan stands for objectively superior to the things God stood for?  Does might really make right, at the end of the day?  Is our morality nothing more than blind obedience to whatever being we fear the most?


But say God really did tell you "go out and rape and murder a bunch of children, I need some entertainment!" are you really saying it would be 'good' to do so?  Is there nothing God could do or say that would justify us replying, "Ya know what God?  You're a bit of a jerk, and I'm not going to do your dirty work for you anymore."?  Is there no actions God could take that would justify us deciding that he wasn't a being deserving of worship?

It sort of sounds like you're saying we have no capacity for moral judgment of our own.  Trying to reason out what actions are morally justifiable or not is fruitless, it sounds like you're telling me, because the best we can hope for is for God to tell us what He wants us to do.  It sounds like you're saying that there's no way for one omnipotent being to be any better or worse than another (it might be better to think of two competing descriptions here, rather than two competing deities, I guess, since you've pointed out that they both can't be omnipotent at the same time).  But to me, if that's the case, there's no real reason for worshipping/following any God, since they're not 'good' or even 'better than some other God'.  They haven't earned worship, they didn't (can't!) do anything to deserve worship.  I guess there's something to be said for doing whatever you need to do to avoid punishment, or receive reward, but I feel like most religious people seem to think that their god actually is worthy of praise, and is really a very good fellow, with lots of positive qualities.  That sounds very different from what you seem to be saying, which is that it's not even possible for their god to have positive or negative qualities, no?

There are so many questions here, in so many divergent directions and some of them off-topic, that we'll have to drop some of them from this thread. This one in particular is off-topic, so this'll be my last reply on it here.



You have the term deity/deities already :) "Superhuman beings" is also commonly used, such as in the OED definition of religion.

I don't think it's useful to take such a wide approach, trying to discuss issues in a frame that includes both monotheism and polytheism, because the two are so different.

I was expanding on my earlier comment that "If God does not exist, there is no morality". I was not claiming morality as a proof of God's existence. Nor was I claiming that morality consists of specific rules such as "don't kill". Morality would be the root from which people imperfectly derive rules such as "don't kill".

I think you've gone overboard here. You're assigning beliefs to me that you know I don't subscribe to, which is shutting down this discussion.

As you like!  I'll try to stick to 'deities' instead of 'gods' from here out.


I haven't really been focusing too much on polytheism, per se (if only because most people here aren't polytheists), so much as the fact that there are competing religions with different 'versions' of God at very least.  There might be only one God (or there might be none at all), but there are indisputably multiple religions making conflicting claims about the deities that they each follow.  Basically, I think everyone who's religious thinks "my deity is better than everyone else's deity" (or at least "everyone else's description of the the one deity is inferior to the description that I believe").  If they didn't think this, they'd presumably change religions.  But if its even possible to compare one deity to another (or one description of the single deity to another), that implies some sort of metric 'outside' those deities.  If we can't judge God by His actions, then we can't say his actions are any better than any other proposed deity.  On the other hand, if we can judge deities, it seems like looking at their actions is the place to start.  Do they kill?  Lie?  Commit genocide?  In general, do they do the things that we call "evil" when people do them?  The whole dilemma is that you either have to be willing to look at a given deity's actions and be able to say "yeah that's evil" OR you're not able to say that "my deity is better than your deity."  It's not polytheism that's the issue, so much as the question of whether a given deity is any good or not.




Oh, I know you weren't asserting that morality is proof of God's existence (though some people here do hold such views).  I was just sort of flipping it on its head a bit, since it sort of looked to me that by your definition of morality (ie, culturally invariant morals) morality didn't exist.  Which would conflict with a "God gives us morality" position, and potentially imply a lack of God.  Not really a key issue, though, and I'm happy to drop it as off topic if you like.  I would like to ask you to perhaps go a bit further into what you meant by "culturally invariant" morals, though.  Can you gives some examples that would make it clearer to me what you meant?  Like I said, I'm not convinced such a thing exists, at least not as I would understand the words.  So I may not be understanding what you're meaning in this case.



My apologies, that certainly wasn't my intention.  For what it's worth, much of the stuff you quoted was questions from me, not me asserting you thought one way or the other.  They looked like the logical consequences of what you were saying, so I wanted to check if those implications were okay in your view.  The latter part of the quote, where I said things like "it sounds like you're saying..." we honest on my part.  It really does sound like that's what you're telling me.  If that's not what you believe, it's not me trying to strawman you, it really does sound like that's what you're saying.  Quite possibly I've misunderstood what you were trying to tell me, but I promise I'm not trying to put words in your mouth.  I AM looking at the implications of what you're saying, not just what you've said by itself, and it may be that I've missed some other alternative that's less offensive, but if so it's an honest mistake and I'm hoping you'll show me where I've gone wrong.

For simplicity, let me just ask this:  do you feel that God is morally superior to Satan?  If so, is there a reason for that other than God being more powerful than Satan?  If Satan had created God, rather than the other way around, but they both still promoted the same kinds of behavior that we currently say they do, would Satan then be morally superior to God?  If you think God is morally superior in both cases, how do we determine that?

In reply to Doulos (msg # 193):

One more point on the suffering makes you stronger point.  I don't think all suffering makes everyone stronger all the time, at least not in every aspect.  But some people are certainly better able to internalize the suffering better than others and come out swinging.  The quote is more of an aspiration than a fact.  For example, those to whom God subjects suffering (let's take Job, for example) are targeted specifically because God knows they will come out stronger.  I'm not sure that the principle can be extrapolated to every human being on earth.  But Job was chosen because of his durability and ability to become stronger.  He was able to prove himself worthy through the worst kind of suffering and set an example.  When the suffering is over in the afterlife, he appreciates it more.

It's kind of like when you are sick, you hate it, but when you feel better again, you have a much greater appreciation for feeling well.  If you accept the premise that the suffering ends at death (or in some religions, at resurrection), then your mind will be free to so much better appreciate that the suffering (even mental suffering) is gone.

And here is I think the problem begins.

With no way to truly determine objective moral values, no matter what you do, it's never really wrong.

It's an non issue.

