A couple questions for atheists on Suffering

by little_Socrates 102 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • little_Socrates
    little_Socrates

    Just how suffering in the gym makes us physically healthier.... Suffering in the world helps us grow roots and be stronger of soul. It gives us depth to our human experience. It keeps us connected to all other living creatures and lets us know we are alive (except for your Tsunami example).

    The Atheists argument is... the world does not appear as though it has been created by a loving God so therefore no God.

    I want to know what would the world would look like if there was a loving God in charge? What qualities should we look for?

  • cofty
    cofty
    except for your Tsunami example

    So address the hard question.

  • cofty
    cofty
    Suffering in the world helps us grow roots and be stronger of soul. It gives us depth to our human experience. It keeps us connected to all other living creatures and lets us know we are alive

    Facile platitudes.

  • little_Socrates
    little_Socrates

    alert - Retreat into deism imminent!

    LOL I admit it is very difficult not to use Christian based arguments but I am trying as hard as I can.

    So address the hard question.

    My comment about "except for Tsunami" was only in reference to the comment "know you are alive"

    You didn't answer my question on this though.... What makes those 250k deaths any more evil than any other death?

  • cofty
    cofty
    What makes those 250k deaths any more evil than any other death?

    I didn't say they were.

    However they were 250 000 examples of totally avoidable deaths. God could have calmed the wave but he didn't. Therefore you have to reconcile drowning a quarter of a million men, women and children with a loving omnipotent god.

    Suffering in the world helps us grow roots and be stronger of soul. It gives us depth to our human experience. It keeps us connected to all other living creatures and lets us know we are alive

    Tell it to her, and multiply her revulsion at your platitudes 250 000 times.

  • Viviane
    Viviane
    Who told you that the world should be free from suffering?

    No one. Why?

    Do you find any value in suffering?

    Exercise, while painful, is gainful. It's also self-imposed.

    I am just trying to understand the atheist argument on suffering. It seems they like to hammer on certain preconceived ideas that theists bring to the table. I am just trying to turn it around and see if I can get atheists to defend and explain their positions. Usually theists are the ones that always have to defend themselves

    That's been done dozens of times. In fact, Cofty had a thread over 100 pages long on it. Theists were unable to come up with rational answer for why a loving god would create a universe so excellently suiting to killing and harming it's inhabitants.

    The entire human experience is beautiful.

    A child being kidnapped, raped and murdered is beautiful? What a sickening notion.

  • cofty
    cofty
  • Viviane
    Viviane
    My point about the victims you mentioned... even though they died tragically, it doesn't negate all the great things they experienced in life.

    No, it doesn't, but if there is a creator God, then he is either a sh*tty creator or doesn't love his creation enough to give them a safe home.

    Would you be fine if someone decided to crush each of your fingers with a hammer? After all, it doesn't negate the lovely dinner you had last night.

    when atheists say "Why does God allow suffering" how do they define it? That is the definition I want to work towards.

    Why would an atheist ask that? They don't believe in God, by definition. I think when you see that, it's a hypothetical as part of a conversation where the existence of God is assumed for the sake of conversation and there is someone, usually, a Christian, trying to say God is perfectly loving, omniscient and omnipotent.

  • _Morpheus
    _Morpheus

    Coffy and viv nailed it as far as im concerend.

  • little_Socrates
    little_Socrates

    A child being Kidnapped raped and murdered....

    In and of itself that is a pretty horrible event. However when taken as a whole with the whole human condition it doesn't make the world an evil place.

    Cofty I am not here to prove God. As absurd as the question is I want to know, for an atheist, what makes suffering evil?

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