/lit/ - Literature

>>16382195
Same way you take any other belief system (Atheism, Islam, Mormonism, etc).

Predetermination =/= lack of free will
Knowing that your dog will chase the stick you toss doesn't mean that you decided for the dog that it would chase the stick

>>16382214
>that you decided

This is where you made a fault -- but that was predetermined, so I can't blame you.

>>16382212
Atheism isn't a belief, it's the lack of one.
>>16382214
It does, you don't have control over your future and only God can change it. You were judged before you were born. The dog doesn't have free will as well, just the illusion of such caused by his instincts.

>>16382195
>brainlets have a perfectly easy time understanding that eldritch Abominations don't make logical sense and we can't comprehend their motives or actiona

>the same dipshits think we can refute the existence of God or truth of religion when he is just incomprehensible

>>16382195
If it's not b8, learn about esoteric/exoteric meaning.

>>16382195
>Open pic related
>Talking horse

Just because some of the stories are mythological/allegorical/batshit crazy, it doesn't invalidate the entire religion as worthless from a literary or cultural point of view. Nor does it negate the possibility that society is more peaceful and prosperous when organized according to the religion in question. Maybe that's just how human behaviour works? Even if it seems inscrutable.

Honest question: if it just makes your country better to do something, even if it involves "semantic acrobatics and freestyle interpretations", why would you not want to do it? Are you that loyal to some notion of ideal reason, which is itself a human construct, that you would sacrifice a superior society to maintain it?

Certainly I can immediately see many advantages of living in a Christian society compared to an atheist one. You and your country can still be Christian without believing every word of the Bible, or even any word of it is actually true.

>>16382257
>>16382265
>nooooooo don't ask questions I know it does'nt make sense but it's true source: trust me

>>16382195
>Open odyssey
>Cyclops
White he fuck even reads the greeks, it's just fairy tale bullshit with no meaning

>>16382195
the average man back then didn't really gave it a thought
the idea of an all powerful and loving being was a way of coping with all the daily struggles he would go through

>>16382274
I'm not talking about the "benefits of christian faith in your country" or the spiritual gain of it. Honestly? I think it has a somehow good message and good morals nowadays, even if some religious ideals are outdated. If everyone lived like Christ, world would be much better, but it doesn't make any of it true.

>>16382274
>some notion of ideal reason, which is itself a human construct
Is this notion a product of ideal reason or is it just a human construct? If the former, than ideal reason has value, if the latter, then why should anyone give it any consideration?

>>16382195
Reddit; a cancerous place where you should stay

>>16382248
Atheism is the belief that there is no god. There's no such thing as a "lack of a belief" everybody belives in something

>>16382332
Then if I don't believe in Big Foot I'm an abigfootist and that's a belief? I'm not even believing in anything. Atheism is looking at religion and not being convinced by any, you aren't even making an affirmation. Every newborn straight out of the womb is born an atheist, are you really sure a newborn has ANY experience to have a belief?

>>16382396
>Then if I don't believe in Big Foot I'm an abigfootist and that's a belief?
Yes.

>>16382195
>Indigenas beliefs, we came from the mud
>Christians beliefs, we came from the mud
You guys can tell which one got slaughtered and which became political propaganda

serious question to athe-faga. why did you let evil into your life? havent you noticed how in corrupts everything

>>16382301
Honestly you deserve to be shot by some sincere communists for your Bourgeois Sophistry. I don't feel like defending you and your "white lies" from a horde of Godless atheists. Honestly when you say that you want other people to live like Christ while personally not believing any of it's true you just prove that you're a dirty little leech.

>>16382396
Are you aware of the concept of Bigfoot? Then you have beliefs about Bigfoot, objectively speaking.

>>16382482
>Honestly when you say that you want other people to live like Christ while personally not believing any of it's true you just prove that you're a dirty little leech.

Yes, I'm saying you can get morals and ethics out of fictional stories. Why does that bother you so much? Also I think Christ wouldn't approve the way you are talking I believe. Do you think Jesus would ever call someone a "dirty little leech" or say someone deserves to be shot? Practice what you pray.

>>16382477
Besides not being perfect, I always strive for bettering myself and ultimately what's good for me and my peers. I want everyone (that deserves it) to have freedom, justice, opportunity and not live in misery, simply as that. My morals might and probably are flawed, so I try to always better them through criticism and reflection. Do you think I like murder or rape just because I'm not religious? It's scary to think a lot of christians just don't do those things because of their faith. I wonder what they will do if they lost it one day.

>>16382498
So if I have no concept of christian God, I have no beliefs about him, objectively speaking? That's the situation of millions of people out there and newborns without concept of God.

