Is God Omnipresent?

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And, if God is everywhere there is no place where He is not present, and so, how can He be absent when evil is present? Now, if evil is simply the absence of God, then God is not all-present?

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Another possible conclusion is that evil does not exist.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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Do you mean God is evil?

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That is certainly a possibility, isn't it?

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

But if God is all-everything, it stands to reason that God must be all-evil.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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By all-everything, I simply meant....

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Okay, if you make up your own words with your own meanings, then every argument can be made logically valid. However, the premises may no longer correspond to anything in reality (or anything in other peoples' conceptions of reality).By all-everything I mean that God is a cheese Danish. See how easy this is?-

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"Evil" is a lack.

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Unless evil is the positive quality, and good is the lack of evil.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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I was using "all-everything" as shorthand for the traditional concept of God.

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Well, the traditional concept of God has problems with coherence and consistency -- that is why the followers of the traditional concept of God has to bring in the notion of "ineffability". But once we allow that God cannot be understood by mere mortals, then anything is possible and rational debate becomes short-circuited.-

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God cannot be evil.

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A staight forward and literal reading of the Christian Bible would dispel this notion as well.-

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Evil is a negative quality.

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By "positive quality" I didn't mean that evil is necessarily a desirable thing. I merely meant to say that evil might be the thing that exists in and of itself, and that good is the absence of evil. If you have some arguments otherwise I invite you to one of the other threads where we are trying to figure out what this whole "good/bad" thing really is.-

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You might as well say God is stupid.

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That, too, is a possibility.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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I'm talking about a philosophical definition of God.

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Who cares about your philosophical definition of God?

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

You would? Under what circumstances could you be induced to argue this? So far you have been mainly making assertians about the nature of God and objecting when the rest of us don't simply accept these assertians.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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If imperfect, He would have arisen out of nature.

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This is exactly what I am talking about. An assertian that comes out of nowhere and stated as if it were obvious fact.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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"The Problem of Evil" one participant claimed that evil is simply the absence of God. But if God is omnipresent He must always be present even if the "evil" thing is around.

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A number of solutions to this dilemma:(1) There is no God, and so the dilemma doesn't present itself.(2) God exists but is not omnipresent.(3) God exists and is omnipresent, but evil is not the absense of God but something else entirely (and may even be an abstract concept that is independent of God, her existence, or her presence).

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

I think that you are going to have to expound on what you mean by "perfect". In particular:(1) Why would non-perfection require something "anterior" (whatever that means) which is perfect?(2) Why would this "perfect anterior" thing, if it existed, have to be God?(3) Why would being "perfect" imply being omnipresent and all good?

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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There would be no way to recognize non-perfection without have something perfect to compare it with.

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If there is a definition of perfection (something for which I have asked you), then we could compare God to the definition to see whether she fits it or not.-

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By definition, nothing could be anterior to God.

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What is it that you mean when you say God? Perhaps the problem is I am getting mixed up with different conceptions of God.-

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There are only 2 choices: (1) the universe in some form has always existed; or (2)a being created it.

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We have been through this one before. This is simply an assertian on your part for which you have never given any reason to accept.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

The universe may have suddenly begun to exist for no reason whatsoever. So there is at least one more possibility.If you don't like that possibility, bring it to the appropriate thread.At any rate you have not yet given a description of your "ideal" to tell whether it can be evil or not. You simply keep stating that, according to your "philosophical definition" God cannot be evil.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

Hi, Faith.I did give a third possibility.A fourth would be to recognize that the time coordinate has a definite starting point, before which there is no "before" -- like asking what is north of the north pole. Therefore, trying to think about the "cause" of the universe has problems -- "cause" or "creation" implies that there is a moment in time in which there is no universe, and then a moment when there is -- but that "moment in time" when there is no universe did not exist, since time begins the same time as the universe. In other words, the universe has always existed.Again, this may not be the appropriate thread for this.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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This is mumbo-jumbo.

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I get that same feeling from your posts.At any rate, what is mumbo-jumbo is talking about actions like creation or causing when there is no place or time for these actions to occur.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

It makes perfect sense to me. As does a universe that has always existed.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt