Benevolence and Conflict

Hi, Paul. God's actions weren't the point.This is the point: Stile proposed a "god filter," whereby god analyzes every decision somebody makes for its potential "evil" outcomes. In effect, every occurrence is then contingent upon god's approval, and not upon your free will.

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-Bluejay/Mantis/ThylacosmilusDarwin loves you.

Hi, Stile. Um, yeah... okay, that part was my argument, Stile: the one about god having the ability to restrict any action under any circumstance he deemed necessary. Surely you recognized it, yeah?That part was me showing the downfall of your argument, because that is a point that you have so far continued to ignore.I know that your argument is that restricting free will results in more "good" happening.I’ll try to express my argument better now. Your argument does not resolve the issue of conflicts: if god were to enforce any standard of "good," there would inevitably be people who still disagree with him. Thus, there would still be conflict, and god would still not be perfectly benevolent to absolutely everybody.So, your scenario does not resolve the fundamental problem, and the argument that the existence of bad disproves that god is benevolent is still invalid.----- I’m not sure how much I agree with this statement, but I have to think about it a little bit longer.Can free will be exercised without an external response? Given my argument that free will is not definable in terms of outcomes, I would say that it is possible. However, I’m not sure how far it goes.Is free will associated with the brain? If so, then the mere act of initiating a neural impulse is the actual practice of free will, and the response of limbs is an outcome, and thus, not guaranteed under the free will contract.Consider a paraplegic. No matter how much they will their legs to move, they’re not going to be able to walk. But, they still have the ability to initiate the neural impulses that should make them walk, don’t they? Obviously, if free will is associated with the brain, then a paraplegic still has just as much free will as I do, but their free will is attached to a defective mechanism.If, however, free will is associated with a certain level of intelligence, then it’s possible that people with Down syndrome or other mental defects have less free will than I do. But, I don’t know how or where to draw a line in this regard.Also, if free will is associated with responses of limbs, why is it not associated with knives or bullets? Surely a simple neural connection isn’t the issue: I would assume (perhaps unreasonably, as you may believe) that integration is a key component of free will, which rules out the peripheral nervous system as a seat of free will in humans, because integration is associated with the central nervous system. (Octopus, however, have various peripheral ganglia that control the tentacles, and these ganglia are associated with neural integration.Thus, I suspect that your argument that varying levels of free will exist is incorrect.----- So, because you can make up numbers that fit your argument, your argument is right?What evidence do you have that taking away the man's choice to rape somebody only results in 10% loss of free will, or that one loss of free will will be less than another?I must confess that I view free will as all-or-nothing, though.-----Let me try one more angle.When does god intervene with somebody's free will on behalf of a child's life?
Should he intervene just before the killer pulls the trigger?
Or, should he intervene just before the killer chooses to get up on the morning he intends to kill the child?
Or, should he intervene just before the parents of the killer chooses to try to conceive the killer?The first seems like the optimal choice, because it is localized and direct, but it may still result in psychological trauma for the child, which, in your argument, may result in 50% reduction of free will for the child.Surely the second one rectifies this loss of the child’s free will, then? Perhaps god should intervene in some action before the offending event occurs. But, how much does this affect the killer’s free will? Is it less than the amount the child suffers? And, how much does it affect the free will and benefit of other people that might interact with the killer to their own benefit?What about the third option? If the killer is never born, god never has to worry about his welfare or free will. Why not delay his parents’ desire to conceive him, so that they wait until next month, when the mother’s ovulation produces a different genome for the child, and it turns out to be a girl? How would this impact the free will and benefit of those that might have gleaned something positive from the killer’s existence?Can you argue that any one of these scenarios will result in a reduction of bad in relation to the child’s death? Who knows: maybe God could do it. But, I prefer to stick to the conclusion that intervention adds unnecessary complications without resolving the fundamental issue of conflict.Whenever there is free will (of any degree), there will inevitably be conflict. Thus, if your argument is correct, we may very well already be living in a world where god has removed our ability to do the greatest of evils, along with our ability to even recognize that such evils could have been done otherwise. If this is the case, it only proves my point, because conflict still exists. I hate reading long posts. It's a wonder, then, that I am continually writing long posts.

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-Bluejay/Mantis/ThylacosmilusDarwin loves you.

