Who's left?

[_Darth J]

What this thread painfully demonstrates is how unfortunate it is that while Joseph Smith was a teller of tall tales, he wasn't really an idea guy. That's why the Book of Mormon has these episodes of prophets engaging atheist straw men, and even then the prophets invariably have to respond to the straw men with nothing more than bearing their testimony, rather than coming up with some kind of substantive knowledge that would not only actually refute the problems the atheist straw man raises, but provide some kind of theologically and spiritually satisfying answers and insights.

You know, the kinds of answers and insights one would reasonably expect to find in The Most Correct Book On Earth That Was Written For Our Day As The Keystone Of The Restored Gospel.

Instead, faithful Latter-day Saints are given no tools to deal with any of these issues, and simply assume that every gigantic plot hole in the faith-promoting narrative is an Alma the Younger vs. Korihor encounter, and role play accordingly.

This is approximately as effective in real life as being stuck in traffic and assuming that you can get out of it because your car is really James Bond's Aston Martin from Goldfinger.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

I find it endlessly fascinating apostates have to educate the faithful on the tenets of their religion.

- Doc

[_EAllusion]

Technically, if God's moral decision making is inscrutable to us, even worshiping God out of fear isn't advised. That's because you have no way of knowing if that is something God would want or not. Maybe God hates people who worship him (because it's unreasonable) and will torture them forever for doing so. Your fear doesn't point you in a direction of any particular action that will benefit your self-interest. To assert God has traits like trustworthiness, you can't default to God's mysterious ways.

The Cthulhu chick tract parody points this out in a funny way, which is why I posted it.

[_EAllusion]

Now, once you have reasoned yourself into some flavor of nihilistic belief,

Rejecting belief in the Mormon God, broader Christian notion of God, or God in general does not necessarily lead to nihilism. I am not a nihilist, nor is Darth J, nor is the bulk of secular philosophical community. We all think some alternative to nihilism is correct, and, obviously think we have good reasons for that position.

Asserting that morality is dependent on the existence of God is widely believed to be refuted by the Euthyphro Dilemma. (Look it up. Good luck responding to it, because it is a more airtight argument than the argument of evil is, and you're crashing and burning on that.) It also is inconsistent with orthodox LDS theology that asserts that God became God through following an already existent moral order of the universe and could literally cease to be God by straying from it. So the existence of your God does not help refute nihilism. If nihilism is false, it isn't because God exists, so welcome to the same boat as the non-theists you are criticizing. If you have a reasonable basis to reject nihilism, it's going to be open to the non-theist just the same.

Even if nihilism was the most reasonable position, that wouldn't impact the truth of it.

[_Chap]

del.

[_harmony]

I suppose it's too much to ask, but could someone explain in a Reader's Digest format what evil exists that isn't in some way connected to man? Because I don't see the weather, animal behavior, the presence of poisonous plants, etc to be evil. I think evil is manmade and man-supported.

[_Bazooka]

I suppose it's too much to ask, but could someone explain in a Reader's Digest format what evil exists that isn't in some way connected to man? Because I don't see the weather, animal behavior, the presence of poisonous plants, etc to be evil. I think evil is manmade and man-supported.

A cat playing with a half dead mouse seems fairly close to evil.

[_harmony]

I suppose it's too much to ask, but could someone explain in a Reader's Digest format what evil exists that isn't in some way connected to man? Because I don't see the weather, animal behavior, the presence of poisonous plants, etc to be evil. I think evil is manmade and man-supported.

A cat playing with a half dead mouse seems fairly close to evil.

Why? Don't you play with your food?

[Guest]

I suppose it's too much to ask, but could someone explain in a Reader's Digest format what evil exists that isn't in some way connected to man? Because I don't see the weather, animal behavior, the presence of poisonous plants, etc to be evil. I think evil is manmade and man-supported.

It isn't a question of who is making the evil, it's a question of why a God of charity would allow unchecked evil and pointless suffering for no discernable reason.

[_Chap]

I suppose it's too much to ask, but could someone explain in a Reader's Digest format what evil exists that isn't in some way connected to man? Because I don't see the weather, animal behavior, the presence of poisonous plants, etc to be evil. I think evil is manmade and man-supported.

DarthJ will no doubt do a fine job of responding to this. But let's try a quick draft, in the form of a short dialog.

Scene 1. The seventh day of creation, as per Genesis.

God: I have seen everything that I have made, and behold! It is very good. Let my children dwell in this wonderful world that I have made, and surely they will see how much I love them!

Scene 2. Somewhere on earth, a while later. Enter Human Being (Hunter Biden), carrying a dead child whose face has been horribly eaten away. She looks up into the sky and speaks:

Hunter Biden: Hey God! Are you listening?

God: Of course my child! As your Heavenly Father I am always ready to listen to my children, because I care for them, just as you care for your own. Are you enjoying the wonderful world I made for you to live in?

Hunter Biden: Actually, God, not all that much. You see, my kid has just died an agonizing and degrading death through necrotizing fasciitis. It was caused by that little bacterium you created, Streptococcus pyogenes, and let loose into this world you say you made for us. It ate his face up, and a lot of the rest of him. Look, I just want to say that if you were a human being I'd say that you sucked as a parent for leaving something like that lying around near your kids. But I know that you actually made the thing that killed him, because you made everything, didn't you? So you made the damn bacterium on purpose, and left it around where it could eat kids' faces off. THAT'S JUST PLAIN EVIL!

You get the idea? Two kinds of evil in the world

Bad things that happen to us because of other people's deliberate actions: fault of those other people. (Though some would say God shares responsibility for not preventing it)

Bad things that happen to us because of the way the world is made: fault of whoever created it, i.e. God. No-one else. That evil is the responsibility of God, not of human beings.