Well sure, that's why we have a justice system. But you really want an omnipotent dictator to make the decision about what you are allowed to be free to do ... if that's not already contradictory? — unenlightened

If it stops genocide without impinging on other freedoms, then absolutely.

3) The natural/unnatural distinction between human societies and nature out there is false. — Chany

No it's not. We've created tons of things that would not exist in our absence. Twinkies, agent orange, concrete, plastics, splicing plant genes into animals, etc.

Climate change is largely being caused by human activity, not natural processes. Nature wasn't going to dig up all that fossilized plant material and spew it out into the atmosphere on it's own.

Why? Provide a reason, not just just state an opinion. — StreetlightX

Technology isn't considered part of biological evolution. Do you disagree that we intelligently interfere with the natural world?

Evolution is indifferent to what is 'natural' or not: if the results of evolution happen to be a bunch of intelligent apes who can invent things like seat-belts that happen to save lives, then so be it - they are the species best adapted to survival in their environment. 'Natural' doesn't come into it, except as an extrinsic consideration from without the process of evolution itself. — StreetlightX

But for the concept of biological evolution to be meaningful. we need to be able to differentiate it from what humans do, such as artificial selection, artificial insemination, splicing genes, cloning, bring back species from extinction, CRISPR, etc.

That stuff isn't evolution, it's intelligent design by humans. And the father we go down that road, the farther from natural selection, genetic drift, etc we get. There is talk about being able to use a chicken to reverse engineer a dinosaur back into existence. That's not something evolution does. There's also been a lot of futurist speculation of using nanobots to aid our bodies in various ways. That's not remotely evolution. Or engineering viruses to fight cancer, create smart drugs, etc.

The claims of philosophy of language, which I think needs a complete revamp. — mcdoodle

Hear, hear.

I'm all in favour of locking them up out of harm's way, but eliminating everyone's freedom is a very high price to pay. — unenlightened

But we are only talking about eliminating everyone's freedom to commit certain crimes. Now that can be abused, and accomplishing it might have unwanted consequences, so maybe we wouldn't find such a society acceptable.

But not because people were unable to rape, pillage, burn, etc. Most people would rather live in a world where war and child abuse was a thing of the past and what not.

My argument is that we don't really value the free will to commit certain evils, nor do we consider having such free will a good thing. What we value is the free will to do non-evil things, and we're worried that some people would like to constrain us from living how we like, when it doesn't involve committing those evils.

I'm just going to say that it's not good for a serial killer to have the free will to kill people, and I don't think other people believe it is good either, which is why we try to deny free will to persons with such compulsions, when we become aware of it.

A Clockwork Orange. — unenlightened

I've never actually seen it, so can you explain how not being able to commit terrible evils would be a hellish thing for society?

Let's try another analogy, which is actually rather close to God. Some think that we will create a self-improving general purpose AI at some point in the future. Being that it does not have the restrictions of biology, it will be able to bootstrap itself to super intelligence.

Setting aside the plausibility of such a scenario, which is fodder for a different sort of discussion, what might such an AI do? Well, let's say it was designed initially with humanity's highest ideals as its guiding motivation. Then when it eats the internet and becomes all-knowing and powerful, relative to us, it could set about to prevent murder, rape, war, child abuse, etc.

It could do what God fails to do, which is prevent various evils. Would we consider such a constraint on human free will to be a good or bad thing?

There would be no virtue in good behaviour, any more than there is virtue in having regard to gravity. Such a world would be 'perfect' in the behaviour of its inhabitants without their being 'good' at all. In fact it would be a pretty hellish society to my mind. — unenlightened

It would be a hellish society where nobody had the free will to murder, rape, steal, commit genocide, or start wars?

I understand such an argument if that involves other unacceptable costs to being human, but not if it only limits our ability to do evil things. Because that is the sort of society we attempt to have much of the time, but fail to do so because we're imperfect, fallible humans with limited abilities.

That's not necessarily true. If free will is itself a good then it's imprecise to say that God values free will over good; rather you'd have to say that God values free will over other types of good. As explained here, "the value of free will (and the goods it makes possible) is so great as to outweigh the risk that it may be misused in various ways". — Michael

That's an interesting justification. But what's really being argued is that God values free will at the cost of permitting various evils to exist. It's not a matter of weighing goods, it's a matter of weighing the good of free will over permitting evil.

