Why believe in "a" God?

Great Debates
121

Again you make the mistaken assumption that my commentary on intelligence has something to do with the value of your existance. All I am trying to illustrate is that without something that is a fundamental truth, you lack the ability to be correct about anything.

You do not believe that this is a fundamental truth so we are at an impasse. In my opinion it’s kind of like the Jeff Foxworthy joke about the kid pulling the TV down onto their own head, that doing it a couple times will teach them. So I figure that the longer you struggle with falsehood, eventually you’ll see the light and know the truth.

You however, do not believe this is the truth. You act as though you have any greater respect for me or my beliefs than I have for yours. To truly understand what I am saying, you’d have to believe in God, as the belief in God informs upon every decision I have ever made, every thought I have ever had, and while I’ve toyed with atheism, and questioned my belief, and what it is I believe, I have never truly been an atheist, the existence of God is simply too apparent to me. I do not harbor any illusions that God is omnibenevolent, as God represents the entire range of existence, and is benevolent or cruel. However, I do believe in free will, and believe that God never ever does anything to us we didn’t ask to happen, so perhaps that is benevolent. God is the whole, the entirety of the universe, every aspect of it is conscious of itself. To me atheism is disrespectful, as it assumes that you are conscious whereas other things in the universe are not. I did not claim that you are unconscious, I merely claimed that you are stupid, this is far less disrespectful than believing that a rock which is conscious is not conscious. Though the atheist is more impacted by his own disrespect than the rock is.

Take that as you will, you do not need my acceptance to live your life, though you have it. Even if I didn’t accept your existance the best I could hope for is that myself and other consciousness could come to a consensus and vote you off the island, which to my estimation would do nothing except shift you somewhere in the grand scheme less proximal to myself.

Erek

122

Yup. This is why I don’t need a god or an afterlife. Isn’t the universe an amazing place? I personally don’t think my conciousness will last any longer than the rest of my body, though.

123

See, that’s my point. It’s not a matter of needing God, God simply is. There is no afterlife because life never ends. Your body will live forever, it will simply change forms. That is the point I was attempting to make. Does your current body contain the same matter as it did when you were born? If the matter is in a constant state of flux, then how does the pattern persist? When a Hurricane blows down a house, that house still exists, it just exists in the form of a house disassembled into many pieces, but it still exists, it’s impact of having existed is still there, it’s foundation is still around, it’s boards may now be splinters but the carbon atoms that formed them are still there affecting the same ecosystem.

Erek

124

If god simply is, where is he? The universe works just as well without him, as far as I can see. Ofcourse, if you define god to be the universe, well, what’s so supernatural about it?

My body will not live forever. It will die, decompose and take on other forms, as most parts of my body have been doing for as long as I live. Life is what makes the pattern persist. Without life, the pattern vanishes. When a hurricane blows down a house, there is no house, even if the rubble still exists. “Ashes to ashes”, as they say .

125

You’re confusing God with something that exists in time and space, which by definition, God does not.

How would you know this to be true? Would the universe exist at all?

126

Oh I think I’m beginning to feel quiet certain about something.

I can see where I went wrong now… All this time I’ve been reading Spinoza and he’s not funny at all. I may have to rethink my approach.

Well, not your’s specifically, but the great thinkers are always misunderstood in their time. Do go on…

Well I find myself asking him for something right now, yet you continue typing…

<Jim from TAXI> Wow! Boy… that’s something… phewww… acid flashback… </Jim>

No worries mswas. I’m quite certain we’ll never travel in the same social circles.

127

Erm, I’m not making this stuff up, I’m trying to get an explanation:

Anyway, I have much more evidence for the universe than for any god.

128

Yes but mail will slowly taper off.

No it does not. Neither does your’s.

Biochemical processes within the cells.

You should notify the survivors of Katrina and Rita of the good news.

129

Yes, because of course they were the first to ever have anything unpleasant happen to them in human history.

130

God is the universe conscious of itself, whereas the universe is just a term for the thing. The two terms are far from mutually exclusive. The term universe means roughly “One Word”. ‘In the Beginning there was the word.’ To me the existence of a ‘verse’ implies consciousness. For instance in biblical texts, the sections are referred to as “verses”. The Universe would be the culmination of all verses that ever have been and ever will be spoken anywhere, in a single cohesive statement.

Erek

131

I can’t speak to generalised rightness or wrongness, but I know that none of the religious paths that I follow claim to be right for or suited to all people in the first place, so the fact that other people follow other paths strikes me as utterly normal and unremarkable, not something that has to be a matter of rectitude.

One has to be far more specific than “not sharing my religion” or “not sharing my belief system” before I have enough data to judge whether I think something is right or wrong. :stuck_out_tongue:

132

Keep it going, Leaffan. You have encountered what any poster to this board encounters when posing a question of genuine relevance: vituperative contempt from the majority, spiced with a few responses of understanding from the minority of authentic seekers of knowledge and understanding.

Formal religion and “faith” are a crock. Everyone knows it. Those who espouse such things, when challenged, defend them at brutish length. Life is, in fact, a “random happenstance on Earth,” as you put it. It’s all just a bunch of stuff that’s happening at this moment. None of it has any meaning, at least in any sense that a human being has of that word.

