THNX JB, as usual you have succinctly stated things that are not clear to me -

lets look at this:

(If this is universal law, then a person should also have the right to take their own life, but they do not have the right to take the life of their children because they did not create their children.)


If i truely created my children [which seems to me if i'm truly THE - "creator" that this would definitely be the case] are you saying then, that i would not have the right to destroy them [which i created]??

now i'm using creation in the sense that i am creating from scratch, not from things already existing.

HMM? explain please?

Alright, how about a philosophical example.

I'm a horrible writer, my dialogue sucks. What can I say, I don't really get engaged in a lot of conversations, regional hazard. The point is, I've written a couple of short stories in my day. Nothing fancy, nothing published, but written word none the less. The people in that story while not real in the sense that they are living flesh, are real in the sense that because they have a story, the do exist. If I were to submit them for publication, and they were printed, even read, they would actually be more real than myself, for in two or three centuries, they might be remembered, where I would not.

Now then, as I've said, these people have not been published, so to the world at large, they do not exist. They have that potetial (with a generous rewrite). They also could be deleted with a single keystroke if I so desired, well at least three considering back-ups. Those people won't even exist because of a whim. I could do nothing, and they could be found long after my death, and given life by another, thus taking on a form past the restraints of the original creator. These are all possible paths.

Now then, while admittedly that was a huge setup, for what will probably be a poor arguement, I will revisit the original question, "Does God have the right to destroy His creation?" Well, yes and no. If God sets forth inanimate non-sentiant beings, then yes, by all means erase that stuff, but if it grows bigger than the original design, well, it's no longer his. Any adjustments like that, and you might as well call it "Earth II The Sequal."

I don't know, it seems to me, he opened Pandora's box, and he let things get out of hand. You know how it is when that happens, even if you have all the knowledge of the universe, sometimes you can't see the way out of a bad mess. Could he cause some major changes, sure, does he have the right, well, yes and no.

I was speaking of people (humans) who have babies and the believe they are the creator of their children. They are not.

By creator, I mean anyone who creates anything. Not just an all powerful God.

If you are an all powerful God and you create humans and call them your children, then you can destroy them if you wish. Nobody is going to stop you.

jb

Murder was not my point it is the point of others who consider this god a murderer.

by the way - how is your total destruction of your own personal ant colony going??

That's a good explanation, i use it in a similar way to explain time when comparing something [such as god] not in the time space continuum.

To me it seems as you state if he is all knowing, that it would not be a yes or no situation, it would have to be yes. IMO

it seems text is where the notion of a god comes from in this society, and it seems to say we all created ourself, and the earth, and picked our own mortal path before arriving, agreeing to come with one hand tied behind our backs, one eye instead of two, one ear instead of two, and agreed to only have about 10% of our total brain to use for problem solving, to teach ourself wisdom, and seems to further say all volunteered with all zest and pride to come, swearing we would do better than our neighbors, not making the same error's in ignorance of not knowing, that one MUST ALWAYS MAKE TO LEARN BY LIVING, AND NOT JUST FROM HEARING, AS HEARING ALONE IS EASILY FORGOTTEN, LOL..........

of course the sight of all that was to be encountered here, was looked at while residing in a place of perfectness, and totally opposite of earth, but the same in all principles that govern the universe, so that to move to immortal when dying one would be prepared.............

are not all just like a child of god that swears at five they can drive, even better than an adult, HAVING NEVER DRIVEN A CAR EVER, lol......

if one take this notion of "god" from text, then all were said to be made in "gods" PERFECT EXACT image, so how is each one then not the only "god" ever to be seen......

so it seems if one has seen another human, then one has seen what they look like as a adult god, or when grown.....

