How could I possibly? You made blind statements, debating which would be foolish. The only thing I could do was debate free will and natural free will with you but that doesn't serve to prove any of what I was getting at. God doesn't think, he invented thought. The definition of thought is - to have a conscious mind, to some extent of reasoning, remembering experiences, making rational decisions, etc. If god can't remember and is irrational how was he able to remember the sins of the past and make a rational decision of sending Jesus to earth. You claim god created everything, even the ability to make decisions, how did he make the decision to create decision making? You claim god created free will and determinism but couldn't possibly be bound by either so how would he do anything, whether it be random chance or some ridiculous form of choice. Things can be made to point to him, miracles can be made to reveal god, but empirical proof will never come about because it is the only thing that matters. For something that holds the position as the objective truth, why can it only be proven through subjective truth?
This is my point. If you don't believe in God, you can't believe because you won't. @ Nitrous: How could he create thought if he can't think himself? The point you are trying to make then, is that God is a thing rather than more human-like in "thought", if you will. But that would be labeling him as a force of nature, not an omnipresent deity. You bring up the point of Jesus. God would have had to think to make such a person who would set up an example for all to follow. (That example being humility and self-sacrifice.) So, in effect, he must be a thinking being.
We are debating that which can never be understood, which means the side not supporting the un-understandable wins. If you were to walk up to me and lance and ask us what we were talking about and I said flarg, your first reaction would be, "what is flarg?" If I said, I don't know, then the debate is over. There is nothing to talk about. What could you possibly discuss?
That's what I'm saying. We can't really fully grasp the concept of God, so there will always be debates that end up like this.
Then dump your religion. It is that simple. No one could possibly understand god so why are you catholic? Why do you believe in heaven and hell? Why do you care about him/her/it/the consequential? You're an atheist, you just haven't realized it.
It would be great if there was an afterlife, you know? And I have heard of some small miracles that have happened, so that contributes to my beliefs as well. But you know, to each his own. But what of the Big Bang? If that [possibly] started the universe, who started the Big Bang? Science has given religion its biggest point: if it all started somewhere, who started the party? EDIT: All right, this thread and that other have been fought to a standstill. It's come down to String Theory vs God. (I'm not so informed about string theory, so I'll have to read up on that.) But keep in mind, both String Theory and God are both theories, and cannot be proven concretely. EDIT 2: Yeah, well what I meant to say was that God was a belief and String Theory is a theory. But neither have been proven to be true facts is what I'm getting at.
So you listened to a christian, mortal man tell you about the incomprehensible and you believed him. He told you about an afterlife, he told you of miracles, and you ate it up as truth or what you'd believe. I say now, if there is a god, I know of no torture greater than eternity. Number one, the thread isn't about the existence of god, it is about theology. The thread itself isn't over though our discussion may be. Number two, String theory is a theory. God is an idea. Theories have natural facts that back them, by definition god cannot be a theory so don't call him one.
Well, it's easy to say that, because you're still alive. You enjoy life. So why deny at least some false hope (for you anyway) that there is another one? It doesn't detract from living in any way, so no wonder it's so popular. On the thread's title, your guess is as good as mine. To quote Nitrous: "Stop worrying and enjoy life." (But continue to pray if it makes you feel better; that's what I'll do anyway.
It can detract when your life is spent praying and hoping your not sent to hell. That is totally besides the point. An afterlife is not something to hope for. Life is enjoyable due to mortality. That is why it would be torture to live forever.
