Tercel

Hi sidewinder,

I am inclined to think the opposite, but I can under you having a different opinion.
Even if you think there is no good philosophical arguments for God, and no good physical evidence, what about an inner conviction that God exists? Many people would argue that it is sufficiently justifiable to believe in God based on an inner conviction of His existence regardless of rational evidence.

I'd have to disagree. Though it depends what argument you are refering to, many of the arguments for the existence of God would prove the existence of God if you accepted their premises and logic.

Surely there is more types of evidence than philosophical arguments and holy books? What about religious experiences, changed lives, miracles etc?

Perhaps. If you see what you feel are contradictions in a holy book then it may well diminish any belief that the book is divinely dictated. However there are other forms of evidence such as Archeology etc that can be employed to evaluate some of the claims of a holy book in an objective manner.

I must disagree. It is for example possible to conclude that a deity whose absolute primary goal is to remove all suffering from the world and is absolutely and utterly all powerful does not exist given the observed fact of the existence of suffering. Similarly it is possible to conclude that a deity certainly does exist if one accepts the premises and logic of some of the philosophical arguments.

Tercel

Ron Singh

I agree. One of the reasons that I am a theist is because theistic answers are more logical than atheistic ones. For instance, the unmoved mover arguement would be logical proof of God. Atheists may on the other hand propose a response to the arguement with a better answer. What may constitute this answer is the logic, evidence, and other questions or repercussions. In this case, theism, to me, wins. Once again, this is just a single reason.

~Your friendly neighborhood 15 year old Sikh.

Metacrock

Meta => I don't understand your reasoning there. If the arguments prove that there must be a God, than God exists. What's the problem? Proving "which God" is a silly concept. There's no such thing as "which God." God is the only God and the only question is "what does God want, what is God like?" There is no pantheon of gods competing for existence with one another. So if the arguments prove any sort of God then that is the God ther is.

SW:Beyond these arguments, there is no evidence that any god exists.


Meta =>Circular reasoning. If the arguments prove God why do we need more arguments? Moreover, there are tons of them. I have 37 so far and I'm not even trying anymore. I have counted as many as 150 but most of them are not worth putting on my website, I'm sure there are more. But all it takes is one good one.



Meta =>So what? Why does God have to be limited to any of those documents?

Meta =>Which in itself proves that God exists ipso facto. The only thing left after that is to figure out what God wants.

[ May 14, 2002: Message edited by: Metacrock ]</p>

braces_for_impact

Isn't it presupposition to insist that only one god can exist? If one, why not two? Or three? Or five billion? Perhaps each atom is, in itelf it's own universe and each and every has a creator? See where I'm going with this?

I myself find atheistic arguments more probable than theistic ones. I have yet to find a theistic argument for 'proof' of god that cannot be picked apart by the correct application of logic. I see no need to believe in something that 'might' be, as this is undesireable and incredibly inconvienent. Additionally, since some gods supposedly dictate that there followers must have faith, wouldn't proof negate that faith? One does not require faith in the presence of evidence, but in lack of it.

Not that atheists don't make mistakes in logic, I myself have in the past, and will probably do so in the future. But to use logic to 'disprove' god, it seems to me one must be specific as to which god you are referring to and what characteristics he has. Even then, all is not certain.

But as to regarding the philosophy as to god existing, I certainly don't consider it a waste of time. It is great mental excersise, and allows you to think both inside and outside of the box. It sharpens verbal and written skills, logical thinking, critical thinking, and I have found it helpful in my daily life to use those skills.

Ender

Metacrock

From the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy classic:
'...man says to God, "Prove you exist." God says to the man, "I refuse to prove I exist, for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing." So the man says to God, "Well, the existence of the Babblefish, which could never have evolved and must have been created, proves you exist; therefore you don't! QED." "Oh dear", says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and vanishes in a puff of logic.
"Oh, that was easy," says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossing.'

I couldn't resist.

~theothanatologist~

[ May 14, 2002: Message edited by: Ender ]</p>

Metacrock

42, the answer is 42!!!!!!

Ron Singh

I've been readnig up on some Albert Caprianni posts, and such have inspired me.

Suppose there are different Gods, in which we suppose that there is more than one. Since God can not be physical, becuase physical pertains to contingency upon naturalism, God must be non-physical. I ask you, how would you differentiate between the different, multiple Gods? Would you know the difference between the multiple, unique Gods opposed to a God of multiple characterestics or attributes?

~Your frienfly neighborhood 15yrold Sikh.

HRG

Friend Metacrock,

you have 35 arguments which - if valid - would prove the instantiation in reality of 35 different God concepts: God-1, God-2, .... God-35.

Identity of those purported God-n entities is assumed, but never shown. There is no reason why God-1 (Ground/Being - how does one grind Being, BTW ? ) should have anything to do with the Cause of the Universe, or why its nature should be necessarily good.

I wonder why you nevertheless stick to monotheism .

Regards,
HRG.

Ender

Perfect timing, HolyRomanGod. I've already asked him that, during my first months on his board. I'd like to hear the answer again, tho' since i never got a chance to respond.

~WiGGiN~

Daggah

No, Tercel. Aesthetics and feelings are not and have never been evidence for anything, as these exact things have been used to defend belief in polytheistic religions, monotheistic religions that contradict each other, and even UFOs. They can't all be true, so religious experiences, changed lives, and miracles are not useful in determining the truth of a religion.

Therefore, the only rational thing to do is to reject their use as evidence for &lt;insert religion or UFO cult here&gt;.