for those that believe in god

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persononplanet
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27 May 2010, 2:08 pm

what evidence do you have that god exists?

events in your life?
happy feelings?

just wondering

ruveyn
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27 May 2010, 3:06 pm

persononplanet wrote:

what evidence do you have that god exists?

events in your life?
happy feelings?

just wondering

There is not an iota of objective empirical evidence supporting the proposition that a (supernatural) God, god or gods exist. It is purely a belief no doubt fueled by the Fear of Death.

ruveyn

skafather84
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27 May 2010, 3:14 pm

ruveyn wrote:

persononplanet wrote:

what evidence do you have that god exists?

events in your life?
happy feelings?

just wondering

There is not an iota of objective empirical evidence supporting the proposition that a (supernatural) God, god or gods exist. It is purely a belief no doubt fueled by the Fear of Death.

ruveyn

That's a little base. I think it goes a little farther than simply being fueled by the fear of death. Not to say that there's some superbeing but rather that the construct of a deity is a necessity in some cases for the construct of morality and justice in society. Though the ideas themselves exist independent of any superbeing, the belief in such myths help anchor the morality to some degree. Unfortunately, the myths can also anchor many amoral beliefs and injustices but that's another discussion....there's more to religion than simply a fear of death.

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iamnotaparakeet
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27 May 2010, 3:16 pm

persononplanet wrote:

what evidence do you have that god exists?

events in your life?
happy feelings?

just wondering

Given that matter & energy cannot create themselves, but only change forms, another agent must have created matter and energy.

psychohist
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27 May 2010, 3:23 pm

persononplanet wrote:

what evidence do you have that god exists?

I don't believe in god, but I just want to point out that many of those who do don't do so because of evidence. The point of religion is faith; requiring evidence is an indication of lack of faith. They believe in god because of faith, not because of evidence.

skafather84
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27 May 2010, 3:24 pm

iamnotaparakeet wrote:

Given that matter & energy cannot create themselves, but only change forms, another agent must have created matter and energy.

Yes. But that agent doesn't have to be a divine godmansuperbeing. Rather less being a Christian or Muslim or Jewish or Greek or Chinese godmansuperbeing.

iamnotaparakeet
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27 May 2010, 3:28 pm

psychohist wrote:

persononplanet wrote:

what evidence do you have that god exists?

I reject your definition of "faith" and substitute my own.

Faith is the trust in a witness, whether an eyewitness or an historical document. Faith in this sense is trusting a reference, such as Josephus' account of the revolt of the Zealots and the camps of the Romans or that Alexander of Macedon actually existed.

skafather84
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27 May 2010, 3:28 pm

psychohist wrote:

persononplanet wrote:

what evidence do you have that god exists?

faith
mid-13c., "duty of fulfilling one's trust," from O.Fr. feid, from L. fides "trust, belief," from root of fidere "to trust," from PIE base *bhidh-/*bhoidh- (cf. Gk. pistis; see bid). For sense evolution, see belief. Theological sense is from late 14c.; religions called faiths since c.1300. Old Faithful geyser named 1870 by explorer Gen. H.D. Washburn, Surveyor-General of the Montana Territory, in reference to the regularity of its outbursts.

It doesn't necessarily mean to blindly believe and if it did, there wouldn't be miracles in the bible.

iamnotaparakeet
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27 May 2010, 3:30 pm

skafather84 wrote:

iamnotaparakeet wrote:

Given that matter & energy cannot create themselves, but only change forms, another agent must have created matter and energy.

Yes. But that agent doesn't have to be a divine godmansuperbeing. Rather less being a Christian or Muslim or Jewish or Greek or Chinese godmansuperbeing.

Correct, however this is only one aspect of a larger set of argumentation. The recognition of the existence of such an agent is prerequisite to the determination of identity.

Awesomelyglorious
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27 May 2010, 3:41 pm

iamnotaparakeet wrote:

Given that matter & energy cannot create themselves, but only change forms, another agent must have created matter and energy.

Technically no. Let's present it this way:

"Given that spiritual beings cannot create themselves, but only change forms, another agent must have created all spiritual beings"

Now, this statement is true in that nothing can create itself, but it is surely false in the conclusion, otherwise you must have an infinite regress of beings of different natures creating other beings.

In your picture, you have to have something that can exist for all time. The problem is that there is no logical problem preventing matter and energy from existing in all time either. This means that your reasoning does not really prove what you need it to prove.

iamnotaparakeet
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27 May 2010, 3:46 pm

Awesomelyglorious wrote:

iamnotaparakeet wrote:

Given that matter & energy cannot create themselves, but only change forms, another agent must have created matter and energy.

Swapping out names is invalid here, as the properties of "spiritual beings" have not been established. What if "spiritual beings" don't need to be created such as if they do not undergo the same temporal causality as items existent in physical time? Or how about if a subset or just one need not be bound by temporal causality? What if these "spiritual beings", such as God anyway, exist in ubiquity, but physical time and physical space only occupy a fraction of ubiquity?

iamnotaparakeet
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27 May 2010, 3:51 pm

Awesomelyglorious wrote:

In your picture, you have to have something that can exist for all time. The problem is that there is no logical problem preventing matter and energy from existing in all time either.

Look up the term "heat death", then. Matter and energy could exist for infinite time, but it wouldn't be very warm.

auntblabby
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27 May 2010, 3:56 pm

ruveyn wrote:

There is not an iota of objective empirical evidence supporting the proposition that a (supernatural) God, god or gods exist. It is purely a belief no doubt fueled by the Fear of Death.

there is nothing to fear of death, only of pain.

Awesomelyglorious
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27 May 2010, 3:59 pm

iamnotaparakeet wrote:

Swapping out names is totally valid though as the property you were referring to is the inability of an entity to create itself. If you present a logical argument, and I can swap out the names and it fails, then your argument has also failed.

I already pointed out "what if matter & energy do not need to be created?". As the issue of creation isn't matter of causality, as something could be responsive, but also have existed for all time.

What if the sum of all of space and time does not need to undergo the same temporal causality as items existent in physical space and time? If the universe is a 4 dimensional block, then certainly the entire thing doesn't undergo temporal causality because time is within the block. But if we hold to the universe as possibly being this kind of block, then nothing within the block needs to be created, as a block containing time would be timeless.

iamnotaparakeet
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27 May 2010, 4:02 pm

auntblabby wrote:

ruveyn wrote:

There is not an iota of objective empirical evidence supporting the proposition that a (supernatural) God, god or gods exist. It is purely a belief no doubt fueled by the Fear of Death.

there is nothing to fear of death, only of pain.

Neither for a Christian or an Atheist is the fear of death an issue. However, I doubt that Atheists would be willing to be Martyred for Atheism and give up this one life before passing into the nothingness to which they look forward.

donnie_darko
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27 May 2010, 4:04 pm

I just see too much order in the universe for it to not suggest a Creator.

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