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Forums - General Discussion - Do you believe in God? Why/Why not?

 

Do you believe in any god?

Yes 63 36.21%
 
No 111 63.79%
 
Total:174
GhaudePhaede010 said:
Peh said:

Uhm, that formula is utterly biased nonsense based on ignorance. 

That probability means absolutely nothing. Also, which god are we talking about?

If you like you can replace god with any fictional character and it works the same way.

Ahhhh. You are that guy, are you? Well, present me more sophisticated statistics on the topic, please. Hopefully, you created the example you will set up yourself. That would be preference.

The probability means something to me. If there is a chance that there is a God; a legitimate one at that, I am willing to hear that out. And we are talking about God. God means, "creator" so I am not speaking on religion as a whole; rather, if there is a creator. I am a Muslim but my religion is not of consequence to my belief in God as my religion is my discipline to myself and God but only because I believe in both myself and God regardless of my religion.

You are correct on that third point. I could also replace God with nonfictional characters... ...like man. Man creates things all the time, such as simulations of, "life" in video games. In other words, man is also a God to its creations. It could work with anything, really. The question is not, "is God proven to be real?" so the argument you are raising is misplaced anyway. The question is about if I have a faith in God and why I have it. I have answered and explained and there is nothing you can reasonably do - outside of show me concrete and absolute proof to the contrary - to change my mind. On the other hand, I assume the same of you and therefore, I respect your opinion.

I don't know what you mean by "that" guy. Statistics on what? Unproven concepts? 

If that probability means something to you than you are grasping at straws, simply because that formula is made on no real basis. Math is objective correct. If I present you a formula which is either 1+1= 2, E=m*c² or P=I*U than we can all agree on the "truth" contained by these equations. They are testable and verifiable.  

But that formula on yours which is made of these variables:

Recognition of goodness
Existence of moral evil
Esistence of natural evil
Intra-natural miracles
Extra-natural miracles
Religious Experience

is simply pure subjective nonsense. How do you determine these values and how do you verify them? You have to be objective on this part, so we all speak the same language. You can't just invent definitions on variables and conclude that this is the case. It means absolutely nothing. Especially on a concept of a god where every human, be it theist / atheist, give unequal qualities/characteristics to that god. 

How likely is it that my feline goddess Neko exists? Oh, 67%. There you go. Here are the variables I used: 

Recognition of all that is feline (D=10
Existence of moral cat haters (D=0,5)
Existence of natural cat haters (D=0,1)
Intra-natural miracles (D=2)
Extra-natural miracles (like cats having 9 lives) (D=1)
Religious Experience with cats. (D=2)

All hail Neko, right? I'm sorry if it sounds like I am mocking you, but that's just what you want to sell us. 

Yes, you have your right to believe in whatever you want. But I am not that one who has to provide proof of the contrary. The burden of proof is always on the positive claim and that is on the concept of a god. I am not convinced by what you are presenting so I simply reject your concept. I don't have to proof that it is wrong. 

"God means, "creator" so I am not speaking on religion as a whole; rather, if there is a creator."

And here starts the problem: God means whatever you want it to mean. Since you've said that you are a Muslim, your God is that of Islam, not of Christianity, not of Judaism and not of any other religion out there. The Jewish god doesn't have a child which goes by the name of Jesus. He has different characteristics than the one in Christianity and even Islam. But besides that, we have still to determine which god you are talking about. Is it a personal god or one who only kickstart the universe and went to do other businesses? You can't just say that you are speaking of a creator without defining one. It doesn't work that way. 

" but my religion is not of consequence to my belief in God "

Sure it is. Without that religion you wouldn't believe in your god in the first place, nor be labeled as a Muslim. 

"The question is not, "is God proven to be real?" so the argument you are raising is misplaced anyway. The question is about if I have a faith in God and why I have it. "

Sure you can have faith in a God. I am not taking it away, I just point out the flaws in your argument and reasoning. Also, I didn't raised "is God proven to be real?" as a argument, I just pointed out how flawed that formula is which you use to determine the probability of his existence. 

Last edited by Peh - on 25 August 2018

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Peh said:
GhaudePhaede010 said:

Ahhhh. You are that guy, are you? Well, present me more sophisticated statistics on the topic, please. Hopefully, you created the example you will set up yourself. That would be preference.

The probability means something to me. If there is a chance that there is a God; a legitimate one at that, I am willing to hear that out. And we are talking about God. God means, "creator" so I am not speaking on religion as a whole; rather, if there is a creator. I am a Muslim but my religion is not of consequence to my belief in God as my religion is my discipline to myself and God but only because I believe in both myself and God regardless of my religion.

You are correct on that third point. I could also replace God with nonfictional characters... ...like man. Man creates things all the time, such as simulations of, "life" in video games. In other words, man is also a God to its creations. It could work with anything, really. The question is not, "is God proven to be real?" so the argument you are raising is misplaced anyway. The question is about if I have a faith in God and why I have it. I have answered and explained and there is nothing you can reasonably do - outside of show me concrete and absolute proof to the contrary - to change my mind. On the other hand, I assume the same of you and therefore, I respect your opinion.

I don't know what you mean by "that" guy. Statistics on what? Unproven concepts? 

If that probability means something to you than you are grasping at straws, simply because that formula is made on no real basis. Math is objective correct. If I present you a formula which is either 1+1= 2, E=m*c² or P=I*U than we can all agree on the "truth" contained by these equations. They are testable and verifiable.  

But that formula on yours which is made of these variables:

Recognition of goodness
Existence of moral evil
Esistence of natural evil
Intra-natural miracles
Extra-natural miracles
Religious Experience

is simply pure subjective nonsense. How do you determine these values and how do you verify them? You have to be objective on this part, so we all speak the same language. You can't just invent definitions on variables and conclude that this is the case. It means absolutely nothing. Especially on a concept of a god where every human, be it theist / atheist, give unequal qualities/characteristics to that god. 

How likely is it that my feline goddess Neko exists? Oh, 67%. There you go. Here are the variables I used: 

Recognition of all that is feline (D=10
Existence of moral cat haters (D=0,5)
Existence of natural cat haters (D=0,1)
Intra-natural miracles (D=2)
Extra-natural miracles (like cats having 9 lives) (D=1)
Religious Experience with cats. (D=2)

All hail Neko, right? I'm sorry if it sounds like I am mocking you, but that's just what you want to sell us. 

Yes, you have your right to believe in whatever you want. But I am not that one who has to provide proof of the contrary. The burden of proof is always on the positive claim and that is on the concept of a god. I am not convinced by what you are presenting so I simply reject your concept. I don't have to proof that it is wrong. 

"God means, "creator" so I am not speaking on religion as a whole; rather, if there is a creator."

And here starts the problem: God means whatever you want it to mean. Since you've said that you are a Muslim, your God is that of Islam, not of Christianity, not of Judaism and not of any other religion out there. The Jewish god doesn't have a child which goes by the name of Jesus. He has different characteristics than the one in Christianity and even Islam. But besides that, we have still to determine which god you are talking about. Is it a personal god or one who only kickstart the universe and went to do other businesses? You can't just say that you are speaking of a creator without defining one. It doesn't work that way. 

" but my religion is not of consequence to my belief in God "

Sure it is. Without that religion you wouldn't believe in your god in the first place, nor be labeled as a Muslim. 

"The question is not, "is God proven to be real?" so the argument you are raising is misplaced anyway. The question is about if I have a faith in God and why I have it. "

Sure you can have faith in a God. I am not taking it away, I just point out the flaws in your argument and reasoning. Also, I didn't raised "is God proven to be real?" as a argument, I just pointed out how flawed that formula is which you use to determine the probability of his existence. 

Indeed we better start using the word entity a bit more since it is less related to religion, saying god makes us entitled telling everyone that it connects to us cause a lot still feel special in that kind of way. In my opinion a lot just fear having little or no importance in their life and the existence of a god makes them hopeful to grow out of that box.(one of the reasons off course )



I do not believe in a sentient god which is the only kind of god I consider relevant to have a discussion on. If you want to say the laws of physics is god that fine but it completely irrelevant to how a person would live there life.

As for why, because I have never seen any convincing evidence of an existence of one. With lack of evidence I fall back to what I observe from nature which is all knowledge and life evolves from simple to more complex.

A baby is less complex in it cellar makeup then an adult. I needed to learn addition before I could do calculus. Physics is less complex then chemistry which is less complex then biology. I don’t mean from the perspective of a human learning the subject in school but rather what is actually going on. That why Physics laws can be reduced down to a formula while biology require written explanations.

In order for me to believe in a sentient god, it require me to believe that in the beginning there was this infinite complex being with knowledge of everything and ability to create matter out of nothing.

For me I find it much more believable to start the universe with something extremely simple, some matter and the laws of physics. Through those two interactions the universe slowly became more complex, eventually leading to chemistry, then biology then life. Just like how I observe everything else in nature that I have ever learned about. That things go from simple to more complex instead of starting with something super complex.



No.

Belief in a God is a tacit admission that you don't understand literally everything in the world and are anthropomorphosizing the concept of the unknown. Put simply: God is a metaphor for the unknown and nothing more.

There has been absolutely no evidence supporting the existence of a sentient, omnipotent, omnipresent God. There has been plenty of situations where things happened with no apparent answer, to which our people hurriedly covered over the gaps in our knowledge with a blanket 'Well god did it". And that's basically it. No evidence, just 'well god did it' any time we don't fully understand something. Could be anything, like a magical tiger-repellant rock or an elusive teapot in the kuiper belt. There is no evidence for a god as a sentient, omipresent, omniscient, omnipotent being watching over us, just conjecture and made up fairy tales.

I challenge any of you to find examples throughout history or your lives that could ONLY be explained by the presence of a god and simply not just 'well we don't know so it must be.'.

Until then, you all need to accept that 'God' is a man-made concept used as a metaphor for the unknown and nothing more.



JWeinCom said:
Eagle367 said:
I believe in an entity that is above all time and space and a I've all dimensions and the creator of everything, I cannot fathom a causeless existence. The one who doesn't have a beginning or an end is the ultimate cause and I believe a Godless or a poly-God existence is impossible. Only the one. It's just my logical and rational conclusion from all angles I inspect. And I am studying physics so the weird stereotype is wrong

Why does a person have to commit to either the position that existence is causeless, or that a god exists?  Why are those the only two options, and even if I do accept those are the two options, why would I have to accept either?

Shaqazooloo0 said:
Yes, I believe in God
Why? because SSBM exists.

The actual reason though is because the way I interpret the world around me, I just feel like their is a God.

Based on our experiences of the world, it would be pretty reasonable to assume the Earth is static, at the center of the universe, and flat.  These are the most intuitive positions without studying the matter.  They're also wrong of course.  Our intuition (just feeling something) is usually a good way to go about things, but can mislead us.

The simulation thing is stupid to me and frankly goes nowhere. Another thing would be we were created by a flawed being who left us after creating us and I don't think the ultimate creator can be flawed so if we go up the chain, we'll find God. Hell even with the simulation thing it works. Go up the chain and the original thing that happened that led to us is the question. How many possibilities are left in your mind?



Just a guy who doesn't want to be bored. Also

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Eagle367 said:
JWeinCom said:

Why does a person have to commit to either the position that existence is causeless, or that a god exists?  Why are those the only two options, and even if I do accept those are the two options, why would I have to accept either?

Based on our experiences of the world, it would be pretty reasonable to assume the Earth is static, at the center of the universe, and flat.  These are the most intuitive positions without studying the matter.  They're also wrong of course.  Our intuition (just feeling something) is usually a good way to go about things, but can mislead us.

The simulation thing is stupid to me and frankly goes nowhere. Another thing would be we were created by a flawed being who left us after creating us and I don't think the ultimate creator can be flawed so if we go up the chain, we'll find God. Hell even with the simulation thing it works. Go up the chain and the original thing that happened that led to us is the question. How many possibilities are left in your mind?

Was that a response to me?  I'm confused.  I didn't say anything about a simulation.



JWeinCom said:
Eagle367 said:

The simulation thing is stupid to me and frankly goes nowhere. Another thing would be we were created by a flawed being who left us after creating us and I don't think the ultimate creator can be flawed so if we go up the chain, we'll find God. Hell even with the simulation thing it works. Go up the chain and the original thing that happened that led to us is the question. How many possibilities are left in your mind?

Was that a response to me?  I'm confused.  I didn't say anything about a simulation.

You said why does the response have to be one God or causeless. Of course if you say you don't know, that already exists in agnosticism but then you have to decide something in how to live your life



Just a guy who doesn't want to be bored. Also

I consider myself a somewhat devout Christian, and believe in God, though I'm probably more flexible with my mindset than most I believe. Whether you believe in God, Allah, Zeus, Haruhi, or just some intangible energy that connects us, I personally see it as different perspectives of the same thing. Take that as you will, I guess.

That being said, I don't really take issue with people who think otherwise either. Generally if someone doesn't shove their viewpoint down my throat, I wouldn't plan to do the same.



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Eagle367 said:
JWeinCom said:

Was that a response to me?  I'm confused.  I didn't say anything about a simulation.

You said why does the response have to be one God or causeless. Of course if you say you don't know, that already exists in agnosticism but then you have to decide something in how to live your life

Atheism is what you believe about a god.  Atheism means I don't believe this claim.  Theism means you believe it.

Agnostic or gnostic refers to what you know or rather claim to know.  So a gnostic atheist would be someone who claims "I know god does not exist".  An gnostic theist would say "I know god exists".  An agnostic atheist would say "I don't believe a god exists but I don't know that for a fact."  And an agnostic theist would say "I believe a god exists, but I can't prove it."

That's how I'm using the terms, and how most atheists use it.  I'm not going to argue over them, cause I find that boring, but just wanted to make sure we're on the same page.  I don't mind being labeled as an agnostic, because that is technically accurate, but I tend to identify as an atheist, because I think my beliefs are closer to what most people think of when they think of atheism.

Back to the point, I don't know why I have to decide anything about the origins of the universe to live my life.  It'd be cool to know, but however it began, I can observe the world around me that exists now, and decide how to live my life based on the current state of the universe.  I can live just fine without knowing, or pretending to know, the origins of the universe.



JWeinCom said:

Agnostic or gnostic refers to what you know or rather claim to know.  So a gnostic atheist would be someone who claims "I know god does not exist".  An gnostic theist would say "I know god exists".  An agnostic atheist would say "I don't believe a god exists but I don't know that for a fact."  And an agnostic theist would say "I believe a god exists, but I can't prove it."

 

You actually got the definition of Agnostic backward.  Agnostic is the belief that something can not be known.  Someone that Agnostic about god believe it impossible to know whether god exist.  You can be Agnostic about anything, not just god.  On the other hand the term Gnostic originated from a religion that believed in a unknowable god.

Edit: After rereading what you wrote I realize you had Agnostic right and I got mix up with the statement you use for Gnostic.  I never heard anyone use the term Gnostic the way you did personally.  

Last edited by Cyran - on 25 August 2018