Do you believe in God(s)?

Debate serious and interesting topics, rant about politics or pop culture, or otherwise converse in essay form about your opinions. The rules of conduct here are a little stricter.
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Postby Radium » 2009.03.06 (15:18)

SlappyMcGee wrote:. However, once again, I think this proves just how irrelevant any argument you can make would be. How do you intend to convey your idea or convince us of the existence of your God if the only proof you have is non-concrete and is therefore impossible for us to confirm or disconfirm its existence?
I agree. Every argument supporting God is based on non-concrete information.
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Postby maya » 2009.03.11 (19:23)

To be honest, I find it impossible to believe in nothing. I definitely believe in 'something', though what that is, i'm not sure . I believe that 'God' is something artificial, something that is man made and created by our minds. I don't particularly believe in any religions as they contradict a lot of things that i believe in. For example, the bible says that God made the Earth in seven days and Humans were made in those first days. However, science has proved that dinosaurs and all sorts of living organisms were on this earth billions of years before this.

It is hard to fully understand the complexity of the whole universe we live in as we start to think too deep. It amazes me when I think that life, matter, time are all endless and go on forever. Where did everything begin? Some people believe it was the big bang, but then again, there could have been millions of big bangs before that one and so on.

In short, I do believe in 'God' but also I question what truth religion says about this being or whatever 'God' is. Noone knows what 'God' is so it is portrayed in so many different ways to believe in.
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Postby maya » 2009.03.11 (19:30)

SlappyMcGee wrote:

Furthermore, your cousin may very well have been some sort of miracle. So, why do other young people die? Why is it God decided that your cousin is better than those he decided to sacrifice? You can say "God does not want us to question his ways" or whatever, or that he has his own purposes, but at that point you're already making a huge logical leap. To prove God's existence, you've mentioned a spectacular event which you attribute to God. When I try and disprove God's existence by asking why he doesn't do more spectacular events, the argument almost invariably circles around to, "No, our God has a clause that says if we question his existence, we our unfaithful. That if we question his actions, we are unfaithful." If you believe that God exists, then you can't question whether or not he exists, because then you believe you will go to Hell.
I don't think that 'God' would be such a hate-filled being as to sacrifice some and just randomly keep others. It could be God has absolutely no power to change the world now. And there's not just our world in the universe, there may be billions of others like ours, but we havent got the means or technology to travel that far and find out.
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Postby Atilla » 2009.03.12 (02:27)

Firstly, use the edit button instead of double posting, please.

Secondly, if God has no power to change the world, He's not very God-like, and He's definitely not omnipotent.

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Postby bobaganuesh_2 » 2009.03.31 (06:06)

SlappyMcGee wrote:I would say that the solid evidence that was found certainly made it extremely likely that the man was a murderer, and later, we realized that the minority was in fact correct. In the same way that it is extremely likely that there is no Christian God based on what we know now, what with historical inaccuracies and a world that predates the best guess of whoever wrote the Bible, and although we may find out in the future, BAM! God existed all along, that's no reason to assume that the majority of evidence we have now is wrong.

Even if we have no way of definitively proving that there is no God, the concept of God is as fabricated as the notion that faith is somehow a good thing. Faith is a blanket term used by people who don't want you to question their actions, because, bobaga, the second you start to question, "Hey, I don't actually know that anything happened in the Bible was fact.", or, "Wait, why does God not want everyone to believe in him?", or finally, and this is a big'n, "Why does God make science prove his non-existence?", that's when the whole thing falls apart.

So, give me a valid reason to believe in God that isn't included in my list. Because "Why the hell not?" isn't good enough.
in a flip, "I don't acutally know that anything in the Bible wasn't fact". I have often pondered your point myself, with the whole 'oh, maybe there was some guy bored out of his skull that decided to right an epic tale, dubbed The Bible. the Bible originated from the scriptures, I think but do not know, and that would be proof enough to the Bible's existence and that the tales, and God, are canon. so if the Bible ain't true, and it's just a fantasy tale, then perhaps we can delve into the motifs and hermanuetics of it and decide whether it sets and example for us, or perhaps alludes to something (dropping a hint that God does exist, or perhaps that we need to decide his existence or not). someone may think the Bible to not be factual, but decides that God exists based upon the content of the Bible. perhaps they'll go "jeez this is amazing I should accept God as well...REAL cuz He is so great and whatnot in this book!" and integrate the Christian religion into their values, beliefs, customs, traditions, and principles. I think this is how Christianity caught on so well early on, because people could accept God, the Bible, and it's teachings whether it was/is factual or not.