>>16382520
>I want everyone (that deserves it)

thats what i thought. you think the people being attacked in the streets deserve it and that you can judge that. enjoy getting fucked in the ass while your life dpirals into Godless degeneracy

>>16382564
People that "don't deserve it" are rapists, pedos, murderers, family abusers and such. How the hell you implied that? No one deserves beatings, mainly in the middle of a street. In that I plainly agree with Christ.

>>16382195
>if God is omniscient
neither the Tanakh or the New Testament claims this, afaik

>>16382280
Listen you buffoon I just told you to DYOR. Read intro to hinduism by Guenon, it has a chapter about esoteric/exoteric. Basically esoteric is deep meaning (real teachings were orally transmitted, even Lao Tse says that "writing was a mistake" because we lost the deep meaning of texts), exoteric is the literal meaning.

>>16382520
>I'm saying you can get morals and ethics out of fictional stories
If they're fictional, then they are not able to be followed, because fiction isn't reality.

>Would Christ approve of my statements?
Emphatically yes, because either Christ is fictional in which case, see above, or if Christ is not fictional because he also criticized Godless people.

>Would Jesus say someone deserves to be shot?
Jesus said that Jerusalem deserved to be raped and pillaged for hypocrisy and unbelief. In 79AD this actually happened when the Romans put down yet another uprising (pic related). My God detests hypocrites like you.

>I wonder what the masses will do if they lose their faith?
They will make you dig your own grave, then put you in it. The revolutionaries would purge humanity of its sins the old fashioned way (like the Aztecs). Doing so wouldn't be very progressive, but neither are you, since you expect to keep people down with things you regard as lies like some old-time feudal lord. The ultimate justice for you would be if people regarded you as a liar and made you pay the penalty for it.

>>16382195
>If god is omniscient, the universe is pre-determined
This is a fallacy!
Assuming X is omniscient, does it follow that X knows that the earth is flat? It seems so, X knows everything!
But this error is only because the most naive logically inconsistent formalization of the property of omniscience. Indeed, X also must know that the earth is round. But then we have a logical contradiction.
The error here occurs because "knows that the earth is flat" presupposes that the earth is flat, which is of course not true.
In the same way, saying "If God knows everything, does he know the future" presupposes the fact that the future exists and is already predetermined, begging the question!
The argument's premise presupposes its conclusion.

>>16382195
Why would predestination negate sin?
Just because you didn't choose to do a bad thing doesn't stop it from being a bad thing.
Let's say we live in a free will world, and I am faced with choosing to kill you for your food, or starving to death. I kill you, this is a sin.
It doesn't stop being a sin just because I didn't have a good option.
This reminds me of "if God is real, why does he allow bad things to happen?" who said God has to be good anyway? He's God, the supreme being, he can hate you just for fun if he wants to.

>>16382531
you're coping so hard right now. those millions of people definitely have some concept of God or a religious/philosophical equivalent to it. They have the conception and if they deny it than they are an atheist. Saying that babies are atheist has to be in the top five most gobsmackingly retarded things I've ever seen posted on this board. Do some actual self analysis and find out the real reason you reject the idea of a higher purpose and power. If its because you knew people that believed in God and they were dumb, its not a good enough.

OP is probably actually 12, I can't believe you are all actually fucking responding to this vapid faggot. Anyone who's not a complete imbecile is aware that the human belief system is complex and atheism is not as simple as "God dumb, I r liberated", but involves a complex patchwork of beliefs from atheists rendering other things like technological advancement, mankind, the environment, pleasure, etc. as sacred.

>>16382801
this
>>16382195
ur a thick skulled nigger

>>16382214
Except I didn't create my dog and instill the desire to chase sticks in its very nature...

>>16382248
>>>16382214
>It does, you don't have control over your future and only God can change it.
Thats all up to persspective really. if your "self" is simply the subset of the larger whole it has freedom to do as it will, and it will do as it is will according to the larger series of events.

>>16382195
....same as any other religion, why? greeks thought that their father of the king of the gods ate their babies. I think you are just myopic.

>>16382195
Because I fucking choose to. Same way materialistic atheists take the concept of morals seriously, it should be fucking impossible.

>>16382195
>if God is omniscient, the future is predetermined
nice try, bucko

>>16383882
Who is he? Is what he said in any way similar to my post
>>16382719

>>16382195
You are interpreting it wrong. Think of it like interpreting a dream. Everything is symbolic and is not meant to be taken literally. Any study of alchemy, hermeticism or occultism will demonstrate this.

>>16382195
>knowing something means forcing it to happen
>knowing Adam + Eve would rebel meant that their rebellion didn't happen
ok webcomic theologian

>>16382801
Religion is the earliest form of trying to understand reality. As better methods were developed, the absurdity of religion became more and more apparent. There is no logical reason to believe the Christian mythology and not the Hindu mythology, it's purely preference, usually informed by cultural or familial teaching/pressure

>places poison fruit directly in his child's playpen
yeah, social services would not have allowed God to be a parent

>>16384263
What the fuck?
I get you're joking, but this highlights how people don't understand the concept of God.
God could make a three year old drink bleach and he will still be God, the King of the Universe.
That's what King means, Absolute, Unaccountable POWER.

>>16384244
Or or or, trying to express concepts or teachings using metaphor.
It's poetry, not a tech manual.

>>16382332
agnosticism is the lack of a belief, while atheism is the rejection of theology

>>16384056
As I continue to actually read on theology and the early church fathers it becomes staggering how many people have next to no understanding of the Christian faith yet shit on it and act arrogant as if they've solved some incredible puzzle like the OP. The schism and Protestantism were a huge blow to Christian philosophy. We became to complacent in just saying "god did it lol" which is true but insulting to anyone with a lust for truth.

>>16382195
metaphor, allegory, and accepting that human error plays a role — especially with respects to possible misinterpretation of what was once no doubt an oral tradition.

>>16384263
The tree itself wasn't poison, the disobedience and the sin that followed was the poison. Its more like a child got into the "bleach" and now god is trying to heal him through the tree of life (Jesus) and the son in his sickness and delirium perceives god as trying to take away his poison high and rebels.

>>16384336
What you've just stated is exactly what I want to criticize about religion. It seeks to establish an entity which can commit atrocities and you can't question it or hold it accountable. That is evil.

>>16384437
>that is evil
What is evil in your world view and how do you justify it?

>>16384342
Except people take it too seriously. People believe in the personage of Jesus or the personage of Krishna as divine agents. This is not healthy, it has all the hallmarks of mass hysteria on a long term basis

>>16384437
That's a completely infantile position to take.
My cat thinks I'm committing crimes against him when I close him in the next room to mop the floor as well. Your attitude is just like his.
You don't and can't know why God does things, and since God is KING, there's nothing you can do about it but bitch, just like my cat does.

>>16384465
This is a problem in people, not religion.
People do stupid shit due to be convinced they are right all the time, I got into an argument with a guy about a cactus once, and he threatened to beat me up over it.
Is it the cactus that should be removed?

>>16384444
There is a subjective experience of things as "undesirable", which means that objectively speaking certain things are undesirable to certain people. Anything which increases the undesirable without a correlate increase in the desirable is evil. This can be reasoned by the individual and confirmed via dialogue and does not rely on an arbitrary edict from an authority, divine or otherwise

>>16384482
So then the answer is to stop thinking of God's actions-that-you-don't-like as evil.

>>16384473
If you willingly suspend your critical thinking in deference to an entity other people made up, then that's your prerogative, but don't expect others to buy into it or even respect it

>>16384491
But they are evil, and to think of them as anything else would be a lie

>>16384480
Anthropologically, it is crystal clear that groups of people invent religions. Just look at the different major religions, the only traits they share are archetypes which occur generally in human psychology, the actual events they are centered around are entirely arbitrary stories. The adherence to the divine aspects these primitive belief structures is unhealthy.

>>16382248
Atheism is the belief that there is no God
>>16384349
Agnosticism is the belief that one cannot know God's will, Atheists require the existence of God to refute it. Both of these are retarded.

>>16384501
And yet evil continues.
God can be evil, I don't see what your argument is about

>>16384530
Define what you think god is

>>16384495
I see, it is the cat that is right, it's his inalienable right to fuck up the kitchen floor and get bleach on his paws

>>16384538
The Supreme Being (and our being is becoming).
Not an invisible man that lives in the sky, although that is an image he might use to communicate with us.

>>16384482
So you believe god to be evil, God is not objectively evil. Sounds like a shaky foundation. I think anon equating you to his cat is quite right. Not all undesirable situations are inherently evil.

>>16384482
your midwit take on morality is undesirable to me, therefore you're evil

>>16384527
So what if God IS Objectively evil, cruel, monstrous?
He's GOD.
Not liking it doesn't make it not so, him not being what you'd like as God doesn't change the fact that he IS.
I can hate King Joffrey, right? But he's still the King. I can hate Obama or Trump, but that doesn't make their power not so

>>16384527
People invented Kingship and The Congress and the Atom Bomb too

>>16384587
I think an argument like that will only make someone stray further from god. God is king but he is merciful and just, saying god would be within his right to be "evil" would also go against his Will as he is all that is good. I see what you are saying but someone with doubts about God doesn't want to hear "yeah maybe he is evil! so what?"

>>16382195
Just because God sees all of the decisions tha you make doesn't mean that you are forced to make those decisions. A creature in time is not able to understand a being which is outside of time.