Either objective moral values exist, or they do not.

So under the premise of how do I know that God is good or evil comes down to a simple premise.

The one that determines good or evil is the one that is the objective value.

If the evil god exists, then who's law is he violating?

God is worthy of worship, and quite frankly, how can a god violate an objective God? Logically, I don't see how this is possible.

Now, if this evil god can violate morals, than it can only violate the morals of the real God, and only that one would be God.

Now, either objective morals exist, or they do not.

Evil exists, therefore there are objective morals.

Therefore, there is an objective one who creates morals. (We would refer to that creator as God)
This message was last edited by the player at 05:38, Wed 25 Dec 2013.

I'm always amazed looking back on these threads at how radically my beliefs have changed from when I first started until now.

I no longer believe that there is any actual objective set of morality, but only a morality that has been created by evolutionary forces that feels objective.

That concept would have been utter nonsense to me but a few years ago.

What might I believe 3 Christmases from now?  Who knows!?

So then you would state evil does not exist?

Here's a simple question. Is raping children for fun a good or evil act?

Hey TitL!  Merry Christmas, and welcome back!  Long time, no see!  It's been pretty quiet here (ie, silent!) the last few months, so you haven't missed too much. ;)  But I'm glad to see you back again, and to pick up this discussion again.


I guess I'd disagree with this.  And, based on what you say below, I think you do as well (I'll get to that in a second).  I think perhaps the issue is that you're treating "morality is subjective" to mean "no one can judge anyone's actions."  But that's sort of the opposite of what it means.  The fact that we can (and should!) judge other's (and our) actions sort of implies that morality is subjective.  But subjective doesn't mean "anything goes, nothing is wrong."  It just means that the only implication of something being right or wrong is how it affects how people will treat you.  If you do something I disagree with, I'll treat you differently.  You can shout "but morality is subjective, you can't judge me!" all you want, but I'll still go on judging your actions, and treating you differently based on how you behave.  That has an impact on your life.  Well, the fact that Tycho is judging may not have much impact, but the people you deal with day-to-day are also judging you and reacting to your behavior, which may have more impact.  And, if any Deities exist, they'll be judging you, and perhaps altering your afterlife, which will certainly have an important impact for you.  So to drive this home, "subjective" doesn't mean "has no impact."  Morality can be subjective and at the same time have a very big impact on your, and be very import to how you run your life.  It doesn't mean "anything goes."  It means that the moral consequences of your actions will come from other concious/thinking/judging beings, rather than from non-thinking/inanimate objects.  To give a concrete example, gravity is objective reality.  If you jump off a bridge, you're going to fall, no matter what anyone else believes or thinks about it.  On the other hand, if you eat a dog, where you live will have a big impact on whether that turns out bad for you or not.  Some places people won't bat an eye at it, other places people will be outraged, and will treat you very differently because of it.  So again, "subjective" doesn't mean "non existent", it means "it exists only in the minds of thinking beings".  Does that make sense?  I feel like we might not get very far if we're not on the same page on that idea.


Yes, that's true, and from what you've said, it sounds like we both feel that objective morality doesn't exist.  What you've called "objective morality" you've gone on to describe in a way that makes it clearly subjective.  "God gets to decide what's right and wrong" is subjective, since if you change the subject (God) to someone else (say, Tycho), you'll get a different result.  I think maybe you view it as objective because you're not leaving it up to yourself (correct me if I'm wrong on that), but subjective doesn't just mean "anyone can choose their own," so much as "someone has to choose".  If God gets to choose, that's a subjective morality, because it requires a subject (God) to do the deciding.  God judging other people is an example of subjective morality.  To be clear, I'm not saying that as a negative thing, just a descriptive one.  I don't view the idea of subjective morality as a bad thing.  Perhaps a true objective morality (with "good particles" or whatever) would be nice, but it's not what we have.


These two sentences don't make sense to me, so I think perhaps we're using different definitions of some terms here.  In particular, if _someone_ gets to gets to determine good and evil, that means its not objective.  Objective means that no one gets to determine it.  It means there is no "decider", so to speak.  No one gets to "be" the objective value, because for something to be objective it can't be based on anyone.  You're calling this idea (that God makes the rules) "objective", but mean meaning of the terms make it subjective.  So I think in order to understand each other, we need to iron out what these words mean.

I think what you're saying is that God gets to make the rules of morality up, so whatever He says is "good" really is good.  The question is then, why does God get to make up the rules?  Is it because He can back up his opinion with more force than anyone else (ie, He can send you to hell if you anger him, whereas I can just shake my fist at the computer screen in frustration.)?  Is it because He made the universe?  Is there some other reason?  Is it just an axiom that one needs to share with you in order to reach your conclusion?


It sounds like here that you're saying that a God can only be evil if there is a good god telling him not to be evil.  This, again, is an argument for subjective morality.  My answer, is "mine, yours, whoever is deciding follow him or not."  Your answer seems to be (again, correct me if I'm wrong) "God's".  The trouble with that answer, in my view, is that you can't tell if God is good or evil, because you're judging Him by His own metric.

Put another way, turn the question around:  If a good God exists, then who's law is He following?  I'm assuming your answer would be "His own."  But then the issue becomes that Satan follows his own law, Allah follows his own law, and so on through any Deity you come up with.  If "good" just means "follows his own laws," then all deities are equally good, and none are evil, even if they promote rape, murder, theft, etc.  You can't argue that your god is good under this line of thinking, only that he's stronger, bigger, more powerful, has more clout, or whatever.  Or, to be more to the point, you can't tell an evil god from a good god under this line or reasoning.  You could arguably tell "powerful" from "weak" or "creator" from "not creator", but you can't make any claims about their goodness or evilness.


Okay, why is God worthy of worship?

And again, it sounds like we're using the same words to describe different things, since "an objective God" doesn't make any sense.  If it involves God, it's not objective, and if it's objective, it's "beyond" God so to speak.  But it seems like you mean something other by "objective", so perhaps the best course is for you to explain a bit what you mean by "objective".


