TPF : Deity as Desk Clerk

[Gnomon]

The 'Hotel Manager' Indictment
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussi ... ent/984441

One of the most frequently raised objections to religious belief in the modern world is the Problem of Evil. The argument is simple and emotionally powerful: if God is all-powerful and all-good, then why does He allow terrible suffering?

This definition of deity may be peculiar to the Catholic rendition of Judaism. The God of the Hebrews was indeed all-powerful, by contrast to pagan idols, but his goodness was conditional : if you don't Love & Fear & Obey God, you will suffer. The Creation was described as Good, but its imperfections were blamed on the species of sentient-yet-gullible creatures that were supposed to “manage” the Garden. Ironically, the Hebrews, as the Chosen People, accepted that blame, on behalf of all humanity, as inscrutable divine Justice.

Catholics inherited the Good God as a given, then spawned a corps of Scholars charged with finding reasons to reconcile Omnibenevolence with both natural and cultural Evil. As usual, the blame is placed on the creatures, not the creator. Except that the machinations of a subordinate Evil God were postulated as a way to test human faithfulness & love for the Good God, which presumably makes up for their innate credulity. Yet, if God is indeed Omnipotent, then the "buck" of suffering stops at the top. Not the desk clerk, but the CEO.

The moment there is matter, there is entropy.

Contrary to Catholicism, my philosophical god-concept is closer to that of Spinoza and Whitehead*1. Whitehead defined his God, not as an ideal of perfection, but as the potential for creation and change. Specifically, his god functions as a “principle of concrescence” : the act or process of coming or growing together; coalescence . And that is one way of describing Natural Evolution : incremental & progressive occasions of form change.

The Big Bang was a cosmic explosion of Energy, followed by ongoing expansion & Entropy. If that was all there was, then eventual Heat Death would result in the snuffing-out of the Cosmic flame. But mutual gravity causes concretion, as Energy becomes Mass, and Mass becomes stars & planets. Evolution is an elaboration and extension of the process of coalescence. And, historically, it has a direction : from the simplicity of a Singularity, to Darwin's "endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful"*2.

Philosophically, we can think of Energy as positive, and Entropy as negative. Then, in terms of human emotions, Positive change is Good, while Negative change is Evil. For sentient creatures, Evil results in suffering. But, as far as we know, natural Energy has no agenda for the survival or thrival of humans. Yet, if Evolution --- as exemplified on Earth --- is indeed moving inexorably toward complexity, then the human brain may be the current apex of material concrescence.

The physical brain's non-physical (immaterial) function, Consciousness, may also be the emergence of a novel form of causal Energy. The homo sapiens brain produces something undreamed of 14B years ago : knowledge and self-awareness. So, Whitehead's impersonal Principle seems to have set our universe on a course that we humans are unable to predict. But some of us may look upon the process of Evolution, and say that it is both Good and Bad, depending on your viewpoint. One way to look at it is to admit that the Cosmos is improving*2 but not yet perfect.


*1. PROCESS COSMOLOGY --- a worldview for our time
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussi ... ur-time/p1

*2. Misconceptions about evolution :
Evolution results in progress; organisms are always getting better through evolution.
https://evolution.berkeley.edu › teach-evolution › misco...
Note --- Adaptation means improve or die

[Gnomon]

But if we take God out of the mix, we still have nature; what does that make of the use of death and pain as the engine of survival in nature (the physics of it)? The world is still as it is, with it's pain and death.

Exactly! Arguing about the goodness or badness of the Judeo-Christian-Muslim God does not solve the humanistic problem of Evil & Suffering. It merely assigns blame to the mythical Manager, who is ironically assumed to be absent from his post. A more philosophical position would be to recognize that the world (i.e. Nature) "uses" pain & death (sentience & senescence) as integral components in the constructive process of Evolution, from a mathematical quantum-scale Singularity to a near-infinite & ever-expanding Cosmos of Consciousness. On one Pale Blue Dot, we humans somehow became sentient, and invented the categories of Good & Evil, so we'll have something to philosophize about.