>>16384599
I don't think lying to people helps.
Most atheists are that way because of the deep hypocritical behavior of their church and families.
Why not have actual believers instead of warm bodies with fickle hearts for the numbers?
Quality, not quantity.

>>16384539
A cat is incapable of reasoning. Are you? Are "God's" commands moral because they serve a function (keeping the floor clean) or purely because you must obey the divine authority?
>>16384547
"Our being is becoming" what does that even mean? And how did you arrive at that belief?
>>16384572
God only exists as those who define him, define him. If someone states God did something, we can judge whether what they claim he did is evil or not. The only undesirable situations that are good are ones who serve an ultimately desirable outcome.
>>16384581
Confronting one's tribal beliefs can be uncomfortable in the moment, anon, but I think you'll find that a well reasoned system of morality is far more desirable than one based purely on deference to a divine authority (who happens to be spoken for by terrestrial human beings)
>>16384587
Whether one person's claim about God's existence is a different issue than whether that person's claimed God is evil or not. Both counts tend towards the negative though
>>16384590
And none of those are divine either

>What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid.
>For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
>So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
>For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.
>Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.
>Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?
>Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?
>Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?
Reminder: God can do whatever it wants, it's God and you're not.
You can cry about it if you want, or you can accept the fact that you don't control reality and move on.
Abandon your foolish hubris, the world is outside your control. Do your best, but don't obsess over what isn't yours to decide.

>>16384683
>God only exists as those who define him, define him. If someone states God did something, we can judge whether what they claim he did is evil or not. The only undesirable situations that are good are ones who serve an ultimately desirable outcome.
You understand that by your logic Christianity is not evil then yes? A Christian believes the hardships imposed by god are justifiable and will be rectified at a later time. By your own definition this belief is good not evil. Now if you want to say you disagree with that then your morality is very adhoc.

>>16384683
>well reasoned system of morality
"What I like = good, what I don't like = evil" isn't a well formed moral system, it's a selfish and childish take on the world.

>>16384683

>>16384698
That Christian belief negates all human morality anyway. Why care if another steals from you, kills your family, ect. It all comes out in the wash at the end of time anyway! Gambling that a divine authority will "put everything right at a later time" is an abdication of morality, the ultimate slave move. It is evil in that it strips people of their own human dignity on an entirely unsubstantiated claim that it will be justified later. Basically a scam overtly and explicitly designed to make them docile

>>16384708
That is a reductio ad absurdum. The morals I advocate for take into account the real suffering or joy of all people, measured as objectively as possible. If a person "likes" having enough food to eat, and "doesn't like" starving, is this a selfish and childish take on the world?

>>16384725
Christians, and even Jews, have a moral obligation from their God to set up courts of law to prosecute and punish criminals.
I know you just read Neechee for the first time and think you're a genius, but don't go on about religions unless you know the first thing about them.

>>16384725
>human morality
Define this, because if its the same definition you gave then it does not negate morality.

>>16384725
Your argument is against the concept of Judgement, and against cyclical time, that is to say, eternity, and against the transcendental as a category.
None of this negates God.

You'd like Unger.

>>16384736
you can't measure feelings objectively
obese lardballs consider the amount of food they eat to be necessary, by your standards it then is because that's what they subjectively want

>>16384739
The fact remains that if God passes an exactly justified sentence after death, then any justice imposed by humans during life must necessarily decrease God's punishment as to maintain the correct proportion of punishment, making the entire project of human justice moot

>>16384736
How Anthropocentric.
The Universe is bigger than just people.
This ecosystem, this planetary biosphere, is bigger than the petty needs of people.
Humanism led to this overpopulation and climate crisis.
Fuck your Humanism. It's childish to the point of caricature

>>16384740
Any sense of right and wrong are irrelevant if it all gets equalized by a divine authority at the end of time anyway, thats what I was referring to.
>>16384746
What led you to that take? I don't seek to "negate" god, just to point out that the claims made about him are unfounded and often evil.
>>16384750
Like any form of measuring, tools can be developed over time and a closer approximation to the truth can be achieved. Obesity has demonstrable negative health consequences which are undesirable.

>>16384756
I agree overpopulation and climate change are crises which we need to find the best solutions to that don't lead to equally bad outcomes. Ironically it is a Christian injunction to "be fruitful and multiply". Maybe God should have mentioned when to stop multiplying....

