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Author | Topic: In defense of nihilism | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
robinrohan Inactive Member |
A person won't of course know it is Gods gift they are refusing. That makes things rather problematic. If a person doesn't know what he's refusing, he can hardly be blamed for refusing something good that he thought was bad, or something true that he thought was false. If I refuse what seems to me an irrational idea and it turns out to be "God's gift," surely this is not my fault. It is my choice to refuse it, but if my ideas are sincere, then my error in understanding is innocent.
He doesn't say things like "Robin - if you stop drinking for a week then I'll consider that to be you pulling yourself in my direction" Well, that's good to know.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
What you seem to be doing, iano, is whittling down what we have to do, as opposed to what God does, to almost nothing. However, you can't whittle it down all the way. If you did, the doctrines of sin, salvation, heaven, and hell wouldn't make much sense.
You say this:
In fact there are no conditions. Then you say this:
All a person has to do is not say No. You've just given a condition. You also seem to be saying that we should pay attention to our emotions not our reason:
But the call doesn't happen at rational level. It happens at heart (or soul) level. Of course, we are not supposed to let all our emotions dictate our actions, only certain ones. And we pick out the certain ones that are in keeping with the moral system that's written in our hearts. Of course we can't prove that our moral system is The Moral System.All we can do is point to its near-universality, like this: Whilst nihilism cannot say there is anything objectively wrong with sex with 4 year olds it is interesting to note an this extreme example where child sex abusers actually don't see anything wrong with their behaviour. Its near-universality does not prove that the rule is objective any more than the near-universal belief that the earth was stationary in the past prove that the earth is in fact stationary. However, certain near-universal feelings that we have do suggest that people have perhaps a "moral faculty" as one has a rational faculty, and that some people's moral faculties work better than other's. And as we intuit the assumptions of geometry, we also intuit the rightness or wrongness of certain actions. There are all sorts of ways we can interpret our general abhorrence of certain actions without invoking God. But let us return to your idea that we should pay more attention to certain feelings than we should the results of Reason. This goes back to that game of God I spoke of earlier. Here we have a world that, on the face of it, operates by chance. By "chance," of course, I do not mean that there are no "laws of nature," but we understand that a law of nature is just a description of what things always do. For example, a very nice person has a car wreck and is hideously maimed. What caused this car wreck? This nice person's brakes failed. What caused the failure of the brakes? Well, during its manufacture, somebody assembling the brakes forgot to insert a certain screw properly. Why? He had a headache that day and so was rather careless in his normally meticulous procedure. What caused the headache? He has had a tendency for bad headaches ever since he was a child, and he forgot to pick up his medicine from the pharmacy. What caused him to forget? Well, he was very excited about this young lady he met at church the night before, couldn't get her out of his mind, and so the idea of picking up the medicine didn't occur to him until after the pharmacy had closed. Why was he excited about the young lady he met, which caused him to forget his medicine, which caused him to have a headache, which caused him to improperly insert the screw, which caused the brakes to fail, which caused the car wreck, which caused the nice young person to be hideously maimed? There is no end to these questions. This is what I mean by life operating by chance. This is the way life appears on its surface, iano. And to combat that idea, we are supposed to be influenced by certain strong moral feelings that occur to us from time to time which are supposed to let us know FOR CERTAIN that this world of chance we experience day after day doesn't really exist, that it's really all planned out in secret--except of course for the actions of our "free will"--by the Almighty. And we are supposed to believe that--based on some "feelings" we have.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
Iano, would you agree that events occur in this world by chance?
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
Nope (he said with fingers crossed). God knows every single thing that happens - and what will happen. Nothing happens without his 'assenting' to it (I use the word cautiously). He knows when a swallow falls from the air and he knows how many hairs that are on my head (you wouldn't have to be omniescent to know that in my case - I looked at the fine head of hair you had - in 2002 at least and....envied). When I die it will be on the day God has determined that I die Well, would you agree that events in the world APPEAR to occur by chance, as in the example of the car wreck? If you do, then we can conclude that this appearance is an illusion created by God. Why did he create this illusion? So that we wouldn't know He was out there? And by the way, why are you crossing your fingers? I thought you were absolutely CERTAIN. This message has been edited by robinrohan, 12-07-2005 03:28 PM
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
Before we stray to far it would be worth while having a definition of what constitutes chance. The "reason" or cause of an event can produce various answers. In one sense, the reason the nice person had the car wreck was that her brakes failed. But that's not the type of reason I'm talking about. I'm talking about the "final cause" or purpose of the car wreck. My point is that there seems to be no overall purpose in such events, on the face of it. It was an accident, of which life is full. That's what I mean by "chance." Common sense tells us that events in life happen by chance-- a series of accidents. If life does not consist of a series of accidents, then such a view is an illusion created by God. Why did God create this illusion? Why is God operating secretly?
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
You mean why doesn't God just go and make himself known to everybody? That's exactly what I mean.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
Hate to do this to you... No problem. It was just a suggestion. "Taste" will do as well. Most of us have similar moral tastes, like most people like ice cream. This message has been edited by robinrohan, 12-08-2005 01:18 PM
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
I have been contending that God has designed a finely balanced mechanism whose end goal is to have us 'chose' freely for or against him. A way that doesn't tilt the scales in either direction. If he was to make himself manifest in an obvious way: say for arguments sake to show everyone a glimpse of life in hell and life in heaven - would that not destroy the very idea of free choice. Remember, Gods motivation for doing all this is love. iano, if there was some woman out there who loved me, but never communicated with me and never even let me know she existed, because she did not want to "influence" my decision to love her in any way, she should hardly be upset if I don't love her back. Or if there was some rich old man out there who kept doing all these secret things for me, like getting me jobs or having me "win" a lottery which was fake, but never let me know he was doing such things, because he did not want me to like him for just those reasons, he should hardly be upset if I don't feel any gratitude.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
What manfestation would satisfy you without ruining you ability to make a free choice. Bear in mind, whilst you ponder on this, the rather choice-compromising reactions of people who were in anyway directly exposed to God: glowing faces, struck blind etc. iano, I'm sure there's the possibility of something in betweeen the two extremes--what we have now, and the sky being rolled back like a scroll. But I think you have a point in suggesting that the theoretical concept of God "showing himself" is problematical.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
Good weekend Robin It's cold outside. Warm fire. Tonight is wine night. Might make a pretty good PNT--"How could God show himself more obviously?"
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
Making it easier to believe in him? Exactly. If it's supposed to be so important that we believe that He exists, He might want to let us know He's around.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
Your life becomes governed by that very knowledge that you have. It is ordered and controlled by it. You are as captive, whether you like it or not, to the fact that 1+1=2 as you would be if God turned up. You would have to believe. No free will involved. But why should that matter? You seem to be suggesting that whether or not one believes that God exists is a moral test, and if you don't believe you fail the test. Some test! God hides himself away and we are supposed to guess one way or the other.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
It is not a moral test. So you don't have to believe in God to go to heaven?
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
But you can resist getting to that point by saying no, no, no, no, no, no, no NO!! It comes to the same thing, iano. It's still a test.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
But remember, if you 'respond yes' to God, it is only by the workings of the conscience that he gave you. If you respond no then it is of yourself - it is against the conscience he gave you. Yes comes from him, no comes from you It's still a test. One makes a choice--oneself or God. It's possible to pass or fail the test.
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