Who Made God?

This has always been a puzzle to me. Believers always say this, but it's plainly false, if He wanted to talk to me He can, I'm here and happy to listen. Never has. Odd that.

But it wasn't God speaking at all was it? There were no words or any indication at all that the motivation came from outside the individual. Nothing.

The instinct is also there in Muslims and atheists so, obviously, it can't have anything to do with being a Christian.

That's correct - and unlike the God thing, we have evidence for it and can see it happening in the brain using fMRI scans.

The thing is, if you think that your God is interfering with your emotions in a direct and physical way such that we can actually see parts of the brain being stimulated by moral emotions then there's no such thing as free will.

But all this aside, when a believer says that God speaks to him, they give the the impression that this is a personal and direct experience, but when quizzed, it turns out to be a very, very indirect affair.

To admit that they actually converse with god is an admission of mental derangement because we all know that it doesn't actually happen that way - it's a one way process that results in a requirement to attribute a reply through indirect means, which to everybody else are simply everyday, common phenomenon.

It looks like we're done - you simply believe something for which there isn't a scrap of evidence yet there's an everyday explanation and I find that totally preposterous, but that's hardly new here

Alternatively, it's all made up and none of it's real.

If you want to make any further progress after asserting something to be real, you need to demonstrate that it is real. No-one in a few thousand years of trying has ever done so. I really doubt that you're any different.

I'm afraid it's not even evidence, it's hearsay at best. Like you say, a story.

That's silly. And you know it. (I hope)

I think that you also know that FSMs and so on are exaggerations to make a point. You need to ask yourself why billions of people believe in things that you don't and have done so for thousands of years. It's the atheist's view that pink unicorns are are viable as Vishna, Thor, fairies and Father Christmas. The Christian god is just another in a long line of fantasies.

You also know that arguments from ignorance aren't any use here either.
But yes, the latter is far more probable. Particularly given the evidence for it and the absence of evidence for the former.

There is no spoon. [door]

The stories in the bible are anecdotal - they're a million miles from evidence - we don't even know who wrote them, but we do know they weren't eye witnesses. Many historians are not even convinced that JC actually existed, let alone rose from the dead.

You've been here long enough to know that rationalists like me, do not believe something just because it can't be disproven. You're exactly the same, you can't prove that Islam isn't the only way to eternal happiness, but you don't believe it do you?

You make a claim, you prove it. I'm prepared to believe things that have some supporting evidence. If you believe in the risen christ and all the god made everything just for us stuff, that's fine, so long as you don't try to pretend it's rational.

The first cause idea is simply a philosophical construct - it's not real. I'm simply not interested in it because it gets us nowhere - making up an imaginary first cause (a god) in order to get around a lack of a first cause is just silly.

Nor do I necessarily need a first cause (physics tell me I don't). I don't even expect to be able to understand how the universe works - I'm just a lump of primitive protein, why should I (ie humans) expect to understand how this all works?

The Theory of Evolution.

Yes. We call it biology.

The Theory of Evolution provides the evidence and the proof for the second, for the first, science is still stumped and maybe always will be. But obviously that's not evidence for a god - as has been said many times on these boards. [God of the gaps.]

There are more scientists alive now that have ever lived in the history of the world. Science is only a handful of generations old. Barely started. Maybe one day we'll solve all the problems and get all the answers - I have no idea. But I have no reason to believe that we can or will.

What I do know is that the God theory has had its day. It's had thousands of years to prove its point and it's failed at every attempt. There is not one single incident of a provable supernatural event - not one.

Primitive beliefs are being chipped away at in all modern societies. Education and economic development sees them off. They'll be out of the way in another millennia.

There's no reason at all - other than self-importance - for there to be a reason why we exist beyond the obvious one that we evolved from simpler organisms.

The desire to find purpose, led to the invention of that purpose. That's just the way we deal with life - we pretend that that we're special. We ain't.

Aren't you bored reading the same old analogies followed by the same old explanations why the analogy is just plain silly? I am.

Biology studies how thing got to be what they are as well as what they are now. Homo sapiens evolved from ape like ancestors which in turn evolved from simpler animals and so on. That is the cause of our existence.

Absolutely not. I have rejected your premise that because I can't prove there in no god, that I therefore should believe in one. Instead I insist that in order for me to believe in something I need evidence for it. You have provided none other than the existence of stories in a book that you personally believe to be true. Others believe other books with similar lack of evidence.

I'm not an atheist because science has proven the stories in the bible to be wrong - tho' obviously that's important and devastating for those that believed in them - I'm an atheist because I can find no evidence at all - and I do mean none - for a god.

So all the rest of your arguments are straw men. I don't need a first cause, I don't need to believe that my existence here is important in any cosmic sense, I don't think there is any important difference between me and a rock, I'm not searching for the meaning of life and I don't need a "why".

In fact, if I believe in anything of this sort, it's that the search for a why - in a philosophical and religious sense - is the cause of most of our problems. And the sooner we get over our massive egos, the sooner we will come to terms with developing ways of making our short lives here more pleasant and equitable for everyone.

