The Sparx401

Thoughts on Turning 21

2011-10-06T16:27:00.000-10:00

I'm not going to lie, this isn't going to be too deep. Why? Because I'm only 21; do not expect old heads on young shoulders! Still, the popular culture today gives great importance to this number, 21, as a mark of manhood, the legal ability to drink, the entrance to the young adult life, and so on, and while I could be pessimistic and rant about how all of this is a social construct that has, ultimately, no meaningful and objective basis any more than turning the age of 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, etc., I think I could use this time better and talk about what lies ahead for me. Now, what better way to do that then to take a song and extrapolate on its lyrics?!

Live and Learn - Performed by Crush 40

Can you feel life
Moving through your mind?
Ooooooooh,
Looks like it came back for more
Yeah...

Can you feel time
Slippin' down your spine?
Ooooooooh,
You try and try to ignore
Yeah,

But you can hardly swallow
Your fears and pain
When you can't help but follow
It puts you right back where you came

Live and learn!
Hanging on to the edge of tomorrow
Live and learn!
From the works of yesterday
Live and learn!
If you beg or if you borrow
Live and learn!
You may never find your way

Can you feel life
Tangle you up inside?
Yeah,
Now you're face down on the floor!
Oh,

But you can't save your sorrow
You've paid in trade
When you can't help but follow!
It puts you right back where you came

Live and learn!
Hanging on the edge of tomorrow
Live and learn!
From the works of yesterday
Live and learn!
If you beg or if you borrow
Live and learn!
You may never find your way

There's a face searchin' far, so far and wide.
There's a place where you dreamed you'd never find.
Hold on to what if!
(Hold on to what if!)

Live and learn!
Hanging on the edge of tomorrow
Live and learn!
From the works of yesterday
Live and learn!
If you beg or if you borrow
Live and learn!
You may never find your way

Live and learn!
Hanging on the edge of tomorrow
Live and learn!
From the works of yesterday
Live and learn!
If you beg or if you borrow
Live and learn!
You may never find your way!!!!!

Live and learn!
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
Live and learn!
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

Can you feel life
Moving through your mind?
Ooooooooh,
Looks like it came back for more

Every day is an adventure for me; if by adventure you mean going to classes, hanging out with friends occasionally, and engaging in Christian apologetics, then yes, EVERY day is an adventure. Not exactly the sort of thing you think of when you go on one huh? When one thinks of adventures, they immediately think of doing something grand or out of the norm in order to experience new things which would bring about some basic pleasure. However, there is more than just the simple pleasures; there is also the intellectual pleasures--those that engage the mind and nourishes it in such a way that the soul yearns for more (thank God Almighty for implementing such a feature in us!).

Once you reach and get these intellectual and spiritual pleasures--true ones, I might add--the basal ones seem more and more...oh what's the word...tragic? These primitive appetites of sex and food become unmasked as entities that seek to oppress the soul through never-ending indulgence rather than being "free". The intellectual and spiritual pleasures, once they draw you, as God to His children, makes you want to come back for more--and best of all, the Prime Source of these pleasures is infinite in nature, and authentically "real" (both metaphysically and as a person whom you can rely upon).

Can you feel time
Slippin' down your spine?
Ooooooooh,
You try and try to ignore

I will admit, there are moments when I wish I were a kid again when things were simpler and I had less responsibilities. I try to ignore time, even in the most minute things; even the act of shaving is done in a manner so as to avoid the notion of manhood. It is this tragic denial as the arrow of time presses on and nature continues its daily routine. Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one in my age group kicking and fighting back in horror while the rest are either complacent or run to adulthood with open arms...whether they are ready to accept the responsibilities and the maturity-price-tag that comes with it or not.

But you can hardly swallow
Your fears and pain
When you can't help but follow
It puts you right back where you came

I have, and still do from time to time, can't shake the fears and pains in my life (not to sound dramatic or anything). The point is that living the Christian life isn't easy; the means to carry it out are easy, but the reality of it is pretty darn rough. It's right at that tipping point of temptation, that pivotal moment where you can choose to indulge and feed into your akrasia (weakness of will), or you can choose to call out to the Holy Spirit to ward it off and continue to walk the path of righteousness. Still, sometimes even after the sin is committed, whether in thought or by deed, it may humble you if your heart is in the right and make the believer understand how much he or she needs to depend on solely on God for sustenance and sanctification.

Live and learn!
Hanging on to the edge of tomorrow
Live and learn!
From the works of yesterday
Live and learn!
If you beg or if you borrow
Live and learn!
You may never find your way

Kind of illustrates the Christian life pretty well don't you think? Every day has its new trials and tribulations, but at the same time, it has its new joys and affections; and we can certainly rejoice in BOTH. Each day, every step, and the works that we do, all feed into our characters and our being, and we live as well as learn during our process of sanctification (to lead a Christ-filled, others-centered life, having a renewal of the mind, tending to all parts of our being in their proper capacities). The fact remains that begging for or illicitly borrowing from someone else's "ethical capital" will ultimately make you lose sight of the goal: living a Christ-filled and Spirit-led life and come to a greater understanding of the Living God. You can't ask or borrow for any substitutes; it stunts the spiritual and intellectual growth-process and at best it makes you too reliant on others, and at worst it renders you a parasitical-Christian.

Can you feel life
Tangle you up inside?
Yeah,
Now you're face down on the floor!
Oh,

To sum this up: life has its way of knocking you face-first into the mud, and no one is immune. That much is clear. But for the Christian...

But you can't save your sorrow
You've paid in trade
When you can't help but follow!
It puts you right back where you came

You can't save yourself; there is no magical boot-strapping trick. That's why Christianity sticks out like a sore thumb, for it is the only religion that argues that mankind can't save itself by works and rituals and other sorts of thing to reach some utopian, optimistic, and/or divine (or semi-divine) status. In fact, quite the opposite is true; it is the Divine that comes down in order so that we may be lifted up. It is God who sets the price, then pays it on our behalf, and invites us to take upon that offer...FOR FREE. It's the greatest transaction in history: my sins for His righteousness. I, and the millions of Christians now and before me, have paid in trade, and we can't help but follow. When we do, everything comes into its proper perspective, and it puts us in the most proper position, doing and being what we were designed for (Plato seemed to call this Justice).

There's a face searchin' far, so far and wide.
There's a place where you dreamed you'd never find.
Hold on to what if!
(Hold on to what if!)

Seems relatively straightforward doesn't it? Again, the first verse has that underlying notion that all human souls have that curiosity and yearning about them in some way, shape, or form. But don't be discouraged when you think you've been ostracized from what you perceived to be the Promise Land, for God has something better in store that will not hurt, but rather strengthen your spirit with the solidarity of diamonds. But don't forget to hold on to your "what if's" since those are the very questions that open the doors of honest inquiry about truth, life, the world, and God. Remember, the God of Truth is not afraid of our questions! PROPER doubt and skepticism is usually a good and healthy thing, it gets you on the road to philosophy, which leads inevitably to theology, which leads you face to face with God. Philosophy and theology aren't meant to be boring branches of study that's all head-knowledge and separated from reality--it is getting straight to the heart and foundations of various matters and issues, and treats the intellectual mind with its due nutrition...just the way that God has made us.

I've been in those areas of doubt and skepticism many times, but the more research I do and the more I place my trust in the God of Truth, the greater my faith is solidified, and it is all the more better for my soul and my mind. So I look forward, then, from my 21st birthday and welcome the trials and tribulations along with the joys and affections that life will bring, because I know that my Lord and my God will use them all for good; as for me, it is the sake of knowing Him, abba father. Daddy.

Happy Thursday everyone.

Voice of the Philosophers

2011-09-26T06:58:00.001-10:00

Yeah, so what IS up with that search bar underneath the "Search this Site" section? Well, it's a custom engine I made via Google's Custom Search Engine feature. What's so special about it? Well, if you ever need articles or podcasts or something related to Christianity, apologetics, philosophy, and/or theology, just type it in, and it'll perform a Google search for you, and cycling only through particular blogs and websites that I fancy! You won't go to a new page or tab; the results will be shown in that little section.

Now if for some reason you don't want to go to my blog to do the search (hehe...), you can always go to the search engine's "home page" which is RIGHT HERE

As for the list of sites, I'm going to have to go by my bookmarks since, for some reason, I can't see my included sites in the Control Panel section whenever I have or need to edit it.

Wintery Knight

Lex Communis

Possible Worlds

The Warfare Is Mental

Vox Popoli

A Christian Thinktank

Apologetics 315

Stand to Reason Blog

MandM

The Analytic Scholastic

Alexander Pruss's Blog

Christ and Pop Culture

The Prosblogion

Reformed Seth

The Poached Egg

Uncommon Descent

Cross Examined

Biblical Scholarship

I think these are all of them, but I could be wrong. Also, consider this my blogroll. If you feel I should put another site in the Vox Philosophus, feel free to comment and I'll check the site out!

Federal Reserve and 1984

2011-09-26T06:29:00.002-10:00

(H/T: Vox Day)

So the Federal Reserve is going Big Brother now.

Excerpt:

Two weeks ago, the media's heart went aflutter when it learned that the president had borrowed a page right out of ole' Joe McCarthy's communist witch hunt book with the launch of Attack Watch. The response by everyone, even fans of Obama, was immediate and brutal. Yet where Obama took about 24 hours to crash and burn, someone else has stepped in with a far stealthier method of ferreting out the traitors amongst us: none other than our old friends, the Federal Reserve Bank of the United States, which in a Request for Proposals filed to companies that are Fed vendors, is requesting the creation of a "Social Listening Platform" whose function is to "gather data from various social media outlets and news sources." It will "monitor billions of conversations and generate text analytics based on predefined criteria." The Fed's desired product should be able to "determine the sentiment [ED:LOL] of a speaker or writer with respect to some topic or document"... "The solution must be able to gather data from the primary social media platforms – Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, Forums and YouTube. It should also be able to aggregate data from various media outlets such as: CNN, WSJ, Factiva etc."

Most importantly, the "Listening Platform" should be able to "Handle crisis situations, Continuously monitor conversations, and Identify and reach out to key bloggers and influencers." Said otherwise, the Fed has just entered the counterespionage era and will be monitoring everything written about it anywhere in the world. After all, why ask others to snitch for you and anger everyone as Obama found out the hard way, when you can pay others to create the supreme FIATtack WatchTM using money you yourself can print in unlimited amounts. And once the Internet is completely "transparent", the Fed will next focus on telephone conversations, and finally will simply bug each and every otherwise "private" location in the world. Because very soon saying that "printing money is treason" will be treason, and such terrorist thoughts must be pre-crimed before they even occur.

All we can say is we welcome our new Chairsatan Voldemort overlord. For it is truly he who must not be named henceforth.

Of course, it may be in your best interest to ~~watch this video~~ follow haplessly to our gracious overlords if you are not in the know about the Federal Reserve:

Happy Monday everyone!

On Animal Rights

2011-09-25T11:48:00.000-10:00

So...Do animals have rights (or should they)?

Excerpt:

Animals having rights is a contentious notion, and there is a strong argument against it: Rights belong to moral agents, and animals lack moral agency. Driven by instinct, they lack the higher-order thinking skills that enable people to choose between courses of action.

But this argument has some weaknesses. First: Some animals, certain primates especially, actually do think rather well. Second: informed consent. Humans can give it, but animals cannot. If one believes, as everyone should, that relationships ought to be delineated by consent as much as possible, then it follows that scientists should experiment only on people.

Third: the marginal-cases argument, which says: What about the senile, the comatose, or the severely mentally retarded? If it is OK to hunt deer because they lack critical thinking skills, then can we hunt children with Down syndrome?

Most sane people would answer, "no." They would say persons with severe mental retardation have a right not to be hunted for sport, even if they can't articulate it themselves. This brings us to the conundrum pointed out by Peter Singer, author of Animal Liberation: Any quality that only human beings have that might provide the basis for their having rights (such as moral agency) will be absent from some human beings—but any quality that all human beings have (such as self-awareness) will be shared by many animals. So either not all people are equal, or people are equal to (some) animals.

Now one of the more pertinent questions that comes to mind is why humans have moral agency as opposed to animals (especially the higher-order ones such as primates, certain birds, dolphins, and so on). If we are to reduce our morality to instincts, then it doesn't help in the long run since morality is supposed to be, at least in one sense, that which compels or draws us to indulge or withhold from other instincts on the basis of some "Right" and "Wrong". If we take a naturalistic/materialistic approach to morality, it goes down the drain really fast. Without any transcendent anchor, human morality could've been otherwise in the grand story of evolution, and so, for example, if our evolutionary pathway went differently, we could've been wired to believe that rape is good and charity is wrong (with all the emotional fervor and neuron firings and whatnot). If raping the innocent is truly and indispensably wrong for humans beings, then it seems morality can't be within the category of the contingent, at least as far as certain objective values and obligations are concerned.

