Free Will and the Nature of Heaven

[aelf]

Being basic and familiar doesn't make it true or even coherent. It's more impressive NOT to be tempted by the options that would tempt most people. For example, Adam Sandler's successful graduation from his Anger Management course (I didn't see the movie, so if that's not how it ends pretend it did) is less impressive than the peaceful campaign by Indians to end British rule.

Why is it incoherent?

 

[Greizer85]

@Aelf: how do you define your moral values?

(I will answer you later but I'm too tired; and I'd like to hear your answer first.)

 

[aelf]

@Aelf: how do you define your moral values?

(I will answer you later but I'm too tired; and I'd like to hear your answer first.)

Not sure if I'm up to that right now either. But it should be pretty clear what I mean. It has to do with right and wrong.

 

[Greizer85]

Not sure if I'm up to that right now either. But it should be pretty clear what I mean. It has to do with right and wrong.

But if not by personal feelings and practicality, then what method do you use? If you really believe that there are absolute right and wrong, where do they come from? God is one answer, but what are the others?

Edit: I need some sleep, it's 5:30 in Finland. I can't wait until school starts in October, my internal clock is totally messed up.

 

[aelf]

But if not by personal feelings and practicality, then what method do you use? If you really believe that there are absolute right and wrong, where do they come from? God is one answer, but what are the others?

No, I'm not a moral absolutist. I believe there's right and wrong, but they're not completely devoid of context. At the same time, there are going to be certain acts that are always wrong and can be criticised regardless of the difference in contexts.

For example, I can say, living in such circumstances and times as I am, that the practice of hunting helots as a rite of passage is cruel and cannot be justified because it contravenes certain or all relevant values that are universal. However, I'm not going to say that lying, or even killing, is necessarily wrong, depending on the reasons why it's done.

Edit: I need some sleep, it's 5:30 in Finland. I can't wait until school starts in October, my internal clock is totally messed up.

I've been living like that for the longest time.

 

[bhsup]

...evil and suffering exist in this world, even though a truly good God would not allow such things.

I'm not going to read through six pages to see if this has been pointed out yet or not, but your entire argument is flawed because of that assertion. No mere human is qualified to make that sort of judgment call.

 

[cardgame]

No mere human is qualified to make that sort of judgment call.

Why not?..

 

[bhsup]

Because we're not. It' self-evident. Considering how limited we are compared to an omniscient being, I'd say the onus is on the OP to prove we're in a position to judge God.

 

[cardgame]

If he's real he's not omniscient...
I'm going to bed for now but i'm sure there are plenty of examples if his lack of omniscience in the Bible, even.

 

[warpus]

Leaving the logical argument unspecified is your problem here.

Murder is pretty much the nastiest thing you can do to someone. If some random guy kicked you in the ass, that would suck, right? If people were allowed to randomly kick other people in the ass without any punishment at all, would that be good for society in any way? Sure, people who like to kick other people in the ass might get a kick out of it, but other than that, that's a big BAD FOR SOCIETY.

Murder is kinda like that, except it's a lot lot worse and does a lot more damage to society. I mean, it's pretty much at the extreme negative end of "possible level of niceness of an action directed towards another person". You could argue that torture could be worse, but murder is def. up there.

I know you're looking for some sort of a "first principles" logical deduction, but that's not how ethics work. If you disagree that murder is a bad thing, I would love to see an explanation of how murder benefits society and the individuals within, in any sort of way that's not "horrible" on average.

 

[GoodGame]

Most major religious traditions with a concept of Heaven - Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Mormonism, the Jehovah's Witnesses, Baha'i - hold that God is good. Yet it is undeniable that evil and suffering exist in this world, even though a truly good God would not allow such things. In a partial attempt to resolve this dilemma, apologists for these traditions often rely on the so-called "free will defense". For the sake of arguement let us say, in the religious realm, free will implies that an omnipotent divinity does not assert its power over individual's will and choices.

Your thoughts

I'll go with Holy_king's response, and also say that I think you're over-rationalizing it, or at least maybe using an overly general approach when maybe you should specifically analyze each religion separately.

My understanding of Christianity is that god is the creator, but don't confuse that with god as an omnipotent being. God not being omnipotent, is what I would take to be the true meaning of the so-called 'free-will defense'. I.e. Humans possess free-will, thereby god isn't omnipotent; God can't puppeteer the billions of earthlings, which is demonstration that there are limits to god's power. God can send signs, prophets, occasional miracles and angels, but can't do it all the time.

