As I see it, there are two very different questions there:
What would it take for me to believe in a deity? Well, objective evidence. What that means is uncertain, but a declaration “Look, I am the great god Spoo and here is a demonstration of my awesome power” followed by some physically inexplicable demonstration would be a good start.
What would it take for me to become religious? Well, in a sense I already am religious. I just happen to be the sole member of my own highly personalised religion. What would it take for me to worship a deity? I wouldn’t, plain and simple. I might treat it with respect and maybe even, if given suitable reason, obey said deity (note that this is a deity that has a noticable physical effect so when I say “obey said deity” I mean “Obey commands specifically given to me by said deity”), but I would not worship it. I have no objection to or problem with others worshipping a deity, but ind the idea vaguely distasteful myself, and I wouldn’t respond well to either bribes or threats in this context.
Lib, I never claimed to have met Mr. Jones. I merely pointed out that meeting Mr. Jones can be varified by describing physical characteristics and seeing if they correspond with the physical characteristics Mr. Jones is said to have by other that have met him previously.
You claimed to have been visited by God, and that God talked to you. I proceeded to ask you questions pertaining to the entity that involved what he looked like and what he sounded like. My questions were a logical followup to the claim you made. You didn’t answer the questions, though, and returned with what I guess you thought were clever questions, though these questions had nothing to do with the simple claim that a Mr. Jones had come to visit. It is perfectly logical to ask what someone looks like if you claim to have seen them, and it is perfectly logical to ask what someone sounds like if you have claimed to have talked to them.
Perhaps it would help if you could use different words than “meet”, “visit” and 'talk" when you are describing a feeling that comes over you that you ascribe to a higher power.
i’d like to hear what you consider to be “objective” evidence. if you perceive said evidence sensually, it’s necessarily subjective. so how exactly can you get objective evidence?
as far as believing in god, i’d need something in my world view that is not explained without god. so far there is nothing. but then, if one defines god generally enough, i can be said to believe already. then again, i don’t believe in much today.
as far as worshipping god, i would need subjective evidence that my life would be made better through worship. i think that’s what most people mean when they say they require “objective proof” of god’s existence. it’s all about interpretation. and in my experience as a quite happy person, i’ve seen no evidence that my life would be made better through prayer.
Just to make myself clear, I don’t believe there are no atheists in foxholes, but I do believe that a lot atheists do in fact turn to belief in desperate times. Certainly not all of them, though.
You claim to have, through your experiences, evidence that God (specifically the Christian God) exists.
Once you said that, you put your personal experiences on the table. If you’re going to claim you have evidence, then you need to be willing to discuss the details. It’s entirely legitimate to ask what the nature of this experience was, and how you knew it was the Christian God. And, for that matter, to ask how you interpret the fact that Muslims and, for that matter, atheists have experiences which they describe as being very similar to yours, but which they interpret quite differently.
The problem is that you want to win the argument without really participating. In other threads (I don’t feel like looking up the cite, but the latest was within the last week) you’ve responded to debates over the existence of God by changing the subject to talk about love instead. In this case, you’ve changed the subject to talk about the nature of logic. Both maneuvers are dishonest. If you’re going to claim to have objective evidence of God, then present it- don’t follow up with a debate over the nature of objectivity.
So you are a solipsist? You don’t think it’s possible to have objective evidence for anything, because all reality is just sensory input? Is that what you’re saying?
No, that’s not at all what we mean. I don’t believe that the relative state of one’s own emotions has any bearing on ultimate reality. If I take LSD and feel happy because a purple dragon is sending me happy vibes, it does not necessarily mean the dragon is really there. If I worship, and “feel better” as a result of my worship, it only proves that the worship made me feel good. It doesn’t prove that a physical supernatural being actually exists.
BUT, if I were to discover objective evidence, like dragon footprints or dragon DNA that could be analyzed, or capture a dragon, it would be a different story.
I’m glad you’re happy, and I agree that one does not need religion to be happy. But the approach you are describing doesn’t work for me. I’ve always had a big problem with the notion that one would pick one’s own version of reality, based on which one you happen to like the best. To me, truth is truth, and we’re stuck with it regardless of how it makes us feel.
Oh, geez. I just realized that I made a big blunder. Ramanujan, it just occured to me that you said as far as worshipping god, you would need subjective evidence, and I was reading it as what it would take for you to believe in god. I totally missed your point, and I apologize. That makes sense - if you are going to worship god, there should ostensibly be a reason to do so. Sometimes it would be really handy if you could delete your own posts.:o
On the contrary, there was nothing logical about your questions. I did you the service of providing questions that would have been logical.
Ben wrote:
I’m more than willing. And I’ve discussed them to a fare-thee-well. I’ve given an accounting of my conversion experience in several detailed narratives. I’ve hosted threads on the ontology,epistemology, aesthetic, ethic, and metaphysics of God. But I cannot be expected to respond to non sequiturs. If I ask you what green sounds like, how can you answer?
