Is there "Evidence" of God?

[Liberal]

@Left Hand of Dorkness

Yes, because he’s not claiming omnipotence. If he’s claiming omnipotence, then that’s what I’d ask him to demonstrate. He could mess with dice, or with the stars, or any of a bajillion other things that a normal human could not do.

Of all the things that God might offer you, you demand parlor tricks but have expressed zero interest in His love.

Because I’m not omniscient, and this supposed God is. An omniscient God already has all the evidence; it’d be silly for such a deity to demand that I provide evidence.

Then isn’t it entirely possible that you have already been through all this? God altered reality, leaving you flummoxed and unsure of what you were seeing. He then altered your perceptions so that you could comprehend what you see. He adjusted your memories so you wouldn’t go insane. And now, you have your new universe complete with the ability to perceive it. Maybe this has happened a thousand times.

An omniscient being would know (whereas you would not) that a proof display of itself to one of the many I’ve offered here would be sufficient to convince me of its existence.

Daniel

I still don’t get the existence thing. Isn’t it entirely possible to know that He exists but to hate Him anyway? What if love is the very mechanism by which He can be seen? Maybe it’s the case that if you love Him, He will appear to you and do card tricks and such.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Liberal

Of all the things that God might offer you, you demand parlor tricks but have expressed zero interest in His love.

I’m not interested in Phnom Grezznickly’s love, either, since I have no evidence that such a being exists. Once i know that God or Phnom exists, I’ll be able to figure out whether their love interests me.

Then isn’t it entirely possible that you have already been through all this? God altered reality, leaving you flummoxed and unsure of what you were seeing. He then altered your perceptions so that you could comprehend what you see. He adjusted your memories so you wouldn’t go insane. And now, you have your new universe complete with the ability to perceive it. Maybe this has happened a thousand times.

Sure–this is the kind of thing we talked about in college when we were stoned. I’ve got no reason to suspect that it’s happened.

I still don’t get the existence thing. Isn’t it entirely possible to know that He exists but to hate Him anyway? What if love is the very mechanism by which He can be seen? Maybe it’s the case that if you love Him, He will appear to you and do card tricks and such.

How can I love something that I don’t believe exists? I could say I love it, but that’d be a lie. Do you love Phnom Grizzneckly?

My loving an entity depends on my believing the entity exists, just as surely as my hating an entity depends on my believing the entity exists.

At any rate, the “card tricks” and “parlor tricks” is a misleading caricature of what I’m saying would constitute proof. A being that wants me to believe in its existence ought to be a being that I can perceive; an omnipotent being that wants me to believe in its existence can easily offer me the proof, through means analogous to what I’ve suggested. Card tricks would not be proof of omnipotence.

Daniel

[Scott_Plaid]

@Liberal

Of all the things that God might offer you, you demand parlor tricks but have expressed zero interest in His love.

I think I have figured out why it is so hard for evidence to be given. It’s because we are sticking to the term omnipotent. All powerful. Seeing as how christianity through out the centuries has used the term a lot, it is reasonable for people to call up arguments involving the fact that christians say their god can do anything. He did in the bible after all. Supposedly nothing has changed, but the truth of it is that such a god would be able to meet the challenges that I have seen here. Instead, we are asked to look in a book written by human hands instead of something that could be demonstrated created by an omnipotent being. In the above question, the idea of using parlour tricks is ridiculed. Sure, parlour trick would be a waste of time. But an omnipotent god could teleport me through time back to before said time was wasted, and leave me with the memory of having seen the tricks.

@Liberal

Then isn’t it entirely possible that you have already been through all this? God altered reality, leaving you flummoxed and unsure of what you were seeing. He then altered your perceptions so that you could comprehend what you see. He adjusted your memories so you wouldn’t go insane. And now, you have your new universe complete with the ability to perceive it. Maybe this has happened a thousand times.

Yes. It is also possible that invisible people are responsible for gravity, but since there is a simpler explanation, I don’t think so.

@Liberal

Isn’t it entirely possible to know that He exists but to hate Him anyway?

If he is a jerk who enjoy making people insane, then yes.

@Liberal

What if love is the very mechanism by which He can be seen? Maybe it’s the case that if you love Him, He will appear to you and do card tricks and such.

In my experience, I see with my eyes. Even if he normally appears to being who “love” “him”, then being an omnipotent being, she can force people without love to see her.

P.S.Why do you keep calling this “god” him?

[Liberal]

Left Hand of Dorkness

Well, once again we must agree to disagree, I suppose. Credit where it’s due, though. You have defended yourself with impeccable civility, if rather uncanny logic (in my opinion). I would like to comment on this, however:

My loving an entity depends on my believing the entity exists, just as surely as my hating an entity depends on my believing the entity exists.