Of course there is. There's a thousand things I could think of that I would accept as proof but the very simplest would be a single, non-controversial miracle.

Just one amputated arm regrown would do it. He's supposed to answer other healing prayers so why not one that's provable? The Pope requires a couple of miracles to beatify a saint. Let's see one.

But no, I'm supposed to have faith. Well I don't have faith in obvious nonsense, sorry.

A couple of years ago I remember seeing a handful of dowsers being scientifically tested to see if they could detect water. They were shown the experiment and they agreed that it was a fair test and that they could be expected to find the water. They all failed miserably. But not one of them would even consider that it was all in their imagination - they all rationalised their failure one way or another.

They needed to believe, so they did.

A modern Christian wouldn't recognise the beliefs of a 17th century Christian; they believed in the absolute literal truth in the bible as taught by their preacher. The majority of Christians these days have had their beliefs rationalised down to the bare bone by one scientific discovery after another. They've rationalised because they have to in order to keep believing.

It's highly likely that in the next ten years or so we'll find that we can make life from simple chemicals and another piece of the jigsaw will be found which will erode another chunk of belief and be rationalised.

The multitude of God stories invented around the world all have their source in our deep desire not to be insignificant. We are the first creatures to evolve the knowledge of our own future deaths and it's a hell of a burden to carry.

If you've ever had to explain to a child why their mother is no longer with them, the easiest way is to say that she's in heaven with the angels looking down on us now. And one day we'll all be back together and happy. It's a fairy story, nothing else.

If there is a god out there he's not the sort you think - he's the non-interventionist kind that pouffed this lot into existence 14bn years ago then found a new toy to play with.

A god, being a god, can of course do anything - inluding ignoring his creation. What you mean is that the version of a god that you prefer to believe in wouldn't do that.

But of course is a hoary old fallacy to equate the possibility of the existence of a god with the conclusion that it is therefore a Christian god (or any other that mankind has made up.)

And, of course, intelligence and morality has nothing to do with it. We know the process of evolution created both of these things. If it hadn't - and there was no guarantee that it would and there's no guarantee that it will continue for long - the universe and all in it would still exist.

The fact that there's 100 thousand million stars in the Milky Way alone, with thousands of millions of galaxies beyond it should be a bit of a clue that maybe we're not as important as we thought we were. The gospel stories were invented by people who thought that they were at the centre of a very small place with the heavens painted onto the sky above them. They, like many other primitive peoples made stories to explain why they were the so special to be on stage in God's theatre.

We're insignificant, we need to get over our self-importance.

Edited by Tangle, : No reason given.

It's not me that's saying it - it's published science. Stacks of it.

We know that an unguided process of evolution produced all life on this planet including us. It produced many intelligent life forms, one of which, us, has developed it to a relatively high level.

Our moral sense is a necessary part of social development and is an emotion developed from empathy - which is seen in other primates.

The alternative is that some unknown god created an enormous universe 14bn years ago, left it alone to see what would happen then plonked intelligence and morality into an ape on one remote planet about quarter of a million years ago.

I choose the former because there is evidence to support it.
The latter is without any supporting evidence whatsoever.

My point is that Gods are invented by pretty much all societies - they're all different but they have a lot in common. The majority promise an afterlife if certain rules are met - mostly about only worshipping the correct god which just happens to be the one your tribe worship and not behaving anti-socially.

Every so often a new organisation rises to challenges the old god and creates a new one or re-defines the rituals necessary to appease the existing god. (You know, "the not a real christian/muslim/hindu" thing.). We're still inventing gods and rituals today.

All of this is about human society trying to get along with itself and come to terms with the fact of their own deaths. We invent gods in order to deal with the tragedies of life and to maintain social control.

To accept this god idea, it's necessary to believe that you (ie the human species, not GDR) are special - god loves love or has a plan for you, takes an interest in you and so on. Without this hubris, we'd just be another animal doomed to die - we need to believe we're special. If there's a god looking after us, then we must be special mustn't we.

That's all.

It really doesn't does it? You have all the evidence you need to know that your neighbour not only doesn't have a car but is also deluded about thinking he has.

How can an imaginary car be useful to you? (I suspect the analogy has just collapsed.)

No, never.

Yup. I go fishing, but that's because I like fishing.

I don't suffer from stresses and agonies. When I have problems to deal with I try to tackle them head on. Maybe I'm just lucky.

Can't tell - the fact that he retires to his garage to think or whatever, doesn't tell me how good a dentist he is. I'd prefer a contemplative chap like that to a fundamental religious believer any day though.

It only has one meaning - don't try to overcomplicate it. I'm lucky in that the things that seem to torture you don't concern me at all. It's luck because I didn't do anything to be this way.

You do, but the rest of us are fine with it so perhaps it's you not chance and luck?

That's simply a god of the gaps argument.

Inventing gods to fill gaps in our knowledge is evidence of our poverty of understanding, not of the existence of gods.