The Essence Of Faith & Belief.

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Is God an objective reality or a subjective concept?

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For realsies? I dunno.
But as far as practical, functional life goes... He's just a subjective concept.
I come to this conclusion based on my experience that there is nothing people have which they attribute to God that cannot come for other, more accessible sources."I felt the joy and happiness that only God can provide!"No, you didn't.You felt the joy and happiness that you think only God can provide... and possibly only the thought of God can provide it for you... but such a statement simply isn't universal. There are many people who have reached levels of joy and happiness equivalent or beyond that which this statement describes... without attributing such to God in any way.It is, of course, possible that someone receives feelings of joy from God while they do not attribute those to God. Some sort of God hidden in the background, or something. And, of course, it's equally possible that when someone attributes these feelings to God... they are simply mistaken.Who's right? I dunno.
How can we tell? I dunno.
Does it matter? No, it does not.What matters are the feelings, not where they came from (if they even came from anyone other than you).
The second we start worrying or arguing over where our Love came from instead of focusing on the Love and promoting it's existence regardless of origin... is the second we start losing that Love.Love, joy and happiness isn't supposed to have rules or definitions or limitations. That's what makes such feelings so powerful. To put them in a box (even one such as "Love comes from God") is to place an unrequired restriction that only serves to reduce the power of these human aspects.It is my personal philosophy that we should focus on the things we know to exist... like Love and Joy and Happiness... rather than to quibble over who may or may not exist behind their curtain.

Spoken like a man who has not experienced the kind of "fucking off" that is forced on so many innocent's in this world.I agree with Larni... who is actually not-disagreeing with you.As far as I know, you very well may be right.
If God exists, I just hope He's not omnipotent. Otherwise He does not deserve anything better than a punch in the nose. An omnipotent God does not deserve to ask for patience if He is so morally void as to have created conditions that allow for some of the things that go on in this world.If the evil that is within this world is required in order for free-will to exist... then a worthy God would never allow this world to come into being in the first place.

Of course.A world with no free will is exceedingly morally above a world such as the one we live in.I don't think you get it... the good that exists in this world doesn't balance out the evil. The evil that exists grossly out proportions the good. If this is the way the world must be... any capable worthy or just judge would not create this world in the first place.Edited by Stile, : Changed "allow this world to exist" to "create this world in the first place" so as to re-emphasize the context of this discussion.

God doesn't have morals? Best answered with another question:
How many innocent lives do you think should be tortuously ruined beyond imagination, just so you can freely choose chocolate ice-cream for dessert? Agreed. And it is, obviously, for far, far worse. So bad, that it would take a derranged lunatic to create such a world in the first place.Again, how many women would you allow to be raped so that you can have "free will of the highest order?"
If your answer is greater than zero... I don't see how you can claim any sort of moral highground.
That isn't even the worst of what goes on in this world...The point isn't that free-will has a consequence of evil... I agree with you.
The point is that the evil that exists in this world simply isn't worth the free-will that provides it.If you think it is, please, let me know:How many innocent children need to die by torture, without knowing what love is, just so that you can have "free will of the highest order?"
How many are worth it for you?Do we really have to ask these questions?It's pretty obvious that the free-will available just doesn't balance with the amount of evil present. Therefore... if a God actually set this up, then that God isn't worthy and deserves a punch in the nose (to say the least).

I like the progression of Gods as seen as a child's arguement:God can smash you with one hand! (My Dad's the strongest!) - Greek/Roman gods
God can destroy entire worlds! (My Dad's stronger than yours!) - OT Christian god
God is omnipotent! (My Dad's the best times infinite + one!) - NT Christian god...it just seems so... mundane-ly developed.
The progression is made just in order to "be better than the other guy" and not made with any thought in mind to the consequences of such claims. Consequences such as... omnipotent gods just plain don't exist or they are laughably unworthy of being acknowledged.