The existence of heaven is a separate idea. In Judaism, not sure, but is there a heaven? There was a blessed real land, blessings, etc.. from obeying god, but was there an afterlife?

For Christians, I suspect heaven is really just the final completion of the religion by the last coming of the savior. It's not a lifetime reward, per se, is what I think. I think heaven becomes a life-time reward concept as people try to say "how could there be an omnipotent god, if there's death?"; But I think that point is moot, unless scripturally, god is taken to be omnipotent, I think (popularly, god might be taken to be omnipotent, but then it's a miseducation problem, not doctrinal problem).

 

[aelf]

Murder is pretty much the nastiest thing you can do to someone. If some random guy kicked you in the ass, that would suck, right? If people were allowed to randomly kick other people in the ass without any punishment at all, would that be good for society in any way? Sure, people who like to kick other people in the ass might get a kick out of it, but other than that, that's a big BAD FOR SOCIETY.

So what if murder happens to be good for society at some point, like when an imminent resource crisis calls for the killing off of some people before it gets to the point where most people would die?

Murder is kinda like that, except it's a lot lot worse and does a lot more damage to society. I mean, it's pretty much at the extreme negative end of "possible level of niceness of an action directed towards another person". You could argue that torture could be worse, but murder is def. up there.

It doesn't even follow that a lot of murders will lead to deterioration of the society as a whole. Let's take an extreme example here. Let's say the Final Solution had not coincided with a world war because the war did not yet happen for whatever reason. Was the mass murder of Jews really going to destabilise German society? How many acts of genocide have been committed without resulting in great negative consequences for the society that took part in it? How many societies did not have to pay the price for their evil deeds?

It seems that when it comes down to it, there must be something more than "bad for society" as the reason why some acts are incontrovertibly wrong.

I know you're looking for some sort of a "first principles" logical deduction, but that's not how ethics work. If you disagree that murder is a bad thing, I would love to see an explanation of how murder benefits society and the individuals within, in any sort of way that's not "horrible" on average.

Evidently, you are veering into a consequentialist path. It might interest you to know that some famous theistic thinkers are quite consequentialist, even to the point where they state that a very good reason for having religious faith is the good consequences that religious faith brings.

 

[Berzerker]

Because we're not. It' self-evident. Considering how limited we are compared to an omniscient being, I'd say the onus is on the OP to prove we're in a position to judge God.

didn't Jesus say something about his followers judging even the angels? But God (of the OT) is not self evidently omniscient, on the contrary, we're given one example after the next of God being ignorant of facts at hand, like Adam and Eve hiding from God in the Garden.

 

[Belisar]

Most major religious traditions with a concept of Heaven

At the beginning of a wrong hypothesis is always a wrong assumption

 

[Camikaze]

If sin keeps you from getting into heaven; why would God allow it once you get there?

Why would sin stop you getting in to heaven? Seeing as, according to the average theist, Jesus was the only human to not sin, wouldn't this mean that no one apart from him is in heaven?

As to the second part, iHeaven is a place that has no actual specific description in religous text, so how can us simple mortals describe it without using what we know about here on Earth?

They can't. However, there is nothing to say that the description by simple mortals of heaven is a correct one. It may be (and most likely is) indescribable. So attaching finite limits on the possibilities of heaven, or the nature of heaven, is not going to really get you anywhere.

@bolded- apple are coming up with everything nowadays.

 

[bhsup]

If he's real he's not omniscient...
I'm going to bed for now but i'm sure there are plenty of examples if his lack of omniscience in the Bible, even.

didn't Jesus say something about his followers judging even the angels? But God (of the OT) is not self evidently omniscient, on the contrary, we're given one example after the next of God being ignorant of facts at hand, like Adam and Eve hiding from God in the Garden.

Okay, even if not omniscient, we're talking about the supreme being of the universe here. He created everything.

 

[Danielos]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mmskXXetcg

I think Richard Dawkins put is so eloquently perfect here. What makes Christianity so unique? What makes that religion more true than any other religion?? Christians are also atheists, because the deny any other past and present religions, despite that the Christian God is just as silly and imaginary as all other gods humans have invented. As Dawkins says, it is all just a matter of in what age and culture you are brought up in. If you lived in Scandinavia during the early Middle Ages, you would have believed in pagan gods! Has any evidence surfaced that Thor and Oden does NOT exist?? What if the vikings were right, and the Christians are wrong??

