Intelligence? The state of being.

[Paul S.]

As long as we're creating some "sliding scale" in which "atheists" occupy some imaginary bottom rung, I offer this for your consideration:

http://www.truthdig.com/dig/item/200512 ... manifesto/

This entire exercise is, after all, about "thinking differently"

--PS

[Trickfox]

Thank you Victoria, That's a great observation, and I realize now that perhaps I should be looking at sandskrit to match up with the Peano logic problem on Cardinality in Arithmetics. The other acient languages are obviously important.

This is exciting and I will have a lot more to say on Sunday. I'm going to Valcourt for week end .
Trickfox

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Paul,

I found the "antheist manifesto" a very interesting read.

But for my part I had a hard time getting through the first couple of words before I started having a reaction to them. This is a purely personal reaction here folks and I am trusting that all of us will react to this article in our own particular way. And that is what is meant, I believe, to happen.

Well, just look at the way I phrased that last paragragh. Something that is "meant to happen." Obviously I am stating that I see a system at work.

And if you all knew me better you would know too that I am a supreme optimist. (Shaken many times but unmoved.) So when I say something is MEANT I am taking the stand that I believe their is an intelligence at work here that I am ready and willing to recognize.

Everyone else? All I ask is that you think about the situation yourself and come to YOUR OWN conclusion. BELIEVE IN YOURSELF enough to do that. Then just watch what develops.

Now maybe some churches would be offended with that last statement. Some churches have grown and prospered by being the "spokesman" between the "common person" and "God" ....... as if we needed a translator.(PERHAPS IN THE PAST, WE DID) Of course, when you add that third element (like the Math problem Dr. Brown told his daughter about once , Paul will share it all with you in good time) something is terribly lost. And thats what happens when that third element is created between the Creator and the creation. Something goes terribly missing. (I BELIEVE ITS TIME TO FIND THAT MISSING PIECE)

So thats where I am in this. I had one initial major reaction to the article that Paul put out there and it had nothing to do with words. Looking at the painting that we all recognize ..... with the figure of "God" erased, cut out

How did that strike all of you? Do you really believe there is nothing there, reaching out for us? Perhaps you do not see the painters vision of God, but deep down, do you actually believe that there has been NOTHING there encouraging us and inspiring us?

As I said. It comes down to a discussion within yourself.

After the shock of the altered painting wore off the next thing that hit me were the words in the introduction " Argues against IRRATIONAL FAITH"

ENGLISH AGAIN. Lets see .... What did he ACTUALLY SAY? That faith was irrational ...... or that there could be RATIONAL FAITH AND IRRATIONAL FAITH. Ok .... I can accept that. I pick the "rational faith" then. Elizabeth

[twigsnapper]

Paul may include in his book eventually a story I have told him of an experience I had while "escorting" Dr. Brown.

We had "chanced" upon a group of refugees walking along a very muddy road . Wandering as many did during that terrible cold spring. The mud was ankle deep. I had walked away from the vehicle and happened upon the body of a little girl who had been left behind. She was , maybe two or three and wearing a cloth coat over a little pink dress. It was the flash of pink that had caught my attention.

Now you have to understand. I had seen many things in my life up to that point and am able to say now, without reservation, that I was a murderous youth.

To me, the world was only what it had appeared to be. All that mattered was survival. You could be smart, talented, gracious, lovely, warmhearted and it could all end in a flash as if it never existed to begin with. I held no illusions. There was nothing out there but life, or death and it was just pure luck where you ended up.

I don't know why that little girls body hit me so hard emotionally. She was just so innocent and so ...... abandoned ....... and I think I pretty much had what might be considered in milder times ...... a nervous breakdown right there. I can remember distinctly the feel of the water and mud seeping around my knees and I guess Dr. Brown saw me go down like that and came to investigate. Paul may eventually tell you what he said to me, if he decides to use the story.

