Review: Victor Stenger's God The failed Hypotesis

In God The Failed Hypothesis, [1] Victor Stenger uses basically the same over all approach and the same objections disprove his argument, yet he makes more use of the fortress of facts concept. For him it’s not so much reduction of God to a big man in the sky as just the lack of hard tangible evidence of God’s DNA, smoking creation gun or other dead give-aways. His arguments are geared to a fundamentalist big man in the sky concept of God and he takes silence as proof, thus no evidence for God, in his mind, equals positive evidence of no God. He begins with a comparison of scientific method to what he takes to be “theological method.”[2] Of course his straw-man version of theological method has nothing to do with the way any modern theologian works. It’s clear from the outset that he is subjecting belief in God to scientific criteria but he’s expecting belief itself to transmute into a scientific hypothesis. After all if there’s only one form of knowledge, as the atheist ideology has it, then that’s what has to be done to have knowledge of something. What this tells us upfront is that we are dealing with the fortress of facts. We can’t allow religious people to have the belief they have. It has to be made over into the doppelganger of my scientific ideas, or it’s not worth considering. Of course that makes it into a straw-man argument because he’s doing nothing more than taking something beyond the domain of science and saying “hey look it’s not science.” He basically admits this when he says: “Objective evidence for an entity of Godlike attributes should be readily available. After all, God is supposed to play a deceive role in every happening in the world. Surely we should see some sign in objective observations made by our eyes…”[3] Should we? This is a theological question, not a question for science. Why should physicists decide what the parameters are for belief? Why should we expect God to be given in “objective” evidence when he’s not given in sense data? How can we expect that which is beyond our understanding, the basis of all that is, to be subject to empirical observations of beings in creation? What If God’s work consists primarily of holding the strong force together? How could we ever know that? We can’t know it by ordinary means, we might know it by intuitive or deductive or revelatory means. Why isn’t that extraordinary? When we do have objective evidence which we can see with our eyes and prove with medical science, such as the miracles at Lourdes, the atheists will merely evoke incredulity as though it’s a proof and refuse to believe the proof.[4]He clearly and unabashedly places God under the domain of science and makes a subject of scientific scrutiny. He proposes an approach that would cast belief in God as a scientific hypothesis. He proposes a “scientific God model.”[5]

Not content with just using scientific criteria he also evokes what is called ECREP (extraordinary claims requires extraordinary proof). Then he sets about listing conditions for extraordinary claims. One could easily argue that this is a false standard. In fact in my first book The Trace of God I do make this argument.[6] For the sake of argument I’ll accept it for now. These criteria include:

(1) Protocols of the study must be clear so that all possibilities of error can be evaluated…

(2) The hypothesis being tested must be established clearly and explicitly…

(3) People doing the study must have no pre judgment…

(4) The hypothesis being tested must contain seeds of its own destruction…

(5) Results must be independently replicated…[7]

No. 4 is vaguely reminiscent of Hegel or Marcuse, the thesis contains the seeds of its own negation.[8] What he’s really saying is it must be falsifiable. So he already has God starched out in the petri dish and is ready to dissect. He’s reduced God to the level of a scientific question. In evoking falsification, he’s saying under what conditions could this hypothesis be disproved? The unwary might think “it can’t be so it must be true.” No if it can’t be disproved under any conditions it can’t be proved either. The problem this only applies to empirical questions. The issue of falsification only applies to questions that are about things given in sense data.

God is not under the domain of science. The question of God is not a scientific one it’s an existential, ontological, or metaphysical question. The question of God is over and above anything about science, because science is about the empirical and God is not given in sense data. Indeed how could the basis of reality be subject to things in creation? Yet the reductionist tries to subject God to the mundane the material and it’s no wonder they don’t’ find anything. This is the ultimate bait and switch. This tendency to reduce God to the level of science is the result of the ideology that reduces all knowledge to scientific knowledge. Stenger knows that he’s coming up against the problem of overlapping magisteria (domains). He doesn’t like that God is off limits to science. He wants to subject the supernatural to the natural and assert its disproof, because he assumes that there’s one valid sort of knowledge; science. He argues with the national academy of sciences statement in chapter one about supernatural is beyond the study of science.

