Who's left?

[_Res Ipsa]

EAllusion,

Just a check to make sure I'm tracking reasonably close to what you are saying:

The logical argument from evil posits a god that is omnipotent, omnicient, and omnibenevolent. It next reasons that such a being could not cause harm to people or allow people to come to harm. It then assert that people are harmed, whether by the action of god or the inaction of god. Because of the contradiction, it concludes that, if there is a god, god is not omnicient, omnibenevolent, and omnipotent. In other words, god is either not all knowing, not all benevolent, or all powerful. Close enough?

The trick is that the validity of the argument depends on the definition of the initial three terms. Does ominipotent mean able to do "anything?" I think Plantinga must recognize that omnipotent doesn't include logical impossibilities: God cannot create a square circle or a rock so heavy he can't lift it. Thus, omnipotent actually means something like "able to do anything that is logically possible."

That is what I'm thinking gives Plantinga his opening to attack the argument. If he can construct a scenario where it is logically impossible for some degree of harm not to exist, then the presence of harm says nothing about the extent of god's power. The way he does this is to, in effect, posit that the absence of moral choice is, in and of itself, harm. And further, that moral choice must be defined to include the ability of one person to harm another. Thus, there logically must be some harm in the world -- either from the absence of moral choice or from the consequences of moral choice. Or, turning the argument around, the absence of harm is a logical impossibility. Because the absence of harm is a logical impossibility, it says nothing about the ability or willingness of god to prevent harm.

So, if god has no choice but to permit harm, then its all a matter of degree and becomes an issue of empiricism, and not logic.

I can follow the argument this far, but the part about natural disasters doesn't seem to me to hang together at all. The absence of, say, earthquakes doesn't seem to entail any kind of necessary harm, as the absence of moral choice would entail. But there's probably some subtlety (or obvious point) I'm missing there.

[_mentalgymnast]

if there's a good God and there is evil in the world, what cosmic event/reality would be necessary to "make it all right"?

I need you to consider something:

It's redundant to modify "God" with "good". Do you understand why?

I'm saying "good God" in response to some things that have been said on this thread pointing towards a God who could simply be a jerk. Obviously, I don't think He is. He's a good God. Gut feeling, I know. Knowing that His ways are not our ways (how could they be?), however, I hesitate to use the word omnibenevolent in an absolutist sense because it then commits me to applying my standard/understanding of "good" to God. I'll say again, when we get too hung up on the omni's we can restrict our view and we basically end up, in conversations like this, applying our own morality on God. When He doesn't meet our standards, then we push Him off to the side or under the bus. Omnibenevolent and omnibenevolence are words that aren't even found in the scriptures. We're using the word as though it's a doctrinal position that God is omnibenevolent because He is the other two omni's , to a limited degree, anyway. So I refer to a "good" God without implicitly saying that He is omnibenevolent. In other words's, I give God the benefit of a doubt that he knows what is good...from His perspective looking on His creations and us as His children.

Opens up a whole world of possibilities.

Regards,
MG

[_EAllusion]

Brad -

That's why Plantinga proposes a scenario where earthquakes are caused by agents. This doesn't have to be likely. It could be infinitesimally unlikely. It just has to be logically possible. You have to remember that people used to routinely argue that omnipotence, omniscience, and omnibenevolence together is logically inconsistent with the existence of the evils we see in the universe much in the same way that a shape being a square is inconsistent with it also being a circle. Plantinga's argument just shows a way where these two facts can be logically consistent. While there are holdouts, it is widely considered to be a successful argument by theist and nontheist alike.

Chap -

You are misunderstanding the argument significantly. There doesn't need to be a chain of regress. Plantinga argues, with some success, that the possibility of moral freedom being an overriding good renders the specific claim that evil in the universe is logically incompatible with God incorrect. Plantinga anticipates that someone might argue that not all evil is caused by the existence of moral freedom, so he proposes a logically possible world consistent with ours in which it is. That's all there's to it.

This doesn't work for a probabilistic argument from evil, but it isn't intended to.

