Formal Mormon Theology

[Ego]

Well now I have a picture of an extreme adventure sports God in mind. Walking tightropes, free solo climbing and in general always at the edge of danger. That would give more force of character and excite a sort of thrill; a God who could at the drop of a hat technically become the universe’s worst tyrant ever known but is so trustworthy that you know he won’t, as opposed to being metaphysically bound not to. This is a much more human and personal God. I think I’ve been persuaded; it fits better with the picture of God Mormonism paints.

As for infinities, who knows what Brigham would have thought. Honestly trying to establish formal theology for Mormonism at all is a nightmare because of the ridiculous and contradictory things he said. I suppose an actual lecture course on Mormon theology would be forced to plainly state his views and how they oppose other teachings. But since I only do this for fun, I honestly can’t be bothered to slog through his stuff.

[Mag’ladroth]

That would give more force of character and excite a sort of thrill; a God who could at the drop of a hat technically become the universe’s worst tyrant ever known but is so trustworthy that you know he won’t, as opposed to being metaphysically bound not to. This is a much more human and personal God.

While I appreciate your thinking through all this, this just assumes the future will be like the past without any warrant. It’s special pleading. It goes like this: If induction is a universal that exists eternally outside of a contingent set of exalted ontologically similar beings and they themselves must use the universal, induction; then you have gods who as you’ve stated could cease to love you in 5 minutes after a bout of philosophizing. This is dualism.

The Mormon then has no metaphysical grounding to say that Elohim and Jesus will continue to love you. Mormonism is just metaphysically rolling the dice that Elohim and these contingent gods will continue to love him.

[Ego]

That would give more force of character and excite a sort of thrill; a God who could at the drop of a hat technically become the universe’s worst tyrant ever known but is so trustworthy that you know he won’t, as opposed to being metaphysically bound not to. This is a much more human and personal God.

While I appreciate your thinking through all this, this just assumes the future will be like the past without any warrant. It’s special pleading. It goes like this: If induction is a universal that exists eternally outside of a contingent set of exalted ontologically similar beings and they themselves must use the universal, induction; then you have gods who as you’ve stated could cease to love you in 5 minutes after a bout of philosophizing. This is dualism.

The Mormon then has no metaphysical grounding to say that Elohim and Jesus will continue to love you. Mormonism is just metaphysically rolling the dice that Elohim and these contingent gods will continue to love him.

If God moves into a more personal realm then we might be able to apply psychology to Him to some degree. Without being technical, if God knows everything, then nothing surprising or unexpected would ever happen that would make him reconsider his choices. He would know every forbidden fruit and that he didn’t want it, nothing would be new where he’d be forced to say “well I hadn’t considered that enticing idea or offer before. Maybe I should just be a tyrant now.”

[Gadianton]

Well now I have a picture of an extreme adventure sports God in mind.

As well you should have, who have you been praying to all these years? You mentioned Jordan Peterson and I'd say there's a great chance he could be persuaded. I mean, nobody has better starting material for creating the right-leaning God of toxic manhood than Mormonism.

But -- theologically it's going to be tough to make it coherent. And, it's possible Chapel Mormons are wrong anyway. So I'd say continue on with your presentation. I've known a couple other theology minded faithful members and they also break with what I would consider to be traditional Chapel Mormonism ideas. I've been enjoying your attempt here so please don't let me derail it.

[Ego]

Well now I have a picture of an extreme adventure sports God in mind.

As well you should have, who have you been praying to all these years? You mentioned Jordan Peterson and I'd say there's a great chance he could be persuaded. I mean, nobody has better starting material for creating the right-leaning God of toxic manhood than Mormonism.

But -- theologically it's going to be tough to make it coherent. And, it's possible Chapel Mormons are wrong anyway. So I'd say continue on with your presentation. I've known a couple other theology minded faithful members and they also break with what I would consider to be traditional Chapel Mormonism ideas. I've been enjoying your attempt here so please don't let me derail it.

That’s the great challenge with a formal theology, do we want to be purely descriptive and tell people what they already ‘know’? Or do we want something a little more philosophical but which will require the chapel Mormon to question their assumptions? Assumptions like how skydiving for God has got to be way better than for us since he can stand in the air and wouldn’t need a plane to get up there.

For your enjoyment, here is more of the attempt, namely the axioms for love and pride.
The definitions that I gave for love and pride assume some things and take them for granted as ‘givens’ or as things that simply seem to be the case. These postulates are those givens:

Love and pride exist. A
Love and pride seem to exist because it can be argued that there is more going on with actions than an absolute will to power (Nietzsche) or pleasure (Freud) such as altruism.

Love and pride are opposites. B
Obviously with them being wills to unify or be against respectively it can easily be seen how they are opposites..

