Is God a real *********?

[Breathe]

Surely if it wanted to communicate with us it would make its presence clear to everyone without a shadow of a doubt.

But that is desire to communicate, as opposed to existence, is it not? What if it does not? Or cannot - either due to its own inability to communicate with us, or our own inability to "hear" what it is saying?

Also, would not the idea of it making its presence clear to everyone, without a shadow of a doubt, infringe upon free will--if such a concept exists in the first place?

What would you consider as communication, also?

 

[Blackdog22]

But that is desire to communicate, as opposed to existence, is it not? What if it does not? Or cannot - either due to its own inability to communicate with us, or our own inability to "hear" what it is saying?

Also, would not the idea of it making its presence clear to everyone, without a shadow of a doubt, infringe upon free will--if such a concept exists in the first place?

What would you consider as communication, also?

I guess it depends on your definition of God. If God is a being that created us then the only reason we wouldn't be able to communicate with it would be because it didn't want us too.

If we are talking about the Abrahamic version of God then he has clearly spoken to his people before(so they say) and seems to have no problem with this communication.

As far as free will goes I would say knowing something exists then gives you a choice. That is all, it infringes not in the least on your free will. If a God wants a relationship with its people then it would make itself known. Since a conversation can only be done between two real beings, or someone on the verge of insanity.

 

[Breathe]

I guess it depends on your definition of God. If God is a being that created us then the only reason we wouldn't be able to communicate with it would be because it didn't want us too.

Would that not only be true for intelligent design and creationism?

If we are talking about the Abrahamic version of God then he has clearly spoken to his people before(so they say) and seems to have no problem with this communication.

That's the problem with the term God; it's so vague and it can refer to multiple things. Personally, when I use the word God, the Abrahamic God concept does not even enter into my mind - unless I specify otherwise. The Abrahamic God concept holds no special meaning to me at all, after all.

As far as free will goes I would say knowing something exists then gives you a choice. That is all, it infringes not in the least on your free will. If a God wants a relationship with its people then it would make itself known. Since a conversation can only be done between two real beings, or someone on the verge of insanity.

I suppose it depends; one can live his or her life without speaking to someone, even deliberately avoiding them and living like they do not exist. However - if you asked for example, someone who was not speaking to his father, "Is your father real?" would they say "I don't believe my father exists" for example? Would that not make one appear to be insane, more than someone the way it is now to believe in God?

Thoughts?

 

[sandy whitelinger]

OK. Morally it would be considered wrong to allow the consequences of suffering to arise if they can be avoided. That's my stance. Why? Because suffering causes both physical and mental harm and, having experienced both, I can safely say that it's something that I don't want to experience it if I can avoid it. Suffering is detrimental to us physically as it involves pain. Pain is your body's method of telling you that something is damaging you, so we have a natural aversion to pain or things that cause us pain.

So, if suffering (pain) can be avoided, then that could be deemed "right". Not alleviating pain when it is possible to do so could be deemed "wrong". Because we have a theory of mind, we know what a suffering person is experiencing and, naturally, we want to remove it. Empathy.

If this isn't a satisfactory answer for you, then can you expand your question please? You've said that so far no-one has answered your question - perhaps you need to give us a bit more to work with.

Finally an answer. Now where is the cut off point? Is some pain good? For example a tooth ache tells you something is wrong which needs to be fixed.

Can you be more specific as to what you mean by "mental harm?"

 

[ManTimeForgot]

Allowing suffering to occur, when it is not otherwise more beneficial in the long term to allow it to happen would indeed be immoral.


The problem that most people here don't seem to realize is just what sort of scope omniscience has. It is quite literally beyond us to even consider, so we really should stop trying. But to try and drive the point home consider these examples.


Moral "Crisis:" At age 4 your parents must decide (internally) whether or not to start abusing you as a child. (I say crisis because most humans would agree that there is nothing to consider; and for us mere mortals they would be right).

Now if you are not abused suppose then that you would grow up to be the next Hitler. However, if you are abused, then genetic engineering does not get developed for another 50 years beyond what it could have been.

Now we have to consider the weight of one child's suffering compared with the value of millions of lives and the millions possibly billions of lives lost that genetic engineering could have possibly saved.