[Guest]

Squares and beating up kids is exactly the question. The question about the problem of evil is what the definition of the Abrahamic God is---omniscient, omnibenevolent, and and omnipotent---and what morality is.

And in addition to that is the LDS concept of God. The omni's become a bit less hard nosed within Mormon parlance.

No, they don't. The LDS Church teaches unequivocally that Elohim has all power, all knowledge, and is completely full of goodness.

Mormon.org: What do Mormons believe about the nature of God?

God is perfect, all wise, and all-powerful; the ruler of the universe. He is also merciful, kind, and just.

To get around paradoxes like whether God can make a rock that is so heavy he can't lift it, theists have said for a long time that logically, the Abrahamic God has all power that it is possible to have, that he has all knowledge that it is possible to have, and that he has all goodness that it it possible to have. If you are now asserting, contrary to the explicit and unequivocal teachings of the LDS Church, that Elohim is somehow less "omni" than the traditional Christian God, then this is what you're saying about Elohim:

--There is some power that it is possible to have, but Elohim doesn't have it.
--There is some knowledge that it is possible to have, but Elohim doesn't have it.
--There is some goodness that it is possible to have, but Elohim doesn't have it, which means that Elohim is morally flawed.

You have an insurmountable problem of internal inconsistency with all of those, but especially the third one. That's because "in Mormon parlance," Elohim is a god because of his moral perfection.

Now that you're asserting belief not in "a Creator God" or even the Mormon god, but in a morally flawed superman who doesn't really know everything and isn't really in control of the universe, you've traded down to Zeus. But the more you keep going, the more you're unwittingly saying that you believe in Cthulhu.

According to Mormon doctrine people have existed in some form, along with God, for a long time before this "mortal probation". He was greater than "them all". He provided a plan for us to become more like Him. He knew more than any of us. He had progressed much farther than any of us. He is "omni", to us. But to say that he has absolute power over all, is by all observations, impractical and unrealistic.

Straw Man said to tell you that nobody said the Abrahamic God has to have absolute power over all for the problem of evil to be a problem. You just need the ability to intervene, the knowledge to intervene, and the willingness to intervene, and the LDS Church most certainly does say that Elohim has all three of these qualities.

You're also bringing up a totally separate, serious problem: if people have existed for an infinite amount of time in the past, how did you traverse infinity to get to the present moment? But leaving that aside for now, man's coeternal existence with the gods is irrelevant. In "Mormon parlance," Elohim is currently in the driver's seat, such that he has all of the attributes necessary to have the problem of evil applicable to him.

When you continue to use "omni" as an absolute quality,

which nobody is doing

it distorts the picture of the world as we see it, with independent beings acting according to their own will and at the same time impacting the will/agency of others.

So Elohim was obeying the eternal principle of free agency when he allowed all those women and children in Ammonihah to be burned to death. He had to respect the free agency of the wicked people who wanted to burn them, even though by doing so he necessarily violated the free agency of the women and children who did not want to be burned. But then when Elohim saved Alma and Amulek from the same fate, he violated the free agency of the wicked people who burned those women and children, which previously he had to allow to respect those wicked people's free agency. So here's a great example of the Book of Mormon's inconsistency refuting the free will theodicy.

To try and wrap our minds around God's "morality" by comparing us (fallen, imperfect beings) to Him (a perfected Being), is doomed from the start. Yet this is what you're doing.

Yes. Just like Jesus did when he visited the Nephites.

3 Nephi 14

9 Or what man is there of you, who, if his son ask bread, will give him a stone?

10 Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent?

11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father who is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?

If trying to wrap our minds around God's morality by comparing our morality to his is doomed from the start, then Jesus was wrong and the Book of Mormon is wrong. That's particularly unfortunate given that you have stated your rationale for believing in the LDS Church is largely that the Book of Mormon seems right to you, and your assertion in this thread that Jesus is the way to cut this Gordian knot we're talking about.