You've here implicitly assumed quite a lot in this statement, and I don't think I'd agree with all of those implicit assumptions, so I think we might need to drill down into this a bit.  In my view, an evil god (or anyone else) can violate the morals of any other thinking being, not just "the real God."  If a "real God" exists, then an evil god certainly could violate His morals, but he could also violate my morales, your morals, and anyone else's morals.


Yes, and it seems we both think they do not.


I don't think that follows, since "evil" can "exist" in a subjective moral system, in the sense that it means someone disapproves of the action.  For example, you think "evil" means that God disapproves of it.  But that's not objective, it's subjective (ie, it involves a subject (God), which could be changed to get a different result).  Now, evil doesn't "exist" in the sense that there are evil particles that we can go out and weigh to see how evil an action is.  But it does exist insides the minds of thinking beings (such as you, me, or God).


Again, we seem to be using "objective" to mean different things.  There can't be "an objective one", as that's sort of a contradiction of terms.  If it involves "a one" it's subjective by definition ("the one" is the subject).  When God does something (such as creating morals, or judging actions) He is the subject, not the object.  Any moral code based on God's views is subjective.  An objective moral code would have to be independent of any subject, even God.  It couldn't be based on what anyone wanted (even God).  So, by that definition of objective, it sounds like we both agree that morality is subjective.  You seem to think the only subject whose opinion matters is God's, and perhaps we should sort out explicitly why you feel that way.  What justifies that position?  It can't be that God is "good" because until we establish it, we have no good or evil by which to judge whether or not God is one or the other.

And jumping ahead to the logical conclusion, it seems to me that if you define good and evil based entirely on what your chosen deity desires, then you can't tell if your deity is good or evil.  Any deity would be "perfectly good" by that standard, and there would be no way to tell if one is "better" than another.


Jumping into your conversation with Doulos a bit (I hope that's okay), you ask if raping children for fun is a good or evil act.  I'm sure we all agree that it is evil.  The question is what that means to each of us.  To you, it seems, that just means "God wants you not to do it."  To me and Doulos (if I can speak for him here), it means that WE want you not to do it.  Now, since me and Doulos don't have nearly the clout of God (if He exists, at least), you might say "who cares what you guys think!?"  And that's a fair question.  But things get more interesting when we ask "if God tells you to rape children for run, does that make raping kids good, or does it mean God is evil?"  Here we come to different conclusions.  Your system would say "if God says to rape babies for Jesus, then that's what you should do."  Our system says "raping babies is wrong, and if your deity tells you to do so, then its and evil deity not worthy of worship."  Now, you're confident that God would never tell you to do such a thing, so you're not going to lose any sleep over this.  But think about the implications a bit:  You're not able to tell the difference between a deity that advocates child rape, and one that says its wrong to rape kids.  Both of them look equally perfect to your moral system.  Which again, is why it sounds to me like you're unable to tell if you're following an evil god or not.  Your moral code doesn't allow you to determine if you're following an evil god.  The system you've described, if you really followed it, would imply a complete abandoning if your own ability to judge good from evil.  You'd be limited to "just following orders," without being able to judge whether those orders were right or wrong.  And since you've expressed no way of deciding which god gets to be what you call "the objective one," it's just a crap shoot as to whether you picked a good one or an evil one.  Now, I'm guessing that you don't see it that way, so presumably there's some unspoken assumption that I haven't taken into account, and that's what we need to track down.  Any ideas as to what it might be?

I will pass on this, as I think our dilemma is based on objectiveness of God.


Yes, that's true, and from what you've said, it sounds like we both feel that objective morality doesn't exist.,/quote> I don't claim objective morals do not exist. I claim they do.

Example, can you think of any circumstances that would make raping children for fun an act that is good? Or would it always be wrong regardless of what any person or group says?

If always wrong regardless of what a person or group says, that would be objectively wrong.



Looks like our sticking point is objective and it's use.


I guess I don't really see it as an argument for subjective evil. I think you're stating a premise, and then supporting it by stating it. Redefining God is a subject, and therefore it's His subjective will.

I question if you're just redefining ideas here, so let's nail down that premise.

Not exactly. Only one is an actual God, the rest would not control the one real God. If there is one more powerful than, then the one is not God. Equal power could present some ideas, but I suspect that we could keep discussing things even without that being determined.

Because they are the one who designed us, created us, made all the rules, and determines what is to become of us.


I challenge that. Why would God not make sense if objective?

Why can God not be God and objective?


But quite frankly, your morals don't matter if there is an objective moral that's true.

Additionally, how would an evil god violate their own commands if this god is objective?




I mean acts that are evil, not acts that people disagree with.

Acts that people disagree with with does not equal there are only subjective morals.

However, acts that are always evil is evidence morals that are objective. Example, raping children for fun will always be an evil act.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:55, Wed 25 Dec 2013.

Fair enough, though, I think it might be worth going back over and thinking about what I wrote, since I'd say it's not actually the issue of the "objectiveness of God" as you say, so much as "what does objective mean".


Yes, I know.  But what you call "objective," you describe in a way that matches the definition of subjective (at least my definition of it).  You say "God gets to decide, and that's the objective standard," but if God gets to decide, that means its subjective, not objective.  But it seems we're both on the same page here in that we mean different things by "objective," and need to iron out what we both mean by them so we can move forward.


I suppose I could come up with some absurdist situation where it was the least wrong thing to do, like some terrorist mastermind having a bunch of nuclear bombs set around the world, and threatening to set them off if someone doesn't rape a child, in which case it might be the best thing to do to rape the child, but in general, no, it's never right to rape a child.  In my opinion.  That last bit is important.  It's my own moral code that says raping children is wrong.  Alternatively, if I'm understanding your code correctly, you would said it IS okay to rape children for fun IF God tells you its okay/good.  That, I think, is the key difference between our views.  You say if God tells you to rape a child, then raping a child is good.  I say that if God tells you to rape a child, then God is evil.  Do you agree with that summary of things?


Yes, but as far as I understand your point, it's not wrong (in your view) "regardless of what anyone says."  It depends entirely on what God says.  If it's wrong regardless of what God says then it could be objective.  But since (in your view) it depends on what God says, then it's subjective.


