God or No God - that is the question (for atheists)

Thank you. I've been wondering if maybe a "Hope" and a "Charity" might also show up.Been enjoying your posts, by the way.This message has been edited by Faith, 08-07-2005 08:21 PM

You must first define goodness, and in doing so you must define the self and its relationship to God. Unless you do that, then you're "falsifaction" of the Christian God is piddly squat. Furthermore, your acceptance of solipsism makes it impossible for you make true/false statements such as you continue to do.

Well, 'goodness' would not be making 10's of thousands of people die in a natural disaster. for one.

I didn't intend for these philosophical topics to be debated here as it would be off topic. I only intended to point out that Frog's falsification was no falsification.And BTW, your statment says absolutely nothing in answer to mine.

Like I said, I'd just as soon proceed from a basis that words already have meanings. If you're not prepared to do that then this discussion is not for you.It's not my responsibility to tell you what good and evil are. Disputing the proposition that evil actually occurs in the world, or that people suffer, is not a position congruent with sanity.

Excuse the oversight PD, but your post said things like "He didn't turn on the light" and "God resides in the imagination..." I didn't see much to respond too. Which is your perogative of course but not exactly something which can said to form the basis of an discussion.There was one little nugget to be mined but if you take the subjectivity out of it (I agree too that at times, man is an appalling thing to behold) you would see that there is nothing known in the Universe which is of a higher order than man. Whether you see his actions as bad or good doesn't affect that. The Sun may be a magnificent thing but it isn't much more that a giant nuclear reaction. Man has a few more strings to his bow. In fact man has the most strings in his bow. He can even make nuclear reactions...

Haven't read everything so far today but I'm inclined to agree with Crashfrog in that words have to mean something. Otherwise we could disappear up our own backsides. Good and evil have been assumed to occur in an objective sense - which brings us back to a world order as originally set up by the Christian God. The argument against this God (for the folks who wish travel the biblical route) w.r.t. presence of evil goes as follows:1) Evil and suffering exist in the world
2) If God were omnipotent he would be able to prevent these things
3) If God were wholly good (specifically, if he were a God of love) he would want to prevent these things from occuring
4) If he were an omnipotent and wholly good God, evil and suffering would have no place in the world
5) Therefore there is no such thing as an omnipotent and wholly good GodEvil however can be shown to prove (indirectly) that God does exist1) If God does not exist, trancendent, objective values of good and evil do not exist.
2) Evil and Good do exist (we feel strongly)
3) Therefore objective values exist, and some things are really, basically, fundementally bad/good
4)Therefore God existsIf the latter is deemed to be inadmissable, then there can be no talk of something being objectively evil or good. Just a person or a societies norms and values at a particular time. But these values change. Slavery was once considered perfectly ok. Now it's considered bad. Which is it; good or evil? If evil is a moveable feast then we are not dealing with Crashfrogs sense that something is evil and always be evil - irrespective of place and timeExample: We consider Hitler to have been evil. But if Hitlers 1000 year Reich had got off the ground and taken over a lot of the world, would folk 700 years from now consider it perfectly normal and good to dispose of the weakest in society? And if they felt it was good, does that make it good?The second proof, indicates God, but it still associates evil with him. But seeing as folk are talking about attributes associated with the Christian God, they cannot suddenly ignore (the quite simple) explainations as to why evil might exist whilst still allowing God to be wholly good. And the explaination is quite simple - it's called The Fall.If you deal with the Christian God then you deal with him in all the areas - not just some. If you don't want to deal with the Christian God but instead with the one posited in post 1 (which only states things about 'Him' which we could reasonably infer from looking around at the universe. then that's fine too. But not a mish-mash of both as it suits your caseGod of the Bible = Absolute, objective definitions of what is good and evil...orGod of post 1 = he could be 'good' and 'evil' (according to our, subjective definition) but so what - that doesn't make the slightest difference as to his existing.

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but your post said things like "He didn't turn on the light" and "God resides in the imagination..."

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I said he didn't light the candle. Very different. I asked God to verify his existence by lighting the candle within one minute. The candle never flamed. Therefore, no God.Since you addressed your question to atheists, who by your definition are people who don't believe that a supreme being exists, what type of response did you expect? What did you truly expect to discuss with that type of person?God is not a real entity, otherwise he would have lit the candle.Therefore the idea of a supreme being only exists within mankind's imagination along with angels, demons, fairies, etc.

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you would see that there is nothing known in the Universe which is of a higher order than man.

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What do you mean of a higher order and how does that make us exquisite? Who determined the order?There are many animals who are stronger than us, better eyesight, etc. We can be eaten just as easily as any other creature. Natural disasters kill us just as easily as any thing else on the planet. We don't even know how to consistently eat right. We create things that are hazardous to the planet and ourselves. Not the brightest star in the sky, I would say.

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He can even make nuclear reactions...

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So we have the power to destroy the entire planet! Just like your God.Therefore mankind created his gods in his own image.

