God is good and evil

I would like to expand this idea quickly.Assume God is absolutely perfect before creation. Any variation or change from absolute perfection is by definition imperfect. Any action God performs, being a change or variation from absolute perfection, would be imperfect. Therefore an absolutely perfect God would not create the universe, hell he wouldn't do anything and as a result would be changeless and unable to act in anyway.Anyone see any problems with this?

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

How did God "make something". Did he way his hand? Then he changed his physical state. Did he think it into being? Then he changed his mental state. In order to perform any action, God has to change something about himself, even if that change isn't permanant. Given that change from absolute perfection is by definition imperfect, an absolutly perfect being wouldn't be able to act.

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

How can it not be? As I explained to Born2Preach, any action or decission requires a change in state (either physical or mental). A being cannot action without change and any change from absolute perfection is be definition imperfect.Given that this isn't your argument though, I don't expect you to defend it.

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

Which is why I gave more than one option. Normally you would then state which option is correct or give an alternative. Knowing anything or even everything doesn't automatically entail doing anything or everything. Unless you are suggesting that God being all-knowing and therefore knowing about evil means that he does evil? I'm sure that isn't where you want to go. If God is not subject to logic and reason (realistic) how could we know or deduce anything about, including his existance?

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

So you agree with me that using your argument you can know nothing about god. Good. I thought you agreed with me. Yes you did, in the first quoted section of this post. Why then are you making statements about god? If you really believe the first part of your post, you can't possibly make the second claim.[This message has been edited by compmage, 04-24-2004]

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

So you believe, based entirely on faith, in God. Not only that, but also, with no reason and for no reason whatsoever, you believe in just one god?

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

I might be young by some standards but I would hardly call myself 'junior'. I thought I got it and then you introducing personal experiance. I really wish you would make up your mind. Why would you want to start calling me names? I can only think of two 'kinds' of evidence; good evidence and bad evidence. Scientific evidence would all into the former category. Not only that, be here you go talking about evidence again. What happened to belief based purely on faith?

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding belief/faith. From what I know, if you believe (have faith) then you not only don't need evidence, but you don't even need confirmation. The only time evidence is required is when you are willing to admit that you can be wrong, but these are the reasons (evidence, confirmation) that you most likely aren't wrong. But there is only one 'kind'. What I was saying was that the only way to split evidence into 'kinds' is if you are going to split evidence into that which strongly supports you position (good evidence) and that which doesn't support you position (bad evidence). My mind is not closed to evidence, I simply realise that sometimes the evidence doesn't offer any support or perhaps even contradicts your position. Are you arrogant for dismissing Santa Claus (assuming that you do)? There is evidence that he exists, though it is not what you seem to call scientific evidence.

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

We all have a life. That is a good place to start. However, being willing to admit that yu are probably wrong, I wonder why you don't seem to seriously consider that your conclussion that he exists is also probably wrong. Why only question his nature and not his existance?I know you admitted that you can't know that he exists, but you don't seem to give it any serious consideration. I thought he was supposed to be unknowable? Earlier in this thread you wrote; No evidence, or rather any evidence can be made to fit a being whos motives and abilities you don't know. I'm sorry, but you don't seem as if you are being rational. How do you find clues when any evidence you find is compatible with an unknowable God? People are mislead, they make themselves believe things that they wish were true, memories get distorted, some people see things that aren't there, etc. Am I supposed to trust personal evidence? Maybe you should just list these kinds, that way we don't end up going in circles. I would be very surprised if these kinds aren't all physical. If it isn't materialistic (physical) how would I perceive it? The only reason we treat Santa differenly is because we know that he is fictional. Remove this and I see MORE evidence for Santa than for God. Your assersion that God is omnipotent and created the universe boils down to special pleading, unless ofcourse you have evidence of this?

