Where did God come from?

This is a chance for creationists to establish the origins of their beliefs. Please explain where the evidence is that you found for the originEdited my Adminnemooseus, to add the content below, which was what sidelined had intended to be the opening message (see sidelined's comments in message 6, below):This is a chance for creationists to establish the origins of their beliefs. Please explain where the evidence is that you found for the origin of God and the reason for this evidence convincing you.[This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 12-12-2003]

I am sorry but the post#1 I placed is again incomplete. Even after I edited to fill in the missing info I reposted and everything was fine and now I come back to find the post is cut in half again. If the admins could give me some idea whatsup I would appreciate it.Any way the post should have been.This is a chance for creationists to establish the origins of their beliefs. Please explain where the evidence is that you found for the origin of God and the reason for this evidence convincing you.I hope it works this time.-----A note by edit by Adminnemooseus - All I can guess, is that you did an edit, then clicked on the "Preview" button. After you looked at the "preview", you forgot to click on the "Submit Now" button. Then you exited out of the window, and ended up finding that you still had the same text as before your attempted edit. I may be wrong, but that's my guess.See message 1 - I added a paragraph, of all your intended text.[This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 12-12-2003]

ZET This is my point. We have people quite often attest to the nature of God and how he operates without explaining just where they get the information to make the conclusion. If they can speak to his abilities I do wonder why they cannot therefore make an attempt at explaining his origins.For example the phrase 'God has always existed' is a classic but does not offer one bit of information as to how the conclusion was arrived at.Why is it such a difficult thing to do?You see how all the debate of Biblical and deistic discourse is argued ad nauseum but the origin of God is never questioned?
Without a firm understanding of how to rectify this problem before we journey into Bibles or Korans then it is like building a house without checking to see if the soil will support it first.------------------
"Physics is like sex. Sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it."[This message has been edited by sidelined, 12-13-2003][This message has been edited by sidelined, 12-13-2003]

B2P I suppose one of the reasons would be that violence done to others is capable of being done to ourselves and those we care about. I personally detest seeing people hurt and have in the past intervened in behalf of those being hurt.
I also have the necessary empathy to understand what it feels like to have someone decide that they don't like whatever about you and figure that fighting you will fill whatever gap between their ears needs filling. No ,natural instinct is to insure personal survival or close relative not race.This makes sense since the continuation of your line requires both.[This message has been edited by sidelined, 12-13-2003]

abdulYou post Which 'stuff' are you talking about?

I have compiled a series of points from Born2Preach as they seem to be the only contenders to attempt any debate worthwhile here. I will leave aside the attempt to return the question of existence of God to me since I am not the one making a claim of God's existence. This is not to avoid the issue since I hold no God to exist on the basis of evidence.In this post we see the crux of my question which is the use of scripture to hold to evidence of God. I am trying to establish the reason for the conviction of people to the existence of God seperate from the bible. It is important to try to coax out the actual basis for the idea that there is a universal standard of right and wrong.By 'universal' do you mean all of human beings or do we include other animals as well? You state we SHOULD obey this law but don't always.This makes it a law like that which humans establish not a physical law.
Obviously you either admit that it is not a 'universal' law or you must clarify the parameters under which it operates. This is a bone of contention which is thrown at people who do not believe in God and I would ask for an apology but I suppose it is easy to assume that we atheists [and perhaps agnostics] are `somehow 'evil'[thus the linking to nazism] for not beieving in God.
You have,however,posted a fallacy wherein you attempt to show that 'survival of the fittest' describes the succesful survival of a species as being the one that is strongest or the most ruthless.This is such a narrow minded application of survival of the fittest since a species may survive due to simply being capable of avoiding the enviromental catastrophe that places most other species on the extniction list. This ability is clearly neither right nor wrong but is more a matter of being in the right place a the right time nothing more. Obviously believing is not knowing. I would point out to you that 'proof of a creator is creation itself' is not a proof due to circular reasoning.You must establish more clearly what it is about creation that gives proof of God's existence. In doing so it is necessary to do what is anethema to most Christians and that is to try to construct a model of the world that shows how to establish a clear evidence 'trail'of God that is rigorous enough to stand on its own merits without reference to mere writings of men.As you can see by the next quote you yourself recognized the fallacy It is when you are willing to question the assumptions of all the things you hold to be true to a critical light and are willing to listen to others when it is pointed out to you the ways in which human beings as a general rule fool themselves that you really begin to see those things our egos would rather ignore.We are not special by design but merely fortunate to exist in a universe which is vast beyond most people's real comprehension.We share with the rest of life a tenuous hold on that same life.Anyway I shall yield the floor to further debate.------------------
"I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it is much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers that might be wrong."
R.P. Feynman

grace2uI am sorry you are upset at my question. I meant no disrespect and if my being atheist brings out anger in you then I will drop the title.It does not change my viewpoint on life and what I have learned from living if I do not have a label that causes such animosity. Let us review what you have stated in your post shall we? This is quite a conjecture on your part.I must ask,respectfully,that you explain what defines absolute truths in your worldview. It is one thing to declare such statements,it is another issue altogether to show simple-minded people such as myself what absolute truths mean when I have never had the ooportunity to observe such as far as I can tell.Further on we have you state this. I am confused. How is it that you can say reason,logic, and morality are the domain of creationists? Are reason and logic not neutral and indepenant of a persons worldview? Morality is ,in my experience, an everchanging landscape of our world that is tied to an intricate web of considerations of how we live with and relate to our fellow human beings.We have laws and rules that we live by and sometimes break.If a codeified set of laws is absolute does that not mean they are unbreakable? I personally believe this to be absurd. Is there no situation in which you would break the laws you adhere to? If it was a choice between your own children or immediate family and this law,is there no room in your worldview for alternatives if the choice was the law or harm to those you love?I will end this post here to give you a chance to respond. Have a good day.------------------
"I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it is much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers that might be wrong."
R.P. Feynman[This message has been edited by sidelined, 12-16-2003]