These scientists and science organizations that would limit science to the investigation of natural causes provide unwitting support for the assertion that science is dogmatically naturalistic…in many of the public discussions we hear today science is accused of dogmatically refusing to consider the possible role that other than natural processes may play in the universe…however, any type of dogmatism is the very antithesis of science.[9]

The problem is by limiting science they admit there maybe more and that they don’t posses the way to know things. In wanting to open everything up to science Stenger Is actually reducing everything to the natural level and implying that there be only one form of knowledge, which by default would have to be science. He’s really making a chatch 22 for religious thinkers, yet he also sows seeds of the negations of his own view. In trying to reduce everything to level of falsifiability he’s admitting that anything not reducible to that level is not under the domain of science. Of course he would probably assert that if it’s not testable by science it just can’t be. So the bait and switch in Stenger’s argument is clear. Reduce everything to the level of science, science doesn’t come up with evidence for God, then argue there must not be a God.

Stenger goes on to indulge in question begging by way of trying to justify stretching science over to fit the supernatural. He says that science can study the supernatural. Yet all he’s really saying is that there is no supernatural which will be proven if science attempts to stud it. All they could logically prove would be that they cant’ study the supernatural. Stenger of course will take the silence as proof because he predisposed to be incredulous about the supernatural. He never takes the dirth of data as an indication that it can’t be studied. It would have to be taken as proof that it’s not there and that’s what he wants.

The assertions that science does not study and that supernatural hypotheses are untestable are factually incorrect. Right under the noses of leaders of national science organizations who make these public statements, capable credentialed scientists are investigating the possibility of supernatural causes…reputable institutions such as the Mayo Clinic, Harvard University and Duke University are studying phenomena that, if verified, would provide would provide strong empirical support for the existence of some nonmaterial element in the universe. These experiments are designed to test the healing power of distant, blinded, intercessory prayer.[10]

It’s clear that Stenger’s purpose in bringing this up is to open up the supernatural to scientific critique so that absence of evidence can be constructed as the failure of empirical testing. The fact of question begging here should be obvious, he’s assuming that because some people study what he deems to be ‘supernatural’ therefore the whole of the supernatural (whatever that is) is opened up as a scientific question. Secondly, the studies he points to are about healing. Healing is only a small aspect of the spiritual and it’s debatable as to whether or not it’s supernatural at all. I would argue that modern concept of “supernatural” is misconstrued based upon concepts of the enlightenment. The term has come to mean anything not under the realm of science, anything form magic to a realm completely removed form the physical. I will deal with this at greater length latter.

Another problem with Stenger’s approach is that it’s a Grand Canyon leap in logic from healing (which is one manifestation if anything of the supernatural) to the conclusion that God’s very existence is a question for science. The question about the reality of God is much more basic and much harder to confront than the question of healing. Healing is an overlap, a point at which something spiritual touches the physical. Yet the reality of God is at the basis of all reality itself. Stenger is assuming that since the work is being done it must be possible to do it. That still doesn’t tell us anything. Suppose the study shows no significant findings proving any extra-naturalistic process. Does that really prove that there is no such process, or does it only mean that it’s out our epistemic reach? Stenger wants to beg the question and assert that because they did the work it be accurate and tell us all. Then he wants to extrapolate from that begged question to another: to extrapolate from the possibility of no demonstration of healing the assumption that there must not be a God.. Rather he wants to use this to establish the assumption that his cosmological opinions really prove something about God’s existence.

I will not belabor the points he makes about reasoning and logic in God arguments. He does deal with some of that on a certain level, in fact he spends a lot pages doing just that. I’m going pass over most of that because the real issue according his own exposition is what science itself has to offer in terms of the big disproof of God. Yet it is instructive to look one most unserious attempt:

(1) God is by definition a being that which no greater being can be thought

(2) Greatness includes the greatness of virtue

(3) God is a being then of which no being can be more virtuous.

(4) But virtue involves overcoming pain and danger.

(5) Indeed a being can only said to be properly virtuous if it can suffer pain or be destroyed

(6) A God that can suffer pain or is destructible is not one that which nothing greater than an be conceived.

(7) For you can think of a greater being one that is non suffering and indestructible

(8) Therefore, God does not exist.[11]

Notice that doesn’t provide any logical problem for the concept of God itself. It’s just one persons idea of God, not one any real theist believes in. Who says God is under the same constraints of virtue that humans are? The idea of virtue and suffering is not applicable to God. Can God even said to be virtuous? If virtue is something creatures of God develop thorugh obeidiecne to God then obviously God is beyond the aspect of virtue, that wouldn’t prevent God form being perfect morally; it would merely mean that virtue for humans an aspect of character we develop. God is source of moral perfection. Even if we assume the argument is right all it’s disproved in one argument, from perfection. It has not shown a logical contradiction in the idea of God per se.