IN THE EXACT SAME IMAGE.......THEN HOW IS ONE DIFFERENT THAN GOD, less one just think differently before totally grown, just as mortal children think when a child, that grown up would be ALL fun, with all power to do all that one wish, lol........

seems maturing would just be seeing the same as the god said to be believed in......

is it not just children of god, mortals for a spell as children of immortal, then all beings as gods when grown up while here, or as grown up after death, but just the same, all learning of mortal things is taught while on earth, so if one dies, then learning is over, as was spoken, and just as all mortal children are born on many different days, so does maturity work and grow the same way while mortal......

what grown up wish another be destroyed, for their own sake of comfort of mortal living?

if one wish to take their own life, then this is their choice, and if all words spoken, and all wills involved that know this one, cannot overt such an act, then what gave this one greater courage to take their own mortal life, except something greater than what another has, whether this something greater be called as evil, or as good, it makes no difference, is it still DIFFERENT SO GREATER THAN WHAT ONE HAS, THAT DOES NOT KILL THEMSELF........

peace

Good setup.

However, as you guessed, there is a fundamental flaw in the argument:

“If God sets forth inanimate non-sentiant beings, then yes, by all means erase that stuff, but if it grows bigger than the original design, well, it's no longer his.”

That says that there is something that god did not create: “Its no longer his” implies “It’s no longer his creation”. Or at least that there is some additional thing that he did not create.

So I'll leave it to tribo to decide if that argument goes outside the parameters of the original quesiton.

i already adressed that above sky, my answer is as yours he has to either be able to create and destroy everything or he is nt truly the creator of all, but your point is well taken and adds depth to what i said, thnx.

Yeah, I guess we were working on our posts at the same time. I had an interruption in the middle of composing mine and I didn't realize you had beaten me to the punch until I posted it.

no prob, as said it gave depth to my 1 line reply.

Well they can consider anything they want, this God would not care. Do you think I would care if an ant considered me a murderer for stepping on one of them or for destroying their entire ant colony? I don't think I would give it a second thought. Yep, I'm a ruthless ant God.



THE ANT SLAVES:



I piled corn meal on and around their ant hill and it rained for the next week and the corn meal just seemed to sink in or disappear. I think they took some and I think the rain washed some away. In any case, the ant hill is still there.

I've decided to make the ants my slaves instead of killing them.

I have decided to use the ant hill for something else. The gravel is quite nice on top of the ant hill. Larger than sand, and not quite what you would call "rocks" so I decided to make use of the ant gravel.

I am collecting the ant gravel and putting it in buckets. When I have a couple of tons of it I am going to use it in my driveway.

I wonder how long it will take for a single ant colony to produce a couple of tons of ant gravel? Perhaps I should venture out on the prairie and find a few more ant hills. They are really quite good at bringing up more gravel after you steal the gravel on their hill.

They are my slaves.

I do feed them sometimes though if they produce a lot of gravel and worship me as their God. I gave them some wheat flour with lots of bugs in it the other day. They seemed more interested in the flour than the bugs. They must be vegetarians.

So goddess[ and don't tell me i can't call you "goddess" anymore from now on - ] what I'm reading is that you have made them GROVEL over making more GRAVEL for you correct? i don't think you'll know for sure if there worshiping you till you see them building alters on top of the gravel or near by, then if you watch you may see them offering insect sacrifices to you. but beware of the ANT-I- Christ ooooooooooooooohh!! he may try to bite you, sneaky little devil bugger!!

I would tend to believe that the Great spirit, God, Jehovah, Allah, Yeweh, Creator, whatever you prefer to call the one you believe is almighty would pretty much be able to and have the right to do whatever it wants!

Absolutely brilliant!

For me, this is a really complex question.

I actually chose not to create any new humans. I chose not to bring any new life into this world. I chose to not do that because I did not wish to 'create' that situation.

Theoretically you could say that there are humans who do not exist because I chose not to create them.

Moreover, had I choosen to create a human being I would have felt absolutely compelled to be completely responsible for its proper mentoring and care.

I personally feel that it's the wrong attitude for people to think that they aren't responsible for having created their childern. I think they are totally responsible for having created them! And they should view them entirely as their creation.

Now having said that, I don't feel that they 'own' them. You don't own what you create in this sense.

What you have created is a free individual and you must respect that this is indeed what you have created.

That doesn't mean that you are free from the responsiblity of having created it though. You are TOTALLY RESPONSIBLE for having created it!

100% responsible!

It was your choice! Unless of course you were raped or whatever, but that's a whole different bag of worms.