But I suspect C.S. Lewis really was on to something in Mere Christianity where he exclaimed that morality wasn't just some cognitive faculty, but rather acted as a sort of choice-filter where, in spite of the tendency towards selfishness, we are urged or stopped short of (not) performing some action, even if some selfish action would benefit the human organism. So as far as the first argument-counter in the excerpt is concerned, just because certain primates think well doesn't mean they have a moral component. To use a software engineering analogy, just because an event-driven system works via events, event listeners, callback functions, and so on does not mean that there must be some particular event listener or conditional logic whereupon the system "chooses" an action based on a particular category of conditions (in our case, the category would be moral ones).

The second counter, that of consent, is a rather interesting one, and perhaps it is a sign that an argument from delineated consent might not work (of course, I could be wrong!). I probably would counter that counter with the notion of the intrinsic value of human beings, and so even those who are unable to give consent (such as babies, the mentally deficient, and others) still have intrinsic value in virtue of being human as opposed to animals who do not have inherent in their nature the ability to give consent. In fact, it may just be that an animal would cease to be merely an animal as soon as it obtains moral intuition greater than the instincts of survival, preservation (either of the self or of the group), and maybe group synthesis (hey, I'm just throwing this out here as I'm typing!). Finally, to save some space, I agree with Tibor Machan's counter to dispel the dilemma brought up by Peter Singer.

Of course, this isn't to say that animals shouldn't be taken care of, or that it doesn't matter if pet-owners abuse their own pets (or other people's!). I myself am an incurable dog-lover, and sometimes I enjoy the company of my cute little baby than some people on campus. At the same time though, something seems intuitively odd with having animal "rights" (as opposed to animal protection, animal preservation, animal health, etc) since they are strongly (but not absolutely) linked with responsibilities. For some reason, I feel moral relativism vis-a-vis specie-ism is lurking somewhere around the corner.

So, should animals have rights? How would you respond to the three arguments in the article? How does this relate to the concept of properties (that some are transient while others are essential)?

Happy Sunday everyone.

Bachelor's Degree...NOT Worth It?

2011-09-16T20:47:00.001-10:00

A college degree? Not for my kid

Excerpt:

My view is that a college education no longer has the value it once did. Many young adults (as well as their parents) are realizing several things: that "higher" education is often a joke, with coursework that doesn't even begin to prepare students for the real working world; that colleges and universities are so liberal that they're hostile toward students with traditional values; and that student loan debt can cripple and enslave people for decades, even a lifetime.

"Too many of the people coming out of even our most prestigious academic institutions," notes Thomas Sowell, "graduate with neither the skills to be economically productive nor the intellectual development to make them discerning citizens and voters." And a college education costs a fortune.

A cartoon by Gary Varvel depicts a student sitting with a high-school guidance counselor:Student: "Why should I go to college?"

Counselor: "So you can get a degree."

Student: "Why?"

Counselor: "So you can get a good job."

Student: "Why?"

Counselor: "So you can make more money."

Student: "Why?"

Counselor: "So you can pay back your college loans."

The bitter words of a highly educated couple jumped out at me recently. "I am 30 years old, and my wife is 28, … Altogether, we are $185,000 in debt to the government for our educations. Paying off this debt will be our lives' work."

Strangely enough, I concur. I say for Computer Science, the majority of information, data, tools, API, etc. can all be found online for free. If you just want to work at a company or something, wouldn't getting A+ certified or CISCO certified and passing a competency test be enough (or ought to be, at any rate)? Why go through all the rigmarole just to get a glossy piece of paper with a dean's signature on it? Those things don't mean squat anymore, and they certainly aren't an indication of intelligence.

I know people who have their Ph.D's and are rock-incompetent and lack critical thinking skills. At the same time, I know people who have dropped out of college, but are successful business owners who are productive and contribute many a good thing to society (such as disseminating free information/tutorials online on Youtube or something!). Colleges, even the private ones, have basically become businesses whereupon the product seriously does not justify the cost. There may be some correlation, but I think such a relation is slowly fading out, out, and away. It also doesn't help when some universities offer the most inane classes that serve no purpose in progressing the individual student well, as Thomas Sowell opines, as you can see HERE.

The sad part is, such "institutions" are somewhat immune to the "physics" of the free market since society is so convinced that you need a degree to prove something, and so colleges and universities capitalize on that. It also doesn't help when there are so many incentives for schools to boost up tuition (I'm looking at you student loans). Do you see where the immunity is? People can't simply stop buying from these businesses and just learn their trade/craft elsewhere because you need that stupid piece of paper with a dean's signature on it. It seems the more I muse over this whole thing, the more I really don't want to attend my own graduation ceremony this coming Spring semester. Just send the degree in the mail; you're not fooling me with your socially-constructed rituals and make me forget for about a few hours that I (and/or my parents) have amassed a huge amount of debt!

Is my chagrin blinding or skewing reality, or is there some kernel of truth to all of this? What do you think about college degrees as they are within this current education system, and what do you think could improve the education system in general? Also...yes, I am back after an unduly long time! Hopefully I can be more consistent with my postings, even if they are mere reactions to things or re-posting other people's posts from their own blogs.

Happy Friday everyone!

Earth Now Considered a Person; School Bans Home Lunch; and Flip Phones Fail

2011-04-12T17:20:00.000-10:00

...You have got to be kidding me! Giving the Earth human rights? Well, it was bound to happen.

Excerpt:

...[The UN document] also establishes a Ministry of Mother Earth, and provides the planet with an ombudsman whose job is to hear nature's complaints as voiced by activist and other groups, including the state.

...It also says that "Mother Earth has the right to exist, to persist and to continue the vital cycles, structures, functions and processes that sustain all human beings."

In indigenous Andean culture, the Earth deity known as Pachamama is the centre of all life, and humans are considered equal to all other entities.

Quick, someone use their ~~Flip Phone~~ iPhone and record this document if and then it gets signed. You should be able to have the time to do that, just give your kiddies to the State, they'll feed them! Either that or the Huffington Post will surely comment on it, but not before paying their unpaid guest bloggers (workers' rights and all that, you know).

Actually, it's quite odd, considering I had an idea for a novel about a year ago (which got nowhere, of course) about a parallel history in which Christianity was replaced with a religious "Green" sect, complete with practices, hymns, and a "divinely inspired" text. Glad to see someone picked it up, but unfortunately, they took it seriously...*sigh*

Also, I wonder what these people's stance is on the abortion debate. It seems to be sheer craziness to say that a fetus/embryo is NOT a human, but apparently this planet is? Any thoughts?
Man, when am I going to post my stuff on the doctrine of Hell?

On the Consistency of Ideas

2011-04-11T19:39:00.000-10:00

(H/T: Stand to Reason)

Yeesh, I'd hate to be that professor. It's a provocative piece nonetheless, showing the consistency of actually living out one's worldview and all that it entails.

Moral Landscaping and Foundations Part 2

2011-04-11T19:14:00.000-10:00

Disclaimer: This is not a post-debate analysis. As stated in my previous post, I will be responding/analyzing Sam Harris' proposal to answer the "Value-Problem" by way of human flourishing. Essentially, this post will be addressing his claims such that he is giving a "talk" rather than debating someone, although of course, part of addressing his claims would be his own rebuttals of Craig's arguments (as well as his responses in the Q&A session).

Here is part 2, while everyone else is moving on after all that's been said and done. ;)

Anyway, let's dig into Harris' claims shall we? I was hard-pressed into typing what he was proposing, so if I'm arguing against a straw-man here, please let me know in the comments!

Proposal 1: Right and Wrong correlates with human well-being.

Agreed, but a correlation between right/wrong and well-being doesn't seem to imply that the latter would be the basis for the former. It simply raises the question: why should we identify anything preserving human well-being "good" and anything that consigns or inculcates into conscious creatures misery be "bad" or "wrong"?

Proposal 2: Humans' judgments of moral values seem to be improvisations and modulations of the culture, society, upbringing, and evolutionary comeuppance.

If such were the case (that we create moral values and duties rather than discover them over the course of history), then it would cease to be an objective morality. Such moral values, then, would be contingent and not necessarily binding. If we were to rewind the clock and have evolution play out again, we might end up with different creatures with different societies, different events, and different cultures in which people/societies "create" other moral values and duties.

Proposal 3: God permits genocide, human slavery, human sacrifice apparently, given that He's supposed to be The Moral Standard.

Red herring alert, this is not the topic of the debate, and at most, even if these things were as Harris makes them out to be, that would only "knock down" the God of the Judeo-Christian scriptures, but not in any way show that a transcendent, necessary, and personal being could not possibly ground morality.

However, make no mistake that the objections raised by some pertaining to God's actions/sanctions/permissions in the Old Testament are and should be considered, and I will get to these issues in time (and in fact I did write a thesis paper on what slavery actually was in the Old Testament, so I'll be pulling material from that when I do get around to these points of debate). But remember, in the context of the debate, Harris is committing a red herring fallacy in which his objections, while noteworthy, are irrelevant to the debate topic at hand. Even more so, Craig was not arguing for specifically the Christian God, but the more modest claim for Theism.

Proposal 4: Consciousness (there would be no values of right and wrong in a universe with no consciousness)

Interesting claim here. Still, that makes the ontology of morality contingent based upon whether or not conscious beings exist. Far from helping his case, it would seem that Harris is making morality out to be subjective, non-binding, and/or having an existence in which "it could have been otherwise".

Proposal 5: Well-being - Morality is equitable with avoiding misery (imagine a universe where all conscious creatures are maximized in their torture and torment; we would call that bad);

But that still raises the question as to why exactly this is "bad" and why morality need be equitable with pain/misery-avoidance. As I try to go through this line of thought, it is becoming apparent to me that perhaps Harris is guilty of equivocation of terms. What I mean is this: it seems as if Harris is saying that it is bad for a conscious creature to be miserable, and because of this (widespread) observation, we can therefore conclude (at least inductively?) that morality is tied with well-being (and that conscious/human well-being is the basis on which morality rests upon). The equivocation is subtle, but fallacious all the same--he is thinking of "bad" relative to preservation and self-interest, but then goes on to conclude that this is also "bad" in the moral sense (i.e. - we ought not do X).

Let's use a parody or two to help us illustrate this. It is bad for you to sow corn seeds in the winter season if your intention is being able to grow and sell corn. We can therefore conclude (at least inductively?) that morality is tied with corn production (and that corn production/crop output is the basis, or part of the basis on which morality rests upon).

It is bad for you to only practice in Super Smash Bros. Brawl with level 9 computer players if you intend on fighting in tournaments in which you are up against real people with human tactics (as opposed to artificial intelligence that you can trick). We can therefore conclude (at least inductively?) that morality is tied with good gaming skills (and that gaming skills/hand-eye coordination/dexterity is the basis, or part of the basis on which morality rests upon).

Hopefully the equivocation is clear in those last two examples; Harris seemingly commits the same fallacy here if one follows his line of argumentation. He needs to explain why well-being and human flourishing are the grounds for an objective morality, because identifying similar linguistic terms used to describe objects/entities/states-of-affairs will not do if and when they have different semantics--that will be equivocation!

Proposal 6: It is possible to be objectively wrong if we could have known/hold deeper values.

Not sure what he was getting at here. Finding out and holding to deeper values over the course of time seems to first of all imply that such values are discovered not created. This seems to be at odds with Proposal 2. Secondly, this still doesn't answer the question of what grounds morality on an atheistic worldview. I'll have to go look back into the debate and hear this bit in context and see if I missed something important.

Moral ontology (what is the foundation of objective morality) vs. moral semantics (what is the meaning of moral terms). We can know the difference between good and evil without being aware that morals are ontologically grounded in God.

Fragmented Notes

Universality versus Objectivity - There were some bits said about the universality of human well-being being at least recognized in all cultures and societies, but expanding the scope of such an observation--even to a universal scale--does not say much if not anything at all about the objectivity of morality, as well as how human flourishing could be the proper grounds for it.

The Problem of Evil and Suffering - Well, I did say that laying this out would've been Harris' best bet, and he did take that lead. Though looking back, I realized that such would be yet another red herring in light of the debate topic; my error in advocating this also means his error in using it. I have already covered this problem, however lightly, in a previous post, and I'll definitely return to it again in the future. However, I'd like to note in passing that the logical version of the Problem of Evil has been recognized by both theists and atheists alike as "failed"--that's to say, it's not logically impossible for both God and evil to both exist. The evidential or probabilistic version of the Problem of Evil suffers from trying to argue for a genuine gratuitous evil in which the objector really knows that any evil act is "pointless" rather than having a purpose in the long run that is only seen by God (i.e. - we do not have a good enough epistemic vantage point).

