God loves no one

Lonewulf said:
Yes, this is ignoring the whole "God doesn't exist" thing. So sue me. Also, Deists need not apply (nor anyone that does not believe in Hell or any kind of punishment in the afterlife).

God doesn't love anyone. Not me, not you, no human on planet Earth.

I use the same logic as I would, in saying that a father that abuses his children if they don't make a decision that would make them miserable, doesn't love his children.

There's no good logical argument against this. The only way to sidestep it is to either refuse to believe that God exists, or refuse to believe in any kind of divine-based punishment in the afterlife.
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Not really, taking your parent metaphor, there are many punishments that from the child's limited perspective would seem cruel, but which are in the child's interest.

How many children think that grounding is an act of wanton power-mad cruelty?

If punishment after death were temporary, as many faiths believe, it could equate to those punishments given to children for their own good. The fact that they don't see the use of it doesn't make it abuse.

If punishment after death is eternal, as some Christians claim, it could be viewed in the same way as incarceration. If all the child-rapists and murderers were in heaven, it wouldn't be a pleasant place for the more well behaved folks there.

There is a description I once heard where hell is a place where there is a sumptuous feast, but no one can eat because their forks are so long they can't get an angle to reach their mouths. In heaven it is exactly the same, but people feed each other.
 
Cavemonster said:
There is a description I once heard where hell is a place where there is a sumptuous feast, but no one can eat because their forks are so long they can't get an angle to reach their mouths. In heaven it is exactly the same, but people feed each other.
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Do you really think it is true?

If hell would be something like this, even if people would be unwilling to feed one another, I am sure that there would be a bully that would _force_ people into feeding him. And if not a bully, then some demagogue that would convince the others that the important thing to do in hell is to feed HIM.

Do you really think that heaven is exactly the same - forks are so long, they cannot get an angle to reach their mouths? It sounds rather a ridiculous place, if so... I imagine all those people day after day feeding one another... LOL.

I guess that in a muslim world, the penises of the muslims cannot penetrate the virgins without help from another person. (Again, an angle problem, or something like that). Only another person could help, but he doesn't want to. In the muslim heaven, the people help each other to penetrate...

Not really, taking your parent metaphor, there are many punishments that from the child's limited perspective would seem cruel, but which are in the child's interest.
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True. But there are also many deeds that fathers who commit sexual abuse sometimes do, and they explain to the child that it is a good thing... So which one is it?

All you did is explained how it COULD be true that a good god would allow for the holocoust to happen. The explanation : maybe we don't know something.

Great explanation, isn't it? If you were a child, and if you would be grounded, would you be given an explanation? Yes. A parent should always explain to the child why he punishes him. So where is the detailed explanation?

Besides, you have not _proved_ that there is a good explanation for it. You said that god is a "daddy", and we are "children", so we don't know for sure. Ok. I agree. But not knowing for sure doesn't mean we can't use our judgement. Given all the evidence we have (holocoust), it is much more probable that there is no one god that is omnibenevolent, and omnipotent. You say " Well... Maybe there is, and it's all for our good... ". Ok. Maybe. But not according to what common sense tells us.

Have you being in Auschwitz? Do you really think that Auschwitz is a good analogy to being grounded??????????


Your religion is cruel. My religion offers a far better explanation of the evil in the world. See above .
 
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JetLeg said:
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If you ask me (as usually is asked here, for some reason), what is the evidence - I will say - well of course, none! It is a matter of faith, entirely. I do not force this belief on others, this is a very liberal faith. You may criticize it, say that it is ********, I don't mind.

And if you ask "Well, other people have faith too?" - Sure they do, but my faith is valid because I believe by faith that only my faith is valid.

And if you tell me - "Well, that is circular logic" - Aha! It would almost be a good argument... But I have the perfect response. I had a revelation from Jerost, and he told me that circular proofs are OK when proving this religion. So I have no problem with circular logic. (This religion shouldn't be proved via ad hominems, and ad populum, and ex nihilo logical fallacies ; but circular logic, begging the answer, and post hoc ergo propter hoc can be used according to him, so he said).
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How might we, who have not obtained this blessed revelation, distinguish it from human vulnerabilities known to exist (for example, auditory and visual hallucinations present in schizophrenia, or delusions present in schizoaffective disorder)? You hint that criticisms from others will have no effect on you, yet I can imagine that being institutionalized for a disease that you profess that you don't have would have a profound effect.*

Not only that, but it would seem that one would, and probably should, begin to question their own subjective experiences if they are able to realize (1) that subjective experiences are prone to delusions and outright untruths and (2) their subjective experience differs substantially from the vast majority of others, so much so as to be characteristic of a known disease which effects subjective experience.

