The God Question

I did mention the dictionary.

 

Oh i read it that he was saying he put 'o' between o and d to get God, but that he had mistakenly written 'o' instead of 'g', and i was saying that it should be 'd' between o and d to get odd - just being silly, but i misread it anyway, so not important.


On another note I just looked up the the census for my country and found bizarrely that only 1/3 of people describe themselves as having no religion, whereas Christianity comes up on top and I don't know any people who go to church and I'm sure the figures of attendance at churches is no where near as high as the number of people who say they're Christian. So I guess for quite a lot of people it's a hope rather than a belief because surely if you believed you could live forever in a paradise going to church for an hour on a Sunday doesn't seem too bad.

 

This is referred to as the difference between emic and etic data. There is always going to be a gap when one compares the information given by asking people about something (emic) and the information gleaned by observing the people instead of asking them (etic.)

Emic data is always going to lean toward an established ideal concept. Etic data does not do this, but also does not provide the reasoning behind given actions.

 

Logic is how we derive conclusions from the basic assumptions. The basic assumptions are the foundations of faith.

Where do we go after death? Nowhere, in my faith. We have the time between when we are born and when we die to make a difference in the universe. Nor is this unique to atheism - some forms of Judaism take a similar view.

What is our purpose? To contibute to the greater good. Again, I don't need a guiding intelligence to light that path.

Too many people reject atheism as a religion, because of a narrow definition that assumes that faith is absent if our beliefs don't include a supernatural being. In truth, we are more alike than different.

And Wrey, I do believe an understanding of different systems of belief can contribute greatly to writing. After all, you may have characters whose faiths differ from your own, and you want to represent them fairly. An important character in my NaNoWriMo story is a devout Christian. I would not wish him to be a caricature.

 

Oh, I agree. It just seems that the forum has gotten a bit bogged down in these somewhat more controversial threads is all.

 

Very true, but this time it was the election day threads that ended up being the salt on raw nerves. For once, we have a religion thread that is managing to stay pretty civil.

 

I’m religious. I just don’t believe in religion.

I think eastern religions, like Buddhism, make more sense in two ways than do the religions of the Book. One: if there is a super intelligent being without possessing the follies of man, than there would be no need to worship It, for It would have no need for praise. It would not have those human desires. Two, though in Buddhism there is a non-personal power that saturates the universe, It is not the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and end. It involves circular time, which fits best since matter and energy cannot be destroyed, and the higher power is simply there, residing behind the scenes.

Science may soon be put into the religious category. Global Warming has taken on an almost religious quality. It is a political tool that threatens to turn scientists into prophets.

That’s my spin anyway. Call me an atheist, agnostic, or existentialist, but I think mankind is in its infancy and has no idea what the things around it are or mean.

 

I’m going to try a different approach here by linking up some comments in a non-linear frame due to their similarities to one another.

This raises all sorts of theological conundrums here most notably about god being all-virtuous. Being virtuous means having the ability and the will to overcome the things that could harm you or destroy you (amongst other things as well). Now if god is supposed to be perfect and infinitely indestructible, and he came down from heaven in the guise of Jesus, and Jesus was crucified, it pretty much makes the crucifixion irrelevant unless Jesus went through complete destruction. And if he was killed, then he as god cannot really be divine. If he is, then he cannot really be all-virtuous, making the crucifixion pointless and very much contradictory seeing as it wasn’t a real form of destruction. If it was a mortal death of Jesus/god, it then makes his supposed immortality a non-point concerning divine retribution. So that Christian standard you are applying when it comes to being forgiven for sins is actually something telling that, if Jesus existed, then he MUST have been mortal. And if he is/was mortal, then this whole business of sinning and its repercussions is strictly and solely ONLY within the human natural realm, so god/divinity/faith are not concepts that can be applied with the nature of sin and forgiveness.

And if original sin is part of the whole christian ethos, and we are all supposed to be born sinners instead of originally having chosen to sin (which we apparently haven’t chosen because it was the work of Adam And Eve), then it makes no sense whatsoever for Jesus to die for our sins. This would of course assume that Jesus himself would’ve chosen to be executed in some sort of clever “plan”. If not, then the reasons for him having been executed have nothing to do with forgiving our sins but were done for something else entirely not relating to sinning at all.