for your second unraveling, self-destroying question "Wait, why does God not want everyone to believe in him?", here's the lazy answer: "why does God do what He does? no one knows, and so maybe, just maybe we shouldn't care to worry about it: it's His business if he wants people to beleive in him after all". Well, if he says that he wants everyone to beleive in him (I got no clue, I've never heard of that in Sunday school/confirmation class (or maybe I ahve, but just forgotten)) and yet lots of people are Islamic, Hindi, Buddhist, Jain, Tao, Zoroastrian, whatever, and leading up to Agnostic or Atheist, then God is hypocritical and not so perfect after all!! whoop-dee-doo??! lazy again: "maybe 'everyone' refers to all the Christians!" or maybe God isn't perfect (Noah;s Ark good example) and the Bible is really a focus on Jesus's perfection of character!

we've been over the third one
Slappy McGee wrote:
bobaga_fett wrote: I'll have to get back to you, Slappy, later, just not right now
Please don't bother. Your arguments were largely illogical, and I doubt that you could give me a straight answer that didn't just come down to wordiness, and I'd rather not get frustrated.
for you, I don't listen to please. my answers are straight to me, and if they're not to you, then I guess that's what you're seeing from that side of the spectrum.

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Postby Adoniseppi » 2009.03.31 (06:20)

I see no reason to believe in such an illogical entity not backed by any sort of evidence whatsoever. Everything about the entire concept of "God" screams fiction.
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Postby SlappyMcGee » 2009.03.31 (14:45)

bobaga_fett wrote:
in a flip, "I don't acutally know that anything in the Bible wasn't fact". I have often pondered your point myself, with the whole 'oh, maybe there was some guy bored out of his skull that decided to right an epic tale, dubbed The Bible. the Bible originated from the scriptures, I think but do not know, and that would be proof enough to the Bible's existence and that the tales, and God, are canon. so if the Bible ain't true, and it's just a fantasy tale, then perhaps we can delve into the motifs and hermanuetics of it and decide whether it sets and example for us, or perhaps alludes to something (dropping a hint that God does exist, or perhaps that we need to decide his existence or not). someone may think the Bible to not be factual, but decides that God exists based upon the content of the Bible. perhaps they'll go "jeez this is amazing I should accept God as well...REAL cuz He is so great and whatnot in this book!" and integrate the Christian religion into their values, beliefs, customs, traditions, and principles. I think this is how Christianity caught on so well early on, because people could accept God, the Bible, and it's teachings whether it was/is factual or not.
Dude, seriously? What the hell does this mean?
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Postby yungerkid » 2009.03.31 (16:39)

Secondly, if God has no power to change the world, He's not very God-like, and He's definitely not omnipotent.
God has all ultimate power, but does not have all immediate power. God certainly does pick and choose people to give grace to based on...something. this is one of the original doctrines of the Reformation, that has been obscured in our age, but nevertheless comes directly from the Bible and has a strong base of support in it. God does not love everyone on the Earth. He does not "love the sinner, but hate the sin". because of man's sinful nature, He hates all those who are not saved, because those who are not saved still are of a sinful nature and origin. God only loves the elect: those whom He chose before time to save to be with Him. that, of course, means that everyone else, He condemned before time to Hell. if He chose the elect before time, then He either chose them arbitrarily or chose them based on some inherent unknown trait. if the former were true, chance would exist, and thus God would not control all power. but if the latter exists, then His system of decision for who would get into Heaven was based on some trait that we have, which is favoritism.

we are all dead to God in our sinful natures. thus, we cannot come to God on our own strength. thus, God must initiate conversion against a sinner's innate will (they are sinful; they don't wish God's peace upon themselves). for the sake of the argument, i will say that there is no such thing as change, only the death of the old and its replacement with the new. thus, when God intrudes upon a sinner to regenerate it, He is forcibly murdering them.

God chose people based on some system we don't even know about, and then forcibly murdered them when time was created.

so why is He able to force this will on anything? is it just because of His power? sure, it might be done according to His moral system, but then where does the moral system get its authority? if it is from the mere fact that God has all power, then ultimately the priority is being placed on power, not on God and His character. power is the only reason that i can see that God's system of morality and will could be so enforced over everything. but if power is truly what is important, why worship God?

why is Jesus' death on the cross so worshiped? if it is out of emotion from being saved, then why is emotion not even secondary to salvation, let alone being the vehicle to it? but God is strong, and omnipotent; surely mere physical pain, and even the pain of being separated from His Father, should not have been more than a minor exertion to such a powerful Being. unless, that is, He is not that powerful. but that would be a contradiction. so, if the Cross truly was such a minor exertion, why worship Him for it? it would be like a group of french fries worshipping and being indebted to a human for not eating them. it was the human's nature to eat them, but it was a minor exertion not to. i realize this analogy fails to account for the eternal aspects of the relationship, but roughly the same idea lies behind the analogy.

