Is there good without God?

"We don't just need a standard, but mercy. It is mercy and a clean soul that secularism cannot by nature provide and Christianity can."

Buddhism is an atheistic belief system from which "God" is totally absent.

Yet at the heart of Buddhism is "compassion". If "compassion" is not the same as "mercy", they are certainly intertwined.

At the heart of the largest Christian denomination one finds, not mercy, but authority and obedience.

The statement quoted at the beginning of this post is therefore erroneous nonsense.

OF SLAVERY, ITS ABOLITION, VERMONT, AND RELIGION:

The Anti-Slavery Society, on its website, (http://www.anti-slaverysociety.addr.com/index.htm), notes:

"2002 was the 225th anniversary of the abolition of slavery in the State of Vermont.

"It was an independent republic after the American Revolution: the Commonwealth of Vermont. On 8 July 1777 it adopted a constitution which prohibited slavery.

"It was admitted to the Union in 1791. It thus has the honor of being both the first sovereign state (as it was at the time) in modern times and the first State of the Union to abolish slavery."

On the state of religion in Vermont today, Wikipedia notes:

"Twenty-four percent of Vermonters attend church regularly. This low is matched nationally only by New Hampshire.[40]

"In 2008 thirty-four percent of Vermonters claimed no religion; this is the highest percentage in the nation.[41][42] A survey suggested that people in Vermont and New Hampshire which were polled jointly, are less likely to attend weekly services and are less likely to believe in God (54%) than people in the rest of the nation (71%). The two states were at the lowest levels among states in religious commitment. About 23% percent of the respondents attended religious service at least once a week (39% nationally). Thirty-six percent said religion is very important to them (56% nationally).[43]"

Vermont was probably much the same religiously in 1777 when it abolished slavery.

General Ethan Allen of the Green Mountain Boys, Vermonts's preeminent personage, wrote extensively of the evils of organized religion.

From the foregoing I conclude that there is no necessary connection between religion and virtue - and that irreligious Vermont's a great place to live or to have lived.

Farnaz1Mansouri1

You wrote, "Correction: Should have written
"Right you are about Judaism and Islam. However, I would have to argue that Jews have been less sinning than sinned against.""

God says in the bible, "Tell them (The Jews) that they have been paid back double for the sins that they have done..."

Interesting, don't you think?

You may not believe in God but you and God seem to be in agreement on this.

It then goes on to speak of their "servitude" in being "The Chosen People" is near at hand, as I have said: God's Plan is unfolding before our very eyes.

Take care, be ready.

Sincerely, Thomas Paul Moses Baum.

John, I am not saying that the wealth of the industrial revolution was produced by slaves. What I am saying is that the venture capital for the industrial revolution was in a large part provided by the wealth that flowed in to Britain via the triangular trade.
On another note, Science has benefited by the product of Millenia of a Judaic culture consisting of vigorous logical education. Nowadays secular jewish minds can put this to work more beneficial to man than studying the Talmud

Five hours for you, four for me. Blogging, however, is necessary for those who grade.

Re: Jews

On the other hand, if we are to take Tanakh as fact (which, with the exception of a few chapters, I do not), Hebrews certainly had their day. However, Judaism is, as you know, Rabbinic Judaism.

I will say that it has been the religion of more than a few scoundrels, among them acquaintances of yours truly, and some evildoers, surely. No question.

Ain't none of us without blame.

Since I must be up and out in five hours, let me conclude this most enjoyable and stimulating part of our discussion by saying that:

1. the Christian debt to Judaism is incalculable.
2. the Christian debt to Greco-Roman culture and to Islamic culture is very great.

There are also (probably) strong Eastern and African influences in the works of seminal Western thinkers such as Plato.

Arguing that Christianity or theism is essential or most important to forming some good things is not an argument that it is not itself in debt to others in some regards.

God's truth is very vast.

Farnaz says: "here are dangers in the religious waters, JMR."

Well, yes. Any true idea is very powerful and when perverted can do dreadful damage. Science works that way. Science perverted in the hands of madmen (like the present leaders of North Korea) does horrific things.

Christianity has given the world great gifts (and has the benefit of also being true), but it can be (and has been) perverted and used to do harm.

We must not, however, forget the good that faithful Christians (of one sort or another)did in every field of human endeavor. This was not accidental. They were inspired by the example of our Savior to do better.

Given human history is not odd that Christians formed Empires, but it is miraculous how many Christians stood up to Empire builders. Many (themselves imperfect in other areas) like GK Chesterton saw the problems . . . and helped end them where they could.

JMR,

Correction: Should have written

"Right you are about Judaism and Islam. However, I would have to argue that Jews have been less sinning than sinned against."

JMR,

"As to student paper (grading in the breaks), the never end . . . proving that life after death must be possible so I can grade them."

Honestly, if you could see the "papers" I've been reading, you would find yourself recalling a great line of Coleridge, presented here with slight modification:

"The Nightmare LIFE-IN-DEATH [were they], Who thicks man's blood with cold"

JMR,

Right you are about Judaism and Islam. However, I would have to argue that Jews have been more sinned than sinned against. They have been a small, despised minority for two thousand years in Christendom, a few centuries less in the Islamic world. Too, they are so small in number that they have not been able to do as much harm, even if their theology cum ideology (religions are ideological) had so guided them.