It's not "redefining" God as the subject.  He is the subject in the sentence "God says this is wrong."  This is sort of a grammar thing.  Subject, verb, object, etc.  When you say "God says rape is wrong," God is the subject, and rape is the object.  If rape is wrong regardless of what God things then maybe it's objective, but if it's wrong because God says so, it's subjective by the definition of subjective (ie, it depends on what someone (God in this case) says/thinks).  That's what I mean by the terms, but it sounds like you mean something else.  Perhaps we can use two different terms to indicate the two different ideas.  Objective-tycho, and objective-TitL, or whatever.  We'd still need to understand what each other means by their own terms to move forward, I think, but at least we'd know in each case which one we were speaking about.  For what its worth, I don't think I understand what you mean by the term "objective" yet, so you might have to explain it further for me.  Do you understand what I mean by the term yet?


Okay, if I'm understanding you, it's an issue of power or control?  If one God can push another around, its the "real" God then?  Would you say that's a "might makes right" position?  It sounds that way to me.  That you view power as what is important, and the most powerful gets to decide what is right or wrong.  If this is what you believe, it would seem that if Satan "beat" God, then you would think Satan would get to decide what we should and shouldn't do.  I come from a different point of view, in which power and control are independent of morality.  Being able to force people to do what you say doesn't make you good or right.  A being could be, in theory, both powerful and evil.  That sounds like a fairly fundamental disagreement between us, no?



Cool, but there are several answers here, which could, in theory, not all be true at once.  The "makes all the rules" part is circular (ie, "they get to be the one who determines right and wrong because they're the one who gets to make all the rules").  The designed/create parts are more interesting.  What if Satan had created us, and told us all to rape, kill, steal, etc.?  Would that make it "right" to do so?  I would say no, but your reasoning seems to imply that yes it would.  Again it seems like you can't tell an evil God from a good one; you're limited to a creator god vs. a non creator god.  Do you agree with that?



By definition of "objective".  If it depends on someone's opinion (even if that someone is God) it's not objective.  It requires a subject (ie, God).  Objective implies something that's the same outside of anyone's mind (even God's).  God might be a better judge than you or I, but he's still a judge, and something that requires a judge isn't objective.  That's sort of what objective means (to me, at least;  clearly it means something different to you, which is fine).


Don't matter?  That's debatable (as I'd still act on them, and they'd still have consequences, etc.).  But more importantly, both of us seem to be describing situations in which there isn't an objective morality.  What you call objective morality is the very much subjective "God decides what's right and wrong."  Now, you could argue that my opinion doesn't matter if God has a different opinion, but that'd doesn't make God's opinion "objectively true," it just means he has more power to back up His opinion.


I'm not entirely sure I understand the question.  Again, I don't see how a god can be objective, really.  If their opinion is what matters, then morality is subjective (which, again, I stress, is okay).  If you're saying that a god which I would call evil acts consistently with their own desires, we wouldn't be able to objectively call it evil, then I agree!  In fact, that's sort of my point.  What I'm saying is that you wouldn't be able to look at a god that says "rape babies" and one that says "don't rape babies" and do any better than a coin toss at determining which was "good" and which was "evil".  They're both consistent with their own moral code, so each is perfect in their own view, and evil in the view of the other.  Only if we have some way of saying "wait, 'rape babies'?!  That's sick!  I'm not listening to you!" can we avoid worshipping evil gods.  But, if I'm understanding you correctly, you're telling me we can't do that.  You're saying we just have to pick the most powerful one and toe the line.  I don't agree with that idea.


To me these are the same thing.  Calling something "evil" is more or less equivalent to saying "I strongly disagree with that."  For you it means "I think God strongly disagrees with that", but it's still a statement of disapproval.  It requires a judge to say it's wrong/bad/evil/whatever.


No, but it implies that subjective morals DO exist.  And in the lack of evidence of any objective morality, then I'd say it's the best we can do.


But again, if God tells you "rape children for fun," then you would say it's good to do so, no?  That's the definition of subjective.  Again, I think this is our fundamental difference.  I say "If a deity tells you to rape children, that deity is evil."  You say "if my deity tells you to rape children, then it's good to rape children."  We both have a subjective version of morality, but you've just given up your own responsibility for it.  You've let someone else make all the decisions for you, but you have no way to determining if they're any better at making decisions than you are.  That's the trouble, in my view, that your position faces.  You put all your trust in God, but you have no way of determining if God deserves your trust unless you consider yourself capable of judging God.  But if you are capable of judging God, then you should be able to use your own morality instead of His.  As far as I can see, you're stuck on this dilemma:  Either you might be following an evil god, or you don't need a god to tell you right from wrong.  It doesn't seem like you can avoid both those problems at the same time.

Sorry Tycho. This is getting a little too much out of context. You keep contradicting yourself to make much sense.

Example, you talk as if there's an evil god, but then give the dilemma that there is no actual objective evil.

But then you agree with the concept that raping children for fun is always wrong, unless God says it's okay. (I disagree with the premise of God violating His nature however)

So you keep flip flopping on objective. Pick one, and stick with it.

So let's pin this down.

Is raping children for fun always wrong, no matter what anyone else says?

If yes, then it is objectively wrong, regardless of what anyone else says.


So can you counter and show that concept is subjective?

Exactly, it's a dilemma (look up "dilemma" if that makes no sense, as it may be an issue of what that means that's causing the confusion).

But to be clear, the lack of objective evil doesn't mean there can't be an evil god.  It would be evil to you or me, just not objectively to the "universe" or whatever.


I agree that raping children is always wrong (with the possible exception of absurdist either/or scenarios mentioned above) to me (ie, it's subjective).  My understanding of YOUR position is that it WOULD be okay if God told you to do it.  I don't think it would be okay in that case, which is where I think we disagree, no?


I'm trying to, but at the same time I'm trying to understand what you mean by the term, since it seems to be different from what I mean.  I'm using it in the same sense every time, but it doesn't seem to be the same sense as you mean it.  I think that's where we're running into trouble.  Not that I'm switching what I mean, but that I don't mean the same thing you mean.


