Hell is awesome

[shunyadragon]

But the necessary/essential attributes of God were not "chosen" by God in the sense of being contingent (since they are--i.e. He is--necessary being).
This likely includes the laws of logic and being, and moral law.

I do not accept this 'but,' it is too hypothetical and smells of Enron bookkeeping to make your view of God fit this argument. There is no indication that anything like the above is pre-chosen as being attributes of God. If God exists there are no such mundane attributes that are fixed as far as God's nature.

[joel]

I do not accept this 'but,' it is too hypothetical and smells of Enron bookkeeping to make your view of God fit this argument.

Except that it has a long tradition in Christian theology on its own and argued from other principles.
It was not just supposed for the sake of this particular 'dilemma'. You might have a point here IF it were just something that William Lane Craig recently suggested to solve this 'dilemma', or something brought up only in this context.

[shunyadragon]

Except that it has a long tradition in Christian theology on its own and argued from other principles.
It was not just supposed for the sake of this particular 'dilemma'. You might have a point here IF it were just something that William Lane Craig recently suggested to solve this 'dilemma', or something brought up only in this context.

Considering the nature of God as believed I do not think it would reasonable to put specific criteria or pre-existing nature on God from the human perspective. I see no justification for this in the Torah, Bible, Quran, nor the Baha'i writings.

[joel]

Considering the nature of God as believed I do not think it would reasonable to put specific criteria or pre-existing nature on God

[I left out "from the human perspective" because I don't find that it adds any meaning.]

If God did not have a pre-existing nature, then God would not be eternal, self-existent. He would not be necessary being. He would be another contingent being (caused to be by some other being), and we would be left to keep searching for the necessary being--for the "first mover"--which would be prior to God.
But that is inconsistent with Christian theology.

The eternal nature of God is found in the Bible in many passages.

[shunyadragon]

[I left out "from the human perspective" because I don't find that it adds any meaning.]

If God did not have a pre-existing nature, then God would not be eternal, self-existent. He would not be necessary being. He would be another contingent being (caused to be by some other being), and we would be left to keep searching for the necessary being--for the "first mover"--which would be prior to God.
But that is inconsistent with Christian theology.

The eternal nature of God is found in the Bible in many passages.

I would not delete it and believe it has meaning because, the human perspective is important as to how different religions view God and the scriptures.

Yes, God has a nature described in different scriptures, but I do not believe that God would be limited in the specific manner you describe.

In traditional Christian theology God chose the manner of Creation where humans would Fall by no fault of their own. Jewish, Islamic and Baha'i use the same scriptures and do not reach that conclusion.

[3abdulmesii7]

People who are in hell get there because they reject God, and they have free will. God will not force anyone to accept Him. God is the source and summit of all goodness; to reject Him is therefore to reject the source and summit of all goodness. I imagine that the consequences are rather more unpleasant than roasting in fire for all eternity. That is just the best image that we have.
On this second thing you're begging the question by viewing religions as an arbitrary smorgasbord. They aren't. And if Gandhi worshiped the wrong gods out of involuntary ignorance, then he could be saved.

"Why should we care about improving the conditions in this world when the next is so much better and our time in it is so much longer?" Because the Bible says that we should?

[YourMaster]

So, I've been thinking how a lot of atheists are pretty butthurt about hell. Some of it is kind of understandable, a lot of religions, including Christianity, with which they are most familiar, insinuate if not outright state atheists will end up there. I've had muslims tell me I'm going to hell and it never bothered me one bit so I can't really relate to the mentality there but I can conceive how some might be bothered by it. What I don't really understand is the philosophical objection to the idea of having your enemies roast for eternity. Most ethics are intimately linked to people's emotions and mental states. Murder and the like bothers people, so they tend to think of it as immoral. But it's plain as day that desire to punish and avenge are as much a part of human nature as love and mercy (if not more so). So why the objection to the very idea of hell but not heaven? Sure, I hear some objections to heaven, but they are largely of the "I don't like the requirements to get in" type rather than the "the very idea of heaven is bad" type? Is it just because much of modern atheism inherited a cultural legacy starting with Christian Humanism and thus had the whole flowers and bunnies mental state engraved in their heads as a result?

Nope, modern atheists simply acknowledge that religion is ridiculous (it's as simple as that). People sometimes make up stories, embellish on facts, legends accumulate, sometimes they wind up in books, and sometimes those legends become a religion. Why does this happen? I mean, besides sociologists and historians, who cares really

[joel]

In traditional Christian theology God chose the manner of Creation where humans would Fall by no fault of their own. Jewish, Islamic and Baha'i use the same scriptures and do not reach that conclusion.

That's not true about Christianity. Only extreme Calvinists come close to that, and even they would not put it like that, but affirm that man's fall was man's fault.

[Kane]

Nope, modern atheists simply acknowledge that religion is ridiculous (it's as simple as that).

It's not actually as simple as that. There are several atheists today who are more than sympathetic with religion while still maintaining a sharp and unbelieving position concerning supernaturalist claims. Check out Alain de Botton, as one example: http://www.ted.com/talks/alain_de_bo...heism_2_0.html

Atheism is not about sneering and snide reductionisms, such as "religion is ridiculous." Atheism is a investigative position that considers the claims of religion and attempts to put them under a rigorous examination for truthfulness (reality -- i.e., what is confirmably actual -- being the backdrop for what is true).