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Postby Tanner » 2009.03.31 (17:00)

bobaga_fett wrote:in a flip, "I don't acutally know that anything in the Bible wasn't fact". I have often pondered your point myself, with the whole 'oh, maybe there was some guy bored out of his skull that decided to right an epic tale, dubbed The Bible. the Bible originated from the scriptures, I think but do not know, and that would be proof enough to the Bible's existence and that the tales, and God, are canon. so if the Bible ain't true, and it's just a fantasy tale, then perhaps we can delve into the motifs and hermanuetics of it and decide whether it sets and example for us, or perhaps alludes to something (dropping a hint that God does exist, or perhaps that we need to decide his existence or not). someone may think the Bible to not be factual, but decides that God exists based upon the content of the Bible. perhaps they'll go "jeez this is amazing I should accept God as well...REAL cuz He is so great and whatnot in this book!" and integrate the Christian religion into their values, beliefs, customs, traditions, and principles. I think this is how Christianity caught on so well early on, because people could accept God, the Bible, and it's teachings whether it was/is factual or not.
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Postby bobaganuesh_2 » 2009.04.01 (03:53)

you people seem to have harrowed yourselves into a nutshell...wait where have I heard that before?? maybe someone should rename the debate forum to "chatting with pre-Eduardo Fernandez"

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Postby SlappyMcGee » 2009.04.01 (04:07)

bobaga_fett wrote:you people seem to have harrowed yourselves into a nutshell...wait where have I heard that before?? maybe someone should rename the debate forum to "chatting with pre-Eduardo Fernandez"

Harrowed ourself into a nutshell?

There are two things that you'll need to -ever- convince anybody that Christianity is anymore than your ridiculous hallucination:

1) Something other than Scripture to cite.
2) A basic understanding of the English language.
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Postby Seneschal » 2009.04.01 (09:12)

Of course, it is impossible to disprove God, but I do believe that he (or she?!) doesn't exist.
God, after all, is meant to be a perfect being. But if he is so, how can he ever do anything? If God does something, it could be anything to communicating with believers to creating the world then he is experiencing a change. How, though, can something that is perfect ever change? Furthermore, how can anything be perfect anyway? The God of the old testament is far from perfect: he is a jealous God, he admits it himself. Jealousy is a neqative quality, therefore anyone who can experience jealousy cannot be perfect. Unless this is a different God from the God of the new testament, in which case there would be two Gods, which would be an interesting situation, then the God of the new testament must also be an imperfect God.
And if God is meant to be omnipotent and omnibenevolent, then how can he allow Satan and all the evils of today exist?
In my opinion, the answer to these questions is simply that there is no God.

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Postby Atilla » 2009.04.01 (12:16)

I have recently conceived the idea that some participants in this discussion may be utilizing curiously sesquipedalian terminology in order to accentuate their perceived level of cogitation, despite their inability to properly utilize the vocabulary with which they discourse. It is my suggestion that they revert instead to a linguistic style which presents less of an impediment to precise comprehension.

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Postby Seneschal » 2009.04.01 (18:16)

Atilla wrote:I have recently conceived the idea that some participants in this discussion may be utilizing curiously sesquipedalian terminology in order to accentuate their perceived level of cogitation, despite their inability to properly utilize the vocabulary with which they discourse. It is my suggestion that they revert instead to a linguistic style which presents less of an impediment to precise comprehension.
I concur with your vigilant assertation.

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Postby yungerkid » 2009.04.01 (19:35)

I concur with your vigilant assertation.
heeee-HAAWWWW

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Postby Seneschal » 2009.04.02 (11:50)

yungerkid wrote:
I concur with your vigilant assertation.
heeee-HAAWWWW
yungerkid has become a donkey...

TIS AN ACT OF GAWD

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Postby t̷s͢uk̕a͡t͜ư » 2009.04.02 (17:15)

cheesemonger wrote:
yungerkid wrote:
I concur with your vigilant assertation.
heeee-HAAWWWW
yungerkid has become a donkey...

TIS AN ACT OF GAWD
Related:

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[spoiler="you know i always joked that it would be scary as hell to run into DMX in a dark ally, but secretly when i say 'DMX' i really mean 'Tsukatu'." -kai]"... and when i say 'scary as hell' i really mean 'tight pink shirt'." -kai[/spoiler][/i]
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Postby Seneschal » 2009.04.02 (19:07)

Tsukatu wrote:
cheesemonger wrote:
yungerkid wrote:
heeee-HAAWWWW
yungerkid has become a donkey...

TIS AN ACT OF GAWD
Related:

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Is no-one safe???