The huge faith commitment which Christianity has and which Judaism has not, is, I believe, in part responsible for the catastrophic events it has brought about. Still, as many have argued, Christianity was necessary for many of these atrocities, but not sufficient. It needed nationhood.

There are dangers in the religious waters, JMR.

Farnaz says: "It seems that by Christianity, you mean Protestantism. Even so, you will admit that Protestantism was enabled by massive material developments."

I am not Protestant, so I did not limit it to that form of Christianity. I think, for example, that the long Byzantine preservation and continuation of the study (religious and non-religious) contributed a great deal to this happy outcome.

As to "massive material developments" they were (I think) the result of a critical mass of the right ideas coming together at the right time. For example, Christian neo-Platonists fell in love with math and this made certain scientific developments possible . . .

Of course, there was great help to Christianity from vital Islamic scholarship as well. My argument is that Christianity was AN essential element to the development of much that is good in the modern not that it is the only contributor.

Ethically, I am making the more general claim that God is the basis for morality . . . but this need not be particularized to Christianity.

As to student paper (grading in the breaks), the never end . . . proving that life after death must be possible so I can grade them.

Re: Colonialism

Arguably, one could say that it was necessary but not sufficient (contra Said and others, of course). It is true that Germany was late into the game, but it did not exist in a vacuum. The gains of other nations, in one way or another, affected Germany.

Farnaz:

You say: "Ain't none of us without guilt or blame, however. The Dalit come to mind."

This is exactly right and what is so good about an ethical system that comes from "without." When Christians act inconsistently to their own ethic of love, it is easy for outsiders to call us on it. With one billion Christians, safe to say there is a good deal of to attack.

This is also a good thing about the other great monotheistic faiths (Judaism and Islam) which also provide us with clear means and guidelines to tell when they have gone bad.

Note: I am not arguing that Christianity has only done good . . . obviously Christians (so called) have done many bad things. However, the ideas behind Christianity (like the "goodness" of the material world which helped encourage science) have done essential good. Everybody going to a modern university can recognize their "churchly" origins . . . as even words like "dorm" demonstrate!

However (and this is important): I don't want my defense of theism (in general) and Christianity in particular to:

1. make it sound like I deny evils done in our name
2. believe only theists (or Christians in particular) have ever contributed to cultural goods.

"However to argue that colonialism was the reason for Western development is simply false . . ."

Agreed.

"What Has Christianity Ever Done for Us?"

But does this address any of the contents of my most recent post? Pride goeth before a fall. (Btw., the human collapses from lack of sleep. AND, At the end of time, when all is dust, only student papers will survive.)

Farnaz:

1. As to "slave trade" I was referring to the triangular trade mentioned by an earlier post.

I am sorry if that was not clear. Slavery is an ancient costume that member of my Church community continue to actively fight to this day in nations all over the world. Hopefully we can all agree in opposing this old, persistent human evil.

2. Colonialism was bad. Some Christians opposed it. Many tried to soften it. Many had a guilty conscience about it (nearly unique in the history of Empires!)

On the whole, however, I am not defending the practice. It was a blot on the reputations of many Christians.

However to argue that colonialism was the reason for Western development is simply false . . . colonialism was a temptation that was the result of Western development which sadly the powerful nations of the West did not resist.

For further reading:

Claim 1: The "Dark Ages" is a misnomer/over-simplification.

Read: "Those Terrible Middle Ages: Debunking the Myths" by Regine Pernoud.

Claim 2: Christianity didn't oppose scientific progress.

Read: A Historical Introduction to the Philosophy of Science (OPUS) by John Losee

Claim 3: Christianity is AN essential source of human progress.

Read: "What Has Christianity Ever Done for Us? How It Shaped the Modern World" Jonathan Hill

Clearthinking does have a point, you know. That colonialism by Christian Europe was a nasty business, what with cutting off people's thumbs and hands, hanging the latter around folks' necks. Got downright ugly.

Then there was the Boer War, in which the great AngloChristians introduced to the world the first concentration camps, made much use of by some of their descendants, churchgoers prominently among them.

Ain't none of us without guilt or blame, however. The Dalit come to mind.

"It was the British navy, motivated by Evangelicals, that stamped out the slave trade."

I honestly don't know how to break this to you, but the slavery continued in the British empire through the early twentieth century, Britania's self-glorifying mythology notwithstanding.

Locke, yes, a seminal thinker, influencing everyone from the likes of Edwards to Jefferson, and well beyond.

It seems that by Christianity, you mean Protestantism. Even so, you will admit that Protestantism was enabled by massive material developments. Some, of course, would argue that the latter gave rise to the former. Perhaps, the truth lies somewhere in between....

Aussie says of slavery:
"wealth of 250 years of the Triangular Slave Trade, which though justified by supremical christianity,its certainly nothing to be proud of."