Ascribing our morality which is based on wrong/right in a world where there is death/destruction/misery that often brings about physical torment/disease/death to His sense or morality, where he can see the end from the beginning and what transpires after death where there is no death/destruction/misery (in the sense that we experience it here on earth) is impossible, and yet you and others attempt to do it and place absolute value on your judgments as to what is then right and/or wrong for God to do with his own creations.

Actually, no. You and the LDS Church (and believers in the Abrahamic God generally) are the ones doing this. You're the one insisting that Elohim is good. And yet you've been consistently conceding in this thread that you have no basis for asserting that. The only way you could say Elohim is morally good is by comparing your own morality to his. Since you've now said that we cannot say Elohim is evil because we can't understand his moral perspective, by the same token you can't say he's good.

So, ACCORDING TO YOUR OWN ARGUMENT, when the LDS Church says that God is (morally) perfect and good, the Church is wrong.

In other words's, when you use examples of rapists, child beating, and other horrific examples of people doing bad things to people...I see no direct connection between this and God's morality. He isn't raping and causing mayhem.

My little boy is beating the crap out of his sister in the next room. I know it, I have the ability to intervene and stop it, but I choose not to. Therefore, I am not doing anything wrong, because I am not the one who is beating her up.

Jesus gave the parable of the Good Samaritan. According to this parable, the Samaritan who helped the injured man was the good one, while the priest and others who passed him by were morally wrong for just leaving him there. According to you, Jesus was wrong. The Levite and everyone else who just left this guy there have no moral culpability. In the context of the story, they knew of the problem and had the ability to help him, but they chose not to do so. Just like our loving Heavenly Father, they were morally just and good in choosing not to intervene. In fact, they were more like Elohim than the Samaritan, because they were respecting the free agency of the robbers in their desire to leave this guy helpless and hurt on the side of the road.

But yes, he allows it to happen within a world where absolute agency reigns supreme.

Absolute agency doesn't reign supreme. The child rapist wants to rape a child. The child does not want to be raped. The rapist rapes the child anyway. Elohim allows this to happen. Therefore, Elohim is preferring the free agency of the rapist over the free agency of the child.

What really, really doesn't help you is that there are so many scripture accounts and faith-promoting anecdotes of the Mormon god choosing to intervene to save the faithful from their enemies. If the reason Elohim allows wicked people to hurt others is to protect free agency, then he is violating that eternal law when he does intervene and takes away the free agency of the wicked to hurt people. So every time Elohim intervenes, he ceases to be God. A sometimes-interventionist deity is not consistent with the free will theodicy.

And the world (tectonic plates-earthquakes, volcanoes, and tsunamis, weather patterns, and what have you) is what it is and people are in some cases severely impacted by the natural disasters that occur. To put that in God's lap is also unrealistic as the world would not "work" if the natural patterns of earth's re-creative actions, and maintenance functions were to be over ridden continually, miraculously, to protect every human life.

So Elohim made this world specifically for us, and deliberately designed it to hurt and kill people. You're not doing a lot to absolve him here.

Tell you what, though. I'm going to custom build a house for my kids. There will be a pit of fire around their beds. Walls will randomly fall on them. And the bathtub will be rigged to make them drown. And then I'll just say, "Hey, the house is what it is. I just made it that way. It's not my fault if you get hurt."

Meanwhile, I am indeed grateful that our Heavenly Father loves us so much, that he kicked us out of heaven and sent us to live here on Planet Deathtrap.

Putting "evil" in the lap of God and then using that "evil" to then push him under the rug and/or say that He doesn't exist is risky behavior as far as my eyes can see and my mind can judge.

Right, because Elohim will smite you if you second-guess his morality through the lens of the Light of Christ that he gave you to understand right and wrong. I wonder why Elohim gave every man a sense of morality that is calibrated just right to make Elohim look immoral.

Much of the evil is human caused by independent beings doing their own thing. Does God want/wish them to do it? Of course not. He would rather that people love one another. This is reinforced continually in the teachings of the New Testament. Natural disasters and disease are going to happen in a world that works such as this one to recreate and maintain itself. To we put death and destruction in God's lap? I don't think so. It just happens.