 

[warpus]

So what if murder happens to be good for society at some point, like when an imminent resource crisis calls for the killing off of some people before it gets to the point where most people would die?

Is that the situation now? No. That is a purely hypothetical scenario that does not apply to the real world.

It doesn't even follow that a lot of murders will lead to deterioration of the society as a whole. Let's take an extreme example here. Let's say the Final Solution had not coincided with a world war because the war did not yet happen for whatever reason. Was the mass murder of Jews really going to destabilise German society? How many acts of genocide have been committed without resulting in great negative consequences for the society that took part in it? How many societies did not have to pay the price for their evil deeds?

It seems that when it comes down to it, there must be something more than "bad for society" as the reason why some acts are incontrovertibly wrong.

Uhh.. I have no idea how, but you have forgotten the emotional pain of the mothers, the brothers, the husbands, the loved ones, the friends, of the deceased.

 

[Greizer85]

All right, let's try and tackle some of this. I'm going to the beach tomorrow so today I have some time for philosophical arguments.

Yeah, like I said, legal positivism. Unfortunately, it's an unsatisfactory answer because you'd probably agree yourself that there are instances where laws are unjust. In fact, you said so yourself. If that's the case, there must be right and wrong outside of the legal context.

Yes, there is, but they are not absolute. The law is the great equalizer (ideally); a 'supreme morality', if you will. The law should value practicality greatly over 'feel-good' issues, in order to guarantee the ideal balance between freedom and security (for productivity, progressiveness, what have you).

Fortunately, these sentiments can be accounted for and explained in a non-relativist ethical framework. Like I said, there are universal values, and IMO tracing their source yields several possible conclusions.

You still haven't explained where these universal values come from.

What do you base these reflections on, then?

Ideally on experience, logic and conscience intertwined, but in practice customs, the law, religion, etc. affect moral decisions in addition, and even to a greater degree. Also, there are exceptions to every moral rule. We'll get to that a bit later.

It might be generally bad, but what makes those instances where it might be good for the species' survival bad?

It makes most humans quesy to murder fellow human beings. That might aversely affect productivity (mental illness, rebellion); I admit that you do have a case here. But there was a reason why the Nazi camps were mostly hidden from the public. Also consider this: if you set out to kill minorities, and are a part of any minority yourself (everyone is), you can never be sure when they come for you next. So there is an incentive not to murder groups of people, based on simple self-interest. It may ofc not be often thought of by the perpetrators.

I believe that we have standards by which we can judge another culture's practices, otherwise we get into all sorts of awkward ethical situations. It doesn't go so far as saying that the culture is evil, but it does mean that we can criticise practices that fall below the standards.

There are standards, but they are strictly ours. What was moral then is immoral now. I don't like it, but that is my pov to it.

No, I'm not a moral absolutist. I believe there's right and wrong, but they're not completely devoid of context. At the same time, there are going to be certain acts that are always wrong and can be criticised regardless of the
difference in contexts.

Imo there are exceptions to every rule, including moral ones. Of course they must be weighed carefully.

For example, I can say, living in such circumstances and times as I am, that the practice of hunting helots as a rite of passage is cruel and cannot be justified because it contravenes certain or all relevant values that are universal. However,
I'm not going to say that lying, or even killing, is necessarily wrong, depending on the reasons why it's done.

Key part bolded. The Spartans saw it as necessary; it was a valid exception for them.

So what if murder happens to be good for society at some point, like when an imminent resource crisis calls for the killing off of some people before it gets to the point where most people would die?

Would you kill a hundred people in order to save a million? Of course irl it's not that simple since we don't know the outcome for certain; and as warpus said such situations are few and far between. But suppose a deadly virus was spreading in one country or continent and refugees were flooding to the borders. It would have a 100% mortality rate and be latent for two weeks. Somehow miraculously noone would yet be infected elsewhere (maybe if it was another planet this was more plausible). Would you close the borders and doom the refugees to certain death, in order to save the (rest of the) Earth?

It doesn't even follow that a lot of murders will lead to deterioration of the society as a whole. Let's take an extreme example here. Let's say the Final Solution had not coincided with a world war because the war did not yet happen for whatever reason. Was the mass murder of Jews really going to destabilise German society? How many acts of genocide have been committed without resulting in great negative consequences for the society that took part in it? How many societies did not have to pay the price for their evil deeds?

