An unbiased quest for a creator deity..

[Inigo Montoya]

I'd like to start by presenting a hypothetical person who has somehow made it to, say 25 years of age, without being immersed in or exposed to any religion whatsoever. He is an orphan with no known living relatives, no friends and no regular acquaintances. He has never used the internet or watched TV, and while he knows how to read, he has never read anything outside of his public school's curriculum of average course studies.

Obviously this will not be about how that's even possible... and I DID say it was hypothetical, so calm down a bit.


Now then. At 25 let us give him unfettered access to the Internet and all current forms of media available, a bank account that not only requires he never work a day in his life but that leaves more than enough for him to travel to wherever he wants and stay as long as he wants.

He decides there must be more to the cosmos and the myriad life within it than the science books can account for. He does not buy into a random, unguided process to explain the origins of all things.

So off he goes. In search of what's missing in the gaps. A genuine adventure to find out once and for all if there is or is not a creator of some kind.

Where does he start? Remember he has ZERO affiliation with ANY religion or practitioner prior to today.

[bluethread]

The problem with this is that Adonai does not work in a vaccum. Our prior experience is integral to how He reveals himself to us. Therefore, if he has lived in issolation from any outside biasing influences, one must ask what influences did he have? In short, he would begin by examining himself and the world around himself. The fact that he feels a need to determine if there is a deity or not is in itself an indication of dissatisfaction with his present state and a desire to find a means to something better, or at least a curiousity regarding influences that he must have just encountered.

[Tex]

I'd like to start by presenting a hypothetical person who has somehow made it to, say 25 years of age, without being immersed in or exposed to any religion whatsoever. He is an orphan with no known living relatives, no friends and no regular acquaintances. He has never used the internet or watched TV, and while he knows how to read, he has never read anything outside of his public school's curriculum of average course studies.

Obviously this will not be about how that's even possible... and I DID say it was hypothetical, so calm down a bit.


Now then. At 25 let us give him unfettered access to the Internet and all current forms of media available, a bank account that not only requires he never work a day in his life but that leaves more than enough for him to travel to wherever he wants and stay as long as he wants.

He decides there must be more to the cosmos and the myriad life within it than the science books can account for. He does not buy into a random, unguided process to explain the origins of all things.

So off he goes. In search of what's missing in the gaps. A genuine adventure to find out once and for all if there is or is not a creator of some kind.

Where does he start? Remember he has ZERO affiliation with ANY religion or practitioner prior to today.

The same question a child would ask.
What happens to the dead.....Why do we die....Why do we exist.
Then he get the atheist point of view and the God point of view....And the choice begins

He either believe he exists for a reason or he believes his life is not worth more than the dirt he is standing on.

[YahDough]

Inigo Montoya writes:

I'd like to start by presenting a hypothetical person who has somehow made it to, say 25 years of age, without being immersed in or exposed to any religion whatsoever. He is an orphan with no known living relatives, no friends and no regular acquaintances. He has never used the internet or watched TV, and while he knows how to read, he has never read anything outside of his public school's curriculum of average course studies.

Obviously this will not be about how that's even possible... and I DID say it was hypothetical, so calm down a bit.


Now then. At 25 let us give him unfettered access to the Internet and all current forms of media available, a bank account that not only requires he never work a day in his life but that leaves more than enough for him to travel to wherever he wants and stay as long as he wants.

He decides there must be more to the cosmos and the myriad life within it than the science books can account for. He does not buy into a random, unguided process to explain the origins of all things.

So off he goes. In search of what's missing in the gaps. A genuine adventure to find out once and for all if there is or is not a creator of some kind.

Where does he start? Remember he has ZERO affiliation with ANY religion or practitioner prior to today.

------------------------------------------------

Sorry Inigo, your hypothetical person would be too overwhelmed by the "world" to be interested in religion. Once he tasted all the distractions this world has to offer (i.e. TV, video games, girls/sex, drugs, the occult, money, etc) the last thing on his mind would be finding the truth about God. The world he never knew would be his God.

