If there was really a God, bad things wouldn't happen.

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In response to the OP of this thread, I would like to specify what most of the people who say the statement that is the title of this thread actually mean.

If an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent deity existed then natural evil could not exist.

God definitely does exist. He created heaven and earth. That's what it says in the bible, anyway. I believe that the bible is true because it's God's word. I also believe that God lets bad things happen to us to test us; to see how much faith we have in Him that things will get better. Plenty of bad things have happened to me, but if they never happened, then I don't think I'd be getting Social Security benefits right now. Nothing happens in God's world by mistake. There, that's by belief.

Can you explain further?

I am afraid that your argument is logically fallacious.

Because your support for the assertion that Yahweh exists is that the bible says so and your support for the bible being correct is that Yahweh exists.

This same kind of circular reasoning can be used to "prove" Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Mormonism and any other religion with a holy text.

+Smudge and +idonthaveanickname

Also what I meant by "natural evils" are evil things that occur in nature. For example: Why would an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent deity allow a flood to kill innocent children?

If he is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolant (aka all powerful, all knowing, and all good) then he would know of natural evil, would be able to stop it, and would want to stop it.

If that deity is unable to stop it, then he is not omnipotent.
If that deity does not know that it happens, then he is not omniscient.
If that deity chooses not to stop it, then he is not omnibenevolent.

SeeksForTruth, I hope my post on the third page, here, will partly answer that. And perhaps a few of the posts before. It would be interesting to see what you think.

I am only asserting that a deity could categorically not exist in a world with natural evil IF and only IF it is supposed to be omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent. For example, most forms of Christianity make the claim that their deity is such.

However if a deity does not have ALL three of these traits, then the existence of natural evil does not disprove it. However, due to lack of evidence I still would not believe in such a deity until proper evidence is provided, and even if I did the likelihood of me actually worshiping such a being is slim as in my opinion the only type of being worth worshiping would not want to be worshiped.

In other words, in regards to deities that are omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent I am a gnostic atheist (aka I make the assertion that those deities could not exists).

In regards to most other deities I am an agnostic atheist (aka I do not believe due to lack of evidence, but do not claim to KNOW whether they exist or not.).

The omnis always get people into trouble. They seem so braggadocious, perhaps insecure and unnecessary anyway.

I'm not sure they don't contain internal contradictions regardless. Omnipotence doesn't enable you to change conceptual truths, for example. An omnipotent God can't change the ratio of a circle's diameter to its circumference, for example.

Could an omniscient God create random events with outcomes He could not forsee?

I would say yes, if there was free will involved in the beings He created.

Or say when humans have created robots/programmes to solve problems for itself. The humans (creators) created the robot and knows what input they used, but the robot still figured out how to solve a problem a human couldn't. Of course I'm not saying the robot is alive, but that's the closest example I can think of.

Referring to the Thread-Title, the fact that there IS a God is exactly why Bad Things Happen, and it is primarily due to that God's STRICT rule...: «All that you or your servants do unto others is done unto you»

Everybody needs to stop paying taxes/fines/etc for it is no different than funding the iniquity of a terrorist-organisation.

When someone hires a hit-man to assassinate another, the employer then becomes guilty of complicity to murder, even if said employer did not kill the victim/target with his own hands personally. A murder is still the crime of murder.

What if the employer were to have the assassin wear a costume, such as a ninja-outfit, does the costume negate the assassination from being a sinful-activity? For there are costumes work by police & military called uniforms.

How about if the employer gave the assassin a shiny badge and a uniform? Does it suddenly change the assassination into a non-murder or non-killing of whomever is being targeted for assassination? Of course not!

What if the employer scribbled down words on a piece of paper in addition to the shiny badge and costume?
The paper says that it is legitimate to go ahead and carry out an activity called assassination.

One man wrote onto paper that it's okay, due to calling it legitimate, combined with giving a shiny badge & costume called uniform, when calling it an assassination. Does it change the activity into a non-murder now? No?

How about if the employer got a few of his friends together to sign their names onto that paper in agreement that they all believe that the writings on the piece of paper is legitimate for carrying out an assassination. Does it suddenly change the act of hiring an assassin to assassinate somebody into a non-murder and is no longer a killing? No?

Well how about if the piece of paper was not only signed by a bunch of the employer's friends, but the piece of paper was then also framed with a border, and a «ritual» of «voting» was performed where the employer and all of his friends decided that it's legitimate to carry out an assassination? Does assassination now become a non-murder? No?

What if we take all of the above and then add the word «Lawful» or «Legal» into these pieces of paper in addition to claiming that the «assassination» is for «security» purposes? Does it suddenly turn a killing into a non-killing?

Any «sane» people would see that a killing is a killing, regardless of whether the act of murder has been re-named to capital-punishment or otherwise, and this is the same with any and all of the other crimes that are carried out in the name of whatever false-idol that people worship (such as the «fictitious» gods known as Zeus or Athena, but in modern-day vocabulary, they are now called State of [what-ever-state-here]).

Essentially, a kidnapping is still a kidnapping, even if re-named into an arrest or detainment.
Essentially, trafficking of persons is still human-trafficking, even if re-named in taking someone to be jailed.
Essentially, hostage-taking is still the holding of hostages, even if re-named to keeping one jailed.
Essentially, extortion is still extortion, even if re-named into bail-bonds.
Essentially, embezzlement is still larceny, even if re-named into following a court's orders.
Essentially, domestic-terrorism is still domestic-terrorism, even if re-named into being a law-suit.
Essentially, criminal-activities are still criminal-activities, even if it is called doing one's job (Hello Nazi-America!).
Essentially, a cult-religion is still a cult-religion, even if it is given names like States or Governments.

