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Rehash god/proof debate

A Vestigial Mote

Well-Known Member
Why wouldn't proof be how it chances a person's life and not something explained objectively?
Whatever it is that "changed a person's life" in the way you are describing would necessarily be a very subjective thing. It isn't "proof" of anything, really. At least not something that can be effectively shared with others. When I think of "proof", I think of something that is accessible to anyone/everyone, and is not dependent on a particular person's views/thoughts/ideas/etc. That's not what "spiritual evidence" tends to be. It tends to very much be something that is applicable/accessible only to a small subset of people - or, in many cases, just one person.

If something changed your life profoundly, would you use logic to verify your experiences, or?
I would understand it to have been something that changed my subjective perception, and my perception alone. I definitely wouldn't expect to be able to share it with others and expect that it have the same effect on them. I mean... thinking that way is borderline lunacy in my opinion.

As an example, let's say I discover wood-carving, and I develop this huge passion for it. I get really good at it, and can carve the most intricate things, and I begin selling these things for very high prices, and make tons of money doing something I love. Someone comes along and says to me: "I am not happy with my life, and you seem to be so happy. What is it that makes this so?" And I say "Have you tried wood-carving? It can change your life." Does this seem like a sound/proper/intelligent prescription to give to this person? Might there not be other factors involved that would influence whether or not wood-working in particular was a good "fit" for them? Whether or not it would change their life in the same way it did mine? This is pretty much exactly how I see religious views and attempts to share. If it is so easy to see how one vocation in this sense might not work out for everybody, nor have the same effects on their "life," then why is it so hard to set aside such silly notions for "religion" or "spiritual" practices?
 

Clara Tea

Well-Known Member
TRUST VS. FAITH:

I argue that trust and faith are almost identical. Many theists claim that faith is about God, not other types of trust, and it is unconditional.

Atheists don't want to believe one thing without proof, or they would have to believe all things without proof (Santa, tooth fairy, leprechauns, and Fred Flintstone (which we know is a made-up story because it is a cartoon)).

Yet, almost everyone believes without proof (just not necessarily in God).

When we cross a street, we have trust that cars will stop. Do they always? Well, there are accidents (and intentional murders with cars). Yet, if we didn't have faith in motorists, we couldn't get near streets.

We have to have trust that when we pay for groceries, the store will actually let us leave with them.

If we have no trust, it would be very unwise to leave our homes. To venture forth among other people is to trust that they won't pull a knife or gun on us. In some neighborhoods, that is a real concern. Yet people carry on with their lives, and seldom do they ask for absolute proof that they are safe.

THE GOOD OF RELIGION:

Religion gives theists guts to carry on. As theists murder others in wars (against God's commandment not to), they carry crosses or figurines of Jesus with them (if Christian). This is what keeps their spirits up as they march through swamps, get bitten by disease ridden mosquitos (God made the swamps, the mosquitos, and the diseases, presumably), and they pray to Jesus (whom humans nailed to a cross until he was dead as his father, God, looked on, not intervening as his son was tortured to death.

Christ's death was to absolve our sins....yet, many don't think that they sinned. Was merely being born a sin, when we consider that it was an act of our parents, not us?

The death of Jesus was not Jesus's idea (Jesus asked God....why hath thou forsaken me....which was a restatement of a psalm).

So, the death of Jesus must have been God's idea. It was presumably payment to forgive sin. Why couldn't God merely forgive without demanding a sacrifice? Isn't God the most powerful entity in the universe, capable of doing anything....yet not powerful enough to forgive?

Why do we pay for the sins of Adam and Eve?

When someone loses a child, they pray to God for solace....is that really God on the other end who hears their prayers? Why did God let the child die in the first place?

When someone is chased by a bear, isn't it God's bear? Should we thank God if we manage to barely escape (maybe missing an arm)?

Is God a loving God? Was he loving when he flooded the world or allowed people to die of diseases without answering their prayers while in agony?

Some people use God as a deterrent to crimes. Yet, others believe that God will forgive them for anything, so they might as well commit crimes and do other sins. For example, most people who graffiti are Christian gang members. Another example, the Mafia is highly religious, and attend church regularly.

Are theists less prone to crime than atheists? Reverend Jim and Tammy Fay Bakker were criminals who stole food from staving Africans so they could enjoy their mansion. Obviously, some theists are still criminals despite their belief in God (if, indeed, they every believed).