I would say that it's always wrong, but not the "no matter what anyone else says" part.  Unless I'm excluded from "anyone else," in which case I can says it's always wrong to me, regardless of what anyone else says, but still makes it subjective.  I think you would say (and correct me if I'm wrong since this seems to be a fundamental difference) that it's wrong because of what someone else (ie, God) says.  If I understand your position correctly, neither of us says it's wrong no matter what anyone says.  The difference we have is in whose opinion matters not whether anyone's opinion matters.  You think God's opinion is the one that counts, I think mine is the one that counts.  But we both think it comes down to someone's opinion (ie, God's or Tycho's).

I've tried to answer your question to the best of my ability, though I know you'll probably not be happy with it.  Can you now try to answer mine:  If God said "rape children for fun" would that make God evil, or would it make raping children good?  My view is that it would make God evil.  I think your view is that it would make raping kids okay, but I'd like to pin that down.

Okay, let's go with this.

You think there is the possibility of that raping children for fun could be a good act.

Who saying it's ok to do that would make it a good act ever?

Do not use my position. Because that's not my position. I want you to describe it in the sense of what would make it an actual good act.

Let me put it this way.

Is murder of children always an evil act?

No, that's not my position (again, excepting some absurdist situations), but I thought it was yours.  Maybe the issue is that I misunderstood your position?


No one saying it's okay would make me think it's okay.  I think it's wrong (with emphasis on "I").  I'm not saying other people's view will "make it okay," but that other people might view it as okay.  I'll still view it as wrong, and (this is the key), that's all I can say.  But I do say it.  The question (to me at least), is whether you can say it?  If God says "rape children" do you think that means God is evil, or that raping children is okay?  As I've said several times, to me, that means God is evil.  My understanding of your position is that "what God says is good, is what [you] think is good," so if God says "rape babies" then you'd view raping babies as good (rather than viewing God as evil).  If I've got you wrong on that, please say so.  My view is that anyone (including God) that says "rape children for fun" is evil.  Doesn't matter how powerful they are.  Doesn't matter if they created us.  Doesn't matter anything else.  I'll view them as evil if they say that.  I admit it's still just my view, but I'm okay with that, since that's the most I can do.  Do we hold the same position on this, or no?  If we're both on the same page on this, and both think that "raping babies is wrong, even if God tells you to do it" then we can move on to the next issue.  But I'm still not convinced we're there yet.  I feel like I've made my position very clear, but you haven't expressed your side of it.  To clarify, I know you thinking raping babies is wrong, but it's not clear to me if you think it's wrong because God tells you not to do it, or whether God tells you not to do it because it's wrong.  More to the point, I don't know whether, if God told you to rape babies, you'd change your mind about God, or about raping babies.  I think this is the point where we disagree, but it'd be good to make it clear.

That's a different question, and doesn't summarize the point about morals or objective.

You are asking a question that is meant to be objective, but doesn't necessarily make it correct in all situations. (And therefore could not be objective in all situations)

Example, knowing that some civilians could be killed in the attempt to save a crowd of people.

Okay, that's not your position? Then your positions is that it's always evil or always good? (If it's not sometimes good, you are only left with two positions, always good, or always evil)


Still not clear. I'm not asking you for your opinion. I'm not asking you what you think I would say. I'm asking what would make that act of raping a child for fun a good act?

That's why I said murder, not accidental homicide.  At any event, that answers your own question: everything is subjective to the right observer.

Well, not really. That's not the only possibility. Asking a question that is not actually objective does not mean everything is now subjective.


However, if you added the qualifier of murdering children for fun, it would always be wrong.

Can you think of any examples where murdering children for fun would ever be considered a good act?
This message was last edited by the player at 00:08, Thu 26 Dec 2013.

I can't, but according to your belief, it can be.


So, if god orders it, murder of children is all right.  That's why gods morality is subjective, not objective.

Note, that doesn't say killing children for fun is a good act.

Did you have any examples where it is a good act?


I challenge that premise. Why does that show God's morality is subjective, and not objective? I get you're stating that, but why do you feel it means it's subjective?

Help me understand the process of logic you used.

Murder of children is alright because God says so
therefore because it is alright, that means God morals is subjective? That doesn't follow the logic. What other steps did you add to come to your conclusion?

I have not read the rest of the posts from here on.  Was out all day with family.

My current viewpoint is that good and evil are ideas created by evolutionary processes and shaped by culture.  While the concept of rape period (let alone of children) is disgusting and abhorrent to me, that's because I have been shaped by evolution and culture to believe such.

It doesn't make it evil or good - just something that is given a particular label because it's our way as creatures to deal with it.

I get the concept, I just don't think evolution plays any role I your idea. For example when a lion forces himself on the lioness, we don't call it rape even though it could be unwanted by one animal.

So in your view,  you think it's possible that raping children for fun could be a good act in a different culture?

Second point, even if a process of culture and evolution, would you agree or disagree that it can not appear objective morals exist, but also have objective morals exist. Simply, while you believe it appears objective, isn't possible that they match objective morals?
This message was last edited by the player at 06:32, Thu 26 Dec 2013.

You're shifting your goalposts, TITl.  First you say murder and raping is bad.  Then you say murder and raping of children is bad.  Now you say it's bad if it's for fun.


In order for something to be objective, there needs to be a universal law behind it.  Gravity is not subjective, it works the same regardless of what you believe.  If murder is evil under circumstance X but not Y, then it's subjective.

To try another tack, is jealousy wrong?  Yes or no, no weaseling.

Yes, it's always evil to me.  I think perhaps the confusion here is that you (and also GMC?) are using "subjective" to mean something that changes, but that's not what I mean by the term.  What you guys are calling "subjective morality" is what I'd call "situational morality," and I'd guess that all moral codes are situational to one degree or another.  But what I mean by "subjective morality" is that it requires a subject.  That means someone has to judge something as being wrong, it's not just wrong independent of any consciousness taking offense to it.  Your view is that it's God's call as to what's good and what's evil.  Since that requires God to make a call, that makes it subjective.  God is the subject.  He's the one doing the judging.  If your moral code requires a judge (and I assert that all moral codes do), then it's subjective.  The important implication being that if you were to change the judge, you could potentially get a different result.  For example, if you said "Tycho gets to make the call as to what's good and what's evil" you'll get a different result in some cases then if you let God make the call.

