If God is infinite, then he is everything.... right?

[Ooberman]

If he is infinite, then no theistic opinion about God is wrong, even this statement.

It is likely that this deity doesn't exist, and since an infinite God is contradictory, it is probably less likely to be true. (Assuming basic laws of logic, our common presupposition).

Since, according to these laws of logic to be "True",the statement "God obtains" cannot be true, is true, and is also, possibly a quantum state (some "other").

Therefore, God does not exist.

The point of this line of inquiry, I suppose a purpose of this idea is to mull over the technicalities of how we arrive at basic assumptions about the world.

After all, we can't FIRST assume a God in order to prove a God exists. If we are trying to prove a God exists, we have to tip the balance in minds when they hear the actual logical argument.

The logical leap, to me, begins with both the Materialist and Supernaturalist. We don't REALLY know what things are made of, but if we go from what has been shown to be effective according to a large consensus of people that gravity works, and the natural laws appear to be consistent. The drama of nature, or the narrative of our lives appears to be a fact of our nature, and that's about all we know.

1. We are physical beings in this universe.
2. We can imagine real and unreal things.
3. We create narrative to ourselves and others to explain natural events, yet, the laws of nature cannot be translated accurately in the language of Man, but in the language of basic math.

We don't need to presume a God for any of them, and the Theist has to answer the question: "why is god a better answer for each of them, without presuming naturalism?"

Meanwhile, I don't think anything in the data shows any problem with the laws of nature being inviolable, and the dramas of our lives are the unique state of our Nature: we produce thoughts, narratives, and believe many things in metaphor, colloquialisms, and other tropes.

Tropes, and other games of words, twists of logic and other quirks as Man attempts to reflect Nature. We have at our disposal all the arts, and another quirk to our nature, the ability to imagine supernatural beings as if they are real.

Religion is a "greatest hits from mythology" in that religion (the process of creating a religion - a process unique to man, and neanderthals, apparently, and a few other Great Apes... And a few birds... And maybe elephants...) tries to capture a link to the conscience and codify it.

There are good reasons to do this, if you have some idea of your subjective position on "The Good" and how that fits into the larger scope of society's idea of "The Good". If you want to do Good, you find a reason to do it if it's not considered "Good" by society, increasingly to a point to being a psychopath. (There are ranges of experience that make morality, ultimately, an impossible task to normalize.)


Morality, like sight, is valuable to you, because it's valuable to you. We argue for that value by making our argument appear to have more weight than the converse.

The Theist comes up woefully short when they explain the basis of their provenance of their ideas: tradition.

In other words, the theist must presuppose the very characteristics of their God, in order to prove their God. Whereas, the naturalist only starts with the things we have a pretty good idea is true, through verification.

That cellphones work proves what Aristotle couldn't. Likewise, I doubt many people are going to challenge our model of the Solar System. And, genetics will never be overturned. These are really true things, it appears.

We are the awesomest of Apes, but Apes nonetheless. And that's OK.

[instantc]

The question is not whether God can communicate properly. The question is whether people can listen to God properly. Only some do listen correctly. People have always used religion to serve their own will and this distorts it. You can see this happening in the modern world.

This bothers me, communication is a bilateral transaction and you cannot just blame the receiving party for not doing the job correctly, especially when the other party is omnipotent.

I know people who have really tried to get to know God for years. They have prayed, read the bible, went to the church and yet, years after doing all this they finally come to the conclusion that God either does not exist or is not willing to talk to them. It is very difficult indeed to see why God would not grant these poor guys at least five minutes of audition after all the effort.

I don't know these people or their sincerity or their reasons for wanting to know God. But if they are sincere maybe God is already with them and they need to realize this? Or maybe God knows it is not time yet? If they are trying to be good that is all they need to do until the time is right.

Any position can be defended with the mystery card, it's the last philosophical corner where anyone can hide.

What more can God want from an individual than sincere effort of getting to know him? Many of these people worship God all their lives and die without ever getting a single sign from above. It is absurd to suggest that God is talking to them but they don't realize that, how ineffective can communication effort of an omnipotent being be?

