Difference between a god (including God) and...

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Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #1

Post by nobspeople »

Most believe gods (including your God) are immortal 'beings' that have existed 'forever' (even though that isn't a concept humanity can fully grasp, which I find amusing but that's something for another time), created most, if not, everything, and is in control (in a sense) of everything (even things humanity doesn't know about - again: amusing :D ). Some gods have the power to grant immortality in a special, good place (ie heaven) or punish in a bad place (ie hell), etc (though this isn't a complete list as what gods are and can do can (and does often) vary from culture to culture, location to location, time to time and even person to person).

For discussion:
So what's the difference between a god and a superior, mortal being (or society of beings) that is more advanced than humanity to you?
How does this play into your belief (or non-belief) in your life? Or does it not matter?
Have a great, potentially godless, day!

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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #41

Post by nobspeople »

Tcg wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 12:15 pm
historia wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 12:09 pm
Tcg wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 11:53 am
historia wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 11:47 am
Tcg wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 11:11 am
Special Pleading doesn't resolve the problem with claiming that God is somehow different from the other gods humans have and do imagine.
On the contrary, I explained why the two concepts of God an a god are different from each other, so your charge of "special pleading" here is erroneous.
That doesn't change the fact that you are using an argument based on Special Pleading. Your only argument apparently is based on capitalization of the name you Specially Plead is the right name for god/gods/God etc... etc.. etc...
You need to go back and read post #31 again, my friend, lest you continue to embarrass yourself.

I specifically criticized nobspeople for treating 'God' as if it were the name of a god. But God, as a concept, is different from a god based on the two reasons I gave in that post.

Those reasons justify treating the two concepts differently -- as they have been in various religious traditions since antiquity -- and thus does not make my argument special pleading.
Nah. All concepts of god/gods/God are equal unless one relies on Special Pleading to claim that they aren't.


Tcg
Because gods are fundamentally concepts of beliefs, I would tend to agree with you.
One can make anything a god. It can have any definition they want. And they can be offended if their 'god' isn't including (not that I care) into a conversation.
Sure, throughout history there were gods with different definitions/powers/abilities/over certain aspects of life - even gods with gods of their own. So what? It's still a concept that one chooses to believe in (or not).
And, as far as I'm concerned, all are welcomed in this discussion. If one wants to limit their discussion to one god or the other, or God, or Zeus or Purple Spaghetti King, that's their choice.
Have a great, potentially godless, day!

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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #42

Post by Purple Knight »

JehovahsWitness wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 5:33 pmWell Knight, before I comment on your second scenerio please note the following. ..
FIRSTLY PLEASE NOTE I make no claims here, I am simply expressing what I believe based on the bible. Please take all sentences to be preceeded by the premise "I believe ..."


Are you alright with this?
Of course. I'm interested to know where worship comes from.

This might actually be the reason I assess that if God exists, it may not be worthy of worship and others assess oppositely: I had terrible parents. So I was forced to discard any idea I ever had (or not develop it) that one's creator is automatically worthy of worship.

I would be interested to see both how religious people assess where this loyalty rightly goes if we disentangle our creation from the best interest in our wellbeing, and how the distribution goes on atheist versus religious when overlaid with good parenting versus abuse.

Neither of these curiosities, no matter how the distribution goes, means that for certain, your God if it exists, is, or is not, worthy of worship. But having a good sense of where ideas come from can help in understanding those ideas.
Tcg wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 12:15 pmNah. All concepts of god/gods/God are equal unless one relies on Special Pleading to claim that they aren't.
Unless you assume a god can't exist, concepts of gods that are illogical - contradictory - are inferior to those that are not contradictory. I would also say that concepts of gods that hurt humanity (require sacrifices for instance) are inferior to those that help or are neutral. And the latter is independent of whether these concepts point to a being that actually exists in our universe or not.

Where you have a point is where this thread is, about more powerful beings. What if worship - blind faith - is such a poisonous thing that no possible being would rightly deserve it?

I tend to think it might be so. Even if we're cosmic children, our understanding so feeble that here is this great being and we would be better off going on its understanding, that's fine, but it would require a guarantee we could understand, that this being was being honest with us and had our best interests in mind, and we cannot have that guarantee because if this being is so much smarter, it always can be tricking us.

