How do we know God is "Good"?

There is yet another record that many of us believe GOD left for us. It's the universe around us. It is amazing, awesome, wonderous. Certainly something good in all.The issue with the Bible is that it was written by men, for men of their period, with all of the limitations, prejudices, knowledge base and bias of their period. It was then redacted, time after time, by equally common humans driven by belief, by politics, by hubris. It is an anthology of anthologies, but without the seperations normally found that deliniate the authors and subject.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

You really that emphatic about that? I certainly don't mean to make anyone feel that way. Well,personally because I ended up in it and so far, have still remained vertical. But let me outline the way I see it.There have been several threads lately about good and evil, gain and suffering, blessings and curses. I think that most have missed the point. IMHO you can't have one without the other. If there is to be good, there has to be bad. If there is to be pleasure, there must be suffering. If there will be blessings, there will be curses.But IMHO GOD has also given us, and TTBOMK only us, the ability to actually do something to shift the balance towards one end or the other.If we look at the world, as you describe it "a cold, random and indifferent universe and the physical laws that govern it" we are different than any of the other critters out there. When the rains fail in the Serengetti, the herbivores die. For a while the carnivores have an easy time, but soon they too die. That is the cold, random and indifferent universe.But GOD has given us the ability to both see what is happening and to actually have the capability to do something about it. We can feed the starving, heal the sick, comfort those suffering.The question is whether or not we do what are capable of doing.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I don't believe that I have said at anytime that there is anything significant about our intellect or that GOD particularly favors humans or that we hold some special place in his being.What I did say is that we we are the sole creature capable of making a change for something other than simple random chance and for the benefit of others than ourselves.You mentioned virus's, volcanos and asteroids. There is also drought, famine, El Nino, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes and a long list of other such change generators. But they are significantly different than the acts of man.While we certainly also generate unintended changes, we also can make directed changes, selective changes. There are other critters that make directed changes, ants that grow gardens, termites that build airconditioned homes, beavers that damn streams and flood lands, but they are limited in both scope and extent.We do have the capability of making things better. IMHO that is both a charge, and a gift, from GOD.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I'm not saying that it isn't. It goes beyond scope and extent, and includes intent as well.The mosquito does not set out to give folk malaria. That is not its intent. All it wants to do is eat and breed, in that order.Humans can make changes by intent. They can decide to intervene and feed the starving that result from those random chance events. No other critter does that. IMHO, it is in the area of intent. We do things, both good and bad, based on intent. That is beyond random chance. IMHO, that capability is one of the attributes of the good GOD.But as I have also said in other threads, I see the good GOD in beauty, in the joy we get from song, in love, in flavor, in the subtle emotions we get from smell, in the symmetry and beauty of the most basic forces and in the universe itself. Okay, I have never said that you must or even should believe in GOD. That is something between the individual and GOD himself. You, and many others deny GOD, but if you agree that "We do have the capability of making things better" and if you actually work towards making that a reality, I believe that it is the denied GOD working through you.But that is my personal belief. I do not ask or expect you to agree with me.As I have said in other threads, IMHO what GOD wants is for us to live up to two rather simple commandments, Love GOD and the two parter, love others as you love yourself. If you live just the second of the two commandments, if you love yourself and if you love others equally, you would be loving GOD. You will be doing good.If everyone, aethist and theist alike simply lived up to the second of the Two Great Commandments, and I hope we are moving towards that, then this will one day be a great world.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Of course.Or maybe the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

IMHO, intent is one of the major defining features of Humans. A second major feature is expanded empathy.I believe these two things, intent and empathy that reaches beyond individual, beyond group, beyond immediate needs are the key things that make us human.In an earlier thread you mentioned several of the things that can effect life (and non-life as well) that make this a random universe. There are tectonic events, weather events, viral events. But each of those are undirected, they happen. As you said, they are random.I mentioned that there were also signs of directed events from other critters than humans. There are ants that build farms, bees that build hives, termites that design in airconditioning, beaver making ponds. But all of these are simply to improve the habitat of the critter itself.There are examples of critters doing things that benefit species other than their own. There is the polination by bees, the distribution of seeds that are consumed and then dropped as dung. But these are not intentional.Humans are different. We can have campaigns to save the whales, dolphin or gorilla. We can have conservation. We can feed those starving even if they are a continent away. We can feel sorry for the suffering of those who are not even part of our species, much less family, clan or pack. We can plan for the future, not just the immediate future as in time to move from high to lower pastures, but for decades and millenia ahead.Intent and Empathy.IMHO that is the meaning of the Garden of Eden. It is not some fall from grace, some lost perfection. Rather it is is the first itteration of the message later reafirmed by Jesus; "Love others as you love yourself".

