If you were God, what kind of God would you be?

If I were God? Well, for one thing, I wouldn't have created the talking snake. Oh, and I'd put any magical fruit I didn't want eating out of reach of anyone who might eat it. That would seem a sensible precaution.I would prevent people from the errors of infidelity or worshiping false gods by giving clear unambiguous signs of my existence and nature. Maybe a brief brisk daily message to my creation, something like this: "Hi, it's the creator of the universe here. My thought for today: don't worship Diana of the Ephesians, she really sucks. Can she do this?" [At this point I would do some highly visible miracle] "Wow, I'm awesome, aren't I? Anyone sacrificing goats to her is just wasting goats, don't say you weren't told, people. Er ... what else ... oh, yes, if you live in the Ur of the Chaldees area, you should see ten million angels with flaming wings pass over around 8 p.m. ... enjoy the show. Well, talk to you all again tomorrow."Oh, and if I chose a people, Nazis and gas chambers wouldn't feature much in their history, or folks might think that I was an impotent nobody not worth a curse, let alone a prayer.I guess you could say that I'd be the sort of God who learns from other gods' mistakes.So, have I got your vote?Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

If you really can't tell the difference between good and evil, arguing with you about morality seems fairly pointless. I don't have to be completely righteous to be right on this one point.Without being perfectly wise, I can know that a man who claims to be an aardvark is talking rubbish. Without living a perfectly healthy lifestyle, I can still judge (and you should believe) that eating cyanide is unhealthy. And without being completely righteous, I am still in a position to assert that the God of the Bible, if he existed, would be unspeakably wicked.I would need a perfect moral sense to make the very finest possible moral distinctions. But the moral distinction between me and the God of the Bible is not a fine one.

Well, of course that's easy to say. But actions speak louder than words.If I wrote down on a piece of paper: "Hitler is light, and in him there is no darkness at all", that wouldn't magically make the Holocaust not wrong, would it? Well, he would say that, wouldn't he. But should we not judge him by his actions rather than by his boastful words about himself? Hitler kept going on about what a splendid chap he was.That his ways are not my ways, I freely concede. For example, I have committed genocide less often. And if I wrote on a piece of paper: "Trust in Hitler and not on your own understanding", would that suffice to suspend your moral judgment with regard to him?---The trouble with your whole line of argument is that you can defend anyone by assuming that they were in the right. Like this.Me: Hitler was a bad man.Nazi: No he wasn't.Me: But he started WWII and instigated the Holocaust.Nazi: Those were good things to do.Me: But I find his actions morally revolting.Nazi: Yes, exactly --- you find his actions morally revolting. This is because, unlike Hitler, your moral sense is imperfect. If you were a truly good person, like Hitler, then you would know what a splendid thing the Holocaust was.Me: But I think his actions were wicked.Nazi: You think so. But it is written in Mein Kampf that Hitler was a simply splendid chap.Me: You proffer Hitler's own advertisement for himself as evidence of his character?Nazi: Of course. As this testimony comes from a perfectly moral man who was incapable of lying, there can be no more unimpeachable source.Me: I feel this argument is becoming somewhat circular ...---And of course the way I break the circle of the argument is that I do know the difference between right and wrong, and I know that I know this. Perhaps I don't know it perfectly, but even a man half-blind can tell the difference between light and darkness.But you enter into the circular argument --- and so there is no atrocity that you cannot justify, no God so false that you cannot worship him, no creature so daemonic that you couldn't swear that he was divine.But why should I, standing outside the circle of your argument, ever be persuaded to enter into it --- any more than I would be tempted by similarly circular arguments to worship Satan or Moloch or Baal?

Aztec: You should worship Tezcatlipoca.Me: Why?Aztec: Because he's infinitely good, and therefore worthy of worship.Me: But doesn't he enjoin human sacrifice and ritual cannibalism on his followers?Aztec: Oh, good, I see you've been reading up on him. What's your point?Me: Well, isn't that kind of ... bad? And therefore in contradiction to your claim that he's infinitely good?Aztec: But Tezcatlipoca wants human sacrifice and ritual cannibalism!Me: That would be kind of my point. It seems to me that if he wants bad things, then (if he exists) he is himself bad.Aztec: But since Tezcatlipoca wants these things, and since he is infinitely good, they can't possibly be bad things. So your argument fails.---Now, if you can see the problem with his reasoning, then please note that it holds up a mirror to yours.In order for me to judge between various claims about the attributes of an infinitely good being, I have to stand outside the circle of reasoning that begins with the premise that the being in question is infinitely good --- and instead apply my own moral sense, imperfect though it may be, to those claims.And, standing outside these charmed magical circles of reasoning, I see no reason why I should step inside any one of them. Why should I follow you round and round your magic circle rather than following the priest of Tezcatlipoca? How can I find your reasoning valid without finding his reasoning valid also?But you can't both be right.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