Definition of VIRTUE

1

a : conformity to a standard of right : morality b : a particular moral excellence

2

plural : an order of angels — see celestial hierarchy

3

: a beneficial quality or power of a thing

4

: manly strength or courage : valor

5

: a commendable quality or trait : merit

6

: a capacity to act : potency

7

: chastity especially in a woman

— vir·tue·less adjective

— by virtue of or in virtue of [12]

None of these qualies would fit God except 1 or 3. Those don’t entail suffering. 4 entails courage that’s the virtue of valor but God is not said to have valor, he doesn’t need it. Of God is not going to have “a commendable trait” because that would degrade God, which all Stenger does. This just another example of demoting God ot the level of main and treating God like a human. Notice the one thing he does not do (he offers many many such misguided joke arguments, although he presents them seriously) he never deals with the tradition of theology or philosophy. He makes no effort to reflect what’s been said by the tradition. As though he thinks science is the only from of knowledge, therefore, scientists are the priesthood of knowledge. Therefore, philosopher’s ideas are not worth considering. This is the kind of vapid nonsense he churns out because he knows too much to consult the experts in a field of which he knows nothing.

He never does actually get around to a scientific smoking gun. He has no great insight or scientific facts that would actually disprove the experience of God. All he ever does is argue from silence by knocking down straw-man versions of arguments such as the fine tuning argument then assuming if these arguments are down there is no argument that proves God, thus absence of evidence is the same as disproof. All of these arguments turn on reducing God the proportions of humanity and then judging the Big man in the sky. He basically admits this modus operandi:

The scientific argument against the existence of God will be modified from the lack of evidence argument:

(1) Hypothesize a God who plays an important role in the universe.

(2) Assume that God has specific attributes that should provide objective evidence for his existence.

(3) Look for such evidence with an open mind

(4) If such evidence is found conclude that God may exist

(5) If such objective evidence is not found conclude that beyond a reasonable doubt that God with these properties does not exist.[13]

Most of the positive evidence he presents is just proof of evolution, which is only a problem for creationists, meaning only a problem for adherents to particular idea of God. Thus we see the atheist straw-God at work. The statement above not only conclusively proves that Stenger is reducing God to science, but that his arguments fail a prori. Premise one is granted, even if that role is merely creating the universe, or just savhing people. Number 2 is a straw-God claim. Why should there be objective evidence for God’s role? That would depend upon the nature of the role. What if the major evidence for God is subjective? That’s only a dirty word to atheists. There’s nothing particularly dirty about subjective proof and there’s nothing illogical about it. There’s no reason why the major evidence for God can’t be subjective. After all we are subjective creatures and every single thing we perceive comes to us form subjective experiences. There’s no logical reason why God is logically bound to produce objective evidence. Number 3 is a lost cause. Stenger has proved he do that because he wont even examine Lourdes miracles. Number 4 takes out Stenger’s thesis because we will present such evidence, the Lourdes miracle which he will not examine are such evidence. Number five takes out his thesis because strong enough evidence can be found to at least provide a reasonable doubt in favor of belief. In other words the strength of Stenger’s case doesn’t meet the stipulate of “beyond a reasonable doubt” even if you grant him his moves of the “scientific God hypothesis.” This will be seen in subsequent chapters.

He does actually try to show that cosmologically the universe looks like the kind of universe we would have without a God assuming naturalistic developments.[14] That’s misleading because he doesn’t deal the cosmological argument, or necessity and contingency. Of course he’s not dealing with the major modern issues in theology such as process theology. None of his arguments apply to modern liberal concepts of God. In fact they apply to orthodox concepts either. The whole new atheist movement is aimed at Christian fundamentalism. The notion of God that "disproves," If any, is that of the big man in the sky. He's applying the standards of biology to the basis of all reality as though we have a lock on understanding all there, when in reality, we don't know beans about the whys and wherefores, or what's out there.

This is why religious experience and religious life have to be approached as an existential journy not as a scientific hypothesis.

---

[1] Victor J. Stenger, God: The Failed Hypothesis:How Science Shows that God Does Not Exist. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2007.

[2] Ibid. 22-23

[3] ibid 22

[4] Lourdes find

[5] Stenger, ibid, 41

[6] Trace of God chapter 2 find.