No matter how feeble our understanding is, we are bound by evolution to be getting things right slightly more than 50% of the time, especially where survival is concerned. Nature would not shell out for our brains if a coin flip would do better. We can understand that, and that makes betting on our own understanding a good bet. Is betting on a god's dictates a good bet? Well we would have to have >50% certainty that it is not simply tricking us.

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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #43

Post by JehovahsWitness »

Okay so just to make it clear I will restate for the record before I begin ....
PLEASE NOTE I make no claims here, I am simply expressing what I believe based on personal reasoning. Please take all sentences to be preceeded by the premise "I believe ..."
Purple Knight wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:23 pm

Scenario 2: A supreme being created our universe, but either does not care for humanity at all or only allowed humanity to torture us as a whim. A lesser but caring being is attempting to help humanity.
Where does the worship rightly go? Does it fall apart?
It seems to me (and I am making no claim here just reasoning on what I believe ) evil cannot create good, so in such a scenerio, there still would be no issue. That which comes (and is therefore a part) of their GOD would give the form of worship it demands. In a universe with no light nobody struggles against the dark. (That statement is not a claim , just a personal opinion based on what I see as logical inevitability)
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"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" -
Romans 14:8

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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #44

Post by Purple Knight »

JehovahsWitness wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 4:38 pmIn a universe with no light nobody struggles against the dark. (That statement is not a claim , just a personal opinion based on what I see as logical inevitability)
That's kind of an interesting proposition. And it makes a sort of sense if good is the higher thing than evil. I'm fully on board with this being more of a discussion than a debate and no you don't have to defend this.

I am interested in it though, in the way that (just an example) I've been in workplaces where absolutely nobody gives half a rat turd about anybody else, and would probably exemplify the JWs' beliefs about worldly places. But in such places, the pretence to good is often highest. In other words, it's a contest to see who can hurt whom the most, and the weapon is always the sword of holy, and the play is always to make the other person seem unscrupulous and selfish, even though everybody is.

So do you think this is possible because of the actual good outside that workplace, or do you think a dynamic like this could develop in this type of universe absent any actual good that people could pretend to be imitating, so that there would be the idea of good, if not good itself? Or if perhaps this false good could ever become real good when there's an oh crud moment and people are forced to actually work together.

I'm most curious if you think good can be taught or learned, even by someone evil, or if you think that the answer in our universe is only yes because every last person has a spark of non-evil. And if not actual good, perhaps even evil can exactly mirror it where people do start to care about each other, if only because if they don't, they die.

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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #45

Post by TRANSPONDER »

JehovahsWitness wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:41 pm
TRANSPONDER wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:38 pm ...the claim that The God of the Jews repackaged to make it the god of Not the Jews, is the creator of everything just because the Bible says so will not do.
Are you suggesting I have made that or any claim ?
JehovahsWitness wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:07 pm
FIRSTLY PLEASE NOTE I make no claims here, I am simply expressing what I believe based on the bible. Please take all sentences to be preceeded by the premise "I believe ..."
Effectively yes,in you posts above.It takes it as a given that (Bible) God created us and thus is entitled to expect love and worship.But if you say you didn't make any such claim than it was just a preliminary block against trhe claim before it was made. So back to how you can tell you really have a god and not an alien acting like one? I know...it's a pointless question since there is no real evidence for either.

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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #46

Post by JehovahsWitness »

TRANSPONDER wrote: Fri Apr 01, 2022 1:48 am
JehovahsWitness wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:41 pm
TRANSPONDER wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:38 pm ...the claim that The God of the Jews repackaged to make it the god of Not the Jews, is the creator of everything just because the Bible says so will not do.
Are you suggesting I have made that or any claim ?
JehovahsWitness wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:07 pm
FIRSTLY PLEASE NOTE I make no claims here, I am simply expressing what I believe based on the bible. Please take all sentences to be preceeded by the premise "I believe ..."
Effectively yes,in you posts above.

The only words you have quoted from me are those in which I say that I am making no claim. Obviously those are not the words you are using to support I have made a claim. Perhaps you can quote the claim you say I made so I can see what you are referring to.