*I have not followed all of your postings, so it is my assumption that you are merely donning these beliefs as a sort of Devil's advocate, and I'm certainly not assuming you have schizophrenia or any other sort of mental problem.
 
Lonewulf said:
I use the same logic as I would, in saying that a father that abuses his children if they don't make a decision that would make them miserable, doesn't love his children.

There's no good logical argument against this. The only way to sidestep it is to either refuse to believe that God exists, or refuse to believe in any kind of divine-based punishment in the afterlife.
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Do you think parents should never punish their children? Or only use appropriate punishment for their actions?

Added: Didn't see Cavemonster's post. I'd like to hear your responses Lonewulf.
 
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TheAnachronism said:
How might we, who have not obtained this blessed revelation, distinguish it from human vulnerabilities known to exist (for example, auditory and visual hallucinations present in schizophrenia, or delusions present in schizoaffective disorder)? You hint that criticisms from others will have no effect on you, yet I can imagine that being institutionalized for a disease that you profess that you don't have would have a profound effect.*

Not only that, but it would seem that one would, and probably should, begin to question their own subjective experiences if they are able to realize (1) that subjective experiences are prone to delusions and outright untruths and (2) their subjective experience differs substantially from the vast majority of others, so much so as to be characteristic of a known disease which effects subjective experience.

*I have not followed all of your postings, so it is my assumption that you are merely donning these beliefs as a sort of Devil's advocate, and I'm certainly not assuming you have schizophrenia or any other sort of mental problem.
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Assuming I might have schizophrenia is offensive. Many religious people think they are talking to god, are they all schizophrenic??? It's offensive towards them as well.
 
A Christian Sceptic said:
Do you think parents should never punish their children? Or only use appropriate punishment for their actions?
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Don't you think that parents should only use appropriate punishment for their actions?

I guess that you meant to say that the holocoust for example, was an appropriate punishment?

Can you tell what was it a punishment for? Or did our parent allow the killing of 6,000,00 people without explaining his children what it was for, and why was the punishment appropriate? Perhaps you can tell what was it for, and why was it needed?

Do you think that there are no sadistic parents? So how do you know god isn't sadistic?

Just visit http://www.geocities.com/onetruereligion/ and see post #62 , #59 in this thread.
 
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JetLeg said:
Don't you think that parents should only use appropriate punishment for their actions?

I guess that you meant to say that the holocoust for example, was an appropriate punishment?

Can you tell what was it a punishment for? Or did our parent allow the killing of 6,000,00 people without explaining his children what it was for, and why was the punishment appropriate? Perhaps you can tell what was it for, and why was it needed?

Do you think that there are no sadistic parents? So how do you know god isn't sadistic?

Just visit http://www.geocities.com/onetruereligion/ and see post #62 , #59 in this thread.
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Sorry - you lost me at hello.

It might be a bit more coherent discussion if you stick with the OP about punishment in the afterlife.
 
Cavemonster said:
Not really, taking your parent metaphor, there are many punishments that from the child's limited perspective would seem cruel, but which are in the child's interest.

How many children think that grounding is an act of wanton power-mad cruelty?
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How many children think that being beaten to a bloody pulp or being sexually abused isn't power-mad cruelty, and actually thinks it might actually be normal? Hell or long periods of torture in the afterlife make no more sense than torturing someone in this one -- especially when those actions are justified by lack of experience, education, or simply being exposed to "the wrong ideas".

If punishment after death were temporary, as many faiths believe, it could equate to those punishments given to children for their own good.
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If that punishment is "you didn't serve me", then sorry, but I can't accept that. My reason won't allow me to.

If a deity were loving, then they could accept me even if I didn't serve them and do exactly what they wanted me to. Christianity almost always demands servitude to God, or to be servile to His Son. There are very few exceptions amongst the denominations.

If a father abuses his son because the son doesn't become a lawyer like the father wants him to, that is not love, nor will it ever be. No amount of mental gymnastics would defend this.


The fact that they don't see the use of it doesn't make it abuse.
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Except that a father can explain why he punishes, because there is always a reason behind that abuse. When you ground a child, the reason for it is actually rather obvious, no matter what the child sees. One can use reason and rationality to understand the punishment. If such a reason exists outside of reason and rationality, then it is punishment without a reason, and is, by definition, abuse.

If punishment after death is eternal, as some Christians claim, it could be viewed in the same way as incarceration. If all the child-rapists and murderers were in heaven, it wouldn't be a pleasant place for the more well behaved folks there.
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This flies in the face of what sin actually means in the Christian context. "Raping children" and "murdering people" are only a few of the many sins.

And even then, desire to rape children comes from a misfiring in the brain, a biological process that one is born with or develops over one's natural life; it has a material cause, that would disappear after one has died. A desire to murder is based on earthly desires. If one were to go to a spiritual afterlife, they would leave behind that earthly existence, adopt a new one, and then punishing them for actions in that material world to "take them away from other spirits" would be that much more arbitrary.

