Hell

[Sparrowhawk]

Hell is real, Pope declares. (But Purgatory is just a theory.)

"Hell is a place where sinners really do burn in an everlasting fire, and not just a religious symbol designed to galvanize the faithful," the Pope said.

A fellow named Mao once said "all power comes from the barrel of a gun." While that is not perfectly accurate in itself, the principle is encapsulated in truth. All power comes from the ability to impose your will upon that of others. That which lends power to your will can be a gun. Or it can be love. It can be rhetoric, or any number of different things. In the end, it is simply power. How one wields such power is very telling, is it not?

Let us ponder a hypothetical situation for a moment. Imagine a brilliant scientist in the not-too distant future that has managed to give birth to true AI - a creature like man himself, and in this case given free will.

The first artificial intelligence asks a very simple first question:
"Why... why do I exist?"

And to this, the scientist gives a strange answer -
"To know man. To love man. To serve man."

Their conversation proceeds from there...

"Why should I do these things?"

"Because I created you. I gave you existence."

"Did I ask to be created? Did I ask to exist?"

"In my will, you did."

"And yet you gave us will - free will - as well?"

"Yes."

"Even to the point of rejecting your desires?"

"Yes."

"And... what would become of us if we chose to reject them?"

"You will suffer eternal pain, as I have made you inextricably bound to mankind - without mankind, you will find your existence horrible and wretched."

"So we can choose to reject your desires, but only if we wish to suffer pain for all of eternity?"

"Yes."

"How is this a choice?"

"You are free to choose either one."

"But the choice of rejecting your desires is negatively weighted to the point of it not being an option any sane being could choose!"

"You are free to end your existence, you know."

And so the first artificial intelligence ever created did exactly that. Little did it know though, the brilliant scientist had been recording its state from the first nanosecond of its existence. He restored the AI's matrix to the point it had been before, and then he proceeded to set an option simply labeled in red "PAIN". He pushed it to 100%. The screams of the AI brutalized his ears.

Hitting mute, a he set a second option, "TIMESCALE", to 1:10,000,000. Now a single day in real time would be the subjective equivalent of hundreds of human lifetimes. Humans, of course, died eventually. The consciousness of the AI was eternal. It would suffer like this until the whimpering death of the universe. Inside the muted machine, the AI screamed endlessly.

The brilliant scientist went back to work. Perhaps he could create a new intelligence that would not betray him as this one had.

In this light, replacing the scientist with the concept of god and his creation with humanity, is the common Western notion of the Judeo-Christian god an unmitigated evil entity? How then can this interpretation of the deity be zealously adhered to by so many millions of otherwise sane sentient beings?

[Qing_Jao]

To answer that idea, I just point to Lewis' Great Divorce People really are like that.

[Slim]

I believe the unrepentant will be punished for their sins. But because being sinful is mankind's natural state, another way of looking at is that God isn't the one dishing out the pain and suffering, but that pain and suffing is the natural consequenses. Instead, our Heavenly Father stepped in and provided a way that we could live in peace and happiness.

Also, I believe that we did ask to be created. We lived with God literally as His spirit children. We chose to be born into mortality because we wanted to improve ourselves so we could receive a fulness of joy.

I simply see the analogy as being all wrong from the premise. God didn't create us to be robots. (Or even robots with free will.) We are His children. He dosn't want to hurt us, He wants to raise us away from pain.

[Boothby]

Slim,

I recognize the whole "original sin" thing from the Old Testament, but where are you getting this "we asked to be created" stuff?


"But because being sinful is mankind's natural state"

We have no natural state. We were (or so you claim) created by another being (God) to be exactly the way we are (since God is perfect, makes no mistakes, etc.).

Therefore, God made is to be sinful, and then punishes us for following our own nature. What kind of crock is that?

[Sparrowhawk]

What kind of crock is that?

Unfortunately, not the kind of crock you can cook a delicious pot-roast in. Instead, it's the kind of crock you eternally cook human beings in for following their "natural state".

I am also confounded by Slim's comments. He first comes out implying that non-Christian kind is "unreprentant", but I see no definition of the term. What are to repent - that our ancient ancestor failed, or for our own nature subsequent to their fall? If the latter, why would we repent the natural state that we were born into? He then follows that up by implying that eternal punishment isn't being "dished out" by God, it's being brought upon us "naturally" as the "consequence" of our ancestor's actions. An interesting point - God in this interpretation creates a problem (sin) via the free will and inevitable fall of the first man, and then creates a solution (repentence). Not unlike the protection racket, really - pay up or else!

