As far as I'm concerned if we are eternal spirit then the most likely scenario is that we have always existed and always will exist.

The idea of some godhead raising humans as pets to worship him is a sick idea in and of itself as far as I'm concerned. I think atheism would be a far more inviting picture to be honest about it.

The idea of a jealous godhead who lusts to be the king of kings and lord of lords over humans is material for a horror movie, IMHO.

The only way that I would even be interested in spritiuality is if it's truly eternal, and that would be open-ended at both ends, not just after death, but before birth as well.

After all, if God is all that exists then we must be God. Otherwise we would be something seperate from God. But then God wouldn't be all that exists and that would fly in the face of what God is supposed to be. The bibilcal picture of a God can't fly no matter what kind of wings we give it. It's just a poorly written mythology that wasn't given a lot of thought.

Spidercmb, you are illogical, inconsistent in your statements, and you ignore good advice and good reasoning.

You answer each logical argument with more ill logic, with more contradictions of your earlier statements.

You do not see this or you do not want to see this. You are therefore either stupid or a warrior for God who uses dubious means.

I despise you and I urge others to never speak to you again.

I understand that you gave us a good run for our money, but you are just being difficult. Obviously you can't be subdued with logical arguments, because you ignore them or you don't understand them. You also do not concede or admit to your own mistakes.

So I withdraw from this argument because you're an illogical person, or pretend to be, and since this is a philosophical forum, and since logic is a very major tool of philosophy, then there is no point in continuing with you.

I must say: You did not stand up to us with your logic, or with the logic of God. You stood up to us with saying random things, and tiring us out (well, me for sure). This is not the winning of an argument you did; it is the winning of a stupid person or a person who pretends to be stupid over not being able to understand the things he says and the things that are said to him.

Good bye, and I urge others here not to speak to you on the philosophy forum.

I must have said something to get under your skin. You have accused me of being a liar and asked if I was insane twice and implied that I was approving the worship of strange gods...

http://www.blueletterbible.org/Bible.cfm?b=Exd&c=20&v=13&t=KJV#conc/13

The above link will take you to Exodus 20:15, the commandment against murder. The commandment is just a single word: ratsach.

http://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?Strongs=H7523&t=KJV


If you follow the first link, you will see that in this verse, ratsach is in the "Qal" tense, which means to commit premeditated or accidental murder. It doesn't refer to killing in war or killing in self defense, which are both called "harag".

If you're basing your accusations of "illogic" on the idea that I said anything remotely like "God did it", then you have no basis whatsoever for the acusation because nowhere did I ever say that.

So as far as your "intellectual thin ice" metaphor is concerned, I would say that your position is not logically inconsistent. It is logically nonexistent. If you want to argue against something I said, then at least pick something that I actually did say.

If you research the history of marriage, you will find that it was a legal / civil arrangement until around 500-600 years ago. It then became religious for reasons that I don't know. I see no reason why the last people on earth couldn't just swear to love one another and then live in a state of marital bliss. If they were the last people, then they would be the only legal / religious authority. I'm not sure why you are so angry, it's really confusing. Maybe you are saying that there would be hundreds or more women, but only this one man. If that's the case, you could have been more clear. Polygamy is always immoral when a man marries more women than he can care for. If the guy was marrying three or four women, I think that could be done morally, but the guy would have to break his back to get enough food and shelter for all of them.

Although I agree with you in spirit, there are forum rules that can lead one to being banned if violated. And you have come perilously close to the edge there.

And partly because I agree with you, I would not enjoy seeing you banned.

Just some friendly advice from a kindred spirit.

Cheers

SkyHook5652,

You said this, right? I just saw the post and clicked "Quote". If you didn't post this, then someone has hacked your account and I apologize for any confusion.

If you said this...then you do realize it was God who destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, right? You are asking how the destruction of those two cities could be justified. Therefore you are questioning the morals of God, which I have already explained is a logical fallacy. The finite cannot question actions of an assumed infinite being. By accepting the premise that God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, it goes without saying that you are accepting the premise that God exists. If you are accepting that God exists and destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, you can't then deny God's justice, goodness or perfection (also from the Bible) without being intellectually inconsistent.

Sorry but it was not me who said "God did it". It is the Christian Bible that says "God did it".

So no, I do not "realize that god did it" and thus, everything after that is based on a false assumption.

Another false assumption you appear to be laboring under is that I beleve in the existence of the your god.

(double post deleted)

That is a harsh and I feel unfair characterization of what has transpired. If have attempted to the best of my ability to answer questions and refute arguments. I didn't take this discussion off course, that was done by others.

My point is this: If God doesn't exist, then there can be no absolute right or wrong. If right and wrong are not absolute, then they aren't truly right or wrong, simply what is best for society or what is best in one person's opinion. Many philosophers and theologians agree with this position. The discussion quickly became an attempt to discredit Christianity and I feel that I have done a fair job at defending the Judeo-Christian philosophy.

Your obvious anger might be the result of me not communicating well or you not comprehending what I have said. I hold no ill will towards you and if you ever want to try again, then I am more than willing.

