The holy catch 22 (614 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 0.26 on 19 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Umbilical_Cord (View user info) at 2005-04-07 01:14:40 EDT
I'm no theologan. But the following are some facts that most people with religious believe would agree on.
1) God is all knowing. He sees the past, the present, and the future.
2) God created humanity.
3) Humans are capable of good and evil.
4) God, and all actions of God, are good.
So when God creates Adam, he knows from the start what is going to happen (unless you're willing to accept that he's not all-knowing). He knows that Adam's going to fail the test, and accept the apple, because god created the machine that is Adam (Unless you accept that God didn't create humanity), and he knows how it works. Adam accepting the apple was an act of evil (unless you accept that good and evil do not exist, or that the bible is fundamentally wrong), and Adam's action, being an extention of the action of God, was good (unless you accept that not all actions of God are good).
Saying that this story is a metaphore does not resolve the problem, because the moral dilemma that the story is built around remains. Saying that it is an exclusively Christian problem is not true. Religions, by definition, stand by these principals. You could blame the devil, but according to genesis, God created him. So I ask you religious folks out there, how can you believe in all four of these?
User Reviews
Submitted by mboomer (user info) at 2005-04-08 07:59:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: -1
meh, dead now.
Submitted by mboomer (user info) at 2005-04-07 12:32:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Submitted by Umbilical_Cord (user info) at 2005-04-07 11:05:48 (#)
Ranking: 0
Furthermore, what if I am just an ordinary idiot, and this poor excuse for an argument is within the capabilities of an ordinary idiot, then both are wrong. And what if both are true? You haven't proven anything.
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So now we're allowed to alter the suppositions... You just picked apart your own arguement.
Oh, and -2 for -2ing your own post in retaliation to strider.
And Phallic..I agree with you, sorry if I was just paraphrasing what you'd already said.
Submitted by Umbilical_Cord (user info) at 2005-04-07 11:37:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Submitted by strider (user info) at 2005-04-07 11:21:56 (#)
Ranking: -1
easy answer: free will.
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No. To accept free will is to accept that god isn't all knowing, because he can't predict the future.
You can't say he created man, gave him free will, then knew exactly what he was going to do with it. It's not exactly free will then, is it?
-2 because i cant stand pseudointellectual pricks who make posts like this.
Submitted by strider (user info) at 2005-04-07 11:21:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: -1
easy answer: free will.
Submitted by Phallic_Cymbals (user info) at 2005-04-07 11:06:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
"1) The Umbilical_Cord is a special kind of idiot
2) This poor excuse for theological debate would only be written by a special kind of idiot.
If one and two are true then case proven. If one is false then Umbilical_Cord didn't write this. If two is false then Umbilical_Cord didn't write this.
Thus, Umbilical_Cord didn't write this. QED.
"
You just proved my fucking point. The correct conclusion, however, is that either he didn't write this OR one of the premises you established were incorrect, which is EXACTLY what i'm arguing.
Submitted by Jeanneee (user info) at 2005-04-07 11:06:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Call Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. I'm sure he'd be more than happy to explain it to you.
Submitted by Umbilical_Cord (user info) at 2005-04-07 11:05:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
If you wanted to, you could prove just about anything with this kind of arguement.
Eg:
Suppose:
1) The Umbilical_Cord is a special kind of idiot
2) This poor excuse for theological debate would only be written by a special kind of idiot.
If one and two are true then case proven. If one is false then Umbilical_Cord didn't write this. If two is false then Umbilical_Cord didn't write this.
Thus, Umbilical_Cord didn't write this. QED.
Notice how I used the word "Furthermore"?
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If two is false, I, being a special idiot, could still have written this. By saying 2 is false you are just saying that there is a chance a non-special idiot, or even a special non-idiot wrote this.
Furthermore, what if I am just an ordinary idiot, and this poor excuse for an argument is within the capabilities of an ordinary idiot, then both are wrong. And what if both are true? You haven't proven anything.
Submitted by Phallic_Cymbals (user info) at 2005-04-07 10:58:37 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
"2) belief shouldn't need to be qualified by logic. "
Perhaps not, but morality certainly should.
So, while i would be accepting (if rather condescending) of someone who chose to believe in the Christian God, i would have no actual objection to their belief unless they tried to force their skewed morality onto others. Unfortunately, that's exactly what the vast majority of Christians try to do.
Submitted by proofofpurchase (user info) at 2005-04-07 10:21:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
We don't know what God did before he created the heavens and the earth. For those of us that believe in God, we have to assume that He existed before these events and didn't just appear out of nowhere at the precise moment He decided to create the universe. What was the reason for bringing this all about?
Does God know His own future? Is that what guides HIS hand? Was He aware of the butterfly effect, if so, did He start the ball rolling the way He did it so that eventually things would turn out the way He intended when all is said and done?
You have tried to apply logic to an unknown.
