Foreword: I don't know all the answers and I would never pretend to you that I do. You will probably come up with objections I can't yet answer, and please don't think any less of me when I tell you I'm guessing, or tell you I don't know. There's a LOT I'm not yet clear about and would like to be as best as possible. I have a relentless curiosity and I would not be surprised if it drove me into a doctoral program someday. But right now I'm still at an early place in that journey, so please do not look down on me for it, OK?
RedFox said:
Christianity makes all actions it defines as sins be that, treason against its god. What the actions are is irrelevant within Christianity because they are all reduced to treason against the Christian god. What I would ask is if the things defined as sins by the Christian moral code are really all bad enough to warrent eternal torture. In courts, they make the punishments fit the crime. Christianity does something different from that, which is using the worst punishment it comes up with for everything.
Part of the reason (as far as I understand it) is that the treason is a symptom of a deeper flaw in us than just the action itself. I think what the difference is between that and human legal systems is the fact that unlike God, we are unable to take all of the variables into account, hence the need to put some restraints on what we do as far as punishment goes.
As far as God, I don't know that all Christians see it this way, but I personally think He's going out of His way to ensure a
maximum number redeemed--NOT a minimum. How He's doing this, what parts of it I do not see, I'm not sure of. Please understand I'm 22 years old and still at the elementary stages of the kind of theological research I'd like to be doing. But, this is a premise I'm working off of, the only one that makes sense to me.
What are the premises? Is it the Christian moral code declaring everybody to be sinners with that leading to acceptence of Jesus?
It's a bit late for me to think tonight.
But, the premises range from whether a God is necessary for there to be a universe to the existence of an absolute moral code to, if such a code is in force, what consequences it has and what this demands of humanity and what resolution God, given His nature (which would be a prior premise) then provides. You're basically talking about the whole of the Christian theological argument, the scope of which would take up hundreds and hundreds of pages.
One book of the Bible you might be interested in breaking down into a logic chain if you get some spare time is Ecclesiastes. This book does not really go into the Messianic expectation (that I can remember), but has some of the logical underpinnings shared by both Judaism and Christianity...a lot of purpose-of-living stuff that goes through the process of establishing the futility of living for other reasons than for God.
How is the scientific standard not appropriate for what?
[snipped truth-table stuff to save space]
Christians could say that the implication that the premises lead to acceptence of Jesus was true and therefore good. Since they already think that accepting Jesus is a good idea, and claim all of the premises in P are true then they're picking out the first line of the truth table.
If it is proposed that there is an absolute moral code determined by the Christian god, that depends on the god's existence. How is the scientific standard not appropriate for testing the existence of the god? Christianity has a meme that says not to test the god. That is a defense against scientific testing to discourage Christians from thinking of doing such things.
The reason I see that the scientific standard doesn't work is that it is insufficient--it only reflects a subset of the human experience...that is, the physical, material world, with no regard for anything that might not be measurable and definable with the limited powers of our senses. The function of science as far as I see it--that is, where I think it belongs--is in a descriptive, not philosophical function.
I may have said this before in other threads, but my worldview is such that I see science and philosophy as two different arms of an
integrated discipline with which to approach the world. I see in theology the WHO and WHY of the universe (who created the universe, why He did it, the meaning this gives to life), and I see in science the WHAT and HOW (the physical laws and processes God ordained and with which He does His work). Using science to answer WHO and WHY questions is inappropriate, and using literal Biblical descriptions to answer WHAT and HOW questions is
in my opinion inappropriate. In some ways, this is a view MORE ancient than ones that lead to things like the whole "evolution vs. religion" debate. As far as I'm concerned, the conflict does not exist. There are some Christians who would argue that, and that's their right. I'm just trying to lay out how
I see it.
To put it in more poetic terms, I see in the Big Bang the command "Let there be light!" These images are one and the same to me.
Anyway, how DOES one find out about God? Ultimately I would have to say personal experience. Science--and even logic--will only get you so far, though I daresay a seeker is
invited to look at those things, not discouraged. Science can show you the nature of the physical universe, and logic can help with some of the implications of different philosophical principles if you were to apply them to the universe, but ultimately something gets in there that is intangible, subjective, and that's a wildcard that science is not up to the task of handling. And that boils down to a personal, internal choice.
(Again, sorry for the rambling...it's late and I had a bad day with an ugly class project.)
The existence of the Christian god is one of the premises leading to acceptence of Jesus. If it cannot be tested, then the truth value of the complex statement P cannot be assessed. It could be true or false. Since Christians think that accepting Jesus is a good idea, they'd exclude the second and fourth lines and could be happy that the implication is true in both of the remaining cases.
However, I consider it fishy to accept the premises as true without question and without evidence. It is because if it turns out that Q is false, then the implication would be false if the premises turned out to be true. If the premises turn out to be false and Q also turns out to be false, then the implication would be true. One could make an implication true with false premises and conclusions. It would be true within the sphere of the system, such as the Christian memeplex because it would be without reference to what's true in reality.
What seems to be in question as far as I understand you is something I alluded to earlier--what kind of evidence is and is not admissible.
If you decide that the scientific standard is not appropriate, what standard do you propose to use? If simple faith is enough, how does one know if the god is real in one's head or in the real world? If someone believed in a god, it would influence how they view the world, coloring it to select the things that appear to support the existence of the god, rather than looking into other reasons for those things.
Ultimately simple faith is what it's going to boil down to in the end...but, I don't think logic is discouraged.
About "God being real in one's head", you may be interested in researching St. Anselm's deontological argument. I'll warn you it's a toughie and I'm not convinced it's the BEST of the logical arguments out there. You'll want a site that has a good explanation accompanying the original text, because St. Anselm left out some of the linkages he was making in his head and modern philosophers have had to go back and reinsert them. But, your phrasing reminded me of that one, hence the recommendation. I do not have all the answers for you and I know it...that's why I keep referring you to outside sources. All I can do is help get you started in feeding your curiosity, if you decide you want to.
