Defining God
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Something tells me that trying to understand something as supernatural as the creator of the universe through the eyes of human-based science is somewhat retarded. Really, are we so self-important as to think we know everything?
I've always seen human suffering as a change from when God has his chosen people, the Israelites, back in the Old Testament. He babied them, listened to their nagging, provided for them, and they still turned out as crybabies when he made food fall from the sky. Thus, in order for humans to develop properly and learn to take care of themselves, he stepped back. He stopped saying "yes" to every prayer. He quit letting people live to be a thousand years old. He lets us fend for ourselves so that we can grow up.
God does this because he is omnipotent, but has chosen to give us the liberty of free will. He could force us all to believe in him, but as someone said earlier, a marriage with someone you love means so much more than a Russian mail-order bride who has to marry you. God wants us to love him because it means so much more that way. God could force us all to believe in him, but it means more if we choose to acknowledge his existence and that he is God all by ourselves.
God doesn't enjoy seeing us suffer, but he lets us because we can make ourselves stronger through it. It's like a father with his children: he can either step in, control his kid's life, and make the kid depend on his dad to solve all his problems, OR he can step back, give advice when his kid asks for it, and watch his kid grow and mature. The first approach didn't work too well for our development, so he's trying the second.
God does this because he is omnipotent, but has chosen to give us the liberty of free will. He could force us all to believe in him, but as someone said earlier, a marriage with someone you love means so much more than a Russian mail-order bride who has to marry you. God wants us to love him because it means so much more that way. God could force us all to believe in him, but it means more if we choose to acknowledge his existence and that he is God all by ourselves.
God doesn't enjoy seeing us suffer, but he lets us because we can make ourselves stronger through it. It's like a father with his children: he can either step in, control his kid's life, and make the kid depend on his dad to solve all his problems, OR he can step back, give advice when his kid asks for it, and watch his kid grow and mature. The first approach didn't work too well for our development, so he's trying the second.
You have forgotten the critical element that is choice. Some faiths dictate that we have no control over our lives, that we have some sort of destiny: others say that what we are is what we make of ourselves. You are assuming that God dictates the actions of the universe, when in fact he might be taking the Deist approach and leaving the universe alone after he created it. God might simply be watching for the most part: stepping in at only certain critical moments to intervene for the sake of the world.Maze1125 said:
In that case, we make our own suffering (with the exceptions of accidents and disasters, which are ruled by chance.)
How can I claim it? Easily. In all seriousness though, let me say explain why the idea of a God is illogical. We live in a universe with causality, I am able to write because I grew up, I grew up because I was born, I was born because, etc... Ultimately we find ourselves at the start of existence, here we have an event which must exist outside of causality, some sort of x-factor that puts all other things into motion. I do not assert to know what that x-factor is, but it is easy to see logically that it isn't logical. Occam's Razor means that in any situation the simplest explination, is the most probable explination. A theory like the big bang, or Smolen Selection is indeed very complex on a mathematical scale, but it is far LESS complex than a God would be. God has to be very complex indeed in order to be capable of designing anything, and here is where the idea of a God as the terminus of causility is wrong, because we only know of one process capable of creating a being so complex that it is capable of designing other things, this process, as you've probably guessed is evolution. The reason that God is a bad theory then, is that because he exists before anything else, he can not have evolved from something, and as such I can say that the existence of God is about as probable as the existence of an invisiible Dragon named Chet in my bathtub. Both propositions are so improbable as to be rediculous, and while neither can be proved absolutely false, they ought to be dismissed, because they are bad theories.Embright said:
As for the world view that this provokes, I think you owe it to yourself to read from the new atheists like Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins before you judge us so pessimistic. Those who are intellectual descendants of the new atheist movement tend to view the earth's complexity as stunningly beautiful, and we actually feel that the proposition of God delutes this beauty. We feel that human life is very important, and feel that it can be objectively stated that questions of morality are questions of "what actions reduce the most suffering and create the most happiness." This conclusion requries no faith in propositions which we can not prove to be at least probable.