I wonder why Elohim and Jehovah did so many things to show us that they're in control of the world they created---like walking on water, making the Earth stop rotating, parting the Red Sea, saving Daniel from the lions, giving prophets the power to literally move mountains, Jesus teaching that our Heavenly Father makes it rain, etc.---if Elohim and Jehovah are not in control of this world they created.

I also wonder why Moroni leads into his eponymous promise by telling us to remember all these miracles that show how merciful God is, if God isn't really in control of the elements.

Geez, mentalgymnast, you're positing a deity who is nearly as theologically useless as an LDS prophet.

Here's where, if there is a God, has created a fail safe mechanism. And that's where I maintain that Jesus is relevant. This event that we refer to as the atonement, if cosmic in significance, is the vehicle or catalyst for renewal and/or regeneration of a fallen world and its inhabitants. Without an effective atonement/mechanism for all the "crap" to be made right, then it is easy or even necessary to ascribe all the "crap" to God, because there's no way out of the "crap", and all of it would be unjust and unfair.

You seem to have forgotten what you were objecting to. One is that you have no basis to assert that Elohim is morally good, which you have repeatedly conceded while insisting you haven't. Two is that Mormonism/the LDS Church has nothing unique or particularly insightful to say about the problem of evil. You have de facto conceded that, too. As there are many, many denominations that believe in Jesus Christ, you are saying nothing new here. All you're doing here is acknowledging that there is evil, but saying so what because the very being who allows it to happen also allowed his son to be tortured to death so that it will all be better someday. That's just an expansion of the boilerplate soul-making theodicy: it's Jesus that makes soul-making possible.

Of course, it's demonstrably false, because even if you accept the premise that Jesus Christ really was the Savior and all, there is currently, post-atonement, a whole lot of gratuitous evil in the world, both human action and natural. That means you're back to the "it will all be better someday." To which I again ask you how many presents do you have to give a kid for Christmas before you'll agree that a malicious serial child abuser is morally good?

Oh, we can't compare our morality to Elohim's? Then Jesus was wrong, the Bible was wrong, the Book of Mormon was wrong, and you now not only have no basis for asserting that Elohim is morally good, you have no basis for believing in Mormonism at all.

But Jesus is the answer, if you believe. God doesn't become something other than "good". He has our best interests in mind but cannot control factors beyond His control.

Can the Mormon god control tsunamis? ___Yes ___No

I will remind you before you answer that the Mormon god is said to have created a year-long typhoon to bring the Jaredites across the ocean to America. That's before even mentioning Noah's flood or parting the Red Sea.

I do not see any reason, in the world as I see it, to believe otherwise. You are dogmatically asserting your claims as a result of an interpretation that you are putting on scripture and/or you interpretation of the "omni's", even when those definitions have been promoted by some so called LDS theologians and/or spiritual file leaders.

I don't know what a "spiritual file leader" is, but the LDS Church and Mormonism have never taught anything other than Elohim/Jehovah having the qualities I am ascribing to him/them. You've also got that begging the question thing happening again. It's not a matter of whether the world gives you a reason to believe something other than Mormon theology, it's a matter of whether the world gives you a reason to believe Mormon theology in the first place.

And since you think I am being dogmatic, I will remind you that I am not the one who floated the idea that it is "dangerous" to point out obvious logical and evidential problems with LDS truth claims.

It's not all about Jesus.

I think it is. But I'll have to admit, without Him you've got an AWFULLY good argument. It may well be that we will not be able to get beyond my first question. Everything else is stacked on top of it.

Oh, okay. Jesus solves everything. And since he suffered in Gethsemane around 2,000 years ago, there is currently no gratuitous evil in the world.

Your first question is a non-starter. You have defined the Mormon god as having every quality sufficient to invoke the problem of evil, and now you want to know what it would take to make the problem of evil not applicable to this deity as you have defined him. You can't.