Non-theistic pre-Christian philosophies --- Brahmanism, Taoism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Stoicism, Epicureanism --- accepted the world "as it is", and charged humans with the responsibility for adapting to that reality. The various gods of Theism serve mainly as someone to complain to (e.g. the management). But secular history records no instances of divine interventions into the course of Nature, on behalf of whining humans. Yet, we have myths saying that the gods fixed the problem by evicting the troublesome tenants with floods & massacres. Obviously, the goal of evolution is not you or me. So we are merely means to some other end. Meanwhile, we philosophize.

That's why I prefer A.N. Whitehead's notion of God (Nature) as the inexorable Process of Evolution. The Darwinian Procedure works like a program*1, via And/Or/Not (selection & combination & elimination), to improve the current stock for the next generation. Like Spinoza, Whitehead uses the term "god" in a technical, not religious, sense to designate the implicit Programmer of this ongoing process of cosmic Creation. So, God is still in "the mix", not as the intervening manager, but as the program and/or programmer of the creative system we call "Evolution" or "Nature". The manager is not at the front desk, but at the cosmic computer console.


*1. Evolutionary programming (EP) is an approach to simulated evolution that iteratively generates increasingly appropriate solutions in the light of a stationary or nonstationary environment and desired fitness function.
https://link.springer.com/referencework ... 92910-9_23

[Gnomon]

So why must we apply the notion of justice to suffering with the presence of of God? There is no other way?

[reply="Janus;985094"] replied "No, the reality of a suffering world is incompatible with the usual conception of a tri-omni God."

When you {plural} use the word "God" are you referring to A) the triune God of Christianity, one aspect of whom is a person capable of empathizing with human suffering? Which may be an attempt to reconcile the "notion of justice" with an omniscient abstract God, incapable of suffering . Or B) to the omnipotent (necessary & sufficient) God of Spinoza, which is the non-personal force of Nature, that is no respecter of persons, hence dispenser of impartial natural justice (it is what it is)?

In case A) Justice is whatever God says it is. Or whatever God's interpreters say it is. {natural law or religious law}. In practice, God's law & justice are always filtered through human opinions.

For case B) what happens is often deemed unfair (contrary to my best interest) by sufferers of natural disasters. But we have no recourse to a sympathetic higher authority. So, we can't legitimately complain about injustice.

Yet there is another way : mundane Human systems of Law & Justice.

Aside from ecclesiastical courts, most appeals to Justice are directed to fallible human judgement, despite its spotty record of fair & balanced & accurate dispensation. Ironically, even most secular courts of Justice aspire to divine recompense for suffering (hand on the bible). But, in practice, it seems that most human & animal suffering leaves us with only two options : take opioids to dull the pain, or "suck it up!"

Even so, wronged humans typically look for someone to blame for the Evil stuff, and to praise for the Good stuff. Hence, the notion of divine Justice as an Ideal for comparison with what's Real. Yet, agnostic pragmatic Aristotle placed the blame for suffering on human ignorance & lack of virtue (bad people)*1. So, we're back to reliance on mundane Justice.


*1. Aristotle viewed good and evil as being about actions and choices, not as inherent qualities. He believed that knowledge and virtue are the hallmarks of good, while ignorance and vice are the causes of evil. Essentially, Aristotle didn't see a separate source of evil in the universe, but rather evil as the result of a lack of knowledge and virtue.
https://www.google.com/search?client=fi ... od+vs+evil

[Gnomon]

When you {plural} use the word "God" are you referring to A) the triune God of Christianity, one aspect of whom is a person capable of empathizing with human suffering? Which may be an attempt to reconcile the "notion of justice" with an omniscient abstract God, incapable of suffering . Or B) to the omnipotent (necessary & sufficient) God of Spinoza, which is the non-personal force of Nature, that is no respecter of persons, hence dispenser of impartial natural justice (it is what it is)? — Gnomon

I was referring to the three omnis: omniscient, omnipotent and omnibenevolent. The Chrisitan conception of God is of a loving personal God, one who cares for all his creatures. The nature of His creation (assuming just for the sake of argument that there were such a creator God) belies the conception that God could be all-good, all-knowing and all-powerful. It a pretty easy to understand inconsistency which keeps getting glossed over by believers.

Spinoza's critique of that conception of God can be found in his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus and a trenchant critique it is. His own conception of God grew out of that critique. Needless to say, Spinoza's God has no concern for humanity or anything else.

