What type of design is this?

[OnceConvinced]

Presuming God is real and presuming demons and Satan is real...

Presuming God created them as angels and then the ones that rebelled became the demons, let by Satan himself. These fallen angels became so corrupt that they became completely evil, with no redeeming features at all.

So God created these beings and for whatever reason they became pure evil. Yet God, even if he didn't know for sure, had a good idea they would become that way. Yet he created them anyway, knowing they would be come corrupted and turn against him.

Or maybe he had no idea at all? Maybe their corruption was a complete surprise to him?

The thing is for them to become corrupt, they must have been designed in such a way that would allow them to become corrupt.

So....
What sort of design would this be?

Malevolent?
Incompetent?
Intelligent?

Please justify your answer.

[OnceConvinced]

In fact, have you even thought about this at all? According to Christianity the Christian God couldn't even create so much as a single solitary human who was perfect. That's a 100% failure rate as a creator.

So you seem to be overlooking the fact that the Christian God cannot be said to be perfect since he can't even create a perfect human.

This must surely be incompetent design.

If this were a human creator, we could excuse the fact he messed it up and created flawed creations. A human creator will never get things 100% correct. Just look at all the computer software out there. There is no such thing as 100% perfect software. We don't expect it. I work in software development as a tester but we know we will never find every single bug and not every single bug will be fixed. If we can come up with software that works as it should, without everything becoming corrupted, then that's great. We will settle for that.

But a perfect God is an entirely different thing. When it comes to the angels... or for that matter the rest of creation, if we have a perfect god who does everything perfectly then we should expect perfection and no errors. Otherwise that god is not perfect.

So either we have an incompetent creator who unwittingly created shoddy software. Or we have a malevolent creator who deliberately put in viruses and bugs into his software, knowing full well it was going to become corrupted if the users did the wrong thing.

[bjs]

The poll seems problematic since it is possible for something to be all three, or none of the above.

However, to the general question, this seems like an appropriate time to apply the free will defense.

God can create a being (human, angel, etc.) that lacks moral freedom. That creature is neither good nor bad. It just fulfills the function set by its creator. To make an analogy, a stone can be used to build a beautiful statue or to bash in a man’s head. The stone is neither good nor bad; the person using it is morally responsible.

Or God can create a being with moral freedom. That creature is morally responsible for its own choices, but it means that this creature is capable of doing evil or even devoting itself completely to corruption.

God cannot do the logically impossible, such as make a square circle, a married bachelor, or a thing that is both “A� and “Not A� at the same time.

It is logically impossible for a finite being to be both “free� and “not free� at the same time. It is impossible for God to create such a being. For angels (or people) to have the ability to do good, they must also have the ability to do evil. The more good they are able to do, the greater their potential for evil.

One might disagree with God’s values. That is, someone might prefer that they lack the ability to do good as long as they also lack the ability to do evil. However, I do not see how someone can rightly say that giving angels (or people) moral freedom is either malevolent or incompetent.

[OnceConvinced]

[Replying to post 1 by OnceConvinced]

Given what you say in the OP...I vote Incompetent. I obviously cannot vote Intelligent so I won't even comment on that, but my reason for not voting Malevolent is that you did not indicate in the OP that this God blames his creations for being what they are, assigns punishments, curses to them, expects his creations to repent for being what they are, what they were created to be.

I also think it would be malevolent if he deliberately created beings with flaws. For instance, when he created angles and humans, he gave them freewill. He knew before hand that they could and probably would exercise that freewill and do evil.

He also created them with a human nature, giving them urges, which he himself deemed sinful, knowing full well that they would act on those urges. Why give those urges if they are so bad?

But that's not all. Not only has he given freewill and animal instincts, he has also created the system so that as soon as you exercise your freewill in a bad way, or as soon as you act on that human nature of yours, then everything becomes corrupt.