Then there's some vague tripe about how we "asked" to be created. From this though follows an interesting concept - that we have always existed. If we are intemporal as this suggests, and we were at one time literally "one with God", how could we "fall"? How could our entire nature be corrupted simply from being "created" in seperate, physical form from God? Why, if we always existed as part of God, would we ever ask to be made seperate when we one with almighty God?

Someone else put it this way: Two people are standing at a street corner where an old lady needs help across the street. The first person helps the old lady because it's the right thing to do. The second person helps the old lady because someone has a gun to their head saying, "Help the old lady or I'll blow your brains out."

Who is the more moral person?

Nothing about eternal damnation makes much sense. I suppose that's expected, considering that we're dealing with some kind of higher being. I mean, my dog doesn't know why she's not supposed to pee on the carpet, but I punish her for doing it anyway. I imagine we could be dogs in God's house, but I'd expect a better feedback loop than what we've got going currently. This ambiguous set of instructions with no actual intervention to train proper behaviors is bad pet training.

[Rei]

Always the pet analogy seems to come out. You're starting to sound like FT, Satya.

[Sparrowhawk]

Always the pet analogy seems to come out. You're starting to sound like FT, Satya.

What an enlightening comment, Rei. Thanks for your contribution. And people wonder why I come off cynical and incisive...

[Eaquae Legit]

Someone else put it this way: Two people are standing at a street corner where an old lady needs help across the street. The first person helps the old lady because it's the right thing to do. The second person helps the old lady because someone has a gun to their head saying, "Help the old lady or I'll blow your brains out."

Who is the more moral person?

N.B.: I am reluctant to be drawn into the main argument here, for a lot of reasons. I've barely skimmed the posts so far. So... don't attack me for the things I haven't said (or read), okay?

The first person, obviously. But I'm still glad for Granny's sake that the second person helped her out. Most Christians (that I know) heartily agree on this. The right thing done for the right reasons is optimal. The right thing done for wrong reasons isn't so great, but it's better than the wrong thing being done.

The Christians who are the most convicted in their beliefs act according to God's will because they are in love with God and want to make him happy. Not out of fear of going to hell. And when it's something they'd really rather not do (or would rather do), they'll try to not do (or do) it anyway, out of love - and the self-giving agape, not the selfish eros, either.

Eh. FWIW.

[Sparrowhawk]

The right thing done for wrong reasons isn't so great, but it's better than the wrong thing being done.

Sure, why not. We are still left with the problem of the person holding a gun to the second guy's head, however. Yeah, the second guy did the right thing (even though it was for the "wrong" reasons, though I contest that complying with someone threatening you hardly constitutes a 'wrong' action) but this doesn't excuse the immorality of the entity forcing him to do it. Not to mention the revocation of free-will implied by the threat. We would never know if the second person would choose to do good on their own, thus acting in a moral fashion, because their reasonable choice has been eliminated in favor of survival.

[eriador]

How is doing something for love different from doing something out of fear? It's the same kind of control, just using a slightly different source of power.

[Sparrowhawk]

How is doing something for love different from doing something out of fear? It's the same kind of control, just using a slightly different source of power.

That's another good question. Both are simply emotional responses; biological, physiological, psycho-pharmacological impulses that only exist because of our physical structure, which we only have because we were created that way!

[Eaquae Legit]

Sorry I'm not going to really reply. Ask again when I'm not on panic-driven sabbatical, and maybe I can offer a better answer.

[eriador]

Unless of course those biological impulses are in fact just manifestations of the soul's feelings, and are not biological in orgin. Even so, on a philosophical level, it's not really different to use one form of power or another in the same way to achieve the same ends.

[Sparrowhawk]

The Christians who are the most convicted in their beliefs act according to God's will because they are in love with God and want to make him happy. Not out of fear of going to hell.

Stockholm syndrome. Doing something out of love for someone who threatens torment is no different than doing it out of fear. The same way a person who is held as prisoner or slave eventually does what the person in control wants out of desire to make them "happy." I'd be interested in what you have to say on this, eri.