EFFECTS OF TAKING AWAY RELIGION:

I would not want to take away a Betsy Wetsy Doll from a small child who loves it. I know that she would cry, because she loves it. It isn't real, but I would not have the heart to force her to admit it.

Why, then, would anyone try to take away religion from someone who uses God as a crutch? They need that crutch to get through life without crying.

So, even though it seems ludicrous to watch a theist believe, it would be heartbreaking to burst their bubble. So what if they roll on the floor and babble incoherently, and insist that they are talking to God in God's own tongue (language). So what if they believe that they should die a natural death if they have a disease that could spread to others. They claim that it is God's will, and God will take care of it.

President Ronald Reagan sold arms to all sides of the Middle East, and gave away the best and most advanced planes that we had to Egypt. He (like Reverend Jimmy Swaggart) believe the bible's prediction of war starting in the Middle East, and that the whole world will be destroyed as a result. So, like Dr. Strangelove who was enamored of a nuke, President Reagan believed in being a catalyst (the cause) for global destruction.

So what if theists want to destroy the world so that their greedy little souls will rapture to heaven? That's their business (taking us with them to death....but non-believers will go to hell). They are fine sending sinners to hell.
 

It Aint Necessarily So

Veteran Member
Premium Member
What proof do nonbelievers (to whom this question is appropriate) want for god?

What do you have?

I don't think that you can do better than demonstrate that a superhuman force exists, not that it is supernatural or created the universe. I like to discuss how science has already ruled out the god of the creationist god of the Christian Bible that wants to be known, understood, believed, obeyed, worshiped, etc.. If a falsifying finding overturned the theory of evolution, there is no other way to account for the mountains of what could then only be understood as deceptive evidence planted in the geologic strata and nesting biological hierarchies to make it seem that evolution had occurred when in fact it was an act of creation. I mention this because even then, you would not know that you had uncovered evidence of a god, since naturalistic explanations have not been ruled out, such as an alien species that was the result of abiogenesis and evolution on its own planet, and now was godlike in power.

The Intelligent Design people had the same problem. Even thought they claim to have been looking for an intelligent designer and not necessarily a god, had they found intelligent design, they never would have considered a naturalistic explanation for it such as the one I have suggested.

So given that, it may be impossible to prove that an entity is supernatural and a universe creator even if it is.

I get the impression that the theist think that skeptics need to lower their standards for belief if there is nothing that is convincing evidence of a god to those skeptics by those standards. Many of the comments I read suggest that we're merely looking for ways to bat off proofs of God, or that we had a bad experience with religion and are being irrational and unreasonable, that we should just believe their subjective reports of a god because that's how they understand the experience.

Then we tell you that our standard for belief is evidence better explained by positing the existence of a god (or any other thing - evidence of unicorns is evidence best explained by the existence of unicorns), and that no such thing exists, but that answer is dismissed out of hand. Surely the skeptic is playing some mind game, right? Nope. Our minds are conditioned to be unable to deny what the senses and reason convincingly reveal to it, and these specious arguments and second-hand experiences just aren't convincing to a mind willing and able to evaluate a compelling argument and be convinced by it.

What is god to you that you'd say its imagination?

Imagination in this context refers to ideas in the head that were created there rather than by experiencing something outside the mind. We can also imagine things that we have previously experienced, but that's not what's meant here. Is there an objective moral code out there that man can discover with his mind and senses, or is it just something imagined to exist. Is there really a god out there, or is it only imagined to exist? Does sin exist outside of the minds of men, or have they merely imagined that it does? When a believer tells me that he has mental experiences that he interprets as a received signal from some external source separate from himself, why should I rule out that he isn't just imagining that that is what his experience represents?

you can challenge personal experiences as proof of god by saying its culture created, upbringing, or maybe just an human need to find one's place (psychological)

Yes. I agree.

I'm a former Christian. We would gather in a church, smile and shake hands, sing pretty songs that life the heart, and praise God. All of this created a psychological milieu of connection and belonging, and often, one would feel a frisson easily understood to be the Holy Spirit. It was my first congregation (I became a Christian at about 18), I was in the Army, and when I was discharged and returned home, I went to a half dozen congregations that lacked that experience, and the services were uninspiring.

I ultimately understood that I had happened into a church run by an especially gifted and charismatic man in the Army, and that he, not the Holy Spirit, was the source of those feelings. I had had an experience that I was culturally encouraged to understand as confirmation of my faith, and did, until the evidence suggested otherwise. That's how I know how easy it is to get swept up in religious practices, which like cathedrals and stained glass, are designed to create that solemn and transcendent mood.