Hi, Paul That's pretty much what my argument is. I think the key point is that the "god filter," and not the individual, is the actual decider of what the person "wills" in all cases, because each case must be screened individually for potential infractions.I hesitated to go into what god "can" and "cannot" do, because it would add another side topic about God's omnipotence when I wanted to discuss the logic of free will and conflict in sort of "isolation," but I see now that my hesitance was probably a mistake.It's very difficult to deal with the topics of omnipotence, omniscience and omnibenevolence without bringing them all in to play.At any rate, I'm beginning to rethink this argument a little bit. The major point is that it doesn't resolve the issue of conflict, and I've kind of steered away from that point in my responses to Stile. Given Stile's argument, God may have already restricted the really great evils, but people are still killing each other over lesser evils.That's the real weakness of his argument: that it doesn't really change anything.----- To quote Catholic Scientist, "Meh."What the ancient Hebrews believe god did in Egypt doesn't matter much to me. I'm only interested in the core argument.

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-Bluejay/Mantis/ThylacosmilusDarwin loves you.

Hi, Stile.Holy crap! I didn't even notice that you'd sneaked a post in between my earlier posts. Crap again!That wasn't your argument: it was the argument that provoked me into starting this thread in the first place---that the existence of "bad" is inconsistent with a benevolent god. My contention here was that your argument didn't resolve the issue that I took with that argument.----- No. You do not.Free will is only exercised at the moment of action. So, once the trigger has been squeezed or the football leaves the quarterback’s hand, free will has already run its course, and any further disruption (like a gust of wind or a defender) only effects the outcome of the action, and not the action itself. Since free will has nothing to do with outcomes anyway, disruption after the action changes nothing about free will.In your second example (you stopping a man from raping a woman), you have not removed his free will, because there is nothing in his having free will that guarantees his success (outcome). So, he exercises his free will in grabbing the woman, and pushing her around (I’ll cut off here for the sake of our underage readers). But, even after this, there remain variables. For one, the woman may be strong enough that his pushing does little to move her in his intended direction. Or, if he blunders upon an Ottoman by mistake, or if Stile catches him and bashes his face in before he can perform the deed, his free will still has not been taken, because these things are all outcomes, and not actions that he initiates on his own.So, perhaps free will is best thought of as being exercised at the moment of initiation, or, at the moment of the attempt. A cowboy tries to shoot a cattle thief, but his gun jams: he exercised his free will in pulling the trigger, not in making the bullet exit the gun; thus, the failure of his weapon is not a restriction on his free will. A paraplegic tries to walk, but falls on his face: he exercised his free will in sending a neural impulse, but the non-responsiveness of the nerves in his legs prevented his action from succeeding (admittedly, this one may be taking it too far, but it’s very illustrative of the concept).Your first example (girl traumatized into dysfunction by rape) is a bit trickier. I have personally experienced major psychological trauma resulting from a hereditary psychological disorder and very unpleasant social circumstances (nothing quite as bad as rape, though). My personal experience leads me to reject the notion that free will is in any way compromised by such trauma, but I don’t believe my experience is unimpeachable. Due to my hereditary disorder, I have often wondered whether I am a fully functional human being at times (and whether this would constitute a get-into-heaven-free card ), but I have concluded, after long hours of careful introspection, that my ability to decide on and initiate my own course of action was always intact, even though I had convinced myself otherwise in many cases.----- or that he has already reached the optimal compromise between free will and good things.Which would prove my point that conflicts still exist in the case of an optimal compromise, and that people still say, if god were really benevolent, he would _______.Do you think this debate that we're having would be any different if god were to prevent infanticide? If infanticide was not an option, would people just agree that god is benevolent?In fact, I’d be willing to wager a substantial amount of whatever-you-want that we would instead be saying things like, if god were really benevolent, he would prevent all murder," because now, since infanticide is not possible, something else must take it's place as the "epitome" of evil.And, if he were to prevent that, we would then say something like, if god were really benevolent, he would prevent all death.At what point do you think this would end and people would finally agree that god really is benevolent?I argue that this would never happen, not until god was preventing all decisions and causing everybody to agree with him and with one another in all circumstances. And, that’s where the Lego pirates come in. But, until we get to Lego pirates, we have the existence of disagreements, conflicts and bad.And, if X is the worst, most heinous evil that we can conceive of, no matter how bad we think X is, it’s pretty safe to assume that we are bound to consider something to have that level of "badness," so preventing what we perceive to be the worst, most heinous evil is strictly impossible.

