Evil is always relative. Just like "Justice is always relative to those in power. " (That's from a movie, but I forgot which one.)

Since I believe the Bible to be a product of men and not a god (keep in mind I am an atheist but not agnostic) you cannot believe what the Bible declares to be "sin" or "evil" to be what "god would want." There's a possibility god has purged all the "evil" and then went out to the celestial tavern for a couple of millennia.


1. We can't really know if we have free will or not. For all we know, we could be god's science fair project, or a "dream within a dream." (That's Shakespeare.) But...

2. "Nature" intended us to replicate our DNA. Is god the same thing as nature?

btw,

You forgot about Chuck Norris.

Chuck Norris isn't a god. By the way, I have put a lot of thought into it, and I have decided that Osiris is the best god ever, far better than any other god. Osiris could easily beat up Jesus AND his dad at the same time. He is definitely the correct god.

... Are you serious? If you join an argument on Christianity, the Bible is THE ONLY PRIMARY SOURCE. You think that just because you didn't mention it, it can't be used in an argument? Entirely false; in fact, my use of a source and your lack thereof only further strengthens my argument against yours. If you're going to call me an idiot and quit, AT LEAST be sure that you're right in doing so.

@rayNimagi You may think evil is relative, but if there is a god at all, of any religion, and judgement day comes around, do you really think that that god will care if you say,'I can't go to hell(or the religions equivalent), evil is relative!' That god will say,'No, evil is what I say it is!' and boot you into hell. Evil is NOT relative.

The lack of logic here is going to make me explode. The bolded statement obviously means that EVIL IS RELATIVE, because it is RELATIVE TO WHAT THAT GOD THINKS.

"Morality is herd mentality." -Friedrich Nietzsche

Why would I care about this magical "Hell" place if I'm dead? It's not like my corpse is capable of caring where it goes.

My bad. How about: Evil is what said god SAYS IS EVIL, not what you say is evil. Happy now?


Your soul cares.

Maybe to you. I'm going to have to go with Nietzsche on this one.

But whatever YOU think is moral, you still get stuffed on judgement day if it's not the same view of this god. So is Fred.

I remember when this topic used to be about surveying people.

Good times.

Yeah, it's these ATHEISTS who won't admit they're wrong...

*glares at em*

XD

LOL what? Soul? Those aren't real.

Sigh. Pity, that makes you an animal. Ah well.

Do I have to read the topic or can I assume these are restatements and delete them?

I am an animal.... You are an animal too. More specifically we can be classified as Mammals. It's not a pity. Being an animal in my opinion is much more preferable than being something like a PLANT.

Moose I don't think we covered this yet.

And being a human is much more preferable to being an animal.
Yes we are mammals, biologically, but not animals. Because we have souls. Which animals(and you?) Don't have.

..........I don't even know what to say to such a dense text-block of ignorance. You might be familiar with the Term Homo Sapian, It is used in TAXONOMY, a system that has a purpose of CLASSIFYING ANIMALS. Humans are animals because they have no cell walls, they do not have chloroplasts, they have nuclei in their cells, and they reproduce through meiosis and then through fertilization of female eggs. Humans do not get their own little kingdom to belong to - there is no reason for them to get one. THEY ARE ANIMALS and SOULS do not exist in any animal or human.

WE ARE ON A ROCK, FLYING THROUGH SPACE!

Also, prove that souls don't exist.

Once again you astound me. So much that I'm entering once more despite my declaration to clear up your ignorance. I did not participate in any argument on Christianity; I participated in an argument on the infallibility of Epicurus' logic. Epicurus himself wasn't making an argument against Christianity, he was making a declaration about the possibility of a god. Nothing I said or responded to was connected to any specific religion. Then you decided that some passage of the Bible invalidated my reasoning.

The problem is in the first line. Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Why would God prevent evil from happening? If God prevented evil from happening, that would be a direct intervention with human free will. Now, the reason that God created humans was so that he could have beings to choose to obey him, choose. If humans are going to choose to obey God or not, then there is one crucial thing that needs to be: a choice.

Now in order for humans to know that something is evil, you need something that isn't evil in order to make a comparison or judgement. We can call this other good. Similarly, if all things everywhere were always good, then we wouldn't know what good even was.. This can be exemplified by someone who has only eaten chocolate their entire life, and nothing else. If you ask this person if they like chocolate, the only response they could give truthfully would be "I don't know, what's good taste like?".

If God were to intervene upon our free will, disallowing us to commit evil acts, then we really wouldn't be able to rebel against God -because rebelling would fall under this category of evil. The only option for a human would be to obey God, since he wouldn't be allowing evil to happen -defeating the purpose of creating humans in the first place.

I've often heard this point of view before. Now according to the bible, Adam and Eve had the choice to either eat the fruit or not. If Adam and Eve did not eat the fruit, but still had the option to, would they still have free will? Absolutely. They would still be filling God's objective of creating beings to obey him out of free will. Now, would it be fair of God didn't allow for the option of eating the fruit in his plan? No, hence the reason that Christianity has a Savior to atone for mankind's sins, all of them. So either way, the plan succeeds. How is that setting us up to fail? We chose to eat the fruit, and as such we chose to take the path of sin. I don't want to go off onto unnecessary tangents, so my point is that God didn't set us up to fail, we have to choose to fail in order to fail.

In the first sentence, if God were omnipotent, he wouldn't have become trapped.

That depends on whether or not the definer of evil is infinite or not. If God really did define evil, evil is whatever he says it to be. Now, if humans define evil, then the definition of evil is subject to change. Since God's existence hasn't been proven or disproven, it is impossible to say whether or not evil is relative or not.

The only way that I have been able to come up with to prove that we all have free will is to come across the same exact choice twice and choose different options each time. This, is impossible as of now. Of course, I haven't met anyone yet that says we all don't have free will.. That would mean I could punch the guy who said that right then and there and blame God. If someone wants to try to say none of us have free will, well, I find that a rather easy argument to win.. There are so many ways to counter that claim. I have already provided one example.

If you have only one source, then you can not prove or disprove anything in that source without using that source. Example: Your argument is invalid, and this is true because this sentence is true. Anyways, he was arguing about Epicurus.

Edit:
Which is exactly what the plants are thinking of us, RIGHT NOW

Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on Oct 1 2009, 1:22 pm by CecilSunkure. Reason: Quoted wrong person