Christianity is essentially the well-being of souls - Actually, Christianity is essentially the heart-to-heart relationship with Jesus Christ (which is the End in itself, not the means TO an end); to walk with Him and know His ways as believers are led by the Holy Spirit. To be sure, our souls are "being well" in the sense that we are redeemed by Christ's work on the Cross and thereby have eternal life, but there's more to the picture than mere self-preservation of the immaterial part of humans.

What about those that haven't heard? - I would agree with the answer that Craig gives in his books, podcasts, and speaking engagements--that those who haven't heard are judged on the basis of the general revelation (a la Romans 1). This is really, REALLY brief, and warrants its own post...

Deathbed conversions (a serial killer comes to God on death-row, and then goes to Heaven?!) - In theory this sounds plausible, but in reality, this objection just doesn't seem to hold water. For the cold-hearted serial killer who has spent all of his life, even some time in prison, wishing destruction on others and being treacherous to the community at large, how could there be a heart change at the moment of death? His character would be so corroded and bent in on itself that the chance of a genuine conversion at that point seems almost zero. Even if some greedy fellow, at his deathbed "recants" his ways and thinks he's cheated the system and has forced God into allowing him into Heaven, he's thought wrong; God is not some vending machine, and neither is the man's salvation genuine--mere utterance of words means nothing to God as He looks at the heart. Did Jesus not criticize the religious elite in His day for their hypocrisy? Did not God say that He desired mercy more than sacrifices and rituals?

More could be said, and again, this is a red herring in the context of the debate, but here's an article from the Christian Think Tank that talks about it in more detail (scroll down to point 8).

People go to Hell because they made a (honest) mistake? - This ought to be reserved for my series on the doctrine of Hell, but suffice to say here, people don't go to Hell because they made an "honest" mistake. They go to Hell because they rejected God and His offer for forgiveness and redemption, and that's basically what Hell is (regardless of what view of Hell you hold, it seems)--separation from God. People are never sent to Hell because of something they didn't know, they are sent there on the basis of how they handled the knowledge that they did have in this life (i.e. - how well did they steward the resources and knowledge that God gave them; especially the repeated offers to place their faith in Christ through family, friends, websites, etc.).

Christianity is a cult of human sacrifice (we worship a being who was a human and who sacrificed himself) - All these are really red herrings to the debate topic. At this point, Harris isn't defending his views anymore. Nevertheless, he grossly misrepresents the Christian tradition and belief, and is out of touch of the cults and pagan nations that did practice human sacrifice (in which a person would be sacrificed to appease the gods and get them on their side). This is contrary to Christianity in which it is God, not humans, who provide the sacrifice, and there is the motivating factor of love and trying to avert people a destiny in which they would face God's wrath--a component that was missing in human sacrifices of the likes of, say, Canaan.

Why can't there be an evil God? Why arbitrarily define God as being good? - See THIS. Roughly around the fifth paragraph and onwards.

Any sectarian Moral philosophy can't be true because of the many different contexts/reasons/beliefs - Just because beliefs and reasons are different does not mean that they are false. One must construe a belief as true or false depending upon if such a truth aligns with reality based on analysis, inquiry, research, inspection, etc. Second of all, isn't it self-defeating for Harris? Isn't his moral philosophy also part of a sect (namely atheism/humanism/philosophical naturalism)? Would that not entail, then, that his beliefs about human flourishing as the grounds for morality not true because they are different than others' beliefs?

Why can't we end all suffering (kill all conscious creatures in order to have an overall net benefit of well-being)? - This was a question posed to Harris. I would say that on his view, the net benefit of well being would end up being zero. I say that because once you extinguish all conscious beings that possess some sort of well-being (whether good or bad overall), you cease to have any conscious beings, and therefore cease to have any well-being in the universe. On Harris' view, it would then seem that "objective" morality just disappears! It is very much the same as imagining a world in which there are no conscious beings at all (so instead of all of them being killed, they simply don't exist)--"objective" morality just doesn't exist. More could be said on this, and I don't think I've even scratched the surface of what implications this question has for Harris' view.

So those are my thoughts on Harris' views/claims/proposals. They just don't hold up once one drags it into the light of scrutiny. During the debate, Harris midway simply stopped defending his views altogether, and started to harp on other issues that were not pertinent to the topic at hand. If I remember correctly, he did not even attempt to tackle Craig's espousal of Divine Command Theory. So I wrote a few fragmented notes on those various bits, as I think they at least warranted some discussion.

Have a happy Monday everyone!

Moral Landscaping and Foundations Part 1

2011-04-07T17:36:00.001-10:00

Disclaimer: This is not a post-debate analysis. As stated in my previous post, I will be responding/analyzing Sam Harris' proposal to answer the "Value-Problem" by way of human flourishing. Essentially, this post will be addressing his claims such that he is giving a "talk" rather than debating someone, although of course, part of addressing his claims would be his own rebuttals of Craig's arguments (as well as his responses in the Q&A session).

Randy Everist over at Possible Worlds has his review of the debate up.

Also, you can find the audio of the debate HERE (H/T: Derek Layne McAllister)

In any case, let's begin shall we? Part 1 will focus on primarily the view itself (and correct me if I'm wrong in misrepresenting it!), then in Part 2 will I focus on the actual debate material as espoused by Harris himself.

A person who advocates a similar view to Sam Harris' may state that the happiness of society contributes to the overall happiness of the individual, and that such is the reason why a person should limit their own pursuit of happiness (i.e. not rape, kill, torture, lie, etc. wholesale). Even someone like Donald Trump would need to contribute at least a little to keep himself comfortable. There are some questions/observations I have with that reasoning though...

1) There seem to be moral choices which are super-arrogatory, that is, above and beyond what is demanded, but on a view where the (apparent?) end-goal of morality is one’s personal happiness, what makes an act super-arrogatory? Is the term “moral obligation” meaningless on this view, considering that one does something because she desires happiness?

2) The advocate of objective morality on the grounds of human flourishing may reason that the atheist’s self-sacrificing actions can enable others to flourish so that others may flourish. The consequences of his/her actions can contribute indirectly to their own well-being since they are improving the state of society around him (sort of like a "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" type of social contract).

Now, is contributing to one’s own well-being the end, goal, or purpose of morality? If so, would it be true, then, that morality can basically be reduced down to whatever makes a person happy; the means to obtain that goal being to contribute to the well-being of the society?

3) What of conflicting interests between societies or between individuals? The radical Islam jihadist strongly believes that he is contributing to the “happy” condition of society, and thus indirectly contributes to his own happiness (of serving his country, of serving his god, etc), but causing harm to individuals in another society would make those people unhappy (let alone dead) and impede their march of flourishing. Does the act of Jihad impede or progress human flourishing? If it impedes human flourishing, how so? Does it not advance the goals of these extremists and contribute to their happiness as a whole? Is it, or ought it be, based on numbers (i.e. – An act is “wrong” if it incites X amount of people to happiness, but X+1 amount of people sorrow)? Would "science" (however that would work out) be the arbiter of figuring out that jihads are really, objectively, wrong?

4) What if science has shown that X really and truly does contribute to human flourishing, but makes some particular group unhappy? In being pressured/encouraged to perform X (say at the behest of their company or for extra credit for some class), they do so grudgingly and doing the “bare minimum” to get by. Such an act did not contribute to their happiness because they clearly had “better” things to do–perhaps some selfish/illegal thing Y that would clearly make them happy, but at the deficit of someone else indirectly.

5) Why do things that make a person happy at all? Why must happiness supersede self-preservation on a view where human beings are merely the accidental by-products of a conglomeration of molecules in which natural selection weeds out the unfit (i.e. those that lack the necessary genes/traits needed for survival)? Is it not the “grand scheme” of evolution to preserve the self and propagate the genes (even then I question why a meaningless, purposeless process in a directionless universe would even have a “grand scheme” or telos to begin with)? Why is this incumbent upon only humans? What about the higher-order animals that exhibit forms of happiness? Should we not also think of their well-being (and if we do, when is it "good" to have their well-being supersede our own?)

6) On atheism, our moral values and duties are not necessary, but contingent, meaning they could’ve been otherwise. If we were to rewind the clock and start the process of evolution all over again, we’d probably have other moral duties or values–-perhaps rape or murder might’ve been our instincts for well-being or contributors towards societal and personal happiness, so on this view we can’t honestly say “Rape is objectively, truly, wrong".

Moreover, I have other deep reservations and questions regarding the derivation of "oughts". What is being espoused here is that one can say people’s actions are good since one can evaluate the quality of their actions from an outside perspective (one person looking at another), and create a moral based on that quality. In essence, if certain actions cause the “human machine” to run better, an “ought” could be derived from those actions.

1) From this notion I have to ask, is it that morality is subjective rather than objective (in that one CREATES moral values and duties instead of discovering them like the laws of physics or mathematical axioms are discovered and expressed; and also in that moral truths seem contingent rather than necessary)?

2) A hypothetical example of smothering your body with a grenade to save comrades might make one “happy” (in whatever sense that means; is he filled with glee or emotional warmth at some instant of time with a smile on his face? Does the rushing of my daughter to the hospital because her head is gushing out blood supposed to inculcate "happiness" in me [instead of the more precise feeling of "relief"]?).

However, such an action does not cause the “human machine” to run better, unless one is referring to the other “human machines” that one is attempting to save, but wouldn’t it make one MORE happy to not protect his comrades and return home to his wife and kids for more happiness and perform inexorably MORE things that would contribute indirectly to his happiness for years to come as opposed to the presumably small amount of happiness that he would get from protecting his comrades (and being cut short of more opportunities to contribute to the happiness of society, and possibly perform more contributory acts of societal well-being with more time in the military)? Even if one were to say that he shouldn't smother his body on the basis of having the opportunity for more well-being both in self and society, would that imply, then, that his choosing to NOT smother the grenade was a lesser good then self-preservation?

3) Just as a tidbit of humor, I would chuckle at seeing the disparity between two epitaphs:

“Here lies Sam Harris, he was a good, moral man”

“Here lies William Lane Craig, he was a man dedicated to contributing to his own self-happiness by contributing to human flourishing!”

4) In any case, the presupposition of naturalism seems to also militate some argumentative force against this, for in leaving the human race with just socio-biological evolution, how can we even trust our own perspective and observations on what constitutes as human flourishing or not? Are our brains and senses wired a certain way to the see the world not as it really is, but in a way that is just conducive for survival? Do we say morals are derived from bettering the human machine as some thing really descriptive about reality, or is it just another trick of the neurons? I know this materialistic problem of undercutting our own means of rationality seems to fall some distance away from the issue at hand, but given that this is supposed to be an atheist offering this view, this seems to be an inevitable consequence if blind, purposeless forces is all that’s really, truly operating “under the hood” so-to-speak.

On the issue of forced marriage, a commenter writes, “Selecting a mate for someone overrides their will in the matter and is more likely to cause unhappiness. Through empathy, I can respect other people’s feelings and refrain from those actions. Therefore, I “ought” to let them choose their own mate.”

1) And we should care about this person’s unhappiness because...? ;)

2) If one were to retort to (1) that it would bring about our own unhappiness, then I would question how that would be so. What if such a person held an “outside perspective” and created a moral that the human race should be pruned and personal happiness be damned? And what if, in performing acts consistent with his “derived morality” actually does make him happy?

3) I’m not sure that such reasoning is even sound. How is it that, on atheism, by overriding someone’s will, causing their unhappiness, and by possessing the capacity to refrain from an action does it logically follow that you must let them choose?

4) What of criminals and their actions? Do we not override their free will in an attempt to preserve the community? Is it not so that by jailing criminals (at least some of them anyway), they are unhappy? By your reasoning, we “ought” to let them go and “choose”. Also, why should one group have their happiness preserved while another group have their happiness restricted? Would it not be going back to the majority ruling again (an act is “wrong” if it incites X amount of people to happiness, but X+1 amount of people sorrow)?

5) Would it not follow from that line of thinking that, if I do not have empathy (and unable to form a sense of respect for the other person and not derive a moral of respecting someone's free choice), I can create/derive the moral that it is good to force someone's hand in marriage? The thing with "outside perspectives" is that such perspectives or individual interpretations seem too subjective to make them non-binding (and certainly not objective)!

So, I just don't see how this view is sustainable. What it amounts to is moral ambiguity and subjectivity. See you all in Part 2 where we actually get to the debate material as espoused by Harris. :P

Is Good from God? The Debate is On...

2011-04-07T12:50:00.000-10:00

Perhaps I'm a latecomer for blogging on this, but to reiterate for the sake of dispersing information, William Lane Craig (defending a Christian theist position) will be debating Sam Harris (defending an Atheistic/Humanist position). Bloggers on both sides will obviously be having some post-debate analysis, explicating on who won, what were the pros and con--strengths and weaknesses--of both people. After the debate, I will, unlike some bloggers, just focus on the objections raised by Harris. I think this is good material to chew on, and to be quite honest, I'm actually not that good in post-debate analysis; I'll just be focusing on the content of what was said and not how persuasive or articulate either person was.