Not quite, for in the case of observed reality he not only stepped back, but also moved away, threw away his cell phone, never told us his mailing address and declared all contact information classified. And upon leaving the house, left behind a loaded gun on the kitchen table and sprikled the living room with primed mousetraps.Jedoro said:
Embright said:
its not hard. WE KNOW god in any form doesnt exist.
however, if you are a christian i also have this little gem for you: http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/
No, you do not know, and technically, no one knows anything, you THINK god doesn't exist, while i THINK he does. There is no scientific evidence he does or doesn't exist, and as to the not healing every injured person evar, maybe our god is an evil god, demanding human sacrifice, maybe he isn't omniscient, or maybe people need to learn to see past the immediate conclusions:vampirekid.13 said:
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS PURE EVIL FOR HUMANS, no event, no matter how messed up or grotesque is purely evil or purely good, someone always loses something, and someone always gains something, there is always an upside and downside, they don't balance out, but both are present. if timmy loses his arms and legs in the, he ends up in a chair, but he matures, (maybe he ends up teaching somewhere, or raising millions of dollars for charities to bring running water to sub-saharan africa to prevent other well accidents)
Smartest stuff I've read all thread. I believe in God, and am therefore opposed to your choice, but your logic, Max, is commendable. Who was the r-tard that started a post about religion anyway? That was one of the first things i was warned about when I joined the Escapist. These kind of things always start heated debates that put the opposing sides at each other's throats, which is really something that us Escapians don't need right now. Put your beliefs aside, and let's have a good time, whether your Christian, Hindu, or a Scientologist. Well... yeah, okay, I geuss I can include Scientology.MaxTheReaper said:
Once again, there is no point to making choices unless there are wrong or bad choices to make, which cause suffering. Sure, you could have a world where there were only good choices to make, but that world would be bland: there wouldn't be any point to making the choices at all.bodyklok said:
I think that defining god is rather simple, God is simply a superior entity which we cannot comprehend.That said, the definition in itself is rather meaningless, for it could mean God in his traditionnal religious sense or it could mean the universe or any number of things really. While the first option is not controversal, the second one is rather more so. So before I'm told why the universe is something that can be understood, let me try first to explain why it can't. There is three concepts that disable us to do so:nothing, eternity and purpose.
Nothing as in true state of nothingness cannot be truly grasped because of the cogito ergo sum: if you try to imagine nothing,you are the source of this tought, hence it is not nothing anymore. This may seem rather trivial, however it is not, since if the universe if finite, there must have been nothing before. If you tell me there was simply another universe before, let's use the term existence . However, if existence is not finite but rather infinite, this leads to the second point: eternity.
Eternity simply cannot be truly grasped by finite beings since we need a beginning and a end to do s
f course, a simple counter-argument is available to disprove what i have just said. If I say that these ideas cannot be grasped, how can it be that I talk about it? Because they can be glimpsed at or if you prefer, there is a vague and minute understanding of them available, but no more.
Lastly there is no way to understand the purpose of life or existence, it is easy to understand the biological purpose of life which is to reproduce, however why is there this purpose? This is what I mean by being unable to understand the purpose of life ( the same reasonning applies to existence).
This said, it doesn't mean that i belong to any religion and if this post hadn't been civil,I would have bashed on religion. I am simply content to know that I can't know more then that and shall strive to acheive my biological goals.
Nothing as in true state of nothingness cannot be truly grasped because of the cogito ergo sum: if you try to imagine nothing,you are the source of this tought, hence it is not nothing anymore. This may seem rather trivial, however it is not, since if the universe if finite, there must have been nothing before. If you tell me there was simply another universe before, let's use the term existence . However, if existence is not finite but rather infinite, this leads to the second point: eternity.
Eternity simply cannot be truly grasped by finite beings since we need a beginning and a end to do s
f course, a simple counter-argument is available to disprove what i have just said. If I say that these ideas cannot be grasped, how can it be that I talk about it? Because they can be glimpsed at or if you prefer, there is a vague and minute understanding of them available, but no more. Lastly there is no way to understand the purpose of life or existence, it is easy to understand the biological purpose of life which is to reproduce, however why is there this purpose? This is what I mean by being unable to understand the purpose of life ( the same reasonning applies to existence).
This said, it doesn't mean that i belong to any religion and if this post hadn't been civil,I would have bashed on religion. I am simply content to know that I can't know more then that and shall strive to acheive my biological goals.