God is Evil

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Early Judaism, if memory serves, did not have a Satan figure. God was the creator of all that was, both good and evil. Of course, it's kind of hard to offer your prized ram to a guy who caused the lightning storm that killed your wife. Hence, Satan.

This is not to say that Satan does not exist, mind you. This is to say that once he came into the picture, God was said to be the creator of all that is good and not of all that is evil.

'Good' and 'Evil' are meaningless words, because what one person views as good, is evil to another.

'I and 'you' are meaningless words, because what one person views as 'I', is 'you' to another.

Well, the words have meaning, they refer to externally existing rules of human behavior and to essences. Even if the external existence isn't real, what is referred to is still something that a lot of people intuitively understand as existing, and even can find hard to abolish from their minds. As such, calling the terms meaningless seems ridiculous, I think.

The free will rationalization for the problem of evil is bunkum. It addresses none of natural evil,nor it does not address whether a person deserves man made evil. (E.g., the billion or so in extreme poverty as we speak and the many and myriad children who will die before their 5th birthday because of it). It fails even in its domain of discussion because it does not address how people acquire said maladaptive decision schema, all the ways of which are closely tied to external conditions of which one has little control over. Viewing the human as capable of pulling itself up by its own bootstraps is so much poppycock.

In my own experience I'd have to debate that one to this extent - it works until you hit your own genetic limits. What do I mean by that? Self-help is great, everyone should try to press the most out of themselves that they can, but there are going to easily be areas that you physically, genetically, cannot improve in after a point. You'll find plenty of people out there who can't give it their all and their best just isn't good enough. With everyone's unique sets of strengths and weaknesses there are plenty of people out there who will be stuck living rather miserable or unhappy lives because a) their limits act almost like a foot on their head holding them below water and b) they're too proud to excuse themselves from life.

I'm still at this point in my life not really sure how many people really are in this situation vs. just don't try; for my own life experiences though I've definitely learned not to judge, mainly because I've learned just how much of a nightmare life can be in this scenario and what its really like to go to sleep plenty of nights hoping not to have to wake up. What it has taught me though, if drop-out-and-fail NT's come up short in a similar manner and have no support at all, unless we're literally too impaired to work we really have no right asking for much of anything - life is pain and a lot of people these days need to relearn the concept of keeping a stiff upper lip.

"Just because we don't know what the right answer is, doesn't mean there isn't one." ~Gregory House



The problem is that you think you have certain limits. Doing things a certain way will always make you limited in how much you can achieve, which is why you need to do things differently if what you're doing now isn't working.

Perception truly is everything. Math is the example I use most commonly because I have the most experience with it. People perceive that they are terrible in math. They come to me, expecting a little improvement in about a half hour of tutoring. What they find, in 10-15 minutes, is that math is not as hard as they think, and they begin improving in areas that they originally thought impossible for them.

Yes, our genetic traits may help us along certain paths and hinder us along others, which is something that people need to accept. People who try very hard and fail are often those who are fighting against their nature. I will never be a great salesman for anything except myself and my beliefs, so I do not hope to go into any sales-related field (including marketing). I also accept the fact that I will probably never be a great artist. I love drawing, and I will continue to do it, but I accept the fact that I will never be able to do such a thing professionally. Some of that may be genetics, and some is the fact that I only started drawing seriously in the past few years. No matter what the primary cause, however, I recognize that limitation and have chosen to create a different path for myself.

It does mean there is one, either. What basis could the concept of 'good' have in reality, besides being a convenient guide for humans?

Limiting the total suffering endured in the world, for one thing.

Last time I checked, not being able to feel pain is a pretty serious disorder.

This is what I'm saying. This particular flow is different for everyone. For some people there will be good or convenient outs, myself I feel like I'm making the best of the good avenues I do have (and I consider myself incredibly lucky to have them). What I am advocating is that while everyone should try what your suggesting, to the best of their ability and for their own happiness, but its faulty logic to assume that everyone or even the overwhelming majority of people have such places to go within their means. If I understand right your more than likely cutting it that black and white to keep people who like making excuses for themselves from making them, if you can see both sides of it fine.

On the other hand though, with a person's general experience of evil and pain in this world - you can't write it off as being that those who see this world as something like living in a cistern are inherently drawing a reflection of what they've created in their own lives. Sometimes that happens but there are more than enough very good reasons to see that, just like everyone has different levels of emotional perception toward different things. Similarly you will have people, I would say a great many actually, who hold that view and who have their lives very well in order (that view often enough drives people's sense of civic duty and altruism). I think that's the only thing I have to disagree on, a person's sense of the degree of good and evil or how much this world comes up short of what they may emotionally need is not that one-dimensional. Just like you have miserable people who make miserable choices you also have some rather hardened optimists and altruists as well, they get war-weary from time to time but that's another story.

Keep in mind that I didn't say a total lack of pain, I said limiting the suffering. There is a difference. Or perhaps that's not even what good is! The world may never know.



The only people I have ever met who have serious troubles in their lives (not because of an excess of envy) are the ones who make bad decisions on an hourly basis. They are especially those who identify what decision would bring about the greatest advantage to them, and then go in the opposite direction. I actually know a lot of people like this. They constantly claim that their lives are unfair, and they blame the people enforcing the rules and laws. There are so many people that I know whose lives I see going down the toilet, and I can identify each and every poor choice they make.

A person's genetic makeup is not the sole determiner of their fate, nor even that large of one. Nobody has every advantage, and nobody has every disadvantage. Everyone is born with a similar amount of each. Some people have more disadvantages, some people more advantages. This is the universal truth that I have seen in my life, and there is not a single person that I have ever met who defies it. These roads may not lead to wealth or fame, but a person can live rather comfortably with any advantage they might have.

Reverend Kusala (Urban Dharma podcast) says that a 7th grader once told him, "Suffering is what happens when you don't want to have the pain."

How very wise.

I thought so.

Assertions assertions, and first-world-centrism. Hast thou a response to my post?