I've been waiting for you to answer my posts. While I'm waiting, one last conundrum. Should I rape Suzy?Let me explain. I am (for the purposes of this discussion) highly sexually attracted to a woman called Suzy. She, on the other hand, is not attracted to me at all.Now, I am not morally perfect. But my judgment is that it would be wrong for me to gratify my sexual urges by raping Suzy, whereas it would be right for me to abstain from doing so. My imperfect human morality tells me that I shouldn't rape Suzy.But the biblegod might think something completely different. After all, I find his decisions about murder and rape and genocide and infanticide and slavery utterly shocking. Apparently his morality is completely different from my morality, and often his morality is in favor of his followers doing cruel and brutal and senseless acts of violence. Therefore, he might disagree with me completely about whether I should rape Suzy.So, should I rape Suzy? According to me, NO, NO, A HUNDRED TIMES NO. But that's just me. However, according to you, what matters is not what I think, but what the biblegod thinks --- the same biblegod who murdered everyone in the world except Noah, his kids, and their wives ---- the same biblegod who told his chosen people to commit rape against the women of the people they conquered --- the same biblegod whose morality is totally incomprehensible to me and fills me with disgust.So according to my standard of morality, I should not rape Suzy. But perhaps according to the biblegod's standard of morality, I should rape Suzy. And he would be right. After all, my standard of morality is, as you have explained, inferior to that of the biblegod, and, as is obvious, my standard of morality is completely different from that of the biblegod.So, once I have discarded my own imperfect human ideas of good and evil --- should I rape Suzy? Apparently, I have no idea. To know that, I'd have to be able to read the mind of the biblegod. Until then, it seems, I might as well toss a coin.OK ... biblegod ... give me a sign ... if the coin comes down heads, I won't rape Suzy ...And then you have the nerve to accuse your opponents of "moral relativism". Your argument abolishes everything we think we know about good and evil. EVERYTHING. However wicked an action is, it would be good if the biblegod was in favor of it.

That's fine. In your own time. See your post #57.---I'll come back to you in a few minutes. I smoke, and I've promised my wife that I'll smoke outside, so this is what I'm going to do right now.

You write: But this doesn't answer my points. I had two points, I believe. Let me recapitulate them.POINT 1: You can excuse anyone like that.You could say that Hitler was perfect, and I could say: "Hey, but what about the Holocaust?" and you could reply: "Well, since Hitler is perfect, the Holocaust must have been good, so the Holocaust doesn't prove that Hitler was bad."Or you could say that Tezcatlipoca was perfect, and I could say: "Hey, but what about all the human sacrifice and ritual cannibalism?", and you could reply: "Well, since Tezcatlipoca is perfect, human sacrifice and ritual cannibalism must be good, so they don't prove that Tezcatlipoca is bad."Do you see the problem?Why should I believe that your argument that the biblegod is perfect without also accepting the Nazi's argument that Hitler is perfect and the Aztec's argument that Tezcatlipoca is perfect? What's the difference? They all sound equally stupid and illogical to me.POINT 2: Should I rape Suzy?My point is this. Your argument pulls out all concepts of good and evil out from under my feet. I thought I knew that rape was wrong. But according to you it would be right if the biblegod approved of it. And I don't know what he's thinking. According to the Bible, he has all sorts of ideas about what is right and wrong that would never occur to me.So if I accept that the biblegod is the ultimate standard of what is right and wrong, then I have to conclude that I don't know the difference between right and wrong, either generally or in specific cases. In which case, I don't know whether I should or shouldn't rape Suzy.---Please address one or both of these points. Don't just tell me again what you believe --- I know what you believe. You have preached enough, it is time for you to try to justify your preaching.

But you're digging yourself deeper into your pit.Look, according to me it would be a sin to rape Suzy.But according to you, it seems that I don't really know that. I cannot, you say, "identify sin". Since I am a sinner, and since I have "lusted over a woman", I am in no position to judge. I don't actually know whether it would be a good or a bad thing to rape Suzy. As you say, it's "no good going on about moral judgement".OK, I'll toss a coin again. It came down heads last time, so Suzy is as yet unraped. Now ... heads, I won't rape Suzy ...Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

You admit that? But that is exactly what you have been denying for the last umpteen posts.If you will admit that I know the difference between righteousness and sin, then what the heck have we been arguing about?I do indeed know the difference. This is why I know that the biblegod, if he existed, would be evil.

