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Who What Now posted:I'm not sure. I believe that the vast majority of people are naturally far more moral than even they give themselves credit for. I'd say that most people have a natural aversion to seeing human suffering or injustice and would willingly try to stop or at least alleviate any such suffering if they reasonably had the power to do so. Naturally this is where things like the government comes in, taking a portion from everyone's ability and combining it to tackle larger issues. But that's neither here nor there.
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Dec 1, 2014 03:59
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Kyrie eleison posted:We are talking about the Creator of the Universe here. The being who gave you life and everything you have in it. Who knows your heart and your fate. A person who you are supposed to supplicate yourself before and worship and give offerings to, to pray to and do penance for. He is your master and your Lord. You are his slave. Dictators are merely ash compared to him. Now I will say you could be right, and that could be what God truly is. If that's true, then I am legitimately serious when this: gently caress your petty, vengeful tyrant of a God, I will not bow him. If he cannot understand why I will not bow before him and condemns me to burn, then I will willingly take my place in Hell. An alternative third option: after we die, we're all just loving worm food, in which case it doesn't really matter what any of us believe about the afterlife. Contrary to what you might think, I find this oddly soothing, actually. fade5 fucked around with this message at 04:08 on Dec 1, 2014 |
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Dec 1, 2014 04:02
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Miltank posted:I'm not sure I agree with this but I'll just accept it for the sake of the argument. What I want to know is your basis for 'reasonably having power'. This has always been my hangup on atheist morality- there is no commitment to acting unreasonably. Do you understand what I mean by this? Having the ability to do so in a way that does not negatively affect their own standard of living. That'd be my guess anyways.
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Dec 1, 2014 04:03
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Miltank posted:I'm not sure I agree with this but I'll just accept it for the sake of the argument. What I want to know is your basis for 'reasonably having power'. This has always been my hangup on atheist morality- there is no commitment to acting unreasonably. Do you understand what I mean by this? I don't understand what you mean by that. What's a "commitment to acting unreasonably"?
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Dec 1, 2014 04:10
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Ernie Muppari posted:I don't understand what you mean by that. What's a "commitment to acting unreasonably"?
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Dec 1, 2014 04:28
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Nessus posted:I think they mean 'why would you help out someone in a situation where you aren't likely to get some kind of return, if you are an atheist or otherwise not being told you ought to do it.' Like it's logical to help your family or your neighbors by cold Randian/evolutionary logic, but why help someone in Africa? Of course, not all atheists are or aspire to be hyper-rational consequentialists, though utilitarian ethics is a common stopping point.
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Dec 1, 2014 04:30
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fade5 posted:This right here is legitimately like half the reason I'm a universalist. The creature you describe here is not a loving God, that is a petty, vengeful tyrant who craves the adulation of those beneath him, and punishes them if they do not comply. There is no love there, he rules out of the fear of punishment, out of the fear of pain and eternal suffering. Assuming for the moment that Hell is actually real, this is an extraordinarily dumb position to take. Think about what Hell is, man. Just obey the petty tyrant, for gently caress's sake. Civil disobedience obviously won't work on the omnipotent creator of the universe, so why bother?
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Dec 1, 2014 04:31
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Cnut the Great posted:Assuming for the moment that Hell is actually real, this is an extraordinarily dumb position to take. Think about what Hell is, man. Just obey the petty tyrant, for gently caress's sake. Civil disobedience obviously won't work on the omnipotent creator of the universe, so why bother? Spite is a powerful emotion that has made people do plenty of stupid poo poo. There are plenty of examples of people refusing to give up in the direct face of certain death, so its hardly surprising. Alternately, God made him that way.
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Dec 1, 2014 04:34
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Cnut the Great posted:Assuming for the moment that Hell is actually real, this is an extraordinarily dumb position to take. Think about what Hell is, man. Just obey the petty tyrant, for gently caress's sake. Civil disobedience obviously won't work on the omnipotent creator of the universe, so why bother? Cause he seems to just do whatever he wants regardless of how you behave?