There are many questions you can ask theists and they don't have the answer. This is not defending with a mystery card. You can ask scientists many questions they can't answer but that does not mean science is wrong.

I am not saying that you should be able to answer every question, but that your theology is prima facie inconsistent with reality. The fact that people go through life worshiping God and die without a single sign from above is hard evidence against the existence of God who is both omnipotent and wants us to freely come to know him.

[mgb]

The question is not whether God can communicate properly. The question is whether people can listen to God properly. Only some do listen correctly. People have always used religion to serve their own will and this distorts it. You can see this happening in the modern world.

This bothers me, communication is a bilateral transaction and you cannot just blame the receiving party for not doing the job correctly, especially when the other party is omnipotent.

I know people who have really tried to get to know God for years. They have prayed, read the bible, went to the church and yet, years after doing all this they finally come to the conclusion that God either does not exist or is not willing to talk to them. It is very difficult indeed to see why God would not grant these poor guys at least five minutes of audition after all the effort.

I don't know these people or their sincerity or their reasons for wanting to know God. But if they are sincere maybe God is already with them and they need to realize this? Or maybe God knows it is not time yet? If they are trying to be good that is all they need to do until the time is right.

Any position can be defended with the mystery card, it's the last philosophical corner where anyone can hide.

What more can God want from an individual than sincere effort of getting to know him? Many of these people worship God all their lives and die without ever getting a single sign from above. It is absurd to suggest that God is talking to them but they don't realize that, how ineffective can communication effort of an omnipotent being be?

There are many questions you can ask theists and they don't have the answer. This is not defending with a mystery card. You can ask scientists many questions they can't answer but that does not mean science is wrong.

I am not saying that you should be able to answer every question, but that your theology is prima facie inconsistent with reality. The fact that people go through life worshiping God and die without a single sign from above is hard evidence against the existence of God who is both omnipotent and wants us to freely come to know him.

You cannot say there is no evidence for God. People who know God know that God's presence is evidence. For them it is evidence. You are entitled to say "For me, there is no evidence" But you cannot say there IS no evidence because you don't know this.

[Goat]

I agree that no one can justify violence in God's name.

God doesn't exist.

As for your assertions that God does exist, they are unsupported.

Technically, the claim 'God doesn't exist' isn't supported either. It would be better to say 'there is no tangible and objective evidence for a deity to exist.

[instantc]

The question is not whether God can communicate properly. The question is whether people can listen to God properly. Only some do listen correctly. People have always used religion to serve their own will and this distorts it. You can see this happening in the modern world.

This bothers me, communication is a bilateral transaction and you cannot just blame the receiving party for not doing the job correctly, especially when the other party is omnipotent.

I know people who have really tried to get to know God for years. They have prayed, read the bible, went to the church and yet, years after doing all this they finally come to the conclusion that God either does not exist or is not willing to talk to them. It is very difficult indeed to see why God would not grant these poor guys at least five minutes of audition after all the effort.

I don't know these people or their sincerity or their reasons for wanting to know God. But if they are sincere maybe God is already with them and they need to realize this? Or maybe God knows it is not time yet? If they are trying to be good that is all they need to do until the time is right.

Any position can be defended with the mystery card, it's the last philosophical corner where anyone can hide.

What more can God want from an individual than sincere effort of getting to know him? Many of these people worship God all their lives and die without ever getting a single sign from above. It is absurd to suggest that God is talking to them but they don't realize that, how ineffective can communication effort of an omnipotent being be?

There are many questions you can ask theists and they don't have the answer. This is not defending with a mystery card. You can ask scientists many questions they can't answer but that does not mean science is wrong.

I am not saying that you should be able to answer every question, but that your theology is prima facie inconsistent with reality. The fact that people go through life worshiping God and die without a single sign from above is hard evidence against the existence of God who is both omnipotent and wants us to freely come to know him.

You cannot say there is no evidence for God. People who know God know that God's presence is evidence. For them it is evidence. You are entitled to say "For me, there is no evidence" But you cannot say there IS no evidence because you don't know this.

But, I didn't say that of course.

I said that the fact that people go through life worshiping God and never get a single sign before they die is evidence against God.

[mgb]

I agree that no one can justify violence in God's name.

God doesn't exist.