What I’m saying to you — and I know you think I’m a horrible example for it, and I think you’re exactly right — is that the entity IS love. You don’t have to love anything in particular, just facilitate goodness. Even if you don’t call It God, He will be pleased, and the whole world — even the stars — will be better off for it.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Liberal

Left Hand of Dorkness

Well, once again we must agree to disagree, I suppose. Credit where it’s due, though. You have defended yourself with impeccable civility, if rather uncanny logic (in my opinion).

I could say almost exactly the same thing–and I appreciate being able to do so.

the entity IS love. You don’t have to love anything in particular, just facilitate goodness. Even if you don’t call It God, He will be pleased, and the whole world — even the stars — will be better off for it.

I think the crux of our disagreement is on whether “God” is a useful term for “love,” and on whether any additional properties (omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence, existence independent of chemical interactions in nervous systems, sentience, motive, etc.) may be assigned to “love.”

From where I stand, I definitely believe love exists as an emotion, alongside fear, joy, envy, contentment, fury, and so forth. I have much fonder associations with love than I have with fury. But I don’t believe the emotion has any special place in the cosmos; nor do I believe that, when we’re discussing the evidence for God, we’ve agreed that we’re really discussing the evidence for Love.

Daniel

[Liberal]

@Scott_plaid

I think I have figured out why it is so hard for evidence to be given. It’s because we are sticking to the term omnipotent. All powerful. Seeing as how christianity through out the centuries has used the term a lot, it is reasonable for people to call up arguments involving the fact that christians say their god can do anything. He did in the bible after all. Supposedly nothing has changed, but the truth of it is that such a god would be able to meet the challenges that I have seen here. Instead, we are asked to look in a book written by human hands instead of something that could be demonstrated created by an omnipotent being. In the above question, the idea of using parlour tricks is ridiculed. Sure, parlour trick would be a waste of time. But an omnipotent god could teleport me through time back to before said time was wasted, and leave me with the memory of having seen the tricks.

Uh huh. And you would be here reporting to us that God teleported you back in time and did card tricks for you. And your counterpart would be here reaming you a new asshole. You don’t believe anyone else’s reports of miracles (and apparently aren’t even aware of modern day reports), so why would anyone believe yours?

Yes. It is also possible that invisible people are responsible for gravity, but since there is a simpler explanation, I don’t think so.

No, actually, invisible people is a much simpler explanation. If you even comprehend the math behind general relativity, you are head and shoulders above 90% of the population. You’ve drawn a mistaken inference from Ockham’s Razor, buying into the pop-culture notion that he advocated the simplest answer being the best. That isn’t what he said.

If he is a jerk who enjoy making people insane, then yes.

Are you denying the existence of neurosis? Are there not people who hate those who love them?

In my experience, I see with my eyes. Even if he normally appears to being who “love” “him”, then being an omnipotent being, she can force people without love to see her.

It is always amazing to me. The metaphor impairment of the hard atheist, I mean. Oh, you use them just fine, but then you pretend not to know that there are 23 definitions as a transitive verb, and 7 definitions as an intransitive verb for the word “see”, only one of them having anything to do with eyes. I suspect that you even fancied “In my experience, I see with my eyes” to be a clever thing to say.

P.S.Why do you keep calling this “god” him?

I don’t. I usually do. But sometimes I call Him She or It. (I’ve called Him It in this very thread.) But I usually use the standard form because it is, well, standard. I have no idea why you want to call God “she” other than that it is just more of you one-of-a-kind cleverness and originality.

[Meatros]

@Liberal

If we all agree that God is eternal, then the question of what came before what is moot. From His frame of reference, all of existence has not yet begun, is ongoing, and is finished — all at once.

That seems to assume that all religions describe the same God-is that what you mean, or am I mistaken?

[Liberal]

@Left Hand of Dorkness

I could say almost exactly the same thing–and I appreciate being able to do so.

I’m honored.

I think the crux of our disagreement is on whether “God” is a useful term for “love,” and on whether any additional properties (omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence, existence independent of chemical interactions in nervous systems, sentience, motive, etc.) may be assigned to “love.”

From where I stand, I definitely believe love exists as an emotion, alongside fear, joy, envy, contentment, fury, and so forth. I have much fonder associations with love than I have with fury. But I don’t believe the emotion has any special place in the cosmos; nor do I believe that, when we’re discussing the evidence for God, we’ve agreed that we’re really discussing the evidence for Love.

Daniel

I understand what you mean, but that’s not the kind of love I mean. I mean definition number 9 here. Agape. The facilitation of goodness.

[Liberal]

@Meatros

That seems to assume that all religions describe the same God-is that what you mean, or am I mistaken?

There are as many perceptions of God as there are people. There have to be. The brain is a closed consciousness. The subjective frame has no accessibility relation to any other frame.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Liberal

Uh huh. And you would be here reporting to us that God teleported you back in time and did card tricks for you. And your counterpart would be here reaming you a new asshole. You don’t believe anyone else’s reports of miracles (and apparently aren’t even aware of modern day reports), so why would anyone believe yours?