Then he must be infallible if he can create any standard of existence for the universe he wants and at his whim and thereby making his standard for the existence of the universe changeable if he so desires if he is omnipotent.
If he cannot set any standard for the conditions of the existence of the universe that he wants, and unable change it at his whim, then he is not infallible.
If he is not infallible then, by an admission of his fallibility, standards for the existence of the universe would have to be set by a power greater than him if not the universe itself.

I’ve never actually heard it said that way before but it’s the way I originally thought of it when watching the film Minority Report and the whole psychic angle thing just didn’t make any sense. Someone behind the script and the cameras certain wasn’t paying any attention!

I think the original interpretation was – If god is omnipotent can he create a rock so heavy that even he can’t lift it? If not, then he’s not omnipotent, and therefore he’s not god. If he can create the rock, but by definition of the question he can’t lift it, then he’s not omnipotent, and therefore he’s not god.
Anyway you look at it, omnipotence is completely impossible. If omnipotence is required for the conditions of god’s existence, and omnipotence is already completely impossible, then god cannot exist. If omnipotence is not a trait needed for a god to exist, and if therefore a god can exist without it, then not being all-powerful means there’s no need to worship such an entity or hold such an entity in reverence. (And I think this is where deism comes into it somewhere.)

When people make the claim that logic cannot be applied to god, or that god is beyond human finite consciousness, I think it’s being extremely disingenuous and placing a contradictory standard because if god is supposed to be beyond us then where is the need to even bother with him at all?

And if god told her not to eat the fruit, but knew already that she would but did nothing, then he is also the perpetrator for the pre-existing conditions of her original sin which he would already have had to put in place long before she did anything. Her intent was put into her. And how would Eve know what "wrong" even meant, seeing as god NEVER mentioned anything about wrong or if she hadn't yet eaten fruit from the tree? Neither Adam nor Eve would’ve had any knowledge of right and wrong before eating from the tree.

If Eve's act was evil, then she was in some way "evil" (or a “sinner”) before committing the act. So how did she get to be a sinner? Did god make her that way? She couldn't have made herself that way, since doing so would be an act of evil/sin as well, ad infinitum.
There has to be a "sinful" consciousness prior to committing a "sinful" act. If eating the forbidden fruit was a sinful act, then Eve was a "sinner" prior to committing it. If it was NOT an act of sin, then the punishment is unjust.
If Adam and Eve did not possess an evil (sinful) nature prior to committing the act, then the act was not itself evil/sinful. You cannot unwittingly commit an act of evil, and then become evil because you did something you didn't know was wrong.
Also, no human being has the ability to "pass on" their sinfulness to their offspring. Heredity is not something a human being can choose, therefore god would be required to make this arrangement. And why would god want each and every person to be born a sinner if he is not malevolent?

If logic is deemed by theists to be finite, then my suspicion is that theists themselves are the ones limiting the conditions and logical understanding of things by boxing themselves into this proverbial corner.

I can’t see how any of that is a refutation of what you’re responding to. What you’re responding to are the conditions that even we can’t change but it would need to take an act of god to affect change in our circumstances that we are powerless to do anything about because he has put us in this un-winnable situation. If he hasn’t put us here in this situation where unconquerable evil etc exists, then there’s no need for a “relationship” with him.

But it was never our choice to sin in the first place. I can’t see why anyone should apologise for something that they had no choice in.

And this is what I meant previously about god being arbitrary. If logic cannot be applied to god, then he is illogical. And if he is illogical, there’s really no reason suggest to infallibility of such a deity.

This is called sympathy. This is what happens within the human condition when you come to see people as people instead of property, or “things”. And existence of sympathy, and expression of such, is evidence for the existence of sympathy, not god.

 

In response to people asking what's the use of this thread. You either:

A. Don't believe in God, and thus this thread is to justify your belief, or lack thereof. You want to live through life being a "good" person, and make the most out of it.

B. Do believe in God, and thus this thread is to justify you belief. You believe that God exists, and thus, is the center and most important part about life.