Love and pride are based on will. C
Paul describes a situation in which actions that might be considered loving are not because of the lack of charity, “And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:3). This suggests that the actions do not constitute love, therefore love is a will which motivates the action. The action would then become an ‘expression of love,’ not love in itself. The same applies to pride as its opposite.

A person must have an idea of the existence of the true essence of another to have love or pride. D
The existence of the true essence of another is required for a person’s love or pride to be able to be fulfilled. E
The example of an online multiplayer videogame can be used to illustrate the difference between the idea and the actual existence of the true essence of another. If a person begins playing such a game and his avatar meets another avatar, he may have the idea that there is another person controlling that avatar and thus he might act with love and respect as the avatars interact. If unbeknownst to him the other avatar was actually being controlled by a computer program then in reality there was no other person being loved. The same applies with phenomena, a person may have phenomena of another person and trusts but does not initially know that the other person has a true essence until they have sonder. So while a person can have a real will of love with an idea of the true essence of another the only way for his love to be fulfilled is if she does have a true essence (ie, she is not a hallucination, fabrication of his mind, etc.).

Unity with the true essence of another is required for a being’s love to be fulfilled. F
This is similar enough to the previous one that the explanation should be self explanatory.

[Dr. Shades]

Love and pride exist. A
Love and pride seem to exist because it can be argued that there is more going on with actions than an absolute will to power (Nietzsche) or pleasure (Freud) such as altruism.

No, love and pride don't seem to exist because it can be argued that there is more going on with actions than an absolute will to power (Nietzsche) or pleasure (Freud) such as altruism. Love and pride seem to exist because you can feel them.

[Gadianton]

I think I've got the gist of it so keep going...

[Ego]

Love and pride exist. A
Love and pride seem to exist because it can be argued that there is more going on with actions than an absolute will to power (Nietzsche) or pleasure (Freud) such as altruism.

No, love and pride don't seem to exist because it can be argued that there is more going on with actions than an absolute will to power (Nietzsche) or pleasure (Freud) such as altruism. Love and pride seem to exist because you can feel them.

I think the best teaching someone might use to say there really can be love and pride beyond a feeling is what Lehi said in 2 Nephi 2:16 “Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other.”

I call it the principle of equal and opposite enticement. If a person has two options before them that would yield the same amount of power and pleasure for them, but one also includes another person receiving the same while the other does not (but might yet have more pleasure on the surface in order to offset the enticement of the dopamine hit a person gets by being altruistic), then we can rest assured that if they then choose the altruistic path then they have a real will of love.

[Philo Sofee]

Newcomer and amateur philosopher here, but “love” and “pride” etc. are all external forms or realities to the Mormon concept of exalted men and women who became gods. This means these definitions are not grounded in the Mormon theistic metaphysical structure but outside of it. Why this is a problem becomes apparent in a second.

As Mormonism denies creation ex nihilo but posits that Elohim created out of pre-existent material (intelligences, “forms” if you want to go full Platonic) that means that “love” is an eternal law higher and outside of Elohim, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, God #4 in the divine council, etc.

In an infinite regress of gods who became gods by adherence to laws outside of themselves, that means these gods are potent or changeable. Meaning love in that citation of Mormon scripture could change in eternal form meaning Elohim and Jesus could change in accordance to the definitional change.

Love could actually now mean something entirely else in the next 5 minutes per Mormon concepts of changing revelation and gods subject to change and laws outside themselves.

Tl;dr love could change definition on a whim in Mormon theology.

Excellent points. And the driving factor for Mormon doctrinal changes is simply expediency. You have folks like Robert Boylan trying to make all the pieces fit like they’re some grand unified coherent theological framework, but in the end it’s all just the whims of Joseph, Brigham, Nelson, etc.

The day Boylan publishes a book piecing it all together, instead of just regurgitating disparate quotes on his blog, will be the day we’re proven wrong.

Perhaps if Boylan scratched DCP's back and helped him finish his 2 promised books, DCP will then turn around and help Boylan with his.

[Dr. Shades]

No, love and pride don't seem to exist because it can be argued that there is more going on with actions than an absolute will to power (Nietzsche) or pleasure (Freud) such as altruism. Love and pride seem to exist because you can feel them.

I think the best teaching someone might use to say there really can be love and pride beyond a feeling is what Lehi said in 2 Nephi 2:16 “Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other.”

I call it the principle of equal and opposite enticement. If a person has two options before them that would yield the same amount of power and pleasure for them, but one also includes another person receiving the same while the other does not (but might yet have more pleasure on the surface in order to offset the enticement of the dopamine hit a person gets by being altruistic), then we can rest assured that if they then choose the altruistic path then they have a real will of love.

Wrong. One can feel love without feeling pride and vice versa.