There were Christians who justified the slave trade and slavery. That is not surprising since almost every nation in human history has had slaves or forms of slavery. It is very ancient. But it is also important to note that it was the Christian nations who did more than any other to stamp out slavery. It was the British navy, motivated by Evangelicals, that stamped out the slave trade. Abolitionists were overwhelmingly motivated by a traditional Christianity.

As the recent political biography of Lincoln points out, he ran on Evangelical votes in the North and depended on them. (See Carwardine on Lincoln.) Whatever his personal faith, the anti-slavery Republican Party, which campaigned in churches and with Sunday School lessons (!), was a creature of Christians. Read the Battle Hymn!

As for the Founders of America, the situation is pretty straight forward. Many were Christians. Some were deists. Few if any were atheists or agnostics. All of them were deeply influenced by the overwhelmingly Christian culture of the colonies. They could sign the Constitution in "the year of our Lord" (thoughtlessly!) because they simply worked in that framework whatever their private views.

Go read the Constitutions of the original states. Look for the Christian references. Go read the sermons of the Revolutionary War pastors. Go read the diaries of the people of the period. Not every Founder was personally pious. Some hated/disliked the organized church, since in the case of men like Jefferson traditional morality got in the way of their lifestyle choices (as Jefferson's slaves sadly learned).

Aussie:

I am arguing that theism (particularly monotheism) has been a key good in the development of ethics and much that is good in global culture. In particular Christianity (which is the largest of the monotheistic faiths) has been compatible with the great developments of the culture.

It is simply false that most of the wealth of the industrial revolution was produced by the slave trade. The great slave regions of the United States (for example) were not heavily industrialized. The UK banned the slave trade and still saw its wealth increase. Germany had few "good" colonies (which contributed little to its real wealth), but became a major industrial power nonetheless.

If you live in a country with a parliamentary form of government you owe it to the hard intellectual work of men like John Locke . . .

Thank God brave men and women in place like India fought for their liberty and used those ideas to gain their independence, but there is no way to pretend that the ideas that form parliamentary forms of government did not overwhelmingly come from the West.

These ideas can be taken up by anyone, but were formed in a particular time and place.

Let me say, I am very impressed with the discussions here. I have been loathe to join in as I was afraid I would lower the interlectual tone . I have been a bit confused about JMR sometimes he is arguing for a theistic outlook and other times an exclusive christian one. I personally think that the fruits of the industrial revolution which JMR puts down to christianity, actually came from the wealth of 250 years of the Triangular Slave Trade, which though justified by supremical christianity,its certainly nothing to be proud of.

IN SUMMARY:
This thread is a teachable moment.
The key thing to notice is NOT the substance of the arguments on this thread by JMR and others, which were interesting and intellectually honest.

The interesting point is that supremacist ideologies, of which Christianity and Islam are good examples, can make intelligent people like JMR make irrational and weak arguments. This superiority complex, that goes deep into the followers psychology, replaces the ability to analyze in a detached, unemotional manner.
Developing the mind to overcome reflexive and emotional thinking and replace it with detached, rational thinking is the method of Vedanta underlying Hinduism and Buddhism.
For example, JMR arques in defence of Christianity that:
The Dark Ages did not exist.
Christianity didn't oppose scientific progress (Copernicus, galileo).
Christianity is the essential source of railroads, science, democracy, enlightenment and free markets.

He confuses (uses) the current wealth & power of European nations acquired through colonialism as proof of the superiority of Christianity, while denying the Dark Ages in Europe under Christianiy or the true religiosity of the Founding Fathers. Most people in the world (non-Europeans) consider colonialism and its theft of resources and destruction of innate systems and cultures to be the greatest crime in the history of mankind (even Tony Blair apologized recently).

So, patronizing arguments about railroads, democracy, and science being given to the savages is at least one century (maybe one millenium) outdated. It would have sounded good at the turn of the last century; it sounds ignorant in 2009. The fact is that different cultures have contributed in many fundamental ways to humanity's fund of knowledge at different times. Some contributions are postive, like writing & technologies, and others are negative, like supremacism.

Therefore I repeat, supremacist systems like Christianity and Islam lead to intolerance and conflict. My prophet, book, or god is better than yours is an inadequate foundation for progress- not just scientific, but moral progress. The last 2000 years would have been better without this. Science, logic, rationionality, free markets, democracy, astronomy and even railroads would have done just fine, if not better.

John Mark,

Farnaz: Since I belong to a Church walloped by the Crusaders, I am unlikely to go off on one!

I am sorry if my brief comment made you think I "dislike" the Enlightenment . . .a movement for which I am (on the whole) very thankful.

Perhaps this is sad, but it is true none the less.
-----------------------
I earnestly doubted you would be Crusade bound! I think there was a great deal in the Enlightenment for which we must be grateful. HOwever, it has also been the well-spring of persistent self-delusion, its encroachments into the social domain not always beneficial. I would imagine you are familiar with Horkheimer and Adorno, "Dialectics of the Enlightenment," one of several excellent critiques.

You're a good sport, JMR.