God IS Love. They are synonyms. And that’s something I’ve said oh, a hundred times or more.
If you’re going to ask for evidence of God, then don’t ask what His voice sounds like and what direction to look when He speaks. God speaking is a metaphorical expression for God placing understanding in the heart. A pretense otherwise seems dishonest to me. There is no real request for information, but rather a desire to ridicule by attempting to present an apparent contradiction that is jejune and Neanderthal in its conception. Metaphor has been a common convention for discussing metaphysical matters for thousands of years. Dictionaries understand this. That’s why “speak” has more than a dozen definitions, including: “To convey by nonverbal means: His eyes spoke volumes.” — American Heritage. Everybody knows that definition and usage. Including you and Czar. Dishonest is as dishonest does, I reckon.
Or in other words Lib, when you are speaking metaphorically, clue us in. To say that asking you to describe an entity that you met and talked to is not logical is in and of itself not only not logical but non sensical. You did me no service by blowing off questions that became an almost necessary followup to the claims you made, and the questions you asked seemed like an attempt to avoid and change the subject.
“Dishonest is as dishonest does”, indeed. When I say that someone “talks” to me or that that someone “visited” me, it isn’t necessary to run to a dictionary to quess which definition I might be using that day. You may not like my politics, religion(or lack thereof), or style of posting, but do not ever call my honesty into question again unless you have the solid proof to back it up. I have never lied on this or any other message board.
Clue you in? Who clues you in to the metaphors you use and encounter each day? Metaphors like, “clue us in”?
I don’t think you’re as clueless as you pretend to be. You know that there are no sound waves involved, no tallness, no physical description, and no direction from which speaking occurs. And yet you persist in putting forward a pretense that you don’t understand. You’re not stupid, and therefore, as with any bully, your obtuseness is deliberate.
It isn’t necessary at all to run to any dictionary. Everyone knows the meanings of “speak”. It is only you who pretends he does not.
Latro, have you ever had a friend tell you, over the telephone and perhaps after you’ve shared something that was troubling you “I’m with you, buddy!”? Did you think at the time he was speaking in the literal sense, and look around for him in confusion, or did the context of his statement of support immediately signal his usage of metaphor? Also, you seem to be quoting a statement Lib made in a different thread regarding his real subjective experience of God, rather than his remarks here regarding the metaphor of “Mr. Jones”. Czarcasm: I wonder how many discussions you’ve had with Lib on this subject wherein he’s established his metaphorical mode of explication? I can understand if you’re attempting to keep things clear within each specific thread for the sake of other readers, but any protestation of confusion on your part is hard for me to understand, given your lengthy board acquaintanceship with Libertarian. Not saying you’re a liar. I’m just saying I don’t believe you thought Lib was speaking literally.
Sorry but it seemed as if Lib was arguing that the expression ‘God speaking’ was always to be taken as a metaphore, not just in this ‘Mr Jones’ example.
This just struck me as odd as he has previously asserted (indeed in a different thread ) that God had spoken to him in the literal sense.
Latro, when other people speak to you in a literal sense, does your “whole being” become “filled with [their] voice”, as Lib described his encounter? If so, you are amazingly empathic.
—On preview, I see my friend has answered this. Good.
I’ll just say then that, when I first began discussing things on this board, I had trouble understanding where Lib (and others) were coming from also. I recommend active listening (in the metaphorical sense, of course).
If you genuinely believe that God is simply love, then it seems to me that your contribution to this thread should be to assure any potential bigots that atheists believe in the same God you do, in the same way, and that the only reason you don’t call yourself an atheist is because of personal preference over a trivial manner of semantics. But so far as I know, it’s not the case that you believe that God is simply love. As best I can tell, you believe in a personal God, a conscious entity, and you believe that that entity established personal communication with you. I can’t speak for Czarcasm, but it seems pretty clear to me that quibbling over sound waves isn’t the real issue here, at least not for me. The real issue is, did you hear specific words in your “mind’s ear”, like Galadriel talking to people telepathically, or did you get some sort of inchoate but overpowerful feeling which you interpreted as having the intention and meaning which you ascribed to it?
You consistently describe yourself as being specifically a Christian, not as a “Loveian,” and not as an atheist, even though that’s precisely what you are if we are to take your declarations that “God IS Love” as being anything but a diversionary tactic. I think it’s worthwhile to reiterate the question which you have ignored:
How did you know it was Jesus talking to you, instead of Allah?
And, while we’re at it,
Do you believe that the Resurrection was a physical event?
Do you believe that God created the universe?
As for what goes on in other threads, that’s not particularly relevant. As best I can tell, the OP is about a personal God (at least, the original poster hasn’t complained about the fact that pretty much everyone but you interpreted it that way.) Since I don’t know what you said in the other threads, then either you can present a link to a thread in which you answer my questions and provide your evidence for the existence of a personal (and Christian) God, or you can restate that evidence here for the benefit of those of us who missed out the first time.