So Hell is a lie, right?"No more pain and suffering"?Thanks for clearing that up. No, you haven't. Let me know when you do.

Then you might have chosen your words with more care.Let's look at it again in slow motion.I suggested that the biblegod might be bad.You replied that the biblegod had promised that at some unspecified time in the future, there would be "no more pain and suffering".Quizzed further on this subject, you admit that you think that this supposed promise was a lie, and that in fact some people will experience pain and suffering forever.But if this whole "no more pain and suffering" promise is a lie, then how does the fact that the biblegod told that lie prove that he is good?If the priest of Tezcatlipuca tells me that Tezcatlipoca has promised that one day it will rain beer, but that according to the doctrines of his religion Tezcatlipoca is not telling the truth, then this doesn't incline me to worship Tezcatlipoca as the Giver of Beer. It inclines me to despise Tezcatlipoca as the Father of Lies. And yet, curiously enough, of the two of us it is you who goes around claiming to speak for God, and telling us what he thinks and what his opinions are.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

Your argument fails twice.First, because if your logic was good, it would follow by the same "process of reductio ad absurdum" that if Hitler was really evil, then he would have killed the Jews in the most evil way possible, rather than by the relatively quick and humane method of gassing them. By your logic, we would have to conclude that Hitler's motives were not evil.Second, because surely if the biblegod thought that he should murder the people who died in the Flood, he also presumably decided that they should burn in Hell for ever, which is the nastiest thing that he could possibly do to them.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

So, just to be clear about this. When you said "neither will there be pain and suffering", you were implicitly excluding the people who would suffer pain for all eternity?Hey. let me use my Godlike powers. By my quasi-divine beneficence, everyone reading this post will win their state lottery this week.What's that? You didn't win? Well, obviously when I said that "everyone" would win, I meant everyone except for the people who wouldn't win.If you call me a liar for saying that everyone reading my post would win the lottery, you're just twisting my words. After all, the biblegod himself said that there would be "no more pain and suffering", when what he meant was that there would be no more pain and suffering except for the people whom he condemned to an eternity of pain and suffering. So if I'm a liar, so is he. I did not twist your words. I quoted them. If you now feel a desperate urge to backpedal, this is not dishonesty on my part.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

So, this is still worrying me. I think that I shouldn't rape Suzy, but according to you, unless I am completely righteous, I can't know whether I'm right or wrong. The view that I shouldn't rape her, as you've explained to me, is just my personal view "based on my relativity", whatever you mean by this.And damn, I so want to fuck Suzy; and, as you have explained to me, my moral opinion that I shouldn't rape her counts for absolutely nothing. So I guess that weighing my real desires against my totally negligible moral viewpoint, I should rape her, right?But I don't feel entirely happy about that, so I'll toss the coin again --- heads, I won't rape Suzy. Tails, I will. So far, the coin has come down heads twice, fortunately for her, but you know the old saying: "Third time lucky"? Well, today I'm feeling lucky ...... hold on, I have a better idea. I'll leave it up to you. Here's what I'm going to do.If you tell me that I should rape Suzy, I'll rape Suzy.If you tell me that I shouldn't rape Suzy, I won't rape Suzy.And if you won't answer the question, then I shall take silence as consent, and assume that you think it's OK for me to rape Suzy. So I'll rape Suzy.It's all down to you now. Should I rape Suzy?Everyone else reading this thread can tell me that it's wrong to rape Suzy. Everyone not sharing your twisted moral philosophy can tell me clearly and succinctly that rape is wrong. I urge them to prove my point by replying to this post and posting the words: "No, you shouldn't rape Suzy".But you --- according to the philosophy that you preach --- cannot tell me that it would be wrong to rape Suzy. So either the question of whether I should rape Suzy is up in the air, and I might as well toss a coin to decide it --- or there is something profoundly wrong with your moral philosophy.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

So, there you go, mike. One vote in. Straggler, who is an evolutionist (I don't know his opinions about God) can say clearly and distinctly that I shouldn't rape Suzy because that would be morally wrong.Unfortunately for Suzy, I have rested her fate in your hands, not Straggler's. Poor girl. She's really not going to like what I'm going to do to her one little bit.Should I rape Suzy?It's a simple question. The people whom you decry as "moral relativists" can tell me that it would be wrong. I know that it would be wrong. But you --- your moral philosophy prevents you from expressing an opinion.Which is a shame for Suzy. Her fate is in your hands.Should I rape Suzy?