global warming

Why would God "punish" innocents?

These things happen on a depressingly regular basis, so if they are 'punishment', God metes it out on a seasonal basis, at least the weather-related ones. Plate tectonics explains the earthquakes, so unless something is causing mankind to sin in sync with plate tectonics, I don't think that punishment from a deity can explain them.

These are both what you would generally call natural disasters. The only argument that one could feasibly make that either are NOT natural would be that global warming has, in recent years, caused an increase in intensity of weather related disasters (i.e. mankind is to blame). Regarding "God": I don't think that there is any God, nor do I think that this would be a punishment if there was one (since most of the people harmed would not have deserved the punishment). From an atheist stand point, regarding the question that most theists would ask: "Why would God punish the innocent people in Burma/China?" there would only be two answers: 1) God works in mysterious ways. (or some other rationalization) 2) God does not exist, these things happened because of tectonic movements/ changes in the earth's climate I don't want to sound too dogmatic, but to me, answer 2) seems to be a lot more plausible, i.e. it can be backed up by facts that are extremely hard to deny (unless one closes ones ears and sings loudly to oneself)

They are routine phenomena that have been occurring since well before humans were around and they will be happening long after we are gone.

I think they are a direct result of human-induced climate change, sometimes erroneously labeled as "global warming." Weather extremes are a direct result of our actions.

From logic perspective,I think the global warming has started to show it's lead to chaos progress.Today's disasters are becoming worse with more damages and impacts. When you are saying is it a punishment from God?I would really want to consider it as somehow:yes. I'm Indonesian,last time Tsunami damaged our eastern city,Aceh with the most victims recorded.But honestly,people should realize that..last time this city had caused conflicts:military for independence movement(formally),and race racist(informally). Other Tsunami locations in other country: places in Thailand (prostitution), India,Maldives and Sri Lanka (military conflict) now..comes Burma(I really hate the Burmese military Junta that are making genocide killing of Karen Tribe and againts human right) We never expect disaster to happen.. but we must ask and ask:why these extreme disasters hit this conlicted areas..? if its God'will then u ask why God kill innocent people? I think anyhow it is still at least God's way of response since we don't know if:the conflicted areas victims(Burma)prefer to die at once instead of being raped,being killed,being tortured by the military dictator. thx