Here is where you are. You've decided on an escape hatch that makes the Mormon god a super-powerful, but not all powerful, alien entity who has the power to crush the human race like a bug, and sometimes actually does it, because of motives that we cannot possibly fathom. And you think it is dangerous to question this powerful alien entity, because even though he is not powerful enough to prevent you from suffering, he is powerful enough to make you suffer, so you feel constrained to appease him because of what he might do to you.

Congratulations. The restored gospel is a cosmic horror story, and you worship Cthulhu.

[_Darth J]

When He doesn't meet our standards, then we push Him off to the side or under the bus.

Unfortunately, your ad hoc "a dog ate God's homework" stories aren't providing a lot of reasons to worship a being as you describe him, other than fear. Fear that itself begs the question, since the problem of evil shows that Elohim as described by the LDS Church does not exist.

Omnibenevolent and omnibenevolence are words that aren't even found in the scriptures. We're using the word as though it's a doctrinal position

We're using those words because they are descriptive of the characteristics ascribed to God in LDS canon and doctrine.

[_mentalgymnast]

Hi Darth,

Thank you for your lengthy and thoughtful reply. You have obviously put as much time into using logical/formulaic algorithms of thought into your presentation, that ultimately results in some flavor of nihilism, as others have done, according to their logic, to prove the existence of a creator/God who has created this world as a temporary home as a way station or axial point before moving into eternity.

Your philosophical meanderings, however pleasing/sensical they appear to be, can only lead to a state of being/belief in which a creator/God becomes the stuff of fairy tale and myth.

So we then have a choice, when all is said and done and the dust of discussion settles. Do we believe...or not. Now, granted, god belief in a personal God who loves His children presents a number of conundrums and apparent morality issues in the "here and now". You have stated with analogous examples the possible rabbit holes one is led down when trying to, at the end of the day, believe in a powerful loving creator/God who can ultimately bring us to where he is by placing us into a world such as we see and experience on occasion. Some apparentlymore "victimized" than others. The fairness issues and agency issues are complex and difficult to come to grips with as one makes a choice to believe/hope in a better world. No doubt about that.

Now, once you have reasoned yourself into some flavor of nihilistic belief, where do you go from here? You spend a good deal of time arguing against what you see as being fairy tale or non sensical myth. At the end of each working day as you go about your labors to discredit Abrahamic/Elohim god belief what drives you? Here's the thing, at least for me. As I have read and listened to arguments for and against God, I always come back to thoughts and reasonings that I've had as I've listened to folks such as John Polkinghorne

http://www.onbeing.org/program/quarks-and-creation/148

And read about the Anthropic Principle

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle

and ask myself whether or not to choosing to believe in a creator/God that has divine purpose for his creations, however convoluted and messy the path is to achieve those purposes my be from my vantage point, makes sense. And it does. I am not at a loss to see why you and others are hesitant and/or opposed to god belief. And from the perspective of the believers you provide a necessary and integral component in the "opposition formula" necessary to use agency to make a REAL choice in regards to choosing faith vs. doubt in a loving God.

So, you're providing a vital function and I have to tell you, you're doing it quite well. There are many that will listen to your sophistry and convert to some flavor of nihilistic belief. And others will become more strongly connected with their belief in the divine. Nothing new here. We've always had, throughout history, believers and also those that make valiant efforts to turn souls away from God.

Regards,
MG

[Guest]

I'm saying "good God" in response to some things that have been said on this thread pointing towards a God who could simply be a jerk. Obviously, I don't think He is. He's a good God. Gut feeling, I know. Knowing that His ways are not our ways (how could they be?),

Exactly. This is exactly what I was trying to tell you. The geometric/theological ignoramus who thinks of God, like a square, as a shape, but one where some of are the opinion that three sides are involved while others are sure it's four. It's open for debate.

however, I hesitate to use the word omnibenevolent in an absolutist sense because it then commits me to applying my standard/understanding of "good" to God.

Exactly. Why insist that a square has four sides? That could just be your subjective standard, when in actuality, a properly understood square has three sides.

