Christianity

[henry quirk]

Your view seems specious to me.

As yours does to me.

[Nick_A]

I C

But you want to launch an accusation against God Himself. To which society, with its concept of "justice," would you appeal, in order to do this? What convinces you that the Supreme Being owes you a particular outcome in life or death?

A question for you. Do you believe a personal God is concerned with subjective human conceptions of justice as opposed to universal conceptions of justice we still don't understand and remain closed to?

[Immanuel Can]

[W]hat started your beliefs that you were owed "justice"?

Uh, dude, the very meaning of justice is that it is that which one is owed.

That's circular. All you're trying to say is, "The reason I'm owed (my) "justice" is because it's (my) "justice."

That's how children (and seagulls, apparently ) think. They just yell, "Mine, mine," and expect it to stick.

Of course, nobody promises or guarantees that one actually receives it.

What guarantees they should have, if they didn't...so they have grounds for complaint?

"Nothing." That's your honest answer. According to you, "nothing" promises/guarantees/gives you any reason to believe that you are owed any conception of "justice," far less your own.

[Immanuel Can]

I C

But you want to launch an accusation against God Himself. To which society, with its concept of "justice," would you appeal, in order to do this? What convinces you that the Supreme Being owes you a particular outcome in life or death?

A question for you. Do you believe a personal God is concerned with subjective human conceptions of justice as opposed to universal conceptions of justice we still don't understand and remain closed to?

I would say that conceptions of "justice" can be measured against the standard of God's objective nature and His justice.

Does that address your question? It's worded a bit oddly, to me.

[Gary Childress]

[W]hat started your beliefs that you were owed "justice"?

Uh, dude, the very meaning of justice is that it is that which one is owed.

That's circular. All you're trying to say is, "The reason I'm owed (my) "justice" is because it's (my) "justice."

That's how children (and seagulls, apparently ) think. They just yell, "Mine, mine," and expect it to stick.

So, in other words, if a person has been wronged and wants to be made whole somehow, then it's "childish" of them to think so? "Me" is all any of us know. It's all any of us will ever experience. We can try to be generous or helpful toward others but we'll only ever know our end of what happened. If you think that's "childish" then I suspect you've just implicated yourself as well.

[Immanuel Can]

Uh, dude, the very meaning of justice is that it is that which one is owed.

That's circular. All you're trying to say is, "The reason I'm owed (my) "justice" is because it's (my) "justice."

That's how children (and seagulls, apparently ) think. They just yell, "Mine, mine," and expect it to stick.

So, in other words, if a person has been wronged and wants to be made whole somehow, then it's "childish" of them to think so?

Only if they offer Harry's reasons...namely, that they think that the mere fact of "I want" grants them "I should get."

Do you think a person can deserve something merely by demanding it?

"Me" is all any of us know. It's all any of us will ever experience.

Clearly not the case. You experience others and the world, as well.

[Harry Baird]

[W]hat started your beliefs that you were owed "justice"?

Uh, dude, the very meaning of justice is that it is that which one is owed.

That's circular. All you're trying to say is, "The reason I'm owed (my) "justice" is because it's (my) "justice."

No. Justice isn't arbitrary, and it has an inter-subjectively understood meaning.

Of course, nobody promises or guarantees that one actually receives it.

What guarantees they should have, if they didn't...so they have grounds for complaint?

It doesn't even make sense to talk about what one should have being "guaranteed" - it's simply what one should have.

Let's look a little more closely though at your own claim, which is that unless one is promised something (by a promiser, i.e., some person), one has no right to it. I've pointed out that this is false, because one can have a right to something (in this case, justice) despite what any other person promises or does not promise.

What's interesting is that the corollary of your idea - that corollary being that if one is promised something (by a promiser, i.e., some person), then one has a right to it - is also false. For example, no matter who - whether a slime mould or the supreme being in the universe - promised me the payment from all of the other humans on this planet of 99% of their wages, I would not have a right to those wages. That's simply not just.