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

The astrobiologist? Some. Well, it would make an interesting thread. I think I can make a case that it is greater than many might think. Ah, but that is why I include extent. Humans are different in the magnitude when it comes to empathy, intent, scope and extent. The pet dog does not become concerned over the fate of dolphin. It does not show empathy for the starving in the house next door. Again, that would make for a great thread. There are hints of it in some of the things we're learning about learning. While we are learning more and more about the HOWs of thought, that does not answer the whole question. Maybe someday we'll understand all of the mechanisms involved in color, math, even art. Maybe we will be able to show that certain areas of the brain light up under each and every known stimulus. Maybe we'll someday understand all the mechanics.But will that answer all the questions? Will that explain love, or beauty, honor or sorrow? Even if we know exactly what happens, will that explain the why or the reality of love? Well, I hope that when I speak of being special that I can also explain exactly how and in terms that others can understand. I hope that I can at the least present my view of religion in compelling arguments even if others may disagree with my conclusions.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

That's close and accurate as far as it goes but I personally believe that GOD does go further. However, GOD is something beyond testing and is a matter of faith. I cannot prove GOD. Knowing that love is but the chemical state of your brain says no more about what love is than analyzing the brushstrokes of George de la Tour's Girl with Candle explains the emotion and effect of the painting. True but not pertinent. Empathy, when combined with intent, extent and scope is what allows us, unlike any other creature, to plan for the good of others, even those not yet born or of different species. We can build machines to outsniff dogs, but can we build a machine to provide empathy? Yes, but I also see things that seem to go beyond the natural processes, that are something more than just the sum of the processes, as a painting is more than the sum of the brushstrokes.I do not see GOD as distant or impersonal. In fact, I see GOD as very personal. Would I be able to convince you of that? Probably not by words or discussion. But perhaps, through my behaviour, I might someday at least make you consider.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

There is an older concept that GOD is terrible. In fact, he often describes himself as such in the writings of the OT.Terrible in these passages is used in a classic sense, meaning great, good, awesome, horrific, ultimate. It is a concept of amorality, something beyond moral or immoral. It can be good, or bad.Good and bad are actually just taglets that we apply to individual experiences. They are attributes that we assign, based on our individual point of view and personal, cultural environment.So asking if GOD is good is a limiting question. GOD is good, and I believe I've pointed out some reasons that I believe that to be true.But GOD is also terrible.Does GOD also embody evil? Yes.GOD is complete.GOD is all.GOD is Yin and Yang.GOD was and is and will be.Is GOD worthy of respect, acknowledgement or praise? IMHO, yes.And fear and awe.And love and honor.GOD Is!

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Well,as I've said before, good and evil are arbitrary terms that we assign, usually based on personal opinion as opposed to the actual incident.GOD is complete.Before we get too deeply buried in specifics, I need to make sure that you and I are talking about things from at the least, a common language.So let's first deal with the Biblical tales.As I have said in the past, IMHO we must read the Bible remembering that it was written by men of a given period and contains all of the limits, prejudices, bias and culture of their period. Can we agree with those assumptions or do you want to first address particular instances from the Bible?

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Thanks. He may well be both, but he is definitely in the calm afterwards. I find him often in the Pastoral. Also the sad Jew Mendelssohn captured GOD in the second movement of his Concerto in E Minor for Violin and Orchestra, Op. 64.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Damn, talking to you is worse than talking to my ex-wives. I still don't get a chance to say anything. LOL.Okay, the Bible is something we can agree on. Those stories must be read through the eyes of the folk living when they were written.So shall we move on to today?