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"The average man does not know what to do with this life, yet wants another one which lasts forever." --Anatole France

Just because God doesn't exist, doesn't make it hurt any less when you stub a toe, or make it any less abominable when someone murders a child.Since God doesn't exist, and yet suffering is present, the presence of evil and suffering are not proof of God. Moreover I'm curious to see you expand on points 2 and 3 - how does our strong feeling about the "trancendancy" of good and evil actually prove that it is?It's sufficient to me that suffering is a universal condition for humanity. Pain is pain. It's not necessary for suffering and evil to be transcendant absolutes, only that they're universal across the human experience. They're not being ignored. They've been dealt with. Neither the "Fall" nor any other human act absolves God of his responsibility, if he is indeed benevolent and omnipotent, to intercede and prevent evil. If you propose a God who takes no action to influence the universe for good or evil, but simply allows things to happen that would have happened anyway, I can't disprove such a God. (Which I've already stated.) But why you would be interested in a God that does nothing is beyond me. If that's the God you believe in then you're already an atheist for all practical purposes.

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Man has not the means within himself, to know if God exists or not. God has to be the one to show he exists. Thus, any argument as to the non-existance of God, based on science or experience or gut feeling, etc. is, I will argue, an inappropriate vehicle on which to arrive at a 'No' conclusion.

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Are they appropriate for a "yes" conclusion though?I agree that definitions of good and evil have nothing to do with the independent existence of a supreme being.If you believe that your God exists, why do you say IF?

• If God exists then he is big.
• If God exists it means there exists a being who is first cause for everything.
• If God exists, then he 'created' us, the most exquisite thing, as far as we can tell, in all his Creation.
• If God exists, then it should be apparent that he is so very.....BIG, the only possible way that a mere man could come to any knowledge and understanding of him, would be if God was the one to reveal that knowledge of himself - to man.
• In other words, there is nothing in the 'Creation' which points, in and of itself, inarguably towards a Creator.

How does the existence of a supreme being automatically mean that it is BIG, that it was the first cause or that it flung the stars in the sky? Why does its existence mean it created us?You yourself said that there is nothing on this planet that points towards a creator.

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"The average man does not know what to do with this life, yet wants another one which lasts forever." --Anatole France

Hee-Hee, this reminds of the the line from HHGTTG by the much lamented Douglas Adams... Don't you think that humans might be just a little bit lacking in objectivity when selecting themselves as 'the most exquisite thing on the planet'?

ohhhhhh yes it is. If your "falsification" is to be a genuine falsification we cannot rely on feelings. We have to have a working definition. Of course not, but determining what good and evil actually is, where it comes from, what we are, what God is, and how we are connected, is important.A good omnipotent God of a universe with evil humans is a paradox, at least to the typical Western viewpoint, but there are plenty of paradoxes out there, and we are not forced to conclude the negative just because something is paradoxical.

The paradox of good/evil and an 'all good benevolent' god is irrelavent.Frankly, the default position about the existance of something is in the negative until some objective evidence can be found.There is zero objective evidence of any sort of deity what so ever. You got people with feelings (who disagree on details). Not very objective.The fact that 'good' and 'evil' are so subjective shows there is no 'objective good'. That rules out the 'god that is the source of all that is good'..

You appear to have made the leap into realising that it needs God to reveal himself in order for you to have proof of his existence. A logical first step. That God didn't respond (in one minute) implies that God had to respond - under your terms and conditions (in one minute) as a proof. That supposes that God is at your beck and call - which is not rational. Could it be that he decides under what terms and conditions he'll respond to someone - given that he is the one whose doing the revealing. And if so, what terms and conditions might they be and did you meet them? You tried one way. Is that the only way? Athiests disbelieve or deny God. I ask on what basis.a) If blind disbelief then ok... but then their postion is irrational, they are ignoring the most important question one can get an answer to (note: that it's the most important question is not a subjective thing. Someone can chose that there's no God but that has absolutely no bearing on whether God exists or not. The fact is belief or no...face him they may. To ignore the issue is not rational)b) If they deny God on the basis of some thought out argument the ok too. They should I imagine, be able to propose a sound basis for denial. If no sound basis then their athiesm is illogical. Denying something they have no grounds for denyingIrrational or illogical or provide a reasonably sound reason for no God which takes into account or argue against having to account for the "he is the one who must do the revealing" argument. Maybe there's another option as well.This message has been edited by iano, 08-Aug-2005 05:43 PM

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If we define God as a being with unlimited power and unlimited goodness then either this universe does not exist or that god does not.

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Unlimited power and goodness are subjective and have evolved to this extreme today. The OT does not describe their God as having unlimited power. They did describe him as more powerful than the other gods.The ancients considered the sun to be God. That's why they couldn't look upon his face.So the sun has been proven not to be a being as have the planets and stars. As I've said before: As mankind gained knowledge of the world around him, he moved God beyond the boundaries of what can be proven. Would something that is real be that easily changed?Other gods that you consider falsified, do they still have strong follwers, believers?Quite frankly I think the term "unlimited good" is fantasy terminology.

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"The average man does not know what to do with this life, yet wants another one which lasts forever." --Anatole France