It does say in the Bible that it rains on the wicked as well as the just. But consider the lost productivity from the killing of the Jews. It may be a cold way of thinking, but humans are very valuable resources to be wasted in genocidal lunacies.

You might ofc say, why not enslave them then? Well, nowadays people's sentiments run against slavery (at least in the West). In fact genocide is also unthinkable in the western world. The installation of Western values to the rest of the world would be a good solution to this problem.

You could then argue further, that those values came from a tradition of moral absolutism (i.e. Christianity). It is a tricky thing. But consider my next answer:

It seems that when it comes down to it, there must be something more than "bad for society" as the reason why some acts are incontrovertibly wrong.

It feels like that, yes. To most people. Only when animal instincts take over in the form of mass psychosis, is this feeling of wrongness subdued. The conditions for such a condition (heh) do not exist anymore in the Western world. Hitler thought us the dangers of extreme idealism. And abundant material wealth keeps war a distant thought from our mind. Ofc the Christian tradition may also have a hand in all this, but it sure didn't stop the Germans of Hitler's time. Rather it was used by the Nazis as one more justification ("Godless subhumans!") for their relentless brutalities.

Evidently, you are veering into a consequentialist path. It might interest you to know that some famous theistic thinkers are quite consequentialist, even to the point where they state that a very good reason for having religious faith is the good
consequences that religious faith brings.

Well, it can also have bad consequences, e.g. repressing of women, persecuting of homosexuals, etc. Religion can quite easily be used to justify inhuman actions; "devil's spawns" are hardly worth including in the tenets of the Geneva convention. But as long as you restrict its influence, i.e. deny priests political power, I suppose it may do more good than harm. It is still nonsense though (imo).


- There is an obvious problem in all of this. If, say, 70% of people voted to kill the remaining 30%, should it be allowed or not? It is a cause of rather large cognitive dissonance for me, but I'm afraid for me the answer is yes, as it stands right now. You either have all of democracy or none of it. We must count on the good graces of the majority, which is a frightening idea to say the least. Personally I cannot wait for robot dictatorship!

 

[aelf]

Is that the situation now? No. That is a purely hypothetical scenario that does not apply to the real world.

So what? Does your ethical stance stand up to scrutiny or not?

Uhh.. I have no idea how, but you have forgotten the emotional pain of the mothers, the brothers, the husbands, the loved ones, the friends, of the deceased.

So you're really just Utilitarian?

Actually, I have no problem that you rely on Utilitarian principles. As I said, there are several possible reasons why some things are right and some things are wrong. Personally, I would be inclined to subscribe to Utilitarianism if I haven't found something better. But of course it has its problems.

As for how this relates to the thread, some people find God necessary in explaining moral behaviour. I really don't feel like going into apologetics, not least because this isn't exactly my area of expertise, though I have been exposed to pretty strong arguments to that effect. Besides, we've been through this and it's useless to argue here.

All right, let's try and tackle some of this. I'm going to the beach tomorrow so today I have some time for philosophical arguments.

Honestly, this is getting nowhere. I detect some confusion here and there in what you say. I wish I could go into them in detail, but that is a taxing affair and I don't think there would be any point in making longer and longer posts. We will probably have to agree to disagree anyway, and this is not even on topic anymore.

But I'll say a few things and I'll try to keep it short.

Yes, there is, but they are not absolute. The law is the great equalizer (ideally); a 'supreme morality', if you will. The law should value practicality greatly over 'feel-good' issues, in order to guarantee the ideal balance between freedom and security (for productivity, progressiveness, what have you).

Sorry, but to call moral stances 'feel-good' issues is to descend to emotivism. And I find such a great faith in the legal system naive. I don't know if you've been exposed to political critique before, but surely it's no great news that the legal system is chronically prone to bias and abuse. What do you expect, it's a social construct that is highly limited by space, time and authorship. Universal values, the things you call 'feel-good' issues, on the other hand, have a wide and timeless application.

With only the legal system that is subject to prevailing opinions as any standard and an emotivist substratum, you're very vulnerable to ethical problems. I'd say that a lot of the evil that exists today is a result of such a tendency. Is torturing a terrorist suspect the practical thing to do? Well, then let's do it! As long as we can justify it within the legal system it can't be wrong!

I'd say that such a position as yours exists mostly because people haven't really given it a good thought and broadened their knowledge in the relevant subject matters. Like you admit yourself, you don't really think about moral issues.

You still haven't explained where these universal values come from.