It seems as though I'm the one left that has to deal with the big elephant in the room seeing as everyone else has cleared out. Here we are roughly a week after the arguement dropped off and not a single person seems to have even flinched at what appears to be an unshakable belief. God, being an awesome god, is an unfathomable one. One who is described as being illogical, unreasonable, and often times psychopathic. The Judeo-Christian god, or Yahweh as some like to call him, must not, to properly fit in with our society, be able to be scrutinized by an onslaught of logical thinking and reasonable actions. God is, as they say, the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end, the indescribable, and the one true god in existence. However, after running through this stream of thought I came across something that I found interesting. The bible describes god many times. Some good, some bad - oh, who am I kidding; mostly bad. It has called god a jealous god, a loving god, and of course a logical god. After all, being logical is what really counts. Would it be more logical to save the lives of tens of thousands of sheep by sending a son to die on the cross for humanity or let the sheeple slaughter the sheep or just to attach a tounge to someone's anus and send him to Neptune. That last one to me, seems a bit erratic and illogical, I sure am glad god is a logical one. That being said, the arguements used previously would suggest that god, being the creator of emotion and all desire, could not possibly have any. God is illogical because he created logic, god is unreasonable because he created reason, god is stoic because he created emotion, and god is non-existant because he created existance. Not to leave anything off god is undesirable because he created desire. Which shows to me you either have no idea what your talking about or you actually don't desire to be with god. How much fun is that? God is a pretty cool guy, though. At least when the filthy humans aren't building buerocracies with him and waging war with each other over whose tribe of Abraham is the better. Funny story, I stubbed my toe this morning and prayed to god to make it feel better; maybe he was just being polite and adhereing to my suggestion that he be nonintrusive because my toe still hurts like the rank backside of antelope being nibbled on by a lion. Maybe I'm being too hard on him. After all he was so active and intrusive in the old testament - look what happened to most of those people. But doesn't anyone find it odd that god, being infallible, would make the decision (or can he make decisions since he created them?) of being so active and then almost completely nonintrusive besides a few wacko stories that everyone seems to believe at face value. Why is it that a god would be so active and expect those people of the time to believe him based on proof while during the age of science we must operate ENTIRELY upon faith? Does this not strike you as a tad bit odd or curious? Apparently it does to the point where a select few Christians say somethings complete counter-intuituve to their faith by calling god unfathomable. Who knows, maybe you didn't mean it, you just got caught up in a little to much of your own bull crap. Maybe that's just the old testament I'm referring to. After all he was the most intrusive in those texts. It seems everyone came out of the old testament either mentally, physically, or emotionally scared. It just goes to show that god is that much more loving than you could possibly be or is he stoic?, I forget. Might as well start at the beginning. Adam and Eve, the first victims of god's love, were punished for being true to their nature. That nature being curiousity. The very nature that god endowed them with. He knew they were curoius, he knew they had to be curious to survive, so he knew they would eat that apple. A cynical person my begin to suspect that god only created us, just to punish us; but really...what's their to be cynical about? The first lesson we learn in genesis is that being human is a sin, we were punished and sent out of paradise for being true to our nature. But we pulled ourselves together and started on the tower of babel so we could be close to god or just check out heaven, we were being curious and doing what comes naturally - as endowed by god. Instead of taking the illogical path of blowing up M-51 (a galaxy) with a box of cracker jacks he did the most logical thing at the time and destroyed our language, admittedly not too logical but atleast he was in the ball park. Barely 20 pages in and we've already taken two severe body blows from our loving and merciful god. Then, just because he can, he floods the planet, probably because someone looked at him funny. He does tip off one person to build a boat because obviously he doesn't want everyone wiped out, he needs someone to punish. Are you starting to see why god is psychopathic? Why, maybe, I don't follow your theology? So here we are post-flood civilization and everyone whose anyone is prescribing an adjective to god. Even those who claim he doesn't have any particular adjective to describe him, still describe him as being indescribible. Maybe there is something profound in that, you'll have to dig deep on that one. So where are we? We're at the point where you realize your not a Christian, your an agnostic who adheres to Christian teachings. Congrats, you've taken your first step to agnosticism. Don't worry, agnosticism is the only thing that will ever be infallible. Of course, maybe, these are all just maybe's. Maybe we're not cut out to discuss this or maybe we are too cut out to discuss this. Maybe someday you just might have a maybe of your own. I hope she's an attractive lass. Peace.
When people say that "God is in us", I don't think it necessarily means that God is "in" us. It just means that he is there to guide us in the right direction. (If you don't believe in God, fine, but that's not the point here.) But could God be the Devil? Not in the sense that he is the dividing force that made Adam and Eve sin. However, he could be the "Devil" in the sense that he watches over Heaven and Hell. Just my opinion. EDIT: Hey Nitrous, I was just saying in that other post that God is a belief, and String theory is a theory. However, neither have been proven as fact.
Neither have been proven as absolute fact. But one has more supporting evidence than the other. Can you guess which one?
The difference between those who believe in God and those who don't is their faith. My faith is good enough for me. Nothing against String Theory though, it sounds cool. (Yes, it has more scientific support.) Here's a comic while I get dinner and think of what to say: Ah, it doesn't show up. Link.
I don't know if you were wanting me to critisize the comic or not, so I'll leave it be til' I get a straight response. Maybe you could also respond to my earlier post calling you an agnostic. I'd like to hear a good reason why you aren't one.
Psychopathic God There is evidence of God being a psychopath. Look what he does to this house of worship: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nty4PX-exMk