In a few hours depending on where you are, by the time you read this, it will already be 2020 to some, there will be several hours to go.
So before we get going with this post, thank you all who read this blog and sometimes comment on my many ramblings. You have all in your own ways made this blog a great gateway from the pressures of life. I noticed that if the people in the US of A stopped reading this blog, it would be such a lonely site. The stats show that you outnumbered all the other readers from the rest of the world combined. There were readers from countries I can’t locate on a map. Hi five to that guy from Latvia and Malta.
One of the best books I have read this year have been by Okot P’Bitek. His criticism of Christianity is beautiful. I fell in love with him.
Then I read Odera Oruka and I loved his contribution to the problem of evil. His argument that in omnibenevolence, omnipotence and omniscience can be inferred seems to be quite novel. He responds to both Platinga and White(I think) and concludes that given the problem of evil, it is more likely that atheism is true and theism false.
I read waiting for Godot and a host of other interesting books.
For some reason that I am yet to discern, the post on sex seems to have attracted a lot of views. Maybe the universe is telling me to write more on sex, who knows😀.
Our economy has been on a nosedive. And the building industry suffers as a consequence which is not fun for those of us directly involved.
Now with my master’s degree complete, i will in the new year begin a PhD in urban studies. That means some 3 years of study😭. Hopefully I get a scholarship to cover for my studies.
I did not ride as much in 2019 and since I don’t exercise much I look like a small elephant. Or rather, I am a small elephant 😀.
Happy 2020 friends. You have all been great.
problem of evil: argument from traffic jam
It is a conclusion of this site that the problem of evil remains unresolved for classical theism.
I found this view of the problem quite hilarious.
Tagged classical theism, Problem of evil
I think you will find this link a treasure.
Tagged African philosophy
[..]. Precious few God-deniers have so much as even attempted a rational evaluation of the question of God’s reality.
one would be tempted to ask why are apologists busy creating new silly arguments to defend their chimeras if it was not the challenge from the godless?
This post says nothing in so many words.
This however has me banging my head against bricks
You might have heard atheists talking more about achieving peace and unity among men instead of meditating upon the significance of our Lord’s incarnation. But how could they even properly speak of “peace and unity” if they believe that God does not exist? Peace and unity presuppose order and order presupposes God. Without God, there will be no principle or reason to which we shall unite or strive for peace. The only virtue that a materialistic worldview could provide is the survival of fittest. There is nothing more.
Where to begin? What has belief in god to do with peace? Somewhere in that christian book of tales, it’s written
Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. (Mathew 10:34)
If the christian believes in an omni god, whence cometh disorder? Who has allowed disorder to reign and why has omni not prevented it from taking root? In Genesis 11:1-11, god is the author of confusion, not men.
We live in a society of men and with discord, that society cannot long survive.
In a society where survival for the fittest is a virtue, peacefulness would be preferred to war. So i don’t see how this post is an argument against survival for the fittest or was the author just looking for words to throw around?
If Christians took their belief seriously, I think very few if none would join an army to kill brothers and sisters with whom they have no reason to be at war with. Tolstoy’s the Kingdom of God is within you would be their to go to book. Or if not, the many tomes against war wouldn’t have to be written, especially in christian nations.
In Mark Twain’s war prayer, after one side has finished offering their prayers to the god of war, these fellow approaches the pulpit to make them aware of the prayer that was not said and they conclude he was a mad man.
Tagged Atheism, Peace
Of a plague in heaven
Awww. Sounds so sweet.
Until you remember that wolves and lions can have rabies, and that rabies routinely jumps species, from beast to humans. Which means that heaven would be in constant danger of a rabies epidemic, which could then easily wipe out everyone there, including the angels and the six-headed beasts.
Come to think of it: what if this has already happened? What if, soon after Jesus ascended to heaven (circa 33AD), a massive rabid outbreak up there killed everyone there, including Abraham, Moses, Elijah, and even YHWH himself?
It might sound like an outrageous idea at first. But it makes perfect sense, if you think about it. It would explain why The Second Coming has not yet happened: the son of man long got bit by a rabid wolf. It would explain why angels no longer visit humans: every single one of them is long dead. It would explain why The Rapture remains elusive: The King of Kings got taken out by a virus centuries ago.
Christians might scoff at this idea. But given the many failed end of world prophecies, they should at least take this idea for a spin: what if a single viral species nuked everyone in heaven, millennia ago?