[7] Stenger, ibid, 24-25

[8] Herbert Macruse, Negations

[9] Stenger, ibid, 28

[10] ibid, 29

[11] ibid, 31

[12] Merrain-Webser’s on line dictionary. URL: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/virtue visited 6/26/12

[13] Stenger, ibid, 43

[14] ibid, 113

How Can Good God Make Bad World?

This is the progression of a discussion on CARM athiesit that has gone on for several threads. The atheist assert that God can't allow evil because good perfect God wouldn't allow anything bad. Of course we all know the world is can be horrible place so many of us ask this question.It's not just a question of doubt. It's a question we all ask. Those who care and who believe in God really struggle with answers, those who don't want answers only use it as a means of ridiculing the faithful. At one time or anohter in all our lives this becomes a serious question.

One problem with the atheists is that their view of the good is usually teleological, based upon outcomes, and their assumption about the nature of the good is utilitarian. So they only count as "good" the pursuit of pleasure and avoidance of pain. Most of them think they understand how the world would be better than the one God created. A great many of them propose such ideas and some have a sense that if they can prove they could design a better world this disproves God. To say "my idea for a world is better than God's" one must make the same calculation God does. We can't do it becuase you are not even aware that one of the major aspects of the proportion is that this doesn't have to be a good world. We assume good God must make good world. that get's ratcheted down to best possible world." So they think if they can imagine a slightly better world they are better than God. (so to speak).

The original premise that Good God can't make bad world is wrong headed. Good God must make POTENTIALLY bad world to have moral universe. Not becuase we need evil to be good for some mystical reason but becuase moral universe means a universe in which we make moral choices. We can't make moral choices if we lack the real possibility of making evil/wrong choices. We have to live in an universe where evil is a real possibility. the calculation comes in where you try to decide is it worth it? I say only God can decide that. The concepts of good and evil can't be lmited to utlilarian ideology. Good is more than just avoidance of pain, evil more than the presence of pain. In my Augustinian view good is based upon love, (the background of the moral universe) and derives from the "will to the value, dignity, and well being of the other." Evil is the absences of good, therefore, the absence of love. Pain in a physical universe is necessitated for a couple of reasons:

(1) we have physical nerve endings and physical pain is so easy to come by; stub your toe you have pain.

(2) intervening variables such as the need for a moral universe which necessitates free will means that God must allow the presence of evil choices, evil choices usually have pain for someone as a consequence. The reason this must be is becuase without the ability to choose the wrong as well as the right the choice is not real an dis meaningless, the moral agent is not truely free. Since the point of creation is to have free moral agents that willing choose the good, blocking the ability to choose wrongly or blocking the consequences would be a negation of the reason for creation.

When I say God must do a calculation I mean he must do the calculation that says if the trouble to create and the pain it causes on a massive scale is worth it compared to not having any creation at all. Would it really be better not exist than to have pain in the world? I think God is only agent who can make that calculation. The reason the choice is one between nothing vs existence rather than the world we have vs. any better world is because God has to know the outcome. This is why saying "it's a fallen world" is not enough of an answer. God had to know it would be a fallen world. So the question then becomes why would God create a world that would fall? That goes back to the issue that any moral universe requires the necessity that God risk people choosing wrongly.

Since any universe with free agency would result in a fall, and since God is good and perfect and can't tolerate anything less, one screw up would invalidate the whole thing as a world of pain. That means the choice is a stark one between any creation vs none at all. The one peice of the puzzell the atheist utilitairian thinking can't accept or anticipate is the necessity of allowing evil due to intervening variables. If God chooses that a moral universe is worth the pain to have and it's a moral important goal than just straight avoidance of pain, then that's a reason why a good God has to allow a bad world for a time. We can't make that callcuation because we are the one's in the "experiment." We don't have God's complexity or understanding of forethought, or his reasons for creation:on principle lab rats cannot decide if the experiment was a success. Not that God only sees us as lab rats.

The utilitarian/teleological assumptions of the atheists lead them to think in terms of all or nothing and of instant gratification. While the Christian answers sees the necessity of going through the process of overcoming a fallen world.

some atheist comments on carm:



Originally Posted by Lance

I wasn't particularly satisfied with the objections to the argument in Occam's thread. Let's start anew, as I think this argument deserves more discussion.

A logical argument from evil attempts to prove deductively that God does not exist using only claims that are logically necessary, essential to theism, or entailed by theism. Common wisdom has it that Plantinga refuted the logical argument from evil in his 1967 work God and Other Minds, but some philosophers disagree. The following version of the logical argument from evil was presented by Quentin Smith in 1997.