So, whichever way we look at it, you're talking crap.

[Immanuel Can]

Justice isn't arbitrary, and it has an inter-subjectively understood meaning.

Even were that true (it's not) it would mean that "understanding" was justified by "nothing." And your "inter-subjectively" doesn't include other cultures, it would seem.

Of course, nobody promises or guarantees that one actually receives it.

What guarantees they should have, if they didn't...so they have grounds for complaint?

It doesn't even make sense to talk about what one should have being "guaranteed" - it's simply what one should have.

What gives authority to that use of the word "should"? Who says they "should" have it? What reasons compel that "should" to be real?

...if one is promised something (by a promiser, i.e., some person), then one has a right to it - is also false....

Now, now...I never said that. You made that up. I'm not going to own it for you.

I said the opposite: that if nothing promised you "justice," then you get none...and no right to any, either. And no grounds for complaint. But I certainly never even remotely suggested (in fact, I implied the opposite when I pointed out your inability to do it) that a person could get a right simply by being promised by just anybody.

Obviously, human beings -- no singular one, and no group of them, can make a conception of "justice" objectively obligatory. It will be objective and obligatory only if it conforms to the version of "justice" known and constituted by the one Person who actually matters in adjudicating it...God, the ultimate Judge.

But absent any legitimation, "justice" entails nothing. And you agreed. You said "nothing" backs your version of "justice." That was your word for it.

[Harry Baird]

That's better, Harry...closer to what I'm saying.

It's still, as I wrote, a massive non sequitur. Consider that promises are only made by promisers: that is, personal beings. Your proposal, then, reduces to "Unless some person promised something to you, you are not entitled to it." (Where, of course, God is a person, which is the heart of your apologism).

This is plainly false. I can demonstrate as much to you by example:

Consider the scenario in which a person is physically violated by another out of vengeance for some imagined slight. Neither had "promised" anything to the other, yet the violation is anyway unjust, even regardless of whether or not any higher power had "promised" anything to either party. There is no need for a "somebody, a something, or a some force" to validate the understanding we have that such an act is unjust, and thus that we have been denied that to which we are entitled - it simply is unjust, based on what the word "justice" means.

Sometimes it is necessary to admit the party is over. Harry and humanity as a whole denies the GOOD described by Plato.

Dude, you don't even believe in a personal God, so how on Earth you think that Immanuel Can's notion that justice (the GOOD) is only valid when promised by a personal God supports your impersonal notion of Platonic good is anybody's guess.

[Gary Childress]

That's circular. All you're trying to say is, "The reason I'm owed (my) "justice" is because it's (my) "justice."

That's how children (and seagulls, apparently ) think. They just yell, "Mine, mine," and expect it to stick.

So, in other words, if a person has been wronged and wants to be made whole somehow, then it's "childish" of them to think so?

Only if they offer Harry's reasons...namely, that they think that the mere fact of "I want" grants them "I should get."

Do you think a person can deserve something merely by demanding it?

If a person has been wrongly hurt, then according to some conceptions of justice, they deserve to be made whole. What is your idea of what justice is?

"Me" is all any of us know. It's all any of us will ever experience.

Clearly not the case. You experience others and the world, as well.

So you experience the pain or grief of others?

[Harry Baird]

Justice isn't arbitrary, and it has an inter-subjectively understood meaning.

Even were that true (it's not) it would mean that "understanding" was justified by "nothing."

So, your claim is that if it is true that justice isn't arbitrary, and if it has an inter-subjectively understood meaning, then justice is justified by nothing. Hooboy. The non sequiturs just keep on coming!

What gives authority to that use of the word "should"? Who says they "should" have it? What reasons compel that "should" to be real?

Done to death in our original exchange years ago. Feel free to refer back to it if you need to refresh your memory.

...if one is promised something (by a promiser, i.e., some person), then one has a right to it - is also false....