So, to go back to your question, I would consider it to be evil in all cases.  someone else may not.  I wouldn't change my mind just because they say "hey, do this!"  I would, however, change how I felt about them.  If someone tells me that raping kids is okay, I would think they were evil.  The kicker being that I would think this about them even if God is the one saying it.

Hopefully that's pretty clear at this point.  I feel like I've answered the question several times, at some length, now.  I realize that because we're using the same terms to mean different things, it can be confusing.  But hopefully my position is pretty clear at this point.  If not, you may need to rephrase the question a bit, rather than just asking it again, since I'm not sure what part still isn't clear.

Now, having answered that, it'd be great if you could return the favor. ;)  Pretty much the exact same question back to you, but with a bit more specificity:  If God tells you to rape a child, would you then feel it was okay to do so?

I've told you my position already, but I'll repeat it just to make clear I'm not asking anything I'm not willing to answer myself:  If God said "rape children" that would NOT make me think it's okay to rape children.  Instead, it would make me think God was evil.  It'd be helpful to the conversation, I think, if you could lay out your answer in a similarly clear way.


Well, to be clear, you are asking my opinion.  I'm happy to give it to you, but if you're asking me to claim that it's objectively true, rather than my opinion, I can't do that.  It is my opinion, and I'm more than willing to claim it and own.  But I'm not able to say it's objective truth.  Anyway, to answer your question, nothing would make raping a child for fun good.  It would be evil in my view in all cases and situations.

Again, it'd be good if you could return the favor and answer the question as well:  If God said it was good to do it, would that make you believe it was good?

Well, respectfully, I didn't change from murder and rape to children and then added for fun. I questioned the concept of raping for children for fun, and then you switched it to murder of children, which I then altered to murder for fun to try and show the point.

I think you made a mistake in suggesting I did something I did not do.


Okay. I am ok with discussing this. You did change the reason behind your previous answer, but let's discuss this.

Would you say there are some things that are objective? And morals cannot be objective because it requires some powerful figure like God in order for morals to be objective?
jealousy can be wrong, and it can also be good. It's reasonable that I am jealous that another man might flirt with my wife. Not reasonable to be jealous that other men talk to her.

Cain, you are providing yes and no as possible answers, but they aren't the only possible answers.

It's different then the questions I am asking, since it appears that no one can provide any answers as to when it could be good to rape children for fun. That suggests it is always wrong.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:54, Thu 26 Dec 2013.

I'm seeing a few logical flaws in some of the arguments here.

There's a big item TitL is failing to bring up regarding objective morality.

As Tycho pointed out, gravity is 'objective'. It is encoded in the nature of the universe. Hypothetically, there could exist universes where gravity is stronger or weaker, or doesn't exist at all, but in this universe, it does exist, and it has a uniform strength no matter where in the universe you go. It is objective (to this universe). Tycho cannot change the force of gravity.

However, the definition of God includes that He *did* create and change the force of gravity. God defined gravity as having a certain value and strength in this universe. And God has the power to change it. TitL's argument is that when God created the universe, He also established basic moral laws as part of that fabric (at least on this planet). That morality, while subjective to God's scale, is as objective as gravity is. Satan's morality code does not carry as much weight as God's because Satan did not define the morality code for the entire universe, and Satan writing a physics book saying an apple falls at 5.8 m/s^2 does not make it so.

I can see a point of confusion here - Tycho can argue (rightfully so) that both morality and gravity are subjective then because they're subject to God's decisions. And here's the point where we have to define terms. Tycho can disagree, but I'm inclined to argue that using the same words to describe God as we do to describe me or TitL is not always useful, so if something has the same level of universality as gravity, I'm inclined to call it 'objective', whether you believe in Genesis or the Big Bang Theory.

Of course, the existence of objective morality does not preclude the existence of subjective (or vice versa). Running a red light is a violation of subjective morality in our culture because of the context of red lights and traffic laws, but it's not directly a violation of an objective morality. The lights could be green or purple, after all.


Both systems also have some pretty significant flaws.

We do see plenty of cases where things we consider morally very wrong are subjectively seen as being right. To pick on child rape as an example, there is a tribe in Africa in which the fathers will (lovingly) engage in sex acts with their pre-pubescent sons to pass on their fatherly spirit. It's very difficult for us to say 'hey, your cultural values and practices are wrong and you should go to prison for life, child-toucher!' because most people in that particular culture are a-ok with it.

Christian objective morality doesn't get a pass either. I have difficulty accepting that God would ask anyone to do anything which would violate God's laws. Obviously, Isaac was just a test, and God never intended him to get killed. But we do see God regularly  telling  Moses to kill everything living, and to take the women as sexual partners regardless as to their consent http://www.biblegateway.com/pa...0-13&version=KJV
http://www.biblegateway.com/pa...2031&version=KJV

So that brings up an interesting question for TitL: under what conditions is it alright to kill a child?
http://www.biblegateway.com/pa...2020&version=KJV

Also note, 'objective' does NOT mean 'does not change'. We believe the speed of light to be objective, but we are also coming to believe that value has changed (slightly) over the life of the universe.

  Really, I'm just looking to fix this subjective and objective angle your taking.


It's always evil to you, so then when would be it sometimes evil (or sometimes good) to rape children for fun? Would anything make it ever a good act to rape children for fun? (I'm not asking when it might be good for you, but when is it a good act for anyone or even someone.)

Would you concede it appears to be objectively evil if no circumstances would make it a good act?

Well, respectfully Tycho, I've been saying this a few times now, but you have answered your own question several times, but you are not answering my question.

What would make it a good act?



Then that is suggestive that there are some things that would make it a good act.

  I don't see the need for a qualifier for it in your view. I'm not asking what would make it a good act for you. I'm asking what would make it a good act. I'm not trying to convince you it's good.

Tycho, the problem being is that we can't even agree on good or evil at this point.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:48, Thu 26 Dec 2013.