To judge one harshly for their actions in the material world is not a sign of a higher mind, but is the sign of one that thinks only in the material.

There is a description I once heard where hell is a place where there is a sumptuous feast, but no one can eat because their forks are so long they can't get an angle to reach their mouths. In heaven it is exactly the same, but people feed each other.
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lolwut?

This suggests that we make our own hells, and not that we are divinely punished. As in, we punish ourselves, and no deity necessarily be present. That would make this lie outside of my hypothetical musings, as I'm talking directly about punishment in the afterlife, or the existence of evil (natural and mortal) in the real one.
 
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Cavemonster said:
Not really, taking your parent metaphor, there are many punishments that from the child's limited perspective would seem cruel, but which are in the child's interest.

How many children think that grounding is an act of wanton power-mad cruelty?
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How many are given an eternal sentence of burning forever? That is an important differance to note, especially worth noting that we are not children. And even then many parents attempt to explain to their child what they did wrong and why they are being punished for it. God has made no such attempt at explanation thus far, comes with being nonexistant I imagine.

Of course the inverse of this would be a parent who really is punishing their child as an act of wanton power-mad cruelty and convinced their child that the abuse is for their own good and that they need said abuse. I think that about sums fundamentalist Christianity/Islam/Judaism.

Kind of pointless to argue the "well we just don't understand it" line of reasoning. It may be the case and we don't understand but since that we don't understand we cannot determine neither truth nor knowledge from the statement and it is equally valid when considering other unfalsifiable statements ie "we do understand but you're merely complicating the issue". Until the parameters are clearly defined and understood we'll never be able to argue the point. But I suppose if we understood in the first place we wouldn't need to argue that we don't understand now would we?

If punishment after death were temporary, as many faiths believe, it could equate to those punishments given to children for their own good. The fact that they don't see the use of it doesn't make it abuse.
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Certainly, so long as the punishment fit the crime. Which means that there should be differant punishments given for gluttons, liars, rapists, etc. The blanket punishment of Christianity conists of burning forever and doesn't really address any sin.

If punishment after death is eternal, as some Christians claim, it could be viewed in the same way as incarceration. If all the child-rapists and murderers were in heaven, it wouldn't be a pleasant place for the more well behaved folks there.
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It could, if we had a crime that deserved an eternal sentence. People are certainly more capable of causing great amounts of harm but are they capable of causing enough harm to deserve an eternal sentence? Think about it for a moment, the most absolutely horrible crimes in history committed by the worst men. Can you honestly say that, if punished in the afterlife, there could never be a time in which they could be forgiven and redeemed of their misdeeds?

There is a description I once heard where hell is a place where there is a sumptuous feast, but no one can eat because their forks are so long they can't get an angle to reach their mouths. In heaven it is exactly the same, but people feed each other.
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And the intelligent people who figure out they can pull the food off with their hands or hold the fork underneeth the points and bite the food off will be going where? ;)

A Christian Sceptic said:
Do you think parents should never punish their children? Or only use appropriate punishment for their actions?

Added: Didn't see Cavemonster's post. I'd like to hear your responses Lonewulf.
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Should parents punish there children? Yes. But you've kind of asked the same question twice, otherwise you're asking if we should use inappropriate punishment for crimes in the first question.
 
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A Christian Sceptic said:
Do you think parents should never punish their children? Or only use appropriate punishment for their actions?
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Appropriate punishment for the action.

The thing is:

A father should not punish wantonly. The child should be let known what they are doing wrong.

Say there's a barn. The father doesn't want the child to enter the barn, because it's dangerous.

Say the child is not warned that he cannot go into the barn, goes into the barn, father takes him and beats him, then throws him in the cellar to punish him. Or hell, the father berates the kid, spanks him, and then lets him go. Both punishments are wrong, because the child was not warned not to go into the barn, so how was he supposed to know?

Now, say the kid was warned directly by the father. "Don't go into the barn!"

The kid asks why, and the father says "Because I said so! You wouldn't understand!"

Is this justifiable? Why can the father not say, "Because it's dangerous, there are rusty nails and loose boards lying around." At least here, the kid knows why to avoid them -- and if he breaks the rules anyways, at the very least, he can avoid harm to himself.

But in this case, punishing the child for going into the barn makes sense.

But that is not what any deity in any religion do. Instead, they rely on "prophets", and not only that, there's always one prophet amongst thousands of others, many proclaiming contradictory or downright diametrically opposed things.

To keep the analogy, this is the father telling one uncle to warn the child not to go into the barn. But there are three uncles and an aunt. The aunt tells him to go into the barn to feed the horses. One uncle says he can only go into the barn on Sunday. One uncle says that he can go anytime he wants and do anything. The last uncle warns him to not do so at all.