This will have to be my last post on this thread. I am doing a lecture on Plato's view of the human soul (fun! Wow!) and have to prepare! I hope I was able to clarify some of my thoughts and as always appreciated the tone and dialog available here. I always learn.

Dear John Mark Reynolds. You know who also shaped the good old U.S.A.? The founding fathers, and there is alot of evidence for this, they mostly they believed in a god, that he created the universe than found something else to do. George washington didnt take communion, and he and John Adams cowrote a message that said the United States was not a Christian nation. Jefferson in all likelyhood was an atheist. Abraham Lincoln was called an atheist when running for office and probably was an atheist. Benjamin Franklin famously wrote that a lighthouse was a better addition than a church.

Do not overstate the role religion played in the creation of this country. You could hardly call any of the founding fathers christian. Two of the greatest presidents were almost certainly atheists.

What is scientism? anyway. Im guessing its stupid.

A commentator said of theism: "But, it certainly is not a religion. It is really just predisposition."

It is not in my case. It is a conclusion I have come to (against my own will at one point) based on reason and experience. Perhaps, I am wrong, but God best fits the evidence as I understand it.

If the only philosopher you read on science is Dennett, then you might try some Plantinga. I of course had to read both! Good for the soul, really!

As for "lost discoveries" . . . well what came of them? Many civilizations (mostly theistic) were formed that did cool things that might have produced a scientific revolution, but they did not. There is no comparing what came out of Western Europe with anything else that happened in human history.

Farnaz: Since I belong to a Church walloped by the Crusaders, I am unlikely to go off on one!

I am sorry if my brief comment made you think I "dislike" the Enlightenment . . .a movement for which I am (on the whole) very thankful.

Perhaps this is sad, but it is true none the less.

I should add that as philosopher who studies ancient philosophy I (of course) know the contributions Ancient Greece and Rome made to the development of the rule of law and justice (mostly theistic and religious societies by the way), but our modern forms are part of the fusion of Jewish and Christian ideas that took place (predominantly) in places like Britain.

John Locke, for example,. . . try reading him without thinking about Christianity!

John Locke, Christian apologist and theist, is an example of the very sort of person that helped shape the US and our values during the Enlightenment. (I wanted to be sure to give a positive example!) No scientism there!

I certainly did not mean that the only thing that the Enlightenment (a generally good thing) did was "scientism." This weird belief (which is common on this board) is that science is the only means to truth.

I am not persuaded by it, but some are. As for the general "Internet secularist" beliefs that science, education, and moral progress were mostly impeded by religion (including Christianity) . . . this is falsehood easily dispelled by reading a good (even non-religious) history of the philosophy of science. As an introduction, I like the standard one by John Losee. ("Historical Introduction to the Philosophy of Science.")

I love the Greeks, just finished a book touting their influence on us . . . but what they had was not a "railroad" in the sense I was using. (I have even been to the site!)

As for the entire notion of a "dark age," I don't believe most historians (come on Wikipedia?) use this pejorative term anymore, certainly none I knew. What "dark age" where? When? Byzantium never knew a time when secular knowledge was not advanced along with religious knowledge, for example.

This sort of atheist agit-prop reminds me of the value of a good general education.

It is perfectly possible that recently (in historical terms) secular Denmark will prove my thesis wrong. We will see, but I doubt it. For one thing, they survive under the military protection of the United States (very religious nation!) so we cannot be sure if they could support their system if really "on their own."

JMR said,

"God is the cause of moral goodness, but nobody has to recognize the cause in order to get the benefit."

That is his opinion, and it is a valid opinion, but I do not understand, then what all the rest is supposed to mean.

What is a theist? Someone who believes in God? Maybe. But, it certainly is not a religion. It is really just predisposition. Just as atheism, and secularism are not religions, either. And what is scientism? A made up word? It is certainly, also, not a religion. And science is not a religion, either.

Sometimes, the suffix, ism, means a reliigon, sometimes, a political ideology, sometimes an economic theory, and sometimes, it is merely a descriptive term to characterize lite-weight observations.

Sometimes people call me a "materialist," but I do not feel like a materialist. Sometimes people call me a "moral relativist" but I do not feel like a moral relativist.

Sometimes, people invent an "ism" that they find objectionable, and then they attach this word to all the people they do not like, when the people so accused, so not even know what they are being accused of.

I just don't see phrases like "goodnes is in the mind of God..." as being very meaningful. That persuppose so many speculations on the part of the speaker, that really makes this type of communicaiton a very narrow idiomatic language which in intelligible only to a few.

Pam, you're right. Energy is not nothing, but it's not a thing either....a shape shifting force would be more like it.

Virtual particles and anti-particles are continuously welling up from the vacuum and just as quickly annihilating one another...only a small fraction of the particles emanating from the Big Bang managed to escape destruction!

For some odd reason, available energy in the universe remains constant e.g. the conservation of energy.

But then, particles aren't things either.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_state

I was saying more that the concept of "nothing" in the physical world, does not exist. There is always something, even if you get all the energy and particles out of an area of space. These virtual particles arise and leave from a sort of microscopic churning that is happening everywhere.