Why then does the world seem to think it is any different from some employer hiring a hitman to cause terrible pain and suffering unto another when tax-payers do exactly the same thing in funding the wages of police & military & politicians & lawyers (i.e.: liars) who engage in daily acts of kidnapping, human-trafficking, hostage-taking, extortion, larceny/embezzlement, money-laundering, perjury, frauds, concealment-of-frauds, violations of human/civil/natural-rights, domestic-terrorism, international-terrorism, invasions, interference, cruel-and-unusual punishments, persecution, etc? For there is NO difference.

I will pose the exact same questions unto the Prosecutor at my next court-hearing in order to prove that he is NOT a «sane» man (and is therefore not «legally competent» to testify against my person).

You can say yes if you want.

But logically speaking you could not be omnipotent and omniscient because of that paradox.

My point was, it would be impossible for a creator, say a programmer, to know exactly how the programme is going to respond and "think for itself", even if the programmer knew the programming language and all the input He entered, very well.

In other words, yes, it would be impossible for *any* being to be omniscient, though as you stated before, it does not disprove the existence of a god.

I don't know if that's strictly speaking true. Since we are talking about an entity that transcends the limitations of the material universe, perhaps it has a mind with sufficient storage space to simultaneously hold all possible states that the program could produce. You could extend that and imagine a mind of sufficient capacity to contain a completely accurate internal model of the phase space of the universe.

We can't imagine holding that much information in our minds, but that doesn't make it theoretically impossible. Even totally randomized output is still going to be in some of range of possibilities described by points in that phase space.

Such a mind would be omniscient as viewed from the perspective of a being within the phase space of that universe.

Doesn't that extend from knowledge into creativity? I guess from a programming POV, the number of outcomes is limited.

What if the same thing was applied to a human mind? Rather than a programme with limited outcomes, would it still end up with limited outcomes, but with far more outcomes? Or is it impossible for even a mind with limitless memory to predict?

The possible configurations of the physical substrate of a human mind, in terms of action potentials in neurons and neurotransmitters in the vicinity of synaptic clefts is very, very large. You have something on the order of 100 billion neurons in your brain, many of these have multiple dendrites and the levels of neurotransmitters at each synapse can vary greatly. Large numbers of these neurons are occupied with task specific functions like interpreting sensory input from the eyes or managing motor neurons to control locomotion, etc. but even with all those dedicated networks taken out of the system, there are an enormous number of permutations of the components in a human brain.

But not an infinite number.

So if we take as axiomatic that the mind is a function of the brain and the brain has a finite number of possible states, then we can imagine a supernatural entity with a mind capable of modeling a phase space representing all possible permutations of that brain.

Such a mind would know every thought and emotion a person has had and every thought and emotion a person could ever have.

On the other hand, we might propose a human mind that works in some mysterious way not limited by the physical substrate of the brain and CNS. Because we don't have any information about how such a mind might work, there is nothing much that can be said about that possibility.

Could a supernatural human mind have states a supernatural God couldn't imagine or know? Who could answer such a question? Insufficient data.

If the infinite cycles of the Hindu multiverse is the most accurate cosmological model, then there are multiple beings with infinite lifespans and existence across infinite universes. Omniscience doesn't seem a logical possibility in such a cosmos.

But getting back at the OP statement. If there is no God, there would not be things that are 'bad'. Let me explain. If God didn't exist the things we perceive as bad are completely formed by our environment. This also means what we see as 'bad' differs from person to person. Some may argue that the things you call 'bad' are actually 'good'. This means there is no such thing as good or bad if there was no God. It are only things you perceive as being bad and will change based on your emotions, environment and a whole lot of other factors. And this also means you that as an atheist you can't lash out at the Christian God. Because if there is no God there is no such thing as cruelty, or bad things happening. Rather this is how you perceive it. And your perception is of no worth if you don't believe in God because it will be gone if you are dead. And if it for some reason passes on it won't matter neither since you won't be there because you are dead. Can someone tell me what a human life is worth if there were no God?

No. No. No.

That's a terrible argument. It comes down to "things are only bad because God says so."
Infanticide? Good if God says so, bad if God says no.

Also you get this weird consequence of thinking good=compliant. I heard this lady on the radio who was just fine with sexually assaulting kids using objects of various kinds, because it wasn't proscribed in the Bible. Two gay man making out though? Stone 'em to death. It's good because God says so. All you have to do is comply and you are a good person, no matter how nasty your actions and how much suffering you cause.

Sounds immoral at best, or even evil to me.

A utilitarian morality that seeks to minimize suffering ends up with all sorts of things being defined as good or bad because of the impact they have. You can take a few basic axioms and build a complex ethical system based on first principles, rather than arbitrary "will of god" statements.

Also, when you reject your own god-given faculty for moral reasoning and go into absolute unthinking obedience to God mode, you have the problem of knowing which version of God to obey. What's the authoritative source for information about what God defines as good and evil?

Do you trust and obey the Koran? The Torah? The Bible? The Noble 8 fold path? The guy who sleeps in the bushes behind the Metropolitan museum who is in constant dialog with a God only he can hear?

Having a book that says "you can trust me because I say so" is not very compelling.

Take a few basic principles:
Human life is immeasurably valuable. Inflicting suffering is bad. Alleviating suffering is good. Promoting misery is bad. Creating joy is good.
Build from there.

You'll end up with a large and complicated ethical system and set of laws. You don't need God for this.