Children that God neglected

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I am spurring discussion about a legitimate issue. It is an issue worthy of discussion.

You appear to be saying that I should not encourage discussion of an issue when I have some pre-existing opinions about the issue. That makes absolutely no sense.

You can defend any ONE post that you make as being legitimate discussions, but you cannot defend them ALL. Taken individually, yes, you can claim that you are spurring legitimate debates, but as a whole, your objective is obviously to goad Christians into arguments.

Its obvious that you get some sort of pleasure in showing that you have superior logic, and I admit that you do. However, your attack is flawed because in order for it to hold any value, you have to believe that Christianty is based on logic, but its not. It is based on faith. Thus the logic that you use to consistenty attack Christians is flawed at the foundation. So, let me ask you, do you believe that Christianity is based on logic or faith? If you say logic, then your whole understanding is wrong. If you say faith, then your whole method of attack is wrong, so what is it?

It is almost like a mathematician who takes his superior calculus to an art convention and goes around showing every artist how their drawings are mathematically incorrect (No, no, no, the house NEEDS to be 8cm from the tree, NOT 7!!). It misses the point of the culture. Relious beliefs based on Religious beliefs should be left alone (for the most part, there are obviously some exceptions). If someone wants to base Scientific or Philosophical beliefs on religious terms, then I say go at it. Otherwise you are just hitting your head against the wall. And, while you may enjoy the feeling, I think that some of us are just tired of all the noise.

I understand your attitude toward Christianity, I just disagree with your method of showing it, as it creates an air of hostility in what is an otherwise friendly place for serious debate. You have the right to believe and do whatever you want, but when the atheists start getting annoyed, I think it should tell you something.

This thread is about why God is bad, not why Christians are bad. I made NO mention of Christians in my initial message. I was talking about God. The title of this thread is "Children that God neglected". (And Christians are not the only people who believe in God.)

You and klassobanieras are the ones focusing on Christians here, not me. I was focusing on God. The word "God" is not a synonym for "Christianity", you know.


Neither. You are presenting me with a false dichotomy. Christianity is actually based on the desire that some power-hungry men have to control and manipulate the gullible masses. But that is off-topic. As I said, this topic is about God, not Christians.


You seem to be saying that religious beliefs should not be discussed.

emp wrote:

There seem to be several possible answers to this:
- an evil god who derives pleasure from horrible suffering;
- a god who is not necessarily evil, but whose actions appear so, whose nature we cannot know;
- no god at all, that's just how things turn out;
- a god who has abandoned his creation, or has been forced from a position of power over it.

The form of your question surprises me, since previous posts have led me to believe you're an atheist. In this one, you seem to be arguing for option #1, god is intrinsically evil. I agree there's a lot of evidence to back up that point of view. But I suspect the real intent of your initial post was to encourage discussion of the question "Why is there evil?"
and this seems to me to be a futile and pointless speculation.

Whether abhorred by god, caused by god, allowed by god or encouraged by god, the kind of suffering depicted in the initial post exists all around us, in the animal world as well as our own. To my mind the only logical response to it is to show compassion and to do what we can to help its victims, wherever we are. If some find comfort in believing that suffering is just the misunderstood work of a loving god, I see no merit in taking that faith away from them.

emp wrote:


It is also an issue without resolution. Neither logic nor faith can offeri a satisfactory explanation, else this would no longer be a subject for debate. Surely there isn't one of us who has not sought an answer to this very disturbing question, and who would not welcome an explanation that offered a measure of peace. I don't believe such an explanation exists, god or no god.

I am not an atheist. I am a most-likeliest. I believe what I think is most likely to be true, keeping in mind that this may change as new evidence, information, reasoning etc is obtained.


You already listed 4 possible explanations. I liked your list. It is very very likely that one of those explanations is the correct one.

emp wrote:

I am as well, though I suspect our "most likely" conclusions differ.

My point, which I failed to make clearly, is that we cannot resolve the question (why is there evil/is god intrinsically evil) through debate. We don't have, and cannot get, the facts to support a valid conclusion. There are too many unknowns.

It seems to me that any of the four explanations I offered (after the deep and profound thought required to spend 5 minutes posting) has an equal chance of being correct or completely wrong; and there may be other explanations as well. I'm glad you liked my list, but personally I find it utterly depressing because it is without hope.

I've spent quite a bit of time around people of faith (mostly Christians and Jews), and I have observed that 99% of them are happier and more serene in their faith that god exists and is intrinsically benevolent than I am, without such faith. If I could suspend my disbelief and acquire that serenity, I would do so, but I cannot.

Death is less of a tragedy to those who believe in Heaven, and I'd be lying if I said I've never envied them. The fruit of knowledge is sweet indeed, but it leaves a sour aftertaste.

[edit]: Oh, and to answer the thread starter's question, the theological reason for cancer and AIDS and stuff is that God is punishing humanity for Original Sin. Even though this is contradictory to the idea of an infinitely kind and merciful God, you've gotta cut the guy some slack. Most people get days off. God's only had one day off in about four billion years. Wouldn't you be cranky?

It is interesting to note that if ANY one of those explanations is correct, then it means it is nonsensical to worship god.

- an evil god who derives pleasure from horrible suffering;
Obvious why you should not worship such a god.