Having said that, human beings have relatively abundant capacities for self-awareness and imagination. We each know that we exist, and we consequently know that, someday, we each will cease to exist. What a bitch, for a creature endowed, as are all creatures, with a survival instinct. It’s a nasty bind. So, using our uniquely fertile imaginations, we concoct some cock-and-bull stories about how there’s a really nice Daddy and/or Mommy up there in the sky (generally quite unlike our own down here on Earth), who’s watching it all go on, and is very benevolent and will reward us after we die, with all nice things, all of the time, after we die, if we only heed its “will,“ its “will“ being something which we also make up.

Challenge such beliefs, as you have done, and you are like a big kid who walks up to little kid holding and loving a stuffed animal that the kid has grown attached to and pretends is real, and ripping it out of his hands. The little kid cries and wails, stomps his little feet and tantrums, because he has become very attached to the myth he has created around some pieces of cloth and stuffing, even knowing, deep in his heart, it is a lie he himself has created. Don’t get me wrong; I applaud you.

You want the meaning of life? Take a walk in the woods. Eventually, you’ll encounter, say, a dead tree, fallen over and rotting. It had its birth, and its life, and now it’s dead. The materials consituting it, including its life force (or “soul,” as we like to call our own life force) will be recycled the same as everything in the universe. Any human being who thinks they are anything more than this is a rank egotist.

And now, my friend, I’m a gonna take a hike, in the woods, and marvel at how I can find a merciless and relentless process of natural selection so utterly beautiful.

133

Oh, yeah, and as for “debate,” that’s another thing you’ll find the turds on this board harping about when you propose an idea that diverges from their own. It’s just their way…

134

Well, the Forum is Great Debates. If one wishes to simply rant on about things without serious challenge, this is ceratinly not the Forum to expect that. (There really is not any Forum, here, where one will not be challenged, but that is the nature of the site, in general.)

Now this particular thread has had reasonable comment from both sides of the issue (along with some witnessing such as that in which you have just indulged). However, if you are only here to insult other posters, calling them “turds” and such, you should probably find another venue for your bile.

If you have the need to call people names, take it to the Pit; do not do it here, again.

[ /Moderator Mode ]

135

First, every study I’ve heard of say that atheists tend to be more intelligent and better educated.

Second, “faith” and “intelligence” are opposites; faith is about not thinking. Claiming it makes you smarter is silly.

Third, “God mind” ? :rolleyes: You really believe the religious have mystic powers of knowledge ? When was the last time revelatory “knowledge” turned out to be true ? One of the distinguishing marks that make science superior to religion is that it works; your mystic knowledge never pans out.

Wrong. All the evidence says precisely that. For example, brain damage. If you lose brain tissue, you lose some of yourself. The obvious conclusion is that if your brain dies, you’re gone.

You will note that that area of his search for knowledge never panned out. Why ? Simple, they were religious/superstitious in nature, and therefore dead ends.

Consciousness comes from the brain. Rocks and trees and just about everything else have no brain, and therefore are not conscious. The universe has nothing to be conscious with.

I am my mind, and nothing else. When it goes, I am dead. My body is just a vehicle for it.

Do you have any evidence for all this ? How can a rock or the universe be conscious ?

You sound like the ultimate materialist. The mere fact that the atoms of something survive doesn’t mean that thing survives; it’s the arrangement of atoms into patterns that define an object. You have claimed immortality by redefining existence down to it’s crudest level.

Now that…simply makes no sense at all.

Well, unless they come up with evidence, I think it’s safe to assume them wrong.

Why wouldn’t it ? There’s no evidence of a god, nor is there evidence the universe needs a god.

136

Or what? The wimpishness around here is absolutely astounding!

137

Since you consider courtesy wimpish, we’ll approach this differently.

You can resume posting in another 24 hours, after you’ve sat out this Warning.

[ /Moderator Mode ]

138

We don’t have hard evidence of the pillar of smoke, nor could we. But we’re not talking about a Boy Scout troop here; we’re talking about hundreds of thousands of people. They also didn’t move everyday - they camped for a while in some places.

Plus, it is the desert, where things get preserved. Absence of evidence where evidence should surely be is indeed evidence of absence. There are lots more reasons why the Bible is inaccurate, again I recommend you read the books.

The writers of the Bible were certainly familiar with the Sinai, so it is no great surprise that they got the features right. Perhaps Mt. Sinai was a holy place in the pre-Jewish religion. So them knowing about it is not evidence of the accuracy of the story.

139

Just as good as publication in a peer-reviewed research journal, no doubt. You can buy all sorts of movies about Noah’s Ark, too. Just proves that conmen are allowed to buy movie cameras.

140

People wouldn’t die horrible deaths in floods for a start. While this god would not control everything, it would also make its existence evident at least to the level the supposed god of the Bible did. People would mess up, but not from being given a bad hand at birth - inbuilt antisocial tendencies, low intelligence, propensity to alcoholism, for example.

Oh - and there would be a loud voice from the sky saying “You schmucks, let them get married already!”