In fact there are creationists out there who insist that everything was perfect until Adam and Eve sinned. Then everything became corrupt. Sickness, pain and suffering entered the world. Herbivores became carnivores. Viruses cropped up, Non venomous animals became venomous, etc etc. Everything became completely corrupted all due to the sin of Adam and Eve.

But how could sin do this unless everything was created with fatal flaws to begin with? Either the creator had no clue what he was doing (incompetent design) or deliberately created these fatal flaws (malevolent design).

Imagine a developer who creates software and includes a sub routine where if you press the # button the computer self destructs and destroy everything within a 5 mile radius. Then in the hand book that comes with the software it warns never to press the # button.

Is that intelligent design?

Of course not, because you're putting in a fatal subroutine.

Is it incompetent design?

No because this was deliberately programmed in.

Is it malevolent design?

This is the only logical explanation.

Likewise, a self destruct button was included in creation called the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. As soon as Adam and Even activated that self destruct button, it destroyed everything. It corrupted everything.

How could that be anything but malevolent design? Unless of course God was just completely incompetent and clueless.

[OnceConvinced]

...
What sort of design would this be?

Malevolent?
Incompetent?
Intelligent?

Please justify your answer.

Malevolent and incompetent design can be also intelligent design. So, I think your question is not very intelligent. But obviously, the point seems to be to preach the antigod propaganda and not ...

I think it's more this statement you make here that's not intelligent.

If it's incompetent how can it possibly be considered intelligent? They are kind of polar opposites.

As for malevolent design, how can it be considered intelligent to do evil? Do you consider doing evil an intelligent thing?

However, giving freedom is not in my opinion malevolent, even though it can lead to bad situations. I think it is nice that God is not like fascist. And I think He is very intelligent, because He could allow also the evil exist and even though they are against God, they serve God.

Satan is also very intelligent but he did evil and rebelled against God. Do you actually consider it an intelligent thing to rebel against God? Or a stupid/incompetent thing?

So if someone creates a robot that goes on a rampage and kills people, would we really call it intelligent design, even though it may be clever? No, it would be more accurate to describe it as malevolent not intelligent.

Perhaps you would be happier if I had changed the poll so that the options were:
Malevolent Design
Incompetent Design
Benevolent Design

[OnceConvinced]

Is our modern justice system fascistic simply because a cop will arrest you for attempting to murder someone else, and a judge will imprison you?

Murder is also crime in the Bible and there is judgment for that. But attempting something is not same as murder and perhaps is not enough for judgement, especially because we may not really know what people are attempting.

So you think that a person who attempts to murder someone and fails is not as evil as a person who attempts to murder and succeeds? Seriously?

And remember the bible also tells us that simply hating someone is equal to murder. The bible also says that just thinking lustful thoughts about a woman is the same as having sex with them. So therefore just the desire to do someone evil is the same as doing evil to someone.

Person who murders, gives others right to do the same to him. That is why death penalty for murder can be accepted. If person doesn’t want to be killed, he should not murder others.

You have here the basis of secular morality. Its how we can become moral without the need for a god with a big stick.

Fascism means that people are not free and they should think as the ruler says, which usually seem to happen in socialistic systems.

If we don't do what God commands he's going to kill us right? Can't get more Fascist then that.

What does intelligent mean in your opinion? If machine that can calculate different things is called intelligent, what would be the reason to say that person who has created free persons, who are able to think and choose, is not intelligent?

If you think it would be more intelligent, if God would not have made you possible, it doesn’t mean He is not intelligent. But of course, you could think it would have been more intelligent to not make you possible, but would it have been good, would you have rather not existed?

So because God is intelligent and can create some really amazing things, we should just ignore the malevolence?

Hitler was an intelligent guy. Should we go around praising him for his intelligence and not call him malevolent?

Hey everybody! Don't knock Hitler! He was an intelligent guy. Just because some of the things he did may appear to be malevolent, he was still a really intelligent fellow! Let's worship him!

[OnceConvinced]

The poll seems problematic since it is possible for something to be all three, or none of the above.