I would say in the premise that it would be "okay" when the payoff is greater than leaving them alive.

A simple example might be in rescuing hostages. We accept, though wish it could be different, when innocents are killed in the process of rescuing hostages in the attempt to save as many as we can.

Do you consider killing children in your hostage situation example (or really, letting them be killed) to be 'good'? Or is it just 'less bad' than the alternative?

I would say it is a good act. The alternative, allowing more to die would be an evil act.

Intent, plays a large factor, although if we new the end result first would make it even more so. (If we knew that acting to help the hostages would save more than not acting, then it would be more evil to not act.)

Okay, now you're confusing me.

God says pretty clearly not to kill kids.

You believe what God says is the objective law.

But you think sometimes it's okay to kill kids.

Isn't that subjective moral law?

To Clarify, it's wrong to murder children. (And adults too)

Not really. It's wrong for us to murder children and adults. But it's not wrong for God to do so.

Example, is it wrong when a child dies due to cancer? God is in control of all people living and dying, correct?

What is wrong for God to do is its own discussion. I was asking specifically about people. (When I want to ask about what is ethical for God to do, I will qualify that. Just like saying something is 'objective' or 'subjective' doesn't apply to God as it does to us, it's the same with how ethical questions apply to Him.)

So is it GOOD for TitL to kill children?

Right, but if people are acting on God's actual commands, what difference does it make how God takes His own creation? To God, using a person to kill with a sword, or using disease, or an accident, God knows when, and knows the result of the consequence.

Generally no. I'm not a cop either, so it's unlikely I'll ever be put in that situation.

And it'll never be good for me to kill children for fun. No matter of any other circumstances. It'll always be wrong for me, and for anyone.

Err...I'm not sure how much clearer I can be on this.  "Always" means always.  I've said it's always wrong, never right in my view, multiple times now, but you keep saying "yeah, sure, but when is it okay?"  Never.  Not any times.  Zero times.  Not ever.  It's always wrong.


No, if it's "always wrong" then nothing can make it good.

Hmm, perhaps the confusion is what I mean when I head "to me" to what I've said.  Note that I didn't say "for me".  What I'm doing there is NOT saying "it's wrong for me to rape a child, but it might be okay for someone else to do it."  When I say it's wrong to me, I'm highlighting the fact that it is my judgement.  I'm judging it to be wrong.  It's my view, or opinion.  Someone else might think/say that it's okay.  My view doesn't force them to accept what I believe.  Their view doesn't force me to accept theirs.  In my opinion it is always wrong.  Someone else somewhere probably believes that it's sometimes good.  That's what I'm trying to get at.  If different judges reach different conclusions, then morality is subjective.  I'm not talking about whether it's okay for one person but not okay for another person.  That's a different concept, which we could get into if you like, but I think we've got enough to sort out here.


No.  Objectivity, as I'm meaning it here, doesn't have anything to do with whether it changes from situation to situation.  It has to do with whether a judge is required or not.  If a judge is required (such as you or me or God or Allah or anyone else), then it's subjective.  It's not something that's part of physical reality, but rather that's something going on in someone's mind.

Let me try to illustrate this with an easier example.  The moon has a mass.  It's mass is an objective, physical property of reality.  It doesn't matter if anyone measures it or not.  It doesn't matter if anyone ever wonders what the mass of the moon is.  It doesn't even matter if no conscious mind ever became aware that the moon existed.  It would still have a mass.

The moon can also be viewed as beautiful.  It can be beautiful to me, or you, or katisara, or God, or whoever.  But that beauty exists only in the mind of the observer.  It's beauty isn't part of physical reality, but rather it's a concept/idea/thought/whatever inside a conscious mind.  It requires someone to find it beautiful.  The observer is the subject, and is a necessary part of the moon being beautiful.  And if you change the subject from one person to another, their view of just how beautiful the moon is may be different.  Or it might be the same.  But the possibility exists that two people might disagree on just how (or whether) beautiful the moon is.  That's subjectivity.

Morality is like the second case.  Something is only wrong to someone.  There needs to be an observer, or judge, to say "I disagree with that action!" to make it wrong.  Your view is that God saying "don't do that" is what makes something wrong.  But that still requires God to judge the action.  Without anyone judging an action there is no right or wrong about it.  There are no elementary particles of goodness or evilness.  Good and evil are ideas.  Without conscious minds to judge an action, good and evil don't mean anything.  They aren't part of physical reality.  They are like beauty.  Someone needs to judge something for it to be good or evil.  From what you've said, it sounds like we agree on that much, you just feel God is the only judge that matters.  I think we also agree that if we change the judge (say, from God to Tycho), then how the judge feels about an action could change.  That's what I mean by subjectivity in morality.  Is that clear?  I feel like it's fairly simple, but clearly we're running into terminology problems, so I might need you to help me understand what part isn't clear, or which part you disagree with.







I don't understand you here.  If I say "it's my opinion that it's always wrong," how is that suggestive that something would make it okay?  Do we not agree on what 'always' means?  I keep saying over and over that I think it's always wrong, and you keep saying "but you haven't told me when it's okay!"  Any ideas on how we can move forward on this, 'cause I feel a bit stuck.  Why do you feel that there must be some situation where I would feel it's okay when I've said that I think it's wrong?



The qualifier "in my view" is highlighting the fact that that's all I have.  I can't tell you what anyone else thinks on it, I can only tell you what I think about it.  I'm pointing out the fact that people can disagree about these things, but that that disagreement doesn't mean my mind has to change.  I feel like you want me to say it's objectively evil, but I've tried to make clear that I view morality to be a necessarily subjective thing.  Things are only evil in someone's opinion.  Your view is that if it's evil in God's opinion, then it's you call objectively evil.  That seems like a contradiction to me, but we can work with it, I suppose.  The only thing I am capable of telling you is that something is wrong in my view.  If I say something is evil, I implicitly mean that it's evil in my opinion.  I'm making it explicit here, to highlight what I'm saying about morality requiring a subject.


