Freethought & Rationalism Archive

luvluv · 07-02-2002, 02:17 PM

I've been reading a few threads on here lately about the different varieties of atheism, and many posters have stated something to the effect that while there are some gods they are not sure about, they are basically sure that Yahweh doesn't exist.

1) What is it about Yahweh that makes you so certain that He does not exist?

1b) Do you base your conception of Yahweh around the Old Testament or does your definition include Yahweh as fleshed out by Jesus, St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, etc. (For the record I don't believe in Yahweh as described in the Old Testament myself, but I'm quite fond of the fully fleshed out Yahweh).

2) What Gods do you find more logically possible?

2b) What is it about them that makes them so much more possible than Yahweh?

Viti · 07-02-2002, 02:36 PM

1) An omnicient superbeing could not be so inconsistent, elusive, and just plain made-up sounding
1b) My conception is based on all available data, which again just sounds like a collection of fireside stories someone strung together. If God is unchanging how could the NT one be real and the OT not be?....that's just silly

2) The only concepts of deity I consider remotely possible are deism...that there was a creator God that started things in motion and bailed for parts unknown...or some type of pantheism...that all the pieces of the universe are part of some collective consciousness . Any concept of a personal deity that is interested in what us ants are doing down here, I dismiss as ridiculous.
2b) They do not make extraordinary claims requiring mental acrobatics to accept and explain

luvluv · 07-02-2002, 02:44 PM

Well, like I said I find some of the concepts of God as presented in the Old Testament as being silly. I think in some cases the Biblical writers were just wrong and in other cases they made rough translations of a reality beyond their ability to grasp. Their own limitations and prejudices formed a filter through which not all of God could get through. Even prophets are like "dirty lenses" through which many of the attributes of God can shine but through which just as many are blocked. I attribute most of the discrepancies in the Old Testament to this process. I see mankind as coming to an evolving knowledge of God and further that God's revelation of Himself to us is subject to the concept of freewill: He'll only tell us as much about Himself as we want to know and are willing to abide by. I object both to the fundamentalist and the atheist notion that the God of the Bible is a "finished product". I think the God in the Bible represents our best ideas of God up to that point, but God is still revealing Himself and we are still learning.

Anyway, that was a digression. Please ignore it.

Can we be a bit more specific as to what the inconsistant, elusive, and made-up sounding attributes are?

[ July 02, 2002: Message edited by: luvluv ]

Darwin's Finch · 07-02-2002, 02:47 PM

luvluv: What could any contemporary person find awe-inspiring about a deity who spends centuries hung up on foreskins and blood sacrifice? This is too silly to take seriously. It's nice of you to include Augustine and Aquinas but, frankly, an omni-everything being shouldn't have needed their superior intellects to prop it up in the first place.

In Augustine and Aquinas (there are countless others -- Pascal comes to mind), we have the depressing spectacle of great minds crippled by ancient cult beliefs. What the hell is there to admire about any of it?

luvluv · 07-02-2002, 02:56 PM

It really didn't need to get to Pascal and others, many of the prophets questioned the efficacy of blood sacrifices and specifically ritualistic expressions of devotion to Yahweh that were absent of actualy devotion or commitment to God or to the other people.

God would need to start with basics in describing Himself for the same reason kindergarten starts with teaching children the alphabet instead of giving them a copy of The Brothers Karamozov. An Aquinas or an Augustine would have been useless to ancient man. It seems to me that God's revalations of Himself has kept pace with man's ability to comprehend them.

I don't want this post to become something amounting to apologetics, but I was looking for something more concrete.

Darwin's Finch · 07-02-2002, 03:11 PM

I don't know about that, luvluv. What exactly do you have in mind when you say "ancient man"? By modern reckoning, Plato and Aristotle are ancient, and neither they nor their audience were exactly backward bumpkins. Why did it take the church so many more centuries to reach a comparably sophisticated stage of thought? Could it be (*gasp*) the mind-crippling effects of ancient manmade cult beliefs?

Imagine, if you will, a conversation between Socrates and Paul/Saul. Is there really any doubt in your mind about who would have emerged from such a debate looking cooly rational and intellectually sophisticated and who would have been exposed as an irrational cultist?