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Dec 1, 2014 04:45
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Ernie Muppari posted:Cause he seems to just do whatever he wants regardless of how you behave? This is also the point where salvation by grace begins to break down. The standard interpretation of Calvinism is that good works, righteous behavior, etc. are enabled through the grace of God. So therefore, if a pagan does a good deed, either it wasn't really good, or they've received divine grace without the Scriptures and the Scriptures are needless. You'll hear more conservative Christians saying things along the line of "only Christians can be moral", and it derives from this interpretation.
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Dec 1, 2014 04:48
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Caros posted:Spite is a powerful emotion that has made people do plenty of stupid poo poo. There are plenty of examples of people refusing to give up in the direct face of certain death, so its hardly surprising. It just seems so arbitrary. Kyrie eleison is right about one thing: If God actually exists, then he gets to decide what is "right" and what is "wrong." I don't know how you could possibly argue against that notion. You might have your own subjective system of morality, but you would be wrong. Who do you think created that subjective system of morality? Obviously, God did. And yes, for some unfathomable reason, he created you in such a way that you found that subjective system of morality worth suffering for in an eternal Hell, for no gain. But it still makes no sense to say that the guy who created the very concept of "wrong" is wrong about what "wrong" is. None of this is actually relevant to me, because I'm an atheist. But the logical implications of a world where the Christian God exists are pretty obvious. edit: Ernie Muppari posted:Cause he seems to just do whatever he wants regardless of how you behave? Exactly. So why consign yourself to an eternity of unbearable torment over it? I'm convinced people aren't really comprehending the Hell concept. Something tells me you'd be regretting your decision to stick to your principles after the first couple hundred trillion years of constant unendurable pain. Cnut the Great fucked around with this message at 04:55 on Dec 1, 2014 |
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Dec 1, 2014 04:51
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Cnut the Great posted:It just seems so arbitrary. Kyrie eleison is right about one thing: If God actually exists, then he gets to decide what is "right" and what is "wrong." I don't know how you could possibly argue against that notion. You might have your own subjective system of morality, but you would be wrong. Who do you think created that subjective system of morality? Obviously, God did. And yes, for some unfathomable reason, he created you in such a way that you found that subjective system of morality worth suffering for in an eternal Hell, for no gain. But it still makes no sense to say that the guy who created the very concept of "wrong" is wrong about what "wrong" is. I've always found the fact that god decides what is right and wrong to be sort of funny in and of itself. If God says something is right or wrong, either its a subjective decision based on what God has decided is right or wrong, or... what, there is an Ur-God that passed down morality onto him? But if God just decides what is right and wrong then it really isn't objective, its just subjective morality imposed by the guy with the universally biggest stick.
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Dec 1, 2014 04:56
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Only evangelicals really believe that a literal demon sticks a literal pitchfork into you in Hell. The majority of Christians believe that Hell is the absence of God. If God really is a cruel demiurge, that probably isn't actually bad to experience.
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Dec 1, 2014 04:59
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Effectronica posted:Only evangelicals really believe that a literal demon sticks a literal pitchfork into you in Hell. The majority of Christians believe that Hell is the absence of God. If God really is a cruel demiurge, that probably isn't actually bad to experience. So, we're already in hell.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:00
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Cnut the Great posted:Civil disobedience obviously won't work on the omnipotent creator of the universe, so why bother? I've thought a lot of this out before, it's why I ended up at universalism in the first place. I don't know if I'm "right" or not, it's just what I'd like to believe is true. I probably could have made the jump to full atheism (I might even do that at some point in the future), but at that point we're all just loving worm food after we die, so my personal belief in the afterlife afterlife doesn't really matter.  Caros posted:Spite is a powerful emotion that has made people do plenty of stupid poo poo. There are plenty of examples of people refusing to give up in the direct face of certain death, so its hardly surprising. 