Okay, then in that case, lets skip the good and evil bit, and jump straight to the action itself:  If God told you to rape a child, would you do it?  I feel like you're trying to avoid this line of questions, which I'm having a hard time understanding.  Why don't you want me to know your views on this?  I want to better understand your position, and the answers would help that.  But I feel like you don't want me to hear your answer.  Am I misinterpreting you?

In reply to katisara (msg # 223):

Just to clarify one thing, it was GMC who mentioned gravity, no me.  I only bring this up, since GMC seems to be using "objective" in a way more similar to how TitL uses it, but which is different from what I mean when I say it.  The multiple definitions will be confusing enough as is, so we should probably avoid extra confusion by linking the wrong people to who said what! ;)

Yuchi, if we agree raping children for fun is always an evil act, and nothing will make it a good act, what makes it subjective evil?

Yeah, I'm now seeing the different definitions as well.

So I'm clear, my understanding is:

Objective morality -- it's always wrong (or right) no matter what the circumstances.
Subjective morality -- it may be wrong or right depending on circumstances such as who the observor is, or what the conditions of the issue are.

It sounds like Tycho's definitions are:

Subjective morality -- the thing requires an observor to say 'yes, this is wrong' (or right). A cat eating a mouse is not morally right or wrong because neither of them can judge it, but a human watching a cat eat a mouse can then give it a moral dimension.

Objective morality -- Actions have an inherent moral value. On a faraway planet where the Xanus eat the Plebus, this is wrong, even though no intelligent life is aware of it happening.

Is that correct?

The definition (at least the one that I'm using) of "subjective".  It requires someone to say/feel/think/judge/whatever that it's evil.  It's evil because it's full of evil particles or something.  It's evil because someone (you, me, God, whoever) considers it to be evil.  If it would help move the conversation forward, we can use a different word to describe this concept other than "subjective," since it sort of seems like this is hanging us up.

To be clear, when I say that morality is subjective, I'm not saying "anything goes, you can do whatever you like, and no one can judge you!"  What I'm saying is that calling something evil really just means that you're voicing your disapproval of the act.  You're saying that you consider the act wrong (and it's possible that the reason you feel that its wrong is because someone else like God told you its wrong).

Good and evil are ideas, not physical quantities or properties.  They exist in the minds of conscious beings.  They are concepts, not something that exists in the physical world.  They are in our heads, and don't exist independent of our (in the largest sense of "our", which includes everyone, God too) minds.  That's all I mean by this term.  Because you base your morality on what God says, that is subjective, because it requires God to judge what is wrong or right.  And if you change the judge to someone else, the result can change.  That's what I mean by the term.  Again, we can call it something else if we need to.

Note, it doesn't really matter if we do agree on whether something is evil, just whether it's possible for anyone to disagree.

Also, to repeat what I said a few posts back, when I say its subjective, I DON'T mean that it varies from one situation to the next.  I also DON'T that it's okay for one person but not for another.  Those are separate concepts, and they're not what I'm referring to.  What I mean is that it's possible for one being to consider something good, and another to consider it evil.  And in such a case, neither is "right" in an objective sense.  they are both only able to put forth their position, perhaps try to change the other's mind, or perhaps just try to force the other to go along with their view with threats of retaliation.  But there isn't anything in physical reality that makes one right and the other wrong, because they aren't disagreeing about physical reality, they are disagreeing about ideas/concepts which have no physical reality.  It's similar to how you can like a song and I can dislike it at the same time.  Neither of us is "correct" in an objective sense, because "like" is an idea in our minds, not something physical in the world.  That doesn't mean that our opinions are invalid, or that we can't or shouldn't act on them.  It just means that they are subjective, and as much as we might wish it were otherwise, that's all there is.

Now, in the case of morality, you can argue that God's opinion matters more than anyone else's, since He's the most powerful, and can punish us for doing what He says not to do.  That's fine, that's entirely consistent when morality being subjective.  God's opinion may carry more weight and have more impact than yours or mine or anyone else's, but it's still His opinion, not something independent of Him.  People can (and do!) make different judgements from God.  They might get punished for doing so, and thus you could argue it's a bad idea to do this, but the fact that they can and do do it should be pretty clear, I think.  The fact that such a thing is possible indicates that morality is subjective in the sense of the word that I'm using.

To put it another way, for morality to be objective, it would have to be possible determine if something was right or wrong without referring to any being's view's on the matter, even God's.  As soon as you say "well, it's wrong because God says..." you've made a subjective statement (by which I mean if you change the subject to something else, the result will change (eg, if you replace "God says..." with "Tycho says..." the result will be different)).

Does this make sense?  Again, I'm happy for us to use a different word than "subjective" for this concept if that would help reduce the confusion.  If you think that'd be useful, feel free to suggest an alternative term that would be less confusing.

Yes, that's more or less what I'm getting at.  There are no "good particles" or "evil waves" or anything like that in physical reality.  The ideas of good and evil exist in our minds.  What one mind considers to be evil may be different from what another does, and there is nothing outside of their minds, out in the physical world, that settles which of them is "right".  They both have their views, and may act on them, but that's all morality is.  It's not something independent of thinking beings.  It requires a mind to make a judgement about something, and different minds can reach different conclusions.

Too much going on in your post tycho. I am cannot figure a reason why it's not objective other than you just don't believe there can be objective morals.

The problem I see if something is evil regardless of belief the. It cannot be due to someone's idea that makes it evil.

More so, if evil does not exist in your view, then god cannot do evil. You are asking what I would consider of god asking me to rape children for fun as if it no longer becomes evil, but add the idea that there cannot be an evil act.

Thought of another way, my hang up is not on subjective.
Tycho, is it possible that objective morals exist along side subjective morals?

Not asking if you think it's proven, just if it's possible they exist?

I feel like Tycho's "subjective" is my "abstract". Abstract concepts don't technically exist, they're totally based in the mind of intelligent creatures.

Gravity is concrete, theory of gravity is abstract. Harm is concrete, morality of harm is abstract.

In which case, I totally see why TitL is getting confused! I think I'd have to describe TitL's "subjective" as "situational" or "relative". My tribe believes it's okay to pirate music but wrong to charge money for things, so that's the moral law. His believes the reverse. Without making some greater moral argument, our moral codes are equivalent.