Mithrandir

For anyone asking which "god", then answer the question generally...why don't you believe in any god?

Thank you for those who answered so far...mjolner nice analogy.

I guess to take this one step further, if God (or any god, in addition to the Christian God) were to make Himself known, then what would you want Him to do in order to make Himself known?

Mithrandir

David Gould

Two way communication would be a start - there is no way he could prove his existence (no-one can do that) but at least a dialogue would enable me to test his claims and get some answers to some real stumpers.

And it would need to be unambiguous two-way communication: I pray for something and he literally replies with 'Sorry, no can do' or 'Sure, David, no problem.'

Then he would expand on the answers a little.

I do not think that this is unreasonable to ask from an ominpotent being who supposedly values humans.

Easy Be

I took a long look at how religion came about and began seeing some consistency to various parts of religion which use coercive elements to draw worshippers in. I noticed that God has been used to explain why the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, the reason why a rattlesnake bite is near fatal, and many others unexplained natural ocurrences.
I then researched evolution which does a wonderful job explaining how we came to be from nothing and strongly refutes many religious claims. The interesting aspect of evolution is it's only been around for a relatively small amount of time. So alot of creationist go out claiming evolution is false and show how it can explain everything. We have only just begun to examine the tip of the iceberg of evolution. I can only imagine in 200 years the advancements that will be made in the field of evolution. As the "proof" for the existence of God becomes older and as miracle claims become fewer and far between it'll be more an more difficult for religious leaders to draw Americans into their cults.

Goliath

Mithrandir,

I do not believe that a god exists because I have yet to see a proof of the claim that a god exists.

Sincerely,

Goliath

General Zod

Because God does not exist. Cheers.

Eudaimonist

That's like asking me why I don't believe in Zeus. Or leprechauns.

The answer is that I don't have sufficient evidence to justify a rational belief in such beings, and they all seem suspiciously like the product of human psychology.

damon_achey

Well if he is all powerful, or even just damn powerful, he can come and have lunch with me. Tell me he is god, tell me a lot of things no one could know about like read my thoughts in detail, and then do something just a little imposible for humans to do. Maybe fly off (without any machines) like the last cut in Matrix or something.

That would probably to it. .... It looks like I'm free for lunch tomorrow, think he, she, it will show?

nomad

[ May 07, 2002: Message edited by: nomad ]</p>

Thor Q. Mada

Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and tortuous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness with which more than half the bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we call it the word of a demon than the word of god. It is an history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind.
Thomas Paine

Finding that no religion is based on facts and cannot therefore be true, I began to reflect what must be the condition of mankind trained from infancy to believe in error.
Robert Owen

It's an incredible conjob when you think of it, to believe something now in exchange for life after death. Even corporations with all their reward systems don't try to make it posthumous.
Gloria Steinem

The Christian religion not only at first was attended with miracles, but even at this day cannot be believed by any reasobale person without one.
David Hume

Why has a religious turn of mind always a tendency to narrow and harden the heart?
Robert Burns

Reason should be destroyed in all Christians.
Martin Luther

If the bible said that Jonah swallowed the whale, I would believe it
William Jennings Bryan

It is best to read the weather forecast before praying for rain.
Mark Twain

Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge of things without parallel.
Ambrose Bierce

Question with boldness the existence of God: because if there is one, he must approve the hommage of reason rather than that of blindfolded fear.
Thomas Jefferson

Want more????

Tercel

It's sound...? Are you serious?
It's self-defeating!
<strong>The claim itself is unfalsifiable and therefore meaningless according to itself.</strong>
The very statement of the claim is illogical: eqivalent to stating "this sentence is false".

Apart from this tiny problem, I am inclined to think the idea of required falsifiability is not particularly sound one. Falsifiability is good in an area like Science, where the method invovles observing repetitive occurances. But historical events have a tendency to be once-only and hence not particularly easy to falsify. To adopt a method of requiring falsifiability would seem to wreck all natural historical investigation - not merely that of professional historians, but that which we do ourselves when friends tell us what they did the other night. An inability to falsify this sort of information clearly does not render it meaningless. Or what about subjective feelings? Feelings can't be falsified, but very few people would be willing to agree their (or others) feelings are meaningless. (I suppose you could argue that by "meaningless" you really meant "objectively meaningless". Fine: Now you need to begin the monumental task of convincing me why I should care if something I find subjectively meaningful is "objectively meaningful" or not!)
To me it seems that those who want to have everything falsifiable are adopting the rather naive approach that the methods of Science can and should be applied to everything... sheer wishful thinking. Not only does it self-deafeat (Note that "One should only believe in things Science has proved" self-defeats as Science hasn't proven the statement), but it also makes a mockery of any endevour which is by nature non-scientific.

Have a nice day ,
Tercel

Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

Tercel,
I, more or less, agree with this. While I think the idea of falsifiability is *very* sound, I also think it is only applicable in strict logic or mathematical structures. You hint on this with your comment on science.

We should be able to falsify 2+2=5. We should be
able to falsify TRUE AND TRUE = FALSE.

Falsification loses applicability when used in the real world, however. Notice I can't prove 'Judy likes me.' If I cannot prove it...I cannot falsify it.

What I find interesting is that this is a clever theological slight-of-hand played by atheists. The pose is 'Since you cannot falsify God...therefore God is not a meaningful concept'.
This lulls the audience into false pretense that the theist *must* prove Gods existence.

However, people need not 'prove' God's existence at all. Just like they need not 'prove' that the Mona Lisa is a painting of a woman. We see a pattern...we see the evidence. If the pattern and evidence are strong enough we have valid reason to believe.

Notice one cannot falsify that the Mona Lisa is a painting of a woman. Yet no one claims that it isn't a painting of a woman simply because it can't be falsified.

The pattern is reason enough to believe.


Thoughts and comments welcomed,


Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

[ May 07, 2002: Message edited by: Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas ]</p>