It seems to be non believers who are the ones demanding proofs for God and the reason seems to be so that they can debunk them.

I'm not. If there were a proof of God, I'd already know it, along with millions of other skeptics. I'd be able to share it with you as I can the proof of Pythagoras' theorem, or the proof that there is a sun. When I say that I need compelling evidence to believe, that doesn't mean that I expect you to provide it. I know you can't. I'm telling you why I don't believe, not asking you to change my mind.

When it comes to presenting the historical things that show God has revealed Himself in history, that whole idea has been attacked

You have no historical or other physical evidence of a god capable of convincing a skilled critical thinker. Rejecting bad arguments is not attacking you. It's reason.

Which skeptics are attacking you on this thread? Am I? If this is attacking you, what makes your dissenting comments not an attack?

You want empirical evidence as if God is an object that can be measured and studied.

Detectable in any reproducible manner would be fine. Show me anything best explained by a supernaturalisitic explanation, where naturalistic processes simply could not be responsible. That is what we require before believing.

Once again, I am not actually asking you to do that because I know that you can't. I'm telling you that because you can't, you can't convince, either.

Then you have to start practicing a spiritual teaching, because that is where the answers lay

That's where I found my atheistic answers.

Of course, you might not like that I equate introspection and self-examination with spiritual practice, because I don't use the word spiritual, and I don't indulge in the trappings like seeking a guru or playing inspirational music.

What I do is think about how I behave, and try to identify routines that aren't working well, how to modify them. How can I be a better husband and friend? How can my life be lived more effectively? What brings lasting happiness and what doesn't? I have done this for decades. This is my spiritual journey, and it has revealed no secret knowledge about the universe, just about myself and human society.

I have been tempted to ask you for months just what knowledge you have gained in your spiritual pursuits. What do you think that you are you learning using the method you have chosen not available to anybody leading an examined life?
 

Clara Tea

Well-Known Member
Well God accomplishes as much as Santa.

Some are not comfortable with a man entering their homes in the middle of the night. Nor are they sure about a man who entices little boys and girls to his lap with the promise of something to play with. Santa spelled differently is Satan.
 

Clara Tea

Well-Known Member
What do you have?

I don't think that you can do better than demonstrate that a superhuman force exists, not that it is supernatural or created the universe. I like to discuss how science has already ruled out the god of the creationist god of the Christian Bible that wants to be known, understood, believed, obeyed, worshiped, etc.. If a falsifying finding overturned the theory of evolution, there is no other way to account for the mountains of what could then only be understood as deceptive evidence planted in the geologic strata and nesting biological hierarchies to make it seem that evolution had occurred when in fact it was an act of creation. I mention this because even then, you would not know that you had uncovered evidence of a god, since naturalistic explanations have not been ruled out, such as an alien species that was the result of abiogenesis and evolution on its own planet, and now was godlike in power.

The Intelligent Design people had the same problem. Even thought they claim to have been looking for an intelligent designer and not necessarily a god, had they found intelligent design, they never would have considered a naturalistic explanation for it such as the one I have suggested.

So given that, it may be impossible to prove that an entity is supernatural and a universe creator even if it is.

I get the impression that the theist think that skeptics need to lower their standards for belief if there is nothing that is convincing evidence of a god to those skeptics by those standards. Many of the comments I read suggest that we're merely looking for ways to bat off proofs of God, or that we had a bad experience with religion and are being irrational and unreasonable, that we should just believe their subjective reports of a god because that's how they understand the experience.

Then we tell you that our standard for belief is evidence better explained by positing the existence of a god (or any other thing - evidence of unicorns is evidence best explained by the existence of unicorns), and that no such thing exists, but that answer is dismissed out of hand. Surely the skeptic is playing some mind game, right? Nope. Our minds are conditioned to be unable to deny what the senses and reason convincingly reveal to it, and these specious arguments and second-hand experiences just aren't convincing to a mind willing and able to evaluate a compelling argument and be convinced by it.



Imagination in this context refers to ideas in the head that were created there rather than by experiencing something outside the mind. We can also imagine things that we have previously experienced, but that's not what's meant here. Is there an objective moral code out there that man can discover with his mind and senses, or is it just something imagined to exist. Is there really a god out there, or is it only imagined to exist? Does sin exist outside of the minds of men, or have they merely imagined that it does? When a believer tells me that he has mental experiences that he interprets as a received signal from some external source separate from himself, why should I rule out that he isn't just imagining that that is what his experience represents?



