Commentary: Discussion on Mormonism

[FSM]

Let me try to answer you clearly, rcronk:

1. Don't kill or hurt kids or adults.
2. Don't take away free will.

If you ask me next HOW I would do both, I will say that I have no clue. I am not god and I again don't believe in god.

But if I was all powerful, I suppose I could do it in a split second if I wanted. If I chose not to, well, I guess that would make me one sick, abusive MF, wouldn't it?

Since you choose to believe a positive assertion it makes more sense for you to formulate god's plan for me and lay it all out. Please answer my questions:

1. Is your god all powerful?
2. Why can't he allow free will and an end to suffering simultaneously?

Thanks, FSM

 

[rcronk]

Thank you for being direct. I will do the same.

1. Yes.

2. From what I understand, in order to remain all powerful, God must not violate certain eternal laws such as justice, mercy, violating our free will, etc. Please read/listen to this talk (if listening, skip to 17:00 to get to the point quicker - that's where the transcript starts). It attempts to explain how God, if He wants to remain God, cannot violate these eternal laws. This is blasphemy in most religions, but it make more sense than anything else I've heard so far. Please let me know what you think.

 

[Skeptical Greg]

The fact that it's very hard to define an interventionist god that really works should be your first clue that maybe there is no such thing.

This works for me ...


rcronk,
I see how you think we are being ' smart alecs ', but you are ignoring that we are the one's presenting you with with a paradoxical God that you cannot explain.

It doesn't work the other way around.

As I mentioned earlier; ' no god at all ' ( or a dispassionate one ) solves the problem ..

 

[FSM]

This is from your link:

"See, God doesn’t violate law. He sets things going. And so you’ve got H2O - it’s water. He said, “But, I need wine.” “Oh, Alright.” Now, that’s the universe in which we live. This is God science, and Brother Widtsoe said, “Isn’t that thrilling Elder Skousen?” and I said, “I never even thought of that being a possibility.” He said, “God has revealed so many marvelous things to us if we’ll just study it out and put it all together.”

Alright, just a little bit more here. Abraham 4:9, 10, 12, and 18 where you see intelligence responding to commandments of the Gods during the creative process. Watch what it says, “And the Gods commanded the dry land to come up. And they watched until they were obeyed.” Dirt doesn’t obey as dirt unless it had intelligence in it. Would it? I mean, if it’s just … stuff. It has no capacity to obey. This is one of the great revelations of God. These little intelligences are in everything. I can move a mountain. I just tell it to move and I can let my priesthood tell it to move and if it’s authorized, it’ll move."


rcronk, if God is choosing, for whatever reason to not violate his own laws of intelligence or free will that HE CREATED and could choose to RECREATE any way he wishes but he chooses instead to let kids suffer...

then he is a sick, abusive MF.

Your link is nice, parts are very lyrical and vivid. But it only puts in place more of the flawed logic:

- god created everything, all laws, all "god science", everything
- god is all powerful
- but god chooses not to break the rules because ...

Either

He is in some way powerless to change the rules (which you've already said is not the case)

OR

He is choosing not to break his own rules. And with that choice comes my condemnation. If I was god, I would send god to hell for doing what I've seen him do to kids.

 

[money]

AIU, the papyri found, it turns out, is a common text known as the Book of the Dead. Quite a few copies have been found. To date not a single papyri has been found that contains anything remotely similar to the Book of Abraham.

So Smith happened to find a text that conveniently has no contemporary. Nothing in which to coorborate it and the only thing that could be found remaining of the papyri is the common portion.

Why did the papyri containing a story of Abraham exist at all? Is there any basis to believe that Egyptians kept these important stories of Abraham when the Israelites didn't? Is there any reason to embalm a copy of the book of the dead and stories of Abraham with a dead Egyptian? The burial of mumies was very precise. Why include a text that had nothing to whatsoever to do with the Egyptian concept of the next life with the Book of the Dead? Why was a text that was very contemptous of Egyptian theology included in the ritual of Egyptian burial?

Why did Abraham use facimilies? Why did Abraham draw facimilies that look remarkably like Egyptian facimilies?

