What are the odds of God existing?

The topic had to do with figuring out what alternatives there were as regards the origin of the universe. One answer is that there was no origin, in which case there's no need for a God. Another alternative was that the universe was created. If it was created by a thing, we might as well say that it existed forever. This thing would be the universe in another form. Some suggested there's a third alternative: it came into being with no cause whatsoever, just appeared out of nothing (to my mind, this is totally unreasonable, but they insisted on it).So in order for the term "God" to have any meaning, the idea had to be distinguished from Nature. The universe is nature. Its distinguishing characteristic is that it is a thing. It gives rise to Being (us, for example), but Nature in itself is not a being. Could we say that the distinguishing characteristic of nature is that it does not twitch? It gives rise to twitchiness but in itself possesses no twitchiness? So nature was created by the Eternal Twitcher. I suppose we could go with that.This message has been edited by robinrohan, 05-03-2006 05:04 AM

Whether or not one is asleep can be measured scientifically, I think. It's not just based on appearance. I don't know if there's a threshold or not. Perhaps there's an in-between creature in which it would be arbitrary to pronounce them conscious or unconscious. I don't know how it arrives. But if we are conscious, then it arrived.

quote:

---

Some suggested there's a third alternative: it came into being with no cause whatsoever, just appeared out of nothing (to my mind, this is totally unreasonable, but they insisted on it).

---

And for some reason you are having trouble explaining why this is so unreasonable.

---

"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

I'm not having any trouble to my satisfaction explaining it, but for the sake of argument we can list that as a third alternative if you like and see what that does to the conclusions in the OP.

According to the OP's logic, wouldn't that lower the odds of god existing to 33.33%?ABE: Isn't your satisactory explanation a tautology?This message has been edited by Catholic Scientist, 05-03-2006 09:04 AM

So...does God sleep?

I want you to be clear on the 'cocky assertions' that cause me to 'have a problem'. I just get such a matter-of-fact context from the post and these statements aren't neccessarily true. It just rubs me the wrong way. Maybe I'm just reading it wrong, or maybe I'm just immature and ignorant, Faith.But anyways....WRT the opening post, what if the universe was created by a council of power-limited gods that worked together?Maybe this council was doing something else altogether and one of the gods farted and out came our universe, a denied accident.The point is, there's more than the two options. Also, even if we assume those are the only two options, we shouldn't assume they have equal probability. For the purpose of this discussion, I would say that electrons are things. I agree, except I don't think a lack of consciousness makes you a thing. Everything is a thing and having consciousness is what makes you a being. Beings are things but things are not neccessarily beings. Its a thing by default.

damn, sorry for starting an off topic bitchfest earlier.

quote:

---

I'm not having any trouble to my satisfaction explaining it....

---

Heh. I'm sure you're not. If all we had to do was convince ourselves, then we'd all be debate champions.

---

"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

This is not an additional option. It's still option #1. The only point to be added is that this God must be eternal--otherwise we revert to option #2--and we could in that case eliminate this god or gods as contingent. If we consider other factors, such as the nature of this creation, we might be able to lean one way or the other. Otherwise, there's no reason for selecting either option 1 or option 2. Might as well flip a coin. This is a matter of definition. One might use other terms. I was using "thing" to mean that which does not possess consciousness. If you wish to say that "beings are things" but "things are not necessarily beings," then we would have two different types of things presumably, those things which have consciousness (we could call these, maybe, "alpha-things") and then those things that don't have consciousness, which we could call "beta-things."So using these terms, we still have the important distinction about two different types of things, alpha and beta. So if the universe is a beta-thing, then that which created it, in order to be distinct from the universe, would have to be an alpha-thing.We might just as well use the original terms, things and beings.This message has been edited by robinrohan, 05-03-2006 09:54 AM

What if the council was not eternal. These gods, which are also not eternal, just happened to find themselves existing and decided to create our universe. I think you would reply that this is option #2 and it is our universe in another form. But, it could be not from another form, that they actually created energy and matter and our universe from their multidimensional superverse. It sorta moves the goalposts to where did that superverse come from but think of it this way. If the scenario described is truly the way it happened, what does that do to your odds of God existing? Ahh, but it isn't. The gods of the council are not eternal beings and they still created the universe. Why do you say that they must be eternal? Because otherwise its option 2? But its not that option because the universe was created by a god(which is a council of them). If there's no reason for selecting either one, why not put the coin down and NOT SELECT ONE. No, I agree, the terms are fine. I was just nitpicking at the way they are defined. I don't think you should define a thing as a thing that lacks consciousness. I think you should define a being as a thing that has consciousness. Because obviously all things are things (and all beings are things) but not all things are beings. You should put the limit of the definition on the beings.Now, I'm still not convinced that beings and things are all that exist. But lets just assume that it is true and move the discussion forward. Where are we going from here?

Okay so if I say there are two levels of mystery:First: Things, that stuff exists at all and
Sencond: Beings, that there is awareness of stuff, consciousness existingHow does this sit with your logic of the the universe?lfen

My third alternative is that the universe does not have an infinte past, but still never "came into being" as you put it. You are still applying too much of a naive (or perhaps unintentionally dogmatic) understanding of time.My fourth is that a universe with no "origin" (has an infinite past) can also have a creator. If this creator is outside our particular time, then his point of creation is unlikely to be representable by a single point of time on our time-dimension. Surely we are part of Nature? Via our conciousness, Nature is one total being. If not, what do you define as the delimiter of our individual conciousnesses? Our physical bodies?

One wishes to choose.

I think using the word "Being" in this sense leaves the discussion open to unnecessary confusion.Does your definition of "Being" in this case differ from what is usually intended by the word "consciousness"?One reason is that I think the universe has being in the sense that it is whether or not we find it to be conscious or not.What is it to be? What Is? and What is it to be conscious.Twitchiness seems to be life but you have later said that not all living things possess what you consider the quality of awareness sufficient to be "beings".lfen
lfen