My purpose at this point is to argue against relativism, not for my personal belief. If you want to know, I subscribe to virtue ethics.

Ideally on experience, logic and conscience intertwined, but in practice customs, the law, religion, etc. affect moral decisions in addition, and even to a greater degree. Also, there are exceptions to every moral rule. We'll get to that a bit later.

That still doesn't mean there aren't universal standards. And social practices are the application of such standards, not the basis.

It makes most humans quesy to murder fellow human beings. That might aversely affect productivity (mental illness, rebellion); I admit that you do have a case here. But there was a reason why the Nazi camps were mostly hidden from the public. Also consider this: if you set out to kill minorities, and are a part of any minority yourself (everyone is), you can never be sure when they come for you next. So there is an incentive not to murder groups of people, based on simple self-interest. It may ofc not be often thought of by the perpetrators.

Yet it was quite widely known that the Jews were being persecuted. How many people lost sleep over it? Obviously, self-interest alone fails as a standard for morality. In fact, it's the cause of a moral degeneration, as people increasingly emphasize rights over responsibilities and start to push against the boundaries of where their rights end with regard to others'.

And you're getting somewhere with our reaction towards evil. Might you not think that there's a basis for such reaction, a basis that goes beyond current modes of thinking and even evolutionary forces? After all, it's quite universal and quite independent of prevailing conditions and the developmental state of the human civilization.

There are standards, but they are strictly ours. What was moral then is immoral now. I don't like it, but that is my pov to it.

That is incoherent. How can something moral become immoral and vice versa? If it's just because we chose to apply the opposite label, then the terms are meaningless. Then why bother? Nihilism ftw.

Imo there are exceptions to every rule, including moral ones. Of course they must be weighed carefully.

Standards don't mean absolutism.

Key part bolded. The Spartans saw it as necessary; it was a valid exception for them.

Actually, you're missing the point. I put it there to emphasize that despite that, I can appraise their deeds.

And, no, it's not a valid exception anymore than the Final Solution was a valid exception.

Would you kill a hundred people in order to save a million? Of course irl it's not that simple since we don't know the outcome for certain; and as warpus said such situations are few and far between. But suppose a deadly virus was spreading in one country or continent and refugees were flooding to the borders. It would have a 100% mortality rate and be latent for two weeks. Somehow miraculously noone would yet be infected elsewhere (maybe if it was another planet this was more plausible). Would you close the borders and doom the refugees to certain death, in order to save the (rest of the) Earth?

So how do you judge?

It does say in the Bible that it rains on the wicked as well as the just. But consider the lost productivity from the killing of the Jews. It may be a cold way of thinking, but humans are very valuable resources to be wasted in genocidal lunacies.

Ah, now you're coming up with a universal value. But looking at human beings as mere resources smacks of nihilism.

You might ofc say, why not enslave them then? Well, nowadays people's sentiments run against slavery (at least in the West). In fact genocide is also unthinkable in the western world. The installation of Western values to the rest of the world would be a good solution to this problem.

How ethnocentric I'm not even getting into that.

You could then argue further, that those values came from a tradition of moral absolutism (i.e. Christianity). It is a tricky thing. But consider my next answer:

It feels like that, yes. To most people. Only when animal instincts take over in the form of mass psychosis, is this feeling of wrongness subdued. The conditions for such a condition (heh) do not exist anymore in the Western world. Hitler thought us the dangers of extreme idealism. And abundant material wealth keeps war a distant thought from our mind. Ofc the Christian tradition may also have a hand in all this, but it sure didn't stop the Germans of Hitler's time. Rather it was used by the Nazis as one more justification ("Godless subhumans!") for their relentless brutalities.

Well, it can also have bad consequences, e.g. repressing of women, persecuting of homosexuals, etc. Religion can quite easily be used to justify inhuman actions; "devil's spawns" are hardly worth including in the tenets of the Geneva convention. But as long as you restrict its influence, i.e. deny priests political power, I suppose it may do more good than harm. It is still nonsense though (imo).

So you're saying that having moral standards will lead to more evil? That's awfully shaky ground.

- There is an obvious problem in all of this. If, say, 70% of people voted to kill the remaining 30%, should it be allowed or not? It is a cause of rather large cognitive dissonance for me, but I'm afraid for me the answer is yes, as it stands right now. You either have all of democracy or none of it. We must count on the good graces of the majority, which is a frightening idea to say the least. Personally I cannot wait for robot dictatorship!

So the majority is always right even when they're wrong?