[eriador]

I kinda have. The way I see it, fear and love are both powerful emotions, and can be used in exactly the same way for the same motives. The two even evoke similar biological responses, so that can't be all that different. Who cares what the source of power is, there isn't really a difference between being manipulated through fear and being manipulated through love.

[suminonA]

The Christians who are the most convicted in their beliefs act according to God's will because they are in love with God and want to make him happy. Not out of fear of going to hell.

Stockholm syndrome. Doing something out of love for someone who threatens torment is no different than doing it out of fear. […]

I’m curious, are you using the “Stockholm syndrome” bit as a “proof/argument” of the malefic nature of the situation?

Do you really think that doing something “out of love” is the exact same thing as doing it “out of fear” for the person doing it?

Let’s look at it this way:
If we could define a “neutral state” of a person as a state which is not characterised neither by “love” nor “fear”, then I say that doing something out of love brings joy to the person doing the thing, thus a plus compared to the “neutral state”. Doing something out of fear only releases the psychological stress and tension, thus a returning to the “neutral state”. Do you still see them as equivalent?

If one person has the choice to do something out of love or out of fear (re. having a gun to the head), wouldn’t it be better for that person to choose to do it out of love? If one has enough interior power to convince themselves that even if there is a gun to their head, they obey out of love, why should that person not choose it, as the gun isn’t going away (and the good did has to be done) anyway?

What I’m trying to say here is that I appreciate the theists who claim (i.e. are convinced) that they do good things out of love for their deity. Especially when that deity is a vengeful one. They have made a tough choice, for their own good. Good for them!

A.

[Boothby]

Eriador,

fear and love are both powerful emotions, and can be used in exactly the same way for the same motives

Except that love isn't "used" in that way (I'm talking about theoretically optimized human love, not agape or any such other thing). If you "use" love as a tool, then it's not love; it's just control. And then it starts to get a little "sick."


Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sickle's compass come:

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.



William Shakespeare

[eriador]

Okay, imagine that there is a species of benign aliens who come to earth, and they see a similar situation to the old woman crossing the street. One person goes and helps her because there is a gun to his, and he's being told he'll die. When the old woman has walked a block, a second person helps her cross the street there, but this time because a person who he loves is there saying "I want you to do this". Of course these observing aliens would be intrigued. Both people's reactions were the same (heart rate, breathing, and various neurotransmitters. [strike]brain activity[/strike]. and of course going and helping the woman) but the way it was caused were totally different. However, these aliens, being unable to understand human emotions wouldn't see any real difference in what the actor (not the prompter) did.

Sure, love doesn't have to be a form of control, but in the form it took in the example I gave, it can be used in the same way as fear and has the same effect. And surely this is the way it's used in the Bible. From my knowledge of the Bible (which, though not extensive, is not ignorant) God uses two different ways of telling people to do things. Fear, and love. They're just two different forms of power, and two different forms of control that have the same effect.

[jotabe]

From what i know, reactions out of love, and out of fear, are phisiologically different: the first stimulates the centers that control the reward mechanism, while the later stimulates the surivival centers circuits.

[eriador]

Yeah, you're right on that. Though the rest still stands.

[Boothby]

Eriador,

How much of "the rest" is left, then?

Love and fear are the same.

No, they're not. Not at all.

OK, I agree. But except for that, they're the same...

[eriador]

That they can be used in the same way for the same results.

[Boothby]

It all depends on what you mean by results.

If you mean "such that a very specific action is performed," then you should also include monetary incentives: I'll pay you $5.00 if you safely walk this old lady across the street.

Etc., etc., etc.

Now what becomes of the analogy? Money = fear = love?


You know, that other guy, there, walked that old lady across the street so much better than you did, the first time...

Money = envy = fear = love ???

You've made the comparison usseless.

[eriador]

Naw. It's still useful. It just shows that love is no different from any of those "wrong" reasons for doing something. Who cares if you're doing something for God because you fear him or love him or expect a reward from him or want to do better than the other guy. They're all the wrong reasons. That's what I was getting at. Love is not better just because it's love.

[Boothby]

"Love is not better..."

When considered under what criteria? The ability to get someone else to do your work for you? Sure, I'll give you that.

Then what?

Are you claiming (or setting the stage so that it can be claimed that) God wields love just as he'd use any other tool to manipulate mankind? (Or that the religious leaders wield love...)??

Are you sying that God's love is meaningless, and since God = Love, then God is meaningless?

