Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Discuss philosophical questions regarding theism (and atheism), and discuss religion as it relates to philosophy. This includes any philosophical discussions that happen to be about god, gods, or a 'higher power' or the belief of them. This also generally includes philosophical topics about organized or ritualistic mysticism or about organized, common or ritualistic beliefs in the existence of supernatural phenomenon.
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Greatest I am
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by Greatest I am »

arjand wrote: July 22nd, 2021, 5:25 pm
Greatest I am wrote: July 21st, 2021, 10:02 am Which ignores that we live in a dualistic universes.

You are trying to have Yin without Yang.

Good and evil compliment each other. One does not say the other does not exist.

Eating is good, when hungry, be it barbaric eating or eating some other way.

Regards
DL
No, that is not correct. Truth has no opposite. (falsity is 'not truth' and nothing by itself)
Sigh. True or false makes statements dualistic.

A court would take truth and would watch for it's duality to insure justice.

I agree that all morals are subjective.

There might only be one objective moral tenet that has no duality.

It is always better to cure than to kill.

Regards
DL
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by psyreporter »

Sculptor1 wrote: July 23rd, 2021, 5:44 pm True an falsity exactly like good and evil are judgements we make about things and events.
Neither truth nor falsity are forces of nature in the same way that good and evil are also not.
If that statement were to be 'true' one would derive at a judgement ad infinitum, which is absurd.
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by psyreporter »

Pattern-chaser wrote: July 23rd, 2021, 12:34 pm
arjand wrote: July 22nd, 2021, 5:25 pm Truth has no opposite. (falsity is 'not truth' and nothing by itself)
Untruth - when someone intentionally lies to you - is the opposite of truth, I think.
When it concerns truth on a fundamental level, it concerns that what precedes 'human reality'. From the perspective of the liar, he could not otherwise than know that his lie is untrue. This aspect would be 'truth' of which it can be said that there is no opposite.
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by Terrapin Station »

polargirl wrote: June 19th, 2021, 11:00 pm Almost every religious philosopher states that good is stronger than evil. I disagree.

Evil is stronger than good because evil can emulate good whereas good cannot emulate evil. Evil emulating good for reasons like "the ends justify the means" completely preserves the evil nature of such act whereas committing lesser evil to prevent greater evil is still behaving evilly.

Good does eventually triumph over evil but not because good is stronger than evil. The reason is evil turns on itself whereas good does not.

So in conclusion, good only triumphs by waiting out evil for it to eventually turn on itself rather than by good's own strength versus evil.
I would think that many religious folks would think that good can at least appear to be evil at times. Many of God's actions appear to be evil--God initiating floods and other natural disasters, allowing infants to die of horrible diseases, etc., but the usual rhetoric is that these sorts of things are part of some ultimate plan that we're not privy to, some plan that's overarchingly good, despite our opinion of the way that the good is achieved per what we experience. The difference would be that there's no intentional deception.
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by Sculptor1 »

arjand wrote: August 23rd, 2021, 9:56 pm
Sculptor1 wrote: July 23rd, 2021, 5:44 pm True an falsity exactly like good and evil are judgements we make about things and events.
Neither truth nor falsity are forces of nature in the same way that good and evil are also not.
If that statement were to be 'true' one would derive at a judgement ad infinitum, which is absurd.
I think not. You need to show your working
The statement is true. Truth is not a force of nature; just a judgement, just like good and evil.
Last edited by Sculptor1 on August 24th, 2021, 10:26 am, edited 1 time in total.
Tegularius
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by Tegularius »

Sculptor1 wrote: July 23rd, 2021, 5:44 pm
arjand wrote: July 22nd, 2021, 5:25 pm Truth has no opposite. (falsity is 'not truth' and nothing by itself)
True an falsity exactly like good and evil are judgements we make about things and events.
Neither truth nor falsity are forces of nature in the same way that good and evil are also not.
True! Nature has no relation to truth or falsity, and also none in terms of good and evil. That would require judgement which nature is entirely devoid of. It just IS conforming to its underlying rules of which we are only ONE manifestation among the many billions that exist...here and elsewhere.
The earth has a skin and that skin has diseases; one of its diseases is called man ... Nietzsche
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by Sculptor1 »

Tegularius wrote: August 24th, 2021, 7:19 pm
Sculptor1 wrote: July 23rd, 2021, 5:44 pm
arjand wrote: July 22nd, 2021, 5:25 pm Truth has no opposite. (falsity is 'not truth' and nothing by itself)
True an falsity exactly like good and evil are judgements we make about things and events.
Neither truth nor falsity are forces of nature in the same way that good and evil are also not.
True! Nature has no relation to truth or falsity, and also none in terms of good and evil. That would require judgement which nature is entirely devoid of. It just IS conforming to its underlying rules of which we are only ONE manifestation among the many billions that exist...here and elsewhere.
I'm pretty horrified at the number of times I have to explain this simple fact to people.
And I wonder at the deep psychology that children are impressed with that makes it so that as adults they do not understand this.
In anthropology and ancient history we see many examples of this misconception. And the "gods" seem always to have to be appeased to avoid the "evil".
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by Tegularius »