And it's not a risk to God, because God already knows that various evils will happen as a result of free will.

So the question becomes whether any good justifies evil, and whether free will is such a good. It would be quite easy to turn the argument around and argue that free will is evil, because it allows for evil to exist. And God, being in favor of evil, created free will for that very reason.

God is said to have given us free will, unlike parents who do not give us free will. So there is a difference in the meaning of "permission" in the OP when you compare parents who permit their children to perform evil acts and God who ("permits") allows for the ability to choose to perform evil acts. — Luke

All of that is fine, provided that God values free will over good, which means that God is something other than being perfectly good. It's certainly not something that human societies value in practice.

But now they are all grown up, they have to make the best they can of their own lives. If they turn out to idiots and arseholes in spite of my loving care and education, that is unfortunate, but if I have to go on exercising parental control for ever, then they cannot possibly grow into responsible adults. — unenlightened

Sure, but society takes over that role to an extent. We have various laws that are enforced, to an extent, which curb people's free will to do anything they might want.I could really hate my neighbor and wish them dead, but restrain from carrying it out because I don't want to go to prison.

I think this sort of thing demonstrates that human beings don't really believe in any sort of absolute free will as being a good thing.

If you aspire to be a believer then you have to accept that your finite intellect will never be able to understand the ways of an infinte intentionailty. — John

But that's a get out of jail free card for anything a believer wishes to attribute to God or the divine story of why things are the way they are.

"I was devastated when my husband started beating me, but I thank God that he had the choice." — Cuthbert

Haha. I've never heard it put that way before. Usually it's, "Why did God let that happen to me?", which turns into it being an opportunity for growth or forgiveness or God's ways are mysterious. But it's never thanking God for free will.

I think, for instance, your very use of the word 'interferes with', would be considered an improper term from an hermeneutic perspective. And again, your total absence of sympathy with the subject at hand, virtually guarantees that whatever interpretation you come up with, will be negative. — Wayfarer

What would you call what Yahweh and Jesus do in the various books of the bible, if "interference" is objectionable to your continental sensibilities? And I'm very familiar with the overall material, so it's not like you can tell me they weren't actively involved with human events throughout the entire Bible (or predicted to be actively involved in future events).

Also, I think the book of Job does a better job with evil and suffering than C.S. Lewis, and it still leaves one deeply dissatisfied. Afterall, God let Job suffer just to prove a point to Satan, and never told Job why.

Why? Because the god who is all unknowable mystery can not be convicted of anything. He's the all-purpose cause, the all-purpose reason, the all-purpose excuse. Very useful, really, but bogus. — Bitter Crank

I just don't see how that God can be only good, when there is evil and suffering in existence. A God who was both good and evil makes a lot more sense. Or a god indifferent to morality. An amoral being. A being for whom empathy and justice is a foreign concept. My very limited understanding of Hinduism is that God is beyond good and evil.

But a perfectly good God with omni-powers is in direct contradiction with existence.

Indeed, it would not be good. Free will is no excuse for bad behavior, whether on the part of a deity or the brats next door who ought to be straightened out with a big stick. — Bitter Crank

The entire thread is directed against a very specific notion of God, which was inspired by another thread, parodying that notion with an all-evil God allowing good in the universe, because free will.

everybody would be a winner, including Christians, who could then flourish with a more authentic religious form of devotion. — andrewk

Here, here. There are some good aspects of Christianity. Unfortunately, those are often tied up with some ridiculous elements.

Metaphors are not to be taken literally. — Bitter Crank

Sure, but they can aid an argument. If parents allowing their kids to have free reign over the neighborhood is considered immoral, then God allowing us to have free reign over the Earth can't be good.

I don't see any omni-perfect beings on or off the hook. — Bitter Crank

I doubt you're a proponent of the FWD in the first place.

t's give God a break. The problem is parents and their children. — Bitter Crank

It was a metaphor, where God is the parent, and we are the children. One the theists have been happy to use from time to time, including in their sacred texts.