Yes. I agree.

I'm a former Christian. We would gather in a church, smile and shake hands, sing pretty songs that life the heart, and praise God. All of this created a psychological milieu of connection and belonging, and often, one would feel a frisson easily understood to be the Holy Spirit. It was my first congregation (I became a Christian at about 18), I was in the Army, and when I was discharged and returned home, I went to a half dozen congregations that lacked that experience, and the services were uninspiring.

I ultimately understood that I had happened into a church run by an especially gifted and charismatic man in the Army, and that he, not the Holy Spirit, was the source of those feelings. I had had an experience that I was culturally encouraged to understand as confirmation of my faith, and did, until the evidence suggested otherwise. That's how I know how easy it is to get swept up in religious practices, which like cathedrals and stained glass, are designed to create that solemn and transcendent mood.



I'm not. If there were a proof of God, I'd already know it, along with millions of other skeptics. I'd be able to share it with you as I can the proof of Pythagoras' theorem, or the proof that there is a sun. When I say that I need compelling evidence to believe, that doesn't mean that I expect you to provide it. I know you can't. I'm telling you why I don't believe, not asking you to change my mind.



You have no historical or other physical evidence of a god capable of convincing a skilled critical thinker. Rejecting bad arguments is not attacking you. It's reason.

Which skeptics are attacking you on this thread? Am I? If this is attacking you, what makes your dissenting comments not an attack?



Detectable in any reproducible manner would be fine. Show me anything best explained by a supernaturalisitic explanation, where naturalistic processes simply could not be responsible. That is what we require before believing.

Once again, I am not actually asking you to do that because I know that you can't. I'm telling you that because you can't, you can't convince, either.



That's where I found my atheistic answers.

Of course, you might not like that I equate introspection and self-examination with spiritual practice, because I don't use the word spiritual, and I don't indulge in the trappings like seeking a guru or playing inspirational music.

What I do is think about how I behave, and try to identify routines that aren't working well, how to modify them. How can I be a better husband and friend? How can my life be lived more effectively? What brings lasting happiness and what doesn't? I have done this for decades. This is my spiritual journey, and it has revealed no secret knowledge about the universe, just about myself and human society.

I have been tempted to ask you for months just what knowledge you have gained in your spiritual pursuits. What do you think that you are you learning using the method you have chosen not available to anybody leading an examined life?

Mountains of dinosaur bones (buried in strata) could have been made with a blink of God's eyes (like Jeannie). After all, he made the incredibly huge and complex universe.

But why the deception? Why make us think that dinosaurs were around millions of years ago?

Well, for one thing, God wants freedom of choice (believe or not in God, and do evil or good). If it was obvious to anyone that God made fake dinosaur bones, then there would be no argument about belief. On the other hand, if dinosaurs really did roam the earth, then evolution is likely correct.
 

Spirit of Light

Be who ever you want
What do you have?

I don't think that you can do better than demonstrate that a superhuman force exists, not that it is supernatural or created the universe. I like to discuss how science has already ruled out the god of the creationist god of the Christian Bible that wants to be known, understood, believed, obeyed, worshiped, etc.. If a falsifying finding overturned the theory of evolution, there is no other way to account for the mountains of what could then only be understood as deceptive evidence planted in the geologic strata and nesting biological hierarchies to make it seem that evolution had occurred when in fact it was an act of creation. I mention this because even then, you would not know that you had uncovered evidence of a god, since naturalistic explanations have not been ruled out, such as an alien species that was the result of abiogenesis and evolution on its own planet, and now was godlike in power.

The Intelligent Design people had the same problem. Even thought they claim to have been looking for an intelligent designer and not necessarily a god, had they found intelligent design, they never would have considered a naturalistic explanation for it such as the one I have suggested.

So given that, it may be impossible to prove that an entity is supernatural and a universe creator even if it is.

I get the impression that the theist think that skeptics need to lower their standards for belief if there is nothing that is convincing evidence of a god to those skeptics by those standards. Many of the comments I read suggest that we're merely looking for ways to bat off proofs of God, or that we had a bad experience with religion and are being irrational and unreasonable, that we should just believe their subjective reports of a god because that's how they understand the experience.

Then we tell you that our standard for belief is evidence better explained by positing the existence of a god (or any other thing - evidence of unicorns is evidence best explained by the existence of unicorns), and that no such thing exists, but that answer is dismissed out of hand. Surely the skeptic is playing some mind game, right? Nope. Our minds are conditioned to be unable to deny what the senses and reason convincingly reveal to it, and these specious arguments and second-hand experiences just aren't convincing to a mind willing and able to evaluate a compelling argument and be convinced by it.