Sculptor1 wrote: August 25th, 2021, 4:57 am
Tegularius wrote: August 24th, 2021, 7:19 pm
Sculptor1 wrote: July 23rd, 2021, 5:44 pm
arjand wrote: July 22nd, 2021, 5:25 pm Truth has no opposite. (falsity is 'not truth' and nothing by itself)
True an falsity exactly like good and evil are judgements we make about things and events.
Neither truth nor falsity are forces of nature in the same way that good and evil are also not.
True! Nature has no relation to truth or falsity, and also none in terms of good and evil. That would require judgement which nature is entirely devoid of. It just IS conforming to its underlying rules of which we are only ONE manifestation among the many billions that exist...here and elsewhere.
I'm pretty horrified at the number of times I have to explain this simple fact to people.
I got bad news. You will need to keep explaining it because any such utterly impersonal power as nature is not personally acceptable to most people. Not then, not now and probably not ever. They never will understand that the substantive ruling powers have no affiliation with our beliefs and values, that we exist as only one occurrence of it and that ends the relationship. The idea that the old hag, "mother nature", creates nothing but orphans strikes our senses as a kind of sacrilege...a crime against humanity, tantamount to throwing Hansel & Gretel into the oven.
The earth has a skin and that skin has diseases; one of its diseases is called man ... Nietzsche
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by psyreporter »

Sculptor1 wrote: August 24th, 2021, 10:26 am
arjand wrote: August 23rd, 2021, 9:56 pm
Sculptor1 wrote: July 23rd, 2021, 5:44 pm True an falsity exactly like good and evil are judgements we make about things and events.
Neither truth nor falsity are forces of nature in the same way that good and evil are also not.
If that statement were to be 'true' one would derive at a judgement ad infinitum, which is absurd.
I think not. You need to show your working
The statement is true. Truth is not a force of nature; just a judgement, just like good and evil.
The consideration of your statement as 'true' would result in a fallacy.

The judgement that provides a qualitative distinction for the statement would be reduced to a psychological illusion by which the statement becomes a meaningless phrase of which one would would be obligated to ask the question: "why pose that statement?"

The only possible answer that that question by the supposed meaning of your statement would be: 'nothing', which is nonsensical.

Therefor, one is obligated to consider 'truth' and 'good' to be of a nature outside the scope of a psychological illusion.
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by Sculptor1 »

arjand wrote: August 27th, 2021, 6:47 am
Sculptor1 wrote: August 24th, 2021, 10:26 am
arjand wrote: August 23rd, 2021, 9:56 pm
Sculptor1 wrote: July 23rd, 2021, 5:44 pm True an falsity exactly like good and evil are judgements we make about things and events.
Neither truth nor falsity are forces of nature in the same way that good and evil are also not.
If that statement were to be 'true' one would derive at a judgement ad infinitum, which is absurd.
I think not. You need to show your working
The statement is true. Truth is not a force of nature; just a judgement, just like good and evil.
The consideration of your statement as 'true' would result in a fallacy.
False

The judgement that provides a qualitative distinction for the statement would be reduced to a psychological illusion by which the statement becomes a meaningless phrase of which one would would be obligated to ask the question: "why pose that statement?"
But that is exactly what "good and Evil" are - psychological fantasies.

The only possible answer that that question by the supposed meaning of your statement would be: 'nothing', which is nonsensical.

Therefor, one is obligated to consider 'truth' and 'good' to be of a nature outside the scope of a psychological illusion.
What's your point?
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by psyreporter »

Sculptor1 wrote: August 27th, 2021, 9:43 am But that is exactly what "good and Evil" are - psychological fantasies.
Therefor, one is obligated to consider 'truth' and 'good' to be of a nature outside the scope of a psychological illusion.
What's your point?
From a human perspective (after the human started to perceive the world), the denotations 'true', 'false', 'good' and 'bad' are judgements in a historical context, a retroperspective that derives its denotative meaning from a memory in time.

The fundamental meaning of those denotations (before the human started to perceive the world) is logically derived from 'truth' and 'good' of which there is no opposite.
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by Sculptor1 »

psyreporter wrote: August 29th, 2021, 10:49 pm
Sculptor1 wrote: August 27th, 2021, 9:43 am But that is exactly what "good and Evil" are - psychological fantasies.
Therefor, one is obligated to consider 'truth' and 'good' to be of a nature outside the scope of a psychological illusion.
What's your point?
From a human perspective (after the human started to perceive the world), the denotations 'true', 'false', 'good' and 'bad' are judgements in a historical context, a retroperspective that derives its denotative meaning from a memory in time.

The fundamental meaning of those denotations (before the human started to perceive the world) is logically derived from 'truth' and 'good' of which there is no opposite.
No. Before the human there is no logic, no good, no evil, and no truth.
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by psyreporter »

Do you intend to indicate that the human (as a life form) is a meaningless deterministic process?

The human being necessarily follows the information obtained by the senses. One is therefor to establish whether anything precedes the senses and if so, what that is/can be.

Logically, for senses to be possible something must have preceded it: valuing.

Valuing cannot find its origin on the level of the individual which implies that the origin of the human in its actuality (as a being that necessarily follows from information provided by the senses, ie its 'consciousness') lays outside the scope of the individual.

The origin of valuing cannot be value which is a simple logical truth (something cannot be the origin of itself). By the nature of value, valuing appropriates its essential distinguish-ability from good and if that indicated good could be anything other than 'good per se', it would need to have been valued which by the mentioned simple logical truth is impossible.

Therefor, good and truth necessarily exist as precursor to any value in the world, and thus, are of a nature of which it can be said that there is no opposite. This also implies that a meaning of life is applicable on a fundamental level (a priori).
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by Pattern-chaser »

psyreporter wrote: August 30th, 2021, 6:55 pm Do you intend to indicate that the human (as a life form) is a meaningless deterministic process?
Sculptor1 can and will answer for himself. But I think his point here is that good, logic and truth are human-created concepts that exist only in our human minds. I.e. they do not exist in the spacetime universe, outside our minds. So if there were no humans, there would be no good, logic or truth. This is certainly my view.
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Re: Is Good Stronger Than Evil?

Post by psyreporter »

My argument is that truth and good logically precede value, e.g. the spacetime Universe, and thereby are of a nature of which it can be said that there is no opposite.
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