"My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea, just and unjust? A man does not call a crooked line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? If the whole show was bad and senseless from A to Z, so to speak, why did I, who was supposed to be part of the show, find myself in such violent reaction against it?
A man feels wet when he falls into the water, because man is not a water animal; a fish would not feel wet. Of course, I could have given up my idea of justice by saying it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if I did that, then my argument against ‘God’ collapsed too-for the argument depended on saying that the world was unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my fancies! Thus, in the very act of trying to prove that God did not exist-in other words, that the whole of reality was senseless_I found I was forced to assume that one part of my reality-namely my idea of justice was full of sense. Consequently atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should have never found out that it has no meaning: just as if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be a word without meaning."
I will take that one step further. We cannot assume, (as a materialist does) that the supernatural, (anything that is outside of our senses or ways of measurement and method of science) does not exist. The naturalist assumes too much!
Rex
C.S. Lewis is a mushy thinker at best.
He may be the most over-rated writer of our time, too.
The standard of good and evil is man's own life and not the experience of bad which makes the absence of it automatically good.
Ignorance doesn't make genius possible any more than death suggests life.
Man's basic virtue is THINKING. All other virtues proceed from being able to think clearly. C.S. Lewis is telling us something different from this. He is indulging in the opposite of thinking. The fallacy of a false dichotomy is soaked into his philosophy.
When man BLANKS OUT his mind he allows evil in.
The willful suspension of one's consciousness allows man to commit folly upon himself and others by reducing the consequences SEEN.
EVIL has no power; it is impotent. It is OUR FAILURE to act rationally which permits the default consequences which we then call: EVIL.
EVIL wins only by this default.
Nazi Germany? Default. Good people did little or nothing in too small numbers to avoid the rush into the vacuum of blind obedience to irrationality.
In any compromise between food and poison; only death can win.
Contrary to what C.S. Lewis says, man calls a crooked line crooked because man thinks CONCEPTUALLY.
Man conceptualizes the shortest distance between two points, as Euclid did, and pronounces a definition of that distance as a straight line. It is a conceptual assertion.
Man deals with life by means of values or valuations directly acquired from experiencing what works and what does not work.
Eating works. Eating is good.
Starving does not work. Starving is bad.
Do mothers starve their children so that the child will eat?
No. Mothers don't scream in their infant's ear so that they will appreciate a lullaby either.
JUSTICE is getting what you deserve as a result of what you've done. Justice is not a vague notion of subjective consequences that result from pronouncements from a mountain top.
INJUSTICE is not necessary to inform us of this. Cause and effect are everywhere impartial demonstrations of the physical universe.
C.S. Lewis is an intellect who's natural intelligence was damaged by his quirky religious indoctrination.
Terry
