/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.20795315]

>this kills the gnosticel

[Anonymous No.20795319]

>>20795315
Why would an omnipotent, omnibenevolent God either allow or decree the evil of privation to exist?

[Anonymous No.20795321]

midwit take

[Anonymous No.20795325]

>>20795315
ON THE SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD.

>Unless suffering is the direct and immediate object of life, our existence must entirely fail of its aim. It is absurd to look upon the enormous amount of pain that abounds everywhere in the world, and originates in needs and necessities inseparable from life itself, as serving no purpose at all and the result of mere chance. Each separate misfortune, as it comes, seems, no doubt, to be something exceptional; but misfortune in general is the rule.
>I know of no greater absurdity than that propounded by most systems of philosophy in declaring evil to be negative in its character. Evil is just what is positive; it makes its own existence felt. Leibnitz is particularly concerned to defend this absurdity; and he seeks to strengthen his position by using a palpable and paltry sophism*. It is the good which is negative; in other words, happiness and satisfaction always imply some desire fulfilled, some state of pain brought to an end.
>This explains the fact that we generally find pleasure to be not nearly so pleasant as we expected, and pain very much more painful.
>The pleasure in this world, it has been said, outweighs the pain; or, at any rate, there is an even balance between the two. If the reader wishes to see shortly whether this statement is true, let him compare the respective feelings of two animals, one of which is engaged in eating the other.

>Translator’s Note, cf. Theod, sec. 153.—Leibnitz argued that evil is a negative quality—i.e., the absence of good; and that its active and seemingly positive character is an incidental and not an essential part of its nature. Cold, he said, is only the absence of the power of heat, and the active power of expansion in freezing water is an incidental and not an es-sential part of the nature of cold. The fact is, that the power of expansion in freezing water is really an increase of repul-sion amongst its molecules; and Schopenhauer is quite right in calling the whole argument a sophism.

[Anonymous No.20795335]

Yawn. Privatio boni and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

[Anonymous No.20795345]

>>20795325
unironically facts don't care about your feelings

[Anonymous No.20795349]

>>20795345
Yes, translator's note is a """fact"""

[Anonymous No.20795358]

>>20795335
you feign boredom yet rebuke with a tedious cliche
curious

[Anonymous No.20795359]

>>20795325
The world is more than the sum of its parts.

[Anonymous No.20795362]

>>20795321
>>20795335
As usual the retards spin out in circles rather than ever attempt to actually give a rebuttal.

[Anonymous No.20795368]

>>20795359
Yes and Schopenhauer called it Will, the dumb, blind and irrational Will.

[Anonymous No.20795370]

>>20795319
>Non-existence
>allowed to exist

[Anonymous No.20795372]

>>20795362
If evil is an absence or lack in Being, then how come the most complex and fully endowed of God's creations is uniquely capable of it? Second, does evil have properties? If it does, it exists. If it doesn't, then why aren't we talking about the Problem of Sloopadorp? All non-existent things are equally non-existent.

[Anonymous No.20795377]

>>20795370
Yes, God allows his goodness to be depleted. Are you telling me evil does not possess a qualitative character or essence all its own?

[Anonymous No.20795379]

gibberish

[Anonymous No.20795384]

>>20795370
Did you actually read what Aquinas says, retard? He clearly differentiates between absence as a negation and absence as privation. Only the second one is evil. Absence as negation is inevitable as long as two or more different beings exist, while absence as privation is avoidable. Privatio boni doesn't solve the problem of evil at all.

[Anonymous No.20795392]

>>20795372
> then how come the most complex and fully endowed of God's creations is uniquely capable of it?
All creatures are capable of it in a sense, human beings are more potent than others and are therefore more efficacious at destroying what is good, they are also more potent at creating or preserving the good (if they choose to do so). No paradox there.
>Second, does evil have properties?
There are properties natural to a given thing or being, evil is the privation of a being or thing's natural properties. So evil itself is not a property.
>If it doesn't, then why aren't we talking about the Problem of Sloopadorp?
For the same reason we only refer to evils as privatives rather than negatives, see the quote in the OP.
>>20795377
>Are you telling me evil does not possess a qualitative character or essence all its own?
I'm not telling you, that is the argument in the OP. Evil has no essence, it is purely privative. That's why it does not even exist in the first place.