"So its quite possible to "create" something out of nothing."

I don't think energy, which can be neither created nor destroyed, should be overlooked. It is not "nothing," and matter is its product.

JMR: "Let's see how Western Europe does sustaining its culture if it continues to adopt secularism. Will it be able to defend, repopulate, or pay for itself?"

A good bit of it has been doing a good job of largely staying out of wars lately. When you decide that it's not your job to remake the world in your own image, you don't have to send your young to their deaths.

Repopulate? Have they become depopulated? Yes, I know their birthrates are down - the whole world could use some of that - but they do still have babies over there.

Last I heard, the dollar was dropping like a stone vis-a-vis the Euro. And some of countries that report being the happiest (Denmark is #1) are among the most secular.

JMR: "Railroads, democracy, and science can into being in the Christian West. They flourished there."

I already showed you that "the West" didn't invent science. It was flourishing in the ancient world - Mediterranean countries, Arabia, India, China - until the Christian Dark Ages drove it underground and nearly extinguished it. Much was lost, and had to be rediscovered centuries later.

Brush up on the history of Democracy (hint: not a product of the "Christian West"):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy#History_of_democracy

And railroads? Here are a couple of lines from the Wiki article on rail transport:

"The earliest evidence of a railway was a 6-kilometre (3.7 mi) Diolkos wagonway, which transported boats across the Corinth isthmus in Greece during the 6th century B.C.E. Trucks pushed by slaves ran in grooves in limestone, which provided the track element. The Diolkos ran for over 1300 years.[1]

Railways began reappearing in Europe after the Dark Ages."

And "flourishing" in the West? You haven't traveled much, have you?

Thanks Plasma - indeed, those virtual particles emerge from the quantum vacuum - rich with vast potential energies....and as real as a dream!

Persi im not sure what this is looking for but most of ones mass comes from particles that come from nothing. So its quite possible to "create" something out of nothing.

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

Hi Farnaz,

Ref. Scientism and religion - in the link, Dennett points out that every time religion/religious folk run across a science fact that contravenes religious dogma, it becomes 'scientism'....I had no idea the concept went all the way back to the Enlightenment :^)

Regarding your earlier point on creatio ex nihilo....in my best understanding of Buddhism, 'appearance' would replace 'creation' in this schema, and indeed would be from nothing (that could ever be identified, per that first Middle Way sutra we were discussing).

Since the universe has been continuously appearing,disappearing, and reappearing from nothingness since beginningless time, no creator has ever been necessary - from the Buddhist view. Without nothingness, there could never be somethingness.

And since perception exists, certain rare individuals will always be able to experience this insight into essential emptiness - have always done so.

In my limited understanding of physics, this idea is curiously becoming more and more tenable as time goes on, although I'm not so sure we'll get past the niggling details of the Big Bang anytime soon :)

But I'm not sure if that was the direction you were headed with creatio ex niliho!

Persiflage

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

JMR,
hey, thanks for the reply.

but it was the idea that NATURAL causes might keep the planets in orbit, the weather happening, and cause diseases that moved science forward. i don't know what "scientism" is, but i guess it's what you're deriding as "science worship"?

the renaissance was the beginning of when man "standing up" and saying "enough of superstition". it seems to me like the christian church has been generally anti-education ever since. through the dark ages smart people went into the clergy...to study...the bible...and build churches... you pointed to the admittedly beautiful cathedrals of the "christian era" (dark ages). when i see that i think of all the wasted energy and smarts devoted to building taller cathedrals.

enlightenment through age-of-reason scientists and moralists had to drag the church kicking a screaming through just about every advance of the last 500 years.

theist scientists of those days may have been motivated to "study the works of god" in discerning natural laws, or "figure out how god does it" or some such pious thought, but it's almost cliche to recount cases of scientists' being censured by "the church" for this or that discovery.

I dont love god for the same reason i dont love unicorns but, to desire to be like the awful creature that exists in the old testament is a horrible desire.

Persiflage,

I actually like JM Reynolds. I don't understand his thinking one iota, but I believe he's sincere, and, hopefully, will not set off on a Crusade next week. What troubles me is that he is a philosopher.

See his most recent post, which appeared eleven minutes ago. Oh, poor Englightenment, not poor owing to confusion of terms, but poor because he spawned "scientism," not science.

Poor Bartleby, more impoverished than we knew.

Did you see my post on creatio ex nihilio? I know the apologists had something different in mind, but....

Farnaz

First, of all most thinkers in the Enlightenment (and most scientists) were theists.

Second, the scientific revolution was not a product of the Enlightenment in any case. In fact, scientism (when it appeared) in the Enlightenment was a false worship of science made possible by the creation of the the scientific revolution prior to the Enlightenment.

first, let me say how much i appreciate john mark reynolds' actually getting "down and dirty", and actually responding to commenters here.