More damning, the facsimiles from the Book of Abraham do not depict what Joseph Smith Claimed. No scholars to date accept Smith's translation. The apologetics that try, in vain, to answer the criticisms are not taken seriously by any non-Mormon scholar. None agree with smith.

On the contrary there is much evidence that the apologetics are simply wrong.

The following is a great video of the controversy that is very in depth.

Thanks for posting that video, RF. Very interesting.

How do you think you would have reacted to that video had you watched it say, six month or a year after returning from your mission?

 

[rcronk]

diogenes - read my answer to FSM and check it out. It is an attempt to solve the paradox and it's straightforward.

FSM - You apparently did not listen/read closely to the entire talk. You missed the answer. If you don't want to, I'll find it and post it for you.

 

[rcronk]

money - I hope that you also read the document I posted a link to that discusses that video and provides some additional information.

Man, I'm going to have to start posting embedded video - it gets much more attention than dumb old links that you have to read.

 

[FSM]

I thought I got it. But please do explain it to me. Perhaps I misunderstood or missed it...

ETA: Just so you know, I am listening to you and I read your link. It is my opinion that I 'got it' perfectly. What isn't happening is me agreeing with you.

You said: "...in order to remain all powerful, God must not violate certain eternal laws such as justice, mercy, violating our free will, etc." AND "God, if He wants to remain God, cannot violate these eternal laws..." which intimates that god can lose his power. If you can lose your power, you are not ALL powerful. If you "cannot" do something, anything, then you are not ALL powerful.

Just wanted to edit to save you time if this was the direction you were heading.

 

[articulett]

money - I hope that you also read the document I posted a link to that discusses that video and provides some additional information.

Man, I'm going to have to start posting embedded video - it gets much more attention than dumb old links that you have to read.

Yes we noticed. You just let your brain skip over the stuff that doesn't support your point of view. I can't tell if you don't read it or if your brain just doesn't "hear" it or "get it". But it's a mighty powerful shield of delusion you have going there. Even embedded links don't seem to help you. Ah well... I don't think they'd change a truthers mind or the minds of any of the woos that come here to preach. Faith is impervious to reason-- it has to be-- it's the "key" to salvation, you see...

 

[rcronk]

FSM - I'll try to summarize, but you really have to get all of this in the context of the whole speech to fully understand. According to LDS doctrine, God's honor is His power. If God does something that violates that honor by being unjust, unmerciful, etc. He would cease to be God. In the same way that parents raise their children to become parents and have their own children because of the joy that process can bring, God was once a man who learned and progressed to the point of being able to perfectly follow these laws to the point where he gained the honor of the intelligences in the universe. His work and His glory is the immortality and eternal life of men. He wants to help us get to the point where we can, if we choose, be like Him.

As a side note, according to LDS doctrine, God had all of us as His spirit children before we came here. He presented a plan by which we could learn right from wrong, sickness from health, pain from pleasure, etc. and receive a body of flesh and be tested to give us a choice of what we want to do. He presented it to everyone. Satan was one of the children and he brought up an alternative plan saying that since there would be so much suffering, instead of letting people choose what they want to do, we could force them to do what's right and all would be saved, and there would be no suffering, etc. A third of God's children agreed with Satan and the rest have come here to earth to get bodies and go through this experience. Based on what we choose here of our own free will, we will receive a degree of glory appropriate to those choices - all of which are better than this world.

These summaries are my own words and interpretation and I'm sure they aren't perfect. Please listen to the entire talk and look up these LDS doctrines yourself if you want a more full and accurate account.

