I've often had similar thoughts "against the unexamined pursuit of the truth" specifically about ideas like abortion and certain wars etc. However, the existence of God seems likely important to me for a number of reasons. The main point of this piece I suppose is just like with any other subject "so what if God exists," what marginal value does knowing that (his nature, not just existence) actually have to me...? But I would argue for you to reconsider that knowing the existence (and nature) of God as having little marginal value. To be honest, I do not know your views that well but have seen some interesting (and opposing to my own) takes you have which is why I subscribe, so perhaps this is not helpful, still if it is then it is worth it. But that is the question and answer to which God is helpful.
Meaning, ethics and value seem to only find grounding in God especially if you believe in God, and there are significant differences in outcome based on changing nature and values of God, and thus knowing him and his nature seems important. Actually, I am agnostic, but the existence of God seems a valuable concept to me, in terms of how I behave, moreso if I actually believed he existed. I suppose a better comment might be (as if I am wrong it clears up misunderstanding, and if not illustrates what I am saying): why does "improving the welfare of fish and shrimp" as you say "actually matter?" If your answer to that is grounded in how you feel versus doing the right thing (which to be honest for a based shrimp welfare maximiser I think is unlikely on a first order level, but could be obfuscated or I could be wrong again) then there is even doubly so more value in knowing the existence of God. If instead the reason it is good relies on God, it seems important to know his nature and what he (it?) would value (although yes, there is more meta-ethics and theodicy to be done if you think about it, you could simply choose to not persue those just like this, as while I do, it is as you say for recreation and curiousity more than pure outcome).
I don’t think there’s a big problem with grounding morality without invoking God. At least, there seem to be a lot of moral philosophers who would agree with that. I admit that I haven’t read a lot of meta ethics (which I also think is probably not worth my time as someone who’s not an academic philosopher). But the intuition that pain is bad and pleasure is good seems to be so obvious that it can be supported on a secular basis — or at least, it seems very unlikely that if I learned the nature of God, I would learn that He wants me to act contrary to that heuristic.
The point that I'm trying to make here isn't that there is not meta-ethical discussion to be had, but instead that the outcome/conclusion of such meta-ethical discussion or rather in this case theological discussion, contrary to the apatheism(?) posited in this post seems to matter (as it establishes what matters). If you believe in God and it is his nature that instead of total pain and pleasure (in the world, or for oneself) it is instead some sort of eudaimonia for example, that has significant implications for ones way of living. More succinctly I am trying to say that God's existence and his nature specifically would end up with us maximising for drastically different goals depending on the interpretation and thus have significant change on our actions. If he is real it isn't some abstract concept, it is Good itself and thus incredibly important (even within utilitarianism some sort of eternal and thus limitless reward or suffering, such that converting one life would equal or be greater than saving all the shrimps on earth). Now if you want to argue that is simply a memetic structure enabling it to be more successful and God isn't real, we're back to the debate if he is or isn't. But it seems quite important.
I got a little muddled here so just to clarify more explicitly:
to be more clear there are two arguements,
Firstly it establishes what we do and if we should even be utilitarian vs. some other intuitive form of morality
Secondly even within utilitariansim it seems to matter (this probably has more sticking force with you and may convince you, but I still think the first point matters)
You raise some good points and I’m convinced it’s worth at least some of my time to look into the implications of God’s existence for meta ethics and normative ethics. I’ll probably write another article if I see something that changes my mind about any major issues.
People debate whether black holes, Higgs bosons, and ancient aliens exist - I don't see why we should hold God to a higher standard of usefulness.
But also, p(religion is true) obviously depends a lot on p(God exists). If God doesn't exist, religion certainly isn't true. But if God does exist, I think I'm at least 50-50 that He was involved in at least one of the times people claim revelation from Him. Whether religion is true obviously affects your life a lot - for example, you might want to consider trying to go to the good afterlife - so God's existence does too.
But also, even if God doesn't exist, the people who *think* He exists will affect your life, so it's useful to have a way to communicate your opinion to those people.
