(Jul 5, 2021 04:34 PM)Ostronomos Wrote:Yazata Wrote:Well it doesn't, absent its context. You mention a caricature of God. What caricature? It's impossible for us to know what kind of idea you are responding to without being able to see the post that set you off.
The thread on that board was about the traditional theological problem of evil. It wasn't (at least directly) "evidence that there MUST be no God behind the material universe". The problem of evil is more about the idea that the existence of evil is inconsistent with the widely held theological idea that among God's attributes are omnipotence, omniscience and omnibenevolence. Was the idea that somebody questioned over on that board whether those attributes are consistent with the existence of evil the offense you perceived as the "caricature" of God that so obviously angered you over here?
YES!
It pissed me off.
People have so many beliefs and misconceptions that they tout as evidence that there is no God. I hate it.
Fine, we know something about your agitated emotional state. Unfortunately, we don't know a whole lot about what triggered it or why. That's why posting replies to things said on one discussion board on a different discussion board doesn't make very much sense.
The thread that you went off on over there was about the Problem of Evil and how the thread starter thought that some theist responses to it are inadaquate. So, do you have anything intelligent to say about that?
You might start by explaining what "beliefs and misconceptions" you are talking about and precisely why you think that they are misconceptions. Why does somebody else having a misconception about something agitate you so emotionally? What alternative ideas can you present to correct what you believe are misconceptions and why should other people agree with those ideas?
I'll point out that the Problem of Evil isn't really an argument that there is no God. It's an argument that the existence of evil seemingly makes it impossible to simultaneously attribute omnipotence, omniscience and omnibenevolence to God as divine attributes. It's about how to think consistently about the divine attributes. And the Problem of Evil isn't a slam-dunk by any means. I posted a hint at what I think could be a very strong rejoinder over in the thread on the other board.
Ostronomos Wrote:(Jul 4, 2021 06:22 PM)Syne Wrote:(Jul 4, 2021 04:21 PM)stryder Wrote: For instance lets say you consider yourself to be a genius (which is a label or moniker that nobody should give themselves).Too true. Even if you have an IQ that qualifies (or you're even in Mensa), you should be aware that no one on the internet is going to take your word for it. Then it's a matter of what you can demonstrate, not to your own self-deluded satisfaction, but to the satisfaction of others, to make that determination on their own. Unless a person is socially stunted, recognizing that much would seem to be a bare minimum for a genius. And if stunted, they're an idiot savant, at best.
Oh shut up. I don't care if nobody gives themselves that label I do. And I wear it proudly.
Here it is again, I'M A GENIUS!
You can imagine anything you like about yourself. But that isn't going to convince anyone else to agree with it.
Genius isn't so much something you are, it's something that you do. It isn't something that one can just claim for themselves, it's something that has to be performed. Einstein wasn't a genius because he told everyone that he was. (Which I'm sure he never did.) He was a genius because he made epochal contributions to physics that transformed that subject.
So then, maybe it's time for you to do the same for philosophy and theology, maybe it's time for you to start presenting new and devastatingly brilliant philosophical points about the Problem of Evil.