To be fair, you ought to mention the good actions of the alleged god of monotheistic religions (whom I doubt you believe in) allows or (allegedly) aids and abets. You should mention liberation movements, emancipations, wonderful life-enhancing inventions like Nintendo and vibrators, peace making, Straight Guys Against Rape, great art of all kinds, Ben and Jerry's great flavors of ice cream, kind humble people (millions of them--count 'em!), smart, polite children and pets, and so on. — Bitter Crank

I don't see how any of that gets an omni-perfect being off the hook. In fact, most of that exists because of evil in the first place.

One more analogy.

Imagine the perfect police department, where perfect is defined as always upholding the law. Now also imagine that this department also knows everything about the area they patrol, and are able to do anything.

Now let's further say that all manner of crime exists in this precinct. Not just jaywalking and going 5 miles over the speed limit, but all manner of serious crimes such as murder, arson, theft, rape, etc.

What would be our conclusion? That the so called perfect police department is anything but. But we can imagine certain citizens within the precinct putting forward the FWD to defend the idea of a perfect police department. Despite wanting to uphold the law 100% of the time, the perfect police abstain from interfering many times to allow criminals to commit their crimes, because it's their free will to do so.

Would that definition be compatible with perfectly wishing to uphold the law? No, not in the least bit.

The ironic thing is that the very concept of freedom coincides the concept of slavery. To be free meant to be sovereign, precisely to not have a lord. — Wosret

That is very ironic. Lucifer is perfectly free.

The reason I'm hesitant to go into bat for Christianity is because I don't self-identify as Christian and I don't want to come off as evangalising on its behalf. — Wayfarer

The very big problem for Christianity and Judaism is that God is very much portrayed as interfering kind of deity in their sacred scriptures. Thus, a Jew can meaningfully agonize at the holocaust, and Christian parent can wonder why in the world God would let their child suffer from a terrible birth defect.

If God is not the sort of being who interferes - speaking from burning bushes, issuing out commandments, healing and striking people down, then you have a more reasonable way of reconciling God with the cosmos, although it still doesn't explain why the cosmos was created in the first place.

The majority of western monotheism involves an interfering God that people pray to to make stuff happen, and that kind of being is wholly incompatible with being omni-perfect and permitting evil.

Keep in mind that Yahweh flooded the Earth in Noah's time, because it was full of evil, but he didn't' see fit to prevent WW2.

I think you will find that impossible to validate with respect to any textual sources. — Wayfarer

So theists didn't invent the FWD as apologetics?

The problem is that you (not just you) don't understand what is the problem that religions seek to solve. — Wayfarer

I'm fine with religion trying to address existential issues, and I'm fine with people thinking there is some transcendental reality. But when this gets turned into statements about what God is, then you're going to have those skeptical of such statements push back.

So at whatever point certain believers decided that God was perfectly good and omni-capable, is the point at which skeptics question the existence of such a being, given that the universe is not a perfectly good place to live in.

And I'm familiar with many of Lewis's arguments, having read several of his books. He was a Christian apologist. I do like some of his stuff to this day, but I think his strongest arguments are from joy and longing, and not intellectual defenses of problematic theological positions laid down by the Orthodoxy.

According to them, freedom is found in abandoning the self, not in fulfilling it. — Wayfarer

But Christians tend to believe that God permits all abuse of free will, so that begs the question of why they don't endorse such a policy with regards to other human beings? It's fine if you think that abandoning the self is the path to true freedom, but trying to constrain other people's behavior would seem to mean you don't think that free will is worth allowing.

Really, I have no intention of continuing this dialogue. I don't wish to defend the Christian religion against those whose only interest in it is why it ought to be abandoned. — Wayfarer

Fine, but Christianity is broad, and not all Christians have had a belief in all-perfect God. There were some sects of early Christians who thought the world was created by an evil God, and Jesus came to give revelation of the higher God beyond creation. That makes a bit more sense than trying to square a perfect God with an imperfect creation.

he ancient man approached God as the accused person approaches his judge. For the modern man, the roles are quite reversed. He is the judge: God is in the dock. He is quite a kindly judge; if God should have a reasonable defense for being the god who permits war, poverty, and disease, he is ready to listen to it. The trial may even end in God’s acquittal. But the important thing is that man is on the bench and God is in the dock. — C S Lewis

Or the Christian conception of God is on trial. It is believers who put the notion out there that a perfect being permits such things to happen. What a surprise when some of us find that difficult to swallow.