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Dec 1, 2014 05:00
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Cnut the Great posted:Exactly. So why consign yourself to an eternity of unbearable torment over it? I'm convinced people aren't really comprehending the Hell concept. Something tells me you'd be regretting your decision to stick to your principles after the first couple hundred trillion years of constant unendurable pain. So basically Pascal's wager? Well, for every Kyrie there's someone else making almost the exact claim but with slight differences (for example, a protestant to Kyrie's troll-Catholicism), which you will be eternally tortured for disbelieving. You can't wager on all of them, so how do you decide which one to wager on?
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Dec 1, 2014 05:02
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Caros posted:I've always found the fact that god decides what is right and wrong to be sort of funny in and of itself. If God says something is right or wrong, either its a subjective decision based on what God has decided is right or wrong, or... what, there is an Ur-God that passed down morality onto him? But if God just decides what is right and wrong then it really isn't objective, its just subjective morality imposed by the guy with the universally biggest stick. Well, I think that would be anthropomorphizing God too much. I don't know that it would make sense to say that God could have a subjective opinion. Apparently God "decided" to give electrons a charge of -1, but does that mean such a measurement is subjective? Again, God necessarily created the concepts of "objective" and "subjective" in the first place. So what does that mean for the argument? But then I'm not sure that the concept of God makes much sense itself, which is why these discussions always seem to devolve into brain-bending nonsense. Sharkie posted:So basically Pascal's wager? Well, for every Kyrie there's someone else making almost the exact claim but with slight differences (for example, a protestant to Kyrie's troll-Catholicism), which you will be eternally tortured for disbelieving. You can't wager on all of them, so how do you decide which one to wager on? You don't. But that's a different argument.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:04
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Effectronica posted:This is also the point where salvation by grace begins to break down. The standard interpretation of Calvinism is that good works, righteous behavior, etc. are enabled through the grace of God. So therefore, if a pagan does a good deed, either it wasn't really good, or they've received divine grace without the Scriptures and the Scriptures are needless. You'll hear more conservative Christians saying things along the line of "only Christians can be moral", and it derives from this interpretation. Well, even without taking into account the house rules of any particular Christian denomination, it still seems hella' shady. If god really existed, and the relationship between myself and him was actually as ridiculously lopsided as most argumentative internet Christians make it out to be, then why exactly would I take god at its word that there's even an afterlife? As far as I can tell, god's about as trustworthy as my email's spam folder.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:05
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Cnut the Great posted:It just seems so arbitrary. Kyrie eleison is right about one thing: If God actually exists, then he gets to decide what is "right" and what is "wrong." I don't know how you could possibly argue against that notion. You might have your own subjective system of morality, but you would be wrong. Who do you think created that subjective system of morality? Obviously, God did. And yes, for some unfathomable reason, he created you in such a way that you found that subjective system of morality worth suffering for in an eternal Hell, for no gain. But it still makes no sense to say that the guy who created the very concept of "wrong" is wrong about what "wrong" is. So God has to be consistent. This would, I think, actually be a great way to explain why God isn't constantly rolling in to save either obviously holy people or whatever sect He actually finds the most pleasing, because if He did that, He's saying nothing's consistent - if the Methodists can just say a magic spell and get God to upend the world for no reason, people will just do Methodist stuff because they learned how to trick God, not out of the reasons why God presumably favored them in the first place.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:07
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Effectronica posted:Only evangelicals really believe that a literal demon sticks a literal pitchfork into you in Hell. The majority of Christians believe that Hell is the absence of God. If God really is a cruel demiurge, that probably isn't actually bad to experience. Well, literal pitchforks was not what I was implying, either. I think the general idea is that Hell is unimaginably unpleasant, regardless of the specifics. If you want to argue that Hell can actually be a great place if you're not into that God stuff, well, okay, I guess. It's a completely different premise, but none of it's real anyway so knock yourself out.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:07
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Ernie Muppari posted:Well, even without taking into account the house rules of any particular Christian denomination, it still seems hella' shady. If god really existed, and the relationship between myself and him was actually as ridiculously lopsided as most argumentative internet Christians make it out to be, then why exactly would I take god at its word that there's even an afterlife? For all we know god is actually what he claims the devil to be. Live out the good virtuous mormon life and you get an eternity of that in heaven. Spend your life coked up and banging sexy broads and you can get past the velvet rope into the eternal party. I just find it difficult to believe that thousands of years ago God revealed himself to a relatively small group of people outside the main focus of human civilization at the time, died, and then just assumes I'll believe the stories two thousand years later. And if I don't believe those stories, I go to eternal torment.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:09
