Are Gods physical?

[ytrewq]

In a previous thread I was astounded to hear the claim that Gods are not physical, presumably meaning they do not consist of physical matter. How any theist could actually claim to know that is a mystery, but never mind. The question being asked here is :-

Are Gods made from physical matter, and if they are not, then what are they made from.

If they are able to think and do stuff, then presumably they must be made of something.

By physical matter, I mean the physical stuff within our Universe from which everything else is made from, which includes atoms, sub-atomic particles, and to be fair I suppose we must include dark matter as well.

But there are other classes of things that undeniably exist, that are not physical matter as such, that perhaps Gods could be made of. Here is a list of stuff that definitely exists, and thus Gods might potentially be made of :-

(a) Physical matter, including atoms, sub-atomic particles, and dark matter

(b) Electromagnetic radiation and other forms of radiation, energy and fields. For example, light and radio waves.

(c) Human (or animal) feelings, emotions, thoughts, love, hate jealousy, intelligence, stupidity, truth, dishonesty, spirituality and so on. All of these can be said to exist, but not in a physical form.

(d) Similar to (c), morals, legal or scientific laws, stories, information, principles, and so on. As with (c), all of these can be said to exist, but not in a physical form, although the media that encodes them may be physical, such as a book or CD.

OK. So what are Gods made from? Certainly not anything in the (c) or (d) category, which do not physically exist in their own right and are not capable of performing physical feats on their own. That is, it makes no sense to say that a God (or anything else) is made from love, or justice or logic or spirituality. These are attributes of something that physically exists.

I have heard it said that Gods are not physical, but spiritual. Spiritual is an adjective, an attribute of something that exists, so it makes no sense to say that a God is made of spirituality, any more than saying it is made of love. So sure, Gods probably are very spiritual things, but that says nothing of what they are made from, which is the topic of this thread.

So what is left? Within the realms of human knowledge, and Im not interested in just making stuff up, then I must conclude that Gods (if they exist) are made of the same stuff that everything else in the Universe is made of, being categories (a) and (b).

Anyone agree or disagree with the above?

[ytrewq]

Anyone agree or disagree with the above?

All your choices are in / from the material world or realm or sphere but there is another existence where thinking self and other aware people can exist and that is spiritual realm and the people are spirits. Spirit is not just the name for what they are it is what they are! It is a category of being and it is not created by the physical realm.

John 4:24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth." is written. It is NOT written is that GOD is material, or atoms or wave lengths etc. GOD has emotions, he is not emotions any more than a human is defined by a fleeting emotion, man is laughter or some such.

I actually agree with what you wrote in red. God is doubtless spiritual but, by your own analogy in red, it makes no sense to say he is spirit, any more that to say he is emotions.

I don't know if you have been closely following the thread, but when I asked JW what it actually means to say that God is spirit, then he has been unable to give an explanation, and nor does the dictionary definition of "spirit" help either. That is the impasse that we are at.

[ytrewq]

In a previous thread I was astounded to hear the claim that Gods are not physical, ...

Now that you are speaking of all gods, then I think it should be clear that some of them are physical matter. For example, people have kept golden calf as their god. It is made of physical matter that is gold.

Bible God is not same, because it is said He is spirit and love:

God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.
John 4:24

He who doesn't love doesn't know God, for God is love.
1 John 4:8

Good point that some Gods are or have historically been "normal" physical objects. Religious discussion is always complicated by the existence of so many Gods, and the Christian God is in turn different to Williams pantheistic god. It's enough to do a man's head in.

For simplicity, I suppose we should restrict ourselves to just the Christian God, and William's pantheistic "God". Does that sound sensible?

And you have found from the Bible that not only is God spirit, but he also is Love. Maybe we are taking the Bible too literally. Maybe what is really meant is that God is both spiritual and loving. Is that possible? It certainly seems to make no sense saying that he is spirit and he is love.

We should probably also refer to any given God as "it" rather than "he", because presumably Gods are sexless, or maybe not, as many of the ancient Greek and Roman Gods were certainly male or female. Didn't the Christian God once impregnate a virgin female? Hmmm. Maybe that God really is a "he". Perhaps I should defer that matter to those that know more about him/her/it. Trying to understand what Gods actually are is genuinely difficult for an atheist. Whatever else, atheism sure is a lot simpler.

