Thread: -God, Good & Evil-

Nietzsche says that "God is Dead" because he denies anything that transcends what is perceived as reality. He says that all that takes away from life and makes us live in illusions and forget the real value that is life itself. He thinks that, although at first cynism will appear when people let all their faiths down, however he thinks that after that a new world will come when everbody will really understand life and happiness.

First, the idea of good has been created in opposition to bad. The fact that good and bad can be described in an infinite number of ways in all the different cultures of earth proves that it is a creation, or is at least metamorphosed, by humankind. People give the meaning to words. If we had been beings that didn't suffer, these two words would perhaps not have appeared.

I am very spiritual, but in my religion (buddhism), there is no God(s) (perhaps some spirits that achieved higher than others, but that's something else). So I can't really answer yes to your question, but seeing the feelings that good things make me feel inside keep telling me that good is just what every single living being should be aspiring to.

This comes from someone who cries when he watches Ah! My Goddess' OAVs/Movie or reads Love Hina

LenMiyata hit my position. Being a Buddhist I preffer to think of things in terms of 'right and wrong' rather than 'good and evil', and I define 'right' as what makes us happy and 'wrong' as what makes us unhappy.
By that logic you could argue that being greedy, selfish and lustful can make a person happy, so hence it is right. Right? Wrong. Such things don't maintain a state of happiness, and you'll probably end up feeling unfulfilled or depressed later on... Other things like love, friendship and kindness don't tend to have such effects, and it's something you can repeatedly fall back on. See what i'm saying?

Buddhist philosophy says there is no God and agrees with scientists rather than theologians when it comes to things like creation. Buddha taught us that all things are impermanent, constantly arising, becoming, changing and fading.
Anything constant like a permanent supreme being doesn't really sit too well with alot of Buddhists, and we are mostly very anti-theistic because the very notion of God conflicts with some fundimental principles in the way Buddhists view of the world and the role of us in it.

But as LenMiyata said, if there is a god... why worry about it?

Great Stuff people!

My two cents;

"God is dead" only in so far as people have pragmatically excluded principles of faith, virtue and so fourth, merely because the progression of time and the duplicity of religion has forced them to do so. Granted: faith in the conceptual sense in still overly palpable, however, who is to say this is not merely a pedantic display? For all intents and purposes, faith may merely be a show of pretension, which would be irrespective of the claims made by the most devout believer in God.

On another note, those who lambasted the thesis need not make an enemy out of me, I am merely citing Nietzsche for our purposes here.

Let face it, God can't be made pragmatic (although, Descartes did come up with a theory to prove the existence of God). As such, if people no longer have the capacity to believe in God, it should logically follow that one no longer holds tenets proportional to right and wrong.

In any event, what the future hold remains to be seen...

Personally I'm with PVP on this subject.

"Nietzsche is Dead"
God

Nihilism only works if you discard half of your evidence. Alot of philosophical theorys are built this way and I have a real problem with that.

As for a universal idea of Good and Evil no matter what people want to believe there are natural laws and consequences. We as humans have our will to choose our actions but we cannot choose our consequences. They say insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result. So why do so many people think they can do whatever they want and they'll be happy. Morality is not relative. There are actions that are wrong and there are actions that are right. If you do something wrong you reap your reward, if you do something right you reap your reward. Which reward do YOU want?

As for whether it relates to God? Well that depends on whether you believe he's omniscent. If he is then he KNOWS the laws. Nice of him to pass them on isn't it.

Originally Posted by Hardedge

Great Stuff people!

Let face it, God can't be made pragmatic (although, Descartes did come up with a theory to prove the existence of God). As such, if people no longer have the capacity to believe in God, it should logically follow that one no longer holds tenets proportional to right and wrong.

In any event, what the future hold remains to be seen...

Descartes' theory has been proven wrong by Kant later on because the logic of Descartes had a big flaw: he "proved" that God existed from his own concept...

His logic:

God is almighty is his concept ==> He has therefore all caracteristics, including existence ==> God exists

All you need to do to prove that god exists is pray. If you pray faithfully, even with the lowest fraction of faith, then you'll feel his presence, if he has presence then he exists. By the feeling you get i mean that great, uplifting, happy feeling right in your heart, youll know it when you feel it, thats the holy ghost letting you know He's there.

Originally Posted by jkun17

I do not believe in moral absolutes such as Good and Evil because in reality, everything is relative. The only absolute in the Universe is Math, plain and simple. With Math there is only ONE right answer. With other topics, no such absolute can be found.

For example, "Is rain good?"

If you're in the desert or work on a farm, hell yes rain is good. If you live near a riverbank or near marshes or swampland, rain is one of the worst things that can happen.

For example, "Is 1+1=2?"

Yes, absolutely. Even if an angel fell from the sky and told us "1+1=3" it would not change that fact that if you have one item and other item of the same design, you have two items.

In a moral aspect of the question "what is good and evil" there are absolutes. Everyone knows what good and evil are, God or nature or instinct gives us all the ability to tell what is Good and what is Evil. If you do a Good or Evil act you will know that you did, and it is always absolute. I guess you can also say that God's judgement is absolute.

When you say "is rain good" that has nothing to do with morals, it is an opinion plain and simple, so it will be anything that people think about it. Rain can not be Evil, but yes it can be bad. Sure 1+1 does equal 2, but is that Good or Evil?

I fsome have lost faith in god why then do they still partake in things that are very godlike....

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