I don't know, that's just me. Wintery Knight will be offering his usual funny, witty, and snarky overview of the debate. :)

If you can't make it like me (I'd drive, but first of all, I'm on an island...), you can watch the live stream of the debate HERE. It will start at 7PM EST.

To pull the description from the live stream page:

Who is Sam Harris? Sam Harris, one of the "Four Horsemen of Atheism", a neuroscientist, philosopher, and bestselling author, will seek to show that the separation between scientific facts and human values is an illusion. Harris will prove that science, not religion, should provide the basis for morality.

Who is William Lane Craig? William Lane Craig is an American Evangelical Christian apologist, theologian, and analytic philosopher known for his work in the philosophy of religion, historical Jesus studies, and the philosophy of time. One of the foremost apologists in the field, Craig has faced some of the best and has been known to hold nothing back in his sharpshooting style of debate. Point by point, Craig will show that morality must be based upon the bedrock foundation of divine revelation, defending the vital role of religion in our modern times.

The topic of the debate will be about morality. Sam Harris' recent book, The Moral Landscape, attempts to explain how morality can be grounded apart from the existence of a Transcendent Anchor (i.e. God) by way of human flourishing/happiness/well-being (both in the individual and societal domains) and scientific facts (or factual data).

On the other hand, William Lane Craig argues that such morality is not and cannot be grounded in this manner, and that objective morality needs to be anchored in some Transcendent, Personal Entity. One of the arguments that Craig gives regarding this is what's called the Moral Argument (which can also be seen as a set of arguments that deal with deducing God's existence by way of analyzing moral ontology, epistemology, etc.). However, Craig here is using his personal 3-point argument:

1) If God does not exist, objective moral values do not exist.
2) Objective moral values do exist.
3) Therefore, God does exist.

Of course, knowing Harris, there has got to be more than just presenting the argument in itself. One would need to analyze and critique Harris' arguments and really challenge those claims on human flourishing, integrating (reducing?) morality with scientific data. On the other hand, what Harris ought to do here would be to trod out the Evidential Problem of Evil (which states that the existence of evil makes it less probable, but not logically impossible, that God exists) and MAYBE point out (alleged) contradictions between God's attributes such as His love and justice, say.

I myself have qualms about both of these things, but in the context of a live debate in spoken word and a limit on time, that probably would be Harris' best bet, I think.

Oh well, onwards into the great debate! Happy Thursday everyone.

Religious Scholarship Funding - Supreme Court Casts Protera

2011-04-04T19:43:00.000-10:00

From The Christian Post:

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Monday that dollar-for-dollar income tax credits for donations to private religious schools are constitutional.

In a 5-4 ruling, the Supreme Court threw out a lawsuit challenging Arizona’s Private School Tax Credit Law, stating that state taxpayers are not forced to contribute to the state program which funds scholarships to private religious schools.

The majority opinion penned by Justice Anthony Kennedy rejected the lawsuit’s claim that the money funds generated for private schools by the school tax credit belongs to the state...

...The court dismissed this case in 2005. However, the ACLU challenged the credit in the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in April 2009. There, a three-judge panel ruled the credit was constitutional, but warned that a trial court might find the opposite true if scholarships were given for religious schools only. The case was later reinstated and appealed to the Supreme Court.

This is good news indeed! Also, I agree with some of the comments made in response to the article (here's one):

The Decision was correct. The dissent misses the mark. These are individual's making donations to private entities of their choice. They are given a credit for this donation. The private entity can support whomever it chooses, so long as at least two schools are receipents.

To suggest that a State Government cannot make these types of taxation decisions would be to read the establishment clause WAY WAY beyond its original intent.

The Establishment Clause

For those who did not catch the Final Fantasy reference...

And just thinking out loud here, if money from private donors going to a private 501c3 actually belongs to the state, then why not, on the Plaintiff's view, let the government take all the private donations from planned parenthood? ;)

...Happy Monday everyone!

Hell - That Challenging and Unlovely Doctrine

2011-04-04T13:46:00.000-10:00

"It is one of the weaknesses of a great deal of contemporary Christianity that we do not speak of the last judgement and of the possibility of being finally lost."
(Lesslie Newbigin)

Then He will also say to those on His left, "Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels...". Then they themselves also will answer, "Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?"

Then He will answer them, "Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me."

"These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

(Matthew 25:41, 44-46 NASB)

It's a shocking doctrine, to say the least. It is probably the most widely criticized, widely abhorred, and widely feared doctrine in Christianity...perhaps more so than the Christian claim that only through Christ does salvation come (the exclusivist position). In our contemporary culture, Hell has been the point of parody, but in facing the doctrine itself, it is met with repulsion, disgust, and loss of respect for those who hold onto such a doctrine that "the righteous may live, but the unrighteous are damned". Our pastors in contemporary churches, as well as those from the Emergent Church, downplay or altogether deny such a doctrine altogether. Some think of Hell as a state of mind whereas others will say that only Heaven exists.

Amidst all the emotions and fervor that go back and forth between traditional orthodox believers, liberal theologians, and layman skeptics lies this belief that those who are not in Christ go to a place of eternal torment, suffering, and punishment called Hell. While extreme fundamentalists on one end preach it so fervently that it seems they actually want people to go there, the other end of the spectrum has people who deny the reality of Hell altogether, and that if such a Hell exists, then God certainly wouldn't be a loving God. In the middle are, presumably, honest thinkers (both Christian AND non-Christian) who have inexplicably mixed feelings. Yet, we cannot leave this doctrine up to personal opinion based on emotions, both for or against. In an examination of the Scriptures that Christians call "Inspired by God", one needs to really look at the text and frame it in its proper context (as ALL good exegetes want to do).

At the time of writing this I will be very, VERY busy what with school, presentations, and "work" that I have to do, so blog updates might be going sparse...again. *sigh*

Still, I want this index so people can see a nice overview of this seemingly not-so-nice issue. We'll be going through this in a systematic manner, and we will be going off on some tangents, especially pertaining to human freedom versus divine sovereignty or the issue of justice itself. This post will continually update as I start writing more and more. My heart goes out to those who have had bad religious experiences, especially with preachers who use Hell as a way of fear tactics to get people to believe and may have deep psychological reservations. My aim here is to NOT Bible-bash and NOT "scare" people with this doctrine. At the same time, my aim isn't to downplay anything that the Bible says at all, and certainly not to water down what Jesus Christ Himself said (we will also get to the significance of preaching the doctrine of Hell, and some points on how to approach it in a prudent and tactful manner).

I also have an aim for both audiences: For Christians, to have a proper biblical understanding of this issue of Hell; for non-believers/skeptics, to show that given the Christian worldview, Hell is a defensible doctrine.

The Overview

Three Views
- Universalism & Critique
- Annihilationism & Critique
- Traditionalism & Critique
Does Hell exist?
Who goes to Hell?
What about those who haven't heard of the Gospel?
How long do people stay in Hell?
What do people in Hell experience?
What are we to make of the imagery found in the New Testament?
Why can't God just forgive sin instead of demanding justice?
Does the existence of Hell/those who go to Hell undermine God's desire for all mankind to be saved?
Why does God punish finite sins with eternal damnation?
Why did God decide to create the universe if He knew massive amounts of suffering beforehand? Why did God decide to create persons knowing that they would reject Him and go to Hell?

The Tangential Topics

Morality: Its Existence, Extent, and Essence
Face-Off: Human Freedom Vs. Divine Sovereignty
God's attributes glancing at Hell
- Holiness
- Justice
- Wrath
- Mercy
- Grace
- Love
Preaching About Hell: Orthodoxy, Orthopraxy, & Orthopathy

...Oh yeah, this will take a while, yet I must press onward. Still, I don't want 5-7 months of this blog all about Hell (I'd have to change the background to a campfire or something...and I like this current background, hehe), so I'll intersperse this with other topics. What this means is to not expect everything all at once. Whew, even this index took me a while to type up!

So then, here we go...

The Ground Which Morality Stands Upon

2011-04-02T18:28:00.000-10:00

So for the past day or two I've been conversing with someone about the nature/ontology of morality. He argues that the Christian Theist's position is incoherent in their "grounding" of objective moral values and duties, and that appeals to God being good seems imply another, separate, independent standard that God has to "live up to". In the post I'll be specifically focusing on the claim that grounding morality in God's nature is fallacious.

First and foremost though, I want to start off with some background information...namely the Euthyphro Dilemma. This famous dilemma is named after Plato's dialogue Euthyphro. The dilemma here is thus, "Is something good because God commands it? Or, does God command it because that thing is good?" Either way, one runs into problems. If something is good because God commands it, then God could command anything--like rape or murder--and that would be good, and Christians certainly don't want to advocate that. On the other hand, does God command something because it's good? If so, then aren't we appealing to an independent standard of goodness? Is it that God is looking at some moral standard and says, "Oh, I see, that's a good thing. I'll command people to do this then..."? We would then have something that sets itself above God, and in fact, this standard would seem to exist even in God's absence.

Now, the response I and a lot of other Christian thinkers have offer is that there is a third option: namely that something is good because God is good. God is the standard for morality to which all others measure up to. God being good and being moral is essential to His nature. What this implies is that God's commands are not arbitrary at all, but rather expressions of His nature. What this also implies is that God does not obey moral laws, but rather He is goodness itself. God being good is as natural and essential as humanness is natural to Plato. What this also implies is that without God, we would not have objective moral values and duties incumbent upon us as humans. Sure, we could subjectively make up our own rules, but they wouldn't be objective or binding. We would not be able to truthfully say, in the absence of God, that rape is objectively wrong regardless if some believe it's right.

What I'm NOT saying here is that a person needs to believe in God in order for him or her to recognize moral values and vices. One does not need to believe in God in order to know that rape is wrong, but that's not the argument here. The argument being offered is that without God Himself, objective morality would not exist--morality would not be grounded. The difference lies between two domains: epistemology (how we come to know things; we can come to know certain moral truths without reference to God) and ontology (the nature of being and existing; that such moral truths would need to be grounded in God's nature in order for them to be binding on everyone).

But the Christian Theist isn't out of the woods yet! The skeptic can still argue that this third option is circular and therefore logically fallacious. He could argue that saying, "God is good because He is good" is circular, and doesn't actually show why God Himself needs to be good. Could we not formulate the concept of an evil and malicious god? Wouldn't the theist then be guilty of being completely arbitrary in saying "God is good"? Or to put it in other terms, if anything that God is, is good, then sadism would have to be good if this is one of God’s traits. If the theist thinks it's impossible for God to be sadistic, he or she needs to explain why it's impossible for Him to be sadistic without appealing to an independent standard (which would land us back into the Euthyphro Dilemma).

To that I respond by saying that God by definition is a maximally great being, and part of being maximally great is to be maximally good, for a being who is all-powerful, ever-present, all-knowing, and all-good is greater than the being who has all these attributes except for a being all-good.

Also, on atheism, our moral values and duties are not necessary, but contingent, meaning they could’ve been otherwise. If we were to rewind the clock and start the process of evolution all over again, we’d probably have other moral duties or values–-perhaps rape or murder might’ve been our instincts for well-being; contributors towards societal and personal happiness; or what we think is right (i.e. how are brains are wired).

What this means is that whatever the ground for objective morality is, it needs to be necessary, and it needs to transcend the physical universe to be the ground which morality stands upon (and also so that it has the highest "vantage point" and provide objective applicability to the entire universe). I’d also like to argue that considering morality is only incumbent on and directed towards human beings–-those endowed with personhood–-then this entity we are dealing with would need to be personal as well (how could it be that some infinite, impersonal force is the standard for morality that is seemingly directed towards beings endowed with rationality and personhood?).

Yet, could we not consider the concept of an evil god? Wouldn't it still be possible for an all-power, all-knowing, and ever-present being to NOT be good (or less than morally perfect)? An evil God could potentially mean that evil would be good; remember that whatever God is, is good, so if God is evil, then evil would be good, would it not?

To quote Glenn Miller from the Christian Think Tank regarding this:

“…let’s approach this is from ethical theory.

(I don’t want to get too technical here philosophically, so I will try to keep this concise. There are some basics in mainstream ethics that should illustrate the point.)

1. Evil is generally defined (technically) in terms of ‘good’ (often as a logical negation or privation–”~good”).

2. Good is NOT defined in terms of ‘evil’ but in terms of ‘ultimates’, ‘absolutes’, ‘transcendentals’ or some finite approximations thereof…

3. Whatever is ‘furthest back’ ontologically (i.e. prior) is the ‘good’ (it forms the existential ‘context’ of our existence, in which our actions and character “fit” or “don’t fit”–see the Existentialist philosophers on this). For theists this is obvious, but even in evolutionary ethics, for example, without an alleged ‘transcendent’, they STILL make ‘survival’ / ‘progress’ / ‘increase in information content’ ontologically PRIOR to the minutia of experience.

