The Problem - and the Paradox - of Evil | John Lennox at UCLA 

Well put!

Any kind of suffering will always be an insurmountable problem for atheism. For the reasons Lennox describes.

@@FlowLai not at all. Nature has no intent, no will. No malice. Once you enter a god into the picture and claim this god designed life and our world, you have now tied all the bad with the good of our existence to the will of that god. And existence paints a cruel picture of that designer.

The problem of suffering is only a problem for atheism in that mitigating it is an ongoing struggle, but coming to terms with its existence is a non-issue entirely. It's just acknowledged that it does, and is not insurmountable in any way. It's a problem for theism as every version of the story that has a single omnipotent, omniscient, all loving, interventionist deity comes apart when faced with the problems of suffering and evil. Lennox's response was a misreading of Dawkins, an inability to comprehend basic anthropology observations outside the lens of theist fiction books and a slightly disturbing allusion to the idea that natural evils exist to ultimately lead to beauty in the wreckage. Not particularly compelling.

@@marcusrockstrom7785 if it’s just nature indeed it is not a problem. There is no moral component to it…it just is. It’s natures balance, population control or whatever the case might be. Nature doesn’t care that we humans invent moral considerations. And to claim a problem from this dynamic is lacking an understanding of it. The surmountable aspect is things like modern medicine…shelter…climate control, etc. All of which we humans develop to minimize suffering. 10-4 on the rest. Good reply

Well, the Christian position is that the world is fallen and corrupted. The existence of God allows for spiritual formation into creatures able to live in the heavenly, and uncorrupted world.

You have only two logical and reasonable choices:1. Give up on the idea of an all powerful God, or 2. Give up on the idea of a compassionate God.

I've always hated the concept of 'God' and it just gets more hateful as life goes on.

That is not logical to me. On the contrary. I believe God’s heart breaks eternally at human behavior. He made these “laws of the universe” and he is so holy he cannot break them. That’s what I choose to believe anyway

​​​@@williamoarlock8634 Best of luck with growing and nurturing the hatred. Once the choice is made, there are no breaks. Indignation and resentment at some point bear fruits. And the more fruits they bear, the more you will want to reap. It is a strong and powerful feeling. Makes you feel righteous and gives a logical explanation of every awful pain and tragic loss. Fills the emptiness inside. With evil.

@@Rebeccakisosondi I think that's what Canoe Doc was attempting to say. When you wrote "He is so holy he cannot break them" you agree with Canoe's choice 1: Give up on the idea of an all powerful God". The interesting question to me is "why" would God decide to submit to rules he cannot break (think JC's horrific death. God knew this was going to happen to him right at the beginning of Genesis). Besides this being a question that only God could answer, I can reconcile an all powerful God. It is like subtracting 1 from infinity. It is still infinity but minus 1. At any time God could have erased the "tape" of human history and creation and decided it was a bad idea to start with, the whole free will thing... but, having done so God would have admitted that this experiment didn't go as planned. God allowed these events in time even though God transcends time and space. "Why" is the interesting question, above my paygrade.

TG; Blaise Pascal stated, "men never do evil so thoroughly and joyfully as when they do it for religious conviction".

It doesn't make sense in many ways. First, WW1 and WW2. This was the era of technocrats, not the religious. I would go to the second part but it would take too long going down the rabbit hole of morality.

@@healthymealthy775 both wars were initiated by deeply Christian nations, and WWII was initiated by the actions and beliefs of fascism and its proponents - fully synonymous with "the Catholic right wing".

@@marcusrockstrom7785 Sorry bro, but you don't know your history. The last 4 centuries Christianity has rapidly declined. In its place the rise of Fascism and Communism took its place. In Europe beginning with the French revolution and it has been declining ever since then.

@@healthymealthy775 Christianity's decline, while a good thing, does not mean it has nothing to do with those wars. Where your comment isn't inaccurate it's simply non sequiter. Fascism didn't replace Christianity, it's partially based in Christian dogma, takes its cues from religious laws and myths and every fascist state in Europe was run by devout Catholics. What you stated is utter nonsense that has no reflection on reality. Fascism and Catholicism are intrinsically linked to the point where if you grab any WWII history book and took out the word "fascism" and replaced it with "catholic right wing" you wouldn't need to change a single other thing for it to still make logical sense. The populations of those states were Catholic, the first treaties those states signed were with the Vatican, the pope held services specifically honouring the fascist leaders even during the war on their birthdays, the anti-Semitism of WWII Germany was taken directly from Catholic preachings from the pulpit.

Yes. Good word. Thank you.

According to a story book.

@@williamoarlock8634 the Bible is a true story and mankind has fear of it because the soul knows that it is true the heart of man wants to debunk it and reject it so people can do want they want but it won’t matter because when we die one day then everyone will know it was true and then unfortunately will have to deal with reality and I would say 90% will not believe the Bible and I understand it I didn’t believe for years but I did what most people won’t do and study it for over ten years and my conclusion is that it’s way to perfect to be inspired my imperfect people but 50 writers over hundreds of years. Mankind is not responding to god and we are going to have a major surprise in our world View If the Bible is wrong then there is no such thing as right or wrong and everyone can do want they really want. We will all know one day ether nothing made us or something made us Good luck 🍀 trying to figure it all out

Indeed

Yes, the biggest failure of atheism is that it has no philosophical grounds for objective morality. Subjective morality is entirely weak, pointless, and self-contradictory. It really falls apart when you look at different cultures and times in history, and see large groups of people doing horrible things. Objective morality, on the other hand gives us virtues we can live up to, or fail to live up to. The virtues themselves aren't tainted by people failing to live up to them. No one is above the moral law with objective morality.

@@natehanson4421 the biggest failure of theism is it cannot: 1. Demonstrate objective morality 2. Demonstrate their brand of objective morality is even moral

@@natehanson4421 To start with as Barbara said theists have never managed to demonstrate objective morality and truly all of their attempts to have largely been entirely weak, self-contradictory, sexist, bigoted, fear-based, tribalist and based in mediaeval needs and reasoning. That would largely be the problem with believing in objective morality, in that it allows for no room for evolution of thought, reasoning, understanding or society. If we still followed the objective "moral" teachings of theism then we'd be murdering our neighbours for holding different religions, murdering women for not acting like chattel, murdering people working on Saturdays etc. Look at the recent swathe of mad indoctrinated religious nutters passing anti LGBT laws in the USA, thinking they're upholding objective morality in their bigotry. You might think "hey, they've got the wrong idea of objective morality" - well that would hardly make it objective then right, since it's so open to interpretation as to have always been entirely subjective in the first place. Luckily, there's no reason to believe that objective morality even exists at all. It's frankly quite silly to call it a failure of atheism to have no grounds for it too, akin to saying it has no philosophical grounds for holding that the sun is purple. Just sort of a nonsense statement really. Subjective morality is all we have, and while its nature changes over time it's done reasonably well in getting us out of the savannah and into semi functioning societies so not really weak or pointless at all. It can be contradictory at times but that's what happens when things change over time and there's an adjustment. It makes no claims of perfection which is the best possible way to be since that means it can reflect the progression of society. It's the people calling their subjective interpretation of what they believe to be holy objective morals perfect that usually cause the most suffering.

I think it is you that is misreading John. Whatever morality man invents, will simply end up as moral relativism and survival of the fittest. Meaning, morality will not actually exist. It’s a rational conclusion that Dawkins and Ilk refuses to acknowledge.

The Bible is sufficient for understanding certain things through the Holy Gohst

@@arielkozak For 'blessed' (privileged) Christian robots.