While suffering provides meaning there is no reason to suppose that we need mass murder, pedophilia, rape, violent assault, etc. There have existed societies without such extremes and there existence provided plenty of meaning.
We could spend a lifetime debating where the range of possible suffering should end and not come to agreement. In the end it becomes merely a matter of opinion.
But consider the responsibility - and potential greatness - of a humanity that is capable of mass murder, rape, etc. but rises above the temptation. Of people who are moved to act to prevent such things - such as the Danish citizens who donned yellow stars to protest the occupying German discrimination against Jews, then smuggled most of them over into neutral Sweden. Of a society that learns from grave mistakes. The worst events can be transformed into a springboard for goodness. Witness the parents who start foundations to research the disease that affected their children, opening opportunities for countless others to exhibit generosity and empathy - their suffering became a road to human greatness.
To respond to an earlier post:
bruto said:
How does the actual, tanngible manifestation of this plan of god's, with its necessity of essentially indiscriminate or random disaster, and unequal opportunity, differ from the manifestation of a world with no God?
Interesting choice of words. I would qualify the terms "indiscriminate" and "random" with the adverb "apparently," since an omnipotent God is certainly capable of making the specific instances of apparently random suffering circumstantially justifiable, while to the human observer most such events appear random because we don't have all the relevant information. That would also fit the characterization "benevolent".
But back to your question. Obviously if there are differences they'd have to be subtle. I wonder whether the desired state of free will requires the
equal likelihood of Yes God vs. No God or whether one of the choices must have greater apparent likelihood. At this point I haven't thought that through (nor am I certain I'm equipped to do so). Off the cuff I'd say the ideal situation would be 50-50, but obviously that's not from thorough analysis. Please share your own musings.
So let's assume the position of the OP POV that such a God exists. As far as humanity is concerned, what distinguishes the world from a godless one?
After giving very brief consideration I've come up with a couple of possibilities, though they are more food for thought than hard positions. I'll have to look into this. Thanks for a fascinating question, bruto.
My first answer would be monotheism. It goes against the prevailing ancient wisdom - and empirical evdience - of disparate forces/gods competing for control of the universe. It's a non sequitur in the ancient world.
Another would be - don't laugh - the Jews. Persecuted and scattered for most of the last two thousand years, with no allies or larger support system such as a central church or allied states (until the twentieth century). Yet not only did they survive, they thrived. I don't know how familiar you are with Mark Twain's own musings on the "secret of the Jews' immortality," which mystified him - despite constituting an immeasurably small fraction of the world's population, Jews have always exercised a disproportionately large impact on world events and trends, and in even greater numbers today than ever before. Try to find a day when Jews or Israel are not mentioned in the world's major newspapers. By itself the story is merely remarkable; the kicker is that the whole shebang was foretold in the OT, hundreds of years before any exile. The dispersion. The persecution. The persistently small numbers (the six million from the Holocaust represented about a third of the total, and two thirds of the European Jewish population). The re-establishment of a Jewish homeland in Israel at the end of days.
I'm sure I can think of more, but that's good material to start with. [Mike Myers as Linds Richman]Discuss.[/Mike Myers as Linda Richman]