Progressive, unfolding revelation my ass!

luvluv · 07-02-2002, 03:20 PM

First, thanks for being so cordial.

Second, Plato and Socrates are still pretty unaccesible to many modern men with high school diplomas (and sadly some with college degrees). It would make sense for God to try to keep his revelation consistent with what the MAJORITY of people could keep up with and discuss. Many of the revelations of God would have been totally useless in a society without a literate population and a printing press. The overwhelming majority of the people who have ever lived have been functionally illiterate. Of the literate, only a minority have lived in a society in which there were cheap and readily available books. Many who are literate and live in societies with cheap available books simply haven't received the education to keep understand Plato and Socrates. A complex religion which would take even learned men hours of reading diverse texts to comprehend would have been totally useless to the overwhelming majority of people who ever lived. Religion is a populist affair.

I am not arguing that Paul was smarter than Plato or Aristotle, I am saying that a) Paul knew more about God than his predecssors in the Christian faith and b) Paul is more accesible than Aristotle or Plato.

[ July 02, 2002: Message edited by: luvluv ]

ohwilleke · 07-02-2002, 03:23 PM

[QUOTE]Originally posted by luvluv:


[QB] 1) What is it about Yahweh that makes you so certain that He does not exist?
1b) Do you base your conception of Yahweh around the Old Testament or does your definition include Yahweh as fleshed out by Jesus, St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, etc. (For the record I don't believe in Yahweh as described in the Old Testament myself, but I'm quite fond of the fully fleshed out Yahweh). 

Certainly, I would include Jesus and St. Augustine in the fleshing out. Thomas Aquinas was a philosopher indeed (I would argue a flawed one), but has a conception of God that tends to abstractify and gloss over the genocidal, partisan, capricious, miraculous God of the OT and NT.

At any rate, the text of the Bible, and accompanying concerns about its sources, inconsistencies, lack of historical accuracy, etc. Make me quiet comfortable that the Bible and the God described in it are not divinely inspired.

The multiplicity of world religion, the absence of this God for the past thousand years, and the immorality of the Biblical God are also of concern.

More to point -- there is something definitive enough in the story of Yahweh that one has something that can be believed or disbelieved.

 2) What Gods do you find more logically possible?
2b) What is it about them that makes them so much more possible than Yahweh?

It isn't so much that other gods are more logically possible, as it is that all other Gods are hard to rule out. I may not have much belief that there is a deist clockwork God that set into motion to Big Bang and disappeared, but there is no easy way to refute such a God since there are few testable differences between such a God and real life.

Related to a deistic God, is what you might call a "weighted odds" God, who does nothing impossible, but shifts the odds of the possible to reflect moral or poetic ends. Here you are pitting anecdote in favor, against an inability to disprove the existence of something that doesn't contradict natural metaphysical law.

Unitarian-Univeralists, liberal Hindus who see multiple God stories as merely figurative representations or manifestation of a universal divine force, Quakers, the not strictly theistic Buddhist notion of kharma, the universal force concept of Taoism, and Gaia conceptions of Earth, all have a mushy, not documentarily burdened nature that makes these religious beliefs harder to affirmatively disprove. I don't believe them either, but obviously objectionable aspects of the religions of the book are missing.

[ July 02, 2002: Message edited by: ohwilleke ]

luvluv · 07-02-2002, 03:27 PM

This is all still kind of vague.

Can we start with fleshing out this statement:

Quote:

The multiplicity of world religion, the absence of this God for the past thousand years, and the immorality of the Biblical God are also of concern.

[ July 02, 2002: Message edited by: luvluv ]

Viti · 07-02-2002, 03:39 PM

Quote:

Can we be a bit more specific as to what the inconsistant, elusive, and made-up sounding attributes are?