I'll say again, when we get too hung up on the omni's we can restrict our view and we basically end up, in conversations like this, applying our own morality on God.

Sure. But theologians see it differently, not that you should just accept what they say, of course. See, as a Mormon, you might see your bearded man as very powerful, but let's do a character sheet. Perhaps he has 197 hit points, and dexterity of 168. You have to wonder, though, what if there is a being out there with 198 hit points? This being would be God plus one HP. But shouldn't there be a word for the being with the absolute most hit points? Some feel that the "best of the best" is what the word "God" refers to. Well, you have to admit, MG, you've never heard in church that there is a being with more hit points than God, have you? So then, the being with the highest HP is God. That means, the man with 197 hit points is not God, since there is a being with higher. So it is with morality. The being with the highest morals is God. That is, unless, you've heard a church leader ever declare that someone, say, Joseph Smith, has lived a more perfect life than God. Even if the bearded man's morality ranks 199 out of 200, you could call him God, but what if one day, another being comes along scoring a perfect 200/200 for morality? Would you leave the possibility open that a more perfect life can be led than the one God lives? If not, you can see how God sort of defines himself through logic, no expectations needed. You can say a square has three sides, so as to not cast judgment, but then what is the thing with four sides? We could call it a triangle, but when the semantic games are finished, there is the three-sided thing and the four-sided thing, just like there is the highest being, and the second highest being, independent of what label you decide on. If you decide the highest being is called Ooblec and the second highest being -- the being with 197 hit points -- is your God, so as not to restrict the (second) most high, then the problem of evil charges Ooblec, and not God. The problem is, Epicurus couldn't see thousands of years into the future in order to predict what string of phonemes the MDB poster known as Mental Gymnast would assign to the highest being and the string of phonemes Mental Gymnast would assign to that guy down on the list, who spoke with Joseph Smith in the grove.

When He doesn't meet our standards, then we push Him off to the side or under the bus. Omnibenevolent and omnibenevolence are words that aren't even found in the scriptures.

Yet, when you were a missionary like I was, you were taught to teach investigators that God is all-powerful, all-loving, all-kind. It seems that modern revelation has filled in the blanks nicely. But wait a second, if you would like to supply the conference talk suggesting God is anything less than perfect, I'm open.

We're using the word as though it's a doctrinal position that God is omnibenevolent because He is the other two omni's , to a limited degree, anyway. So I refer to a "good" God without implicitly saying that He is omnibenevolent. In other words's, I give God the benefit of a doubt that he knows what is good...from His perspective looking on His creations and us as His children.

Opens up a whole world of possibilities.

I can fix your entire problem, MG. It's pretty darn easy. Take that predicate "omnibenevolent", and define it according to God's perspective. Now God is omnibenevolent. Do you disagree?

Now here's a really, really tough question for you: According to God's perspective, is there any evil in the world?

check. and mate.

[_Darth J]

Hi Darth,

Thank you for your lengthy and thoughtful reply. You have obviously put as much time into using logical/formulaic algorithms of thought into your presentation, that ultimately results in nihilism,

See: false dilemma

as others have done, according to their logic,

because logic is subjective

to prove the existence of a creator/God who has created this world as a temporary home as a way station or axial point before moving into eternity.

Your philosophical meanderings, however pleasing/sensical they appear to be, can only lead to a state of being in which a creator/God becomes the stuff of fairy tale and myth.

But see: deism, pantheism, agnostic theism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, pandeism, Baruch Spinoza.......etc.

See also: Korihor, the Atheist Straw Man

So we then have a choice, when all is said and done and the dust of discussion settles. Do we believe...or not.

See again: false dilemma

See also: begging the question

Now, granted, god belief in a personal God who loves His children presents a number of conundrums and apparent morality issues in the "here and now". You have stated with analogous examples the possible rabbit holes one is led down when trying to, at the end of the day, believe in a powerful loving creator/God who can ultimately bring us to where he is by placing us into a world such as we see and experience on occasion.