 

[The_Animus]

I could list pages of my experiences where people have been cured of pot-smoking-induced lung cancer in minutes

rcronk - I highly doubt that. Do you know that smoking marijuana doesn't cause lung cancer? I'm going off of memory of what I've read before but to my understanding pot smoke travels through the large airway whereas cigarette smoke travels through the small airway. They also contain different chemicals which irritate the lungs and air track. This is believed to be the reason why cigs cause lung cancer so much and marijuana doesn't. They have done studies of a large number of people who have smoked marijuana heavily for as much as 40 years and they never get lung cancer. The cases where pot smokers do develope lung cancer are cases in which the person who smokes pot also smokes cigarettes. As such it is much more likely to be a result of the cigs vs the pot. Now if you can be mistaken about information such as this, what else might you think you know that you don't?

coughing up blood and chunks of lung one minute, just fine the next - of many many other illnesses being cured in minutes - including infants, just to take placebo effect out of the picture

Since you have seen so many of these instances why don't you win the $1million dollar challenge? Next time bring a video camera with you, record the doctors showing you an MRI or whatever that shows the lung cancer and then after they are magically healed take another MRI and video tape that to show it is gone. Tape the doctors telling you they have no explanation for this event.

It is quite common with those who have lung cancer to caugh up blood and guts one minute and stop the next. I know, both of my grandpas died from cancer. My grandpa on my mother's side would caugh start hacking and caughing up blood and spit out a nice giant gross something and then would be fine for a while.

But these are the sources of my holding fast to a belief that cannot be proved or disproved scientifically.

We don't need to disprove there is a God not to believe. Just as we don't need to disprove fairies, or santa clause, or the boogy man to not believe in them. You have to prove that god exists, just as you'd have to prove santa exists, which you cannot do, and you have no real evidence. You could give us various reasons for why you think there might be a God, but they fall quite short of logical arguments and reasoning to show why there isn't a god. It is not two sides of a coin. They are not equally likely. A belief that fairies are real and that they are not real is not equally likely. Is there a chance that they could be real. Yes. Certainly. But I'm not going to believe in them when it makes much much more sense that they don't exist.

I'm not blindly holding onto this belief - I have my own evidence that leads me to that belief and I'm aware of the dangers of not being able to detect deception objectively.

Maybe not blind, more like glasses which distort your vision. Just as you had your own evidence and personal experience to lead you to believe that pot smoke causes lung cancer, you have your own evidence and personal experience to lead you to believe God exists and the BoM is the truth.

 

[The_Animus]

Let me offer a hypothetical. 4 individuals. Assume the Mormon Church is true.

Jason: Moral and decent Mormon who doesn't know that the Church is true but follows the church on faith that the Church is true. He remains faithful to the teachings of his Church until he dies.

Richard: Moral and decent Catholic who doesn't know that the Catholic Church isn't true but follows the teachings of the Catholic Church on faith that the Catholic Church is true. He remains faithful to the teachings of his Church until he dies. Richard has friends that are Mormon and has taken the lessons but has never had a desire to join.

Mark: Knows that the Mormon Church is true. He remains faithful to the teachings of his Church until he dies.

Mary: Atheist. Mary is a licensed therapist who has donated her time to provide counseling to prisoners. She serves, pro bono, as a board member for a philanthropic organization that raises money for community outreach programs including caring for the homeless.

What is the difference between these individuals?

Finding god doesn't reveal much of anything about a person. How a person lives his or her life is what reveals the character of a person.

I can't think of anything more beside the point than a religious institution.

Excellent hypothetical Randfan!

Given the assumption that the Mormon church is true as you stated: Jason could turn away from that truth if his beliefs are challenged by imperfect human logic. I have been Jason. Richard would learn a lot about God and Christ and gain faith in them but would miss out on receiving the healing and saving ordinances that would allow him to have greater joy and progression in this life and in the life to come. I have talked personally to thousands of Richards about their faith and lives. Mark is less likely to fall away from the truth when his beliefs are challenged by imperfect human logic. I have been Mark. Mary would be in a similar position as Richard but without faith in God or Christ. I have been Mary - except that I was a boy and I wasn't as smart or as generous.

You totally missed the point of his post...

 

[FSM]

FSM - I'll try to summarize, but you really have to get all of this in the context of the whole speech to fully understand. According to LDS doctrine, God's honor is His power. If God does something that violates that honor by being unjust, unmerciful, etc. He would cease to be God.

So by that rationale, god is choosing to act with honor by allowing children to burn alive and be raped and killed as an act of justice and mercy? And again, if he can lose hit points by performing any action, then he is not ALL powerful. ALL powerful means you set the rules, you make the rules, you ARE the rules. You can make a whole universe! You can define honor in any damned way you please! You are GOD, for god's sake.