Science fantasy. — Wayfarer

We're talking about God, who didn't find it too hard to create an entire universe with the laws of physics as they are, and you're telling me that making animals with carbon nanotubes instead of calcium is too difficult? Gimme a break.

Free will is necessary in order that we may be able to determine the truth, through choice of what to believe, instead of just believing what is told to you by your parents or other authorities. It is by questioning the authorities that we rid ourselves of falsity within our beliefs. — Metaphysician Undercover

Why would God set things up so that we haven't question adults in order to learn the truth?

According to the main Christian denominations, humans are autonomous agents who are able to behave as they wish. — Wayfarer

According to Christian denominations, heaven is an eternal place where humans (and angels) are not autonomous agents, free to do as they wish. Or better yet, no human or angel, post Lucifer, wishes to freely will evil in heaven, apparently. For eternity. Which raises the question of why Lucifer and the angels, and mankind, were able (or wanted) to freely wish evil at all.

But setting aside the afterlife, even though it's rather important to Christian theology, Christians don't behave as if being wholly autonomous in society is desireable. Notice how often they wish to constrain behavior via various policies, or endorsements of certain moral positions.

Your post is entirely anthroporphic. First, even though, on the basis of what you post, you don't profess to have any actual belief in God, you think you understand what such a being, if such a being exists, must or must not do, on the basis of a comparison between that being, and what parents do. — Wayfarer

The idea that God is good is an anthropomorphic idea, based on what human beings value as good. Get rid of the good, and the FWD is no longer problematic. It's not even needed.

The problem is that believers have defined God as being perfectly good and capable of preventing evil, this the reason the FWD exists. So it's not me that's being anthropomorphic, it's inherent to the FWD.

I think you may be wilfully blurring the distinction between ability and permission. — Luke

We don't give people permission to murder other people in society under normal circumstances (setting aside war, self-defense, death penalty, etc).

But we lack the ability to always prevent people from carrying out a murder, although the police will, if a planned murder is known in advance.

God lacks no such ability. I don't see where I've blurred the distinction.

I think critters behave like it's a good universe. They have a natural exuberance. — Wayfarer

Until they're being chased by a lion, or fail to find water during a drought, or have parasites infesting their brain.

And the textbook answer is - and this is from one who doesn't even profess Christianity - that God creates beings who are free to do whatever they like. — Wayfarer

I don't think most human beings actually consider this sort of free will to be a good thing, but I'll create another thread about it.

But one of the inevitable entailements of physical existence is the possibility of accident and injury. How could it be different? — Wayfarer

We could be made of something more resilient than meat. Even as meat, we're not optimally designed to last and avoid injury. We just have enough resilience to reproduce and raise children, on average.

You can't really tell me that God couldn't think of a better design. Our bones could be made of carbon nanotubes. Or immune systems could be much more resistant. But for that matter, why do we inhabit a world where we need immune systems? Why should the environment be chalk full of things that would like to hijack our cells or feed on us? That's just horrific.

Why oh why does life exist at the expense of other life? Why can't the entire biosphere be massively symbiotic? Are you telling me that God is incapable of that?

And aging is unnecessary. Our germ line is ageless, going back all the way to the first life. Cells don't necessarily have to age. There are several organisms who don't show any aging.

And what is up with cancer? Are you telling me that God couldn't make our cell reproduction mechanism robust enough to avoid uncontrolled growth? Is God that bad of a designer? Are you telling me that cancer is unavoidable. That no possible design could have eliminated the possibility?

We can make machines faster, strong, and of more durable material than our bodies. Can God not even do that much?

In other words, unless life is like a perfectly stage-managed spectacle full of happy endings and healthy people, then there must be something the matter with whoever is in charge. — Wayfarer

So if God can't do any better than create a world with genocide, sexual trafficking, famine and predation, why create a world in the first place? And the hotel manager is a terrible metaphor, as if the inconvenience of a poorly run hotel is somehow equivalent to the holocaust, or people starving to death.

David Benatar's argument really comes into force with a being like God.

Globalism has existed in some form as long as humans have been able to travel over distances and come back, and thus engage in trade. Technology has just made it more doable in recent centuries.

There is no alternative to globalism. What do people expect, for countries to shut their borders down and prevent anyone from coming and going?