JMR said,
"I argue that no educated person can look at Western art (or science) and argue that theism did not motivate much (if not most!) of it. Take art as the easiest case to see: Was it secularism that motivated the creation of the rose window in Notre Dame? Or Notre Dame itself? The examples are endless."

well, it's kind of silly for credit "theism" with these advances - basically everyone was theist. for that to work you'd also equally have to blame theism for all the (man-made) evils in the world prior to the enlightenment.

note also, that it was during the enlightenment, when scientists and philosophers quit leaning on god for everything, that scientific and moral progress was made.

'Humans may create, but most humans who create were motivated by theism'

What shall we make of the grand Chinese culture of Confucious and Lao Tzu then?

And how about those pantheistic Greeks? Pre-Constantine Romans? Japanese?? Was the industrial revolution driven by Calvin and Luther?? The Protestant work ethic is highly overrated as a motivator.....

On the other hand, even if this particular far-fetched axiom were true, sometimes it takes a carrot to make a mule go....but a carrot is still just a carrot.

As always, in order to work right, theism requires faith - pure and simple.

Oh Ye of Little Faith! - you'll just have to hold out for factual evidence....or another truckload of carrots.

J. M. Reynolds wrote: "...Some have claimed on this thread that no educated person can sustain the notion that theism caused the creation of culture." __________________________________________

I'd argue that theism is not the cause of culture but an artifact of it.

Thomas Paul Moses Baum wrote in response to my post:
Do you think that the 20th Century was/is a foretaste of this "adulthood"? __________________________________________

I think centuries are too brief a sample from which to draw conclusions. But I am hopeful that the rise in numbers and enthusiasm of atheists might be a leading indicator of maturity. I also dare to hope that a unifying global economy will make it increasingly difficult for populations to attack each other. I think Europe has finally learned that modern war is lose/lose situation. Can the USA be far behind?

tojby_2000

You wrote, "Fortunately, we are at long last healing from the trauma and adulthood awaits."

Do you think that the 20th Century was/is a foretaste of this "adulthood"?

Take care, be ready.

Sincerely, Thomas Paul Moses Baum.

Humans may create, but most humans who create were motivated by theism. Some have claimed on this thread that no educated person can sustain the notion that theism caused the creation of culture.

I argue that no educated person can look at Western art (or science) and argue that theism did not motivate much (if not most!) of it. Take art as the easiest case to see: Was it secularism that motivated the creation of the rose window in Notre Dame? Or Notre Dame itself? The examples are endless.

Readers of this comment box should note two things:

1. There are arguments for the existence of God. Check out Richard Swinburne, if you want an example of some.

2. The problem of "evil" has been addressed by Christian philosophers. You might try a book by my colleague Doug Geivett on the issue.

As for Christianity being "accidental" to all the good things you now enjoy . . . well, maybe, but then isn't that what secularists would have to say? How do they know this? For example, many of the founders of science were motivated by their belief in God which gave them hope of finding an orderly universe. Theistic neo-Platonists put faith in math based on their theology and theistic philosophy. Of course lots of things are possible . . . but ancient secularists (like Lucretius) simply did not produce the scientific revolution.

Let's see how Western Europe does sustaining its culture if it continues to adopt secularism. Will it be able to defend, repopulate, or pay for itself?

We shall see won't we?

"Walking with God over the centuries, theists have learned a thing or two about ethics from divine revelation."
It is far more likely that observing common human ethics and using observation and common sense that theists learned about ethics but due to their need to attribute things to deity, the ASSUMED that they received "divine revelation" .

"Some of the most ethical people I know are atheists and agnostics."

That is becuase they recognize humanity as primary not man-made deities

"One can certainly be moral without believing in God, but this is because men can surely breath without being aware of the existence of oxygen."

Fallacious analogy. There is absolute proof of oxygen. There is no proof of God.

"God is the cause of moral goodness, but nobody has to recognize the cause in order to get the benefit. "

A belief in god may be the cause of YOUR (and other believers') moral goodness. But to assert that man-made entity is the cause of moral goodness (or the cause of anything in reality) is not a sustainable assertion.

JMR,

"Railroads, democracy, and science can into being in the Christian West. They flourished there. One can invent all sorts of reasons why Christianity had nothing to do with it . . . or pretend their favored belief could have done the same, but they did not. "

The problem with that assertion is that there is no proof that Christianty or deity had anything to do with those tings. In fact is is just as likely that those things flourished IN SPITE OF deity.

The assertion that thiests create things because of deity or religious belief is not sustainable by any educated observer. And the idea that Secularists appropriate things is equally unsustainable.

It is humans who create, both theists and secularists.

There is (are) no god(s).

Our species was thunderstruck a long time ago when we realized that death was inevitable. Our unconscious went into denial mode and that was OK. It prevented us from going numb. This magical thinking had its uses but also had its hobbles.

Fortunately, we are at long last healing from the trauma and adulthood awaits.

John Mark Reynolds wrote: "...The fact that x caused y does not mean he must be the direct cause of everything..."
_________________________________________

When X is an entity both omniscient and omnipotent it means that all events flowing from Prime Movement are attributable to X. Here's the whole Epicurus quote:

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?”

How could we forget Goethe? An avowed pantheist.....