Now, now...I never said that. You made that up. I'm not going to own it for you.

I didn't say that you said it. I said that it is a corollary of your primary claim.

After all, if one only has a right to something when it is promised, then it is only a promise that grants one a right to something. If you maintain that I am misrepresenting you, then you must be claiming that only some promises grant one a right to something, in which case, you need to explain which promises and why. Please do elaborate...

You said "nothing" backs your version of "justice."

No, you dissembler. I said nobody promised me justice, not that nothing backs it (which I wholeheartedly endorse as false).

Let's take stock though: all of this nonsense to avoid explicitly affirming that on your belief system, it is "loving" and "just" to punish a person with eternal, unimaginable torment for finite transgressions. Hooboy. The hoops you jump through! But we can all see why.

[Immanuel Can]

If a person has been wrongly hurt,

Wait. "Wrongly"? Justify the use of that term, in the case you wish to point out.

then according to some conceptions of justice, they deserve to be made whole.

And according to others, they do not.

Here: let me help you out, with a case I'd call "wrongly."

In Northern Pakistan, a woman is savagely raped for the reason that some other man in her family did something insulting to somebody in somebody else's family. (This is real-world stuff, of course.) In the West, we'd say "She didn't deserve it." In her culture, they'd say, "Her family deserved to be humiliated in return; and she's a member of that family. Honour was restored, and justice was done."

Who is right, and why?

[Gary Childress]

If a person has been wrongly hurt,

Wait. "Wrongly"? Justify the use of that term, in the case you wish to point out.

then according to some conceptions of justice, they deserve to be made whole.

And according to others, they do not.

Here: let me help you out, with a case I'd call "wrongly."

In Northern Pakistan, a woman is savagely raped for the reason that some other man in her family did something insulting to somebody in somebody else's family. (This is real-world stuff, of course.) In the West, we'd say "She didn't deserve it." In her culture, they'd say, "Her family deserved to be humiliated in return; and she's a member of that family. Honour was restored, and justice was done."

Who is right, and why?

I would hope you don't believe raping the woman for someone else's deed restored justice in anyone's book. Or do you believe it did?

[Harry Baird]

In Northern Pakistan, a woman is savagely raped for the reason that some other man in her family did something insulting to somebody in somebody else's family. (This is real-world stuff, of course.) In the West, we'd say "She didn't deserve it." In her culture, they'd say, "Her family deserved to be humiliated in return; and she's a member of that family. Honour was restored, and justice was done."

The obvious problem for you, here, of course, is that the answer you expect us to arrive at - that this is outrageously unjust - is based on an understanding of justice in which punishing a person with eternal, unimaginable torment for finite transgressions is even so much more outrageously unjust that it is beyond sadistic!

[Immanuel Can]

Justice isn't arbitrary, and it has an inter-subjectively understood meaning.

Even were that true (it's not) it would mean that "understanding" was justified by "nothing."

So, your claim is that...

I find it funny, Harry, that you transparently attempt to rewrite what you call "my" claims (rather than, say, quoting me) and then try to take issue with them.

If you do that, you're only taking issue with yourself.

What gives authority to that use of the word "should"? Who says they "should" have it? What reasons compel that "should" to be real?

Done to death

Only in your imagination.

But I know that even you know that's not true. Every philosopher of any depth at all knows legitimation is not a "dead" issue. It's a huge philosophical problem right now.

...if one is promised something (by a promiser, i.e., some person), then one has a right to it - is also false....

Now, now...I never said that. You made that up. I'm not going to own it for you.

I didn't say that you said it.

Hilarious!

There it is, again.

You said "nothing" backs your version of "justice."

I said nobody promised me justice, not that nothing backs it (which I wholeheartedly endorse as false).

Good. You now say it's "wholeheartedly false" that your "justice" has no legitimation behind it. You say something "backs" it. What backs it?

And don't be so silly as to try the definitional dodge. Defining a horse as a "horse" doesn't mean you shall ride.