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

Expecting science to disprove a being that is defined in such a way that he is unfalsifiable and then using its inability to do so as evidence amounts to little more than loading the dice. "Personal proof" amounts to nothing given that other people have "personal proof" that contradicts yours and your God. Sure you can, especially when ANY result can be made to fit the idea/being. It is however, meaningless. And how would you evaluate it? See if other people agree with you? You seam to have a problem. Most people think that your God doesn't exist. And personal experiance is meaningless, especially when other peoples personal experiance contradicts yours. Bad reception? This is supposed to be realiable? You back up your belief of one unknown entity with the 'feelings' you get from a sense we don't know exists and that you say can't be shown to exist. This sense also, according to you, is prone to picking up more junk than 'real image'. I have a TV with really bad reception in my garage. The picture is really snowy, but the great thing about this TV is that it shows events from the future. Care to buy it? I don't have too. You are making the claim that he exists, you have to provide the evidence. I treat your God the same as I treat every other God and the same as you treat every other God. Without reliable evidence I don't believe. Where is your evidence? And no, personal experiance doesn't count. Even if I accepted personal experiance as evidence, those that have this 'evidence' against your God outnumber those that have it for your God. Evidence from senses that can't be shown to exist don't count for anything and even if they did you'd be on the losing side. Remember, most people believe that your God doesn't exist. You are making the claim, you have to present the evidence. Your failure to do so is starting to make it seam that you don't actually have any.

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

Well there is crashforg's, there is also mine, which is much the same as his, the there are the Muslims, the Hindu's, etc. However, are you really claiming that you believe that nobody belonging to any other religion has any 'personal experiances'? It is meaningless because it demonstrates nothing. Both A and ~A give the same result. Yes, most people believe in a God or gods of some sort but they don't believe in your God. If I had to setup a questionair asking if your God existed most people would answer no. If a God actually exists but he doesn't posses the attributes that you (or anyone else) believes he does then you aren't worshipping the right God. No, you seam to have forgotten that you said; As I have pointed out before, you keep on contradicting yourself. "You don't need evidence, just faith", "you don't accept my personal experiance as evidence of God". Your wrong. I have personal experiance with this TV showing pictures from the future. Since you accept personal experiance as evidence you have to accept that this TV does actually should pictures from the future, or does personal experiance no longer count. If this is the case then I am left to conclude that your God most likely doesn't exist. The evidence you have presented is subjective and contradicted by most of the worlds population. When you have something more conclussive let me know. I don't think most people are atheist, I just realize that they don't believe in your God. Therefore their personal experiance contradicts yours. Pot calling the kettle black. Stop attacking a strawman and address my actually argument. Funny, that is what I have been saying. Now, address that statement and we can move forward.

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

Lam, never left. You must just have been missing my nitpi...I mean posts.

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

Ned, I thought I addressed this point in the last sentence of that paragraph.

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

Could be, however, given the disparity between the different gods and their natures, the more likely explanation is that they don't exist. You have 100 people all explaining an accident to you, the number of cars involved range from 2 to 8, the car makes represent every manafacturer you have ever heard of and this accident supposedly happened in 12 different cities. Would you believe they are talking about the same event? That would work great, except ofcourse for a god that gets seriously annoid when you don't use his name in your prayers, or one that gets very upset when people bother her with what she thinks are petty things, etc.No evidence means no way to know, and if we were talking about anything other than God I'm fairly sure you would agree with me that the chances of this being/event/thing actually existing or having happened is so remote that we should bother waisting our time. I'm trying to prove my point above. when this standard of evidence is applied to anything besides God you reject it. Good. Now if you could only convince your fellow theists of this so that they can stop trying to force faery tales into classrooms, and stop trying to pass laws that affect people who don't belief as they do, etc. Who says I've never had one? I have belonged to more than 1 religion in my life. The evidence later convinced me that there was nothing supernatural behind these personel experiences.

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations

This is just too much. I offer an example designed to be so unrealiable and far fetched that any reasonable person would realize that to accept these accounts as belonging to the same event would be the hieght of gullability and you actually accept it.[Born2Preach]Well, I guess we won't know till we meet Her/Him, eh?[/QS]And until such time he/she/it isn't worth our time. Like your God? You are trully amazing. That is two examples of rediculous situations, one you would accept and the other you reject only because you know I wasn't being serious. I really want to know, how much money do you spend on info commercial products? Why not? That is exactly what they appear to be. They have no reliable supporting evidence, magical beings performing fantastic feats, talking animals, heroic kings. Yup, just what I would expect from fantasy books. The only difference is that people believe these stories.Could I be wrong? Yes, but I would be very surprised. Started out as a Methodist, later joined a 'happy-clappy' church (almost became a youth minister), Pagan, just plain esoteric, and I had beliefs similar to your just before I became an atheist.As far as the evidence goes, there is too much to list here, but the unrealiablity of evidences offered in support of religious believes was significant. The fact that I can, pretty much at will, 'conjur up' a personal message from god, complete with feelings of euphoria and oneness with the universe, didn't help the religious case much either. For more you will have to bring up specific evidence for God.

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Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in
this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely
conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbian Dictionary of Quotations