Searching for GOD...

[Stranger]

Morality emerges at "higher" levels ( of complexity ) because immorality emerges. "Lower or simpler things appear to be doing what they ought to be doing.
However immorality isn't a given emergent from complexity.
Again Physical complexity defined by reductionism or eliminativism gives us no information regarding right or wrong.

Comical and self-contradictory. You can't shoehorn morality down to the lower levels by pretending there's something they 'ought' to do and then contradict your self by saying that get no information about right or wrong from them.

[Stranger]

I think you need to say how things change.

If something changes it is not changeless. The clue is in the word. 

The implication is that God was going to act in a certain way and is unchanged by us.

An action is a change. Something that is changeless cannot act.

This was the transmuted into a God that cannot act because he doesn't move.
That though is different from an unmoved mover or unchanged changer or unactualised actualized and is therefore a bit of a red herring.

An action is a change in state. No amount of your or Feser's comical bullshit can change that basic fact. If there is an unchanging 'base of all hierarchies', then it is nothing like any of the multiple versions of God described in the bible. Something changeless cannot act, create, judge, interact, manifest itself, or do anything at all.

This is really simple.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

If something changes it is not changeless. The clue is in the word. 

An action is a change. Something that is changeless cannot act.

An action is a change in state. No amount of your or Feser's comical bullshit can change that basic fact. If there is an unchanging 'base of all hierarchies', then it is nothing like any of the multiple versions of God described in the bible. Something changeless cannot act, create, judge, interact, manifest itself, or do anything at all.

This is really simple.

Let is now outline what we must now call Strangerbollocks.

1: I am not suggesting that God doesn’t act.If you want to call acting changing then that is not in the same sense that I am using it which is susceptibility to entropy.
2: Why you have ran ahead with your own argument I do not know.
3. Contingency without necessity is what is absurd pal, not merely speculation
4: What has determinism got to do with any of this? Isn’t it just a way of saying the universe just is and there’s an end to it.
5: The principle of sufficient reason allows for internal reasons as well as external reasons
6:You have on at least one occasion tried to debunk the principle of sufficient reason by using the principle of sufficient reason.
7:Use of Spacetime.manifold. If God is at every location it doesn’t matter what and how space time is.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Comical and self-contradictory. You can't shoehorn morality down to the lower levels by pretending there's something they 'ought' to do and then contradict your self by saying that get no information about right or wrong from them.

Gibberish.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Whoosh! The fact that there are multiple versions of the 'God of scripture' is a directly observable fact about the world. Look at all the endless denominations, sects, and cults and all their different ideas about what the 'God of the bible'.

The problem for you is that none of them (that I'm aware of) are compatible with the base of all hierarchies concept.

These must be versions in the same sense that those who knew Churchill had a different perspective on the same person

[Walt Zingmatilder]

You're the Christian.
Ring any bells?So what? If Jesus is both human and divine, he is something that changes but you said God is unchanging.

The whole point of this is to show you that your assertion that God is unchanging is, on its face, complete bollocks, unless this god does not intervene in the World. The act of intervention is, by definition, a change, no matter what gobbledegook you come up with to obfuscate the fact.

Jesus is both human and divine without confusion. I think the trouble comes when you think in purely physical things then you are into stuff like hybrids, chimeras, cut and shuts and the other nonsense.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Vlad,

This seems to be a restatement of your “God is unchanging” schtick.

My Schtick, as you put it, is that God is not subject to entropy. He doesn’t turn into the physical

So, if according to this belief if this “God’s nature” is to want little Timmy to die of leukaemia then little Timmy will die of leukaemia right?

God’s nature=Wanting Timmy dead? I don’t think that’s true

You also though seem to believe that praying can actually work. Thus if someone close to little Timmy prays hard enough and in the correct manner, then your god who intends him to die may change his mind and cure little Timmy instead. Thus your “unchanging” god changes the course of events he'd intended because the praying persuaded him to do so: ie, God's Plan A becomes God's Plan B instead.     

So which claim do your religious speculations make: an unchanging god, or praying that works? 

Your thesis can have either, but not both.

Prayer aligns us with God’s “plan.” It’s a brave soul who thinks they can change God.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

This implies that morality and immorality are different things, rather than merely characterisations of particular points on a scale of a single concept.

How do you know? What complex systems are you aware of that don't have morality?

In the formulation you've given above, actually, it does - it says that given that morality isn't there until a certain level of complexity is reached, it's reasonable to consider that it's a product of that complexity, and not something inherent to reality. Which also leads to the conclusion that the detail of the complexity would affect the detail of the morality - in other words morality is relative.

O.

I’m finding it hard to see how something that is the product of something real can be unreal, so maybe you could explain yourself.

Do you mean the product is not physical and you are equating physicality with reality?

