On May 5, 9:07 am, SM <[email protected]> wrote: > Deidz, > > I note with interest the following post from Bridge in another thread: > > Is stealing wrong? > > > > > I watched a kid steal my basketball once. I just let him take it. He > > snuck off clutching it. > > > I was glad, overjoyed even. > > > Who knows, maybe he'll be a great basketball player who will donate > > basketballs to kids some day? > > It's clear that Bridge can see that the allowance of a wrongful act against > him does not make him complicit in doing wrong as well. Bridge was 'sinned > against', but by allowing it he doesn't take on any of the moral > responsibility which lies with the kid's choice. I believe he's right not > to. To be consistent with your present position, I expect you would > disagree, and hold Bridge at least partially responsible for not only the > outcome (which I can agree with - that is what's meant by "allow"), but more > to the point, even the *moral choice* of the kid. > > I also see a parallel with the second part of this excerpt from Bridge's > post: ("I was glad, overjoyed even...maybe he'll be...some day"), to the > reason for God's 'allowance' of sin. Presumably, Bridge could have stopped > the kid from stealing his basketball, but did not becaus he sensed that a > greater purpose would be served in allowing the offense.
The anti-capitalist comedian in me wants to say "Property is theft! There was no sin in the kid taking the basketball because it's bad for people to hoard so much personal property in the first place." Just kidding. But once again, if you're comparing Bridge's situation as a human watching a kid do a bad thing and deciding not to act on it, to the situation of an omniscient, omnipotent creator of everything with perfect knowledge of everything that will ever happen in the universe as a result of the way he creates it, once again that is a poor comparison. Imagine a different situation in which Bridge is psychic and "creates" this boy, warns the boy that stealing is wrong, but knows that the boy will steal. Ha ha, that's wonderful, the boy sinned but it wasn't that big a deal. (Shouldn't you disagree with Bridge for taking a sin so lightly? Thou shalt not steal?) Doesn't it sound absurd that Bridge would create the boy to steal and make pointless warnings, if stealing were really a bad thing in and of itself? My interpretation is that Bridge doesn't see stealing as a very sinful act, and he's making somewhat relativist arguments all along. I think I'm kind of relativist, but that's a separate issue. If we're critiquing a moral system that doesn't allow much wiggle room, then the child still "sinned" and Bridge's reaction is basically immoral or amoral. He isn't concerned about strict observance of the moral system because this act might be minor *relative* to the possible consequences of it. You were right about how I would interpret the situation. Bridge is technically responsible in part for not stopping the transgression or not trying to correct it afterwards. But obviously he didn't consider it a big enough transgression to pursue. It was a theft that turned into an involuntary donation in retrospect. Again, that's an interesting situation, but too different from an omnipotent creator of the universe. If Bridge knew ahead of time that the child would steal, and he created every aspect of the situation in which the child stole it, this would be very different from a regular person deciding not to react after he sees his ball stolen. My arguments against Bridge in some of that thread are probably ones that you would write off as arrogantly or unfairly wishing that God would change his behavior or remake the universe according to my own plans. Heck, even if I am being arrogant, it wouldn't change the question: why would a good god use bad means to accomplish some good end, when it could obviously achieve all good ends, for all time, without ever resorting to "bad" means? Humans are limited and sometimes have to balance out things like that, try to make the ends justify the means. An omnipotent being would never need to balance good against bad or justify negative steps by the positive results. An omnipotent being could just achieve good results using good steps. And every time we go back to this question, why would a good god allow evil in the universe it created? Why would a good god not take steps to prevent sin or evil or suffering from ever manifesting in his ideal universe? ... The responses seem to be (1) that it's arrogant to ask that question or to presume that some other way of creating the universe is possible. (and that's a dodge, doesn't answer the question at all). Or another response is (2) that God wants genuine love, and he can only test this and confirm it as genuine by letting us choose not to love. Presumably the same idea applies to goodness and evil. How could we be described as "good" unless we make our own choice to do good? Which sounds like God is testing us. Except his fore-knowledge of what we will do makes the "test" as pointless as a psychic flipping a coin. He could create only humans who will "choose" to love him. He's not exactly forcing them all to love him like automatons. He's just creating them with freedom of choice, and only creating the ones who he knows will choose what he wants. So the claim about the needy, clingy God who is jonesing for genuine love so bad, he's willing to condemn some portion of his creation to eternal torture for behaving in the way he knew they would... it doesn't stand up. It doesn't make sense that a good god would create things in the way the Bible describes. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "A Civil Religious Debate" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/a-civil-religious-debate?hl=en.