The problem with this assessment is that they don't' even deal with ideas that are essential to theism they mainly create their own straw man God who can't brook a single evil event then try to use that as a basis for saying "see God can't make a world like this." The reasons that would lead one to think he could completely elude them.

Quinton Smith's Argument:

(1) God exists and is omnipotent, omniscient, and wholly good.

Omnipotent does not mean able to violate logical necessity. God can't have his cake and eat it too. He can't create good agents who have free will but can't do evil. I think this premise is here so that the skeptic can claim that a good God could and would prevent evil regardless of FWD , then it's wrongheaded.

(2) There is evil.

naturally

(3) An omniscient and omnipotent [and wholly good] being eliminates every evil that it can properly eliminate.

That's the premise that is meant to dislodge god wiht the existence of any kind of evil. It also necessitates the all or nothing approach so that the calculation is bewteen "some creation" vs none at all.

"that he can properly eliminate" probalby means he can't eliminate it and allow free will. To have moral universe there must be the possibility of not choosing the good. that means moral decision making is a decision between good and evil.Choosing not to do the good is a choice to do evil if only by default.

that means a moral must of necessity allow evil choices! that defeats this premise an it defeats the argument.

i say with all sincerity QED!

(4) It is possible for God to create free humans who always do what is right without there being any natural evil, and if God creates these humans, it will not create natural evil.

wrong. To be a true choice they have able to reject the good. if they can't truly reject the good it's not a moral decision. Therefore, the premise is false.

(5) There is no evil. [entailed by (1), (3), and (4)]

they are false premises. I just disproved them.

(Source: The Cambridge Companion to Atheism, p. 169)

An evil that God can "properly eliminate," as the term is used above, is an evil whose destruction does not entail eliminating a greater good or creating greater evil.Thoughts?

Lance is pushing for the idea of God as evil. But he would eliminate a greater good if he didn't allow evil. He would eliminate the good moral decision making. That means that God is not evil just because he allows an evil world for a time. The atheists are here missing several key concepts, so the claim using only claims that are logically necessary, essential to theism they don't do either one. For example the concept of redemption and also that of refining completely allude them. They posit ideas such as limited free will. The agent would have the freedom to choose the good but always and only choose good. But the choice isn't' real unless he possibility of coshing evil could really result in evil. If God blocked that it would mean blocking a higher good, that of free moral agency and a moral universe. Moral universe is one in which free moral agents freely choose the good. The choice is not free if the possibility of screwing it up is not real.


Originally Posted by simplelife

Meta, I have to disagree. Why can God not arrange things such that people always freely choose good (by supplying adequate information, environment, motivation etc) to always choose good of their own free will?

Meta:

Choosing good is NOT just a matter of education. No matter much information we posses you can't overcome self interest. That's the point of a decision process you have to choose yourself over the good. or the good over yourself hopefully. That whole drama of who will we choose, we have to do something all that will be avoided and I'm sure you want to avoid it. It takes away the responsibility from us and God wants us to have the responsibility.


Originally Posted by Lance

Exactly! I'm glad you get this point. It is by our nature that we choose to do good and evil, and God determined our nature.

Meta:

That's only half right. The aspect of nature that mandates this is the anxiety that follows form self transcendence. that's inherent in having a psychosocial creation. That's an aspect of how omnipotence can't overcome logical necessity.

Lance:

Our motivations, our desires, and our ability to resist temptation and strength of will are all qualities God has endowed us with. It stands to reason, then, that God could have made us so that by our nature we would always freely choose good.

Meta:

God plug's that stuff in when we choose it. It's a matter of choice first. It's first a matter of the will, of having the resolve to choose the good, then god gives us what we need to do it. We have the responsibly to choose.

Lance:

The libertarian wants to say that there are some other things that factor into our choices that God is not in control of, but what are those things exactly? Many point to the very mysterious and poorly defined "soul", but that in of itself is quite a philosophical train wreak.

Meta:

I refuse to be called a "libertarian" but I do argue that way. I just answered that. Soul is the issue. Soul is a metaphor for the relation between our lives and God. The point is we have to make the choice before we employ the strength to keep it. Then we will be given the strength spiritually when we choose the good and step out in faith.

Some people want the responsibility taken off their shoulders. they want to blame God for their stupid choices. Not to take responsibly for their loyalties.

In answer to anther poster's question about "do you want to feel god's love."

