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

So you are obviously not a Christian or the follower of any other religion which proposes a God who cares for and loves us. If we follow your analogy we find a God who uses us for His own aesthetic satisfaction - perhaps a God who finds wars beautiful, or who arranged the Holocaust because it contributes to the pattern He wants to see. Human suffering means nothing to the God you propose, all that matters is His own subjective perception of "beauty" in the result.

Well why put forward an "analogy" rather than proposing a God who has no interest in people at all. That is less opposed to Christian belief, is more plausible and equally invulnerable to direct falsification.And, of course, by putting forward such arguments you concede that there is a case to be made against any "God" who IS presumed to directly care for humans as people.

But you DID implicitly discuss traits of God by claiming in the oriignal post that the existence of God was the most important question for everyone. That certainly doesn't apply for a God that doesn't interact with humanity in any way at all. The existence of a remote philosphical God isn't an important question for many people at all. And to Christians the most important question must be the existence of the Christian God - not some general sort of god.Anyway why should an atheist grant that the existence of a God could reasonably be inferred from the physical world ? I don't even see how you could construct an argument for that - especially if you hamper yourself by leaving the concept of God completely nebulous.

Well although you claim that I'm not reading the posts it is rather clear that you have no answers for the points I raised.I pointed out that the God/No God question is NOT the most important question - UNLESS traits are assigned to "God" that make it important. FOr instance, as I stated the average Christian cares far more about whether the Christian God exists.Secondly, you were the one who brought up the issue of inferring God from the physical universe. But you don't address the points there.And quite frankly having looked at the posts it is rather claer that you don't understand the cosmological points that you are arguing against. Or even acknowledge the fact that there is a scientific basis for many of the points under discussion.

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Which when you think about it, is precisely what a God who made us with free will to chose for/against him - but who didn't want to load the deck in his favour would do.

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However we can be reasonably sure that THAT sort of God doesn't exist. That sort of God would want us to be able to make an informed choice - and what proportion of humanity has ever been in a position to do that ?

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If such a God informed us at all objectively as to his existance, then there would be no choice left to make - what proportion of humanity has realised that ?

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That only says that the decision is obvious. But if that is the case, then a God who wanted us to choose him of our own free will would provide that proof - since that would give Him what He wants.Understanding the choice to be made cannot be said to impede free will. In fact it is necessary to the fullest exercise of free will. Why would a God who values free will want a decision to be made on the basis of ignorance or error ?

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So by you trying to tie up my tapestry into a neat little package of an evil sadistic being, is fanciful at best.

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Well lets look at the quote again The initial point IS your analogy. According to it God arranges human suffering BECAUSE it produces a beautiful "tapestry". So there is nothing fanciful in that - and if that depiction of God is "evil and sadistic" then it is your analogy that says so.Then we have the suggestion that the God in question might find wars beautiful. It's a reasonable possibility given the analogy. Wars are a large scale human activity - and therefore likely to be significant parts of the human portion if the "tapestry" - and do produce large amounts of human suffering as the analogy requires. I do not see that this depicts the God of the analogy as sadistic (since I do not state what aspects of wars are considered aesthetically pleasing) or any more evil than the analogy has already claimed.The final point is the suggestion that the God of the analogy might have arranged the Holocaust. Since the God in question DOES arrange human suffering there is nothing overly fanciful in suggesting that that such a major event with so much suffering might have been an example. And since this point closely follows the analogy, any suggestion of "evil" or "sadism" is due to the analogy itself.Quite frankly you seem to be offended by your own analogy - in which case I suggest that the problem is that your analogy does not accurately convey your view.

I suppose that the analogy didn't really address the issue of alternative means to produce the same result (which means that it is inadequate to deal with the issue of an omnipotent God), but in the analogy there is no oher practical way to produce the result.

Did you actually read the definitions you quoted ?Did you notice the second definition ? "a lack of belief in the existence of God or gods" ?Unless a baby agrees in a God or gods is it not an atheist by the second definition ?