Why Should I Believe in God?

[anthonyjfuchs]

Lily wrote

Apparently, convincing pretty smart people of the truth of transubstantiation isn't as hard as you think.

Neither was convincing white Europeans that dark people made good farm equipment.

Neither was convincing 1940's Germans that Jews made good charcoal briquettes.

Hell: some of the smartest people figured out the most efficient ways to do some of the most immoral things.

Moral of the story? Otherwise smart people can buy a bad idea, and that still doesn't make it valid.

Humanity is a gullible animal.

[Single Serving Jack]

Lily wrote

I see evidence for God everywhere I look! You ask me what and I am prepared to tell you.

I'm listening

[/frasier]


I see no evidence whatever for God anywhere I look, so tell me what I'm missing that's apparently staring me in the face?

[Riddler]

Lily wrote

AvT Chestnut #48.0:
I see evidence for God everywhere I look! You ask me what and I am prepared to tell you.

Single Serving Jack wrote

AvT Chestnut #48.1:
I see no evidence whatever for God anywhere I look, so tell me what I'm missing that's apparently staring me in the face?

AvT Chestnut #48.1.1:
As an adjunct to that, and so we can be quite clear as to what you are seeing that is God, and what what you are seeing that is just Stuff, please say what you see now that you didn't see prior to your conversion.

[Irreligious]

Lily wrote

...You have made a positive claim about the universe. There is no God. You must offer some sort of proof for that. It is simply preposterous to state it as though it were obviously true. It isn't. It is an assertion about the nature of reality that needs to be argued. I see evidence for God everywhere I look! You ask me what and I am prepared to tell you. While I think I discern the outlines of an argument in your various statements that could lead to your position, I don't think you have made that argument here.

Erik has supported his position. He sees no evidence of a supernatural entity working behind the wonders of the universe because, as he explained, there are perfectly natural explanations for them that do not imply, to him, any sort of supernatural agent at work.

Apparently, Lily sees some sort of supernatural agent that she calls God as the author of all natural occurences, perhaps, because the natural explanations themselves aren't good enough for her. That is, these explanations, otherwise, don't answer the question of their ultimate origin. The fact that they are unknown is untenable where she is concerned, no doubt, because of their implications of an uncertain purpose for existence.

I suppose the God that she sees doesn't have to be real as long as she thinks she sees it as the force behind every natural occurence. It's real to her, because she "sees" it, and it's, no doubt, deeply disturbing to her that we don't. Therefore, she calls us blind, while we call her deluded.

The "beauty" of this situation is that the God she sees need never make itself obvious. All it need be is implied. As it concerns the unknowable, that's as good as "seeing" for the devout believer.

[Erik]

Lily,

You are the one mixing apples and oranges. I have already told you that I don't think science has disproved god; only that science has disproved the personal god. You asked me for my reasons to think that god doesn't exist; by that, I assume you meant the personal god, because I already told you I am not discounting for purposes of this discussion the possibility of a prime mover. And I gave you at least some of those reasons.

My original point on this thread was that the discussion of the prime mover is fairly irrelevant. I don't particularly want to go back into why I think so.

As far as otherwise intelligent people accepting the truth of transubstantiation, I am fully aware that this happens regularly. I have friends who are excellent trial lawyers, educated in the problems of evidence, who nevertheless believe this and other patent nonsense. I am sure psychologists could write volumes on the subject, and probably have.

[calpurnpiso]

The science of neurology has already disprove the existence of god these are the facts:

Do we created the concept of god with our brains or does it picks it up from god itself like a radio picks up waves? If it did entheogens ( psychotropic substances), which alter the perception of god, would not affect this organ belief. Well they do, so god is a delusion produced by a malfunctioning, uneducated, sick brain. 2+2 is after all equal to four not six as the Christian retards insist. We are in the 21st Century not the 12th.