[Goose]

For simplicity, I suppose we should restrict ourselves to just the Christian God...

You'll need to rephrase your question for debate then. The way you've framed the question it's incoherent to a Christian. It forces the Christian to answer a question which misrepresents the Christian concept of God. The Christian concept of God is one in which God is uncaused, not created, and eternal. God was not made. He was not brought into existence. So when you ask a Christian what is God made of, you may as well be asking him what's good about God or can God make a square circle.

[ytrewq]

For simplicity, I suppose we should restrict ourselves to just the Christian God...

You'll need to rephrase your question for debate then. The way you've framed the question it's incoherent to a Christian. It forces the Christian to answer a question which misrepresents the Christian concept of God. The Christian concept God is one in which God is uncaused, not created, and eternal. God was not made. He was not brought into existence. So when you ask a Christian what is God made of, you may as well be asking him what's good about God or can God make a square circle.

Sorry about that. I was not intending to imply anything about whether the Christian God was eternal or created, AKA "made" at some time in cosmic history.

What I asked, was what God(s) are made of which is an entirely different question. What constitutes them. What is their physical composition? Are they physical? Do they have mass? Or alternatively, do they have no physical existence of all, not actually made of anything.

I'm fairly sure that those Christians that did answer understood the question OK, and the most common answer is that "God is spirit". I appreciate the answer, but I honestly do not understand what it actually means.

[Goose]

What I asked, was what God(s) are made of which is an entirely different question.

You can highlight of but it doesnt make it a different question or any more coherent of a question on the Christian view of God. The word made implies a maker. In the Christian view God has no maker, God was not made. There is no other proper way for a Christian to answer that question.

What constitutes them.

Again, asking the Christian what constitutes God is another way of asking the same question. A question which implies God was formed, made, composed, etc. Thus it gets the same answer.

What is their physical composition? Are they physical? Do they have mass? Or alternatively, do they have no physical existence of all, not actually made of anything.

Again, still asking the same question just worded differently. To ask a Christian what God is composed of implies God was brought into existence. It gets the same answer.

I'm fairly sure that those Christians that did answer understood the question OK, and the most common answer is that "God is spirit".

Well they shouldn't have. If a Christian answers God is Spirit to the question what is God made of, I dont think that Christian recognized how the question itself misrepresented the Christian view.

I appreciate the answer, but I honestly do not understand what it actually means.

I think if one were to take the time to appreciate the subtleties of Christian theology one would understand how the question is incoherent on the Christian view of God.

[Mithrae]

[Replying to post 24 by William]

So you have decided to throw your hat into the ring. That is good. This is a forum for discussion and scrutiny of ideas, the more the merrier.

I will respond, but first make the observation that you clearly have quite a different idea as to what God is compared to say JW or Christians. That does not bode well for the notion of any God. If theists cannot agree on what God is, then as an independent, unbiased observer, why should I believe what any of the theists tell me? If most of them are wrong, as clearly they must be, then that suggests to me that they are all wrong. On what basis would I choose one theistic belief over another? Just one more reason to suspect that Gods simply don't exist, but that was not the topic of this thread. {Rant over}

As yet I have only skimmed through your posting. but your key claim seems to be that God is consciousness.

But that makes no sense to me, being akin to saying that God is enthusiasm or love or happiness or awareness and so on.

Consciousness is an attribute of living creatures, humans for the point of discussion, a state of mind, and has no existence as an entity in it's own right.

Fascinating topic A few comments which I think are best inserted here...

Firstly, I don't think what William said is all that different from what the Christians have said. Early Christians and probably early Jews, like most folk prior to the 20th century or so (probably still a majority even today), were dualists supposing mind and body to be somehow different 'things.' I'm not sure where he was going with the verb definition and second noun definition, but William explicitly related his comments to the definition of 'spirit' as "the non-physical part of a person which is the seat of emotions and character; the soul." Granted, some folk view 'soul' and 'spirit' as different things; but in general, since most Christians remain dualists, the view that "God is spirit" is probably equivalent to saying that God is the same sort of stuff in which consciousness resides - the most fundamental and all-encompassing spirit, obviously. Saying that "God is consciousness" (again, presumably the most fundamental and all-encompassing consciousness, not just any old dog's daydream) seems to be the same thing sans the dualistic intermediary of 'spirit.'