Imagination in this context refers to ideas in the head that were created there rather than by experiencing something outside the mind. We can also imagine things that we have previously experienced, but that's not what's meant here. Is there an objective moral code out there that man can discover with his mind and senses, or is it just something imagined to exist. Is there really a god out there, or is it only imagined to exist? Does sin exist outside of the minds of men, or have they merely imagined that it does? When a believer tells me that he has mental experiences that he interprets as a received signal from some external source separate from himself, why should I rule out that he isn't just imagining that that is what his experience represents?



Yes. I agree.

I'm a former Christian. We would gather in a church, smile and shake hands, sing pretty songs that life the heart, and praise God. All of this created a psychological milieu of connection and belonging, and often, one would feel a frisson easily understood to be the Holy Spirit. It was my first congregation (I became a Christian at about 18), I was in the Army, and when I was discharged and returned home, I went to a half dozen congregations that lacked that experience, and the services were uninspiring.

I ultimately understood that I had happened into a church run by an especially gifted and charismatic man in the Army, and that he, not the Holy Spirit, was the source of those feelings. I had had an experience that I was culturally encouraged to understand as confirmation of my faith, and did, until the evidence suggested otherwise. That's how I know how easy it is to get swept up in religious practices, which like cathedrals and stained glass, are designed to create that solemn and transcendent mood.



I'm not. If there were a proof of God, I'd already know it, along with millions of other skeptics. I'd be able to share it with you as I can the proof of Pythagoras' theorem, or the proof that there is a sun. When I say that I need compelling evidence to believe, that doesn't mean that I expect you to provide it. I know you can't. I'm telling you why I don't believe, not asking you to change my mind.



You have no historical or other physical evidence of a god capable of convincing a skilled critical thinker. Rejecting bad arguments is not attacking you. It's reason.

Which skeptics are attacking you on this thread? Am I? If this is attacking you, what makes your dissenting comments not an attack?



Detectable in any reproducible manner would be fine. Show me anything best explained by a supernaturalisitic explanation, where naturalistic processes simply could not be responsible. That is what we require before believing.

Once again, I am not actually asking you to do that because I know that you can't. I'm telling you that because you can't, you can't convince, either.



That's where I found my atheistic answers.

Of course, you might not like that I equate introspection and self-examination with spiritual practice, because I don't use the word spiritual, and I don't indulge in the trappings like seeking a guru or playing inspirational music.

What I do is think about how I behave, and try to identify routines that aren't working well, how to modify them. How can I be a better husband and friend? How can my life be lived more effectively? What brings lasting happiness and what doesn't? I have done this for decades. This is my spiritual journey, and it has revealed no secret knowledge about the universe, just about myself and human society.

I have been tempted to ask you for months just what knowledge you have gained in your spiritual pursuits. What do you think that you are you learning using the method you have chosen not available to anybody leading an examined life?
First of all, I can not speak for your experience with religious practice or teachings :) if it made you into an atheist so be it. Personally spiritual practice formed me to who i am today, on both good and bad. But sufism ooened my eyes to seeing my own faults, on not only others "fault" or what I thought was faults in others. Actually I was projecting my own faults onto others, so what I saw was my own faults not their faults.

This is why I am much less Critical of others today than before. Because if I am gonna be a good example for others, I must first fix my own crap. Not try to correct others.

So the knowledge/understanding I gained in spiritual practice is about my own being and what I have to change. It is an on going prosess that will take a long time to solve. The more I digg, the more I find that must change.
 

F1fan

Veteran Member
So a personal belief in God is a belief that must be proven to the non believers (or others) to be a valid belief?
Yes. Anyone can believe anything they want, but if they are going to join a diverse and open debate forum that discusses religion a believer will need more than personal belief if they claim their idea of God exists outside of their imagination.

It's not as the vast majority of believers are exceptionally wise and in balance in a way that non-believers can clearly observe but can't attain themselves without belief. What we observe is wise and in balance non-theists as well as theists, and many theists who are quite despicable people despite their beliefs. So there's no cause and effect of being religious that suggests they are onto something special.
 

Spirit of Light

Be who ever you want
Yes. Anyone can believe anything they want, but if they are going to join a diverse and open debate forum that discusses religion a believer will need more than personal belief if they claim their idea of God exists outside of their imagination.

