[tovej]

If we limit god to any god worth worshiping, i.e. one that prescribes a set of morals on their followers and answers the prayers of those who follow the god's morals, you would expect that the god has the same set of morals as their followers.

Unless the god is playing games with their creation, maybe studying them to see how they would respond. But even then, this would tell us something about the nature of a god. That they are not worth worshiping from a moral standpoint, since they aren't benevolent.

[breuleux]

Right. And considering the existence of natural disasters and horrible diseases, which conventionally moral humans would prevent if they could, the problem of evil is really about arguing the possibility or plausibility that if you were omniscient and omnipotent, you would see that there are in fact good reasons to allow natural disasters and horrible diseases. And if there are, well, maybe there are good reasons to torture babies as well. Who's to say, except God?

Plus, there is no real evidence that God rewards followers. A conventionally moral human, perhaps, would do so. But if you were omniscient, isn't it possible that you wouldn't? Instead, perhaps you would see that it is in fact best to reward sufferers and punish those who lived happy lives, regardless of their moral character. Or perhaps you would see that afterlives are entirely pointless. But it is difficult to take these considerations seriously without degrading one's motivation to worship, so they generally aren't.

[Animats]

If we limit god to any god worth worshiping

Which is the underlying problem here. That article is about the Abrahamic model of a god, even though it doesn't say so. Omnipotent and perfect - that's the Abrahamic model, underlying Jewish, Christian, and Islamic religions.

The Graeco-Roman pantheon was a better fit with reality - a group of morally mediocre gods with their own agendas, mostly indifferent to what the mortals were up to. The transition to the Abrahamic religions resulted in a lot of cruft - devils, angels, prophets, etc. A legacy code problem, in other words.

[pmoriarty]

"The Graeco-Roman pantheon was a better fit with reality - a group of morally mediocre gods with their own agendas, mostly indifferent to what the mortals were up to."

It is a better fit in terms of The Problem of Evil, but it raises a different problem: What happened to them?

They seem to have been conquered by the other major religions and pretty much disappeared.

So the world's not really a good fit for them either.

[tovej]

Yeah, a sort of bargaining form of religion does impose fewer moral conditions on the gods. Things like the Graeco-Roman gods, old folk religion, Norse mythology, Egyptian mythology, etc. seem more like rationalizations of nature and the struggles of the human condition.

Much better model. Gods don't care about your mortal life, gods are just selfish powers that you can cajole into helping you.

[nine_k]

> maybe studying them to see how they would respond

Have you ever looked at the Book Of Job [1]?

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Job#Contents

[tovej]

Yeah, that's pretty much what I'm talking about. I would argue that whether or not the set of morals that god expects Job to follow are the ones that god considers good and correct makes a difference here.

If they aren't, god is not worth worshiping. If they are, at least god is consistent, and may be worth worshiping if he exists.