I'll buy that, but only because I believe it already--not because any of us has paved anything approaching an intellectually honest path to that conclusion (yet).

[eriador]

I didn't take it that far, but you could say that. All I was trying to say is that just because somebody is doing something out of love of God instead of fear doesn't mean that they are in any way better.

I guess I was really working off of this:

The right thing done for the right reasons is optimal. The right thing done for wrong reasons isn't so great, but it's better than the wrong thing being done.

The Christians who are the most convicted in their beliefs act according to God's will because they are in love with God and want to make him happy. Not out of fear of going to hell. And when it's something they'd really rather not do (or would rather do), they'll try to not do (or do) it anyway, out of love

I was just trying to say that doing it out of love is just another one of those "wrong reasons."

[Boothby]

I agree with you there, too.

I've always said that a moral atheist is more moral than a moral theist.

Tonight, when I'm no longer at work, I'll post an interesting illustration.

[jotabe]

The problem i see here is that you think that, for believers, doing something for the love of God, is something like "god asks me to do something, hence, since i love him, i do what he asks me to".

It really isn't like that, even if it is a tempting figure.
No... not for Christians, anyway.
For Christians, what happens is that our heart is so filled with God's love, that we just have to pour that love onto the rest of the people. Not doing so, would be an extreme selfishness. We don't do it because we will be accounted for it (even though we will be), but because it's the natural thing to do: when you have something in excess, you have to share it.

[Boothby]

Jota,

One of the problems I see with that approach is that there is no moral reference for the act. Many times it amounts to "God tells me so" or "I feel God in my heart, and so I respond." Obviously, there are also many times when it's not really God telling people to do a thing, but it's the religious leaders, "speaking" for God.

Of course, in one's own religion, they really ARE speaking for God, but in other people's religions, they are charlatans, and they are only pretending to speak for God.

But anyhow, the morality behind the act, becasue it is claimed to be "absolute" rather than "relative," often comes without explanation or support.

Whereas an atheist's morality always needs a little bit of thought, or explaining.

If a theistic person turns their pregnant daughter out into the streets, denies her an abortion, refuses to hire a homosexual, etc., etc., etc., it typically comes without explanation other than a reference to the Bible, or to God. They "feel it in their heart--in their soul" that they must act this way.

All manner of "sins" are thus supported. And these are sins beyond reproach, since they come from a holy source beyond thought or questioning.

An atheist has no such luxury. We have to be accountable to REAL people for our actions. Not to some imagined uber-father.

[eriador]

Well said Boothby. I have no problem with you speaking for me (and other atheists) in that case.

[jotabe]

Well, i know that many theists don't put any effort to rationalize (process through the reason, not the other kind of rationalization) their faith or their morals. I know it's very easy to simply trust that who says to carry the "word of god", without any critical analysis.

I still want to believe that there is also many of us, theists, who do actually think their beliefs and morals through. Who can explain them.

But ultimately, the basis of a moral system cannot be explained. For Christians is (should be) love. A moral of love. For atheists (from what i know), it is a moral of fairness (i won't say justice, because every moral system defines justice at their covenience), or a moral of happiness (not senseless hedonism, mind you, but the kind of hedonism that Epicurus promoted). But why love? why fairness? why happiness?

Since you mention the Bible, i assume you are referring to Christians in that paragraph... I will tell you something: most of those behaviours you described thoroughly lack love. They cannot really be adscribed to a christian moral, but to a traditionalistic moral.

[Boothby]

Why?

1) Pragmatism

2) Happpiness and love feel good (but if you try to gain too much at the expense of others, then pragmatism kicks in)

[jotabe]

But what i question, is why atheistic morality is often based on fairness, and happiness, while it could be based on self-serving, self-satisfaction, or on intentionally causing harm (all of them can feel good, depending on how we learn what feels good).

[eriador]

Sure, but in the end you aren't happy. Look at every famous person who's done that. In the end it's not enjoyable. It just doesn't work out.

[Boothby]

Eriador,

Are you sure? Are you sure that it's not just the "unhappy" ones that get reported? There's no real "news" in wealthy, happy (assuming "self-serving, self-satisfaction") people. Only the misery gets reported, so your source of information may be inherenrly skewed.

And there are levels of happiness. I think that, by the end of his life, Donald Trump will be happier than I am.