The question is specifically aimed at persons who believe a personal God exists, so there’s no poll option appropriate for atheists or agnostics. Those who object are invited to kiss my shiny metal ass. Or, more constructively, say something smart in the thread.
Missed the edit window.
For purposes of this poll, both polytheists and monotheists are theists.
Options 4-6 are pretty much the same as 1-3. I think maybe you meant something like
God is omniscient but not omnipotent or omnibenevolent.
etc.
Why are you not content to allow anonymous polling? The combative nature of many atheists on this board will strongly discourage theists from answering honestly, or answering at all.
I’m an atheist for the record.
Sometimes I do anonymous polls – always when it comes to things posters have actually done, or their feelings on actual sexual matters.
I too am an atheist. But I don’t think I, personally, am combative; I don’t think theists necessarily stupid, foolish, misguided, or malicious. (Some are, of course, but so are some atheists.)
Are you specifically referring to believers of Abrahamic religions? I’m not sure the question is even answerable to those who aren’t.
I’m an atheist or the long haul.
I said God doesn’t necessarily need to be omnibenovelent. It’s simply a question of what constitutes benevolence in the big scheme of the world.
Did you not see post 2?
If I’d meant Christians, Jews, & Muslims, I’d have said so.
Bolding mine. As an atheist, you gotta admit you find theists misguided. Right?
Nope. I am not infallible; it is conceivable that I am wrong about the existence of God or gods.
Creationists are misguided. Anti-vaxers are misguided.
Yeah, I don’t think the poll options were particularly well chosen. For one thing, there’s no response for anyone who does believe in all three.
Although, I’m not sure how God could be omnipotent without being omniscient. Is knowing a power? If not, how do you define power? I suspect people just like the parallelism of the three "omni"s.
For that matter, how do you define any of those terms? Is God still omnipotent if he can’t do both of two mutually exclusive things? Is God omnipotent if he chooses to limit his own power? And what would omnibenevolence actually look like? How would you define it?
All I can say for sure is that the God I believe in is beyond my ability to completely comprehend. He eludes the attempt to definitively define, describe, or (forgive the pun) nail him down. I might timidly go on to say that there are some understandings of the words “omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent” that I would agree apply to God.
Except that I and everyone else can see how everyone answered, and it seems like an invitation to be harassed by the atheists who ARE militant. Whether you are or not is irrelevant.
Dude, where is the “I believe God is omnipotent, omniscient and a decent feller”?
I think it depends on how you define each of those terms. God is almighty, but he does keep his word, which could be seen as a limitation of his power. He is omniscient, and yet he promises to both forgive and forget your sins. And he is Good, but this does not mean that he will 100% stop all evil.
Based on the way I’ve seen you guys define all these terms, I guess I’ll go with the first three options.
Meh. I think you overestimate how harassed we theists feel that have actually chosen to stick around here. Plus, I have a hard time thinking of any harassment that wouldn’t also be threadshitting or worse.
I still don’t see any justification for making people out themselves on this poll. Polling is by default, and generally should be, anonymous as a rule.
I need a definition of omnibenevolent for the purposes of this poll.