4. You can have ‘good’ in existence ( with ‘evil’ DEFINED thereby) WITHOUT having ‘evil’ in EXISTENCE. [VERY IMPORTANT POINT--VERY OFTEN overlooked in these types of discussions.]

5. If you have ‘evil’ in existence (and not merely in ‘logical definition’), then you MUST have ‘good’ in existence (mere ‘definition’ of ‘good’ is not BIG enough to ground evil’s ‘existence’).”

(Original Article)

So that’s the problem in a nutshell about having an “evil God” because “evil” isn’t some absolute, but rather a deprivation of something or the way something ought to be; a world full of evil is a world deprived. A god full of evil is a god deprived, and not maximally great. In fact, that is exactly the definition that people give for God...a maximally great being!

Part of being maximally great is to be maximally good, for a being who is all-powerful, ever-present, all-knowing, and all-good is greater than the being who has all these attributes except for a being all-good.

Consider two beings that have the traditional attributes ascribed to God, except for the second being, who unlike the first one, lacks the attribute of being all-good; consider also that both of these beings are three persons each. Even if neither being creates entities endowed with personhood and intrinsic value (i.e. humans), the first being is maximally great whereas the second one is not because the second has the possibility of treachery within his intra-trinitarian relations. The first being who is all-good will have maximal relational status between His intra-trinitarian relations, and that would give Him “the edge” over the second one. We traditionally call this maximally great being “God”.

Note that when I use the term "maximally great", I do not simply mean "morally great". If such were the case then I would be guilty of question-begging; but what I take "maximally great" to mean is “ontologically great” in totality. Let’s take a morally neutral example, say, omniscience (well, omniscience in general anyway). Say that both entities X and Y are omniscient (that is, they know every true proposition). Entity X knows all true propositions by virtue of his own nature, whereas entity Y knows all true propositions because entity X told him so. Which being, then, is the greater being with regards to omniscience? Surely entity X right? So that “component” would be part and parcel of what being maximally great is, not just the moral component.

So here at last we arrive at a maximally great being in which one requisite for maximal greatness would be moral perfection; and that Goodness is ontologically (and perhaps logically?) prior to Evil. This maximally great being is sufficient grounds for the reality of an objective morality in our world and in our day-to-day lives in which we face moral values and vices every single day. This has been a long read, to be sure, but I hope that this moral investigation shows that the Christian theistic position is not incoherent, and in fact, that to make the case for objective morality for Theism's opposite (Atheism) would actually fall short in doing so. If God does not exist, our intrinsic worth as humans and the values and duties we hold people to disappears; the words remain, but the meaning is gone.

On Flame and Blame

2011-03-31T19:59:00.000-10:00

Alternative titles include:

Love Me or Burn in Hell
Choice and Fire
WTH God?!
What in Hell is Going On

It's probably one of the more prominent questions seekers and skeptics alike will ask: What kind of choice is that?! Love me or burn in Hell? This particular question is what we'll be delving into today. In fact, I'll be writing a slew of posts on questions pertaining to Hell and Salvation and such.

First, a "sketch":

Tim bows on one knee and says to Karen, "I love you more than anyone could imagine! You're so incredibly beautiful! And actually, Karen, I was wondering if you'd be my wife and marry me."

Taken aback by this, but obviously touched by his feelings, Karen thoughtfully responds, "That's so sweet of you Tim! Still, I'm going to have to think about it..."

"Oh sure, go right on ahead. I don't want to force you, else that wouldn't be a genuine choice," replies Tim.

"However," he exclaims, "If you don't choose to marry me, I'll send you down into my basement where my crazy cousin Micah will torture you forever".

"What? That's totally unfair! What kind of choice is that? Why would you send me down there for?" stammers Karen with shock.

"I'm not sending you down there Karen, you are sending yourself there if you choose not to marry me. It's still your free choice, after all".

Such a story is how a good number of skeptics view God's "provision" of choice vis-à-vis Hell and Salvation. Yet, how accurate is this portrayal given the relevant biblical data and Christian doctrine? My contention? Very inaccurate.

First and foremost, the story I've sketched makes God out to be someone who uses scare tactics or threats to try and coerce our choices to the point where it ultimately turns the decision-making into something where we are "pushed" and our free will seems inhibited somewhat (or at least disrespected). Of course, there is a huge difference between that and wanting to choose something and trying to escape the consequences of such a choice. For example, if we choose to jump off a building with nothing but the clothes on our back knowing full well the consequences (and we weren't coerced in any way, shape, or form), then one shouldn't complain in the afterlife that he/she died! The consequence of death/serious injury from such a free-fall isn't something that is being used to push our decision-making, but rather a natural consequence of natural laws.

And oddly enough, Hell and damnation is quite similar. God doesn't use or threaten Hell to try and get us to "shape up and shut up" (but we can sure of think of zany religious zealots who do!), it's a consequence of The Justice System; an expression of God's justice. As a perfect being, God cannot let transgression and injustice go on without proper, satisfactory amends. By His very nature, He has to deal with sin at one point in time or another, He can't leave a "case" hanging. Within the Christian worldview, every single person (including the writer) falls short of the glory of God, and we fail to live up to His moral commands pretty much everyday. So really, everyone deserves Hell (and we'll get to the question of, "Well, I'm good enough" in a subsequent post). This is deserved not because of the desire of a malicious, sadistic God, as scripture makes it clear that God does not delight in the death of the wicked and in fact doesn't even like to judge!

Now, Christians believe these three things about God: He is perfectly just, He is merciful, and He is gracious, and it really is at the Cross where all three...cross! Let us put it in this way, through God's justice, sin has to be dealt with; through His mercy, He has held off of judging immediately; through His grace, He sends His only begotten Son--Jesus of Nazareth--to take that punishment and satisfy the requirements for justice on our behalf. This is seen as grace because though God would be in the right to judge or restart the universe, He chose to take that justice up upon Himself, and provide a means of reconciliation and restoration for us. So, the only thing God calls us to do regarding salvation is to believe in His Son and that He was our sufficient substitute on our behalf.

He placed the cookie jar on the bottom shelf for us. For all of us.

So God provides the life raft (the element of rescue, which is missing in the sketch between Tim and Karen), and it is up to us whether to take hold of it or not. The consequence for not doing so will only come about because we refused the help, and so we are accountable for our actions still (and this can easily segue into divine sovereignty, free will, and providence issues, but that will be for a later time).

Objection 2: Why couldn't God just have/make pets like dogs or something? They seem to be more loyal and faithful than humans are!

Because God loves us, and in spite of knowing everyone's rebellion at one point in time in their lives or another, He created us and invites us into a loving and personal relationship. Human beings are specifically made in the image of God and so are endowed with higher-order rationality, intentionality, empathy, as well as a moral capacity that is simply unheard of in the "Natural World". We were called to be God's children, not His pets.

While animals such as dogs and cats (and I'm an incurable dog-lover) give an unconditional love with our sole duty of providing for their basic needs, the depth and complexity of a human-to-human relationship, especially the Parent-to-Child relationship, is far greater. One could say it's a higher risk with such a developed creature as the Human, but it comes with a higher reward...a deeper, bilateral relationship as opposed to a more unilateral one between the Owner and the Pet.

To be sure, even Jesus himself used the analogy of the Shepherd and the Sheep to illustrate the connection between God and Man:

I am the good shepherd, and I know My own and My own know Me, even as the Father knows Me and I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep. "I have other sheep, which are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will hear My voice; and they will become one flock with one shepherd.

(John 10:14-16 NASB)

And while we in modern 21st century western society find it hard to relate specifically to sheep and shepherds, we can relate with our owning of pets, and the point that Jesus is making is still clear. Yet the analogy isn't a comprehensive and full one. Humans are made in God's image, but the dog is clearly not made in Human's image.

Consider also the fact that God desires in communicating with and working through whole communities as well as through individuals (i.e. the Body of Christ, the nation of Israel...). Animals groups/packs don't seem to provide or display higher-order synthesis, charity, expression, etc. If anything, these animals would be concerned about their preservation (i.e. survival of the fittest), and would lack the capacity to do certain things (or to prohibit certain things) on the basis of seeing their kin as ends in themselves or of intrinsic worth.

Within the Christian worldview, God desired to create free creatures in His image so that we as His children can share in a wonderful relationship with Him, and as such the capacity of love, awe, and worship are increased many times over if so choose to. This can't be done with animals.

At the same time, in order for God to genuinely allow His children to make such a free choice, He had to also give them the alternative to rebel and say no. You see, to give humans free will, and yet never give them the choice to say "No, I don't love you, I want to live life by my own rules and do what I want to do. I want my will be done, not Yours," means that they aren't really free, autonomous creatures. In fact, I would say it is an act of God's respectfulness and openness to create free agents capable of rejecting as opposed to puppets or pets.

What this also means is that as rational, autonomous agents, we are held responsible for our actions. With animals, we can write their actions off as, "they don't know any better," but humans aren't so easily off the hook. Our responsibility to be moral and just creatures in both the spiritual and social domains, as well as our accountability to God, the moral Law-Giver, will be discussed in subsequent posts.

While there is so much more that needs to be said, debunked, articulated, clarified, and analyzed about the doctrine of Hell, I hope this provides at least some insight to this very controversial (and unfortunately, not all that talked about in churches nowadays) topic. On top of all this are the emotions that run along with this doctrine. That sheer repulsion of the thought of a loving God who would even send people to Hell in the first place; the aversion of many a Christian to downplay Hell so as to maintain a "marketable image" of Christianity or their church. At the same time, we want to hold onto that which is true, and so we may need to scale back or step forward...if we are honest truth-seekers. We cannot dismiss a doctrine simply because we do not like it, and neither can we over-blow certain biblical text and read into scripture what we want about Hell.

This may seem a bit messy, but I'll try to fix it up when I get a good amount of time to. This post took me roughly 10-12 hours, and I thought I was going to have it posted on the blog earlier today, but I totally overestimated a lot of variables during the writing process.

For those that want to leave a comment, please try to not be divisive, disparaging, hateful, or disrespectful given this particular, emotionally provocative subject. Thank you.

A Liberal Shot in the Foot?

2011-03-30T13:02:00.000-10:00

Here's an interesting article from Georgetown University's News Magazine:

The Kids Aren't All Right

Essentially, the writer, Julie Patterson, exclaims that she finds children repulsing, even the thought of "family time" and child-rearing inculcates in her a sense of disgust and revolt. She writes, and a I quote:

I’ll come right out and say it: Children repulse me. They frighten me. They make me anxious. Babies all look the same, and they are all ugly. Toddlers are praised for doing ordinary things like speaking and waving. Children have a comment and a question about everything.

and,

...I could muse on how the source of my discomfort lies in how the promise of youth that shines in their carefree eyes makes me lament my own loss of innocence, but it’s probably more accurate to say that these kids just suck. They’re loud, they’re obnoxious, they have too much energy, and they’re still learning how to conjugate irregular verbs. I have no time for that in my life...I assume that they, like many predators, can sense fear, and will therefore leave me in peace. But there are no guarantees in life—not even the success of birth control. Here’s to hoping no little accident ever “blesses” my life.

Even for people who prefer not to have children, this seems to be going too far. This may be a shot in the dark, and correct me if I'm wrong (I have tried to look and see her personal beliefs on religious and spiritual matters, but to no avail), but I don't think she's a Christian...perhaps a nominal one in label only, but certainly not following any orthodox teaching from any mainline denominations.

I have found via Lex Communis, who provided this other related link that, "Incidentally, Julie’s Facebook page lists her only two Interests and Activities as “Being a Bitch” and “Being a Hypocrite.”"

Whether that truly belies a specific misanthropic disposition or if she's doing that for the sake of being edgy and to "shock" conservatives (and hey, even some moderates and liberals as well), I really can't say. More intriguing though, is the fact that she calls these little young ones "accidents". What could she mean by that? That ALL of the children she sees were unintended or unplanned? Does she implicitly assume that children are objectively a burden with no greater reward, and so does not believe that any [sane] couple would choose to have children (ergo, they "must have been" accidents)?

...Or perhaps she's just launching personal attack against them. Wait...if that is the case, then at one point in time she was an accident? At what point does she "cease" to be an accident (because I don't think that she sees herself as one, yet she was a child before)? Did she just unwittingly reveal an engrossed sense of selfishness; a calling card to bad upbringing; or both?

And a thought just occurred to me: this is a fairly prevalent position of the far-leaning Left (in general terms: progressive-secularist Liberals). If a large amount of liberals refuse to have or bear any children, they really can't pass on their values. Conservatives, on the other hand, do affirm the value of the family and the value/sacrifice of child-bearing and child-rearing in a way that allows them to pass on their beliefs and values to their own children.

In fact, liberal demographer Phillip Longman laments this trend as he writes,

This dynamic helps explain, for example, the gradual drift of American culture away from secular individualism and toward religious fundamentalism. Among states that voted for President George W. Bush in 2004, fertility rates are 12 percent higher than in states that voted for Sen. John Kerry. It may also help to explain the increasing popular resistance among rank-and-file Europeans to such crown jewels of secular liberalism as the European Union. It turns out that Europeans who are most likely to identify themselves as “world citizens” are also those least likely to have children.

The great difference in fertility rates between secular individualists and religious or cultural conservatives augurs a vast, demographically driven change in modern societies. Consider the demographics of France, for example. Among French women born in the early 1960s, less than a third have three or more children. But this distinct minority of French women (most of them presumably practicing Catholics and Muslims) produced more than 50 percent of all children born to their generation, in large measure because so many of their contemporaries had one child or none at all.

Tomorrow’s children, therefore, unlike members of the postwar baby boom generation, will be for the most part descendants of a comparatively narrow and culturally conservative segment of society. To be sure, some members of the rising generation may reject their parents’ values, as always happens. But when they look around for fellow secularists and counterculturalists with whom to make common cause, they will find that most of their wouldbe fellow travelers were quite literally never born.

(emphasis mine)

Link to the Article

Seems like on the macro scale of things, Liberalism as we know it is tearing itself down. With the strong desire to negate away parental responsibility by way of not having any children, they are going to be hard-pressed to be able to pass their beliefs down. Perhaps this is why they want a bigger government with time-enduring laws in favor of their ideology.

Any thoughts on the matter?

UPDATE:

(H/T: Lex Communis...again)

So San Francisco's youth population is dropping, and is apparently, "disappointing news" for city officials. Consider that,

Families that remain in The City are bucking the trend that has plagued San Francisco for years as the number of children — defined as people up to 17 years old — has dropped from 181,532 in 1960 to 107,524 today, according to the latest U.S. Census Bureau figures. The 2000 census counted 112,802 youths.

Given California's advocation of abortion and same-sex marriage, this really isn't surprising. On top of that, the exodus of many a traditional and nuclear family--families that do have children--occur because their values are being pushed away in favor of the distorted "equality" and "tolerance" virtues. How then, shall they live?

Theology Matters

2011-03-06T20:04:00.000-10:00

Here's an interesting video that I found a while back:

http://player.vimeo.com/video/8788549

Very simple, organic, yet profound. Theology--proper theology--matters. For if we as Christians want to have and maintain a relationship with God, would it not be a good idea to find out what He likes? What He dislikes? How His creation relates to Him? What it means when we say that He is holy, just, moral, the ground of our existence, omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent? Is this not also a sign of maturity and love for this God to want to know all that we can know about Him; to have our minds captivated by all that He is? Studying theology and apologetics doesn't have to be seen as boring, mundane, and simply "more work I have to do", but rather it is the development of the mind in such a way that it aligns closer to reality and peels away the intellectual gunk that we may have acquired and simply accepted without questioning it.

I certainly agree that not everyone will be able to comprehend and reiterate deep and rigorous philosophical topics and compete with Oxford professors, but it is my contention that every Christian should be able to grow in this area, and articulate at least the basics of the Christian faith and the reasons/evidences provided. To be able to refer a skeptic to another person who has expertise or other resources is in itself an accomplishment in the sense that you are aware of others that can answer the skeptics questions/objections, and to be able to do so in a way that shows the non-Christian that you care about these deep-seated objections instead of merely brushing them off.

Question: How do you see theology, and what role do you think it plays in the life of a Christian?

On Religious Pluralism

2011-02-18T19:46:00.000-10:00

Before we even get started talking about religion and getting to know God and all that other stuff that we'll talk about, it is important to look at a belief that permeates through this 21st-century culture that is really a showstopper for Christianity even before we mention the name "Jesus". I'm talking about pluralism, and specifically in this essay, I'm going to talk about religious pluralism. In this post, I am not going to argue for Christianity, or Monotheism, or even plain old Theism! This is so foundational, so bedrock, that most people nowadays assume this belief without even realizing its implications on whether it's true or not. Here, I will be talking about what I mean by pluralism and what religious pluralism is, then go into detail on why such a belief is faulty and must be abandoned before tackling anything else pertaining to religion and specifically Christianity.

So, what exactly is pluralism? Well, pluralism is the general belief that all things are equally valid and true, and religious pluralism specifically asserts that all religions are equally valid and/or true, and that no one religion ought to claim that it is the only true one whereas the rest are false. Religious pluralism is in stark contrast to religious particularism, the belief that either one or no religions are true and, generally speaking, particularists will say that the "right religion" is the one that most aligns and describes reality. Religious pluralism is also somewhat synonymous to relativism--the belief that religion and religious truth is relative to the person in their own culture, time period, personal opinion, etc.

Now then, when a devout evangelical claims that Jesus is the only way to eternal life and salvation, the pluralist will immediately be put off by such statements. They'll object by saying it is narrow-minded and intolerant to claim that only the Christian way is true while all other religions are false. Moreover they'll question how Christians know for sure that their religion is correct since no human being has complete knowledge of how the world works, especially the supernatural part…how dare we Christians be so cocky and snooty about this whole ordeal of "religion" that mystified mankind for centuries upon centuries!

Unbeknown to the religious pluralist, his objections seem to have some holes in it. For starters, if the pluralist believes that all religious beliefs are equal and valid, then what about the religious belief that only one religion can be true? What about the religious belief that only Christ is the way to God? What about the religious belief that not all religions are equal and valid? The pluralist denies that those kinds of beliefs are valid, but then they either are being inconsistent with their beliefs or else committing a logical fallacy called special pleading whereby they make some arbitrary exception to the rule. They essentially claim that all paths are good and valid except for the path that says it's the only way.

What's also astounding is that the pluralist will generally say that all religious claims are relative to everyone, and that no religious belief is absolute or objective (that is, a belief that is binding on everyone regardless of whoever believes it or not--like the belief in gravity, for example). The problem here is threefold.

FIRST, the pluralist's statement, "all religious claims are just relative to everyone," would also apply to him right? That would mean that his claim is ONLY relative to him, and so by his own statement, he destroys the binding truth of it. What I mean is, if all religious claims are relative, and that in itself is a religious claim, then it is only relative to the pluralist, and thus only exists in his mind and is not actually true. The argument basically defeats itself!

SECOND, his statement is problematic in that such a claim would be an absolute truth! How so you might ask? Well think about it, the pluralist is making a blanket claim that ALL religious beliefs are relative to people right? If it includes ALL beliefs, then it is a universal statement is it not? If so, then it is an absolute truth/belief--a belief that is binding on everyone regardless of whoever believes it or not. So by definition, the pluralist can't even be consistent with his belief that all religious claims are relative since THAT religious claim in and of itself applies universally.

THIRD, the pluralist may contend that religion is, by definition, subjective and amounts to nothing more than personal preference like your favorite ice cream flavor or what's the "best" restaurant to eat at. Therefore, they say, religion (and religious beliefs) can't be deemed true or false. Certainly people express their preferences through their religious convictions, but that does not mean all religious beliefs, statements, or systems are just preferences. Statements such as, "Christ rose from the grave" or "Being saved means to attain Nirvana and realize that you are the Buddha" or "Moses led the people out of Egypt through God's power" are certainly not subjective preferences, but rather are assertions that attempt to describe reality and how the world really is. These statements, then, are either true or false. To deny this is to deny religious believers any authority concerning the content of their own beliefs, which would be incredibly naïve on the part of the pluralist. To shove these hot-button issues off onto the side as periphery and focus only on what religions have in common is to be rather close-minded and intellectually lazy. To argue that religion is just about being nice and promoting good values and virtues is being incredibly vague and simplistic, as it glosses over a lot of what the world religions actually decree. Changing the definition of religion does not change the fact that within each worldview lies assertions of objective fact that are either true or false; they either align with reality--accurately describing it--or it does not.

Yet another objection arises. The pluralist or relativist may say that we shouldn't impose our beliefs on other people since that would be intolerant and mean-spirited. This again is a bad argument for pluralism since it's committing a logical fallacy called ad hominem. Such a fallacy occurs when a person tries to deny an argument by simply attacking the person who offers it. An extreme example of this would be something like, "What? It's going to rain tomorrow? Well, I know the weatherman personally and he's so stingy when it comes to paying the tab, so I shouldn't believe him." Now, the weather is a hard thing to predict, and it may be that it does NOT rain tomorrow, but one would be considered irrational to claim that it didn't rain because the person who gave that prediction was stingy during happy hour! You can't defeat an argument just by saying things about the person holding it!

Likewise, if a belief--any belief, whether it be religious or scientific or just matter-of-fact--is objectively true (like gravity existing, that Columbus went to the Americas in 1492, that I have a brown and scruffy dog…) then it is binding regardless of the attitude of the person who believes it. You can't defeat a claim like, "Christ is the only way to God" simply by saying that Christians are bigoted and mean-spirited! Even if every Christian was a jerk, that doesn't in any way conclude whether Christ did rise from the grave or not and whether he was the Son of God incarnate or not.

For example, say that there was a doctor who finally discovered the cure for cancer, but was a total jerk to his colleagues. He belittles and insults them for not finding the cure first and buffs up his ego and trumps around with his head held high that it was he who found it and that he should be awarded the Nobel peace prize, and that he should have a statue or a hospital or a university erected in his honor…you get the picture. Now, if you had cancer, and the studies have shown that his cure did in fact cure it, would you then refuse to take it simply because the person who discovered it was a prideful jerk? Of course not! Similarly, even if Christians say that Christ rose from the dead in a mean-spirited tone, that does not conclude the truthfulness or falsehood of the matter. The truth of those claims must be settled on other grounds such as history and archaeology.

The inverse statement may sometimes be said by the pluralist, but it is still illogical. They may say that since the people they meet are nice and sincere (perhaps even nicer and more honest than people at church), they aren't wrong, or that we should also just be nice and sincere and leave it at that.

FIRST OF ALL, such a statement confuses objective truth and humility. Of course we ought to let people be free to believe what they want to believe, and we should be able to "agree to disagree" in many areas of debate, but we shouldn't compromise truth in the process of being courteous to the other person. The concern isn't a matter of public policy, but rather what is true, how do we know it is true, and what are the implications of such truth. Truth by its very nature is exclusive and not democratic, because it eliminates all other false statements.

SECOND OF ALL, we know that there is more to truth and there is more to assessing reality than just sincerity. While it is a noble attitude, it is certainly not enough…in fact, we find it scary (sometimes amusing) to see people be sincere about such things as "the government is ruled by aliens in secret!" or "there really are goblins underneath my bed!" We must be correct and informed as well as being sincere. Sincere ignorance of the law is no excuse, as some people find out when they get pulled over by the cops and say, "But officer, I sincerely didn't know it was a 30 mile an hour zone!" A more vivid example might be jumping off a cliff with the sincere belief that I could fly. No matter how sincere I am, there are some dire consequences, and reality will not "move aside" to accommodate my heartfelt belief! On the other, harsher end of the spectrum, the greatest evils in the world such as the Holocaust or Mao's Revolution had corrupt leaders who were incredibly sincere with their beliefs. So as you can clearly see, being sincere amounts to very little in terms of assessing truth.

And sometimes even if statements that may "make us feel bad" are true, they nevertheless must be said because of some greater worth or risk at stake. For example, getting the message from the doctor saying you have a terminal illness and only have a few months to live would definitely make anyone "feel bad", but the doctor must say it to you because though it hurts, it's the sad truth, and at least you are aware of it so you can make the last days of your life count. Now, I can't (and won't) speak for other religions, but in terms of Christianity, the truth is that all other religions hold false statements or propositions. Some may have kernels of truth, like, say, don't murder others or don't be selfish. Those are certainly found in other religions and are not exclusive to Christianity, but the point is that it is Christ who is the only way and is the only mediator to God. Salvation only comes through His blood that He shed on the cross. Christians are compelled (or ought to be) to speak this truth because the world we live in is in desperate need of saving lest we become subjects to God's wrath and His justice. Just as the doctor is compelled to give his heart-wrenching diagnosis, so the Christian is compelled to give his heart-wrenching notion that all of us are spiritually dead, as well giving the encouraging good news that we can get out of our human predicament through Christ.