An omniscient being knows instantly (has always known... really tricky dealing with infinite/absolutes here) which outcome prevents the most harm/derives the most benefit. At this point some would say: "I find it nearly impossible to believe that there are not any better alternatives to the path we are currently on." Point taken: but if some being were to start "optimizing" human progress whenever and however it chose, then we lack free will do we not? "But Jehovah intervened in the past." First off: Jehovah quite clearly is not omniscient as this being admits to making mistakes, but even if it were true that this being was "God," then just because something was done in the past no longer means that it is the least harmful/most beneficial option now (again omniscience is pretty far reaching ).


Trying to know the mind of "God" when it is billions of times (possibly infinite) smarter than any of us is so far beyond possible that to call it an exercise in futility doesn't do justice to the scope of how far beyond possible it really is. Do we know what the future holds? Do we know what happens on other planets? Do we know what happens in other dimensions (we could be affecting other sentient species right now)?

MTF

 

[work in progress]

But is that not because of our desire to anthromorphise God into something we can understand and relate to - having the same feelings as us, and so on? Perhaps this God is not sadistic, but it seems that way to us because we think of ourselves, and what we like or dislike. It doesn't necessarily mean this God is a sadist, just indifferent.

And what about natural evil? The Problem of Evil devotes all it's time to discussing human suffering, but doesn't address the fact that our natural world depends on an interactive system of disease and predation that is evil if we consider the suffering that most higher developed animals have to endure during their brief lives. The only way the natural system can be understood as not being evil, is if we accept that it is not designed by a creative higher mind. It's just life doing what it can to survive and produce offspring.

Things have to change, and things mutate as we know from evolution. These are laws of life; with life comes illness, pain and death, with death decay. To think that evolution would not throw these up simply because there was a Primal Cause, for example, seems a bit, well, pointless to me.

The benevolent attributes awarded to God in the modern western conception have a big problem explaining how an all powerful, all loving creator makes a world that depends on the natural processes we find in nature. God had no choice other than follow the evolutionary process apparently. Why would an all-loving God bother to make such a world to being with? Why not just stop at creating that perfect world in heaven?

It also implies that God is perfect, for example - which excludes the Demiurge God concept.

The demiurge is a creative way to bypass the problem of evil; but it is no more a valid explanation than the tendency of people to create apocalyptic myths during hard times to explain why their god isn't helping them, and give hope that the god is really concerned and will act in the future to give them everything they've been hoping for.

Is that because people cling to this illusion, though? Or people see themselves through an ego-lens. The ego hates change it cannot control. Does that become the causal factor?

The belief that the ego is a real thing apart from the physical body that generates it, is where the illusion begins.

 

[victormeldrew]

Trying to know the mind of "God" when it is billions of times (possibly infinite) smarter than any of us is so far beyond possible that to call it an exercise in futility doesn't do justice to the scope of how far beyond possible it really is. Do we know what the future holds? Do we know what happens on other planets? Do we know what happens in other dimensions (we could be affecting other sentient species right now)?

MTF

How do you know God is billions of times smarter than any of us? What makes you think he knows better than we do what is best for us?

You are giving us the 'God knows best, it's not for us to question him' argument, and it's not good enough.

I'm intelligent. I have experience of the world. I have a sense of right and wrong. Why is it futile for me to question the notion that the world has been created by an all-powerful God who loves me? Isn't it better to look for truth than be constrained by the archaic superstitions of the myth-makers?

Victor

 

[Breathe]

And what about natural evil? The Problem of Evil devotes all it's time to discussing human suffering, but doesn't address the fact that our natural world depends on an interactive system of disease and predation that is evil if we consider the suffering that most higher developed animals have to endure during their brief lives. The only way the natural system can be understood as not being evil, is if we accept that it is not designed by a creative higher mind. It's just life doing what it can to survive and produce offspring.

Is this not more of a problem for those who are creationists or follow intelligent design, as opposed to theistic and atheistic evolution where God did not decide on the way things are, but nature did?

Why would an all-loving God bother to make such a world to being with? Why not just stop at creating that perfect world in heaven?