The kinds of quick one-offs often touted, such as "religion is ridiculous" is a tactic used by some public intellectuals of our time (e.g., Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins) more as a method of drawing theists into the ring. It's a verbal way of throwing a beer bottle into the crowd and starting a fight. It is not, however, the fighting art itself. If it was, atheism would be KO'ed before the fight began.

[Sparko]

Well said Chris.

[YourMaster]

It's not actually as simple as that. There are several atheists today who are more than sympathetic with religion while still maintaining a sharp and unbelieving position concerning supernaturalist claims. Check out Alain de Botton, as one example: http://www.ted.com/talks/alain_de_bo...heism_2_0.html

Atheism is not about sneering and snide reductionisms, such as "religion is ridiculous." Atheism is a investigative position that considers the claims of religion and attempts to put them under a rigorous examination for truthfulness (reality -- i.e., what is confirmably actual -- being the backdrop for what is true).

The kinds of quick one-offs often touted, such as "religion is ridiculous" is a tactic used by some public intellectuals of our time (e.g., Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins) more as a method of drawing theists into the ring. It's a verbal way of throwing a beer bottle into the crowd and starting a fight. It is not, however, the fighting art itself. If it was, atheism would be KO'ed before the fight began.

Atheism is common sense divorced from indoctrination. It doesn't require parsing every word of a holy book with those who claim to believe in its contents.

Over time ... by caveat of scientific discovery, increased dissemination of information, etc., theism will exceedingly weaken (just as it has over the past century). The places where it maintains its strongest grip are the places where people are the least educated, most oppressed, etc. With any luck, over time, oppressive regimes will crumble, some semblance of economic prosperity will come to the starving, and fewer and fewer young people will gravitate to things like religion (just another way mankind traps itself in the past ... because he's scared of himself).

Here in America many are convinced that our freedom is granted by an invisible force, which is a powerful idea (because again, we're scared of ourselves). If we admit that our freedom was won by "men" then we become fearful that it can be taken away by men. However, this dream has never provided protection for liberty. Men take it anyway, if we let them. They tried to take away a piece of our internet freedom just last week, and it wasn't god who blacked out the internet, it was us, it wasn't god who wrote their congressmen, it was millions of American citizens. There was no sign of an invisible friend on the battlefield when we fought the British during our revolution, no sign of this god when Civil Rights protesters were being beaten and sprayed with fire hoses by authorities. We fought for our own freedom, and when we got help, it was from things that actually exist, like the French navy (during our revolution).

Maybe we can say that the idea of god, especially one who suffered and died in our stead, is powerful psychological motivation to fight for freedom against all odds. Maybe we can say that immersing ourselves in a set of rules (like a ten commandments) is a good way to induce compliance with those rules. None of this lends any credibility to the claims themselves, but I concede it could be a powerful motivator. However, there's one big problem with this. If we insist on using this idea, what happens when the idea is no longer plausible? What happens when most people acknowledge that continually changing the story to match emerging scientific evidence is adequate proof that religion is no different than every other myth or dead religious system in history? Keep in mind, when this does happen (and it will), we may still be stuck with a society who's barely educated. They may know about new scientific discoveries, they may have enough common sense to understand the implications for religion, but they may not actually understand science (in a rigorous way), they may have never read any of the great philosophers, they may be unfamiliar with even rudimentary history, and so while they abandon the idea of a god, they lack the intellectual acumen to sustain their own freedom. So secularists have an important job, sustain freedom with arguments backed by real evidence ... history, sociology, biology, and logic (and do so as loudly as possible). Besides that all we can do is punch it out with theists to make sure they never again gain a strangle hold around the neck of western civilization (and they will if we let them). Combative and vocal arguments sustain our line in the sand, and even occasionally push back. It's sort of like politics, people always say they wish it would become a kinder/gentler sport .... yet smear campaigns, combativeness, etc., usually wins (maybe with the the exception of Gingrich in South Carolina, but he just got lucky, because in this 1% vs. 99% environment, a guy who ran a private equity fund, pays a 15% tax rate while he rakes in tens of millions of dollars, who closed over 1,000 factories and raided the pension funds of its workers, doesn't stand a chance).

[lilpixieofterror]

Atheism is common sense divorced from indoctrination. It doesn't require parsing every word of a holy book with those who claim to believe in its contents.

Over time ... by caveat of scientific discovery, increased dissemination of information, etc., theism will exceedingly weaken (just as it has been over the past century). The places where it maintains its strongest grip are the places where people are the least educated, most oppressed, etc. With any luck, over time, oppressive regimes will crumble, some semblance of economic prosperity will come to the starving, and fewer and fewer young people will gravitate to things like religion (just another way mankind traps itself in the past ... because he's scared of himself).

Another ignorant person that doesn't actually know the history of Christianity at all.

[YourMaster]

Another ignorant person that doesn't actually know the history of Christianity at all.

I know the entire history of Christianity ... what would you like to know?

[Sparko]

I know the entire history of Christianity ... what would you like to know?

Why are you such a troll?

[YourMaster]

Why are you such a troll?

I would hardly describe myself as a supernatural being from Norse mythology (then I'd be forced into the awkward position of not believing in myself)