Second this. I also think there’s a pretty plausible prediction from theism to universalism, which bodes well for you eventually. If someone told you that in the future you’d enjoy twenty more years than you otherwise would’ve enjoyed, and moreover that those years would be by far the best of your life, I think you’d be interested. If you’d be interested in finding that out, why turn your nose up at an infinite afterlife of perfect bliss?
(Also, apologies to Scott — I forgot to reply to your comment under my post about God and the paralysis argument, and then I procrastinated because of all the other thoughtful comments I hadn’t replied to. Will aim to reply tomorrow.)
1. Don't you think having true beliefs is, to some degree, a good in itself? This is basically the idea behind Nozick's experience machine. I don't think I would choose to use the experience machine, but perhaps you feel differently.
2. Having true beliefs has instrumental value. For example, it increases your social status, which may make it easier for you to earn money, which increases the number of shrimp stunners you can purchase.
The existence of God(s) is useful for getting people to abide by and follow moral commands over generations. This is a wheel that Benthams Bulldog is eager to reinvent.
I don’t know if theist is a good description since I’m not sure why fine tuning would imply a “God” with any particular nature (ie, who fits our idea of what God is).
I tried to make this point in the comments of a recent Bentham post where I asked why anything is at stake in the question of God’s existence. People made a bunch of arguments using logical notation trying to argue that the kind of minimal theism that the arguments purport to prove imply that god is likely to have a bunch of specific properties that happen to be the ones that monotheistic religions attribute to him. I found it very uncompelling. I DM’d Bentham, curious what he makes of all this, and he said he tends to agree with the commenters. Now I’m confused!
If theism IS decision relevant for me then I want to know about it, but I’d like to hear a clear argument for this, ideally not being made by someone who seems to be trying to backsolve for Christianity
I've often had similar thoughts "against the unexamined pursuit of the truth" specifically about ideas like abortion and certain wars etc. However, the existence of God seems likely important to me for a number of reasons. The main point of this piece I suppose is just like with any other subject "so what if God exists," what marginal value does knowing that (his nature, not just existence) actually have to me...? But I would argue for you to reconsider that knowing the existence (and nature) of God as having little marginal value. To be honest, I do not know your views that well but have seen some interesting (and opposing to my own) takes you have which is why I subscribe, so perhaps this is not helpful, still if it is then it is worth it. But that is the question and answer to which God is helpful.
Meaning, ethics and value seem to only find grounding in God especially if you believe in God, and there are significant differences in outcome based on changing nature and values of God, and thus knowing him and his nature seems important. Actually, I am agnostic, but the existence of God seems a valuable concept to me, in terms of how I behave, moreso if I actually believed he existed. I suppose a better comment might be (as if I am wrong it clears up misunderstanding, and if not illustrates what I am saying): why does "improving the welfare of fish and shrimp" as you say "actually matter?" If your answer to that is grounded in how you feel versus doing the right thing (which to be honest for a based shrimp welfare maximiser I think is unlikely on a first order level, but could be obfuscated or I could be wrong again) then there is even doubly so more value in knowing the existence of God. If instead the reason it is good relies on God, it seems important to know his nature and what he (it?) would value (although yes, there is more meta-ethics and theodicy to be done if you think about it, you could simply choose to not persue those just like this, as while I do, it is as you say for recreation and curiousity more than pure outcome).
I don’t think there’s a big problem with grounding morality without invoking God. At least, there seem to be a lot of moral philosophers who would agree with that. I admit that I haven’t read a lot of meta ethics (which I also think is probably not worth my time as someone who’s not an academic philosopher). But the intuition that pain is bad and pleasure is good seems to be so obvious that it can be supported on a secular basis — or at least, it seems very unlikely that if I learned the nature of God, I would learn that He wants me to act contrary to that heuristic.