If you disagree with the above, then it must only be so because you do not believe that God exists, that Jesus rose from the dead, or other things pertaining to particular Christian creeds. However, it is simply illogical and empty to say that these core tenets of Christianity is false simply because certain Christians are jerks, hypocrites, or downright no different (or worse) than other people you've met. Again, those Christian creeds must be assessed and critiqued by other means.

It is also allegedly stated by the pluralist that religious particularism can't be true because people acquire their beliefs based on when and/or where they were born. For example, if I were born in Pakistan, I wouldn't be a Christian, I'd likely be a Muslim. Now, this objection is flawed because it commits what's called the genetic fallacy. This is fallacious because the pluralist is trying to defeat the argument by criticizing how people came to hold their beliefs. However, just pointing out how a person's beliefs originated does not invalidate the belief itself. In fact, by the same token, if the religious pluralist didn't grow up in a postmodern, post-Christian, 21st-century Western society, then he wouldn't be a religious pluralist. So what?

Again, another example, if you were born in ancient Greece, you would've believed that the sun revolved around the earth, but does that in any way mean that the earth revolving around the sun is a false or unjustified belief? Of course not! So in the same way, saying that religious particularism can't be true on the basis of the environment in which they acquire this belief does not make the belief false or unjustified.

For completion's sake, let's take a look at an often used illustration of the blind men and the elephant…an illustration used mostly by adherents to postmodernism (the view that real religious and/or real historical knowledge can't be known) rather than pluralists per se. The story goes that a group of blind men feel different parts of the elephant and arrive at different conclusions. One man feels the tusk and thinks the elephant is like a sharp spear; another feels a leg and thinks the elephant is rough like a tree; yet another feels the tail and thinks the elephant is like rope. The men began arguing that his own perceptions of the elephant was right, and this commotion awoke the king who told them that the elephant is a big animal and that each man only touched a part of it. The men must "piece together" all these parts in order to get a better perception of the elephant.

Now, the story is likened to that of religion: each great world religion holds a piece of the puzzle of this grand "Reality" or "The Real" or "God" or "Ultimate", but none can claim that their religion is the real one. The problem with the parable is that if the blind men are analogous to all of the world's religions, and if the elephant represents reality, then who is the king supposed to be analogous to? The king in the story has a full view of the elephant, and has a better (probably the best) vantage point in assessing what the elephant actually is such that he can correctly tell the blind men about it. Is the postmodernist or pluralist supposed to be the king telling us how the world is like (namely that we can never accurately describe it, at least not in one religion)? If so, how do they know that? How did they get to that vantage point to see beyond the darkness? How do they know that reality cannot be known? If they are part of the blind men, then they are just that--blind, and so their assertion that reality cannot be known is just another blind man groping his way in the dark, and therefore not really reliable.

Second of all, parables or stories are not good pieces of evidence--they merely are sketches or illustrations, but that doesn't in any way mean that the point the story is making is actually true. Again, such claims to reality need to have evidence and good reasoning to back it up. Stories like this only help visualize what the view or belief is, not if it is actually true or not.

Third of all, the story assumes the elephant is mute, which means "reality" or "The Real" or "The Ultimate" or "God" is mute, and so it is up to us to grope around. What if God or "The Ultimate" had spoken or had provided a way, somehow, to be exposed through inquiry? Christianity is in stark contrast to this because we contend that God is not silent, but rather has manifested Himself through His son Jesus. We believe that He came down and communicated with us, not that we have to grope around aimlessly and hope that we find Him. Whether or not He actually did this will be for another essay, but the point is that the parable does not describe an accurate picture of seeking and finding, at least in light of Christianity (and actually in the other monotheistic religions as well such as Islam and Judaism).

Fourth, the parable makes it out as if the reason for religious debates and "head-on collisions" is because we all lack exposure to other beliefs just like the blind men did not all touch every part of the elephant, but merely stuck with one part and then tried to conceive of the elephant from there. The error in this is that religious particularists, especially Christian thinkers, reject pluralism not because we haven't "seen enough", but rather because there are inherently logical problems with it. A better illustration would be if the blind men came across a marble that could fit in the palm of their hand. If one of the blind men stated, "Ah ha! The marble is bigger than a house!" he would be shunned by the others because clearly they can hold it within their hand, and they know that houses cannot be held just within your palm. The evidence they have points to the best probable notion--the marble isn't as big as a house.

In the same way, when Judaism says, "Jesus is not the Messiah" and Christianity says, "Jesus is the Messiah" clearly both cannot be true. Either he was or he wasn't. The problem is not simply being uninformed in this case, but rather ideas and statements of alleged fact that completely contradict each other. The real point of contention among the many world religions is not the blind groping and then drawing a conclusion, but rather the inherent contradictory problems and inaccuracies of an already formulated religious system.

In this post I have propounded upon what religious pluralism is, what the pluralist's objections are for religious particularism, and gave rebuttals on why each objection is flawed, and how the belief that all religious views are equal or valid or true is self-contradictory, and how such a belief can't be lived consistently by those who profess this belief. I also contended that a common illustration used to help visualize a postmodern view of reality is mistaken, and that such a view of reality refutes itself. I urge people to take an honest look and invest some time on weighing the evidence that each major world religion provides that are alleged to validate their beliefs, including Christianity. In fact, I urge honest truth-seekers to check out Christianity first since its core doctrine, the resurrection of Jesus Christ, is claimed by its orthodox adherents to be a real and historical fact that can be analyzed and examined. If Christ really did rise from the grave, then he really was who he claimed to be…namely God incarnate…and surely what He/God says about reality will help us cut through a lot of the murkiness, confusion, and uncertainty of virtually every religious system.

Class Discussion

2011-02-18T14:46:00.000-10:00

Today in my religion class (entitled "Christian God & Human Experience") we had a group discussion that took up the entirety of the class time. The professor explained that we should be talking amongst ourselves in small groups instead of him always talking in a sort of "one-way" sense of learning. So, we had the 50 minutes of class-time to discuss five questions that I found most interesting. Unfortunately, my group didn't have any atheists (in the sense that they believe that God does NOT exist instead of the "materialistic" / "morally pluralistic" Deism brand). I had four people in my group, most of them Catholic or at least went to Catholic school (which doesn't say much about their own personal beliefs about God, religion, and truth).

I personally didn't want to go the whole nine yards and start preaching to the group--it was geared to be a conversation, not a self-appointed lecture--and so I had a great time trying to at least help facilitate input--especially from the people who were quiet. However, if I did have the microphone and had to give a more detailed response to all five questions, here is what I'd say...but first, the questions:

1) How would you rate the God-search / God-hunger / God-thirst in the world today?

2) Do you know of anyone who has had & who has described a God-experience of some kind?

3) Which atheist's line of reasoning seemed most persuasive to you?

4) What evidences for or against God do you find most convincing?

5) What is your take on this first segment of the course material that introduced human experience and the question of God?

My Response

1) How would you rate the God-search / God-hunger / God-thirst in the world today?

This seems to me a broad-brush question, because there are so many factors such as the cultural stance on religion and God, age group, and so on. On top of that, the terms are not very well-defined. Does "God-search" mean seeking if God does exist, and then finding out what He is like and if we're able to relate to Him? Or does it mean to search out your own "personal" God where you can mix-and-match from different religions or strains of spiritualities to fit what you think is "good" or "appropriate" or "tasteful"? If the former, then I would say only in the upper tiers in the American philosophy departments; if the latter, then it's completely widespread.

2) Do you know of anyone who has had & who has described a God-experience of some kind?

Yes. Though, I take it that the "authentic" experiences of the Holy Spirit (to which I could not be able to have fully epistemic certainty of someone else's experience) would not be evidence you would use to show as evidence, but just knowing God personally. If all we had were experiences, then it'd be incredibly hard to SHOW or prove simply based on those experiences; there's a difference between epistemic certainty and providing justification.

3) Which atheist's line of reasoning seemed most persuasive to you?

Nietzsche definitely. He understood where atheism led and what those implications amounted to (that is, moral nihilism). If I had to think of an argument that would be the best one against God's existence (though I think it is not a knockdown argument by any means) would be the Problem of Suffering and Evil. Part of it is because you can subdivide the issue in four ways:

1 - The logical problem of evil (God's existence is logically contradictory with the presence of evil and suffering in the world)

2 - The evidential or probabilistic problem of evil (God's existence is rendered improbable given the presence of evil and suffering in the world)

3 - The emotional problem of specific evils (which must tackled differently than from the philosophical approach; the emotional force can really seem like a show-stopper at times)

4 - The issue of God's omniscience and omni-benevolence (why would an all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-loving God knowingly create a world where people would suffer, rebel, and choose to reject Him; the issue of theodicy).

4) What evidences for or against God do you find most convincing?

God is the best explanation for the fine-tuning of the universe, God is the best explanation for the cause of the universe, God is the best explanation for my metaphysically there is something rather than nothing, God is the best explanation for the existence of objective moral values and duties, and that God is the best explanation concerning the data surrounding the event known as "Jesus' Resurrection". Not any one argument for His existence is a knockdown proof, nor I should think it was meant to be, but cumulatively speaking, the arguments and evidence through sound reasoning points to the existence of God that far outweighs the probability of the proposition's negative, "God does not exist".

5) What is your take on this first segment of the course material that introduced human experience and the question of God?

The class started discussing religion through an anthropological approach, so I thought it was a very interesting take on addressing these big issues.

So, how would you answer those five questions? For the fifth question, you can answer this prompt: "What do you think the best method is for approaching the question of God's existence?"

Happy Aloha Friday folks, have an awesome weekend!

Hey Luther, still can't do no other?

2011-02-18T09:04:00.000-10:00

So it's been 465 years since Martin Luther's death in 1546. For those who don't know him too well, he's the guy who really set off the Protestant Reformation, "unofficially" starting with his nailing his 95 theses on the front doors of the Castle Church in Wittenburg in 1517. That piece of work mainly dealt with his disapproval of the indulgences of the Roman Catholic Church at the time, whereupon people could pay money to save the souls of themselves, their loved ones, and those who were already dead, from purgatory.

For more, please see this pop music video of somewhat epic proportions.

For a closer inspection of his 95 theses, I give you this lovely bit. While obviously not usable as a source you could cite on a research paper, it's a nice blend of pop culture and history.

Civil Unions & Church Failure

2011-02-17T19:43:00.000-10:00

From the Huffington Post:

Excerpt:

"HONOLULU — Hawaii lawmakers approved a bill Wednesday to allow civil unions for same-sex couples, marking an end to what the governor called an "emotional process" for a longtime battleground in the gay rights movement.

Democratic Gov. Neil Abercrombie's office said he intends to sign the bill into law within 10 business days. Civil unions would begin Jan. 1, 2012, making the state the seventh in the nation to grant essentially the same rights of marriage to same-sex couples without authorizing marriage itself."

Thoughts:

1) I still do not have a clue as to what any meaningful difference there is between civil unions and same-sex marriage. The debate between preserving marriage as an institution for uniting one man and one woman and "opening up" marriage for same-sex couples, I can understand, as one of the bigger issues, if not the most central issue, is a civil rights (i.e. equality) one. Now, I'm one to be wary of the Snowball Fallacy (a logical fallacy that is committed when one starts linking propositions such that one is the coming effect from another and so it "snowballs" down), but I think this is one of the seeds being sown to open the door to same-sex marriage. I must say, they were smart in that regard, because all they really need to do at this point is to pull some sleight-of-hand equivocation trick and presto, same-sex marriage authorized.

2) I still suspect that the homosexual agenda is not one of merely tolerance, but of acceptance (and more government/judicial pressures for people, especially for evangelical Christians, have dramatically increased my suspicion of being spot-on). This isn't an agenda of "let them be", but rather, "you must approve". This goes far beyond some call to civil rights and equality, but the bending of the will of others to conform to their values and their beliefs. History has an odd way of repeating itself. In that regard, I feel like we're moving back to 4th century Rome. If that is the case, there is need for more Pauls, Barnabas', Priscillas, and other reasoned-and-seasoned Christian apologists.

3)Here's what one protester against the civil unions bill stated:

"I feel very grieved for all of us. Now we'll need God even more in our islands,"

Here is where my complaint with the Church in America (i.e. - the Body of Christ) starts to crop up. Do we honestly think that praying and hoping that God will slap these legislators over the head and make them repudiate the bill? Do we honestly, as Bible-believing Christians, think that simply praying and rallying will make a huge difference? It may make some difference, but in all appearances, I think that the majority of the "onlookers" in the House of Representatives and in the Senate are just looking at us like some extreme religious zealots who've been brainwashed and want to maintain a theocracy.

Do we need God more in the islands? Of course. Should we continue to pray and make our opinions known to those in authority (with humility and respect)? Of course! But we need to do more than that, and we need to be like these liberals and think LONG-TERM. We also need to sow seeds and think of the next generation, and a huge part of that is teaching them how to give good reasons and arguments for the faith, as well as being a role model for them in this regard. As a whole, teens and young adults don't seem to have good critical thinking skills, and a lot of Christian parents just twiddle their fingers and just give stock responses like, "Just pray," or, "Just have faith," or, "Well, that's what the Bible says".

