Jonsey3333

The remaining "pagan" religions that have never been lost, as far as I know, are religions from tribes of Native Americans, Shinto, and Asatru.

Maybe there are many gods, but a very shrewd god by the name of Yahweh has convinced billions of people that this god is the only one and deserves all the worship.

-Mike

Draygomb

The answer is right in the initial assumption it says God not Gods. So let's work with what we've got.

Non-praying Mantis

I think that to make this discussion work correctly, we need to make some basic assumptions, and then go from there:

P1: God Exists

This has already been mentioned, and is required for this discussion.

P2: God created the universe

This is a standard assumption for a god, so this is another good one to start with. Assuming P2, God probably set the constants of the universe (gravity, electrical charge constants, etc) with some goal in mind.

Perhaps god did NOT intend to create intelligence in the universe. There is a LOT of space here, and 99.9999999% of that space is inhospitible to intelligence (at least as we know it). Perhaps god meant for the universe to be an object of art, or perhaps a dwelling for godself?

But if this were the case, then god would seem to be quite impotent, because here we are. If god has any ability to control the outcome of god's universe, or predict that outcome ahead of time, and intelligence was not a desired outcome, then our existence would have been squelched long before now. So we come to ...

P3 God intended for intelligence, particularly humans, to exist.

Since there is no evidence for a brute creation event, and evolution has been scientifically proven (at least to most scientists' satisfaction), god intended for evolution to bring about intelligence (assuming again that god had the ability to stop evolution if god wanted to).

Evolution works over a long period of time (even when compared to the lifetime of the universe). This suggests that god has other long term goals in mind.

P4 God has long term goals for intelligence

What would some of these long term goals for us be? Suggestions?

NPM

bgponder

Non-Praying Mantis:

I am unclear how this can be determined if we are accepting the premise and definition of free will already given--for we have the ability to destroy ourselves, and possibly all (known)life that could evolve intelligence. P3 does not entail our continued existence.

Peace cornbread Barry

Draygomb

Non-praying Mantis

I agree the way the universe is set up suggests a long-term goal and the random nature of evolution indicates that god either doesn't know what he wants or doesn't know exactly how to get it. If the goal was Humans why not just create the sun, moon and earth? Therefore Humans aren't the "Main" goal. Intelligence is a good guess but it's only a guess as of yet.

[ February 01, 2002: Message edited by: Draygomb ]</p>

Non-praying Mantis

Perhaps I was jumping the gun a bit...

I did not intend to mean from P4 that Humans were the intended result or that humans are the only possible intelligence.

Yes, I think I should point out that humans are not necessarily necessary to God's plan, only that intelligence is necessary to God's plan. We are just one example (the only one we know of) of intelligence in the universe.

It is also important to point out that even on earth humans are not the only "intelligent" life forms. Although we are the only ones we know of that can think abstractly to a significant degree. Other animals have some hallmarks of what we would consider intelligence, just not all of the human ones. Perhaps we are not what God is attempting to create through evolution.

NPM

Vorkosigan

Draygomb:

Insults of this nature are unacceptable. Do you want people to dialogue with you, or not?

Michael
Administrator

Vorkosigan

You mean, there are some choices that can be made with perfect knowledge of the future?

Michael

Vorkosigan

A single god also raise the question of who ro what created it. There is no escape from that question.

Michael

Draygomb

Turtonm
No, that would preclude the possibility of free will.

Yes, but here we are assuming that the single god exists without a creator. Or at least that we are talking about the first god in the series.

[ February 04, 2002: Message edited by: Draygomb ]</p>