GOD

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: crin
If anyone here believes in any kind of "Good" or "Bad", I would like to put something to them; there are 2 things they may believe;

This is the fallacy of Bifurcation. The unsupportable claim that there are only two possible stances when there can be many more. Often used to invent support for a god belief, as we see here. But then god supports are typically one form of fallacy or other. Let's explore this one.

1 Good and Bad may be things of their own opinion (like preferring, say, beer to cider),

Show us ANY good/ bad claim that is not a personal decision and can not change based on the environment at the time. e.g I prefer a hot cider after being outside in the winter shoveling snow, but perhaps a beer on a hot day.

so if the human race had never existed,

Granted the concept of good/ bad is a human construction. Though any species can be shown to follow good/ bad actions. And what one species might follow, which has shown an evolutionary advantage to that species, might be contradicted by another. The ultimate objective determination of whether a specific action is good or bad (for that species) is continued survival of that species.

or if someone did not witness you doing a good action, there is no good or bad.

Now you are claiming that the good/ bad assignment requires an outside 3rd party agent. That someone can not do a "good" (or bad) thing unless someone else has determined it to be so. What if someone saw a board with nails sticking up in the raod. They stopped and picked it up while no one was watching. Had they not, it could have caused a tragic accident. It was obviously a "good" action (had positive benefit) even though no one but that person knew they did it.

2 They believe Good and Bad are real. It follows there may not be any correlation between what is Good/Bad and what evolution has taught us to be enjoyable (i.e Gene-sustaining).

There are many actions which are "enjoyable", but are harmful to "gene-sustaining". Many people find excessive drinking or heavy drug use to be "enjoyable", yet can have a definate negative impact on their ability to pass their gentics along.

So Good is actually Right and Bad is actually mistaken. But the moment they say this, they are putting a third thing in the universe in addition to Good and Bad; some law or standard of which Good is right to be Good and Bad is wrong to be Bad.

Since any specific action can be good at some times and bad at others, any claim to an outside objective absolute source is erroneous.

It is because so many people believe 2

This is called the Fallacy of argumentum ad numerum. The claim that the more people that believe something, the correct it is. Facts, Truth, ... does not depend on votes. The beliefs of the masses shift over time and at best align with objective outcome of results. But do not determine which is which. Other than personal opinion.

that you will never be able to kill religion.

Yes. It is likely, just by statistical probablity, that some people will always require such an addiction/ excuse. This does not mean it is a good thing.

The human mass always wants some purpose

The number one activity of the brain is pattern matching. "Purpose" fits this perfectly. Ys we are hardwired to "find purpose". This does not in any way support a claim of an outside 3rd party agent being needed to provide "purpose".

I wouldn't be surprised if dolphins and chimps are on the brink of religion. If so, it would be well established in humans. Then belief in God would be practically genetic

Dolphins, chi

[Tormod]

Okay. 381 posts in one topic is about the limit, I think. Closing this down now. Move on folks, nothing to see here.