Why isn't it a good answer? I can asnwer it very easily. The answer is obvious... 0 innocent lives should be tortuously ruined beyond imagination just so you can freely choose chocolate ice-cream for dessert. I didn't think the answer was particularly difficult. However, if you're struggling with this question, I can understand why you're avoiding the others as well... Really? The answer, again, is obvious to anyone with any amount of positive morality. The answer is "all of them." Gaining joy at the expense of the suffering of others is just plain evil. How could anyone really experience "joy" knowing that in order for them to feel such there are innocent's suffering horrible pains? It's revolting. But, of course, it isn't impossible at all. I can tell just by looking at all the suffering in the world that if such a system was put into place on purpose... then the one who decided to create it is as evil as evil gets. More evil than Hitler. More evil than The Joker. More evil than anything we can imagine. To say we can't measure it is nothing more than to create a coping mechanism within your mind so that you can relieve yourself of the responsibility of having to say "Hey, you! That's wrong!!" Maybe that's okay with you, but I simply can't let someone (or something, whatever God is... if He exists) just set up something like this and think it's okay. It's not okay, and He deserves a giant punch in the nose for it. Of course, He likely didn't create it because He likely doesn't exist... but it's still rather obvious that if an omnipotent God does exist and is responsible for creating the world... then He's obviously not worth a second thought. Given omnipotence, I could have created a better world (with an even higher level of free-will) in my sleep.Anyone who can't see it simply hasn't experienced the kind of evil this world is capable of, or is fooling themselves.

Why would you ask me to do those things?We're not talking about dealing with the world after it's been created.
We're talking about an omnipotent being deciding to create the world in the way we see it now. In that context... you *are* talking about gaining joy at another's expense. If you're not talking in this context... what, specifically, are you discussing?If the world "must" be created in the way it is... then it is immoral to create the world.
This leaves two possibilities:1. God isn't omnipotent.
2. God didn't create the world. Again, you're just wrong.
I can evaluate some of the evil that is present in the world without a problem.
Some of the evil that is present is enough to conclude that no amount of good can "balance the equation."Let's take the most wonderful thing in the world: Love.
Let's make us omnipotent.
Now. You're saying that the only way it's possible for you to experience the love you have with your wife is if you create the world in such a way that innocent children are brutally murdered.
Would you save those innocent children by not creating the world in the first place? Or would you rather have them brutally murdered so you can love your wife?I think the answer is rather simple and easy. It is obviously more moral to save the innocent children and not create the world in the first place. Deciding to create the world anyway is nothing short of selfish. Which means the "love" you would be experiencing would be selfish love and not really all that great anyway.No viewing of all evil is necessary.
No viewing of all good is necessary.
No specific terms of evaluation are necessary... just the general terms that Love is good and brutally murdering innocent children is evil. Are you seriously going to argue against that? It's insane.An omnipotent God would have had these decisions to make.
If He exists and He is omnipotent and He decided to create this world in this way anyway... God deserves a punch in the nose for being a dimwitted fool. Why would I design a world in which we can only choose good options? What a boring world.
I wouldn't lower the number of options of available. I would allow evil-doers to choose to do evil, if they wanted to. The world we have now:
When an evil-doer hurts an innocent we have two beings coming into contact... one gets their free-will options lowered. In our system the evil-doer retains all their free-will where the innocent's free-will becomes restricted.I'd simply reverse that outcome. Stile's world:
If an evil-doer hurts an innocent than I would have the evil-doer's free will restricted as a consequence instead of the innocent's.Same number of options... evil-doers can choose to be evil as much as they want. Yet a higher-level of results = a better, "higher-level" freewill system. Very easy, if one is omnipotent.In both scenarios we have two people coming into contact. An evil-doer hurting an innocent. One of them will leave the situation with a restriction on their free will. God decided to restrict the innocent's free will. I decided to restrict the evil-doer's free will. Who's got the moral high ground? Me for punishing an evil-doer who decided to do evil? Or God for punishing an innocent who's just in the wrong place at the wrong time?Why decide to let the innocent's free-will get restricted instead of the evil-doers? It's a immoral system. Therefore, if it was created puposefully that way, than the creator is immoral and deserves a punch in the nose.

Why does this matter? I didn't mention a Judge, and this statement of fact doesn't require me to judge a Judge one way or another.
But, of course, you need to show that a Judge actually exists before you question what we're doing with one... Reality. Sure.
Or, the Deity may well agree with us and is proud that we've figured out the system and are attempting to fix it on our own.
Or, the Deity doesn't exist and musing about it is just a waste of time.