It's not as the vast majority of believers are exceptionally wise and in balance in a way that non-believers can clearly observe but can't attain themselves without belief. What we observe is wise and in balance non-theists as well as theists, and many theists who are quite despicable people despite their beliefs. So there's no cause and effect of being religious that suggests they are onto something special.
The only one i have to prove my self to is Allah. What others believe about my faith and belief is up to them. I already have answer to believe in Allah
 

F1fan

Veteran Member
If a person was interested in spirituality as you understand it,would it be possible to give evidence to those with genuine interest?

Sometimes we may not discuss spiritual evidence for fear that others will discredit it rather than the inability to describe it.
We need to distinguish "spiritual" from "religious". The two may overlap in some ways but are certainly not defined as synonymous.

To my mind "spiritual" can include yogic exercise and meditation, or even therapy. It's anything that helps a person come into balance. I further suggest there is intellectual, emotional, and physical balances that work together. The emotional and intellectual balances certainly can be non-theistic. In some ways being non-religious and non-theistic IS a way to achieve intellectual and emotional balance.

Religion and being religious is typically a social behavior that may contribute to a person's feeling of belonging and soothe anxieties of self-awareness. Being religious may bring out the worst in someone. It may justify prejudices and irrational beliefs that extend beyond the religious framework, much like we see in conservative politics in the USA. Religion can be used by some folks who have serious and self-descructive habits and it provides a framework to commit to, and use as adjustments are made. We see many converts who had a crisis in life and found solace in religious belief. I think that is fine. I also question a person becoming dependent on religion for life to help prop up emotional frailty. A life preserver will help save a life when your ship sinks but you take it off once you are on land again.

I've said before that there is not much that is spiritual about having a head full of irrational concepts.
 

F1fan

Veteran Member
Well, what about subconscious mechanisms? You are making the unwarranted assumption that we need to be conscious to remember things. For instance, once I dreamed of someone ringing at the door, while asleep, to find out, the morning after, that someone indeed rang at my door. My brain just constructed a model of the outside world while I was unconscious.

Isn't maybe something to keep into account before invoking the spiritual world?

Ciao

- viole
True. There is seldom any attention given to the role and huge power the subconscious has in how it affects conscious thinking and behavior. There are many studies that show much of our thinking happens in the subconscious and then projects onto conscious awareness. Fear can affect perception and the undisciplined mind can experience things in the conscious mind that were created in the subconscious and it is interpreted in a flawed and narrow way.

The religious views most people have were adopted by the social influence that is mapped out in the subconscious. Kids end up believing in Santa Claud because they learn about Santa in family and social experience. It is learned, and then applied in the conscious mind. The same with religion.
 

F1fan

Veteran Member
That's how God exists by a profound belief that impacts their lives.
Yet doesn't;t a child getting money from the Tooth Fairy and that one awesome present from Santa also impact their lives? Do we conclude these entities actually exist as believed, or consider other explanations for the "good feelings" of an effect?

Masturbation tends to have a physical response and very satisfying (probably), so do we conclude the experience imagined must have really happened for it to have had an emotional and physical effect?

Do you see the dilemma of how emotional and physical experiences are not always a result of engaging with actual beings outside of our imagination?


What other proof could their be for anything outside their personal experiences?
People with well developed brains and experiences with what is real in the environment and what is imagined don't have a lot of trouble distinguishing the difference. For example if you drive down a street are you confused about real people crossing the street versus imaginary people? If you are confused you might have a mental impairment. But most of us easily know the difference.

If you want to pretend the supernatural beings that bring emotional satisfaction is real versus learned and imagined there is no life/death consequence, so the mind can get lost in distinguishing the fantasy for the sake of profiting emotionally from it. To my mind I have little interest in working to deceive myself about something like this.
 

blü 2

Veteran Member
Premium Member
What proof do nonbelievers (to whom this question is appropriate) want for god?
Before I can answer your question I need a clear definition of the real God you speak of so that when I find a real suspect I can determine whether it's God or not.

(I know about gods that are purely conceptual / imaginary, but I take it you're talking about a being that's not imaginary and has objective existence. Please correct me if that's wrong.)
 

F1fan

Veteran Member
Some are not comfortable with a man entering their homes in the middle of the night.
Not a single restraining order against Santa, he's that loved.


Nor are they sure about a man who entices little boys and girls to his lap with the promise of something to play with. Santa spelled differently is Satan.
Just don't bring up Catholic priests.
 
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