So when you said "If killing babies was absolutely wrong in any and every possible circumstance, then how can one justify the destruction of Sodom and Gamorrah?" you meant how do Christians justify God's actions?

If so, I hope you can see that I made an honest mistake. You weren't clear what you meant and others in these forums have insisted that Jericho was razed, but that God had nothing to do with it. I thought you were taking a similar position.

Okay, so your position wasn't intellectually inconsistent, you were simply asking how Christians come to terms with God's actions.

As I've already explained, Christians believe that what was done was done for the greater good of humanity. God's omniscience allows God to take such actions in way that does not violate his nature.

Ayn Rand argued for objective morality. Check her out if you're interested in that.

That's true. The disagreement I have with Ayn Rand is that she felt that morality was objective, but the result of some unexplained natural force. I believe that the creation of objective morals must have been through an intelligent moral agent, ie: God.

But her ideas on capitalism were preaching to the choir here.

I agree with your original comment that if God doesn't exist, then there can be no absolute right or wrong.

However, the reason the discussion turned to the Judeo-Christian philosophy was because you brought up the 10 commandments which comes from that religion.

I responded to your comment about the 10 commandments and thus the whole Judeo-Christian philosophy came into question.

Just for the record, I don't deny the possiblity of a "supreme creator". On the contrary I personal favor the idea of spirituality. And therefore I am open to the concept of 'absolute' right and wrong. Although I firmly believe that even within that framework, the 'absolutelism' of what's right or wrong could still be contextual.

In other words, a commandment like "Thou shalt not kill" is far too broad and could never have been the commandment of a God, IMHO. Because I personally believe that there are contextual situations which warrent the ending of a life. It can't be reduced to a simple list of commandments that don't take into consideration the context of situations.

Other biblical commandments are equally meaningless out of context, such as 'honor they mother and father'. That would only apply if the mother and father themselves are honorable, IMHO.

However, the bottom line in all of this is that once a "God" is brought in to be the ultimate authority then the very next question is "What is God's will?"

That brings up the question of "Which religion speaks for God". The Christians are going to hold up their Bibles as the source of the word of God. And that's not going to reduce to just the 10 commandments. They are going to demand that the entire book represents the word of God and that Jesus must be worshiped as God as well.

So now we've left the simplicity of morality behind and we're into a religion that is demanding to be the religion of all humanity.

From my point of view if we're going to allow that some supreme might be real, then why not accept the Wiccan Goddess?

One simply law, "Do as ye will, but harm none".

This would especially be easy to accept if the idea is that the Goddess has already bestowed us with a conscience. Then we have no books to argue about. We have no morbid God to defend from having done horrible things to people.

And we can also then respect everyone's individual relationship with the Goddess.

So if we wish to have an absolute value system Wicca would be the best religion to go with as far as I can see. There's far less crap to argue about and no nasty God to defend.

Well there you go. With the excaption of "If right and wrong are not absolute, then they aren't truly right or wrong" that is exactly the position I have been taking all along.

The premise that right and wrong must be "absolute" or they cannot truly be right or wrong, is simply definition, not an argument. If you start with a premise that defines right and wrong as absolute, then of course, you can reach no other conclusion than that they are absolute.

So really, all I am saying is that I don't agree with your definition of right and wrong. Which is just exactly what you said "Many philosophers and theologians agree with".

I'm glad to hear that we agree on this.



Which I posted in response to your question. But I wasn't blaming anyone for us getting off topic, I was pointing out that it wasn't me, if that was what Wux was so angry about. I really think Wux's reaction was an entirely emotional "flash in the pan" type of anger, with which I am eminently familiar.

I'm not looking for strife, I'm just looking for intellectual discussion. If someone doesn't want to discuss a topic with me, then I can respect that.

Yes, that is what I was asking.

And really, no problem with the mistake. It happens a lot in here and is to be expected. No worries.

Now there appears to be a contradition between that and the "Man was created in God's image" concept. I would assume that man would be imbued with a moral "instinct" that paralelled God's. But you appear to be saying that some things that are "moral" for God are "immoral" for humans. Which indicates to me that there are two different moral standards in effect - one for God and one for humans, which would necessarily mean that morality is not absolute.

I really can't accept a "moving target" form of morality. Such a morality says that slavery was right during it's time. Such a morality says that those who fought for the rights of slaves were immoral and it was only after almost everyone agreed that slavery was immoral that it really was wrong. I think any treatment to which we would object if we were subjected to it, is immoral. The exception would be a just punishment following a trial if a crime had been committed.

All things being equal, you would be correct. But we don't have God's knowledge, intellect, boundless patience or love. We are also sometimes controlled by our emotions. Think about how many men kill their wives when they are caught cheating. What would it be like if God killed us if we ever worshiped another god?

So again we have a "moral in some circumstances and immoral in others" situation. In other words, imprisoning someone, against theuir will, is always immoral for an individual, but sometimes moral for a group. That seems like a perfect example of what you've labeled “moving target morality” to me.