Daylight63
Verified User
What is the Basis of Law?
The problem of evil
- Thread starter Hume
- Start date
What is the Basis of Law?
Morality for some laws, but not all laws.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Mutual social agreement.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
That's a college Freshman level argument for atheism.
The logical, educated view is to ask the question "If God exists then why does God allow evil to exist?"
The answer is found in Free Will. People can't have free will without a choice. To give a person a Hobson's Choice is not free will since there is no clear choice. It's like Milo Minderbinder's reply to the Chaplain when confronted about the high price of meals. The Chaplain complained that the men had no choice but to pay the high prices. Milo told him they had a choice; either pay or starve. That's not a realistic choice.
Having Good and Evil, or as stated previously, the choice of God's grace or the darkness is a choice. Darkness is a choice many MAGAts have chosen by their disregard for the welfare of their fellow Americans, especially women and minorities.
Daylight63
Verified User
And that mutual social agreement is around "norms of behavior" which is really all that morality is.
Morality is the norm of behavior for social animals to co-exist and increase survival benefits from a safe and stable social setting.
There is no such thing as free will, if there was free will, there would not be consequences for breaking God’s will.
Religion wants us to conform to God’s will, if you don’t, you face eternal damnation.
If we truly had free will there would be no eternal punishment for choices made that aren’t “God”
We would be free to reject God with no consequences.
Daylight63
Verified User
Things like "Murder is illegal" and "Theft is illegal" are what I was thinking of. Obviously "parking laws" would have a much harder time being considered a "moral" concept.
But you get the point.
The basis for our legal system is little more than what we all generally agree are things which are things we do NOT want to encourage in our society. This gets back to my more "functional" version of morality as the in-built concepts that any social animal would have that maintain a safe and stable social structure. But not all of these behaviors are "instinctual", so we build out more rules to improve cooperation and control.
Daylight63
Verified User
This is an interesting approach to "free will". I hadn't thought of it that way. IS IT TRULY "free" if the cost of making the wrong decision (with incomplete information as all humans are thus limited) can result in eternal punishment. Sounds more like a "trap" than a free choice.
I am free to NOT pay the protection money to the mob boss but I will be punished. Is that truly freedom?
Interesting.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Possible. But if "morality" is natural, then do chimps have it? Dogs? Cattle? Other social animals?
Pretty good..
I would break it into parts:
-Human law and human custom: the organization and systemization of human values (Code of Hammurabi, Mosaic Law, the Endangered Species Act, Medicare Act, the Nuremberg laws of 1935, et al.)
-Natural law: the rights and duties inherent in human nature. Not subject to opinion, vote, or consensus.
-Divine eternal law: The Decalogue, the Five Pillars, the Eight fold Path.
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Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
What are the consequences? People are free to step into God's light or stay in the darkness. The only consequences are those claimed by people, not by God.
Agreed on Religion, a human invention. Again, humans say this, not God. God gives us a choice to figure it out on our own.
There isn't.
We are.
Daylight63
Verified User
Presumably they have their own rules for their society. I doubt they have a structured explanation of their rules and are more driven by instinct but they also have large brains and we only know a little about their mental processes.
Daylight63
Verified User
If religion is made up how do we know what God allows or wants?
That's a good point.
In principle, I do like the concept that evil is accountable and does not win in the end.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
The field of Comparative Psychology covers this and the answer is "No, they don't". Animals don't think. They only react to their genetics or experiences.
Human morality was expressed in the movie "Aliens" by Ripley:
"You know, Burke, I don't know which species is worse. You don't see them fucking each other over for a goddamn percentage."
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
That's the puzzle.
If God really wanted us to know what the rules were, then those rules would have been imprinted upon our brains.
Daylight63
Verified User
I've always found the "I don't like this because it makes me sad" approach to understanding how the world works to be less than appealing. But you are not alone. A lot of people are terrified of facing a reality that doesn't care about one human's most intense wishes.
It may be that the universe DOES care about YOU but I doubt it. Given the fact that the vast majority of the universe is wholly antithetical to any life I'm guessing there's ZERO reason to assume it must care about us somehow.
Daylight63
Verified User
That's the puzzle.
I have a possible solution to the puzzle.
Do we owe this version of God any sort of "fealty" or "worship"?
Is it though? I guess if you believe in God getting you in the end, in eternal reward and punishment then it’s satisfying. I don’t believe in Heaven or Hell, so I count on humans being just, and that’s been a disappointment.