But my point is. We are not simply victims. And it is possible to decide for yourself that lives are to have purpose and meaning. The little girl in pink showed me that through the years. I have basically been her knight in the years since and I believe that I have made a difference for her. Was it a random event, finding her? Having Dr. Brown walk up and put his hand on my shoulder? A random toss of the coin? Up to each of us in our own lives to decide.

I encourage all of you to read again and again what Dr. Einstein wrote and SEE what he is actually saying. Twigsnapper

[Paul S.]

[quote="twigsnapper"]
I encourage all of you to read again and again what Dr. Einstein wrote and SEE what he is actually saying.[/quote]

Which Einstein quote/source are you referring to there, Mr. T? The "friendly universe" quote above or something in the other links in this thred?

--PS

[Mark Culpepper]

Mr. Twigsnapper, sir

Thank you so much for our last post. I have wondered where you and Dr. Brown might have been since you I am sure have intentionally left the details of place and time out of your story. And I will leave it to Paul to (PLEASE,PLEASE,PLEASE ) tell this particular story because just the little bit that you have mentioned is outstanding . I am guessing that you were in Germany, just after the wars end? Perhaps? No one has ever said that of Dr. Brown, but would I be wrong in assuming that? In Pauls "expanded" version of the story, will we learn what it was that Dr. Brown said to you?

And Paul. I have an odd question for you. When was that quote from Einstein made? I ask that because his phrase " Then we are simply victims to the random toss of dice and our lives have no real purpose or meaning." rings very similarly to what Dr. Brown wrote the fall of 1938 when in his poem he wrote

Her love and faith I mean to share
but her future dreams I care! I care!
Where to place the blame for what may be a great loss?
I cannot say
Perhaps the blame was before my day
Like an act of God in one respect
In another a random coin toss.

Now I guess that Einstein was tossing dice and Dr. Brown was talking about a random toss of the coin but the sentiment is amazingly similar. Enough for me to notice, I don't know why .

Paul, When you are finished with Dr. Browns biography have you at all considered talking with Mr. Twigsnapper (and Morgan) about his life story? Mark C.

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

I found this quote and strangely it seems to at least address some part of our discussion here.

Its by Ralph Waldo Emerson .... in his Essay on Nature (1844)

"For no man can write anything who does not think that what he writes is for the time the history of the world; or do anything well who does not esteem his work to be of importance. My work may be of none, but I must not think of it as none, or I shall do it wih impunity.

In like manner, there is throughout nature something mocking, something that leads us on and on , but arrives nowhere; keeps no faith with us. All promise outruns the performance. We live in a system of approximations."

Something that leads us on and on?, but stills remains just out of reach? Is that the onion peel that Paul and I keep working on ?, or the horizon that keeps getting further and further as we keep thinking we are making progress?

Or is it the discussion about learning how to "think outside the box" which is a condition always tempered by the knowledge that you may have stepped out of ONE box ..... into just a slightly larger one ...... and the process continues.

Anyway. Things to think about. Elizabeth

[Victoria Steele]

I wanted to respond to something that Linda B had said about Einstein not being able to reconcile his "findings" with the fact that there was a God or not.

Seems to me that there is an assumption here that if you find something wondrous, out of our understanding , that it somehow MUST be the work of "God." And then for SOME people when you use that word you automatically put yourself in the frame of others who "believe in God" with all of their various belief systems with the "standards " that have been set up through hundreds of years .

I grew up in a community that believed in a "vengeful God". Fire and brimstone for those "sinners". Not a whole lot of discussion otherwise. Now I notice that same exact community (I have been gone for many years) has shifted now away from that "Vengeful God" to one that is looking out for everyones best interest and is even interested in our financial well being. (You have seen them too. Tapes are something like twenty bucks)

And thats just one reason I have a hard time jumping back into that "frame".

I was touched with Twigsnappers story of the little girl in the pink dress and I think there is alot to be talked about in that scene. How can there be a "personal God" if he would choose to turn his back on that little girl? I am asking a personal question here which for many churchgoers would be termed gently a demonstration of a "crisis in faith".

