From Facebook:
A few days ago, I said:
“For myself, I have come to a belief that the Universe was never created and will never be destroyed (though of course changes all the time). But true-false, right-wrong, good-evil, good-bad etc exist, and exist objectively in the sense that they would apply to mankind’s deeds even after the extinction of homo sapiens…”
Hune’s question: “Did God say “thou shall not kill” because it is evil, or it is evil because God said “thou shall not kill”? Are ethical values in your view independent entities existing in nature much in the sense of physical objects?”
My answer: “Not really, nothing so complicated. I am much more simple-minded I am afraid. I only mean this: imagine a world in which homo sapiens is extinct (not hard to do really given the extinction of other species). Would it still be true in that world that 2+1=3 in normal arithmetic or that Adolf Hitler caused evil things? My answer is yes.”
Viz., “A simple note in ontology and epistemology”.
What I mean by saying the Universe was never created and will never be destroyed is merely that matter (the elements of the Periodic Table, Hydrogen etc) has always existed and will never not exist.
It is not impossible to imagine an integral defined between negative infinity and infinity of
x (matter)
and
dx (change in matter)
and if someone wished to define that integral
-∞∫∞ x dx
as Brahma, YHWH, God, Allah,
the Riddle may have come to be resolved.
[I do not use f(x) because I do not really wish to be mathematical but if you do please set f(x) = x].
We may then sail safely between the dogmatic and sceptical positions of Kaufmann and Freud that I contrasted in “An example each of dogmatism and scepticism in theology“:
Kaufmann is right to say there is existence but is wishful in assuming benevolence; Freud is right to deny the benevolence but cuts too thickly and denies existence.
I call my position “Non-Theistic” to contrast it with both the Theist and the Atheist — repeating once more that true-false, right-wrong, good-evil, good-bad etc exist, and exist objectively in the sense that they do not require the presence of homo sapiens.
Subroto Roy
November 7 2009, my father’s 94th Birthday.
Independent Indian: Work & Life of Professor Subroto Roy 