It's hard enough as it is when we have charlatans of the faith saying they're Christians, yet indulging in sin, hatred, and so on. It's hard enough that we live in a post-Christian, post-modern society that sees Christianity as an outdated, primitive, childish, fanatic, homophobic, xenophobic, and disingenuous. It's hard enough that a lot of churches are breaking and giving way to the whims of the culture as opposed to being culture-changers in and of themselves.

So can we just cut the crap (theological term) about doing over-the-top wacky stuff at church, making long, drawn-out, and uninspiring "plays" that have no relation to Christian values/doctrines and serve no educative purpose? Can we stop treating the church-members like little children who need to be wowed with colorful lights, jokes, and cute cartoons? As much as I enjoy humor as a means to get a point across, sometimes it's overkill, and if people are simply coming to church JUST to feel good or JUST to get a kick out of the jokes or JUST to see a good show, then we've failed. Children who grow up in these kinds of churches will eventually find their thrill-seeking elsewhere--usually in places where they are captured by the culture so-to-speak, and eventually fall away.

Again, I must reiterate, I'm not necessarily opposed to having plays, skits, or inserting humor to bring home a point or to "set the atmosphere" of some message, in fact, I think that the Arts should be redeemed by Christianity, but I must warn churches...be wary of how much you invest in it and how often you use it, because people will end up settling for the sugary highlights as opposed to the meat and potatoes of understanding Christian doctrine as well as applying biblical truths to our lives practically-speaking.

This issue is one of the many reasons why apologetics is important, and training (not just learning or memorizing or parroting mindlessly) people to engage in debate and be able to give good reasons and evidence for the hope that is in us.

It appears that there is a sort of Christian Renaissance going on the philosophy departments across this nation, and if this is so, then we simply MUST get the Church on board, challenge preconceptions, leave behind misconceptions, and be true, authentic, real, no-nonsense culture-changers. The Church has stowed away in the intellectual closet and made a little universe of its own in which it operates while the real world around it moves on and crushes it in its wake.

So, churches of Hawaii, what are you going to do now that the bill has been passed and that the governor does intend to green-light it? Are you merely going to say, "just pray harder," or are you going to do something more substantive and productive?

If you were in Moses place during the time when Israel was enslaved by Egypt, would you go up to the Pharaoh and say, "Let my people go! Oh...you won't? Death threats? Harsh punishments? Okay, you win. We'll just pray for you that God will change your heart..."?

So, what do you guys/gals think?

Prove it!

2011-02-17T13:46:00.000-10:00

We've all heard it before at one time or another (or some of us have even used this line), "If God exists, then prove it!" Yet before our good Christian apologist even begins to take on the challenge of the atheist, you have to stop and think, "What does he/she mean by proof?"

If God exists, why doesn't He give us absolute, undeniable, 100% certain proof that He exists or that Jesus really did rise from the grave? Given what we have now, it's still always possible that your beliefs/claims are false!

First and foremost, there's a big difference between proof and certainty, and we need to make sure we properly distinguish between them. Now, when someone asks for proof, you could take it to mean one of two things: a piece of evidence, or more specifically, an argument (i.e. - a sequence of steps, statements, or demonstrations that lead to a valid conclusion).

Let's say that the ever-witty Christian apologist starts laying out the moral argument, the fine-tuning of the universe with "design" as the best explanation, and the "God hypothesis" as the best explanation for the data concerning Jesus' resurrection. Perhaps our atheist friend even agrees to all of the evidence presented, but then retorts, "Well, it's still possible that God doesn't exist. Even if it were probable, there's still the possibility that He doesn't exist or that Jesus didn't rise from the grave!"

At this point, we must explain how much warrant we ought to have in believing any proposition or statement-of-fact. If Mr. Atheist means proof to be 100% certainty (like some magic bullet), then we can say there's NO proof of God's existence in that case given the definition. But you see, then we don't have proof for virtually anything...we couldn't live life properly if all we were to accept are propositions or arguments that we think are 100% certain.

Take for example the clothes you're wearing (you ARE wearing clothes...right?), we are not 100% certain that we're wearing clothes. Now, you may find that incredibly silly, seeing as how you can feel them, you can see them, no one around you is snickering or looking shocked, and so forth, but you are just concluding beyond a reasonable doubt based on the preponderance of the evidence that you are in fact wearing clothes.

If we only accepted things that we are 100% certain of, then we could always respond to this issue by saying that it's possible that you're a brain in a vat of chemicals, wired by a mad scientist to some diodes that make you THINK you're wearing clothes and make you THINK that being a brain in a vat is absurd. It's possible that everyone around you just so happened to look the other way or is legally blind, and so that's the explanation for the lack of shock. It's possible that our senses and memories are fooling us into thinking we are wearing clothes at this very moment. You see, almost anything is possible, but we'd be crazy to go forth and give these possibilities as reason to NOT believe you're wearing clothes!

And just because something is possible does not make it probable, and it certainly does not make it the best explanation in light of the relevant data/evidence. Yet, the question arises, how much should a proposition or argument be probable in order to accept it as true? The answer is: more probable than its negation.

To go back to our clothes-wearing analogy, given all of the relevant data and evidence, it is, beyond a reasonable doubt, more probable that you are wearing clothes as opposed to the notion that you are not wearing clothes. You can use this line of reasoning for any proposition that attempts to describe reality or some state-of-affairs. Am I breathing right now? Do I have black/red/blonde/dyed/no hair? Am I reading this article right now? Did I eat breakfast this morning?

Though the questions I've listed seem so incredibly obvious and easy to answer without having to go into detail about "more probable than its negation" or "beyond a reasonable doubt", the fact remains that there really isn't anything that we can be 100% certain of, and so with regards to God's existence of Jesus' resurrection, so long as we can provide good evidence and good reasons that "weigh in" with 51% for versus 49% against, we are epistemically warranted in going with the position that is more probable than its negation.

Also, the issue of certainty is a psychological one relating to persons. People are certain about things, not propositions, and a person's certainty, or lack thereof, is not good reason or good evidence to claim that what they are skeptical of is false or improbable! We must take inventory of the data and evidence we have, and see if that renders the proposition "God exists" more probable to be true than the proposition "God does not exist".

So the next time you run across someone who cavalierly exclaims, "Prove it!" just ask him or her if she's wearing clothes.

The Problem of Evil

2011-02-17T01:49:00.000-10:00

How could a loving God permit this...

A question has been posed, and Christians must answer it, because it is the one brought up most often against the existence of God. Whether the argument comes from the lips of a harsh critic or from someone who is emotionally and morally disgusted at certain evils in the world, the question remains: Why would God permit evil? Why doesn't He do something about it? I mean, Christians speak about the love of God and everything, but if you just look out the window, you see pointless deaths, torture, genocide, rape, murder, discrimination, and persecution. Sometimes innocent little children are killed...why didn't God intervene?! Where is the justice?

The Atheist Alternate

First and foremost, despite the strong force the argument offers, it seems to me that this isn't a good argument against the existence of God, because as we shall see below, Christian Theism is the best worldview to handle this problem! On an atheistic worldview, there is at bottom no good, no evil, no design, and no objective moral values to which we could call such heinous acts wrong. In a universe that sprang into being from nothing with no God at all, we're just cosmic accidents, and all we look forward to is death of the self, death of the species, death of the planet, and finally, death of the universe.

It's an incredibly bleak picture, but the fact of the matter is, by cutting God out of the picture, we cut out the foundation for morality. Now, what I am NOT arguing is that we need to BELIEVE IN God to ascertain moral values. I'm saying that it is God Himself that IS the ground for morality. Neither am I saying anything about how we come to KNOW ABOUT moral values/duties (i.e. an issue of knowledge), but rather how is it that moral values EXIST (i.e. an issue of existence/ontology). At the end of the day, Atheism really only offers socio-biological evolution as the ground for morality, but that doesn't make things like rape or genocide really/actually wrong--just not advantageous to the species or to the preservation of the self. Things like murder or discrimination isn't wrong in any real sense, it's just not in line with the "herd morality", or that it doesn't help the species out.

To see how flimsy this is, imagine if you were to rewind time and let evolution play out again. Perhaps we might have evolved differently and have a different set of moral values/duties. Perhaps we could've evolved in such a way that rape is good, and that our brains are wired to think that it is good and that sharing, let's say, is wrong, and we feel "repulsed" by it. On an atheistic view, morality is just a tool to propagate genes.

Or to put it another way, imagine an alien species that has comparable complexity and personhood to us, and they come down and start killing the men and raping the women. They have evolved in another star system out there and have evolved to believe that rape and murder is advantageous to the species. Whose to say which species is right, the humans or the aliens? Of course, we'd want to say humans are right, but again, on Atheism, we have no basis for saying that aside from just trying to survive; it's just another aspect of evolution like teeth or claws or fur.

So reviewing what the alternative--Atheism--has to offer, it seems to me that trying to push God out of the picture because of heinous evil acts makes the problem worse, for then we cannot even say that such atrocities were even wrong! However, we're not done with the discourse yet, and so we must tackle the questions posed to the Christian theist head-on.

Where was God when...

I want to note real quickly that this portion of the post will deal with the issue of evil relative to God's existence/goodness in an intellectual manner. To those seeking an emotional problem or dealing with specific suffering, this section may come off as cold, academic, and uncaring, but these answers are meant to target the questions posed by people who are reflecting on this issue philosophically and theologically. I hopefully will put up a separate note in the future that is geared towards answering the emotional problems of facing suffering, evil, injustice, and so on.

What I first would like to say is that we as finite and limited creatures may not always comprehend and be able to know why God permitted certain evils to occur. This is not an argument of shoulder-shrugging, this is simply being honest about the limitations we have as humans. Christians hold onto the hope that at the end of history, God will serve justice on the wicked and the evil, and right the wrongs humans have inflicted upon one another (and this is perhaps the primary reason why it is actually a GOOD thing that God is a just God, and that He must judge and punish injustice/sin as part of His nature).

Yet here in this life we won't be able to grasp the big picture or the entire tapestry of history that would allow us to see how these seemingly pointless evils affect later events in time. We may question why God would allow gratuitous evil (that is, evil that seems pointless), but it may very well be the case that there simply is no gratuitous evil in the world! While in our limited scope we feel as if there are pointless evils, but perhaps from the sovereign and divine vantage point that God has, He has so ordered the circumstances and knows every FREE choice every person would do, and would use those evils that do occur in the world for good (this is not to say that God intends or wants evil to occur).

A good case study would be in the book of Genesis where Joseph was sold into slavery by his jealous brothers, was put in prison for being wrongly accused of adultery, and just living a seemingly terrible life all around. Until finally after years of these apparent "pointless" evils, God raised him up to basically be the "prime minister" of Egypt and to anticipate a huge famine. Take a look at what he told his brothers after their father passed away:

"When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, "What if Joseph bears a grudge against us and pays us back in full for all the wrong which we did to him!"So they sent a message to Joseph, saying, "Your father charged before he died, saying, 'Thus you shall say to Joseph, "Please forgive, I beg you, the transgression of your brothers and their sin, for they did you wrong."' And now, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father." And Joseph wept when they spoke to him. Then his brothers also came and fell down before him and said, "Behold, we are your servants."But Joseph said to them, "Do not be afraid, for am I in God's place? "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive." - Genesis 50:15-20 (NASB)

Through God's timing, He is able to bring about good, even though we feel He's being too slow or inactive. In fact, "The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance." - 2 Peter 3:9 (NASB)

When one begins to understand God's sovereignty and ominscience, one realizes how futile it is to try and figure out why such events happen, and for what reason God would have in permitting them. Perhaps the answers to some evils can be found out during our lifetime, perhaps the answers will come about far after we ourselves die, or perhaps we'll find out at the end of history. Either way, if God is good, He can and will use the evils and sins of humanity to bring about the good.

Second of all, as a Christian, one would expect evil to occur in this world! God has given mankind over to their depravity and sins, and this increases (or perhaps allow us to realize) our responsibility to be morally right as well as the realization that we fall incredibly short of God's standard, and thus need His saving grace. The evil in this world ought to compel us to seek after God and recognize that humanity cannot save itself and are morally responsible for their deeds. To quote C.S. Lewis:

"God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world."

...And to quote his mentor, George MacDonald:

"The Son of God suffered unto death, not that men might not suffer, but that their sufferings might be like his..."

Final

So this is what I have for now. I'll add to this later when I find the time to go through, say, the logical version as opposed to the evidential or the probabilistic version, but I've been typing non-stop for about two hours or so. As always, feel free to comment/critique this as you please!