In the same way that parents raise their children to become parents and have their own children because of the joy that process can bring, God was once a man who learned and progressed to the point of being able to perfectly follow these laws to the point where he gained the honor of the intelligences in the universe. His work and His glory is the immortality and eternal life of men. He wants to help us get to the point where we can, if we choose, be like Him.

Wait, I guess I'm too ignorant about Mormonism, but God was once a MAN? Yes? How did that happen? And if that's true, who created him? I'm confused. Is being god like a title you get over time if you are really REALLY popular and powerful? And then you pass it on like Miss America? I don't get this... I'd like you to explain this a bit further, please rcronk.


As a side note, according to LDS doctrine, God had all of us as His spirit children before we came here. He presented a plan by which we could learn right from wrong, sickness from health, pain from pleasure, etc. and receive a body of flesh and be tested to give us a choice of what we want to do. He presented it to everyone.

Why? Why choose to let us choose? Why not make the rules be choice without consequence? If he is ALL powerful, he is not bound by any rules. He wants to enjoy the PROCESS of kids getting killed and raped like a parent with kids? Let me tell you what I do to parents like that...

Satan was one of the children and he brought up an alternative plan saying that since there would be so much suffering, instead of letting people choose what they want to do, we could force them to do what's right and all would be saved, and there would be no suffering, etc.

Satan isn't the boss of god, I thought. Satan was only allowed to do whatever god allowed him to do. And again, god is god. If he wanted to give us free will without consequence he could have. He chose not to.

A third of God's children agreed with Satan and the rest have come here to earth to get bodies and go through this experience.


This just sounds weird.


Based on what we choose here of our own free will, we will receive a degree of glory appropriate to those choices - all of which are better than this world.

These summaries are my own words and interpretation and I'm sure they aren't perfect. Please listen to the entire talk and look up these LDS doctrines yourself if you want a more full and accurate account.

I am sure your interpretation is very eloquent and well put. None of that changes the simple fact that if god is ALL powerful he can do anything he wants, anyhow he wants, anytime he wants. Sitting around discussing how god's hands are tied by certain codes of honor and laws and intelligences only muddies the thing up... God is god, he chose all of this exactly the way it is. IF he wanted it different, it would be different.

He has chosen this suffering for us. Sick, abusive MF that he is.

 

[rcronk]

The Animus - I don't know if the girl also smoked cigarettes or not - I know that she had smoked pot for about 10 years and so I assumed that was the cause of it. My bad. She had been to the doctor before and after and the tumors that were once there were gone.

If I catch anything on video, maybe I'll do the million dollar challenge.

Good thing I don't have to prove it to anyone else.

Your glasses analogy assumes that I'm wrong. Yes, I possibly assumed wrong on pot causing cancer but the experiences and evidence I have are not assumptions.

 

[articulett]

The Animus - I don't know if the girl also smoked cigarettes or not - I know that she had smoked pot for about 10 years and so I assumed that was the cause of it. My bad. She had been to the doctor before and after and the tumors that were once there were gone.

If I catch anything on video, maybe I'll do the million dollar challenge.

Good thing I don't have to prove it to anyone else.

Your glasses analogy assumes that I'm wrong. Yes, I possibly assumed wrong on pot causing cancer but the experiences and evidence I have are not assumptions.

Well they sure aren't measurable evidence that would make any skeptic think you know something "true". You've been taught what to think. But you sure don't seem to know HOW to think. You make some very wild extrapolations as though they were fact. It's really not different from people convinced they've been probed by aliens who cannot be dissuaded-- at least as far as the actual evidence (or lack thereof) is concerned.