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A lot of the text of the bible implies that disobedience for most people leads to simple destruction of the mind after death, rather than eternal torment.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:11
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Ernie Muppari posted:Well, even without taking into account the house rules of any particular Christian denomination, it still seems hella' shady. If god really existed, and the relationship between myself and him was actually as ridiculously lopsided as most argumentative internet Christians make it out to be, then why exactly would I take god at its word that there's even an afterlife? Outside of argumentation, we have Matthew 29: "Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a cent? And yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows." or Jonah 4: "But God said to Jonah, "Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?" "I do," he said. "I am angry enough to die." But the LORD said, "You have been concerned about this vine, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, and many animals. Should I not be concerned about that great city?"" Of course, someone like Kyrie is going to argue that even if the Father of Jesus of Nazareth really is the guy who expects you to slaughter all the Amalekites you should still obey, but there's a consistent counter-current of universalism throughout the Bible's later compositions, once the Israelites and the Jews get religion.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:18
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Dec 1, 2014 05:22
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Best post in thread.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:23
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Cnut the Great posted:Well, literal pitchforks was not what I was implying, either. I think the general idea is that Hell is unimaginably unpleasant, regardless of the specifics. If you want to argue that Hell can actually be a great place if you're not into that God stuff, well, okay, I guess. It's a completely different premise, but none of it's real anyway so knock yourself out. If it's oblivion, that's not such a big deal.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:24
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Nessus posted:For me the moral objection comes because Hell is a place of infinite punishment. It is impossible to do anything that merits eternal - literally eternal - agony. Hitler doesn't deserve that. Maybe he deserves a thousand years of agony for every person he got killed - but that's still a finite quantity. I don't think anyone deserves that, either. At the same time, I wouldn't blame someone for doing literally anything to avoid such a fate. It's just that horrible.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:25
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Dec 1, 2014 05:25
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Miltank posted:I'm not sure I agree with this but I'll just accept it for the sake of the argument. What I want to know is your basis for 'reasonably having power'. This has always been my hangup on atheist morality- there is no commitment to acting unreasonably. Do you understand what I mean by this? It continues to surprise me that Christians think atheists can't be altruistic or want good things for others even at their own expense without the fear/love of God compelling them.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:28
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Nessus posted:For me the moral objection comes because Hell is a place of infinite punishment. It is impossible to do anything that merits eternal - literally eternal - agony. Hitler doesn't deserve that. Maybe he deserves a thousand years of agony for every person he got killed - but that's still a finite quantity. Yeah that's the thing. Most readings of what's actually in the Bible indicate several things: 1) That ordinary people are effectively not anywhere from death til Judgement Day. Only special people "get" to go straight to heaven or hell at death. 2) That even people who really hosed up might have a chance at redeeming themselves judgement (Which depending on readings may be interpreted as needing time in punishment before being allowed up to the fun times; or may simply be "ok dude are you sorry now, to me, literal good standing here before you? ok that's what I thought") 3) That punishment can easily consist of simply zot and you cease being after death, unless you are as is in point 1 an especially special person. Lots of the other stuff is bolted on over the years.. it's not really taking authority from biblical sources so much as purported earthly authorities. Especially the mainstream 21st century person's ideas of how afterlife stuff works.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:32
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GAINING WEIGHT... posted:It continues to surprise me that Christians think atheists can't be altruistic or want good things for others even at their own expense without the fear/love of God compelling them. I wouldn't claim to. Just that they will never find a rationalization for morality, and that morality of the "reasonable effort" is basically no morality at all.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:33
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Miltank posted:I wouldn't claim to. Just that they will never find a rationalization for morality, and that morality of the "reasonable effort" is basically no morality at all. When I realized there was no God I made love to a crocodile, not because I wanted to, but because I suddenly realized there was no right or wrong, so how could I tell if I was supposed to romance that specimen of Crocodylus niloticus or not? I wooed it with food I stole from a starving family, because who can say what's right or wrong without Holy Writ from an omniscient being?