If he loves us all, why did he fight and kill on the side of the Israelites...sounding like any number of war god myths? Certain foods like shellfish are "abominations", but slavery is okey dokey? He can create the perfect "heaven", where the angels presumably have free will enough to rebel and become evil, with full knowledge of his existance....but it is somehow necessary he not reveal himself AT ALL to us here on Earth as THAT would interfere with free will? Talking animals, good versus evil, destruction, miracles, magic, and redemption are all hallmarks of a good exciting myth and are all present in the goat herders' stories

07-02-2002, 02:17 PM	#1
luvluv Veteran Member Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Planet Lovetron Posts: 3,919	Why are you guys so sure about Yahweh? I've been reading a few threads on here lately about the different varieties of atheism, and many posters have stated something to the effect that while there are some gods they are not sure about, they are basically sure that Yahweh doesn't exist. 1) What is it about Yahweh that makes you so certain that He does not exist? 1b) Do you base your conception of Yahweh around the Old Testament or does your definition include Yahweh as fleshed out by Jesus, St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, etc. (For the record I don't believe in Yahweh as described in the Old Testament myself, but I'm quite fond of the fully fleshed out Yahweh). 2) What Gods do you find more logically possible? 2b) What is it about them that makes them so much more possible than Yahweh?

07-02-2002, 02:44 PM	#3
luvluv Veteran Member Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Planet Lovetron Posts: 3,919	Well, like I said I find some of the concepts of God as presented in the Old Testament as being silly. I think in some cases the Biblical writers were just wrong and in other cases they made rough translations of a reality beyond their ability to grasp. Their own limitations and prejudices formed a filter through which not all of God could get through. Even prophets are like "dirty lenses" through which many of the attributes of God can shine but through which just as many are blocked. I attribute most of the discrepancies in the Old Testament to this process. I see mankind as coming to an evolving knowledge of God and further that God's revelation of Himself to us is subject to the concept of freewill: He'll only tell us as much about Himself as we want to know and are willing to abide by. I object both to the fundamentalist and the atheist notion that the God of the Bible is a "finished product". I think the God in the Bible represents our best ideas of God up to that point, but God is still revealing Himself and we are still learning. Anyway, that was a digression. Please ignore it. Can we be a bit more specific as to what the inconsistant, elusive, and made-up sounding attributes are? [ July 02, 2002: Message edited by: luvluv ]</p>

07-02-2002, 03:20 PM	#7
luvluv Veteran Member Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Planet Lovetron Posts: 3,919	First, thanks for being so cordial. Second, Plato and Socrates are still pretty unaccesible to many modern men with high school diplomas (and sadly some with college degrees). It would make sense for God to try to keep his revelation consistent with what the MAJORITY of people could keep up with and discuss. Many of the revelations of God would have been totally useless in a society without a literate population and a printing press. The overwhelming majority of the people who have ever lived have been functionally illiterate. Of the literate, only a minority have lived in a society in which there were cheap and readily available books. Many who are literate and live in societies with cheap available books simply haven't received the education to keep understand Plato and Socrates. A complex religion which would take even learned men hours of reading diverse texts to comprehend would have been totally useless to the overwhelming majority of people who ever lived. Religion is a populist affair. I am not arguing that Paul was smarter than Plato or Aristotle, I am saying that a) Paul knew more about God than his predecssors in the Christian faith and b) Paul is more accesible than Aristotle or Plato. [ July 02, 2002: Message edited by: luvluv ]</p>