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Postby t̷s͢uk̕a͡t͜ư » 2009.04.03 (02:14)

cheesemonger wrote:Is no-one safe???
Heh, well, you're actually a lot safer if you're the crook, if you think about it. If you can take advantage of local superstition and blame a non-human for a crime you committed, you're home free.
[spoiler="you know i always joked that it would be scary as hell to run into DMX in a dark ally, but secretly when i say 'DMX' i really mean 'Tsukatu'." -kai]"... and when i say 'scary as hell' i really mean 'tight pink shirt'." -kai[/spoiler][/i]
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Postby Seneschal » 2009.04.03 (15:28)

Tsukatu wrote:
cheesemonger wrote:Is no-one safe???
Heh, well, you're actually a lot safer if you're the crook, if you think about it. If you can take advantage of local superstition and blame a non-human for a crime you committed, you're home free.
Mind you, the goat does seem to be wearing some kind of crown, so I reckon it stole that. And you know how the saying goes, once a thief...

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Postby yungerkid » 2009.04.03 (16:17)

Mind you, the goat does seem to be wearing some kind of crown, so I reckon it stole that.
am i supposed to refute this? how can i refute such pristine logic? your debate style possesses a brilliant logical flow, to the ultimate effect that i am confounded by your mere eloquence.

...and it's like posting, "i am a grass-eating cyclops", in a pie forum

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Postby Seneschal » 2009.04.03 (16:47)

yungerkid wrote:
Mind you, the goat does seem to be wearing some kind of crown, so I reckon it stole that.
am i supposed to refute this? how can i refute such pristine logic? your debate style possesses a brilliant logical flow, to the ultimate effect that i am confounded by your mere eloquence.

...and it's like posting, "i am a grass-eating cyclops", in a pie forum
Though I don't understand you, possibly because you're a donkey, I think you're trying to tell me to get back on topic.
Fair enough.
This was the last sensible thing posted.
cheesemonger wrote:Of course, it is impossible to disprove God, but I do believe that he (or she?!) doesn't exist.
God, after all, is meant to be a perfect being. But if he is so, how can he ever do anything? If God does something, it could be anything to communicating with believers to creating the world then he is experiencing a change. How, though, can something that is perfect ever change? Furthermore, how can anything be perfect anyway? The God of the old testament is far from perfect: he is a jealous God, he admits it himself. Jealousy is a neqative quality, therefore anyone who can experience jealousy cannot be perfect. Unless this is a different God from the God of the new testament, in which case there would be two Gods, which would be an interesting situation, then the God of the new testament must also be an imperfect God.
And if God is meant to be omnipotent and omnibenevolent, then how can he allow Satan and all the evils of today exist?
In my opinion, the answer to these questions is simply that there is no God.
So refute that.

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Postby jean-luc » 2009.04.06 (03:53)

cheesemonger wrote:Of course, it is impossible to disprove God, but I do believe that he (or she?!) doesn't exist.
God, after all, is meant to be a perfect being. But if he is so, how can he ever do anything? If God does something, it could be anything to communicating with believers to creating the world then he is experiencing a change. How, though, can something that is perfect ever change? Furthermore, how can anything be perfect anyway? The God of the old testament is far from perfect: he is a jealous God, he admits it himself. Jealousy is a neqative quality, therefore anyone who can experience jealousy cannot be perfect. Unless this is a different God from the God of the new testament, in which case there would be two Gods, which would be an interesting situation, then the God of the new testament must also be an imperfect God.
And if God is meant to be omnipotent and omnibenevolent, then how can he allow Satan and all the evils of today exist?
In my opinion, the answer to these questions is simply that there is no God.
Forgive me if I've already mentioned this, but there's something called the Teleological Argument (I think) states that god must exist because god is perfect. It goes like this:

Imagine a perfect being. List all the traits that such a being must have. Omniscience, Omnipotence, Benevolence, Etc...
Now, add "Existence" to this list. Is the being not more perfect, because it exists?
Clearly a being that is less perfect than another is not, in fact, perfect.
Concluded: In order to be perfect, a being must exist.
Applied: A perfect being cannot not exist.
Applied: A perfect being must exist.
QED

I have not so far seen a proof that disproves this argument.
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Postby t̷s͢uk̕a͡t͜ư » 2009.04.06 (21:35)

I put zero value in proofs by linguistic acrobatics.

Consider the creature "the existing unicorn."
Does such a creature exist?
A non-existing, existing unicorn is a contradiction, therefore existing unicorns exist.
An existing unicorn is, for all intents and purposes, a unicorn.
Unicorns exist.
I have not so far seen a proof that disproves this argument.

Consider the creature "the existing leprechaun"...
[spoiler="you know i always joked that it would be scary as hell to run into DMX in a dark ally, but secretly when i say 'DMX' i really mean 'Tsukatu'." -kai]"... and when i say 'scary as hell' i really mean 'tight pink shirt'." -kai[/spoiler][/i]
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Postby yungerkid » 2009.04.06 (22:02)

what about that post i made on the previous page detailing arguments against Christianity? does anybody have any thought on that?


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