Subject:
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Re: Will Libertopia cause the needy to get less?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Fri, 1 Dec 2000 14:33:06 GMT
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Viewed:
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827 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, John Neal writes:
> When I mentioned "impulses to do good, I was referring to atheists" >Christians do good in response to God's love. God loves me, and so in joy I
> want to share this love with others. This is the Gospel, that God loves us
> all, and wants us to have abundant life.
Well, ok, here's the question. Do humans truly have the ability to derive
good on their own? Can humans, without God's help, truly be good? Or can we
only act good simply by mishap or flawed thinking?
When an atheist takes a homeless man into his home to try and help him get
back on his feet, etc., is that act truly a good act? And if not, why? Is it
not good because it doesn't come from God, or is it because humans are only
capable of creating some logic (minorly flawed at best) that mimics good and
is indistinguishable to humans from actual good? So, is it not good BECAUSE
it doesn't come from God or is it not good because the premise is flawed?
And if it *is* a good action, is it any better or worse than a 'true'
Christian's performance of the same action? Basically, is there any reason
to believe in God if one could be perfectly good without believing in Him?
Not implying anything about people's ability to actually BE "perfectly"
good, but let's say just as good as a 'true' Christian?
My guess is you'll say that the reason to believe in God is that through
believing in Him, you'll be happier and more joyful. Hence, you don't NEED
to believe in God to be good, but you'll be happier if you do. And my
response to that is that:
A. it then doesn't matter that you attribute good to God, since God's only
apparent purpose is to make you more happy in your life, and people can act
good on their own-- really it empowers man with the potential for absolute good.
B. you can't logically argue that someone SHOULD choose to believe in God.
You can't know that the person would be happier with faith in God, and it is
no more 'correct' to believe in God than not to, if your personal tastes
dictate otherwise. In this sense, if believing in a Hindu God or no God at
all makes me happier, then I really AM better off for believing so.
> > does that mean that humans are incapable of wanting to
> > do good on their own?
>
> No. It is a free decision.
>
> [snip]
> > If [impulses to do ill] come from the Devil, now humans have no impulses.
> > To me, that wipes us clean of responsibility. We're just tools with which
> > God and the Devil duke it out.
>
> Yes, I agree, but it is not the case.
I'm a little confused here, but your answers to the above may clarify that
somewhat. I was under the assumption that you were saying that the impulse
to do good mentally derives in humans from their connection to God. And
under this proposition, that the impulse to do evil was also external to man.
But if you were saying that humans have the potential to derive good on
their own, wouldn't you have disagreed, saying that humans still had the
ability to derive both good and evil on their own and that God and the Devil
would merely help to sway things to their favor by their own methods?
Anyway, your above answers may clarify this part anyway...
> > If evil impulses come from ourselves, well, isn't that just saying that God
> > created us that way and that as inadvertently as you said above, that evil
> > impulses are his will too?
>
> NO. God gave us a wonderful gift-- life-- to do with it what we will.
Well, really the question is, why grant us the possibility for error? But
that's a time-worn question. "Why did God allow for/create evil?"
> It is
> God's will to for us to live our lives with abundance. How to do that was
> explained by Jesus while he was on earth.
Again, a minor nitpick, what about people living before Jesus? Mainly, it
just doesn't seem fair to give people a better chance at salvation by
explaining it to them if you're not going to explain it to others... But
again, if you argue that people can be good without knowledge of God, then
it's ok. It just poses me to ask why believe in God if one can be good
without it?
> > But my response to that is that we've just pushed the issue out further. The
> > definition of good is no longer to commit good actions, but to choose in
> > favor of good actions and not evil ones. And to that end, where does the
> > impulse come from to choose good over evil? And why is it better to do so?
> > Is it based on personal reward? (going to heaven?)
>
> NO. As I've stated before, *nothing* anyone can do can get God to love us any
> more or any less--Pope or Mr H., God's love is *un*conditional.
I'm not quite sure what you're suggesting as a reason to choose good...
except perhaps that it's NOT good to choose good over evil, since God will
love you just the same?
> This is a *very* interesting point for me. As C.S. Lewis proposed in his >book, _The Great Divorce_, anyone can go to Heaven if they choose, but some
> people love darkness so much and are so prideful that they would rather sulk
> in "hell" (defined as separation from God) than swallow their pride and join
> God. That idea resonated with me because I believe in a loving God and have
> trouble with the concept of a "judging God". That being said, I still can't
> quite understand how someone, when confronted with the majesty of God, would
> choose *not* to be with God.
Well, I don't have any issues with that view (actuallly, my concept of what
I'd view God to be is just about exactly what you've laid out), but mostly,
my question is do you think people would be *incorrect* to choose not to be
with God? And further, do you hold yourself (as someone who acts towards
good) as being "better" than someone else (as someone who acts 'evilly')?
Personally, I think it's a matter of taste. If someone else wants to act
immmorally going by my set of morals, I don't hold myself any better than
them. That doesn't mean I won't try and stop them from acting immorally, but
I won't think I'm better than them. And one issue I have with Christianity
is that it tends to hold itself as somehow more correct than other religions
or philosophies.
> > Anyway, my issue is that according to that philosophy, is either there is no
> > free will, or there is no absoloute good.
>
> Don't understand how you got here
Basically summing up. If God 'controls' our actions via good impulses (they
can ONLY come from him), then we don't really have free will. If we DO have
control over them, then to say that good is better or more 'correct' than
evil is an ill-concieved notion, and hence there is no absolute good, it's
just a matter of taste.
> but I will say that there is absolute good
> (as defined by God). Logically speaking, free will is hard to prove, but in
> the end I simply must accept that there is. And even if you "prove" that
> there isn't free will, since we don't know outcomes, we can certainly pretend
> that there is-- it just makes it harder to take personal responsibility.
I'd strongly agree with the free will part. Personally, subscribing to
science on the issue, physical laws are NOT random. Reasons for action and
reaction are fixed, even if we can't as humans always see the cause of such
actions. And going by that, we're all just pre-destined to act in ONE way,
and history has been decided. But since we don't (and can't via chaos
theory) know what we WILL decide, it's indistinguishable to us from having
free will, and nothing is to be gained from thinking otherwise.
DaveE
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