07-02-2002, 03:23 PM	#8
ohwilleke Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Denver, Colorado, USA Posts: 4,834	[QUOTE]Originally posted by luvluv: <strong> [QB] 1) What is it about Yahweh that makes you so certain that He does not exist? 1b) Do you base your conception of Yahweh around the Old Testament or does your definition include Yahweh as fleshed out by Jesus, St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, etc. (For the record I don't believe in Yahweh as described in the Old Testament myself, but I'm quite fond of the fully fleshed out Yahweh). </strong> Certainly, I would include Jesus and St. Augustine in the fleshing out. Thomas Aquinas was a philosopher indeed (I would argue a flawed one), but has a conception of God that tends to abstractify and gloss over the genocidal, partisan, capricious, miraculous God of the OT and NT. At any rate, the text of the Bible, and accompanying concerns about its sources, inconsistencies, lack of historical accuracy, etc. Make me quiet comfortable that the Bible and the God described in it are not divinely inspired. The multiplicity of world religion, the absence of this God for the past thousand years, and the immorality of the Biblical God are also of concern. More to point -- there is something definitive enough in the story of Yahweh that one has something that can be believed or disbelieved. <strong> 2) What Gods do you find more logically possible? 2b) What is it about them that makes them so much more possible than Yahweh?</strong> It isn't so much that other gods are more logically possible, as it is that all other Gods are hard to rule out. I may not have much belief that there is a deist clockwork God that set into motion to Big Bang and disappeared, but there is no easy way to refute such a God since there are few testable differences between such a God and real life. Related to a deistic God, is what you might call a "weighted odds" God, who does nothing impossible, but shifts the odds of the possible to reflect moral or poetic ends. Here you are pitting anecdote in favor, against an inability to disprove the existence of something that doesn't contradict natural metaphysical law. Unitarian-Univeralists, liberal Hindus who see multiple God stories as merely figurative representations or manifestation of a universal divine force, Quakers, the not strictly theistic Buddhist notion of kharma, the universal force concept of Taoism, and Gaia conceptions of Earth, all have a mushy, not documentarily burdened nature that makes these religious beliefs harder to affirmatively disprove. I don't believe them either, but obviously objectionable aspects of the religions of the book are missing. [ July 02, 2002: Message edited by: ohwilleke ]</p>

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07-02-2002, 02:36 PM	#2
Viti Contributor Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: Down South Posts: 12,879	1) An omnicient superbeing could not be so inconsistent, elusive, and just plain made-up sounding 1b) My conception is based on all available data, which again just sounds like a collection of fireside stories someone strung together. If God is unchanging how could the NT one be real and the OT not be?....that's just silly 2) The only concepts of deity I consider remotely possible are deism...that there was a creator God that started things in motion and bailed for parts unknown...or some type of pantheism...that all the pieces of the universe are part of some collective consciousness . Any concept of a personal deity that is interested in what us ants are doing down here, I dismiss as ridiculous. 2b) They do not make extraordinary claims requiring mental acrobatics to accept and explain

07-02-2002, 02:47 PM	#4
Darwin's Finch Senior Member Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Gardnerville, NV Posts: 666	luvluv: What could any contemporary person find awe-inspiring about a deity who spends centuries hung up on foreskins and blood sacrifice? This is too silly to take seriously. It's nice of you to include Augustine and Aquinas but, frankly, an omni-everything being shouldn't have needed their superior intellects to prop it up in the first place. In Augustine and Aquinas (there are countless others -- Pascal comes to mind), we have the depressing spectacle of great minds crippled by ancient cult beliefs. What the hell is there to admire about any of it?

07-02-2002, 02:56 PM	#5
luvluv Veteran Member Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Planet Lovetron Posts: 3,919	It really didn't need to get to Pascal and others, many of the prophets questioned the efficacy of blood sacrifices and specifically ritualistic expressions of devotion to Yahweh that were absent of actualy devotion or commitment to God or to the other people. God would need to start with basics in describing Himself for the same reason kindergarten starts with teaching children the alphabet instead of giving them a copy of The Brothers Karamozov. An Aquinas or an Augustine would have been useless to ancient man. It seems to me that God's revalations of Himself has kept pace with man's ability to comprehend them. I don't want this post to become something amounting to apologetics, but I was looking for something more concrete.

07-02-2002, 03:11 PM	#6
Darwin's Finch Senior Member Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Gardnerville, NV Posts: 666	I don't know about that, luvluv. What exactly do you have in mind when you say "ancient man"? By modern reckoning, Plato and Aristotle are ancient, and neither they nor their audience were exactly backward bumpkins. Why did it take the church so many more centuries to reach a comparably sophisticated stage of thought? Could it be (gasp) the mind-crippling effects of ancient manmade cult beliefs? Imagine, if you will, a conversation between Socrates and Paul/Saul. Is there really any doubt in your mind about who would have emerged from such a debate looking cooly rational and intellectually sophisticated and who would have been exposed as an irrational cultist? Progressive, unfolding revelation my ass!

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