Secondly, and following on from that, against your comments we could just as in/validly assert that 'physical stuff' is just an attribute of thinking minds, without existence in its own right; the feeling of hardness, the sensation of light and so on. Given the assumption that other human bodies share minds like our own we can certainly prove that our various minds share those sensations and perceptions in common, implying a common cause outside of our minds (further confirmed by instruments and unobserved experiments), but it remains the fact that everything we experience consists of perception in our minds and we have no way of getting around that to see whether 'physical stuff' exists outside of all minds.

Minds exist: We know that, it is the most certain thing we possibly can know; imbibo ergo sum. But what is this 'physical' stuff you're talking about? Can you coherently describe what it actually is without reference to perceptions in our minds or abstract mathematical models built on those perceptions? How do you even know it exists, if it is somehow different from the minds which we know most certainly and through which we perceive?

The concept of 'physical' stuff is uncritically accepted by dualists, and uncritically retained by many folk who have rejected dualism. But it seems more reasonable (for several reasons, but I'll keep this short) that, having our minds as the most certain fact known to us and rejecting dualism as untenable, we should not introduce some non-mind concept and then attempt some kind of post hoc reductionism of mind into matter: Rather, unless and until that non-mind concept can be justified, it's better to think of the 'physical' world we see and feel as something along the lines of a shared convenient fiction (or at best rather poor representation of reality) with which our minds interact*... as physicists themselves have increasingly discovered!

Of course if mind or consciousness best describe the stuff of which reality consists, rather than unthinking 'physical' stuff, then some semantic quibbling aside the conclusion we'd be left with is essentially that reality = mind or consciousness = god/s = reality. What is god made of? Reality. Consciousness. What are tables and planets made of (or at least from); consciousness. Hence if we can bring ourselves to see past dualism, and bring ourselves to see past the unjustified assumption of physical monism, the logical conclusion is pantheism or panentheism... or panpsychism or even simply idealism, depending on how averse one is to calling a spade a shovel

We'd be kidding ourselves if we imagined that we really understand the ultimate nature of reality one way or another, and indeed it may well be that by pure happenstance physical monism turns out to be correct after all, but the most reasonable conclusion falls very much along the lines of (pan)theism, and provides some kind of answer to your question as an added bonus.




* I quite liked William's comment in post #26:

The 'Soul' can indeed 'do things'. Things are there, 'to be done.'

[ytrewq]

What I asked, was what God(s) are made of which is an entirely different question.

You can highlight of but it doesnt make it a different question or any more coherent of a question on the Christian view of God. The word made implies a maker. In the Christian view God has no maker, God was not made. There is no other proper way for a Christian to answer that question.

What constitutes them.

Again, asking the Christian what constitutes God is another way of asking the same question. A question which implies God was formed, made, composed, etc. Thus it gets the same answer.

What is their physical composition? Are they physical? Do they have mass? Or alternatively, do they have no physical existence of all, not actually made of anything.

Again, still asking the same question just worded differently. To ask a Christian what God is composed of implies God was brought into existence. It gets the same answer.

I'm fairly sure that those Christians that did answer understood the question OK, and the most common answer is that "God is spirit".

Well they shouldn't have. If a Christian answers God is Spirit to the question what is God made of, I dont think that Christian recognized how the question itself misrepresented the Christian view.

I appreciate the answer, but I honestly do not understand what it actually means.

I think if one were to take the time to appreciate the subtleties of Christian theology one would understand how the question is incoherent on the Christian view of God.

You are turning yourself inside out trying to avoid the question. The word "made" does not even have to come into it, and I am quite happy to accept that your God is eternal and was not therefore "made". What more could you possibly ask from me? So please don't bring the word "made" into the discussion again. Your God was not "made". It has existed for all time. That is understood.


What is the physical composition of Gods in general, and the Christian God in particular?

And for another question, does your God have mass?
In other words, are other objects gravitationally attracted to a God?


I fully accept that you may not know the answer to these question(s), but that is not reason to blame or avoid the question.

These are not unreasonable questions. If you think they are, then you are guilty of what is known in debating as "special pleading", for these are questions that could be reasonably asked of anything else that is claimed to exist, certainly any 'thing" that is capable of thinking and performing physical feats.. Some Christians actually say that special pleading is necessary when debating religious matters. Do you agree with that?

[rikuoamero]

[Replying to post 35 by Goose]

Again, still asking the same question just worded differently. To ask a Christian what God is composed of implies God was brought into existence. It gets the same answer.