And you know what, I think that is one of the problems with normally raised people of this world also. We are ALL bombarded by distractions. Jesus said the Father has to draw a person to Him. All we Christians can do is try to help.


Jn:6:44: No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.

[playhavock]

I think that the assumtion that there is more to the world will be the first thing this person comes to question , but if they have made up there mind that there is a deity then the preconcived bias will lead them to some deity at some point, even if it is one they must make up for themselfs.

[Morphine]

I think he should start at a neutral point. "Clearly I exists and so do the things around me. Where did it all come from? Lets begin studying everything and testing my theories."

That's about it. That can lead you down all sorts if paths. Cosmology, psychology, religion, archaeology, biology, politics, probability, he said she said, etc....

[dusk]

The same question a child would ask.
What happens to the dead.....Why do we die....Why do we exist.
Then he get the atheist point of view and the God point of view....And the choice begins

But he wouldn't get the "God point of view". He would get the Methodist, Evangelical, liberal Catholic, conservative Catholic, sunni Muslim, salafi Muslim, Buddhist, Taoist, confuzian, ...... POV.
He would get the rebirth till Nirvana and the heaven and hell, the heaven without hell, different types of heaven, different ways rebirth works. He would get hundreds of genesis stories and a millions of interpretations.

The difference is that a child ask its parents first whoever that may happen to be. Maybe also the teachers or friends. This hypothetical dude would have no obvious person to turn to. This is as I see it what the OP is getting at with his unbiased quest for a creator.

He accepts sort of the basic ideas that would push him to theism but is completely and utterly lost thereafter.


To any intelligent objective person it is not atheism vs. my dads faith.

I personally think one such person would eventually explore most of the well known "big" religions and explore the interpretations of the dudes he talks to first of each religion. He will then choose whatever fits his character most. Some want spiritual liberty they will go eastern. Some want to be safe from thinking they go fundamentalist abrahamic. Some like to submit they go Islam. Some like don't like themselves ...

I personally read a lot of prolific Christian writers to get behind why they believe because that is my dads religion. I found that none of even the basic concepts I could stomach and no matter how well respected the authors are their reasoning seems completely delusional after the introduction. Just extremely biased with some lack of either logic or intellectual honesty. It is as they say. You first need to want to believe in it (for some reason) to stand a chance.

[Mithrae]

He decides there must be more to the cosmos and the myriad life within it than the science books can account for. He does not buy into a random, unguided process to explain the origins of all things.

So off he goes. In search of what's missing in the gaps. A genuine adventure to find out once and for all if there is or is not a creator of some kind.

Where does he start? Remember he has ZERO affiliation with ANY religion or practitioner prior to today.

I'd say consider the major options. The major religious traditions of Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam, cross-checked against various philosophical views such as deism, infant deity, pantheism, panentheism, monotheism (god/universe duality) and so on. He can hardly read all the sacred texts and philosophical treatises, so a few weeks research and discussion of each should give him a good enough overview. Several major religious traditions suggest that a personal/experience approach is important, so that's probably what he'd want to do to really learn properly. He could hardly expect to learn any great truths through academic study when it's eluded so many, after all. Perhaps spend some time praying to an unknown personal God, but frankly for the most methodical approach he'd probably be best off looking to the disciplines advocated by eastern religions; yoga or tai chi for the body and meditation for the spirit. Send him off to some remote Buddhist monastery for a year and hope he learns something there, I reckon.

[McCulloch]

Jesus said the Father has to draw a person to Him.

If our quest for a creator deity is dependent on that deity's affirmative action, then why are some people not drawn to him? If the Father is omnipotent and omniscient, surely when he draws someone to him, his efforts are sufficient to achieve that goal. Why, if he is a loving and beneficent God, would he be selective about this drawing? Why exclude so many?

[joncash]

Know thyself.