As for your assertions that God does exist, they are unsupported.

Technically, the claim 'God doesn't exist' isn't supported either. It would be better to say 'there is no tangible and objective evidence for a deity to exist.

All the atheist can say is "For me there is no evidence." It is not possible to say "There IS no evidence" You cannot know this, because theists, who are aware of God, will say this awareness is evidence.

[mgb]

I said that the fact that people go through life worshiping God and never get a single sign before they die is evidence against God.

Do they worship God? This is difficult to know, especially for me, because I don't know these people.

[instantc]

I said that the fact that people go through life worshiping God and never get a single sign before they die is evidence against God.

Do they worship God? This is difficult to know, especially for me, because I don't know these people.

So it would seem, it would be rather absurd to suggest that they would go through life pretending to worship God, act as if they really wanted to get to know him and do all the effort for no reason. Their motives appear quite genuine to me.

The same criticism would also apply to science. If a scientific hypothesis is prima facie improbable and seemingly inconsistent with reality, then that hypothesis carries a heavy burden of proof. I think an example of this is the mind/brain reductionism, which seems prima facie inapt and has not been able to carry out its burden of proof so far.

I agree though that strong, regular and consistent personal experience could in some circumstances outweigh inductive arguments, such as the Problem of Evil and the argument from divine hiddenness. For those of us who don't have such experiences, the very argument I'm endorsing constitutes a strong case against God, which cannot be overridden by hearsay evidence of mysterious events in the ancient history.

[mgb]

I said that the fact that people go through life worshiping God and never get a single sign before they die is evidence against God.

Do they worship God? This is difficult to know, especially for me, because I don't know these people.

So it would seem, it would be rather absurd to suggest that they would go through life pretending to worship God, act as if they really wanted to get to know him and do all the effort for no reason. Their motives appear quite genuine to me.

If they are good people then they are surely aware of God albeit unconsciously. The writer Simone Weil said that "The desire for the good IS the good". In other words if we truly desire the good we already have it in its purity, in that very desire.

[Ooberman]

You cannot say there is no evidence for God. People who know God know that God's presence is evidence. For them it is evidence. You are entitled to say "For me, there is no evidence" But you cannot say there IS no evidence because you don't know this.

So what isn't evidence, then? People who believe in aliens, faeries (yes, these people exist), bigfoot and all kinds of supernatural beings and cryptozoology all claim to have evidence.

Is there really this massive amount of evidence for all these things?


BTW, you are aware there are people who believe there is evidence for a New World Order, Time Cube, Lizard People, the Illuminata, ghosts, witches, magic, 9-11 conspiracies, and all the rest... they ALL claim to have evidence.


How are we, those who don't beleive all those things....


Let me re-phrase...


Pick one of those things you DON'T believe in and give me a set of questions you would ask them to see if their evidence is good quality or not.

What questions would YOU ask a person who believes there is evidence for something you don't believe in?

[mgb]

You cannot say there is no evidence for God. People who know God know that God's presence is evidence. For them it is evidence. You are entitled to say "For me, there is no evidence" But you cannot say there IS no evidence because you don't know this.

So what isn't evidence, then? People who believe in aliens, faeries (yes, these people exist), bigfoot and all kinds of supernatural beings and cryptozoology all claim to have evidence.

Is there really this massive amount of evidence for all these things?


BTW, you are aware there are people who believe there is evidence for a New World Order, Time Cube, Lizard People, the Illuminata, ghosts, witches, magic, 9-11 conspiracies, and all the rest... they ALL claim to have evidence.


How are we, those who don't beleive all those things....


Let me re-phrase...


Pick one of those things you DON'T believe in and give me a set of questions you would ask them to see if their evidence is good quality or not.

What questions would YOU ask a person who believes there is evidence for something you don't believe in?

Let me choose Bigfoot. This is a sighting, there is no 'forensic' evidence, just a testimony. I would ask them what they saw and try to ascertain their sincerity. I would try to discern if they have ulterior motives and I would try to estimate their sanity or lack of sanity. If I came to the conclusion that they were sane and sincere I would then talk to other people who made the same claims. In this way I might be able to build up a picture of what is likely to be true.