- no god at all, that's just how things turn out;
Cannot worship him if he does not exist, obviously.

- a god who has abandoned his creation,
That is like your mother abandoning you. Makes no sense to worship a god who abandoned you. Again pretty obvious.

- or has been forced from a position of power over it.
He is not omnipotent then. Someone else more powerful than god has taken control. Again not much sense in worshipping god.

- a god who is not necessarily evil, but whose actions appear so, whose nature we cannot know;
This is the old "god works in mysterious ways" explanation. And as subatai_baadur and 666 have pointed out, it is a pathetic explanation. Furthermore, it still makes no sense to worship something that has a nature you do not know. Makes no sense to worship something unknown. If it is unknown, it could be terrible, and so you could be worshipping something terrible.

You seem to suffer from the selective evidence disorder that you CONSTANTLY blame Christians of doing. As I said (in its entirety):



You convienently ignore the first part of sentence and chose to answer the last part of my sentence, which changes its entire meaning, and makes it easy to answer. You are clever, but that is all, not intelligent, you just use clever debating tricks. A post or two is an indication of an opinion, but a whole slew of posts is an indication of ones character. I am OBVIOUSLY making a statement about the general direction of your posts, not this single post, but you cleverly turn my statement around to make it easy to answer.



No, you are avoiding my question again in a clever way, as power hungry men may DRIVE Christianity, but the belief of the masses is either based on faith or logic. You do not attack the drivers of Christianity, but consistantly attack its passengers. Again, you do a very clever dance around the question, but that is all it is, a clever dance.




No, I am saying they should not be attacked in the clearly offensive manner in which you have been doing. As i said:




Again, you selectively choose a sentence out of my whole paragraph which changes its entire meaning, showing that you suffer from the same selective argumentitive disorder you constantly accuse Christians of having. notice the statement in parenthesis, and the sentence after that. Again, I say you are clever, but not that clever, its easy to see through your debating style.

I am through discussing this, as the tricks you are using are so transparent and obvious, they are not even worth pointing out anymore. You are plainly a hipprocrite who uses debating tricks to ignore the obviously hypocritical way between the way you argue, and the people you complain about who argue in the same way.


\\\\\Is done ranting
\\\\\Is NOT defending Christianity
\\\\\Thinks it is TOO easy to see through his tricks
\\\\\Could not get the darn quotes to work right, hence the excessive editing
\\\\\Wishes everyone a nice day

Last edited by jonathan79 on 24 Jun 2006, 9:51 am, edited 5 times in total.

Yes, a sour aftertaste. It requires a certain amount of fortitude and courage to accept the truth regardless of how sour it is and regardless of how much you wish it were otherwise.

I could not agree more.

I thought you were saying that this here thread was an attempt to goad Christians into arguments, and thus I explained why it is not. OK, so you are not talking about this here thread specifically. Very well. So, addressing your hypothesis, for what reasons would I want to goad Christians into argument? Why would I do that?


I maintain my position that you are presenting me with a false dichotomy.


I attacked (criticized) the drivers in my previous message. I said that they are power-hungry manipulators. That is attacking them. I have criticized both the drivers and the passengers.


It is not a clever dance. You are simply trying to force me to pick 1 of 2 options, neither of which is correct IMO. I reject your false dichotomy.


I think it is fine to criticize their religious beliefs/opinions. A society where you cannot criticize peoples opinions is a backwards society.


Not true, because if you claim that I missed responding to something, then I respond to it, as I did above with the goading Christians point. If I did not respond to a part, all it means is that I thought it unimportant. But if you raise it again and insist that it is important, here I am responding to it:


So you say, "Religious beliefs based on Religious beliefs should be left alone (for the most part, there are obviously some exceptions). If someone wants to base Scientific or Philosophical beliefs on religious terms, then I say go at it."

In your first sentence, you seem to be saying that religious beliefs should not be discussed, for the most part, but there are some exceptions.

In your second sentence, I do not know what you are trying to say there.

Again, you do a clever dance around the issues. You respond, but you don´t answer, there is a difference. I think that I have made my point. I will not waste my time exposing the obvious dodges you have presented to my questions. You are obviously no different from the people you criticize so vehemently, so I am done with this discussion.

emp, You say that you're bringing up this issue because it's a legitimate one. If I had'nt been reading your post for several months I would agree. Fact is you've been atacking the bible at it's weak points for quite some time now. I don't disagree with what you're doing but you are'nt being candid about your motives here. You've already made the point that the bible is an obsolete and often immoral(by today's standards)book. We get that point already. It's obvious at this point that you're simply cursing the darkness. Again I don't disagree with that. I do the same thing. But you have to reach a point that you realise one basic truth. YOU CAN'T ILLUMINATE A ROOM BY CURSING THE DARKNESS, YOU MUST LIGHT A CANDLE. You've done an exellent job of pointing to the absurdities of the bible. How a bout proposing AND DEFENDING a beter moral ethical system. That would make for a much more interesting debate!!

Thanks for thoroughly depressing this already depressed agnostic. What a ray of sunshine. I think I'll go cry.

If we're not talking about Christianity or another mainstream religion, then there's not necessarily any moral baggage attached to God, and your question stops making any sort of sense. You're the one making assumptions.