[Rhinoqulous]

Does no one even bother to read the crap Lily links to? If they had, they could have pointed out that her link to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy wasn't even a relevant link (she should have linked here). Also, anyone keen on logic could have pointed out this little gem of an article, in which you can find...

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy wrote

If logical truth are ones whose truth is guaranteed as long as the meaning of the logical constants is kept fixed then logical truths are good candidates for being analytic truths. Can analytic truths imply the existence of any entities? This is an old debate, often conducted using "conceptual truths" instead of "analytic truths". The most prominent debate of this kind is the debate about the ontological argument for the existence of god. Many philosophers have maintained that there can be no conceptual contradiction in denying the existence of particular entities, and thus there can be no proof of their existence with conceptual truths alone. In particular, an ontological argument for the existence of god is impossible. A famous discussion to this effect is Kant's discussion of the ontological argument in (Kant 1781/7), namely (KrV A592/B620 ff.)... Whatever one says about the possibility of proving the existence of an object purely with conceptual truths, many philosophers have maintained that at least logic has to be neutral about what there is. One of the reasons for this insistence is the idea that logic is topic neutral, or purely general. The logical truths are the ones that hold no matter what the representations are about, and thus they hold in any domain. In particular, they hold in an empty domain, one where there is nothing at all. And if that is true then logical truths can't imply that anything exists.

When will you people learn, that if Lily is bringing up formal logic she is talking out of her ass?

[Choobus]

Rhinoqulous wrote

Does no one even bother to read the crap Lily links to?

Not usually no. I am still amazed that anyone tries to have a serious conversation with her. It's like going back to an old lottery ticket every week hoping the numbers have somehow changed to winners.

They never do.

Rhinoqulous wrote

Does no one even bother to read the crap Lily links to? If they had, they could have pointed out that her link to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy wasn't even a relevant link (she should have linked here). Also, anyone keen on logic could have pointed out this little gem of an article, in which you can find...

When will you people learn, that if Lily is bringing up formal logic she is talking out of her ass?

What a stupid thing to post. Had you bothered to read, you would have seen that Dogpet and Irreligious assumed that I had made up the term. So, I linked to the article that defined the term I was using. It, in turn, links to the *little gem* of an article on ontology in its 2nd paragraph. Did I ever seriously believe that either one of them would read and think about these matters? Yeah. Right.

So, this was enough to bring you back? I will never post on the subject of ontology, or any sort of logical argument again. It is all mental masturbation anyway.

May that promise be enough to send you far, far, away ... forever.

Irreligious wrote

Well, for starters, a reasonably comprehensible description of this alleged entity might help.

What the hell is it? Of what is it composed? How are human beings, bound by the natural world, supposed to apprehend something that is allegedly supernatural and outside of the only realm we can access? How, exactly, does it operate?

Once we've pinned down what an actual "God" is supposed to be, a coherent presentation of some concrete evidence of this alleged thing's existence would be the next step towards moving from speculation to actual knowledge.


Apparently. It implies to me that we don't know. What does it imply to you?

To begin with i think that God is as comprehensible to us, as quantum physics or relativity would have been to ancient cavemen.

Seen in the above light some attributes of God as i see it:
-non physical (spiritual, higher dimentional)
-omniscient as far as humans and the universe are concerned
-incomprehensible (see above)

Some things are difficult to pin down scientifically for example:
What the is love ? What is it composed of ? In what unit does science measure it ? How does science detect it ? What evidence is there that it exist ?
Does good exist ? Does evil exist ? Why ?
Is jealousy a green monster ? Can you show me a piece of jealousy so i can believe in it ?

I don't trust science to be capable of detecting everything...

In the absence of absolute knowledge/evidence it seems you are inclined to believe God does not exist until science ((if it's capable) proofs otherwise, i'm inclined to believe God exists until science (if it's capable) proofs otherwise.

[calpurnpiso]

w_1975 wrote:

"To begin with i think that God is as comprehensible to us, as quantum physics or relativity would have been to ancient cavemen."