C. Are not sure, and are looking for some answers from us intelligent forum-goers.

I believe this is a useful thread.

 

AMEN! (Or is that not a good way to agree? Hmmmm.)

 

In addition to those reasons there is also simple curiosity as to what others believe nad why. There is the oppotunity to share someone that is important to you with others in a safe open discussion. There is the opportunity to learn about other faiths as well as more about ones own as different interpretations or historical information are presented. There are lots of resons beyond trying to justify ones beliefs or seeking help in finding belief.

As for helping with writing, characters' religions (both the current and the one in which raised) have significant impact on characters' actions and motivations. It is important to understand what real people off different belief systems are like to avoid making characters into stereotypes. I think it is very healthy both as a writer and as a person to get to know people with different beleifs. It improves me as a writer and as a person.

 

All attempts of analyzing god logically eventually boil down to a endless loop of contradiction. Either he can do this or he's not god, or he can do it but by some means doing it makes him not good. In turn this itself contradicts his own supposed nature. It's why we can't disprove his existence or prove it. Attempting to do so either way is a pointless and fruitless endeavor.

As for the question of why bother with him: Just because we can't fully comprehend him doesn't mean we have to ignore him. If he exists and is as the Bible describes him he's been going around the world for a long time. Wether we want anything to do with him or not, he obvious wants something to do with us, and would appear to have the power to manipulate the world as he pleases to that end.

You don't need a sense of right and wrong to understand cause and effect. God said eat it = death. She knew nothing of right or wrong but usually when we're told something will kill us we have a tendency to avoid it regardless. They had no knowledge of good or evil prior to eating the fruit, but ultimately you don't need that sense to be told not to do something because there is a consequence. Animals would essentially lack a concept of good or evil, but they still know that when people are around they might want to stay away because they know that people don't always bode well for them.

It is a good question why God did nothing to stop the event. I would think of it like the cookie jar. You know that if you leave it out a kid might get into it and snag a cookie before dinner time, but you leave it out anyway. Why? Too see if they do take a cookie and then you have too teach them something about eating dessert before dinner. That's how I look at it anyway...

I've heard other reasons for it though but most of them make little sense to me.

She wasn't a sinner. Sin began when the serpent tricked her into eating the fruit of the tree, and by which she ignored what she'd been told. You don't have to be evil to do evil. A 4 year old could murder a man by accident. Murder is always a bad no matter how you look at it, but the child doesn't need to understand the good/evil scale to commit the act. Now is the child evil? No. We don't punish them because they can't understand the act or at least appreciate the consequences and we decide not to hold them accountable (God is apparently a lot more strict than we are XD).

Maybe in terms of a legal system. But like I said. I could say, leave a screw lose on a catwalk while I go out for lunch. While I'm gone someone walks on the catwalk and dies because the walkway collapses. Now at most for me that's negligent homicide. I didn't meant for that person to die, I was going to eat before finishing my work. But ultimately I did kill someone, whether I'm punished for it or not. Murder is murder, stealing is stealing, ignorance of somethings nature does not absolve one of consequences.

This only applies to Original Sin in that because Adam and Eve ate the fruit all their offspring are born with the knowledge of good and evil, and thus they all have to deal with that problem.

Actually I think that's what it is. Faith is the universal trump card for someone who chooses to believe in something that inherently makes no sense from out view of reality. It's perfectly suited as something that can never be disproven, but itself cannot prove anything. Hence Eternal Catch-22.

I took the poem as being something attacking god from the point that he's suppose to be good but does nothing to solve those problems. I guess you intended something different by it that I missed. Looking back I think I see where I lost track of what you meant so sorry for wasting your time with a pointless statement.

Everything is a choice.

In a human sense this is perfectly reasonable but since the idea is that god is illogical in that he can't be analyzed logically but is still god it's flawed reasoning. This is why logically discussing god always boils down to endless loops of contradiction and getting no where as one side always has "faith" to fall back on but cannot use that fall back to refute the logic.

Like I said, 57 more years and I'll know the answer (hopefully I won't die early XD).

 

I think we generally agree on this, but misunderstand one another.