The point that I'm trying to make here isn't that there is not meta-ethical discussion to be had, but instead that the outcome/conclusion of such meta-ethical discussion or rather in this case theological discussion, contrary to the apatheism(?) posited in this post seems to matter (as it establishes what matters). If you believe in God and it is his nature that instead of total pain and pleasure (in the world, or for oneself) it is instead some sort of eudaimonia for example, that has significant implications for ones way of living. More succinctly I am trying to say that God's existence and his nature specifically would end up with us maximising for drastically different goals depending on the interpretation and thus have significant change on our actions. If he is real it isn't some abstract concept, it is Good itself and thus incredibly important (even within utilitarianism some sort of eternal and thus limitless reward or suffering, such that converting one life would equal or be greater than saving all the shrimps on earth). Now if you want to argue that is simply a memetic structure enabling it to be more successful and God isn't real, we're back to the debate if he is or isn't. But it seems quite important.
I got a little muddled here so just to clarify more explicitly:
to be more clear there are two arguements,
Firstly it establishes what we do and if we should even be utilitarian vs. some other intuitive form of morality
Secondly even within utilitariansim it seems to matter (this probably has more sticking force with you and may convince you, but I still think the first point matters)
You raise some good points and I’m convinced it’s worth at least some of my time to look into the implications of God’s existence for meta ethics and normative ethics. I’ll probably write another article if I see something that changes my mind about any major issues.
Apatheist = Valley of Meh? https://tempo.substack.com/p/the-valley-of-meh
People debate whether black holes, Higgs bosons, and ancient aliens exist - I don't see why we should hold God to a higher standard of usefulness.
But also, p(religion is true) obviously depends a lot on p(God exists). If God doesn't exist, religion certainly isn't true. But if God does exist, I think I'm at least 50-50 that He was involved in at least one of the times people claim revelation from Him. Whether religion is true obviously affects your life a lot - for example, you might want to consider trying to go to the good afterlife - so God's existence does too.
But also, even if God doesn't exist, the people who *think* He exists will affect your life, so it's useful to have a way to communicate your opinion to those people.
Second this. I also think there’s a pretty plausible prediction from theism to universalism, which bodes well for you eventually. If someone told you that in the future you’d enjoy twenty more years than you otherwise would’ve enjoyed, and moreover that those years would be by far the best of your life, I think you’d be interested. If you’d be interested in finding that out, why turn your nose up at an infinite afterlife of perfect bliss?
(Also, apologies to Scott — I forgot to reply to your comment under my post about God and the paralysis argument, and then I procrastinated because of all the other thoughtful comments I hadn’t replied to. Will aim to reply tomorrow.)
This perhaps doesn’t apply for deities that promise great rewards for believing in them in relation to some form of Pascal’s wager.
I’m not a theist, but Pascal’s wager makes it seem like the question of that type of God is an important subject from a prudential pov.
Though, after thinking about it, such a deity seems unlikely, at least if they’re also supposed to be God.
1. Don't you think having true beliefs is, to some degree, a good in itself? This is basically the idea behind Nozick's experience machine. I don't think I would choose to use the experience machine, but perhaps you feel differently.
2. Having true beliefs has instrumental value. For example, it increases your social status, which may make it easier for you to earn money, which increases the number of shrimp stunners you can purchase.
The existence of God(s) is useful for getting people to abide by and follow moral commands over generations. This is a wheel that Benthams Bulldog is eager to reinvent.
It might be getting close to that unexpected time to 'care if there is a God or not'
https://www.lavitanuova.org.uk
Very based take
An Apatheist! Sign me up please.
Glad to hear you are a theist! Bentham's work is convincing to me as well.
Have you ever considered other theodicies?
I don’t know if theist is a good description since I’m not sure why fine tuning would imply a “God” with any particular nature (ie, who fits our idea of what God is).
I tried to make this point in the comments of a recent Bentham post where I asked why anything is at stake in the question of God’s existence. People made a bunch of arguments using logical notation trying to argue that the kind of minimal theism that the arguments purport to prove imply that god is likely to have a bunch of specific properties that happen to be the ones that monotheistic religions attribute to him. I found it very uncompelling. I DM’d Bentham, curious what he makes of all this, and he said he tends to agree with the commenters. Now I’m confused!
If theism IS decision relevant for me then I want to know about it, but I’d like to hear a clear argument for this, ideally not being made by someone who seems to be trying to backsolve for Christianity