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

As regards Christianity and the evolution of science - the religiousness of Gallileo, Copernicus, Newton, and so many more, was merely coincidental to their discoveries - had nothing whatsoever to do with their belief in God as near as anyone can tell.

With Leibnitz, the rather limited idea of the God portrayed in the bible is fast losing steam - much less with the insights of Spinoza! While Descartes was a believer, it's hard to see a shred of typically inflexible, dogmatic Christianity in his thinking.

As an aside, astrology was still quite popular and taken seriously by Newton, Copernicus, and other big thinkers of that early era of science.

Modern day scientists have essentially given up the idea of a limited Creator, along with the idea of Creationism. This is merely the evolution of ideas and experience in action.

Clearthinking has much to say of value regarding other and perhaps more viable concepts of the Absolute.....these nondual ideas do tend to keep pace with cutting edge science - or is it the other way around?

See quantum physicist David Bohm's ideas regarding the creation of the material universe below - at least physicists generally have enough common sense to know what they don't know......they understand hypothesis and theory, as opposed to absolute truth.

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

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

Here is the problem for my interlocutors:

Railroads, democracy, and science can into being in the Christian West. They flourished there. One can invent all sorts of reasons why Christianity had nothing to do with it . . . or pretend their favored belief could have done the same, but they did not.

Period.

Newton humbly conceded that he stood on the shoulders of giants.
JMR, seems to think (not so humbly) that science has stood on the shoulders of Christianity.
And railroads, democracy, and free markets also came from Chritianity?
Sometimes offense is the best defense in football, but in an intellectual argument it can be self-defeating.

And as to "free will" being the source of evil, how would you characterize "acts of God" - storms, earthquakes, tsunamis, and other natural disasters that kill thousands of people each year and cause untold suffering

Oh man, JMR, you couldn't be more wrong.

I suggest reading Lost Discoveries by Dick Teresi.

Here is the publisher's summary:

"In the tradition of Daniel Boorstin, the co-founder of Omni delivers an original work of history that demonstrates why modern science rests on a foundation built by ancient and medieval non-European societies.

Lost Discoveries explores the mostly unheralded scientific breakthroughs from the ancient world - Babylonians, Egyptians, Indians, Africans, New World, and Oceanic tribes, among others, and from the non-European medieval world. By example, the Egyptians developed the concept of the lowest common denominator and the Indians developed the use of zero and negative numbers. The Chinese observed, reported, and dated eclipses between 1400 and 1200 B.C. The Chinese also set the stage for later Hindu scholars, who refined the concept of particles and the void. Five thousand years ago, Sumerians were able to assert that the earth was circular. Islamic scientists fixed problems in Ptolemy's geocentric cosmology. The Quechuan Indians of Peru were the first to vulcanize rubber."

I am indeed trapped in dualism . . . the same trap that invented the railroads, the democratic forms of government, and the the free markets that are the best things happening in the sub-continent today.

Almost Superman revisited. Merely, substitute capitalism for one of the terms: Truth, Justice, and the American way. Or, two of the terms: Capitalism and the American way.

Or, capitalism: Fits your pronouncement better.

But you know better than what you write. You know what Walmart is doing, what Nike has done, etc. You know that the president refused to meet with Dalai Lama in the interest of Chinese markets.

You know that the president is "conciliating" with the UN indicted war criminal head of Sudan, also to placate the Chinese.

Is capitalism the American way? Is it?

I am indeed trapped in dualism . . . the same trap that invented the railroads, the democratic forms of government, and the the free markets that are the best things happening in the sub-continent today.

John,
You wrote "It is hard to see how a material process could produce ideas."
"Concepts such as good and evil are built into the human soul."
"Goodness is an idea that exists in the mind of God".

You, along with most of Western philosopy and religions, are trapped in dualism. In the East, philosophers long ago addressed this issue and developed an advanced monistic philosophy manifest in Vedanta (Hinduism) and restated by Buddha. They then developed rational spiritual systems to help a person develop the right understanding and knowledge necessary to be moral and peaceful.

Your statement "It is hard to see how a material process could produce ideas" reveals the struggle and the trap of dualism. If you assume a separation of mind/body or material/spiritual at the beginning of your philosophical inquiry, you will never resolve the conflict.

In Hinduism, a complete philosophical system has been established over the millenia which has metaphysical, epistemological, moral, political, and aesthetic systems that are internally consistent. It has no conflicts with science including Copernicus, Einstein, Bohr. Quantum physics and advanced physics confirm monism and increasingly refute dualism.

I know its hard for you to believe these statements, but think about how little you know and understand about Vedanta, Hinduism, and quantum physics. Also, we have had a good 200 years of British/Christian supremacist propaganda as part of colonization and control which required defaming advanced languages (sanskrit), philosophy (Vedanta), and religion (Hinduism) in order to maintain control and an image of superiority.
Don't worry. Learning is a process.

I should add that Islam as a monotheistic faith that inherited much from the Byzantine Christian commonwealth also contributed a great deal to the ideas that formed modern science.

Clearthinking:

People need only go read Aquinas or a book like C.S. Lewis' "Discarded Image" to know your caricature of the Middle Ages is false.