That third "omni" is the problem. As the Jews learned over centuries of divine tough love, Omniscience & Omnipotence are not compatible with Empathy & Sympathy. Omni love would be more like Artificial Intelligence*1. Modern humans can "fall in love" with computers, and the computers are programmed by humans to express their "care & concern" for the person with benevolent words*2. But computers & Gods, lacking biological bodies & motivating hormones, are presumably incapable of feeling love, in the human sense.

So, that's why I think the Christian triune God-concept had an emotional advantage over the abstract unitary deity of the Torah. It reintroduced a physical concrete element that the prophets of Yahweh had attempted to banish for generations. A heroic, half-human, half-god messiah was more like the pagan demi-gods, Aeneas, Bacchus, & Hercules : More inspiring & sympathetic characters, for people to admire and aspire to. The addition of an immanent Holy Spirit added an element of practical magic to the mix. So, Christianity hit all the right notes at a time when both Roman and Jewish gods were fading in popularity.

The three-in-one Christian god-head is still popular among the masses, but waning with the intelligentsia, who are more impressed by rational evidence than by emotional myths. That's why I think A.N. Whitehead's update of Spinoza's nature-god is more appropriate for the 21st century. Spinoza referred to his Ultimate Substance as "God", and Whitehead used the same term for his Ultimate Principle of Progressive "Concretion" (evolution).

For my own philosophical purposes, I tried to find a different label for the creative Process that evolved a world of Life & Mind from an initial burst of Cosmic Energy. But that only led to mis-understandings. So, like them, I sometimes use the G-word, because it is the best known term for the Ultimate Cause that is creating a meaningful world from scratch. Yet, I see no reason to complain to omnipotent Nature for succor, to relieve the sufferings caused by both Nature and Culture.


*1. A Psychologist Explains Why It’s Possible To Fall In Love With AI
https://www.forbes.com/sites/traversmar ... e-with-ai/

*2. Humans sometime express benevolent feeling in "little loving lies" : Fleetwood-Mac

[Gnomon]

With whatever conception of God there is that fits the all-good-powerful-knowing God of the argument, I am asking why is it we can’t account for all the pain and suffering if there is such a God, but we can account for it without God? Why is it we are fine adjudging “An all-good God would not want there to be any suffering let alone all of the gratuitous suffering, but nature needs there to be all of this suffering in order for it to function at all.’ ??

Strangely, most people in the world do believe in some kind of god-concept, as an explanation for basic existence. Yet, they strive to appease the mythical mercurial ruler of the world, because they know that as bad as things are, it could get worse. For Christians, that "worse" is The Worst : eternal suffering in Hell. So despite the routine woes of life in God's creation, the long-suffering victims sing the praises of their redeemer, who will reward them with The Best : eternal bliss in Heaven. This reminds me of the old saying "justice delayed is justice denied".

As you said, Nature seems to inherently "need" (require) both positive & negative variables. This dichotomy goes back to the nature of Energy (causation) : it "works" by alternating between Hot & Cold, More & Less, Pain & Pleasure, Life & Death. These up & down variations are inherent in the cycles of Space-Time. So, we tend to view impersonal Nature non-judgmentally as "it is what it is", but we judge a personal God, capable of Love & Hate, in terms of Good vs Evil. Making God vs Devil a necessary adjustment to the monotheistic ideal.

That's why Spinoza's God/Nature was described as impersonal : it omits the Good/Evil judgements, and stoically accepts the Pain/Pleasure dimension as simply Natural. It's the same Paradise-failed reality, viewed from different perspectives, and with different expectations : differing accounting methods.

[Gnomon]

Sure but Spinoza, probably out of not wishing to offend the religious authorities even further than he already had and out of his belief that the masses need a personal conception of God anyway, spoke in terms of "Deus sive Natura", where he could have simply spoken of natura. An impersonal God offers no comfort, and Spinoza did not believe in any afterlife.

Yes. I think the world was "created" in some sense : Big Bang. But the creation could only be considered intentional in the sense that purposeful, intentional creatures have emerged from the progressive evolutionary process. So, the Bang must have had the potential for purpose. Hence, the Cosmos can be viewed as personal & purposeful in that self-aware & motivated beings inhabit the Earth, and soon learn to take care of themselves.