Originally Posted by Lance

If God does in fact exist, yes I would like to experience such a thing. As of now I have not, though, and from where I stand the evidence appears to be against his existence.

that's becuase you don't want God exist. open your eyes and look at the rationalization you doing to yourself.

Meta:
If god came down today in front your face and said "I am here, I want you to give up the things I say are sinful and then you can know me." You wouldn't do it would you? you would say "only if you force me to so I want have to choose."

is that actually what you are saying? I'm only going by the example you've given i coutner to the argument. (in previous exchanges he advocated certain sins as "awesome" saying "don't knock it until you have tried it").

Originally Posted by maybrick

The problem you are not seeming to see is that according to your religion God can, and indeed will create a perfect world. This perfect world will be inhabited by (presumably) perfect (human?) beings. I put the "human" in brackets, because at this point in our theoretical existance I am not sure these beings would qualify as Human.

Meta:

What you are not facing is the imagery of the Gospels about refining. Perfection comes after refinement, that comes through a struggle for spatial life that invovles having to take responsibility for one's choices. God created a perfect world and we chose to sin. Of course God knew it would happen so the issues are not really about that so much as an overall calculus of a painful world vs no world in which the good is met through choices, but the possibility of choosing wrongly is real and causes pain, vs no world at all, which means no sin at all but also mean no moral refinement, redemption, or perfecting.

The arguments your side is putting forth are about evading the responsibility of choosing. you want God to remove the problematic nature of choice making from you so you don't have take responsibility for bad choices.

Lance:

But these beings will (again presumably) only ever choose the good over the bad. And they will be that way because God made them so.This world (as I am sure you know) is heaven.

Meta:

NO! agian1 for the umptihjumpth time. people in heaven are there because when they go through the mill on earth and they get refined. only those are in heaven who want to be there. Only those are there who want to be there. They want to be there because they don't want sin. they don't' want sin because they internalized the good by seeking truth and they suffered for it. so they rally choose good.

Every assumption you have made is wrong. people in heaven are not automatically made perfect they are refined. they took responsibility for their choices and they chose rightly. They internalized the values of the good.

Unknown Atheist:
not the guys screen name, I just don't remember
who said this:

The only counter (that I have seen) is that we need our earthly life with all its suffering to appreciate heaven and only want to make the right choices. I think I have seen you make this argument, and I have certainly seen others do so.

Meta:

you are kind of spining it to suit your needs. I never said "we need suffering to appreciate heaven" internalizing values is a bit stronger than that.

But this counter fails utterly on two fronts.

Unknown guy again:

The vast majority of humans (assuming life begins at conception) die well before they are in any position to make any decisions regarding good/evil and (again, presumably) go straight to heaven. Hence God simply doesn't attach that much importance to making good/righteous decisions and having beliefs. The pure numbers speak of a God who fasttracks most Homo sapiens to heaven. This obviously runs counter to Christian theology.

Meta:

The vast majority don't die in infancy do they? Infant morality rate for the world is like 90%? I don't think so. Your counting sperm? this is jaundiced. Moreover, you are assuming they would all get eternal life. why assume this? maybe they just cease to be. Other possibilities:

(1) levels in heaven.

(2) purgatory

(3) Reincorporation?

There are alternatives.

Unknown:

(2) The counter implies that God cannot endow us with an inbuilt knowledge of evil and what making wrong decisions can lead to. But why? Is this a god who doesn't possess the knowledge that both you and possess right now?

Meta:

I've expalined over and over. you are assuming that there is value in the process of learning. you are assuming people are machines and you just feed some data in and they do what the data shows and there's no learning, feeling, life, construct, experience, you don't have to experience something to understated and appropriate it. that's all antithetical to the spiritual life. Spiritual life is about learning its' about a process we must go through to be refined

If you read the gospels you see many many references to reefing fire, wheat from chaff, burning off the dross.

Unknown:

I understand right now the consequences of picking up a hammer and randomly beating my wife to death with it. Seemingly, God doesn't. I also didn't need 40 years on this planet to understand this concept.

Meta:

what you are saying is you understand seeking pleasure over pain and immediate gratification but you don't' understand learning and being refined and making spiritual progress.

People in American society been so seperated form their spiritual heritage and the depth of an inner life (tv and one-dimensional society--consumerism) one-dimensional man has taken its toll. Apparently all you can understand is infantile stimulation of immediate gratification you don't understand the basics of a spiritual life.