Why would it? Maybe it simply didn't want to - if one believes in 'making a world' at all.

 

[work in progress]

Is this not more of a problem for those who are creationists or follow intelligent design, as opposed to theistic and atheistic evolution where God did not decide on the way things are, but nature did?

It is a problem for theistic evolution, if the assumptions are made that God is both loving and in full control of setting up the process. Unfortunately, the most prominent theistic evolutions around, such as Francis Collins and Ken Miller, do not discuss the issue. The only way out of all of the problems of evil for modern liberal Christians (or those with similar conceptions of God) is to propose some sort of Process Theology - where God is growing in awareness along with the Universe he created.

Why would it? Maybe it simply didn't want to - if one believes in 'making a world' at all.

Well, at least in the Western cosmological model, heaven is perfect and immortal, and full of perfect, immortal creatures. If goodness and perfection were prime objectives, creating an imperfect realm doesn't make sense.

 

[idav]

Well, at least in the Western cosmological model, heaven is perfect and immortal, and full of perfect, immortal creatures. If goodness and perfection were prime objectives, creating an imperfect realm doesn't make sense.

An imperfect realm from a perfect creator doesn't make sense in the first place whether it be heaven, hell or earth.

 

[Breathe]

It is a problem for theistic evolution, if the assumptions are made that God is both loving and in full control of setting up the process. Unfortunately, the most prominent theistic evolutions around, such as Francis Collins and Ken Miller, do not discuss the issue. The only way out of all of the problems of evil for modern liberal Christians (or those with similar conceptions of God) is to propose some sort of Process Theology - where God is growing in awareness along with the Universe he created.

It seems as though there is a blurry line between theistic evolution and intelligent design in your claim.

Well, at least in the Western cosmological model, heaven is perfect and immortal, and full of perfect, immortal creatures. If goodness and perfection were prime objectives, creating an imperfect realm doesn't make sense.

That's if, though, isn't it?

And also, that's Western (by which you mean Christian, and possibly Abrahamic religions as a hole) only. They don't really hold any real weight for me.

 

[ManTimeForgot]

How do you know God is billions of times smarter than any of us? What makes you think he knows better than we do what is best for us?

You are giving us the 'God knows best, it's not for us to question him' argument, and it's not good enough.

I'm intelligent. I have experience of the world. I have a sense of right and wrong. Why is it futile for me to question the notion that the world has been created by an all-powerful God who loves me? Isn't it better to look for truth than be constrained by the archaic superstitions of the myth-makers?

Victor

I'm trying very hard not to insult your intelligence, so I am going to assume that this response is pure unadulterated hubris on your part.


What part of "Extra-terrestrial being capable of understanding multiple spatial and possibly temporal dimensions with the power to create an entire universe" does not translate for you into "This being is phenomenally smarter than humans can ever aspire to be in their lifetime." Are you really so arrogant as to assume that somehow nothing can be beyond your imagination or that within our pathetically short lives of a hundred years that we can come to grasp the existence of a being that might have existed since before the Big Bang (assuming there even was a BB)? I guarantee you, there are humans that defy your conception right this very moment. The possibility that a multi-dimensional or pan-dimensional entity being within your ability to conceive was not a possibility that even remotely occurred to me.

Maybe you are a smart guy; I'm willing to give you credit and assume that you are book-learned and have a fair handle on some aspects of rationality (intellectually humility is probably lacking though). But we are cosmic infants: ants really. Our best models of how the universe was formed are so full of holes that to presume we are even close to understanding it is pure folly.

When anything is possible you have precisely zero knowledge. There are scores of variations on BBT out there, and that doesn't include all the non Bang theories out there. These are not things proposed by people without knowledge; these are all theories that some astrophysicist came up with. So at the very least they are largely consistent with the current body of knowledge. The "tests" for several of these are beyond our ability to experiment (how do you test whether or not in a trillion years the universe will collapse and you get another BB?).


If you decry religion's hubris for assuming that they have a great handle on life and the cosmos, then you have to not commit the same fallacy lest you become a hypocrite. Are you a hypocrite sir? I get the impression that you aren't or at least aren't trying to be.

