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From: tim@cmu-cs-k.ARPA (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: net.religion.christian
Subject: Re: contruction/destruction
Message-ID: <285@cmu-cs-k.ARPA>
Date: Sun, 24-Feb-85 01:18:12 EST
Article-I.D.: cmu-cs-k.285
Posted: Sun Feb 24 01:18:12 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 27-Feb-85 07:04:30 EST
References: <1247@shark.UUCP> <253@cmu-cs-k.ARPA>, <732@bunker.UUCP>
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI
Lines: 68


 From garys@bunker.UUCP (Gary M. Samuelson) Thu Feb 21 09:36:40 1985
> > I have been rather puzzled lately by the messages concerning
> > destructiveness and constructiveness and suggesting that the former
> > is evil while the latter is good...
> >
> > Virtually all constructive activity requires a previous destructive act to
> > clear the way...
> > Take slum renovation, another constructive act.
> > First the old slum buildings have to be knocked down, destruction...
> >
> > The universe is a continual dance of construction and destruction, and it
> > was made thus by the Lord.  Destruction is no less good than creation, and
> > neither could exist without the other.
> >
> > Tim Maroney.
>
> Now I am puzzled.  Is this the same Tim Maroney who wrote "Even if I DID
> believe...", in which said Tim objected to the God of the Bible
> because of said God's destructive activities?  And this same person
> is now saying that destruction is good?  There appears to be an
> inconsistency here.

Perhaps there does if your major concern is contradicting rather than
comprehending.  Your twisting of my position is absurd.  I claimed that
neither creation nor destruction is good or evil in itself; you are saying I
claimed that all destructive acts are good.  Thou shalt not bear false
witness against thy neighbor....

> Opinion time: whether destruction is good or not depends on whether
> destruction is for its own sake, or for the sake of the anticpated
> construction.

That criterion fails.  When David Letterman smashes things in a hydraulic
press, he is doing it for its own sake, but it could hardly be claimed that
this is evil.  In fact, it's a lot of fun.  Destroying smallpox was good in
itself depite the fact that nothing was constructed to take its place.

> In each of Tim's examples in which destruction is held
> to be good, the destruction is good because it allows the construction
> to proceed.  Therefore, destruction is "less good" than creation, in
> that while creation may be viewed as good in and of itself, destruction's
> goodness is contingent.

No.  It is possible to create and have that be an evil.  For instance, if I
were to build an antimatter bomb capable of trashing the planet, that would
be evil.  If you were to destroy the antimatter bomb, that would be good,
despite the fact that you have no intention of creating anything.
Destruction's good is not necessarily contingent on a later creation; I just
used that as the most clear-cut example, and to show the interdependency of
the processes.

> Also, destruction cannot occur prior to creation, but creation can
> occur prior to destruction.  Before anything was created (if you
> accept the possibility of such a concept), it was possible only
> to create, not to destroy, since there was nothing to destroy.

Meaningless.  If there was nothing, then there was no one to perform any
creation.  If there was someone to perform creation, then there was
something that could be destroyed.
-=-
Tim Maroney, Carnegie-Mellon University Computation Center
ARPA:	Tim.Maroney@CMU-CS-K	uucp:	seismo!cmu-cs-k!tim
CompuServe:	74176,1360	audio:	shout "Hey, Tim!"

"Remember all ye that existence is pure joy; that all the sorrows are
but as shadows; they pass & are done; but there is that which remains."
Liber AL, II:9.