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-Bluejay/Mantis/ThylacosmilusDarwin loves you.

Hi, Stile. I'm tempted to say, "So what?"----- No, I wouldn't.Why do you think free will would grant him the ability to leave the cell?----- Can slaves disobey their masters?The fact that they'll get punished if they're caught doesn't change the fact that they can do it. Remember, they can't choose the outcome.----- I know. I know what you're talking about."Harming people" is one form of "bad" that we see in the world.
But, what if, like you suggest, god made it impossible to harm other people?
Would "bad" disappear, and leave only "good," "kinda good" and "neutral," as you are suggesting? Or would we simply find something else to call "bad"?
Wouldn't "neutral" then become "bad," and "kinda good," "neutral"?If we started calling something else "bad," why couldn't people in this hypothetical universe make the same argument you're making, except, instead of using "harming people," they would use whatever it is that they think of as "bad"?Would their argument be any less valid than yours? Why?
Could you ever reach a point where your argument could no longer be legitimately applied to something?

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-Bluejay/Mantis/ThylacosmilusDarwin loves you.

Yes, that’s what I’m telling you. In this example, neither the man’s free will nor his ability to exercise his free will are compromised in any way.Scenario 1: you are in a prison cell, and you want to get out. You try to open the door. Scenario 2: you are in a prison cell, and you want to get out. You try to open the door. You are able to do exactly the same things in both scenarios. The only difference is the outcome, which is outside the jurisdiction of your free will anyway.Free will only acts in the present. The present is always defined by a certain set of circumstances. And every set of circumstances has its own restrictions on what you can and can’t do.
For instance, while I am driving my car on the Interstate, I am restricted from posting a message on EvC because my computer is at home.
So, would you argue that, while I am in the car, my free will is restricted?
If so, could you please provide me an example of a time when free will is not being restricted in some way?----- What are you talking about here?
Are you saying god actually, literally puts someone in jail?
Or is this a metaphor for god’s interfering with the actions that we are capable of performing?There is a difference between preventing success and preventing an attempt. Sure, god could go around dropping cages on top of people to prevent their harming others.But, you still have to define harm.----- Why do you think harming other people should be avoided?
Is it not because you view harming other people as bad?----- I’m saying that your harm others argument will also spiral out of control.Harm is no better defined than bad.
Do bruises count as harm?
Do hurt feelings count as harm?Where are you drawing your specific line? Why couldn’t somebody draw another line a few steps beyond yours?And, the big one: who gets to decide when somebody has been harmed?Edited by Bluejay, : superfluous commas

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-Bluejay/Mantis/ThylacosmilusDarwin loves you.

Hi, Stile. You sure did. And, I even remember reading it before. It must have escaped my mind on my second attempt (it was very early in the morning).I apologize for being stupid.----- I really do enjoy debating with you, but somehow we always end up arguing about what words mean, even though both of us are adamant that we hate this. I don’t know how to continue this debate without arguing definitions.Perhaps it’s my fault. I apologize again.-----I will suggest this little thought, though:If harm and benevolence are meant to be opposites, can one exist without the other?
I argue that they cannot.
If I'm right, then the tradeoff would be between "maximizing good" and "minimizing bad," neither one of which makes god malevolent.
Either way, the original argument that I made is correct: the existence of suffering is not evidence against a benevolent god.

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-Bluejay/Mantis/ThylacosmilusDarwin loves you.

Hi, Stile. I'm in full agreement here.I always find myself in a peculiar situation when it comes to this type of argument. Atheists usually think I'm insane because of my apologetics approach, and theists usually think I'm a heretic because I don't come to any conclusions that they particularly like, either.I rest my belief in a non-omnipotent god who, whether "benevolent" or not, generally keeps its fingers out of people's personal lives. Whether or not that belief is vindicated, I suppose I may find out someday. But, until then, I supposed I'll just remain in uncertainty.That's not nearly as scary to me now as it once was.Anyway, thanks for the debate. See you at the next one.

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-Bluejay/Mantis/ThylacosmilusDarwin loves you.