Submitted by Rookie (user info) at 2005-04-07 09:52:04 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Go read a Dragonlance book...http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0786915749/qid=1112881910/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/103-9054902-3823868
Submitted by mboomer (user info) at 2005-04-07 09:22:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Again with the applying logic to belief. Belief doesn't have to be logical.
Furthermore, the logic you are applying to it is flawed. The axioms are mutually exclusive.
If God created an organism that is capable of evil, then how can it be said that all his actions are good?
Oh and God wasn't always good, look at the old testament, he was a petty, vengeful god then.
So the question How can people believe these things is flawed on two fronts.
1) the logic enabling the question.
2) belief shouldn't need to be qualified by logic.
If you wanted to, you could prove just about anything with this kind of arguement.
Eg:
Suppose:
1) The Umbilical_Cord is a special kind of idiot
2) This poor excuse for theological debate would only be written by a special kind of idiot.
If one and two are true then case proven. If one is false then Umbilical_Cord didn't write this. If two is false then Umbilical_Cord didn't write this.
Thus, Umbilical_Cord didn't write this. QED.
Notice how I used the word "Furthermore"?
Submitted by Phallic_Cymbals (user info) at 2005-04-07 08:31:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
None of these responses are satisfactory in the context of the question.
Here's another one.
Premises:
1- God is perfect.
2- God is everything.
3- God is omniscient.
If God is everything, and God is perfect... Everything is perfect. There is no such thing as evil, and no action can be construed as evil.
If not, then God is NOT everything, and somehow parts of the universe are not a part of God. Alternatively, God is everything, but he is not perfect.
So which is it?
I'll pre-empt the 'free will' response here. There is no such thing as free will, as an omniscient God knew when and how we would sin before we existed.
It was completely predetermined by this knowledge.
Furthermore, Christianity is based on the weakest circular logic there is.
How do we know the bible is correct?
It is the Word of God
How do we know God is real?
The bible tells us.
These contentions are mutually supporting but cannot be proved independently. They are not legitimate answers.
In conclusion, people who refuse to believe that the universe came from nothing, but happily accept that the universe was made by a big invisible man who himself came from nothing, are simpletons. Yeh, and they remind me of cavemen.
Submitted by mboomer (user info) at 2005-04-07 07:57:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Okay, well this is pretty much just an exercise in semantics. But I like semantics so here goes...
1) God is all knowing. But God also gave humans free will, so by saying that he knew what was going to happen, you have just disallowed free will of any kind. Thus God is omniscient, but the future is unknowable.
2) Again with the lack of free will. Tho you just got a +1 for "the machine that is Adam"
3) 7 on tuesday.
4) God is ineffable, at least in Catholicism. Thus who knows what the fucker is thinking when he does stuff.
Religion isn't logical, trying to apply (flawed) logic to it will only fail. Give it up.
NB: Not actually a catholic, but was raised in Ireland, and was taught by priests.
Submitted by indoninja (user info) at 2005-04-07 07:51:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
If you believe in an Omniptent God whose intellegence is beyond our grasp then his actions don't have make sense to you in order not to contradict themselves, they are just beyond your comprehension(the easiest answer to your catch 22).
The bible is full of contradictions, and you picked a weak one to try and "disprove" religion. God created the universe and gave Adam free will, that is the choice to be good or evil. Therefore it isn't a slight on God's power if Adam chooses the dark side, he created people with that choice.
Submitted by tinactin (user info) at 2005-04-07 03:06:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
http://www.ubersite.com/m/51870
I did something similar to this once.
Submitted by ChronicMasturbator (user info) at 2005-04-07 02:57:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I like this, I have been pondering about this for some time.
Let's look at this way (I am not Christian).
Just because God is all knowing, and he knows the present, past, future, etc does that stop us from having a free will? What if god is forgiving, and he forgave Adam and Eve (Not according to Bible). Then basically that means he said this: Ok, humanity now has free will, I will set down rules (religions), and you shall follow them according to your free will.
The way I look at it, free will is a good thing. Christians think it's a bad thing. However, there is a flaw in their reasoning. If humans sin because of their "free will" and all actions are not good enough in the presence of god, then we are chained to sin. We have no free will to begin with, because all we do is bad. We can NOT do anything good. Again, some small reasoning.
Submitted by Genko (user info) at 2005-04-07 02:52:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
All four are possible.
Adam isn't a machine, he's got free will, therefore his actions aren't an extension of God's actions.
Submitted by jack0173 (user info) at 2005-04-07 02:43:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
+1 for bagging religion, your argument could be more developed though.
Submitted by Phate (user info) at 2005-04-07 02:19:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Not that I have any religous tendancies, but I believe that the theory is that you are given free-will and that you may chose to follow the "Path of the Righteous" or whatever the hell they call it. So that in Adam's case, he could have chosen to tell Eve to fuck off with the apple already and start sucking his dick, but he was hungry so he pimp-slapped her and took the apple.
Ummmm. Yeah.