The virtues and the vices.

"They do not so much as know dice, or any such foolish mischievous games. They have, however, two sorts of games not unlike our chess; the one is between several numbers, in which one number, as it were, consumes another; the other resembles a battle between the virtues and the vices, in which the enmity in the vices among themselves, and their agreement against virtue, is not unpleasantly represented; together with the special opposition between the particular virtues and vices; as also the methods by which vice either openly assaults or secretly undermines virtue; and virtue , on the other hand, resists it." - Utopia, Thomas Moore

I need beta testers for Virtues and Vices. If you've played checkers and chess and have felt hatred, love, empathy, or ever lied then you probably already know how to play.

Problem of Evil, The Euthyprho Dilemma

[Some basic principles: This argument states most assumptions (God exists), if there are basic understandings that do not have arguments in the text it is the author's intent that they are already proven by another's far more convincing argument (Anselm, Kant, Decartes, et cetera). In the bottom section that tackles an absolute (G)ood and ethical (g)ood the author has used capital 'G' Good to identify the 'absolute Good' and a lower case 'g' good to represent ethical good to help make the text more obvious. Please point out any obvious fallacies and argue with gentlemanly determination the perspective, conclusive, and philosophical differences.]

There is an absolute Good and Bad

God exists

God exists outside of time

If God is God he is all powerful

If God exists outside of time then (inherently) good cannot exist outside of God

If God exists, God exists outside of time, God is all powerful, and good cannot exist outside of God, then either God is good or God created good.

It is bad to allow bad

God allows bad

If God is all powerful, God is good, it is bad to allow bad, and God allows bad, then God cannot be good (contradiction)

If God cannot be good then God created good

If and only if you can choose between good and bad then you have ethics

If ethics are absolute, and nothing conceivable that can exist can exist outside of God, then God created Ethics

If God created ethics and God is all powerful then God exists outside of Ethics

If God exists outside of time, God is all powerful, good cannot exist outside of God, God created good, it is bad to allow bad, and God is outside of ethics, then God is not bad and is not good.

If God created ethics, God exists outside of ethics, and God is not bad nor good, then God does not choose between good and gad.

It is necessary to have a mind to be all powerful.

It is necessary to choose an action if you have a mind.

It is necessary to exist to have good

If it is necessary to exist to have good, then it is bad to not exist

If it is bad to not exist, absolute bad would be to cease all existence

If God exists outside of time, God does not choose between good and bad, God is all powerful, God has acted, and God has not acted in absolute bad, then God acts in absolute good.

Therefore, God is outside of ethics, God wills good, ethics are outside of God's will.

If it is inherently good to reason

And to reason out right from wrong

…and that is what ethics is

And there is an absolute ethics (a non-relative good and bad)

And ethics defines right from wrong

And absolute ethics is good

Then ethics defines itself as good

Which is begging the question and therefore logically impossible if absolute ethics is logically possible.

Therefore there must be a higher understanding of good. An absolute Good.

If ethics is the understanding of the difference between good and bad
and thereby the definition of whether or not a certain thing is good or bad

Then ethics adheres to an absolute good.

If ethics are inherently good and it cannot define itself,
…so that an absolute good must define ethics as good, then it is good to create ethics (and therefore, it seems, to reason)

And God created ethics

Then God defines that absolute good.

If God defines it, and God is all powerful, and nothing existed before God,

then God alone is absolutely Good

and therefore absolute Good has always been and is indefinite other than saying it is God and vice versa, that God is Good. Not ethically good, but absolute Good.

Therefore, God is Good, God wills good and bad.

A foundation of my observing.

I, wisdom, was with the Lord when He began His work, long before He made anything else. I was created in the very beginning, even before the world began.

Proverbs 8:22-23

The scientific, the philosophical, the aesthetic, and the religious are the four major paths to human Understanding. Most couple these with each other, creating broader paths that encompass more senses and abilities, thus hopefully creating a fuller vision of the universe. All these paths seek to find that subtle secret song of the complete purpose of existence; this purpose which must have existed before there was something to have been purposed. It is in seeking this that one finds one’s self a magnificent portal of thought through which perception, discernment, understanding, and truth all come to focus in the first and final accretion, Wisdom.

'We all start from naive realism, i.e., the doctrine that things are what they seem. We think that grass is green, that stones are hard, and that snow is cold. But physics assures us that the greenness of grass, the hardness of stones, and the coldness of snow are not the greenness, hardness, and coldness that we know in our own experience, but something very different. The observer, when he seems to himself to be observing a stone, is really, if physics is to be believed, observing the effects of the stone upon himself.' – Albert Einstein

The Scientific splits into two correlating trails that often cross and join in their independent studies, the two being Pure Science and Applied Science. Pure science seeks the knowledge of facts of perception without bias for intent thus finding its individuality from applied science. Both adhere to a procedure that is avowedly, if not actually, objective, candid, and impersonal. The scientific path of understanding satisfies the one who is most interested in the world, laws, utilities, and structure of nature. The underlying principle of existence found in the study of Science speaks softly of a steady regularity and dependability. But the scientific mind understands that it can only hold so much of such a complete picture of nature’s facets.

The philosopher is in love with truth, that is, not with the changing world of sensation, which is the object of opinion, but with the unchanging reality, which is the object of knowledge. And is there anything more closely connected with wisdom than truth? (Plato, 380BC)

Philosophy is a comprehensive approach of intellect to form a concept of the world that will enable us to understand its whole significance. Philosophy’s intent is to form a body of thought that is reasonable and self-supportive and that correlates contributions from both science and experience. Its motive is a love for speculation that pushes it toward an intellectual harmony and satisfaction, by way of logic. Philosophy’s greatest power is its greatest flaw, imagination. Philosophical arguments seek to complete themselves with imagination when its more solid tools have broken upon the cliffs of ignorance. But in so doing great things have come to be, for imagination is based upon scientific observation and the knowledge of self both of which are some of the most solid forms of possible understanding available. So having seen similar cliffs erode over time due to certain circumstances, the human imagination might be able to formulate a picture of what this certain mystery would look like having eroded into new-found knowledge.

The truly cultured man sees in every bush a flaming world of loveliness and inspiration. –Karl R. Stolz

Art is a powerful approach to the universe when it is motivated by a search for beauty as a cherished value. The pinnacle of the aesthetic impulse is more than mere random genius; it is a vibrant aspiration for a real experience. Song, poetry, and beauty are instigators of emotion; they are the motivation of ideals. They incite hope, courage, grief, and all the rest of the spectrum, thus fueling the thoughts of self that form the basis of so much that we call experience. Every other approach to the identification and accumulation of Wisdom often finds itself referring to art as an explanation or representation of itself. The beauty of an atom, the coherence of a thought, and the eloquence of a novel all express the similarity of the pursuit of wisdom.