Well, perhaps so. Justifiably. What if I just say that the whole idea that there is a personal God that would leave a little girl like that is an offense to my intellect. I don't buy it.

Not that I give up on the idea that there seems to be something there, some sort of force that I can't begin to truly understand. I believe thats what Einstein was actually saying,that there seemed to be some sort of an interlocking system at work here and we all seem to be in that system, but a personal God? One who watches over my every move? Isn't that a whole lot egotistical of me? I am so special, so loved? Humans seem to Need the knowledge of that Love and individual attention. First that vengeful god that offered strict guidelines (a reflection of HIS GREAT LOVE for us they said on the pulpit ) and now that our world has changed strangely the face of that God now has changed to reflect that new need.

Is that really God or just a reflection of our current NEED? Sort of like the hall monitor who hands out passes which allows us to be wherever we are. We don't think we belong in that hallway, its a scarey place , so we get "passes" from the "monitor" who has that ability.

Maybe its just time to grow up? My Sunday morning observation. Victoria

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Paul,

I just wanted to point two things out that were mentioned in that "Athiest Manifesto" FOR STARTS.

First is the statement ............ " If God exists, EITHER he can do nothing to stop the egregious calamities OR does not care to.

You and I have been led to that phrase over and over by Morgan and we should both recognize that as soon as we see that phrase we need to look at the situationt with different eyes. I will leave the discussion of what that all means for a little later, right now I am just leaving a diving can on this site to mark it for the future.

Then there is this statement . " An Athiest is in touch with reality appears shamefully out of touch with the fantasy life of his neighbors." And you KNOW I can't leave that one alone.

How does the Athiest know that HE/SHE is in touch with reality when that person may not even know what reality actually is? Now I know thats a cheap shot at that phrase but how can you take the position that others are living a "fantasy world" compared to yours ..... when you don't even know what your world really is either?

I happen to believe (theres that word again) that we have much to learn about the world around us. The REALITY of that world might prove to be quite different than we had ever considered before. So Athiest or Deist, or whatever would be on the absolute end of the "scale" that Linda mentioned .......... Perhaps we are all trying to work our understanding on an artificial scale to start with?

Perhaps in one hundred years others will look back on these words and say, chuckling and shaking their heads..... "Silly rabbits" .......... Elizabeth

[Trickfox]

Can the objective reality include Artificial Intelligence as a state of being?

This famous scientist is in worst physical shape than most everyone around him, but he is still a great new star in the public eye. He is an inspiration to me in because he earned the respect of people who understand and agree with his "bubble of reality".
Here is what he says;

"Together with Roger Penrose, I developed a new set of mathematical techniques, for dealing with this and similar problems. We showed that if General Relativity was correct, any reasonable model of the universe must start with a singularity. This would mean that science could predict that the universe must have had a beginning, but that it could not predict how the universe should begin: for that one would have to appeal to God."
-Stephen W. Hawking "Origin of the Universe" lecture http://Galileo.phys.Virginia.EDU/classe ... ing-1.html

I submit to everyone the idea that nothing is original about the future so we cannot see it as being any different then the past. in Scientific terms The "heat death of the universe" is another vision that we can never experience. It is part of another singularity. but wait there are other possibilities.

What if singularity could also mean that "TRANSHUMANISM" is possible because it is also predictable. Transhumanism is about using technology to enhance the human body and render the thinking mind immortal. Some scientists believe it will be possible to transfer the mind away from the body and into a computer.

Along with the term "Hiccup", I would like to introduce the term "Autonomous Psychogenesis" which is the process english speaking people understand to be an "EPITHANY". When a person undergoes a sudden profound change in the way they understand something, they undergo an "epithany".

There is no equivalent term in French so I will refer to it as "the Autonomous Psychogenesis". for example "How does a person face up to singularity".

Singularity is thus best described an epithany caused by "the subtle fear" to "cease existence" or "die".

Another issue which stirs up issues of the epithany of singularity are "Close encounters of the third kind".

Any event which forces a person's thoughts into being focused on a "void in identity" is a singularity issue.

Trying to think of the total distance of the universe is another issue which helps describes singularity.

So let's say the "proof is/was discovered" in science and math. That means the proof is possibly hidden in the most acient of languages and so it has been around for ages.

Supposing we decide to united all of these other concepts about singularity together and include the "proof of discovery" . The sum total of this concept is then reserved for the meaning of the word "singularity" and now we finally have found the starting point for TRANSHUMANISM.

These disscussions about "intelligence as a state of being" are indications that the metaphysical search for truth actually forces the average scientist to think about the true state of singularity.

I'm going beyond that and adding that -the proof exists in these barely detectable "Bifurcations" or "hiccups". (Bifurcations are like subtle diversions in an existing pathway). Supposing that several beings share these bifurcations over time however the whole process still appears like " a completely random event" which now seems to repeat itself.

How do we know the "absolute truth" for sure that a random event seems to repeat itself. We can know it because it is BEAUTIFUL and SIMPLE. When it comes to truth, I trust my instinct and look for beauty.

Using Elizabeth's illustration about the onion, -we are caught noticing ourselves "Jump" from one layer inside the onion to another in the onion. The key difference I am pointing out here is that the "Whole Onion" shares the same space as the "infinitely small seed" inside the onion and that they are both "singularities" when viewed from an infinite outside hyperspacial perspective.

To answer Martin's question further down, one must picture the same scene as the the ending of the movie "Brainstorm" where the viewer pops out of one life's moment and sees "several seperated spheres of reality" in a matrix configuration then travels into one of the spheres and falls into another life's moment. Unlike the "onion illustration" this parallel type of illustration is really the only other practical way of showing how singularity is viewed as a whole "inclusive area" and as a seperate "exlusive area" at the same time. I honestly believe these are the same visions expressed by the scientist named Hugh Everett who invented the multiple universe theory.

The fact is, -that both are also "the objective and complete bubble of reality". The further outwards you travel in your subjective bubble of reality the more you see that you are part of bigger and bigger bubbles of reality. Reality and the center remains the same reality at all times as you travel outwards, it's just that as you travel outwards you begin to see how much more reality is left to be discovered.

This post has been self-edited twice because Mr. Twigsnapper is quite correct about my tendancy to try and bring up complex math to hide issues I'm not sure of. so here is the point I'm trying to make:

In the begining there was singularity, in the end there is singularity, and as soon as we understand how to transfer the soul into a machine, we will have singularity. According to some versions of thinking, all of these issues are happening at the same time and we cannot see it because we are caught in the time interval of moment to moment consciousness where events flow evenly.

I hope that my explanation is clear. Now all I have left to do is write the proof in mathematics so that others who see the rest of the foundation in physics can critique my point of view.

Trickfox

[twigsnapper]

I just noticed a piece of communication which flashed over my desk. One very intelligent person made the observation that he felt Einstein sometimes used higher math to obscure the fact that he wasn't really sure about what he was saying. He would throw something out there and then bury it in high math or references to high math.

Mr. Trickfox, you know I respect you. I would not put you in the same company as Einstein if I did not. That said, you and he share the same trait.

There might be a few people out there who would catch your meanings without reaching for a quantum physics book. You and I (and I am no scientist) might trade inside scientific buzzwords like "Single-Mode Interactions and coupled Dirac and Maxwell fields" but of what good will those discussions be here? There is something more important than all the technical jargon happening HERE AND NOW and I am sure that you see it.

Now I am asking you to review what you have just sent us and put it into radically simple language. This is not easy Trickfox. Its the ultimate challenge! but I know that you can do this. This is not a "dumbing down". This is an excercise in "reaching up". Twigsnapper

[Martin Calloway]

Trickfox,

As Victoria has so colorfully put it sometimes I was hanging on pretty good but somewhere along the line I lost my grip and ended up with a mouthful of dirt. I wish I understood exactly what you mean but I flat out don't.

But I would like to see what you mean actually by " The whole onion shares the same space as the "infinitely samll seed" and they are both singularities. I'm lost. I am sorry. Its just that I have never had a chance to really bench race mentally like this over this kind of track .... so help me out here if you possibly can. Mr. Twigsnapper seems to hold you in high regard so I am assuming that you will be able to follow his request and get things somehow simpler to understand. I'll hang in there if I can.

I guess you are not the only one who has had to do this. Did you notice that Stephen Hawkins has had to write another book? . He was asked to do that and "make things simple enough for most people to understand" so you see you are not being singled out.

I read a little bit about Hawkins too and the thing that seems to bother him the most is not that he has such a terrible disability. He has managed to live a full and productive life, in spite of horrendous difficulties. His main complaint was however, in praising the wonderful computer voice box he was recently given to use, that the voice is (because of its place of origin) decidedly American sounding! He was however assured that a new unit with an English accent would be forthcoming!

Oh, another thing. I was asked if you perhaps had ever heard of a gentleman by the name of Spencer Clark(e) in your neck of the Canadian woods. He was apparently active in collecting a wonderful art storehouse and maintained an estate where very many world figures came to discuss situations that they could not make public with their own governments. It was a name in passing and I thought perhaps that it might strike some bells with you or with any of our other readers out there. Anyone know anything about a fellow named Spencer Clark(e)? Looking forward to more messages from you Trickfox. Its always more than a little interesting! Martin

[LongboardLOVELY]

I don't know how we digressed form St. Arey's original topic, but I have a few responses to what was posted about the impossibility of a GOD, Jehovah. Keep in mind that I am presenting only the intellectual response, not the rectitude of society. I will not say that I am arguing in either direction of there being a GOD or no GOD. Just the possibilities behind the opposite argument.
*************************************************

1. To argue that God should not permit evil or suffering is to argue against human beings having free choice.

Is moral freedom good? Is it right that people have the ability to choose for themselves? Or would it be better if human beings were choiceless, mechanistic robots who walked around and did good because we had no other choice?

If God had made us without the ability to choose, wouldn't we resent him for that too? Actually, we wouldn't, but only because we wouldn't have the capacity to criticize Him.

According to the Bible, when we question God we're exercising the same freedom of choice as when we choose good or evil. We're having this discussion only because God has created us with a freedom to make choices.

What does freedom mean? Doesn't it necessarily involve the capacity to choose evil? Of course. You cannot have true freedom of choice if you can only choose good but not evil.

And what if evil was stripped of all its consequences, so you could choose evil but it wouldn't bring any suffering? Well, then it wouldn't be evil any more, because evil and suffering are inseparable, just as good is inseparable from the desirable consequences it produces. Strip evil of its consequences, and we wouldn't be exercising real choices. It would only be a facade.

The freedom to choose is sacred in this society. Isn't it ironic to blame God for giving us the very freedom we so highly prize?

Ask yourself this question: If you were God, how would you have created people differently?

Would you have withheld from people the capacity to make wrong choices as well as right ones? If you would have, then human beings—as we know ourselves to be—would not exist.

2. The things we consider the greatest virtues would not be known in a world without evil and suffering.

Here's a short list of desirable qualities: compassion, mercy, heroism, courage, justice, sacrifice.

Think about it. Could there be...

Compassion without suffering? Mercy without need? Heroism without a desperate plight? Courage without danger? Justice without injustice? Sacrifice without compelling cause for it?
Which great virtues could be seen in a world without suffering or evil? Don't most if not all of the greatest virtues come into play in response to evil and suffering?

Think of your favorite books and movies. Take Gladiator, Saving Private Ryan, Schindler's List or Amistad. Or take fiction like Star Wars or Lord of the Rings. The virtues and camaraderie that inspire us in these stories could not exist without evil or suffering.

If you could snap your fingers and remove all evil and suffering that has ever happened, would you?
If you did, there could be no Hellen Keller, Frederick Douglas, Sojourner Truth, Abraham Lincoln, Harriet Tubman, Susan B. Anthony, Corrie ten Boom or William Wilberforce (who abolished England's slave trade).

We must not minimize suffering. But we must also admit that we praise the virtues that have emerged from suffering—and in so doing we make an unspoken recognition, that good can come out of suffering.

Isn't it logically inconsistent to say the virtues that emerge out of contexts of suffering are good, then turn around and say there's no way a good God couldn't allow evil and suffering? You can't have it both ways. Is it possible that the good coming out of permitting human freedom to choose outweighs the evil that results?

If you think that's not even possible, what qualifies you to know this? You can say, "In my limited understanding of all things, I don't think the good outweighs the bad." Fine, that's your opinion. But to say "I know for sure the good cannot outweigh the bad" would require that you be all-knowing. (And if you think you are all-knowing then you do believe in God after all—you believe that you are God!)

3. Our moral objection to evil and suffering is itself an argument for a good God.

Only by appealing to a standard of goodness that's bigger than ourselves can we determine that evil is evil and there is something fundamentally wrong with suffering.

How could moral evil evolve out of lifeless matter? Chemicals mixing and molecules banging against each other cannot account for good and evil. Nor can they account for the profound human awareness of good and evil.

An atheist may say evil proves there is no God. But follow this to its logical conclusion. Without God there is no reference point for good and evil. Who can condemn nature for evil? Nature is what nature is. And we should have no capacity to break outside the system and evaluate it if we are really the product of blind evolution rather than intelligent design. (By the way, I hope you've read the New York Times bestseller Darwin's Black Box, by biochemistry professor Michael Behe, one of many scientists who argues that the complex machinery which exists on the cellular level can only be explained by intelligent design.)

On what basis can we call one thing good and another evil? If there is no God, then "good" and "evil" are nothing more than subjective feelings reflecting what our culture has taught us to approve or disapprove. Evil is nothing more than whatever I happen to oppose or dislike. Suppose you object to murder, but I think it's fine. You think rape is evil and someone else thinks it's okay. Apart from some external objective moral standard we're just exchanging opinions. Why is your opinion or mine more valid that Adolf Hitler's or Jeffrey Dahmer's?

People who claim to be moral relativists say there's no such thing as a moral absolute—but they can't live within their own system. Ask them, "if I were to beat you over the head with a baseball bat, rape your sister, kidnap your child, or burn down your house, do you think that would be absolutely wrong?" Of course—if we admit it, we do believe in moral absolutes. But who or what is behind those standards? Who besides human beings has set them up so we can appeal to them?

Our belief that there is good and evil is itself an argument for the existence of some outside standard of good and evil. If we're merely the blind product of time, chance and natural forces, we're part of a system with no transcendent ability to step outside it. We're stuck in the system.

A gazelle runs from the cheetah, but gazelles don't sit around the campfire and discuss how unfair it is that cheetahs kill gazelles. There's something in us that cries out "something's wrong," something needs fixing. That thing that cries out is what the Bible calls the conscience, God's law written on our hearts (Romans 2:15). We are made in the image of God. We are more than just animals. We have a conscience, a moral code built into us. That's what allows us to step outside of what we see around us and call it good or evil.

If there is no God, there is no such thing as objective evil. What we would call evil is merely projecting our subjective feelings onto events. But that doesn't satisfy our instinctive outrage over evil and suffering. Morality is more than an evolutionary trick played on our minds.

The very fact that we recognize evil and object to it, is evidence that a God of goodness has planted in us the notion of goodness. We are using God's own standards of good, which he has written on our hearts, as an argument against him.

My question to some of my atheist friends is, "If there is no God, why are you so angry at Him?"

There are no atheists in foxholes. They are either shaking their fist at God in anger or crying out to God for mercy. But in either case, they are recognizing the existence of the God they have denied. Suggestion: don't wait until your deathbed to come to grips with the question of God. No question is more important. Don't procrastinate finding answers to this question.

4. If you argue that evil is evidence there is no God you must also admit that good is evidence there is a God.

You can't have it both ways. You can't argue for the negation of a thing, a good God, by the existence of evil unless you also argue for the thing itself, a good God, by the existence of good. If not for a good God, where would goodness come from?

Is there anything in the blind evolutionary process of survival of the fittest that would cultivate kindness and putting other people first? How much good should we expect to see in a self-generated world? None. We should only see ruthlessness and the will to survive at everyone else's expense. We do see plenty of that, of course, but we also see kindness, compassion, sacrifice and love. I'm convinced that without a good God, who created in us an appreciation of virtue—and empowers people to do good—we would see none of those.

5. The Bible itself raises this question. It never backs away from it. The problem of suffering and evil is in Habakkuk, Jeremiah, Job, and many of the Psalms.

God does not condemn people for asking such questions. For instance, Jeremiah 12:1 says, "You are always righteous, O LORD, when I bring a case before you. Yet I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the way of the wicked prosper?"

Many of the Psalms ask, "Why, O Lord do you stand far off? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble? Why are the heavens silent when I ask for help? Why do the good suffer? Why do the evil prosper?"

Anyone who tries to gloss over or minimize the problem of evil doesn't get it. I've walked through the streets of places of great poverty. I've been with many suffering people. Just as the Bible doesn't, we shouldn't underestimate the seriousness of this problem.

6. The Bible attributes the origin of human evil to people exercising their free will; when they choose to disobey God's standards, it brings suffering.

God said "You can eat the fruit of every other tree, but if you eat from this one, you will surely die" (Gen. 2:16-17). The Bible says "the wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23). We are free to choose, but there will be severe consequences if we choose to disobey. The first man and woman chose that path, and when they did evil, death and suffering kicked in.

The Bible teaches that the whole earth was under man's dominion and care, and that not only man, but animals and all creation suffered the effects of human sin. Romans 8 says "The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration...in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time."

Thus, one of human sin's consequences is a disordered creation, including natural disasters. But the greatest tragedies of history, which have caused the most suffering, are not natural disasters, but wars and persecutions and murders conducted by sinful human beings.

People are quick to lay the blame for this at God's feet. They point to portions of the Bible that speak of terrible things. But there is much the Bible records that it does not endorse. And when God orders military aggression against a particular people group, we should take a closer look at the group and their cancerous influence on surrounding nations. We may still not understand, but at least we'll have a more accurate picture of what was at stake.

God condemns the human choices that have brought the great majority of suffering. Men blame God. But God blames men. Jesus looked at the suffering of Jerusalem, and wept over it. He longs for people to live by his standards. If we did there would not be evil and suffering. According to the four Gospels and the book of Acts, God did not stay at a distance, but did something startling to deal with the problem of evil and suffering.

I read a two good books once by a man named Lee Strobel who was once an atheist (as he says). The two books are "The Case for Faith" and "The Case for Christ". He was educated at Yale Law School, and was an award-winning legal editor of the Chicago Tribune.

Linda B.

whew, that was a mouthful.

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Linda,

Thank you so much for the extraordinary amount of thoughtful time you have put into this post. I am sure it will generate more of the same from our readers and contrary to your original statement about how we had "strayed" from the original subject, I don't think thats the case at all. "A state of Being" is what St. Arey had written and what would be more appropriate.

The clash of good and evil .... the either or ..... the ultimate choices all of us seem to have to make. Zoroaster would be proud of this discussion.