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

That is a great question and goes to the heart of the issue. Why do bad things happen?This may seem like I'm rambling but honest there is a point to all this and I'll return to your nephew before the end of this post. But first, let's step back a short way in time.About 65 million years ago an asteroid smashed down into the Gulf of Mexico a few hundred miles from where I live. That was a monentous event. For a long period of time the dinosaurs had been the dominate lifeform on the planet. They had been very successful and lasted far longer than we have and had expanded into all of the niches that humans now occupy. They lived in warm and cold, high and low, forest and plain, swamp and meadow.The asteroid strike 65 million years ago must be considered a very bad thing for the dinosaurs. So we can ask the same question as about your nephew. Why do bad things happen?Well, here is the fundamentalists chance to show the big picture, how it was bad for the dinos but good for us, right? Well, no, that's not the argument I hope to make.Although the changes after the asteroid strike did open up environmental opportunities that mammals expanded into, I do not see the strike as some act of GOD to bring about humans. Instead, it was a normal result of the universe we live in, one of the random and unfeeling incidents we have both mentioned before.Basically, over the last 65 million years or so all of the evolution of the mammals has happened. That's pretty quick, a rush job as it were, and it shows. If you look at the result (and IMHO this single fact is enough to blow any thoughts of Intellegent Design out of the water), what evolved are critters that are just barely good enough. This is true of every mammal out there. None of them are really well designed overall. They are all a collection of mismatched parts and Rube Goldberg engineering. They get sick. They break. They wear out way too soon.The Fundamentalist might say, "Well, that's all after the fall and before then man was perfect." Fine, they may believe that but frankly, there is no evidence to support such a contention and trying to do so simply opens up way to many other issues. The result of such mental gymnastics is a theology that is an even bigger Rube Goldberg than life as evolved.Back towards the topic.If we look at life today we find similar effects and issues regardless of species. Animals and plants get sick. They have systems that don't function or they break. It's pretty normal.But finally, this gives me the opportunity to point out some of the things I see that show GOD is good.First, the system.IMHO GOD designed a universe that is, unlike the individuals in it, self healing. We can see this at every scale, every level. If we look out way beyond our local neighborhood we can see stars exploding, galaxies colliding. Yet the result of such catastrophies is not an end but a beginning. New stars and galaxies form, new elements are made, we get the iron that forms the core of our planet and our very existence from such events.Closer to home we can see the same thing. The catastrophy 65 millions years ago was healed. The system is designed to assure that if life exists, it will evolve to fill the available environments regardless of what they are. If tomorrow something happened that wiped all mammals from the face of the earth, something else will evolve to fill the world again.Even if all life were destroyed, it's likely it would start again. It certainly happened at least one time before and most likely, several times. Since we know that life began even if we do not know how, there is no reason to believe it could not happen again.So the system GOD created is pretty good. It works well and seems to be self healing.Now let's return to your nephew. He is typical of all the life we see around us. Every living thing we've found so far is subject to desease, to injury, to the limitations of the individual critter. Animals break bones. They get sick. They wear out. Their systems vary from individual to individual.Unfortunately, your nephew has diabetes. I'm sorry. I wish it were otherwise.There is one thing though that also brings me back to the Good GOD, something I've mentioned before. It's something unique to humans that I see as evidence of that Good GOD.We can treat his diabetes. In fact, we are at the point where we can do more for him than ever before. And there is a very good chance that in the not too distant future we may be able to prevent such incidents.Humans, through the scope, extent and intent of their capabilities can do things to help. If he were any other mammal, suffering any desease or breakage, he would be on his own. The other primates do not set and brace broken limbs. They do not treat the deseases that inflict others of their kind, much less other species.That brings me to the fourth attribute that I've mentioned in the past, Empathy.Humans have empathy that extends beyond their immediate family, their species, their clan, their nation. They are the only critters that actually intentionally try to improve the lives of other critters regardless of relationship. The concept of a veterinarian is uniquely human.Yes, when I look around, I see the product of a Good GOD.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Well, I don't believe in inherent sin, so I dont see that as an issue.But you cannot have good without evil, pleasure without pain, gain without suffering.In an earlier post you asked if a meteor falling on my house was good or bad. My answer is neither. It may be unfortunate, but it is not bad. It had no motive, it did not single me out any more than storms, lightning or any other accident singled me out.GOOD and BAD are judgements and labels we assign. For me, they include an element of intent. BAD is the result of concious actions or the willful suspension of morality.Nature can not be bad. The most horrific acts of animals are not bad. Only humans can be bad, IMHO.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Well, Hamlet might wonder but I suppose that people can actually be bad as well as do bad. While such people are in the minority, we hope, they often cause suffering way beyond proportion.The discussion on land mines is moving way, way off topic, but I do think it interesting and one of importance. If you propose a topic on that I'll see about getting it promoted.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion