What would convince you that God doesn't exist?

[abnoxio]

I'm interested what it would take for a Christian, Catholic, etc. to be convinced that God did not exist.
In other words what kind of proof would convince you. The discovery of Jesus's body? Alien invaders? that kind of thing.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.

[bernee51]

People as individuals are generally charitable. It's when they get in groups that they become stingy.

I guess you are still wrong...I suggest you check here.

Indeed if you look here you will find a list of 1713 philanthropic organizations of which 194 are listed as christian.

Statistics don't lie...

Surely you are joking...tell that to any politician.

"There are three types of lies - lies, damn lies, and statistics." - variously
attributed to Benjamin Disraeli, Alfred Marshall and Mark Twain

in the area of philanthropy and volunteerism, the numbers are clear.

What is clear is your bias is showing.

It is objection to evidence that God makes readily apparent that is illogical .

God has not presented the evidence...you have claimed he has and presented what you believe is evidence.

There is no evidence of the existence of your god or any other. Can you prove that statement wrong with a logical argument?

I don't believe so.

What else did people believe? The earth was flat and at the centre of the solar system.

Okay, and they weren't wrong, were they? From their perspective, the earth IS flat -- else we would have a lot more difficulty building. From the perspective of the moon, the earth IS central.

And from their perspective there was a god. That, like the flat earth, doesn't make it a fact.

When we discovered that the earth is not central, we didn't throw the earth away, did we?

No we threw away 'belief'

Women and children were beleived to be property.

They weren't just "believed to be" property -- they WERE property. In many parts of the world, they still are. This isn't a matter of belief -- it's a matter of practice. When we stopped believing that women were property, we didn't throw away women, did we? We didn't throw away property, did we?

No the belief and/or practice was thrown away.

People sold themselves to pay a debt.

One word...Africans.

What was their debt?

When we decided that this was wrong, we didn't throw away the people, did we? We didn't throw away the concept of debt, did we?

No we threw away the belief that it was right to buy or sell human beings.

Actually it is called 'spiritual evolution'.

No... evolution doesn't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Neither does the non belief in a deity when it comes to spiritual evolution.

Atheism is spiritual abandonment.

In your opinion. Can you support that with some evidence?

I know Buddhists who do not have a deity belief and are probably the most spiritual people I have met. Personally, I feel I am more spiritually centred now than I have ever been.

Sure... and we should evolve spiritually. I believe in the development of doctrine... but not in throwing away the One who creates and sustains us.

Your 'doctrine' is written in a book that belongs to an agrarian culture. It, you claim, is the immutable word of god, it is 'gospel'. How can that 'doctrine' develop?

[Diana Holberg]

trencacloscas, my answer to all of your questions... reread the thread.

[Cathar1950]

bernee51 wrote:

Your 'doctrine' is written in a book that belongs to an agrarian culture. It, you claim, is the immutable word of god, it is 'gospel'. How can that 'doctrine' develop?

The stories come from an agrarian culture. It was most likely finally created and compiled during Ezra so the Persians had laws in order to judge Judea and create social order.
The NT was written for converted pagans in a Greek/Roman dominated world.
Doctrines do develop. Therefore, that is a good point and question.
If you look at the Gospels, you all so see evolution (change). In Mark,
Jesus becomes the Son of God (servant) at his resurrection.
Matthew has it happen at his baptism.
Luke puts it at his birth.
John puts him at the beginning and equal with God.
From 70-100 C.E. at the earliest we see development, change and evolution.

[Diana Holberg]

I guess you are still wrong...I suggest you check here.

I did... not sure what your point in posting this was.

Indeed if you look here you will find a list of 1713 philanthropic organizations of which 194 are listed as christian.

Which happens to be about 80% of all the religious organizations listed. And nearly 200% more than the next religion listed.

And how many of those non-religious charities listed do you think may be run by Christians? If the proportions are the same as in the "Religious" section, it would be 1,200... that would be a total of nearly 1,400 out of 1,713...

dmoz is not a study anyway...

If the discussion has deteriorated to quoting web searches as studies and hurling insults, it's time to end it. I'm not interested in an insult match.

And from their perspective there was a god. That, like the flat earth, doesn't make it a fact.

Right... perception was wrong. Earth wasn't flat. But there was still an earth.

People sold themselves to pay a debt.

One word...Africans.

What was their debt?

I was not referring to Africans. Indentured servitude is relatively commonplace in some areas.

Your 'doctrine' is written in a book that belongs to an agrarian culture. It, you claim, is the immutable word of god, it is 'gospel'. How can that 'doctrine' develop?

The words don't develop... our understanding of them does.

I will not be presenting you "evidence" of God... no "evidence" is proof to you. Time has told.

[Cathar1950]

I wanted to share to our Theistic friends some insights.
I loaned my books by Charles Hartshorne's A Natural Theology for Our Time and Beyond Humanism so I had to look this up.

Dan Dombrowski writes in http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hartshorne/ about Charles Hartshorne:

And he does not think that it is possible to think of a preeminent being that only existed contingently since if it did exist contingently rather than necessarily, it would not be preeminent. That is, God's existence is either impossible (positivism) or possible, and, if possible, then necessary (theism). He is assuming here that there are three alternatives for us to consider: (1) God is impossible; (2) God is possible, but may or may not exist; (3) God exists necessarily. The ontological argument shows that the second alternative makes no sense. Hence, he thinks that the prime task for the philosophical theist is to show that God is not impossible

.

Belief in God as omnipotent, he thinks, has three problems: (1) it is at odds with the disorderliness in nature; (2) it yields the acutest form of the theodicy problem; and (3) it conflicts with the notion from Plato's Sophist, defended by Hartshorne, that being is dynamic power (dynamis). An omnipotent being would ultimately have all power over others, who would ultimately be powerless. But any being-in-becoming, according to Hartshorne, has some power to affect, or to be affected by, others; this power, however slight, provides counterevidence to a belief in divine omnipotence. In contrast, God is ideally powerful, on the Hartshornian view. That is, God is as powerful as it is possible to be, given the partial freedom and power of creatures.

God is omniscient, on Hartshorne's view, but "omniscience" here refers to the divine ability to know everything that is knowable: past actualities as already actualized; present realities to the extent that they are knowable according to the laws of physics (e.g., what is present epistemically may very well be the most recent past, given the speed of light); and future possibilities or probabilities as possibilities or probabilities. On the traditional or classical conception of omniscience, however, God has knowledge of future possibilities or probabilities as already actualized. According to Hartshorne, this is not an example of supreme knowledge, but is rather an example of ignorance of the (at least partially) indeterminate character of the future.

See, Not every one wants to trash Christians.

[bernee51]

[Cathar1950]

[bernee51]

[trencacloscas]

trencacloscas, my answer to all of your questions... reread the thread.

Sure. And? If God exists to you, that's OK, it's your belief. But if you want to make it exist for others, evidence is required. I'm sorry to say you didn't present one single piece. You can have all the "personal" evidence you desire, and it can be enough to you. But "Evidence" is a word we took from Latin, it comes from the verb 'videre' (a complicated verb, by all standards) and it involves "seeing". To be considered "evidence", an argument, object, trace, whatever, must show its "evident" quality. That is, to be "visible" to others in terms of materiality or logic. You can always tell what evidence can Christians produce about their God under this standards...

[Cathar1950]

bernee51 wrote:

I may have missed something...
If it is impossible for something to exist, e.g. square circle, married bachelor, then that would suggest it is non-existent. How is that not proof?

No, you did not miss anything. It is proof.
They are forced to either change their view of God or abandon it.
On the other hand, they need to show that it is possible.

This a problem with Christianity is it not? I am quite happy to accept that god is subjective - i.e. it exists for the believer. Unfortunately this does not sit well with your average Christian - well none that I have ever come across. They have all insisted that their god is objective - it exists regardless of belief.

I see the same problem. True, if God exists, then it is necessary existence, and would exist regardless of any ones belief.
Quoting from the Bible is not proof.
When the Bible is talking about God's Word, it is not talking about the Bible.