Musings of the Chronologically Challenged™ Fourth Generation

 
PENSIVE
Sam said "I'm not so sure I believe in ANYTHING spiritual anymore." Pennywit commented:

"Why do bad things happen to good people? Stephen King once answered that question in a short story: Bad things happen to good people because they can.

Deism supplies another answer. Deists believe that God is a "Great Watchmaker." The deist believes God set the universe in motion, and does not interfere with its function. The deists also don't believe in miracles or revelations -- they attempt to infer God's existence through reason or philosophy.

Another school of philosophy posits free will. Under this school, God wants people to do good, and instills in people the ability to do good, but God has also instilled free will. When people exercise free will to do evil, it saddens God, but he does not interfere because of free will.

Mark Twain's "The Mysterious Stranger" (whose 1916 release was later revealed as a literary fraud) posits what might be the bleakest view: God has endowed man with a Moral Sense, but that Sense allows man to enjoy immoral acts.

Other theories abound. One is everything is predestined. Another theory holds that God is evil. At best, it's a difficult question.

Were I a theist, I would lean toward the deist argument -- that God has chosen to set the world in motion, and does not interfere with its natural laws.

--|PW|--
Pennywit | Email | Homepage | 11.19.03 - 7:06 pm | #

posted by HCL at 6:19 PM