Religion tells us that, following the advice of that last uncle should bring him rewards, anyone else punishment. But it's up to the kid to decide. And, after listening and coming to a rational conclusion, he goes with the Aunt, because the horses need feeding, and he wants to be of help around the house -- but, even though his intentions were pure, he still gets punished.




Now, this would make sense if the father was not able to (didn't have the power to) warn the child. It would also imply that he was not able to foresee that there would be the other two uncles and the aunt to confuse the boy. Yet, it would also assume that he also was unaware of this later, or decided to punish the boy anyways, which makes his punishment based in ignorance or make his punishment unjust.


But these are deities we're talking about; they're Above humans. Better than. Superior to. With greater powers -- in the case of God, the greatest of powers in all the universe! They have no excuses.
 
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Kthulhut Fhtagn said:
Should parents punish there children? Yes. But you've kind of asked the same question twice, otherwise you're asking if we should use inappropriate punishment for crimes in the first question.
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I was trying to understand Lonewulf's point and trying to gauge on whether it was the idea of God punishing people or a specific way / form of punishment he was addressing.
 
quarky said:
Its curious that many atheists seem to be angry with God.
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Which Atheists are those and based on what do you affirm that they "hate" God? Most Atheists do not hate that which they do not consider to exist in the first place
 
Personally, I believe that there are 5 evil gods, and 2 good ones. The bad ones outnumber the good ones, this is why there is so much evil of the world. The names of the good ones are Jerost and Vapos, and the bad ones are Hiija, Jilk, Samasa, Niva, and Yolt.

No god is omnipotent, but all are omniscient. Vapos is the loving god, he loves everyone. Jerost loves only those who worship him or Vapos.

Hija, Jilk and Samasa, do not really hate humanity; they just dislike it. Niva hates everyone; Yolt hates only those that worship Jerost and Vapos.

Heaven was of course created by the good gods; hell by the bad ones. Whether a person goes to hell or heaven is not based on good deeds at all, but on luck. It all depends on who comes for his soul first -> a good god, or a bad one. Those who worship Jerost have a slightly better chance than the others, since BOTH Jerost and Vapos cares for them, for the others only Vapos will try to come. (Only me and some of my close friends believe in Vapos, so it is us who have the better chance ).

Occasionally, Jerost or Vapos catch someone from hell, and take him from heaven. This is good news, since the bad gods can't do the opposite.

IT IS UNKOWN how the world will end. Maybe the good gods will win, and the world will become a much better place; maybe the bad gods will win, which I sincerely hope will not happen. We cannot do much to help... We are powerless in the god struggles.

For more information, and donations go to

http://www.geocities.com/onetruereligion/
 
JetLeg said:
Personally, I believe that there are 5 evil gods, and 2 good ones. The bad ones outnumber the good ones, this is why there is so much evil of the world. The names of the good ones are Jerost and Vapos, and the bad ones are Hiija, Jilk, Samasa, Niva, and Yolt.
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No, no no no!!. You got it all wrong. The names of the Good Ones are: Space Ghost, The Dude and Rorschach. The names of the bad ones are: Skelletor, Ganondorf, Zorak, Syndrome and Gargamel

And by the way, my Gods are more truthful than yours cause I have more faith in them than you have in yours, and also I bet you that I pray more for them on a daily basis than you do
 
A Christian Sceptic said:
I was trying to understand Lonewulf's point and trying to gauge on whether it was the idea of God punishing people or a specific way / form of punishment he was addressing.
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That's... complicated. I'm actually glad that you're asking me to clarify that, because it's a good point.

I'm criticizing both, for similar but different reasons:

For 1, the idea of hell and most conceptions I hear of punishment in the afterlife are pretty nasty. Zoroastrianism is one of the exceptions, except for the whole "one person taking on all of your sins" thing. That's not very cool.

For 2, the spiritual realm and the material realm are distinct according to religion (or else the soul would be material and die with the body), and most of what we do on the material world has material causes. Lust (which really honestly shouldn't be much of a sin, honestly, until you get into the extremes like rape, child or adult), greed, murder, etc. These are the result of thought processes in the brain, based on our experiences and our limited knowledge here on the world. Punishing us for that limited knowledge or those experiences seems no less silly than 1.

The more we understand of how our minds and brains work, the more this becomes clear. For instance, why is one sociopathic (I bring this up for sociopaths that actually do bad things)? Is it because they willingly let their souls become dark, or because of processes in the brain beyond their control? Why does it make sense to punish their soul, after they are dead, when this would free them from the very constraints they had in life? It's much like with Adam and Eve. "Hey! You now understand what right and wrong are! Congratulations, what you did was wrong, here is your punishment!"
 
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