>>16384755
Touting your pet theory as a fact doesn't make it one

>>16384781
Undesirable to whom, and for what end goal?
If you know a person will go through a period of low food access, excess fat can save his life.
Things are just so fucking much more complicated than your reductionist approach.
For instance, why did it take Einstein to fix the major issue of Newtonian Physics, that is to say, why could we not predict the orbit of Mercury until Einstein?
Because knowing a simple rule (like the laws of thermodynamics) is only helpful in extremely specific circumstances, and with simple systems.
The more parts a system has, the more difficult it is to predict.
Reductionism must fail.
You may eventually discover how unavoidable this realization is

>>16384781
and yet many fatties still desire it, denying the health consequences and eating themselves to death
explain to me though, how do you make a tool to measure feelings? how do you compare these feeling values?
you're the one saying it's possible, so please do explain, I'm interested

>>16384810
I set up an if/then situation. If I am incorrect, show where I am wrong. If you disagree with the premise, then we are in agreement that God passing final judgement is a bad premise for morality

>>16384781
>Any sense of right and wrong are irrelevant if it all gets equalized by a divine authority at the end of time anyway, thats what I was referring to.
Right and wrong are right and wrong, I don't see why a god enacting justice for doing right or wrong means they stop existing. Unless you're saying our morality is already subjective and comes form us being finite in which case the argument is null as the belief in a god is on par with the disbelief from a finite doomed species.

>>16384811
Every appeal you made in that post is to usefulness. That is exactly my premise. Fat is useful in specific situations, therefore IF that situation is likely, then being fat is a good thing. If it is unlikely, then the side effects being fat carry mean being fat is a bad thing. I am fully taking into account the complexity of moral situations by explicitly taking all components into account

>>16384820
When did you stop beating your wife?
That's the kind of bullshit framing you're using.
Throw this woman in the river! If she drowns, she's innocent, if she floats she's a witch and gets the death sentence

>>16384840
You have yet to actually point out in my post where I went astray. Does God impose a just punishment? Is there anything lacking in his punishment? Why, then, would additional human punishment be required?

>>16384832
It's physically impossible for you or anyone else (besides God or maybe some alien somewhere) to take the complexities of the entire universe into account.
A computer that could do this would need to be bigger than the universe itself.

>>16384820
human judgements and punishments provide chance for human repentance prior to the final judgement, that isn't a flaw in the system it's a feature
now I say unto you, your proposition did nothing to deny the actual fact that I stated
Christians hold people to moral law, prosecute and punish people according to moral law, and have gone to war over moral law
I know that because the mustachioed kraut said they're slaves you're assuming he's right, but have you ever considered looking at history and how people behave outside of Nietzsche's protestant-raised-rebellion worldview?

>>16384850
What's the point of enacting punishment if everyone is equalized in death?

>>16384854
Yes, and heuristics like moral maxims are useful when kept in line with the ultimate aim of usefulness. But even these must be measured as best as possible as to dispense with any maxim which actually does more harm than good

Swallow the non-rational / mystical pill; talk to your fellow Sufis and Eastern Orthodox Christians (and whatever the Kabbalists are up to). These questions of yours will then whither away, the same as this internet comic. Remember that The Enlightenment lead to Biblical literalism.

>>16382248
>there is such thing as neutrality
there is no such thing

>>16384856
Repentance in response to punishment doesn't seem like authentic repentance at all. That just leads to a case of "I'm sorry I got caught" not "I'm sorry I did that thing in the first place".

Also, I used one phrase from one philosopher because it exactly fit the topic at hand, this does not mean I am in love that that philosopher. In fact, I am quite "meh" on Nietzsche, if you must know.

>>16384870
Death does not equalize what happened during life. In a lot of cases, death is the escape from accountability.

>>16382195
unironically yawned reading this op

>>16384930
>but still replied

>>16384928
Death is not an escape form life, its the opposite. So if we hold someone accountable for what they did as affront to the then living which we hold dear as life (our only life) and livilyhood are important then wouldn't death be the best punishement for those people? Or are we to keep them alive soly to make ourselves feel better in their punishment? If so are we not putting them in an undesirable situation where their is no good to increase from it. Sounds evil. Unless of course you're saying the suffering of another human to sedate your idea of justice is "good".

>>16384901
Regardless, your personal problem with reconciling human punishment and the final judgement actually has nothing to do with the reality that christians and jews pursue worldly judgement in tandem with their belief in the final judgement

>>16384953
Death is the entrance to life? What are you talking about? Also, within a society, there is an optimal justice system which produces the best results overall. I believe this system involves holding people accountable for their transgressions against other people, and not a reliance on the assumption that there is an entirely non-corporeal court in the afterlife which will dole out the perfect judgement. That belief would be the height of childish thinking.
>>16384971
Religious people have conflicting beliefs, I agree. It's not "my personal problem", it's a demonstrably conflict between two held beliefs which you have failed to reconcile in the slightest

>>16384850
Your belief in the possibility of Utopia is fucking horrifying.
Talk about unfounded faith

>>16382332
>>16384528
>what is this God you are talking about?
>is X and it has the properties I'm saying it has
>ok got empirical proof of it or peer reviewed evidence
>no, but let me tell you how hard I thought about it and came to the conclusion it exists in reality
>I don't believe you
>so you don't believe he exists
>no, you didn't proof anything therefore such thing doesn't exist so far
See, no beliefs.