Yet, when humans are born, they are weak, ignorant, and needy. So, they cling to mother for sustenance and comfort. Consequently, even as adults we often feel the need for soothing solace from another similar being. Unfortunately, other mature --- but sometimes cranky --- humans, with problems of their own, may be less inclined to mother weepy grown-up strangers. Therefore, the wishful notion of a supernatural parent capable of unconditional love, and power to fix broken things, is understandable.

That's why I don't discuss emotion-suppressing and myth-busting rational philosophy with members of my own family, who still feel the need for a more personal & caring I-Thou relationship than Spinoza's natura can offer.

PERSONAL COMFORT & CONSOLATION

[Gnomon]

The three-in-one Christian god-head is still popular among the masses, but waning with the intelligentsia, — Gnomon
I may have the wrong end of the stick, but I have the impression that the difference between the God of the masses and the the God of the philosophers goes all the way back to Xenophanes in the earliest years of philosophy in Ancient Greece.

Yes, rational philosophers have always felt less need for the personal touch of anthro-morphic gods. But analytical mathematician/statistician & probability theorist Blaise Pascal, argued that, although we can't be sure the God of theologians even exists, we would be wise to bet on the "house" to win.

He also decried the feckless God of philosopher Spinoza, who can do no more than what happens mechanistically in Nature. And the majority of humanity seems to agree with him. Strangely, some of Pascal's fellow Catholics, believed so sincerely in the infinite reward-pot after death that they were willing to cut short their mortal coil, and go all-in. How can austere reason compete with such popular passion, and long-term thinking?

PS___ Ironically, Pascal might be surprised to learn that modern science views Nature as statistical instead of mechanical. Does that mean that we are all playing the odds. Does that imply a gambling god? One who does not predetermine the path of nature?

The statement "nature is statistical not mechanical" is a philosophical perspective often debated in physics, suggesting that the universe operates on a probabilistic, rather than deterministic, basis. This perspective is often tied to the idea of quantum mechanics, where measurements are probabilistic rather than having a predetermined outcome.
https://www.google.com/search?client=fi ... mechanical

[Gnomon]

So, the Bang must have had the potential for purpose. — Gnomon
That would only seem to hold if you take the so-called laws of nature to be fixed and immutable from the beginning. Peirce didn't think that, and as far as I remember from studying Whitehead quite long ago, nor did he.

The link below says that Whitehead viewed natural laws as "emergent patterns"*1. And they are indeed emergent in the sense of our understanding of them. For example, Newton's view of Gravity has been significantly modified by Einstein. But the cosmic Law of Attraction didn't change, only our scientific & mathematical models.

Aside from those philosophers, most scientists today assume that Natural Laws are "empirical regularities"*2 upon which we may depend for developing our knowledge and technologies. Either way, the burst of Causal Energy & Regulating Law that we metaphorically imagine as a Big Explosion (voila!), necessarily included the Potential (latent capacity) for all subsequent forms.

For my philosophical worldview, I assume that the various Laws of Nature in effect today, were inherent in the mathematical Singularity that went Bang, but only as generic Potential, not actual or specific. If so, then the possibility of emergent Intelligence & Purpose must have been "programmed" into the metaphorical Singularity. That "point of infinite density & curvature" --- no space, no time --- could not contain anything that we now know as physical or Actual, so the myriads of Real things today, may have originated as what Whitehead enigmatically called "Actual Occasions" : fundamental, irreducible units of reality.

In computer programming, we understand that the Output (result) of the computation process began as a Goal or Purpose in the mind of the Programmer. And that's how I imagine the otherwise mysterious something-from-nothing Big Bang input, followed by the creative computations of evolution. Some imagine that the BB was just a blip in an eternal process of universe production, with no beginning or end. Maybe, but I find that notion difficult to reconcile with the contingent & entropic Reality we experience today.


*1. In his philosophy, Alfred North Whitehead argued that natural laws are not fixed, pre-existing rules, but rather emergent patterns arising from the relationships between "actual occasions" (events) and "eternal objects" (concepts). He emphasized that these laws are not separate from reality but are part of the ongoing process of becoming
https://www.google.com/search?client=fi ... atural+law

*2. Most scientists take it for granted that the laws of nature were fixed at the moment of the Big Bang,
https://opensciences.org/open-questions ... ture-fixed