I choose not to be the creator of new life, not because I didn't want to take on that responsiblity, but because I simply looked at the world around me and instantly recognized that I do not have the power to be in a good parenting position. The society that I lived in simply won't permit it.

I recognized this very early on in life, long before I was even old enough to marry.

I vowed as a preteen not to bring any new life into this world the way it currently is. This is one vow that I can say that I kept.

None the less, I still had an urge to be a father and mentor. It's not that I didn't want to be a father and mentor. Not at all. I just didn't want to bring new life into an already over-crowded world that has serious political and social illness.

I was more than prepared to adopt a parentless child. Or potentially many parentless children. But I wasn't about to do that as a single parent.

I never married. Again, another choice. But that choice was actually made simply because I never met anyone that I was interested in marrying. So in a real sense it wasn't exactly a 'choice'. But at least I did make the choice not to marry the wrong person just for the sake of getting married.

But yes, defintely view having offspring as being the creator of that life. I take that act very seriously.

Everyone is totally responsible for the life they brought into this world.

If we can create anything at all, we most certainly create our offspring!

But that doesn't mean that we 'own' them. Just because we create something doesn't automatically mean that we own it.

I "deg to biffer" with your statement my friend,

Only because i meant that the creation was of a god not mankind.

plus - i think there are many more circumstances where children are begat by accident other than rape etc.. busted condoms, devices that weren't installed properly, even occasionally birth control pills fail. and this is true even with married people not just unmarried.

As you say yourself what you would have "created" was a >situation< not a child, big difference, the child would be the PRODUCT of the created situation - a natural occuring phenomina - not the act of bringing into existance something from nothing as this god is supposed to do, unless you formed them as adam or eve was formed. and i know that's not what you meant -

Now i do agree with the rest of what you state as being totally responsible!!

I don't think like this.

None of those things are 'excuses' for 'accidents' IMHO.

If a person isn't prepared to deal with the results of an act of procreation they shouldn't be participating in the act in the first place.

This might sound 'strict' to you, but that's my personal assessment of it.

Even if I had created life due to one of your so-called 'accidental' situations, that wouldn't change the fact that I had created it.

Rape is entirely different because that implies non-consent. Busted condoms, and so forth, are no excuse IMHO.

This may sound strange, but I personally woudln't have sexual intimacy with a woman I wouldn't consider co-parenting with.

I just don't go there.

That doesn't mean that I won't use birth control methods. It simply means that if those methods should happen to fail I'll take full responsibily for the resulting creation with the same dedication and love that I would give had it been preplanned.

I take parenting responsibilities more serious than anything else I can think of.

Ironically, even though I have these high moral values I've never been a parent and most likely never will be.

So in a sense they've basically been moot morals for me.

Having strong family values doesn't do a hermit much good.

I'm sorry if I gave that appearance. I in no way think God, or any other diety is all knowing. Oh they might appear that way to someone of lesser knowledge (like me), but it is only because they see over a longer time and a larger area. I will not give God credit for knowing everything, if (s)he did, (s)he would have never made this mess because the outcome would have been obvious. The human race is the best evidence that God don't know Jack.

And now i see why you stated what you did, good for you Majik man, but this does not eliminate the problem with millions of others that do not see it as you do, so i take that as only a personal view point that works for you. As to the others i stand by what i stated, they are "accidents" in the sense that they were not done to create a child even though they may/could/or did.

Creation as i'm talking of of is a deliberate act to bring something forth in a planned way. To suit a purpose and has a definite reason for doing so, and if a child, - the responsabilities that is entailed in meeting all of its needs.

May you live an extremely loooooong life my friend

First of all, just because you create something initially, doesn't mean it is always yours. Prime example, your children. You created them, but they do not belong to you. Why because they grow past your original parameters (and that right quick), and hence is no longer yours to destroy. Edison's light bulb, original design his, you bet no denying it, modern design, not his, so he couldn't halt production of it if he wanted (and was alive to do it).

God did not create everything, fundamental flaw with religion, and your counter arguement. God did not create himself, he was always there, so no my friend God is not responsible for everything. Nothing anywhere can be held responsible for it's own creation. Even the stars in the sky are actually a response to gravity's effects on large masses of space dust.