I probably should have put "benevolent design" instead of "intelligent design".

However I think we can easily pick one that we think fits the best.

If you say he is intelligent and deliberately created flaws in his system that he knew would become corrupted, then you can vote "malevolent design".

If you say he is intelligent and unwittingly created flaws in his system, then you can vote "incompetent design".

If you don't see any malevolence or incompetence in this system (which seems unbelievable to me), then simply vote "intelligent design".

No longer problematic, right?

However, to the general question, this seems like an appropriate time to apply the free will defense.

The freewill defence is quite irrelevant in this scenario. If God created his angels with freewill, knowing full well they would go on and corrupt the entire world and try to destroy all human life, then that is a malevolent act. If he had no clue what would happen, then that is incompetence.

[1213]

We're arguing about design, given an example and asked whether this design indicates the designer to be incompetent, malevolent or intelligent.

Ok, now, if we start from the beginning, as the Bible tells, everything was good after God had created it. Then people wanted to know evil and therefore were expelled to this first death. We are now in that death, place where we can learn what good and evil truly means. For the lesson, all kind of evil things that were not possible in God’s place, can be experienced in this place. This can be compared to the matrix in the movie Matrix. Soul can experience through body many things, but the soul itself can’t be destroyed by anything of this world. Obviously this lesson can be painful, but in Biblical point of view, this is just a short lesson. And for educational purpose, I think this works well and is good design, because:
1. Very realistic
2. Very educational
3. Can’t destroy soul, which is the important thing, in Biblical point of view

Because of those reasons and because people have ability to choose good and do good, I think design is good. Bad thing is that many people love more evil and lies than good and truth.

[1213]

…If there are any humans who love people that aren't beneficial for them then your argument that God loves all, "unlike humans", is not true. …

This depends obviously much of how we define love. But anyway, in Biblical point of view, also people who are born of God, love without conditions.

...
Christianity boasts of an inept God. A God who can't even heal the criminally insane. Apparently the God of Christianity is as helpless and inept as little ol' me.

What if they don’t want to be healed? Should God force all people to be what He thinks is good?

[1213]

…
Malachi 1:3 "but I have hated Esau, and I have made his mountains a desolation and appointed his inheritance for the jackals of the wilderness.�
….

In Biblical point of view, hate doesn’t seem to be the opposite of love.

[1213]

…If it's incompetent how can it possibly be considered intelligent? They are kind of polar opposites.

Perhaps we can’t continue this before you define what it means that people are incompetent? What humans can’t do that they should be able to do?

As for malevolent design, how can it be considered intelligent to do evil? Do you consider doing evil an intelligent thing?

I think evil could be done intelligently. I would not call it intelligent, or not intelligent, I would say it is evil and wrong. Intelligent is defined for example to mean person has mental capacity, ability to earn and understand, ability to adjust actions in response to varying situations. Evil can also have those abilities. The more intelligent and evil person is, the more damage that person could cause. That is why I hope evil people are not very intelligent, because then they could make much more evil.

Satan is also very intelligent but he did evil and rebelled against God. Do you actually consider it an intelligent thing to rebel against God? Or a stupid/incompetent thing?

I think intelligent is not on/off matter. I don’t think Satan is the smartest guy, but I think he shows some intelligence also. But I don’t think it is intelligent to go against God, when one knows God and that God is good. And it seems to me that Satan is actually against people, because he tries to deceive us to make wrong things (at least in Bible).

Interesting thing is that intelligent is also relative. It depends on what is the information that is used for the action. It could be that the decision is right, in some situation, but if the information is incomplete, the decision can still be wrong, when taught with all information.

So if someone creates a robot that goes on a rampage and kills people, would we really call it intelligent design, even though it may be clever? No, it would be more accurate to describe it as malevolent not intelligent.

I think it could be called intelligent, because it is able to do things on its own. I would call it evil, if it has decided to do wrong/bad/evil things.

Choosing evil doesn’t mean person is not intelligent, it means person is bad or evil.