First, the question isn’t what would get other people to believe my evidence; the question is, what evidence would I find convincing?

That said, scott, I wouldn’t find the experience you described especially convincing; it’d be far likelier that I was delirious if I had that experience. The experiences I’m talking about, ones that would convince me, would be ones not easily explicable through delirium. That’s why having a broad number of people undergo the experience, and having the experience be replicable, are both important features of the experience.

Consider the evidence we have that chimpanzees exist:
-I’ve seen them.
-I’ve seen pictures of them.
-I’ve talked with many other people that have seen them.
-There’s a place I can go where I can see them whenever I want.
-I’ve never talked with anyone who did the things I did to see the chimpanzees and who didn’t see them.

Consider the evidence that last week I was chased by rabid squirrels:
-I saw them.
-My wife didn’t see them: she saw me sleeping next to her.
-Other people didn’t see them.
-I cannot repeat the experiment (going to sleep in my bed) and reliably see them again.
-I’ve talked with plenty of people who have done essentially the same thing I did, and didn’t see these rabid squirrels.

Based on the evidence, I conclude that chimpanzees exist. Based on the evidence, I conclude that I dreamt about the rabid squirrels.

If I experienced God in a fashion similar to my experience of rabid squirrels, I’d probably conclude I was dreaming. If I experienced God in a fashion similar to my experience of chimpanzees, I’d probably conclude that God exists.

Daniel

[Liberal]

But squirrels are made of atoms and molecules and such. It makes sense that you would require that sort of empirical evidence. Are you thinking of God as a creature of some kind, existing in the universe and made of matter? Is that the sort of thing you’re trying to observe?

[Lightnin]

Look. We’re talking about this God person. You know, exists eternally, created the universe, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent. He/She/It is the fundamental force. If something like that exists, there should be no debate over whether God exists. It would be obvious. Everything and everyone in the universe, capable of any sort of observation, would be able to see God, and denying God would be completely, utterly impossible.

I mean, gravity’s pretty pervasive, and every living creature is aware of its existence. And yet God, who created gravity, isn’t just as obvious?

Either God doesn’t exist, or he/she/it is playing hide-and-seek.

Most Christians say that if you don’t actively worship God, you go to hell (I know you don’t, Lib, but you’re kind of in the minority). Eternal suffering, that sort of thing. But if God is hiding himself from us, he’s effectively sending us to hell for falling for his tricks.

Yes, yes, I know- some people have claimed that if you could actually know that God exists, you wouldn’t have any choice but to love and worship him. It seems to me, though, that that would actually be a truer test of faith- if you could know that God exists, and still deny him, then you deserve to go to hell. Right now, we’re being asked to make a decision (one which affects us for all of eternity) based on lies and deception- and not lies and deception from that Satan fellow, but from the Big Man himself.

[Scott_Plaid]

@Liberal

And your counterpart would be here reaming you a new asshole.

My glod, It’s like you know me. That is exactly what I would do if I found myself looking at myself. Really. No kidding.

@Liberal

You don’t believe anyone else’s reports of miracles (and apparently aren’t even aware of modern day reports), so why would anyone believe yours?

From what do you conclude I don’t believe peoples reports of miracles. Besides who to say I don’t have a recording device. Sure, many people would believe recored evidence. Same with the moon landing. Their loss.

@Liberal

If you even comprehend the math behind general relativity, you are head and shoulders above 90% of the population. You’ve drawn a mistaken inference from Ockham’s Razor,

Who said I was getting it from Occams razor?

@Liberal

I suspect that you even fancied “In my experience, I see with my eyes” to be a clever thing to say.

I loved that song by The Gorillaz

@Liberal

I don’t. I usually do. But sometimes I call Him She or It. (I’ve called Him It in this very thread.)

Ok with me.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Liberal

I understand what you mean, but that’s not the kind of love I mean. I mean definition number 9 here. Agape. The facilitation of goodness.

I’m still not sure what we’re talking about. I’ve also looked up Agape there and also looked up Charity there.

If the question is whether people experience a sensation of spiritual love, then yes, I think that exists, and think there’s ample evidence of its existence.

If we’re talking about Charity as “The theological virtue defined as love directed first toward God but also toward oneself and one’s neighbors as objects of God’s love,” and defining God as that, then we’ve got a recursive definition.

If we’re talking about something vaguely akin to The Force, then I don’t see evidence of its existence.

Essentially, if we’re talking about some form of love that existed when biology didn’t exist, whose existence doesn’t depend on the existence of multicellular animals, I’m disinclined to believe in it, not having seen evidence of its existence.