[Outrider]

I’m finding it hard to see how something that is the product of something real can be unreal, so maybe you could explain yourself.

I'm finding it impossible to work out where the hell you dragged that conclusion from, given what was written, but hey-ho.

Do you mean the product is not physical and you are equating physicality with reality?

No.

You suggested that morality didn't exist in simple systems, and emerged from complexity. This suggests, therefore, that morality is a property of those complex systems (arguably of the complexity itself) and not something independent - and, therefore, that it is relative as it's dependent upon the specifics of that complexity. A different culture, and different civilisation, begets a different morality.

O.

[Stranger]

1: I am not suggesting that God doesn’t act.If you want to call acting changing then that is not in the same sense that I am using it which is susceptibility to entropy.

Jeez, what is it with the Christians here that they think they can just make up a new definitions for a word? Change is change, regardless of entropy. Something that acts changes and hence does not logically fit with your unchanging base of all hierarchies schtick.

3. Contingency without necessity is what is absurd pal, not merely speculation

A necessary entity is logically incoherent unless you can explain the actual logic that means that it couldn't not exist. Without that, it's no different from a brute fact.

4: What has determinism got to do with any of this?

Fuck knows. I didn't mention it.

Isn’t it just a way of saying the universe just is and there’s an end to it.

Isn't what a way of saying that?

5: The principle of sufficient reason allows for internal reasons as well as external reasons

So give the sufficient reason for universality of the principle of sufficient reason and the sufficient reason why a 'necessary entity' couldn't not exist or be different.

6:You have on at least one occasion tried to debunk the principle of sufficient reason by using the principle of sufficient reason.

Reductio ad absurdum.

7:Use of Spacetime.manifold. If God is at every location it doesn’t matter what and how space time is.

And....? My point about the space-time manifold is that it doesn't appear to be contingent on anything else.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

My Schtick, as you put it, is that God is not subject to entropy. He doesn’t turn into the physical

No, your schtick is that at same time there’s an "unchanging" god who also changes his mind when prayers are offered up in the correct manner.

So which is it: an unchanging god (in which case praying is pointless), or praying that works (in which case your god isn’t unchanging)?

Your theological conjectures can have either, but not both. So which is it?     

God’s nature=Wanting Timmy dead? I don’t think that’s true

Why not? If little Timmy dies of leukaemia, would that not be what your god intended to happen? 

Prayer aligns us with God’s “plan.” It’s a brave soul who thinks they can change God.

Those are two contradictory statements. Either payer “aligns” us with what “God” intended all along (in which case it doesn’t change anything), or prayer can change “God”, in which case you god isn’t unchanging.

Which one are you opting for?     

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I'm finding it impossible to work out where the hell you dragged that conclusion from, given what was written, but hey-ho.

No.

You suggested that morality didn't exist in simple systems, and emerged from complexity. This suggests, therefore, that morality is a property of those complex systems (arguably of the complexity itself) and not something independent - and, therefore, that it is relative as it's dependent upon the specifics of that complexity. A different culture, and different civilisation, begets a different morality.

O.

Or, maybe what emerges is moral ability,analogous to mathematical or linguistic ability.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Literary criticism, forsooth! No, I am appealing to what I observe is what the Bible actually says, with a little help from Julius Wellhausen and Richard Elliott Friedman, two worthies of rather greater stature in the field than dear old C.S. Lewis, the literary critic you are so fond of quoting.
The henotheism to which you refer is rather more prevalent than you suggest. Though unequivocal in Psalm 82, its presence can be discerned throughout the Pentateuch and beyond. Genesis 1 is an unequivocally monotheistic text, but this Priestly narrative derives from a far later period (probably post-exilic). From thereon the Priestly narrative is interpolated with a very mixed bag of texts which are certainly henotheistic by implication, but certainly do not show the transcendental monotheism of Genesis 1. Who is the old buffer in Genesis 2 - is he your unmoving, unchanging centre of all the 'hierarchies'? And the genocidal maniac who is behind Exodus, Numbers, Joshua, and even as far as Kings is surely not any sort of 'Ground of Being' or 'unmoving centre of the Hierarchies'. Let's hear you make a good case for Numbers 31 and the bloodthirsty massacres in Joshua inspired by this very "jealous" tribal deity. What was he 'jealous' of, to order all this slaughter? Presumably because he feared there were other gods.....

In fact, we do not find any unequivocal monotheism in the texts (except for other references in the Priestly narrative) after Genesis 1, until the 2nd Isaiah, especially chapter 45. This text has also been dated as post-exilic, possibly within decades of when the Priestly narrative was redacted, which is a significant point .(Isaiah 45 also a good one for Alan Burns to read, since he believes in a personal Devil in opposition to God. I wonder how this personal Devil hopes to usurp the 'unmoving, unchanging centre of all hierarchies'. Can anyone have a go?)