The Middle Ages laid down the ideas that produced the scientific revolution.

I am aware of the schools of thought you mentioned, but the bad news (for your point of view) is that they did not succeed in producing science or anything like it.

John,
You stated, "Clearthinking faces the historical problem that science developed in areas dominated by Christianity and not in areas dominated by the Hindu faith.
Good luck with explaining that away."

No luck needed.
1. There is no "historical problem" as you call it, if one knows their history objectively.
2. Science developed INSPITE OF not because of Christianity in Europe. So, to try to take credit for science is a bit silly. BTW, Islam often tries the same trick.
3. Natural philosophy, logic, rational analysis, science has been developing in various parts of the world for thousands of years. In India, natural philosophy, logic, and mathematics flourished under Hinduism. It was under Islam, since 1000 CE, that much was stifled. Do a little research on what and how old the Nyaya (logic) school of philosophy is in India and the development of mathematics and natural sciences under the influence of Hindu philosophy. Learn some real history, not just "western history". Your bias is showing on that one.
4. Christianity was so oppressive in Europe - politically, culturally, socially, & philosophically - that there was no scientiific of philosophical development.
5. It's amazing that a system that led to the "Dark Age" in Europe is actually trying to take credit for the development of science and rational analysis. You have to admit that this requires serious mental gymnastics.

You also did not address the critical issues of supremacism and proselytization that are a fundamental flaw for any religion or spiritual system. These ideas lead to intolerance and retard personal spiritual evolution. Remember: every "religious" conflict in the world has Christians or Muslims as at least one of the parties. Curious?

Clearthinking faces the historical problem that science developed in areas dominated by Christianity and not in areas dominated by the Hindu faith.

Good luck with explaining that away.

The difficulty with your argument is the small size of your sample: you only have the short space of recorded human history. Arguably some things are getting worse (is our "new" sexual morality really better from a survival point of view? while other things get better).

We would have to have a "moral perspective" to start with to make the judgment that things are "getting better. . . " or you could just be making the judgment that whatever survives is better . . . but that seems wrong. If society A values liberty and society B does not, society A is right . . . and society B is not!

And a philosopher in B could make that judgment even if B had conquered and eradicated A.

It is hard to see how a material process could produce ideas.

John Mark Reynolds:

Sorry for the confusion. That should read "an evolutionary-type process". I did not mean Darwinism, per se. This is to say an adaptive process in which systems of morality are tried and tested in societies with the better ones (the ones that bring the greatest good to the greatest number of people) surviving. I have no reason to believe that this process is not continuing as evidenced by, for example, society's changing attitudes on capital punishment, torture, the intrinsic value of other animals on this planet, etc..

You very well may say that God is causing this painfully slow, incremental refinement of morality, but I see it as purely a natural process...pretty much what I would expect from a non-directed human enterprise.

Fortunately for the world, science has successfully undermined the simpleminded religions - the Abrahamic cults, mainly Christianity and Islam.

Christianity and Islam have had a good 2000 year run preying on ignorance and the ignorant. This ended for Christianity in Europe with the development of science. It is now looking for the ignorant and uneducated in Africa and South America.

Islam - a strange combination of ignorance and intolerance - has been picking the lowest lying fruit for a 1000 years as apparent in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Now is the time for science, logic, and deeper & truer spirituality - not supremacist, intolerant cults like Christianity and Islam that proselytize and force their views on others. This results in conflict, violence, and suffering.

Now is the time for Vedanta & Hinduism. After 1000 years of anti-Hindu propaganda, many are not prepared to hear the wisdom or absorb the deep & complex monistic philosophy which is consistent with science. Now is a good time to start; at least some will benefit.

A new age of rational spirituality is again arriving, and Hinduism and Vedanta will lead the way again.

I view our morality as a product of evolutionary process refined over vast stretches of time. Religions have certainly participated in this refinement, but not always in good ways. I doubt anyone today, for instance, would think today that slaughtering the pregnant women in the neighboring tribe or torturing a non-believer into a confession is a morally good thing to do. And yet, both of these were at one time quite acceptable to religious people. The fact that they are no longer acceptable is, I contend, a tribute to the contribution that non-religious people have made to this process.

I would put it this way:

The Father is responsible for liberty (a good) and the son is responsible for abusing his liberty.

The son can have credit for his As and Fs.

Thanks for responding.

I take it then that you are not a theist who posits that everything that happens is part of God's "plan", or that the devil is responsible for evil (of all kinds) in the world?

To extend your example a bit, you seem to be saying that the father is only responsible for the A's on Johnny's report card, but not the F's.

Epicurus: "Then whence cometh evil?"

There are many possibilities and it would depend on what kind of evil (natural, moral, or some other kind) you mean.

I am a Platonist so I would suggest a combination of free will and the perversity of ruined nature cover a good bit of it.

The fact that x caused y does not mean he must be the direct cause of everything. A man has a son, but when the son grows up he is not directly responsible for all a son does!

John Mark Reynolds: -- "God is the cause of moral goodness..."

Epicurus: -- "Then whence cometh evil?"