>>16385025
There is no contradiction.
It's called Biographical vs Historical Time.
Biographical Time is life right now, the one you're living.
Historical Time is the life of a species, of a culture, of a civilization.
We punish crime in Biographical Time, but the crimes we make mistakes on, or miss, are addressed in Historical Time, and in Judgement Day religions like Zoroastrianism or Christianity, that is the end of History.

>>16385033
I believe there are optimal organizations of human society and that through dialogue, reason, and work we can move closer to them. This is not faith, and it is not a belief in achieving "Utopia", it's simply the project of incremental improvements, something all humans intrinsically strive for, as it is the basis and impetus of all human activity

>>16385070
That is a contradiction. If everything you miss gets resolved anyway, it doesn't matter if you miss everything.

>>16385064
Empiricism is flawed, we must use reason to adjust it.
White light is empirically Low Color and High Intensity.
Reason tells us that it is all colors at once.
We use a prism, yes? Is that an Empirical process? Only partially, again, our senses tell us this piece of glass changes white light into a rainbow, but it is reason that tells us the rainbow is the same light broken apart and not a different set of lights

>>16385074
I disagree with every single one of those faith based notions.
>>16385083
Not at all.
I can't clean off 100% of bacteria with my soap, only 98%. Should I stop washing my hands?

>>16385083
That is to say: I have to live my life right now, and improve it as I am able.
That life will improve permanently and fully after I am dead is of no immediate use.
So while I know that life will eventually be perfectly good, it will not be now, so I must do my best to get it as good as I can.

>>16385025
it's only a contradiction because you're making it one
God judging at the end of days and people judging during days doesn't contradict each other

>>16385106
You disagree that there are better ways tor organize human society and there are worse ways? What are you on about?

If you wash your hands and it gets 98% but then carry out a divine cleansing that is guaranteed to remove 100% of bacteria every time, then yes, washing your hands would be pointless

>>16385074
>I believe there are optimal organizations of human society and that through dialogue, reason, and work we can move closer to them.
Optimal Organization Of Human Society is the definition of Utopia. It has never existed, even briefly.
Dialogue, Reason and Work being capable of bringing about Utopia is another article of faith, there has been no evidence that this is possible.

>>16382195
>Life spontaneously generates
>By uninterrupted chain of micro-evolution, giant proto-bird-lizards came to dominate the earth, until suddenly interrupted by unique and unexplained apocalyptic meteor
>by second uninterrupted chain of mirco-evolution, bipedal ape comes to dominate the planet instead of bird-lizards

If the fundamental law of reality is entropy, how does order come from chaos?

>>16385125
It does in regard to achieving justice. If there is an exact degree of justice, and God will always set it to that exact level at the end of time, then any adjustment prior to that by humans is entirely pointless

>>16382248
Lack of belief is still a belief

>>16385141
If there are states of human society that are better than others, than there must be a state which is the best out of those. This is the logical conclusion from the premise "there are better and worse states of society".

>>16385142
Go watch the two lectures on dissipative adaptation (thermodynamics theory of life) by Jeremy England, or read his book, I pre-ordered it months ago and it came the other day.
Trust me

>>16385150
>If there is an exact degree of justice
bold assumption, why?
>God will always set it to that exact level at the end of time, then any adjustment prior to that by humans is entirely pointless
again, you're making an assumption
why would it be pointless, and why would it not be considered by god?

>>16385150
Not to them in their lives right now, in biographical time.
Stop being fucking obtuse.
You're arguing that since it is a certainty that the sun will burn out, we might as well just give up now and lay down and starve to death.

>>16385167
Are you taking the position that there is something lacking from God's final judgement that can be supplied by humans? That seems like a bolder assertion

>>16385174
I mean, Jesus states that it's much harder for rich people to enter heaven than the poor, so strictly speaking, maybe you should lay down and starve to death

>>16385160
>If there are states of human society that are better than others, than there must be a state which is the best out of those
That's a supposition. No reason at all that there should be a best System.
In fact, like say, in Murray Bookchin on the left or in Dark Enlightenment thought on the right, there's a lot of really strong fact-based arguments for why tribalism or Feudalism were superior to Liberalism and Socialism.

>>16385183
He's saying that rich people have no humility.
Which is verifiably so

>>16385175
Yes, the thing that is lacking is that it happens at the end of time and not right now you stupid fuck

>>16385150
Justice is the giving of what is due. As God has created all things gratuitously, nothing can be due to anyone or anything except to the extent that God has proscribed it, and all things are due to God either directly or indirectly as an act of obedience. By original sin, man has fundamentally violated divine justice. As man has nothing of himself, but all things from God, man has no way of restoring justice to God. The only just recompense is death. But, in an act of self-sacrificial love, God made himself man, and offered himself as a sacrifice to himself on our behalf. It is only by participating in this self-sacrifice that any man can be justified before God.

