Does God exist? (your opinion anyways.)

[Obsidian]

Usually my opinion of higher power clash harshly with others. Not because I'm an atheist (I'm not, I tried but it didn't feel like a correct mindset to me), but because what I believe isn't present in the various religious texts most western religions look to for answer.

 

So, I do think a god exists. But not as most people that I've met (including those here) would paint it as.

[Alyxx Thorne]

Usually my opinion of higher power clash harshly with others. Not because I'm an atheist (I'm not, I tried but it didn't feel like a correct mindset to me), but because what I believe isn't present in the various religious texts most western religions look to for answer.

 

So, I do think a god exists. But not as most people that I've met (including those here) would paint it as.

That's fairly interesting though.

[Axeldeath]

Usually my opinion of higher power clash harshly with others. Not because I'm an atheist (I'm not, I tried but it didn't feel like a correct mindset to me), but because what I believe isn't present in the various religious texts most western religions look to for answer.

 

So, I do think a god exists. But not as most people that I've met (including those here) would paint it as.

 

So you're a deist

[lonesomedrifter]

I think life would make a lot more sense if God was just a bad comedian.

[BTGBullseye]

I think life would make a lot more sense if God was just a bad comedian.

Try Pastafarianism.

[Doom Shepherd]

I think life would make a lot more sense if God was just a bad comedian.

Try Pastafarianism.

 

Or any of a number of Trickster gods. My favorite, I may have mentioned, is Coyote.

[danielsangeo]

Wall of Text Warning!

 

Me, I don't think that the definition of the three-letter string "God" has been truly and adequately defined. How does one distinguish between "God" and simply a being of sufficiently-advanced intelligence and evolution (to borrow from Arthur C. Clarke)? I know I'm quoting Star Trek here, but they've touched on this subject several times. In Star Trek 5, a renegade Vulcan takes the Enterprise and her crew to the center of the galaxy to "meet God". There, they find a being of massive power claiming to be the deity of many religions, yet requires the assistance of lowly mortals to "carry him" outside the center of the galaxy ("What does God need with a starship?").

 

Later, in the TNG episode "Who Watches the Watchers?", a group of proto-Vulcans mistake Picard as a deity after a mistake causes the proto-Vulcans to see these beings of far-advanced technology (they haven't evolved to the point where First Contact can be made and the Enterprise crew had violated the Prime Directive by making their presence known), going so far as to call him "the Picard" and attempting to "please the Picard" even doing quite evil things, such as attempting to sacrifice Troi to "please" him. Picard attempts to show that he's "not magical, just very advanced" and, in one of the proto-Vulcans' desparate attempts to prove that Picard is the magical deity, shoots him with an arrow. Picard is grievously injured and is dying on the planet. Only then do the inhabitants realize that he is mortal. He is transported back to the ship where Crusher performs a life-saving operation and Picard is restored to good health.

 

In a later episode of TNG, a being known as "Ardra" has come to 'collect' on her guarantee of a thousand years of peace on a planet. She is there to enslave the planet and, as such, the planet is now in chaos and the Enterprise is called in to assist. The being calling herself "Ardra" appears on the ship and claims ownership of the Enterprise and its crew (as per the deal struck a thousand years ago). However, due to ancient custom, Picard is allowed to challenge Ardra to a trial. During the trial, she causes the various "apocalypse" signs to happen including showing up as their version of the devil (she is able to shape-shift into the Christian devil as well for Picard and the Klingon devil Fek'lhr for Worf), causing planet-wide quakes, and even disappearing at will. Picard believes "Ardra" to be a charlatan, taking advantage of cultures such as this planet's for personal gain, but they have no evidence. In fact, the thousand-years of peace did happen on the planet, but Picard quickly deduces that the peace came about not by Ardra's work but by the hard work of the people on the planet; they cleaned up their environment, they stopped the wars, they shifted to a more agrarian society, and so forth), but the people of the planet still don't believe it. It appears that Picard might lose the case, his ship, and his crew to Ardra. Until they find Ardra's cloaked ship. Quickly, they take over Ardra's ship and suddenly she has lost all her powers and Picard has suddenly gained them. Picard then announced that "Ardra" was one of 23 different aliases she's used in a single sector of space and she was taken into custody by the planet's security forces.

 

In all three instances, mortal-but-very-advanced-by-comparison beings are mistaken for deities. These people (the creature at the center of the Galaxy, Picard and Ardra) are not magical or supernatural at all, just very advanced. So, how can we, as a people, possibly KNOW that "God" (if this thing even exists at all) is a deity? What is a deity?

 

That has not yet been adequately defined and I don't think it ever can be.

 

As for "God" himself? In my mind, He's just one of many conceptions invented by humans to explain the unexplained (such as the creation of "Ra" to explain the sun). As such, the attributes given to "God "by us have a logical inconsistency: Namely that an all-knowing, all-good, and all-powerful being could ever possibly allow any sort of evil to happen ever, even in the course of promoting a "greater good" (a la "Naziism" was not a good thing even if it led to something good coming out of it; an all-good, all-knowing, all-powerful deity could not possibly have allowed even that to happen, but it did). This is the kind of error that fallible humans make, but not the infallible deity known as "God".

 

To make a long story short (too late!): I do not believe in any deity simply for the fact that there's no evidence that has been (or possibly could ever be) provided for me to possibly believe. Could such evidence be provided in the future where I can be shown to be wrong? Perhaps, but historically speaking, it's not looking very good.

 

I don't mind or even care if you do believe in a deity. If you do, more power to you and I salute you. I just can't. And, if you use that deity you believe in to try to advance your own personal goals against certain groups of people, then you and I are gonna tangle, if you know what I mean.

[Alyxx Thorne]

Same here. Don't really care what people believe. It's what they do that bothers me most of the time.

[Stevezor]

Looking around at the world, it's hard not to believe there's some sort of divine power out there SOMEWHERE. We have this amazing thing called love, we're a curious species, yet despite our intelligence and attempts at humanity, there's always those evil bastards, or just total retarded douchebags that spoil it for everyone. Then there's all the stuff that happens with our world. I don't think we're the CENTER of the universe, nor the most important mortal race, but we just might be caught in the middle of some universal politics, which if we use right, might just give us an advantage.

 

(and yes, I stole universal politics from Freeman's Mind. don't sue.)

[Alyxx Thorne]

Well, we have each other at least. That's always a comfort.

[Vapymid]

That has not yet been adequately defined and I don't think it ever can be.

 

To me it's pretty simple - any candidate God must have a reasonable claim on having created this Universe and having existed in some shape and form before the Big Bang.

 

Anyone or anything that came into being after the Big Bang, no matter how powerful he is, cannot be God.

 

Regards

[Wheatley]

That has not yet been adequately defined and I don't think it ever can be.

 

To me it's pretty simple - any candidate God must have a reasonable claim on having created this Universe and having existed in some shape and form before the Big Bang.

 

Anyone or anything that came into being after the Big Bang, no matter how powerful he is, cannot be God.

 

Regards

 

 

(I'm back, after quite an absence due to school-related things and other madness)

 

Two nitpicks:

 

There have been many suggested beings which were thought of as gods or deities that didn't create the universe or claim to. You have given a definition, but what makes this definition better than any other? And would creating a universe necessarily give a being or thing an automatic "godhood"?

 

Secondly, a bit of a physics nitpick, but the whole idea of something existing before the big bang and causing it seems rather odd considering that time seems to have started with the big bang. There wouldn't have been any "before" the big bang. This concept is a little tricky, but it's presented with the breakdown of relativity that a singularity would imply. If this is the case, would you say that it's impossible for a god to exist?

Also, just curious, you mentioned that this potential god must have a reasonable claim on having created the universe and existing before the big bang. Considering that there is no known way to even potentially get information about what happened before the big bang (assuming such a concept is meaningful), how would this potential god make a reasonable claim?

[Vapymid]

You have given a definition, but what makes this definition better than any other? And would creating a universe necessarily give a being or thing an automatic "godhood"?

 

To me, the scope of God means absolute power over the Universe and one has to be beyond it to have such power, because anything within the Universe would be subject to its existing laws and conditions. So, even if you are very powerful and can go in and out of a black hole at leisure that would not qualify you as God in my eyes (maybe as an angel or archangel, at most). But if you create a Universe, you set the rules for it and initiate the process of its creation and that may make you God and Creator for that particular Universe.

 

There wouldn't have been any "before" the big bang. This concept is a little tricky, but it's presented with the breakdown of relativity that a singularity would imply. If this is the case, would you say that it's impossible for a god to exist?

 

If you are God (and Creator, which is synonymous to me) then it is probably impossible for you not to exist before your create your Creation. So, if God exists then, by definition, it existed prior to the Big Bang. If nothing existed prior to the Big Bang - there is no God.

 

The truth is, we don't as yet know if there was anything before the Big Bang and anything is possible. Just because our current model for the Universe breaks at the initial point may only mean that the model is imperfect. There maybe a multiverse and our Big Bang may have been just an event there. There may be a recursion, when the end of our Universe results in the new Bang. The arrow of time may not exist or casuality may be totally different in those other dimensions in such multiverses - we just don't know. Yet.

 

Considering that there is no known way to even potentially get information about what happened before the big bang (assuming such a concept is meaningful), how would this potential god make a reasonable claim?

 

There may be a way to see... There are hypotheses that CMB may contain information about the pre-Bang environment, there may be cross-talk between universes or there may be a way to travel from our Universe to others, including the pre-Bang one(s). Anyway, if you are God you will find a way to present convincing evidence

 

Regards

[BTGBullseye]

Anyway, if you are God you will find a way to present convincing evidence

But only if he wants to.

[Stevezor]

But only if he wants to.

 

Then it's definitely not the god of the bible, we haven't heard from him in a good millenium or two.

[BTGBullseye]

Why do you say that? Plenty of miracles and signs since then...

[Stevezor]

If it was an all-loving all-powerful, all-compassionate god, you think there would be a bit more historical documentation than what we have. And with all the wars, and death, and destruction and etc etc etc etc...

 

I find it more likely Freeman's theory. We got caught up in the middle of some cosmic politics, and we're trying to make the best of it.

[BTGBullseye]

To each their own. I just see how God can't interfere all that much while still preserving free will, but I'm one of the rare ones that understands the completeness of the issue.

[Alyxx Thorne]

I think a lot of people have problems understanding the nature of God and how God has evolved and how he works. It's not my role to judge people for it but I have to agree with BTG here.

[Wheatley]

To me, the scope of God means absolute power over the Universe and one has to be beyond it to have such power, because anything within the Universe would be subject to its existing laws and conditions. So, even if you are very powerful and can go in and out of a black hole at leisure that would not qualify you as God in my eyes (maybe as an angel or archangel, at most). But if you create a Universe, you set the rules for it and initiate the process of its creation and that may make you God and Creator for that particular Universe.

 

If you are God (and Creator, which is synonymous to me) then it is probably impossible for you not to exist before your create your Creation. So, if God exists then, by definition, it existed prior to the Big Bang. If nothing existed prior to the Big Bang - there is no God.

 

Okay, that answers my main inquiry. Thanks.

 

The truth is, we don't as yet know if there was anything before the Big Bang and anything is possible. Just because our current model for the Universe breaks at the initial point may only mean that the model is imperfect. There maybe a multiverse and our Big Bang may have been just an event there. There may be a recursion, when the end of our Universe results in the new Bang. The arrow of time may not exist or casuality may be totally different in those other dimensions in such multiverses - we just don't know. Yet.

 

There may be a way to see... There are hypotheses that CMB may contain information about the pre-Bang environment, there may be cross-talk between universes or there may be a way to travel from our Universe to others, including the pre-Bang one(s). Anyway, if you are God you will find a way to present convincing evidence

 

Indeed, it's entirely possible that relativity and quantum theory just aren't complete or accurate enough to properly explain the big bang. Simply speaking from what we do have at the moment, it seems possible that the universe having been created might not even be a valid concept; of course, there are a lot of hypotheses that would predict potential events before the big bang, so there's no way to make a solid statement about such things. Hopefully we'll dig far enough in physics to get some more information soon.

 

But only if he wants to.

(I mean to address the three posts after this one as well, but in order to save space, I'm just going to quote this one)

 

But how do we even know if there is a god that he/she/they/it wants anything. Want is a very biological concept, if there was an actual creator god, why would it display the traits of animals and, most peculiarly, humans above all others? If something did predate the big bang and existed in another universe to create ours, it would likely be so different that concepts such as love, hate, punishment, reward, etc. would be meaningless in attempting to describe it.

It's one thing to imagine a "universal first mover"; while there is no evidence for such a being it's entirely within the realm of possibility. However, the omnipotent, malevolent/all loving (depends on your interpretation of the bible), anthropomorphic Yaweh seems discordant with what we know of the world.

 

To each their own. I just see how God can't interfere all that much while still preserving free will, but I'm one of the rare ones that understands the completeness of the issue.

 

I'm not sure if you intended your post to read this way, but it strikes me as rather... Impolite.

 

I think a lot of people have problems understanding the nature of God and how God has evolved and how he works. It's not my role to judge people for it but I have to agree with BTG here.

 

But we're talking about a being we have no knowledge of; a being we're not even sure exists. If people have faith in god, that's fine, but I don't think anyone can claim to have a better understanding of a god than anyone else. Understanding requires knowledge, but we don't have any here.