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Dec 1, 2014 05:34
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Miltank posted:I wouldn't claim to. Just that they will never find a rationalization for morality, and that morality of the "reasonable effort" is basically no morality at all. By contrast your morality can be boiled down to "I don't kill people because the invisible sky man said something bad will happen to me if I do." That is a child's morality. Are you really moral if you only do something because you fear punishment or desire reward?
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Dec 1, 2014 05:39
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Miltank posted:I wouldn't claim to. Just that they will never find a rationalization for morality, and that morality of the "reasonable effort" is basically no morality at all.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:39
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Caros posted:By contrast your morality can be boiled down to "I don't kill people because the invisible sky man said something bad will happen to me if I do." That is a child's morality. Are you really moral if you only do something because you fear punishment or desire reward? I don't believe in hell and I don't care about heaven. Nessus posted:Presumably there was some semblance of human morality before the invention of agriculture, considering that humans successfully spread out, existed, settled most of the world that could support hunter-gatherers, etc. Where do you think that came from? Unenlightened "natural" morality. Don't gently caress with the people inside your kinship and marriage circles. This is the morality that some people point to when they claim that humans are naturally moral. e: unenlightened, not unlearned. e2: Ernie Muppari posted:To be fair, from the perspective that there's no inherent purpose to existence, it's ultimately no more silly than any other basis for morality. And this is my point. There can be no morality without irrationality. Miltank fucked around with this message at 05:47 on Dec 1, 2014 |
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Dec 1, 2014 05:40
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Caros posted:By contrast your morality can be boiled down to "I don't kill people because the invisible sky man said something bad will happen to me if I do." That is a child's morality. Are you really moral if you only do something because you fear punishment or desire reward? To be fair, from the perspective that there's no inherent purpose to existence, it's ultimately no more silly than any other basis for morality.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:42
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Ernie Muppari posted:To be fair, from the perspective that there's no inherent purpose to existence, it's ultimately no more silly than any other basis for morality. 42! *holds up hand for a high-five*
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Dec 1, 2014 05:48
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Miltank posted:I'm not sure I agree with this but I'll just accept it for the sake of the argument. What I want to know is your basis for 'reasonably having power'. This has always been my hangup on atheist morality- there is no commitment to acting unreasonably. Do you understand what I mean by this? Maybe? I think you're trying to say that there is no reason to act in a way that isn't immediately beneficial to you, or perhaps not beneficial at all but is still nevertheless the right thing to do? If that's correct then my answer to that is there are reasons, and other than the threat of hell/promise of heaven they're probably the same as yours. That is, that doing such things results in society becoming a better place to be, and if one must be cynical or logical about it then as they say 'a rising tide lifts all boats'. Or you do it because it's what what you would want done for you if you were in such a situation. As an example to that last point: I donate money to various charities and I volunteer some of my free time if/when I'm able to (primarily the Meals on Wheels program which takes bread, milk, and hot meals to home-bound seniors) not because I benefit from it personally, but because if I were in those people's positions I would wish for someone to help me as well. Even small courtesies, like loaning a stranger a few bucks when they're short at the cash register and the like, can help make the world a slightly better place. If that isn't what you're asking, then I'll need to have it explained better.
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Dec 1, 2014 05:51
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A simpler way to put it was expressed by an alien horse-man in a Marvel comic: 
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Dec 1, 2014 05:55
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Miltank posted:I wouldn't claim to. Just that they will never find a rationalization for morality, and that morality of the "reasonable effort" is basically no morality at all. You just adopt axioms that have nothing to do with god, much in the same way religious people just accept that god exists. Morality can exist apart from religion.
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Dec 1, 2014 06:04
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