Judgment is a principle of justice. It is the determination of justice. One either judges according to his own authority, or according to the authority of another. Man, being nothing by himself, has no authority which is not God given. As God has created all things, all judgments must correspond to divine judgment. To the extent that any man judges without authority or at odds with divine judgment, that man takes from God what is God's alone and therefore does an injustice to God.

>>16385184
What you've stated there is that there are different views as to what the "superior" society would look like. I agree that it may be that radically different structures could be in the running for best society and it may be very difficult or even impossible for us to conclude what the best would be. However, there are definitely smaller scale aspects which are much easier to assess as to whether they are closer or farther away from optimal

>>16385204
You're still thinking that humans are universal abstract objects that there is a closed set of ways to satisfy.
That's laughable.

>>16385175
no, I'm taking the position that God can consider human judgements having happened, rather than whatever autistic Judgment Total Number System you've thought up

>>16385164
Why should I trust you? My question is not one of mechanics, but of logic. To describe the manner by which things have happened is not the same as explaining why such a manner is necessary. The problem is that some mechanical problems are answered using the principle of order out of chaos, while others are answered using the principle of eternal decay. These two principles are contradictory. Therefore, there is a fundamental illogic to atheistic materialism. Solve the contradiction, or you must abandon the entire system of belief.

>>16385215
Even if there are infinite ways, there would still be better and worse ways.

>>16385228
You can have patterns of order arise in an overall decaying system. They do not contradict

>>16384368
Any elementary study of philosophy would show most people are woefully inept at interpreting reality. We should teach philosophy in place of science in high schools

>>16384244
>There is no logical reason to believe the Christian mythology and not the Hindu mythology,
This statement is completely uninformed. These religions have entirely different metaphysical frameworks which can be evaluated logically. Monism or dualism? Creation ex nihilio or ex nihilio nihl fit? What is personal identity? Does it exist at all? What is the essence of morality and the consequence of not following it? Are we intrinsically corrupt or intrinsically divine?
Each religion and religious mythos will give you different answers to all those questions. Its not just "haha 4 armed elephant man and desert foreskin man haha"

>>16385228
They aren't contradictory tho.

>>16385289
That demonstrates a temporal bias. A stable structure contains within it all the possible structures of collapse.

Imagine a constructed building being demolished. Perhaps, as the building is collapsing, a random collection of parts manages to coincidentally arrange itself into a a room. If you were inside the falling building and managed to find yourself inside this spontaneously ordered room, it may appear to you as though order had arisen from chaos, but this would be an illusion. For this seeming room to develop, the components for the room would have already needed to exist. The actual room before you was already a potential room in the constructed building. But once the building has fully collapse, there are no more potential rooms.

The contradiction between evolution and decay is that the sequence of evolution, if placed inside a system of decay, requires a primitive state of order which contains the potential order actualized in the decay. If you cannot explain the initial, primitive state of order, the contradiction between evolution and entropy remains.

>>16385278
This is not at issue.
You're ignoring that there is not a closed list of mutually exclusive possible ways to organize society.

>>16385363
But materials inherit their shape from shapes that materials have been in before.
That's the link between lifelike organizations and life.
Non-equillibrium Thermodynamics.
Dissipative Adaptation.

The entropy is patterned

>>16385380
I agree a "Utopia" is likely impossible to practically implement. But my point was in regard to evaluating different organizations of society and moving towards the best one possible, even if only by incremental improvements

>>16385380
Different person, but there is a closed set. Society and the system of organization is a function of people, space, technology and time. People, too, are not a vague and indifferent resources, but a finite and precisely ordered resource. Technology too does not exist indifferently, but requires certain combinations of people and space and has specific demands on time. Space, which includes the placement and quantity of both known and unknown resources, is static, and constantly diminishing, absolutely and relative to technology and people. Meanwhile, time is perfectly linear. If the entirety of humanity could be considered in its fullness, incorporating all possible combinations of space, technology, and time, the resulting number of possibilities would be unimaginable, but technically finite. Moreover, for practical reasons, most possible organizations of society could simply be ignored. The largest issue in determining the ideal society is the perennial philosophic question--what is good?

>>16385363
Your question speaks to the origin of the material universe, which is, in fact, still shrouded in mystery. We can observe both life's tendency towards order and complexity and also the overall state of decay and entropy. The origins of this state of affairs is unknown and can only be speculated at with varying degrees of accuracy based on what can be observed now. However, placing a preferred belief into this gap in knowledge is at a high degree of risk of self deception.