It is a difficult pill to swallow to admit that you don't understand something that you love. Knowledge of the cosmos appeals to a great many people. But don't mistake the desire for knowledge for actually having that knowledge. I would be well and truly shocked if there were Not some fantastically powerful being out there somewhere beyond the bounds of space and time. But that isn't "God" to me, and even if it might technically qualify as a "god" if it were the intervening sort, the fact of the matter is that if there is such a being then it is not intervening in a way that we can detect experimentally. Prayers to "God" to win the lotto don't improve people's chances of winning. But on the flip side of things: Why should some cosmic insect think that it is important enough to warrant the attention of a greater cosmic being that possibly spans multiverses?

MTF

 

[victormeldrew]

I'm trying very hard not to insult your intelligence, so I am going to assume that this response is pure unadulterated hubris on your part.


What part of "Extra-terrestrial being capable of understanding multiple spatial and possibly temporal dimensions with the power to create an entire universe" does not translate for you into "This being is phenomenally smarter than humans can ever aspire to be in their lifetime." Are you really so arrogant as to assume that somehow nothing can be beyond your imagination or that within our pathetically short lives of a hundred years that we can come to grasp the existence of a being that might have existed since before the Big Bang (assuming there even was a BB)? I guarantee you, there are humans that defy your conception right this very moment. The possibility that a multi-dimensional or pan-dimensional entity being within your ability to conceive was not a possibility that even remotely occurred to me.

Maybe you are a smart guy; I'm willing to give you credit and assume that you are book-learned and have a fair handle on some aspects of rationality (intellectually humility is probably lacking though). But we are cosmic infants: ants really. Our best models of how the universe was formed are so full of holes that to presume we are even close to understanding it is pure folly.

When anything is possible you have precisely zero knowledge. There are scores of variations on BBT out there, and that doesn't include all the non Bang theories out there. These are not things proposed by people without knowledge; these are all theories that some astrophysicist came up with. So at the very least they are largely consistent with the current body of knowledge. The "tests" for several of these are beyond our ability to experiment (how do you test whether or not in a trillion years the universe will collapse and you get another BB?).


If you decry religion's hubris for assuming that they have a great handle on life and the cosmos, then you have to not commit the same fallacy lest you become a hypocrite. Are you a hypocrite sir? I get the impression that you aren't or at least aren't trying to be.

It is a difficult pill to swallow to admit that you don't understand something that you love. Knowledge of the cosmos appeals to a great many people. But don't mistake the desire for knowledge for actually having that knowledge. I would be well and truly shocked if there were Not some fantastically powerful being out there somewhere beyond the bounds of space and time. But that isn't "God" to me, and even if it might technically qualify as a "god" if it were the intervening sort, the fact of the matter is that if there is such a being then it is not intervening in a way that we can detect experimentally. Prayers to "God" to win the lotto don't improve people's chances of winning. But on the flip side of things: Why should some cosmic insect think that it is important enough to warrant the attention of a greater cosmic being that possibly spans multiverses?

MTF

You misunderstand my position, and the topic for discussion of this thread. The OP is posing the traditional 'Problem of Suffering' question, a conundrum which demolishes the archaic mono-theistic idea of an all-powerful God that cares about the fate of us 'cosmic infants'. That notion of a Creator is so petty and tiny-minded it would not be worthy of discussion were it not for the fact that many people have faith in the religions that have grown out of this idea. They hold their faith tenaciously in the face of all the evidence that we live in a cosmos that is astonishing and stranger than we can imagine.

You said 'God is billions of times smarter than us'. If you had said 'If there is a God (or Creator), he/she/it must be billions of times smarter than us,' I would not have taken issue.

Victor

 

[St Giordano Bruno]

As far I see it he is more of a ******** the farther back in history you go. The Mayan deities were also real ********* for demanding their believers to sacrifice their people on high alters atop stepped pyramids to appease them. Some references to the importance on human sacrifice are mentioned on the bible with Abraham's intention to sacrifice his son in the wilderness, so I should think one should not go too much farther back in history where a pre Abrahamic God demanded the ritual of human sacrifice every bit as blood thirsty as the deities of the Mayans.

 

[TheGodHypothesis]

That's why I believe in panentheistic Hinduism. It's the only way that God can exist and make sense based on this argument.