I am talking about logic in the most fundamental sense, not the axioms or theorems based on axioms. Proof cannot be disputed if you maintain the axioms. The axioms needn't be maintained though, as you describe. However, there is a distinct difference between axioms we choose and logic itself. Logic must be conserved. Mathematics doesn't exist without it.

I believe very strongly that logic holds with or without the human mind to conceive of it. Axioms are entirely arbitrary. I agree with you here - all I claim is that logic must always hold. If we cannot count on logic as a sort of innate ladder of truth, we cannot count on anything. It cannot be proven wrong. If it were wrong it would not be logical.

so in short.... yes, mathematics are devised by us. the language, the axioms are ours. but our base assumption that the world operates logically cannot be disproven. To disprove logic, you are still using logic, thereby refuting your own argument. Do you see what I am saying? We must accept this as our only sense in the dark, in a way. Everything can be built from there on... it is human error or misinterpretation if mathematical systems end up to be proven incorrect. But PROOF cannot be disproven, just because of the nature of the thing. You can say "these axioms don't fit", and then of course your mathematical system will be proven wrong by the wonderful beauty of the natural world. But in that case, your axioms are inappropriate, and ultimately, your proof is invalid.

anyways, I see what you are saying. I guess we share differing concepts of logic vs. mathematical interpretation.

 

That's exactly what I'm talking about, though. Your saying you're an atheist doesn't tell me anything about you, but the rest of your post does. 'Atheist' just describes the path you have not taken, but the rest of your post begins to describe the path you have. I find that stuff much more interesting.

 

well, Jesus came down from heaven in a form of a human. so it is natural for Him to die. by complete destruction, what do you mean? do you mean destruction as in nothing else of His existence is supposed to remain anymore? in christianity, even for humans it is impossible. the flesh is only a shell for our soul/spirit to reside in while we are on earth. if we die, it is only the flesh that die, by no means is our soul/spirit destroyed.

Jesus is not only divine, He is also human. they are not mutually exclusive. how can He do that? i don't know. He is God. so the process of how it actually can be done is beyond our knowledge and understanding.

the whole thing about sinning and its consequences does not apply to only the human realm. if we die we have to answer for our actions in another realm.

say for example, you build a house, just like how God created the universe and everything. if your son wreak havoc in his room, does it mean you only punish him while he is inside his room? no. when he came out, you are still going to punish him, no matter where he is, be it in the kitchen or the guest room. the same for us. the human realm is only a part of the creation, just like how a room is inside of the house.

may i ask, how do you think he suddenly manage to see people as humans instead of property when all the while he had been seeing them as commodity? even if he suddenly see it that way, there would be no reason for him to write a song to praise God, right?

of course you are right. as long as we live and use the earth resources, i see a need to contribute back. but the question is, how are you going to do that?

some people view their life as full of meaning when they go to 3rd world countries to help out. some see helping out in the local hospital as meaningful. of course i am not saying it is wrong.

for those of us who believe in God, we believe our abilities and skills, intelligence and environment are given to us. so how do we best use our abilities? if everyone is contributing to the local hospital, God wouldn't give us all different abilities. he would have created 10 Mr X instead of 1 Mr A, 1 Miss B, 1 Mr C, 1 Miss D and so forth.

as to where to we go after we die. you see, we don't believe in darwin. no offence to darwin supporters, but the process of single cell organisms to water creatures to land animals and monkeys to humans just don't seem right. we are different from animals in that we know what we are doing and we can think. our brain is made up of cells, and in my personal opinion i don't think a mass of cells is capable of forming logic. that's why i believe there is a God. and that we have a soul/spirit. and now if there is a God, when we die where do our soul go to? i don't think it turns back to dust. it has to go back to where it came from - God. of course, this is my own opinion, as a christian.

erm, don't you think it will be too late by then to realize that there is a God?

 

Oh I believe there is one. I've seen what I would consider evidence in my own life that there's something looking out for me that can't be explained. But that doesn't change the fact that faith can only take you so far towards being absolutely sure before you hit what I'd call mental disorders. I think he's out there and I live by that belief, but I still can only be so sure (I put it at about 95% sure for me). I'll find the other 5% once the I get there. Sorry, I'm a skeptic by nature (as Ironic as that may sound) so it's hard for me to take something and call it absolute.

 

This might be a bit staticy...

We don't gain a new life on heaven, we gain a new life on earth, at the second coming. The kingdom of heaven is to be build on earth. I think this is more plausible from what has been said in the bible.

The whole trinity, 3 beings being one doesn't make sence. There are plenty of biblical quotations which clearly state seperate beings. Hence my belief against the trinitarian teachings.
Getting to the quotation, What your saying is that God being Jesus meant he sufferered which leads to the idea that God had to be Jesus to suffer. No. God did suffer, as he had to watch his own son die.

What actually makes its more powerful is that God sacrificed his own son for us.

A further query; do you actually know this, does it actually say in the bible that they didn't know about good and evil, morals of whats right and wrong?

rm

 

if you read the Bible, the earth and the heavens now would no longer be around. there will be a new earth and a new heaven. (Revelations chapter 21). it did say the Holy City came down from heaven though. i cannot really say for sure how the new system would be like. but i always believed that humans go to either heaven or hell after they die.

although it didnt say specifically in the Bible, the closest thing that serves as the proof is, 'but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, ... '

 

I guess I should've clarified that I was stating Catholic doctrine. From what I posted it looks like it's something all Christians believe, which, as you illustrate here, is not the case, as many Protestant denominations vary widely in their theology of the Trinity.

 

I was raised by a Lutheran mother, but we didn't go to church regularly. I spent my high school years going to a youth group at a Bible Church where they took their faith from a fully literal translation of the Bible. In college I hung around with the Baptists a bit and took Far Eastern Religion and The Pyschology of Religion.

After all of this, I tended to think there was a god, or at least a supreme power, but I was having trouble resolving my Christian upbringing with my belief that other religions are valid as well. Then I read The Celestine Prophecy. It talks about the life force of nature that is in every living thing. It talks about Christ, Muhammed (sp?), and Buddha having all been humans who reached the highest state of enlightenment (the tenth insight, in the book's terms).

After many years, I still tend more toward the beliefs set forth in The Celestine Prophecy. I believe that God is not truly in human form. I believe that we put God in human form to better understand it. I believe God is in all things, a living energy that connects all of us, the animals, and the plants. I believe that prayer works to a certain degree, but more because it is a sending of positive energy to those you pray for (this is based on readings I've done of scientific studies about prayer and healing).

As for your own spiritual quest, I believe that everyone's spirituality is ever evolving and part of a journey that is very personal. For me, I've found reading books on religion (traditional and new age) is very helpful. I wish you good luck on this quest.

 

hmm according to buddhism the buddha certainly gained enlightenment and became a divine being from human. i don't know much about islam so i cannot say anything much. for christianity you got it wrong. Jesus was a divine being from the very first, took on a human form, and then went back to being a divine being again.

i am curious about why you think this way. if we pray for someone and it worked to a certain degree it meant we are sending positive energy to the people we pray for. but doesnt it also mean if we continually hate a person we are also sending negative energy to that person? it seemed to me you are saying our thinking/determination can directly affect a person to a certain degree without having us do anything. forgive me if i interpret wrongly.

 

I'm a Christian, but I don't discount evolution. There's overwhelming evidence to support it. Who's to say that God didn't create life this way? There is also a "missing link" between the most evolved form of human-like primates and humans that no scientist has been able to find. Maybe there wasn't any, it was God speeding things up and finally making us human. I see nothing wrong with evolution.

 

That's about the one thing almost everyone I know agrees upon. The don't seem to take that literal 'earth-is-6000-years-old' kind of thing. They go to church, read the bible, etc. But they don't deny science.

Then, how do you explain that drugs affect our reasoning? If the spirit is the one forming logic, and the spirit is not physical, how do you explain this? I'm serious, not provocative.

 

This may have already been mentioned, but I don't know, I haven't taken the time to read this whole thread.

But I do understand Pastafarianism.
That, I have taken the time to study, and believe it is something that anyone with any religious beliefs should study too, especially if they are judgemental towards other religions.

Ramen.

 

I knew the flying spaghetti monster would pop up!