grace2u
I am glad that you are not posting in anger.In response to your post I believe a key element in your post is located here. This is,no doubt,a key issue in discussions that occur here. It is not my intention to simply take a contrary position to yours.You see,
to me,the issue with the idea of God is that I do not see how we reconcile the work of creation that is attributed to God with the idea of what amounts to magic.I cannot fathom how an immaterial entity is considered real in any sense. I do admit that science holds a fascination more and more each day and in all the things I have experienced or studied or contemplated I find that I am in agreement with the late Richard Feynman concerning the world. It is my personal objective in life to no longer search for "The Truth" for I am of the impression that such is futile within the limited span of a single life.It is ,rather,my journey in life to pursue clarity instead. The books of religion,IMO,confuse and alienate people due to inflexibility on the part of the stance they take with rival religions.There are no actions,good or bad,that are not the result of individual choices regardless of the individual beliefs of the people.
I would rather be flexible in my dealings with people rather than have preconcieved notions of merits of a person based on a worldview which is their choice.I do definitely hold the position that a person does not automatically fall out of favour with me based on their points of view. It has been my observation in life that some people who are stereotyped as 'good' or 'trustworthy' because of their affiliation with a group I would not trust to water my lawn while others who are opposite viewed as troublemakers and even 'evil' I would trust my childrens lives with. In my world trust is earned not assumed.I have rambled on enough about these things in an effort to show that as an atheist I do not try to presume that I am right and you are wrong but that I have learned in my life that we are to easily fooled by our own desires. Evidence in my world requires a great deal of interrogation and investigation.I must end this post now as I have a long day slated for work tomorrow. Good night------------------
"I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it is much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers that might be wrong."
R.P. Feynman

grace2uI have to admit,it has been awhile since I dealt with this kind of fuzziness before. Again you have drawn out the issue but you have given examples of moral problems and failed to provide evidence for absolute truths.Hell you even went so far as to define them. You then make this odd statement. So here we have a definition of absolute truths as being "Perfect in quality or nature; complete". At the same time it is only partly known to man.You say it is not based on guesswork yet admit that men have incomplete knowledge of it.Then having avoided the issue of evidence you put forth this statement. I would love to be able to assert the truth or falsehood of the arguement for absolute truths but you have not yet shown evidence for them.you even admit that there is evidence. In what way is the universe rational and what other universe do you use to compare its rationality/irrationality against?You then go into the issue of rape and end with this series of questions. Obviously the idea you are presenting here is the nature of God is the reason we feel moral outrage rather than simply being appallled personally at the prospect of it.Again you have no evidence you are stating a personal point of view.PLease straighten up the lack of evidence and then we can proceed.------------------
"I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it is much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers that might be wrong."
R.P. Feynman[This message has been edited by sidelined, 12-18-2003]

This is Willowtrees original post. Now I think the problem here boils down to these two sections."The crux of the issue whether anyone wants to accept it or not is the fact that desire for God can only originate from Him. No matter how miniscule if you have desire to know, want, or desire God then this is a work of God. A person cannot manufacture the desire for God contrary to what anyone might claim."" "What is the method by which God will reveal Himself to any given person ?" Any given person must come to God on His terms and THEN He promises to reveal Himself."If God reveals himself in the desire to know Him then has he not already revealed himself before you come to God on His terms where He then promises to reveal Himself?Is this a circular arguement Willowtree?Rrhain?--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it is much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers that might be wrong."
R.P. Feynman

grace2uYou wrote: Could you please point out to me the contradiction in this statement?------------------
...people today are so accustomed to pretentious nonsense that they see nothing amiss in reading without understanding, and many of them at length discover that they can without difficulty write in like manner themselves and win applause for it. And so it perpetuates itself.
G. A. Wells, 1991

grace2uI quoted this phrase from your post. You are unable to see that when you state "there exists an absolute truth" this means that it does not need to be "sought out." It would be unquestionably obvious would it not?Then you state in this last post Are you saying that we observe a world where absolute truth does not exist or do you mean that rational and intelligent discussion do not exist?

---

...people today are so accustomed to pretentious nonsense that they see nothing amiss in reading without understanding, and many of them at length discover that they can without difficulty write in like manner themselves and win applause for it. And so it perpetuates itself.
G. A. Wells, 1991

grace2uWhat is the arguement you would give for the universe being infinite?What would you declare to be the evidence?

Born2Preach So if one does not have a belief in God then like the ability to [as you so classily put it] take a dump one is born with morality? Does this also mean that like swallowing is controlled by the elctrochemical constituents of our bodies? Now how do we go from there to amassing evidence to show that God is the source of morality? This is the proposition that is constantly falling short of the mark.The assumption of God's existence is not agreed upon. Without the ability to independantly verify God's existence then we are dependant upon God himself[herself?itself?] to give us evidence and He/She/It ain't talking.To avoid further waste of time please do not say "But He does talk to you if you believe." because then we come around to the circular arguement.

---

...people today are so accustomed to pretentious nonsense that they see nothing amiss in reading without understanding, and many of them at length discover that they can without difficulty write in like manner themselves and win applause for it. And so it perpetuates itself.
G. A. Wells, 1991