[Anonymous No.20795406]

in the harmonic series the major interval is much closer to the root than the minor interval. evil arises when you deviate too far from the root, and the root of all things is silence.

>All that I have written appears to be as so much straw after the things that have been revealed to me.
-Thomas Aquinas

[Anonymous No.20795411]

>>20795384
>while absence as privation is avoidable.
Absence as negation is avoidable too. Yet it is both necessary, and even good, even though it is not good in itself. The same applies to privation, only it requires a broader perspective to see how this can be ultimately good for us (some will typically refer to the idea of providence). The fact remains that evil does not actually exist, so the problem of evil does not exist.

[Anonymous No.20795417]

>>20795392
>Evil has no essence, it is purely privative. That's why it does not even exist in the first place.
>Yes, God is still going to send you to eternal hellfire for comitting those actions He considers "evil"

[Anonymous No.20795420]

>>20795392
Evil has a real and positive existence. What does a serial murderer 'lack'? He certainly does not lack for vigor. Is it love and hugs? Don't be so naive.

[Anonymous No.20795427]

>>20795362
This board is pointless, which means all of 4chan (aside from /an/) is now pointless.

[Anonymous No.20795432]

>>20795411
>it requires a broader perspective to see how this can be ultimately good for us
Aquinas, like many other Christian theologians, believed in massa damnata, so we already know what God's endgame is. How can this be a greater good? Why would a supossedly omnibenevolent God decide to create the world knowing that it would lead to most of his creatures being subjected to unimaginable levels of pain for eternity?

[Anonymous No.20795437]

>>20795432
You're talking to a grown man with brain fungus. Don't waste your time.

[Anonymous No.20795447]

>>20795420
>What does a serial murderer 'lack'?
A stable and healthy psychological disposition. If humans did not have a natural and essential function to begin with there would be no such thing as a serial murderer, because being a "murderer" only has meaning with respect to the law and the general understanding of good conduct with respect to a human being. And so we will never be able to put our finger on pure evil, all we do when asked is attempt to show the most heinous things people can do, which are all just violations or deviations from good conduct, and can never stand alone by themselves (because they are privations). And what are we supposed to do? That which ultimately leads to happiness or the good for us, which is already usually implanted in us by nature when we are born.

[bodhi No.20795448]

>>20795319
it is only on this loka that those it exists. Your false assumption is that permeates the entire matrix which is wrong

[Anonymous No.20795462]

>>20795447
They're not privations of good conduct you retard, they posit and stand for an entirely other, diabolical form of conduct. Serial murders like Kemper even have their own spirituality; they believed their victims would become their slaves in the afterlife. Panzram was more articulate than half the zoomers on this godforsaken board. What they lack in x they make up for in an excess of positive properties y. Diabolical evil is more convinced of God's existence than most theology professors.

[Anonymous No.20795475]

>>20795432
>so we already know what God's endgame is.
You don't, you just think you do. It's that simple

[Anonymous No.20795479]

>>20795462
>they posit and stand for an entirely other, diabolical form of conduct
No they don't, the only reason they are "diabolical" to begin with is because they are straying from what they know is right. The fact that they can pretend to be spiritual doesn't mean anything with respect to its status as a privation.

[Anonymous No.20795488]

>>20795475
>Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. (Matthew 7:13-14)

>Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’ “But he will answer, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from. Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’ But he will reply, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!’ (Luke 13:25-27)

Please, tell me how this is not a confirmation of massa damnata.

[Anonymous No.20795589]

>>20795315
This is to say that God, in his infinite resourcefulness, doesn't have to be parsimonious in allocation, or careful in use of innate qualities, in the way that we as well as beast of the field must be to have a good time of it. Yet it's hardly incompatible gnosticism, or for that matter the pagan cosmogonies of the Epicureans or Stoics, the gods of which are not responsive to the flattery of request. That is except for that last line about privation: He leaves a little wiggle room for prayer and redemption, but doesn't seem a fan of it in this passage, much less of God to the ridiculous degree that Evangelicals are.

[Anonymous No.20795956]

>>20795325
How can one man be so based

[Anonymous No.20796198]

>>20795372
>Second, does evil have properties? If it does, it exists
This is spurious logic, becomes it assumes that an appearance cannot falsely appear to exist while itself lacking that existence which it imitates