 

[rcronk]

FSM - God apparently didn't create the eternal laws that we experience every day such as when our "sense" of justice is violated. He must obey them or lose his honor. According to Mormon doctrine, intelligences are like light and they exist eternally, are not created or destroyed. Each one of us is an intelligence. God gave us a spirit body to gather experience and then provided a way for us to gain a physical body to gain more experience. His father did the same for Him and so on eternally. Honestly, I do not comprehend eternity and no beginning or end. Choice without consequence is meaningless - like playing a video game. Apparently free will with consequences is necessary for progress. Satan had free will and decided to propose a plan and people followed him - God doesn't violate satan's free will or the free will of those who followed him or chose not to follow him. String theory sounds weird too. Again, apparently God did not create eternal laws such as justice, mercy, etc. If He violated justice, the universe would cease to honor Him and He would cease to be God - just like if a judge in your town let the guy who robbed your house off without any punishment, your sense of justice would be violated. He hasn't chosen this suffering/joy/progress for us, we have. We could have followed satan's plan and gone with him but apparently we didn't since we're here, according to Mormon doctrine.

 

[FSM]

Rcronk, if god is all powerful he can choose what honor means and he can choose how to define intelligence and he can choose to let some things live eternally (like your intelligences) or to die quick painful horrible deaths, like little kids.

Choice without consequence is only meaningless because god wants it to feel so. If he wanted, he could choose to allow choice without consequence and still allow himself honor. HE IS GOD. He is unlimited in power. If he is limited by some other force, then he is not god. God made Satan, made Satan give us a choice and then forced little kids to suffer the consequences of that choice. God could even RIGHT NOW simply erase time, start all over and erase Satan. He could do any damn thing he wants. In my opinion, that's what ALL POWERFUL means.

 

[The_Animus]

Don't you see a problem with people making up wild stories to explain how things work. Stories that have no way to be tested or shown to be true? Stories that cannot be tested to show if they are wrong and thus can always be hid behind for an explanation.

None of these things are based in reality. None of them.

Do you believe that sins creates bugs, viruses, and bacteria which infests peoples bodies, brains, the soil, and the atmosphere, which is the cause of global warming?

Do you believe that there are pink invisible unicorns walking amongst us? It is logical after all. They are obviously invisible or we would be able to see them. And I have faith based on personal experience that they are pink.

 

[articulett]

Rcronk, if god is all powerful he can choose what honor means and he can choose how to define intelligence and he can choose to let some things live eternally (like your intelligences) or to die quick painful horrible deaths, like little kids.

Choice without consequence is only meaningless because god wants it to feel so. If he wanted, he could choose to allow choice without consequence and still allow himself honor. HE IS GOD. He is unlimited in power. If he is limited by some other force, then he is not god. God made Satan, made Satan give us a choice and then forced little kids to suffer the consequences of that choice. God could even RIGHT NOW simply erase time, start all over and erase Satan. He could do any damn thing he wants. In my opinion, that's what ALL POWERFUL means.

I think you need to accept that Mormonism is true for these apologetics to make sense... see, to Mormons, you chose this life... maybe the stuff in it, I don't know... Your gender? Your religion? Whether people will immolate you in childhood? Once you accept the paradigm, the explanations seem to make sense. You just haven't accepted the paradigm. To anyone outside the belief system, it's a wild story... like Scientology or Greek Mythology. You want to say, "do you really believe this??" But to him it's weird like "string theory"... to us it's weird like those who speak in tongues and perform exorcisms.

I feel like he's saying, "well, Darth was Luke's father and obi wan Kenobi gave him the force and...the people in black are the bad guys, see-- but women aren't meant to be part of the battle..."

 

[The_Animus]

Your glasses analogy assumes that I'm wrong.

Yes they do, but that is to be expected. We all do not believe in God or the BoM. You come to us with the claim that there is a God being and that the BoM is completely true. We do not accept this claim so you must prove it. Until you do you are assumed wrong.

If someone came here and claimed that there are pink invisible unicorns living on earth they are assumed wrong until they prove otherwise.

Claims of God are no different.

If He violated justice, the universe would cease to honor Him and He would cease to be God - just like if a judge in your town let the guy who robbed your house off without any punishment, your sense of justice would be violated.

You are giving very human qualities to a God. If God is subject to universal laws beyond and above him then you are saying that there was already a universe and universal laws before God? If this is the case and even God has someone/something to answer to then God is simply another being that is a part of this universe. Just like us. God would then not be an all knowing, all loving, perfect being. He is simply a more intelligent being than us. Your very description of how things work destroys the definition of God.