Not really because we KNOW god is simply a product of our brains....interaction of neurons using axons exchanging information via electromagnetism & chemicals. Nothing mysterious or incomprehensible at all, unless the person's brain is affected by a psychosis. i,e Lily, YWHW , missionary, Phelps, Bush, Chenney, & other retards whose brains are stuck in the 12th Century.

[ubs]

w_1975 wrote

What the is love ? What is it composed of ? In what unit does science measure it ? How does science detect it ? What evidence is there that it exist ?

With a brain scan. Are you suggesting that feelings are metaphysical? They are not. They are chemical reactions, and yes they can be measured and viewed.

w_1975 wrote

Does good exist ? Does evil exist ?

Only as adjectives.

w_1975 wrote

In the absence of absolute knowledge/evidence it seems you are inclined to believe God does not exist until science ((if it's capable) proofs otherwise, i'm inclined to believe God exists until science (if it's capable) proofs otherwise.

So you have a high level of discomfort with ambiguity, "God" is a label for what you don't know, and as science improves your belief ebbs?

[anthonyjfuchs]

w_1975 wrote

i think that God is ... -incomprehensible

And yet here you are, pretending that you can comprehend it by not only attempting to comprehend it, but by making claims that depend upon the ability to comprehend it. If you can't comprehend it, you can make no claims about it, including the claim that it exists.

Or are you really so pompous as to believe that you are capable of doing what is literally impossible?

[Choobus]

Saying that god is incomprehensible is the all saving excuse for people who know full well that they are bullshitters. It's very convenient, but it does have the drawback (as Wanker_1975 is now coming to learn) that anything you say about this incomprehensible god is meaningless, and therefore any religion based upon worshiping the same is equally meaningless.

[Irreligious]

w_1975 wrote

To begin with i think that God is as comprehensible to us, as quantum physics or relativity would have been to ancient cavemen.

Seen in the above light some attributes of God as i see it:
-non physical (spiritual, higher dimentional)
-omniscient as far as humans and the universe are concerned
-incomprehensible (see above)

Some things are difficult to pin down scientifically for example:
What the is love ? What is it composed of ? In what unit does science measure it ? How does science detect it ? What evidence is there that it exist ?
Does good exist ? Does evil exist ? Why ?
Is jealousy a green monster ? Can you show me a piece of jealousy so i can believe in it ?

I don't trust science to be capable of detecting everything...

In the absence of absolute knowledge/evidence it seems you are inclined to believe God does not exist until science ((if it's capable) proofs otherwise, i'm inclined to believe God exists until science (if it's capable) proofs otherwise.

Unfortunately, none of this tells me what God is. Calling something "spiritual" or "higher dimensional" is extremely vague without a definition of what a spirit is supposed to be or the discovery of a dimension higher the three of which we are all aware. Is there such a thing as a fourth or fifth dimension (and I don't mean the 1960s pop group)?

Love and jealously are emotions, by the way. We all experience and see their effect on others every day that we're conscious. I'm not a scientist, but I'm pretty sure their effect can be measured on the human body in terms of the chemicals that are released when we're feeling these emotions. Otherwise, we can see their effect in terms of the behaviors one exhibits when one is experiencing profound attraction or jealousy.

Evil is a concept. We don't like something or we find it malevolent, we call it evil. I think starting wars under false pretenses is patently evil. Others think homosexuality is evil, or a woman in a very short skirt is evil. Really. The vast majority of us probably think the wanton killing of innocents is evil. Even if we disagree on what constitutes evil in specific instances, we all know it when we confront it.

I thought God was supposed to be more than conceptual in the minds of those who believe in this alleged entity. You still haven't told me in any comprehensible way what God is to you. Forget science for a minute, since we all know that science is silent on the issue of the possible existence of a creator God. What, exactly, is it that you detect and place your faith in when you claim to believe in God?