But I have a very simple question for you. Its one that you actually asked yourself .... supposing that you had already answered it. But I don't REALLY think that it was answered. You asked "IF NOT FOR A GOOD GOD, WHERE WOULD GOODNESS COME FROM?" Now ..... it strikes me ...... thats a very good question and I would like to hear OTHER opinions on that.

Another snippit from your dissertation was "Thus one of huiman sins consequenses is a disordered creation .... including natural disasters." I am not sure how you want me to translate that so I am repeating what was said so that I can understand the statement better. Are you saying here that natural disasters are caused by us somehow being somehow "sinful" and causing it?

I agree that there is much misery and suffering that is caused by humans but when it involves a "natural disaster" most of the time, in my opinion , its because the humans are basically in the wrong place at the wrong time. I don't think that nature is holding back or bringing forth anything other than what it would ordinarily do .... with our presence or without it. Just a matter of observation on that score. Many people died when Katrina hit. Hurricanes have been hitting the coast forever. It was man who decided to build his city there .... several feet beneath sea level ..... so ..... nature punished us for our sins? No, I would rather leave nature blameless for that and put the blame squarely on us, where it belongs.

I myself got off my own subject really! back to the first question. "If not for a good God WHERE WOULD GOODNESS COME FROM? " Elizabeth

[Victoria Steele]

Linda,

I congratulate you on a masterful rendition of your view on good and evil and Gods part in all of this.

You know of course that I am hard pressed to let some of your statements go by without a challenge. I do this with the utmost respect for your rights to declare your beliefs. I also have the right under the same system, at least so far . to say "I don't buy it"

I am a particular hard nut case in some situations because I happen not to believe the "original sin story" to begin with!

I do not blame Eve for picking the apple after that couple was told not to eat from that tree. That simple stand would have erased much of the hardships that women have suffered through the centuries. I don't blame the serpent or hold the tree of life in any more esteem than other wondrous works of nature. I do not believe in that entire story. Which means, watch out! I do not understand or appreciate the role of Jesus as our "Saviour" from that original Sin. His role as that "Saviour" loses its meaning when the "original sin" story goes away. Not to say that I have not listened very carefully and found much value in the words that Jesus was reported to speak.

Gives me a decidedly different viewpoint of the things that you have been talking here about the quality of Gods relationship with man.

So with that viewpoint out front, I need to ask, When "God" gives an "order" for a military move Linda, just how is that "order" received? How would a person actually know that it was a "God -given order? Or just the agenda of the nearest General? There have been many Generals and many statesmen in the world who have considered themselves "appointed by God" for their duties. I need not go too much further into that, because thats a situation that we are facing in the United States this very moment.

Do we really have to admit to the existance of a God to aknowlege the existance, of obvious good and obvious evil? The world is full of opposites. But does that mean that what is one thing could not also be another? In the horror of a world wide pandemic which might kill hundreds of thousands of people and disrupt civilization down to a standstill. In the long run of it was that an evil? Or was that the single situation that might ensure the food supply for those humans left, a situation that would avoid starvation. In this natural disaster,where is the evil?

I believe personally that nature does not recognize good or evil. Nature in its ruthless culling is just impartial.

I learned this very early on a Texas ranch, watching cattle growing up. One lovely little calf took a liking to me,( right out of" City Slickers" ... a "Norman" like calf). Except that he ran off playing one day and snapped his ankle in a hole. By the time we found him the coyotes had half eaten him. Now there was nothing evil about that calf. He was beautiful and he was good but he was also somebodys dinner that next day. There was no evil in what happened there. The other calfs in the pasture were not more "blessed" than my little guy. They just didn't put their foot in that hole.

We do constantly do seem to be looking for something that we can call a "good force" and I have wondered if it is something that is somehow a characteristic of our intelligence. I am not sure that our awareness of things around us is any more "gifted" than the animals but we do seem to WANT to figure how things work.

Of course, maybe animals have that process already acomplished and we are the only ones that are behind in development!

Just throw these thoughts in for consideration. What good is a minds energy if it can't be shared? Victoria