For example, the Indian Ocean tsunami was viewed by some people as a product of their god's wrath against some people. Thinking of the tsunami like that does not encourage one to look into what really caused it, which was run of the mill plate motion.
The plate motion is the HOW and the WHAT...I have no argument with plate tectonics.
But the WHY? God's wrath? That's not how I see it. If anything, perhaps there is a wake-up call for us survivors to become more compassionate, less condemning--to get us to learn to reach out to those in need (not our first instinct, for sure!). I don't see it as a punishment against those who died or who were impacted otherwise by it.
Christianity may work for making one feel better and be more forgiving. If that is all that is wanted and needed, then it would be a good thing. However, there is a world beyond what Christianty sees and it does not care if somebody is Christian or not. For example, someone who thought that tsunamis were just the wrath of a god, they would not look into what caused them and figure out what to do, such as going to higher land when the sea gets sucked out. Thinking outside of the box of Christianity can be life saving.
I don't see Christianity as encouraging inaction. Remember what I said the purpose would be, of that event. Would that not demand that Christians in a position to do so act to teach people what to do in the case of a tsunami, to save lives and prevent future loss? That's a call to action, not inaction.
The Christian memeplex also has the meme that says its moral code is absolute and unchanging, locking Christians into a moral code, discouraging them from improving it. For example, there is the meme that says gay people are sinners. If Christians were willing to improve the Christian moral code, they might change it after seeing what damage homophobia encouraged by the meme causes.
By the way, the Christian memeplex has the anti gay and anti abortion memes so that it would increase the number of potential hosts it can spread to. It enourages its hosts to think that marriage is only for hetrosexual couples to make sure that people can get into marriages that can make more babies for the memeplex to spread to. The anti abortion meme prevents the loss of potential hosts.
Those memes are included in the Christian memeplex because it helps it to spread. Since Christians think that the moral code is absolute and unchanging, they would not change it about gay people and abortions even if it abridged the rights of gay people and women.
Not all Christians are anti-gay or anti-woman; please be careful about broadbrushing. I am incensed by people who use Christianity as a reason to be cruel to homosexuals--believe me. The abortion issue is tougher...I personally don't think I'd be up to getting one, psychologically. But I'm not sure I like the idea of striking down Roe v. Wade. Again, an issue I need more research on.
Another example of the Christianity memeplex supressing other things is book burning by Christians who think that Harry Potter books and other things like that are Satanic. The Christian memeplex encourages the supression of completing memeplexes. More examples are the Crusades and the witch trials. The Church in Europe also discouraged scientific work because the Christian memeplex wanted to stay in control. This set Europe back for centuries, maybe as long as a millenium.
Those are inappropriate power-trips caused by human greed, not by Christianity itself, if you ask me. I see no need for the book-burning, Crusades, or witch trials. As for scientific work, those people were too far on the OTHER side of the spectrum (dismissing the physical)...whereas an integrated approach like mine doesn't have that trouble. They are excesses that should rightfully be condemned. But I see the people who DID them as responsible, for their warped interpretations.
The Christian meme of Satan discourages investigations into things blamed on Satan. Scrapegoating Satan doesn't help anybody find out what causes things and how to control or stop them. Instead, the people deemed to be Satanic could be killed, like in the witch trials. I would prefer rational investigations into what really goes on in the world, rather than depending on what Christianity tells us about how to see things.
I see things differently...I DO believe that Satan exists and causes problems in this world. But I ALSO believe Satan gets a kick out of it when we fail to take action when it's within our power to try to control or stop those problems. That's a failure in our duty of compassion. Take mental illness. I'm all for investigations into the physical/neurological mechanisms at work--but integrated with counseling to try to get at the spiritual mechanisms at work, since to my view body and spirit are intertwined, and there's a feedback loop between the two. (Again, an approach that does not exclude, but accounts for both sides of the coin.)
You could say that those Christians' interpreations are wrong, but they would say that you are wrong and that they are right.
As I imagine you're starting to see, I am one of those who gets flamed by both sides. I've been treated very cruelly both by staunch Christians and staunch atheists--atheists have called me stupid, and Christians have called me hellbound. I strike a balance that seems to really irritate a lot of people. So yes, I have definitely endured the kind of criticisms you're talking about.
From the examples like those above, it seems like accepting Jesus, Q, is not a good idea. I consider moral codes to be part of the social layer within the levels of emergent phenomena. Moral codes do not appear until societies appear. They are not fundematal parts of the universe. They do not appear in physics, which is about the basic parts of the universe that interact to make higher layers of emergent phenomena. Believers in a being that had such a moral code in mind when creating the universe had given no evidence for such a being. So there is no reason to think that their claims about such a being are true. If P, the statement that includes all of the premises leading to Q, is false, then the premises can imply that accepting Jesus is a good idea because it's done within the Christian memeplex, where P and Q are taken to be true, even when they might not be, and where there are memes to prevent testing or questioning the truth values of P and Q.
I would rather not accept things as true without knowing for sure that it really is true. Don't tell me what to believe without evidence.
Which gets down to the question of, does the universe need a Creator? That's one of the very first questions that has to be addressed. I have not yet been able to find a single argument that makes any sense, suggesting that the universe somehow "always was" without some kind of kick-start from a force that set things up and wrote the laws. That's a whole other thread there.
One question for you, because I'm curious. Why is it that you ever do anything good for anybody else? Why do you consider it worth your effort? This is not a personal attack in any way. I just want to see the logic flow.