A rabbit hole into which Jesus of Nazareth explicitly invited us in the Sermon on the Mount, and repeated verbatim in 3 Nephi.

And some more than others. The fairness issues and agency issues are complex and difficult to come to grips with as one makes a choice to believe/hope in a better world. No doubt about that.

Great. We choose to believe. As an experiment, I invite you right now to choose to sincerely, seriously believe that Darth Vader is a real person.

Now, once you have reasoned yourself into some flavor of nihilistic belief,

See: not even wrong

where do you go from here? You spend a good deal of time arguing against what you see as being fairy tale or non sensical myth.

Or, alternatively, by identifying a logical and evidentiary problem that by your Alma the Younger speech here, you are conceding that you cannot answer. You are also conceding the original point to which you so strenuously objected: that Mormonism and/or the LDS Church has/have no particular insights or unique responses to the problem of evil, as we would expect the one true church with a Bat Phone to God to have.

At the end of each working day as you go about your labors to discredit Abeahamic/Elohim god belief what drives you? Here's the thing, at least for me. As I have read and listened to arguments for and against God, I always come back to thoughts and reasonings that I've had as I've listened to folks such as John Polkinghorne

http://www.onbeing.org/program/quarks-and-creation/148

And read about the Anthropic Principle

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle

Universal Translator says: "I can't conceive of any reason to get up in the morning outside of my entirely self-referential worldview. Therefore, anyone who rejects Mormon, and to a lesser degree Christian, dogma is a nihilist."

and ask myself whether or not to choosing to believe in a creator/God that has divine purpose for his creations, however convoluted and messy the path is to achieve those purposes my be from my vantage point, makes sense. And it does. I am not at a loss to see why you and others are hesitant and/or opposed to god belief. And from the perspective of the believers you provide a necessary and integral component in the "opposition formula" necessary to use agency to make a REAL choice in regards to choosing faith vs. doubt in a loving God.

I never said I don't believe in any god. I said I don't believe in the Abrahamic God/the Mormon god, because the dogmas surrounding this deity are demonstrably false and internally incoherent. What you're now advocating is belief in belief. You're providing no reason to accept these beliefs other than the naked assertion that there is some unarticulated moral superiority in believing something for its own sake. Feel free to explain why, if merely choosing to believe in a given deity is so virtuous, someone should choose to believe in Elohim instead of Zeus.

There are people today who sincerely believe in and worship Zeus, you know.

So, you're providing a vital function and I have to tell you, you're doing it quite well. There are many that will listen to your sophistry and convert to some flavor of nihilistic belief. And others will become more strongly connected with their belief in the divine. Nothing new here. We've always had the believers and those that make valiant efforts to turn souls away from God.

Thanks, Alma. I accept your surrender. Speaking of sophistry, we're sure now that Elohim is not really all powerful, all knowing and all good, but merely the next closest thing to all powerful, all knowing, and all good such as to be indistinguishable. Right?

To recap, the following points remain unrefuted:

1. Mormonism/the LDS Church have nothing unique or insightful to say about the problem of evil.
2. Under the terms of mentalgymnast's own argument, there is no valid basis for asserting that Elohim is morally good.

[_Darth J]

http://www.onbeing.org/program/quarks-and-creation/148

And read about the Anthropic Principle

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle

Even if one accepts the above, that says nothing about the nature of a Creator God* or any reason to believe in any one of the particular deities postulated by people throughout history.

*And you don't believe in a Creator God, anyway. Your proposed escape hatch for the Mormon god, both in what you have argued and in the apologist links you posted, depend on Elohim not being the actual creator of the universe, but a Nietzschean superman who has to follow the pre-existing laws of the universe.

Speaking of nihilism, how did the first human on a planet somewhere get to become a god, if there was no god above him yet to provide a plan of salvation and a savior? And where would the first human who became a god have come from, if there was no god above him yet to create him?

[_SteelHead]

Turtles... All the waaaaaaaaaaaaaay down.