Why? The Theist can make sense of any absurdity or contradiction imagineable. They often do. Why are children raped and murdered every day? "God is mysterious!", Why did He allow 6 million jews to be slaughtered by the Nazi's? "Ours is not to question God, the suffering shall receive their reward in Heaven!". The Earth is 4 billion years old!, "No it's not, God caused the Radiometric clocks to cause perceived oldness!" They have a never ending answer to all manner or irrationalities in an attempt to maintain their faith.

 

[Breathe]

Why? The Theist can make sense of any absurdity or contradiction imagineable. They often do. Why are children raped and murdered every day? "God is mysterious!", Why did He allow 6 million jews to be slaughtered by the Nazi's? "Ours is not to question God, the suffering shall receive their reward in Heaven!". The Earth is 4 billion years old!, "No it's not, God caused the Radiometric clocks to cause perceived oldness!" They have a never ending answer to all manner or irrationalities in an attempt to maintain their faith.

Emphasis mine.

"The theist"? Is that all theists?

 

[work in progress]

An imperfect realm from a perfect creator doesn't make sense in the first place whether it be heaven, hell or earth.

Yes, this is the main thing I found unsettling about the "God's waiting room" sort of teaching I received many years ago. Having this world as a mere testing ground to determine everlasting paradise, or everlasting hell is absurd and unnecessary. If perfection is the most important thing, then why not just stop when you create the perfect realm?

 

[work in progress]

It seems as though there is a blurry line between theistic evolution and intelligent design in your claim.

Theistic evolution doesn't have a problem dealing with science. That's why most scientists and a lot of secular humanists don't want to bother challenging theistic evolution. But if the theistic evolutionist is an evangelical, like Francis Collins, and interested in promoting his religious beliefs in the public arena, he has to address the dilemma of proposing an all powerful and all loving creator with the harsh, brutal reality found in the natural world....and he doesn't! He has expressed some sort of very loose belief in moral progress of life in the Universe, but he doesn't present it as a scientific case, or address why there was such a nasty beginning for life.

That's if, though, isn't it?

And also, that's Western (by which you mean Christian, and possibly Abrahamic religions as a hole) only. They don't really hold any real weight for me.

No, but the problem with dealing with a lot of Eastern explanations is that they do an even better job of moving their religious claims away from objective scrutiny than Western theology does. If someone continually makes objections that we are misunderstanding your version of God and reincarnation, it's a futile exercise for anyone trying to do what's called The Outsider's Test of Faith, and see if it's a belief that can hold up to scrutiny when examined in relation to what we find in the natural world. This sort of moving and shifting around is often referred to as 'trying to nail jello to the wall."

 

[Breathe]

Theistic evolution doesn't have a problem dealing with science. That's why most scientists and a lot of secular humanists don't want to bother challenging theistic evolution. But if the theistic evolutionist is an evangelical, like Francis Collins, and interested in promoting his religious beliefs in the public arena, he has to address the dilemma of proposing an all powerful and all loving creator with the harsh, brutal reality found in the natural world....and he doesn't!

The second one sounds more like intelligent design than theistic evolution. Are you using the term too loosely?

No, but the problem with dealing with a lot of Eastern explanations is that they do an even better job of moving their religious claims away from objective scrutiny than Western theology does. If someone continually makes objections that we are misunderstanding your version of God and reincarnation, it's a futile exercise for anyone trying to do what's called The Outsider's Test of Faith, and see if it's a belief that can hold up to scrutiny when examined in relation to what we find in the natural world.

I don't actually get the point you're trying to make...

 

[AgreeToDisagree]

So what is the point of this life?

A omnipotent, omniscient, beneficent god could just erase this 'not-afterlife' and let all the good people live the nice afterlife.

God suposedly knows who the good guys are and also who the bad guys are, so why let people suffer? Why not go straight to the afterlife?

One cannot appreciate something before he experiences the opposite. A man may not appreciate his food as much unless he felt hunger (longing for food). Happiness will not be as happy if you don't feel sadness at first.

It is because of our free will that we can learn to appreciate. If God decides to take that free will, then we will be like mindless zombie.