This is a comic about me traveling back in time to meet Epictetus.
Tuesday
Personal Pihlosophizing/Why it is existentially important to think about these things
I guess it started last fall when I took vertebrate zoology. I saw, for the first time, that I would be calling all of my peers delusional, stupid or liars if I didn't accept Darwinian evolution and one cannot go through life thinking that of everyone else in his or her field (unless you are a philosopher or theologian)—also it made a fair amount sense.
Previous to that I had never considered the problem of evil a problem: oh sure, there is a tonne of evil in this world, but I couldn't conclusively say that it wouldn't all make sense in the after-life; it would be arrogant to think otherwise.
Darwinian evolution makes the whole mechanism behind creation a little bit horrid and something I could never call good—efficient, elegant and even somewhat beautiful, but certainly not good. Now, this very world we experience is built on the suffering of myriad sentient beings and I thought, "do they all get an afterlife that reveals to them the point of this whole ruthless show?"
These thoughts brought about two things: first, I could no longer call the Bible completely true and if I ever experienced God it was through that book; second, I began to see a problem of evil.
This problem was amplified when I took philosophy and started asking questions about the nature of my existence: Is my soul a material object? Do I have continuing identity? What is free will?
The first one raised doubts about life after death, the second, whether it even makes sense to talk about life after death, and the third, whether it even makes sense to say that God is not responsible for the evil in this world because he gave humans freedom and they did the evil (I realized later that God would be in a way a product of his nature and thus despicable or laudable, but not morally reprehensible in the way I previously conceived of it.)
The first two by themselves or the last one by itself would not be enough to make God evil in my view, but taken together these three spelled doom for any non-Christian or other Christian (there are different varieties: I like to think I shared mine with C.S. Lewis and Augustine, my teachers) Gods I was considering and thus I decided to say, "For now, I will be agnostic concerning the existence of God", which really means an intellectual atheist who has an open mind.
(Aside: If you are wondering about how I was agnostic about a possibly evil God it is because I wasn't—and still am not—sure about whether resurrection is possible (I mean I fall asleep and wake up as the same person, I think).)
Later on, I questioned what good means and ended up with a very Kierkegaardian conception of it. This led me to think that it is possible for there to be a good God, but still left me wondering if there is a God: doubt in something comes a lot easier than it leaves.
So this brings me to today: I am an empiricist bordering on positivist, with a few hold out rationalist biases. Anyway, this story is why I think philosophy is so important: it can free thinking (I have a much easier and more harmonious, if less exciting, thought life now that I am an atheist) and alleviate social tension (I always felt so much guilt for not evangelizing much).
The funny part about this is that I think I like and respect Christians (even if they are a bit creepy sometimes) more than Christians like and respect Christians; I even like evangelists (they actually let their ideas compete in the intellectual forum and let their beliefs influence their actions, which is a far more honest of a way to believe things) and I don't think they get enough credit from emerging church types. My home church is full of wonderful caring people and faith is very important to my mother's wonderful family.
So here's where I will end it. There are obviously apparent gaps in my reasoning, but just comment on them and I can fill them for you.
Previous to that I had never considered the problem of evil a problem: oh sure, there is a tonne of evil in this world, but I couldn't conclusively say that it wouldn't all make sense in the after-life; it would be arrogant to think otherwise.
Darwinian evolution makes the whole mechanism behind creation a little bit horrid and something I could never call good—efficient, elegant and even somewhat beautiful, but certainly not good. Now, this very world we experience is built on the suffering of myriad sentient beings and I thought, "do they all get an afterlife that reveals to them the point of this whole ruthless show?"
These thoughts brought about two things: first, I could no longer call the Bible completely true and if I ever experienced God it was through that book; second, I began to see a problem of evil.
This problem was amplified when I took philosophy and started asking questions about the nature of my existence: Is my soul a material object? Do I have continuing identity? What is free will?
The first one raised doubts about life after death, the second, whether it even makes sense to talk about life after death, and the third, whether it even makes sense to say that God is not responsible for the evil in this world because he gave humans freedom and they did the evil (I realized later that God would be in a way a product of his nature and thus despicable or laudable, but not morally reprehensible in the way I previously conceived of it.)
The first two by themselves or the last one by itself would not be enough to make God evil in my view, but taken together these three spelled doom for any non-Christian or other Christian (there are different varieties: I like to think I shared mine with C.S. Lewis and Augustine, my teachers) Gods I was considering and thus I decided to say, "For now, I will be agnostic concerning the existence of God", which really means an intellectual atheist who has an open mind.
(Aside: If you are wondering about how I was agnostic about a possibly evil God it is because I wasn't—and still am not—sure about whether resurrection is possible (I mean I fall asleep and wake up as the same person, I think).)
Later on, I questioned what good means and ended up with a very Kierkegaardian conception of it. This led me to think that it is possible for there to be a good God, but still left me wondering if there is a God: doubt in something comes a lot easier than it leaves.
So this brings me to today: I am an empiricist bordering on positivist, with a few hold out rationalist biases. Anyway, this story is why I think philosophy is so important: it can free thinking (I have a much easier and more harmonious, if less exciting, thought life now that I am an atheist) and alleviate social tension (I always felt so much guilt for not evangelizing much).
The funny part about this is that I think I like and respect Christians (even if they are a bit creepy sometimes) more than Christians like and respect Christians; I even like evangelists (they actually let their ideas compete in the intellectual forum and let their beliefs influence their actions, which is a far more honest of a way to believe things) and I don't think they get enough credit from emerging church types. My home church is full of wonderful caring people and faith is very important to my mother's wonderful family.
So here's where I will end it. There are obviously apparent gaps in my reasoning, but just comment on them and I can fill them for you.
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