The argument we were discussing was that god was either evil (as in not good) or not omnipotent.
Whether humans must be evil due to free will is another discussion entirely, and I would propose that free will is never entirely free and always limited by our perception and understanding of the world. If evil didn’t exist, you would be as free to be evil as you are to ignore gravity. Also, most religions believe in a paradise free from evil, so does that mean you lose your free will once you enter?
Actually yeah, at least from what I’ve read up on such religions. In many cases, you lose free will in said paradise. But there’s still debate on what exactly said after life is, as expected.
In some cases you don’t go until some apocalyptic event happens either. Then there’s karmic religions, which technically fill all the requirements in the chart but can obviously be perceived as unjust by us (those suffering now were bad in the past and vice versa). Hence why I mentioned at some point to some “first you have to define evil”. Although I guess the real thing is maybe “first you have to define justice”. If we humans can’t still figure out what we actually want, kinda hard to define a benevolent omnipotent being.
For example, let’s say everything starts from the get go as “good”. Well then, “good” also doesn’t exist, because there’s no duality to compare it to. Even if God knew it was good, we wouldn’t. Next, would intelligence be capable of existing? Some knowledge would inherently be “evil” even if it lead to good. What about evil through good intentions? When you eliminate all these factors, you’re basically eliminating humanity as we exist, because intelligence is no longer possible; at least, assuming “evil” is defined as “anything with the potential to be used for evil” as well.
Now you could just say “well an omnipotent God could just eliminate any of those possibilities” but now with direct intervention there is DEFINITELY no free will. But then you might say “so they are not omnipotent”, in which case a paradoxical creation could solve that.
God could make a parallel universe in which all this coexists invisibly with the “paradise” universe, and even another where no good exists too. But only 1 of these universes need God to reside for him, thus he would “exist and not exist” simultaneously. Some Christians have this interpretation when it comes to explaining heaven and hell, btw.
The argument we were discussing was that god was either evil (as in not good) or not omnipotent.
Whether humans must be evil due to free will is another discussion entirely, and I would propose that free will is never entirely free and always limited by our perception and understanding of the world. If evil didn’t exist, you would be as free to be evil as you are to ignore gravity. Also, most religions believe in a paradise free from evil, so does that mean you lose your free will once you enter?
Actually yeah, at least from what I’ve read up on such religions. In many cases, you lose free will in said paradise. But there’s still debate on what exactly said after life is, as expected.
In some cases you don’t go until some apocalyptic event happens either. Then there’s karmic religions, which technically fill all the requirements in the chart but can obviously be perceived as unjust by us (those suffering now were bad in the past and vice versa). Hence why I mentioned at some point to some “first you have to define evil”. Although I guess the real thing is maybe “first you have to define justice”. If we humans can’t still figure out what we actually want, kinda hard to define a benevolent omnipotent being.
For example, let’s say everything starts from the get go as “good”. Well then, “good” also doesn’t exist, because there’s no duality to compare it to. Even if God knew it was good, we wouldn’t. Next, would intelligence be capable of existing? Some knowledge would inherently be “evil” even if it lead to good. What about evil through good intentions? When you eliminate all these factors, you’re basically eliminating humanity as we exist, because intelligence is no longer possible; at least, assuming “evil” is defined as “anything with the potential to be used for evil” as well.
Now you could just say “well an omnipotent God could just eliminate any of those possibilities” but now with direct intervention there is DEFINITELY no free will. But then you might say “so they are not omnipotent”, in which case a paradoxical creation could solve that.
God could make a parallel universe in which all this coexists invisibly with the “paradise” universe, and even another where no good exists too. But only 1 of these universes need God to reside for him, thus he would “exist and not exist” simultaneously. Some Christians have this interpretation when it comes to explaining heaven and hell, btw.