>>16385391
As I already addressed with my analogy. In trying to explain order within Chaos you have only introduced the need for a higher order. To say that entropy is ordered demands a higher and preceding order which contains and bounds the entropy. If chaos is ordered, it's not chaos.

>>16385419
well said anon

>>16385430
So, as I began, the principles of tendency toward order and tendency toward decay are contradictory. The origin cannot be answered mechanistically, for it must resolve an irresolvable tension. You warn me of self-deception, but you have willingly accepted a self-contradicting system of belief.

>>16385459
It's not a contradiction, it is an observation. The origin of this system could be mechanistic, what do you think rules that out as a possibility?

>>16385439
Yes, and so?
Dissipative Adaptation, thermodynamics theory of life, does not negate God, but confirms him

>>16385459
It is your own limited human experience of reality that makes you think that chaos and order are opposing forces.

>>16385501
>>16385510
>>16385519
Cognitive dissonance in action.

>>16385519
>It is your own limited human experience of reality that makes you think that bachelors and married men are opposites

>>16385551
>asking questions to better understand a point is cognitive dissonance
you may be retarded

>>16385557
They are not opposites, that's fucking stupid

1/2

it's very poorly written, author was up their own ass for the first chapter.

2/2

1/5

2/5

3/5

4/5

5/5

>>16385064
>Atheism is predicated on a rejection of theism.
>Theism is required to exist in order for atheism to have its antithesis.
>Therefore atheism requires the notion that God exists in order to refute Him.
Welp

>>16382195
>People DIED for this
Look bro just because the snakes don't talk to you doesn't mean they're not dangerous. That one snake started all of us dying and the Bible never denied that. Well, apart from the bit where Jesus says that by dying He would prevent our deaths. That bit is more dodgy than the talking snake tbph.

>>16385755
The opposite can also be argued, that theism requires atheism to exist.
Both arguments are fucking dumb

A certain John Milton might do you fellows some good

>>16385755
Atheism is the default state. If you are a Christian, you are by definition atheistic towards all other religions as you reject their claims about divinity

>>16386375
Theism is the default state. If you are an atheist, you are by definition atheistic towards all other religions as you reject their claims about divinity

>>16386240
I'll see your Milton and raise you Imre Madach!

http://mek.oszk.hu/00900/00918/html/

ADAM
But God said He would punish us
If we should stray from our appointed path.

EVE
Why should he punish us? If He has set
The path we are to follow, surely He
Will have arranged that we can choose no other.
Why leave us standing above the deep,
Dizzy and abandoned to our doom?
Or if sin too is part of His design
As storms are of hot days,
Why blame the roll of thunder more
Than heat which gives us life?

LUCIFER
I see we have our first philosopher.
You are the first of many, my fair sister,
Who’ll argue the same point a million ways.
A few of them will end their days in bedlam.
Others stop short, but none will find a refuge.
Do put aside this futile speculation,
There are so many fine shades of opinion
On every issue that if you try them all
You end up knowing less than when you started
Without a hope of reaching a conclusion.
Contemplation means the death of action.

>>16386396
Beliefs must be formed. This means that prior to the formation of that belief, there exists non-belief. Therefore the default is non-belief. Sorry if this basic concept still goes over your head

>>16386414
The Lucifer section is retarded. "Don't try to understand things, just act on impulse. Contemplation bad"

>>16386445
Beliefs must exist. This means that prior to the formation of that belief, there exists belief. Therefore the default is belief. Sorry if this basic concept still goes over your head

>>16382195
>How can you take the Bible seriously without doing semantic acrobatics and freestyle interpretations?
You can't, and therein lies the danger of idealism.

>>16382195
>semantic acrobatics
That's a fancy way of saying metaphor. No one takes it literally you fuckin sperg.

I think midwits like OP dont realise that rationalism existed before Christianity. Greece had aristotle, yet still embraced the religion. You are not understanding that people crave irrational things, and that more importantly, irrational does not equal bad or even untrue.

>>16382195
The snake story acts as a brainlet filter.

>>16382195
that just proves determinism is satanic bait

>>16386774
That sounds like a nice cope. What about miracles and other such things? Are those also just metaphors?

>>16382214
po-tay-to, po-tah-to. if you can predict whether the dog will chase the stick, and be 100% accurate with the prediction, then the dog doesn't truly has a choice, and therefore it would be immoral to judge, punish, or reward the behavior of chasing the stick.

>>16382248
Atheism beloved in logic, self, past present, cousality. And tons more shit, all completely unprovable by science.

>>16382195
can't stand that guy's comics

>>16385064
>things only exist when they have been proved to exist
>the empirical method is the correct / most important way of understanding reality
there are two beliefs