Not really. I'm going to borrow from William Lane Craig for this one, shocker of shockers. He has, on at least one occasion that I can remember, brought up as a hypothetical (to help explain his God) the notion of a bowling ball resting on a cushion from past eternal, causing an indentation. In this hypothetical, the ball is eternal, and so is the cushion. Would it be incorrect to ask what is the bowling ball, or the cushion, composed of or made of, to ask what are their material components?

[Goose]

You are turning yourself inside out trying to avoid the question.

Im not at all avoiding the question. Im dealing with it logically. Im trying to point out to you how the question, on the Christian view of God, is utterly incoherent.

Its as incoherent to the Christian as is the question, what does a square circle look like? Can you answer that question for me? No, of course you cant. Why not? You cant answer it because its incoherent. There is no proper answer to what a square circle looks like. All you can do is say the question is incoherent.

The word "made" does not even have to come into it, and I am quite happy to accept that your God is eternal and was not therefore "made".

Why, then, do you insist on asking Christians to answer the question, what is God made of (or variations of that question)?

What more could you possibly ask from me?

Im asking you to pose a question to Christians that is coherent in our view of God since you want to focus on the Christian concept of God.

So please don't bring the word "made" into the discussion again.

No problem.

Your God was not "made". It has existed for all time. That is understood.

Perfect. Thank you.

What is the physical composition of Gods in general, and the Christian God in particular?

You are asking the same question, just in different words. The question is incoherent in relation to the Christian view of God. Composition implies creation by a composer. God has no composer, God was not composed. He was not created.

I fully accept that you may not know the answer to these question(s), but that is not reason to blame or avoid the question.

How on earth can I know the answer to an incoherent question? There is no answer because the question is incoherent on the Christian view of God. Do you know the answer to what a square circle looks like? What is it composed of? What is its mass?

You are misrepresenting the Christian view with your question. Thats not my fault.

These are not unreasonable questions.

They are on the Christian view of God.

These are not unreasonable questions. If you think they are, then you are guilty of what is known in debating as "special pleading", for these are questions that could be reasonably asked of anything else that is claimed to exist, certainly any 'thing" that is capable of thinking and performing physical feats..

I dont think you understand what Special Pleading is if you think thats a Special Plea.

God is also claimed, on the Christian view, to have not been created or composed and to be the creator of all that exists. How can you then reasonably ask what something, that created everything, is made of when that something wasnt made? Or what something that wasnt composed is composed of? How on earth do you think those are reasonable questions?

Some Christians actually say that special pleading is necessary when debating religious matters.

Irrelevant.

[ytrewq]

You are turning yourself inside out trying to avoid the question.

Im not at all avoiding the question. Im dealing with it logically. Im trying to point out to you how the question, on the Christian view of God, is utterly incoherent.

At this point, all you are doing is repeating endlessly that the question is incoherent, while giving no explanation of why it is incoherent. Why is the question incoherent? Why is it unreasonable to ask for the material composition of your God, that exists and has the capacity to think and perform physical feats? For anything else that exists and can think and perform feats, then I'm sure you would agree that the question is perfectly reasonable. Why should we make exceptions for you?

You keep repeating that your god was not "made", but so what? Even if it has existed for all time, it's still gotta consist physically of something, doesn't it?

So let's assume your God was not made, and has existed for all time. It's easy to show that it's still perfectly acceptable and logical to ask what it physically consists of. Here is an example.

For centuries, most scientists believed that the Universe was timeless and not "made", just as you claim for your God. It was believed the universe 'just was" and had always been, and forever would be. OK. Now by your reasoning, it would therefore have been ridiculous to ask whether the matter within the universe was physical, or what the objects and matter within the universe were made of. By your reasoning, that would be an "incoherent" question, because it was accepted that the universe was not 'made" but had existed for all time.

Um, what! Really? You gotta be kidding me. Why would it be an "incoherent" question? Nobody else thought it was. Of course people asked that question, and progress was made on the answer, too, though that's not actually relevant to the discussion.

As seen clearly in the example, what you are saying just does not make sense.

Edit. And BTW, your example of "what a square circle looks like" is an example of a contradiction. Everyone agrees on what is a circle and what is a square, and If something is circular, then it is not square. But there is nothing that I have said that is contradictory, so your analogy is irrelevant.