On the possibility of moral progress
Odera Oruka notes
….in matters of morals, man appears to be several centuries behind scientific and technological progress, in spite of the fact that great religions such as Christianity and Islam have existed since antiquity. The lag in moral progress must partly be blamed on these religions. Perhaps if in their place we had had the systems more oriented to earthly and worldly progress right from the beginning, the world would have been more positively different.
Tagged christianity, Islam, Morality
Philosophers should be scientists and scientists philosophers. The current rigid separation of science from philosophy is dangerous, for it encourages acquiescence in partial knowledge, leaving the ultimate and all embracing concern with truth only to faith and ideological and racist obscurantism. The separation denies scientists human wisdom and philosophers the sober knowledge of nature. Science without philosophy is wrongly authoritative, while philosophy without science is seriously limited.
Odera Oruka
Tagged Odera Oruka, Philosophy, Science
Dear friends, passerby and all, happy holidays.
And if you are one of those people who don’t have something to celebrate today, worry not, it is my birthday. And I am receiving gifts and cash donations. All will be used for a good cause of my choosing of course 🙂
Now that we have that behind us, can we examine the claims in this post.
In the very first paragraph, the author makes an unjustified claim, that is
Suppose that there were no God. I say that both atheists (that is, naturalists) and theists would be deluded.
do we know that there is a god? Nope.
We are told atheists would be deluded because
Atheists, or at least most atheists, would also be deluded. They think there is a meaning to life. Not a grand meaning, but a personal meaning. They make the meaning. It’s subjective, of course.
and i can’t help but wonder how believing that we give our lives meaning be a delusion? To start us off, it should be important to point out there is no consensus on what meaning in life is. Is it different from a moral life, a happy and pleasant life? Those who believe meaning is subjective (mind dependent) represent just one group of naturalists. There are as well objectivists who maintain meaning is mind-independent. But this distinctions are not important for our discussion now. It is only important to point out that the author of that post without claiming to, does believe in a supernaturalist view of meaning- without deity no meaning is possible.
S/he writes
This meaning would be reducible to a set of brain states. These can be ultimately reduced to chemicals. Thus, this meaning could be achieved chemically. So if we could invent an advanced heroin-like drug, something akin to the soma found in Brave New World, one that could induce a sense of awe, wonder, purpose, connectedness, community, happiness, etc, then we all can find meaning in our lives. Why not? We could make this available to everyone, so that everyone lives a meaningful life.
and i reject this view. We wouldn’t consider a life in tube (simulator) as meaningful. Two, does a happy life mean a meaningful life? Or a life in community? Could it be the case that these things answer to different states and may only be secondary to the question of meaning.
To rephrase this as an argument, let’s call the combination of all those features of lives worth living well-being:
(1) Well-being is subjective.
(2) If well-being is subjective, then it is reducible to a set of brain states.
(3) Therefore, well-being is a set of brain states.
(4) If well-being is a set of brain states, then it can at least theoretically, if not practically, be induced chemically.
(5) Well-being can be induced chemically.
Does well being and meaning mean the same thing? And while subjective is reducible to brain states, I don’t know whether it is the practice anywhere, even among scientists to reduce their states of mind to chemicals. I think this is a strawman argument.
How the author comes from the above to
if an atheist/naturalist thinks that meaning, purpose, and all that makes life worth living is anything beyond a set of states that can be induced by drugs, then they are deluded too.
In this last paragraph, the author is conflating happiness and meaning when he writes
However, if an atheist is willing to accept that happiness, at least in the short term, can be achieved by some kind of drug, then I guess they aren’t deluded after all. This could be extended, theoretically if not practically. Imagine that we can solve our survival problems with machines so that we don’t have to work, and arrange for the machines to manufacture and deliver our drugs, then an uninterruptedly happy and meaningful life can be achieved completely by drug use. Ahh, heaven at last!
for one, a few people are known to claim to be happy when high. This is not a delusion and is a fact of common experience- i.e, it is a truth. We have been working towards inventing machines to solve our survival problems not so that we can be uninterruptedly happy, but so we can have more time (thanks to capitalism this is not happening, we still work long hours side by side with robots) to do those things we find meaningful.
In the end, I argue that this author has not proved what he sought to do. But that happens a lot when you create a strawman anyway.
So once again, Merry Christmas my friends. You have one and all made blogging interesting and worthwhile.
for those interested in further reading on the subject
Tagged Atheism, Meaning of life