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Romans 14:8

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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #47

Post by JehovahsWitness »

AGAIN PLEASE NOTE I make no claims here, I am simply expressing what I believe based on the bible. Please take every individual sentence to be preceeded by the premise "I believe ..."
Purple Knight wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 7:54 pm I'm most curious if you think good can be taught or learned, even by someone evil ...
Yes (and I am making no claim here just stating my opinion) , yes I do believe good can be taught and it certainly can be learnt.
Purple Knight wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 7:54 pm ... even by someone evil [?]
In my experience, people are a little quick to label someone "evil"; if evil / wicked is the absence of good, it stands to reason (and I am making no claim here just stating my opinion) few people are truely evil and even fewer incorrigibly so. Most people that are evildoers are ignorant or damaged or both. I do believe God will kill off those who are incorrigibly wicked/evil so obviously certain people cannot learn good.

JEREMIAH 13:23 [ * ]

Can an Ethiopian change the color of his skin? Can a leopard take away its spots? Neither can you start doing good, for you have always done evil
.





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NOTE All posts I write represent my personal faith based beliefs as one of Jehovah's Witnesses
[ * ] I am ONLY mentioning the bible to show what Christianity says in line with subforum guidelines, not to prove that a statement or story therein is true. ​I am not presenting the bible as authorative or proof of truth and have no intention to add an argument to that end in this subforum See LINKS for details: viewtopic.php?p=213491#p213491
INDEX: More bible based ANSWERS
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681


"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" -
Romans 14:8

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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #48

Post by TRANSPONDER »

JehovahsWitness wrote: Fri Apr 01, 2022 2:30 am
AGAIN PLEASE NOTE I make no claims here, I am simply expressing what I believe based on the bible. Please take every individual sentence to be preceeded by the premise "I believe ..."
Purple Knight wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 7:54 pm I'm most curious if you think good can be taught or learned, even by someone evil ...
Yes (and I am making no claim here just stating my opinion) , yes I do believe good can be taught and it certainly can be learnt.
Purple Knight wrote: Thu Mar 31, 2022 7:54 pm ... even by someone evil [?]
In my experience, people are a little quick to label someone "evil"; if evil / wicked is the absence of good, it stands to reason (and I am making no claim here just stating my opinion) few people are truely evil and even fewer incorrigibly so. Most people that are evildoers are ignorant or damaged or both. I do believe God will kill off those who are incorrigibly wicked/evil so obviously certain people cannot learn good.

JEREMIAH 13:23 [ * ]

Can an Ethiopian change the color of his skin? Can a leopard take away its spots? Neither can you start doing good, for you have always done evil
.





JW











NOTE All posts I write represent my personal faith based beliefs as one of Jehovah's Witnesses
[ * ] I am ONLY mentioning the bible to show what Christianity says in line with subforum guidelines, not to prove that a statement or story therein is true. ​I am not presenting the bible as authorative or proof of truth and have no intention to add an argument to that end in this subforum See LINKS for details: viewtopic.php?p=213491#p213491


I said 'effectively' yes, not that you set it out in the actual words. By effectively I'm pointing out what the situation with the repackaging of God is, whether you said so or not. I retrace the discussion to see how we ended up up here if you want.

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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #49

Post by TRANSPONDER »

Looking back I posted this

To this and your earlier post. It doesn't matter whether you made such a claim or not. This is the claim of the Bible pointed up with the objections to crediting any such claim.
Bottom line is that a Creator of everything may or may not deserve worship. That's not the point.The point is assuming for sake of argument that a thinking being created everything, why should we assume that the Bible or any other Holy Book tells us about this being let alone which sub - sect we should join in order to express worship?


To say that you make no such claim is ingenuous not to say pointless, the point being that you accept such claims. Thus you (effectively)make them whether you originated them or not.

In your #26 you assert that you have evidence which you would be willing to discuss somewhere else. You'll know as well as we that such 'evidence' is contested and it takes a lot of discussion, but, bottom line, it does not make a very good case which is what matters not what you happen to believe, which is quite, quite irrelevant to the case.
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Re: Difference between a god (including God) and...

Post #50

Post by TRANSPONDER »

Looking back further, you made the creation of Life (as a belief which I for one do not share) a criterion (there may be others) that gives a reason why the creator should be worshipped.

Now you may have heard the Sumerian gods from outer space theory which interprets Mesopotamian creation -myths as scenarios of alien flying saucer pilots creating Humans. Ok, but one could easily tweak that to be ET scientists making Life. or even just bringing it here. Would that entitle them to be worshipped as 'God' Or does God need to be something more than very clever boffins from the planet X?

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