All this before we get round to the preposterous arguments about the Trinity, which neither Muslims nor Jews (as far as I can see) will accept as any kind of monotheism.

What is the significance of the Muslims nor Jews not accepting the trinity as monotheism?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Vlad,

No, your schtick is that at same time there’s an "unchanging" god who also changes his mind when prayers are offered up in the correct manner.

So which is it: an unchanging god (in which case praying is pointless), or praying that works (in which case your god isn’t unchanging)?

Your theological conjectures can have either, but not both. So which is it?     

Why not? If little Timmy dies of leukaemia, would that not be what your god intended to happen? 

Those are two contradictory statements. Either payer “aligns” us with what “God” intended all along (in which case it doesn’t change anything), or prayer can change “God”, in which case you god isn’t unchanging.

Which one are you opting for?   

I think you'll find that what you call "My schtick" is really "Your Schtick" Hillside.

Ditto "theological conjectures".

[jeremyp]

Jesus is both human and divine without confusion.

Just saying you are not confused doesn't make it so. If Jesus is human, he is by definition changing. But Jesus is also God, so God changes.

I think the trouble comes when you think in purely physical things then you are into stuff like hybrids, chimeras, cut and shuts and the other nonsense.

No I think the trouble comes when you try to pretend that something logically incoherent is coherent just by saying it is.

[jeremyp]

My Schtick, as you put it, is that God is not subject to entropy.

If just you wanted to say God is not subject to entropy, why didn't you say that? Why did you go off on this "unchanging" nonsense.

Entropy is a statistical phenomenon and doesn't exist at the level of interactions between fundamental particles, so I could accept the possibility of a god that is not subject to entropy. What's your evidence that this god exists?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Just saying you are not confused doesn't make it so. If Jesus is human, he is by definition changing. But Jesus is also God, so God changes.

That is not a statement of my confused state, that is an article of faith in the Protestant, catholic and orthodox churches. Jesus’s humanity changes, that is part of being human. His divinity doesn’t change. His divinity is eternal.

[jeremyp]

That is not a statement of my confused state, that is an article of faith in the Protestant, catholic and orthodox churches. Jesus’s humanity changes, that is part of being human. His divinity doesn’t change. His divinity is eternal.

Looks pretty confused to me. Why are you conflating "eternal" and "unchanging"?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

If just you wanted to say God is not subject to entropy, why didn't you say that? Why did you go off on this "unchanging" nonsense.

I think it was rather you who went of on one. I have never said that God does not act.

Entropy is a statistical phenomenon and doesn't exist at the level of interactions between fundamental particles, so I could accept the possibility of a god that is not subject to entropy. What's your evidence that this god exists?

There is no physical evidence but the alternative arguments are infinite regress, The universe just is or the universe being the necessary entity.

[jeremyp]

I have never said that God does not act.

Yes you have. You kept saying that God is unchanging.

There is no physical evidence but the alternative arguments are infinite regress, The universe just is or the universe being the necessary entity.

You are confused. Those are arguments against your assertion.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Looks pretty confused to me. Why are you conflating "eternal" and "unchanging"?

Depends what you mean by change. If you mean changes from one entity into another then his various entities cannot be eternal.

Since you assert he does change then in what way does he change?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Yes you have. You kept saying that God is unchanging.
You are confused. Those are arguments against your assertion.

My assertion I believe was that prayer changes me rather than God.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

I think you'll find that what you call "My schtick" is really "Your Schtick" Hillside.

No, it’s yours. You’re the one claiming an “unchanging” god, not me.

Ditto "theological conjectures".

No, you’re the one posting theological conjectures – not me.

So again: on the one hand you assert a god who’s “unchanging”, but you also assert praying that causes this god to change his mind. Thus god’s plan A at 9am (to kill little Timmy at lunchtime for example) becomes god’s plan B (to effect a “miraculous” cure for little Timmy instead for example) provided someone has dome some praying at 9.30am. 

So which of these mutually contradictory claims are you actually asserting to be the case?

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

My assertion I believe was that prayer changes me rather than God.

So you think now that praying for other people (little Timmy for example) makes no difference at all to the outcomes for those people?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Vlad,

No, it’s yours. You’re the one claiming an “unchanging” god, not me.

No, you’re the one posting theological conjectures – not me.

So again: on the one hand you assert a god who’s “unchanging”, but you also assert praying that causes this god to change his mind. Thus god’s plan A at 9am (to kill little Timmy at lunchtime for example) becomes god’s plan B (to effect a “miraculous” cure for little Timmy instead for example) provided someone has dome some praying at 9.30am. 

So which of these mutually contradictory claims are you actually asserting to be the case?

No Hillside, You are giving us your view of what prayer is and how a God operates. It’s theology, innit?