Daniel

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@Liberal

But squirrels are made of atoms and molecules and such. It makes sense that you would require that sort of empirical evidence. Are you thinking of God as a creature of some kind, existing in the universe and made of matter? Is that the sort of thing you’re trying to observe?

Either God has some influence on the universe, or it doesn’t.

If it doesn’t, then, and this sounds bad, but I really don’t care whether or not it exists.

If it does, then I want to see evidence of that influence. This evidence needs to be evidence that’s not satisfactorily explicable by existing entities that I already believe in.

God doesn’t have to be made of atoms: gravity’s not made of atoms, but every day people see evidence of gravity, and people can repeat experiments designed to demonstrate gravity. Same thing with light.

Time’s not made of atoms, but I can do experiments that satisfy me that time has passed, that time exists.

I can think of no experiment I can do to satisfy me that any supernatural being exists. I can think of plenty of experiments that I can (and have) done that fail to satisfy me of any such thing.

Daniel

[andros]

@Lightnin'

It would be obvious. Everything and everyone in the universe, capable of any sort of observation, would be able to see God, and denying God would be completely, utterly impossible.

I mean, gravity’s pretty pervasive, and every living creature is aware of its existence. And yet God, who created gravity, isn’t just as obvious?

Why do you assume every living creature is aware of gravity? I’d be hard pressed to believe my dog is, let alone my stupid cat or my fish. It just is. Gravity requires no special awareness to work, and all the cows stay on the ground just fine without being aware of gravity (or, really, much of anything).

Why do you assume god isn’t obvious? Gravity existed before mankind could quantify it. Perhaps we are surrounded by a clearly obvious god and simply don’t grok it? I’m not sure why being surrounded by god would make denying him impossible, if we lack the terms to describe god.

(Full disclosure: I’m not religious, not a Christian, and probably don’t believe in god. I am, however, devastatingly handsome.)

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@andros

Why do you assume every living creature is aware of gravity? I’d be hard pressed to believe my dog is, let alone my stupid cat or my fish. It just is. Gravity requires no special awareness to work, and all the cows stay on the ground just fine without being aware of gravity (or, really, much of anything).

When your dog comes to the top of a stairway, does the dog look down before walking forward, or does it look straight ahead and act surprised when it falls?

My cat jumps far more strongly when she’s jumping to a high windowsill than when she’s jumping to the top of a footstool, as if she realizes it’ll require more effort on her part to overcome gravity in the former instance.

I doubt that amoebas have a similar awareness of gravity, but I think most mammals have some understanding of it.

Daniel

[Lightnin]

@andros

Why do you assume god isn’t obvious? Gravity existed before mankind could quantify it. Perhaps we are surrounded by a clearly obvious god and simply don’t grok it? I’m not sure why being surrounded by god would make denying him impossible, if we lack the terms to describe god.

The thing is, if we were surrounded by a clearly obvious god, then we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Like gravity, I’m not saying that we should be able to understand God, but we should at least be aware of him. Saying that God doesn’t exist should be the same as saying the Earth doesn’t exist- people should look at you as if you’re insane.

If God exists, the argument shouldn’t be over “Does God exist”, but rather something like “Okay, so what is God’s nature?”

Oh, and I expected someone to bring up such things as amoebas… but I imagine they’re just as aware of gravity as we can expect them to be aware of anything. I imagine the next point will be along the lines of “Well, we’re like amoebas when it comes to recognizing God’s existence.” That’s essentially saying “We can’t know”- if that’s the case, why bother arguing one way or the other?

[Liberal]

@Left Hand of Dorkness

Essentially, if we’re talking about some form of love that existed when biology didn’t exist, whose existence doesn’t depend on the existence of multicellular animals, I’m disinclined to believe in it, not having seen evidence of its existence.

Daniel

Okay, fair enough. Very very fair. That is what you should start seeking evidence of. Nevermind devising tests for the existence of genies and magical creatures made of atoms. Devise tests for the existence an Eternal Love, a Facilitator of Goodness. For example, here’s one. If goodness exists in se, without regard to molecules or physical law, then I should be able to approach an enemy, humble myself to him, beg his forgiveness, and love him. By all that is natural, he should sense my weakness and deal me a final defeat. But if love has power in se, then my love will defeat his anger. He will lift me up from my humility, tell me that he is sorry that we who once were friends are now enemies, and we will both cry in each other’s arms as we rue the day that we said one cross word to one another. I do love you, my old friend.

[Scott_Plaid]

@Liberal

. Nevermind devising tests for the existence of genies and magical creatures made of atoms. Devise tests for the existence an Eternal Love, a Facilitator of Goodness.

If it was possible to invent a machine to test for love, (perhaps intensity and type of pheromones) then it would indeed be an interesting idea. As to the other, I agree, a machine to detect magical creatures whold be interesting, but I find scientific proof of a god to be more interesting.