Nostalgic Pushhead

As with any unlikely phenomena (aliens, telekenesis) it would take irrefutable first hand evidence. I'd have to see an alien. Or someone move a rock. With God, it would take something that *nothin* else could explain. I'd probably have to see an angel, or have hellfire rained down on me.

So yeah, it would take a lot.

sandlewood

I like to think that I’m open-mined enough that if sufficient evidence appeared that supported the existence of god, that I would change my beliefs. In general, I think that’s true about most things. But the problem with God is how it’s defined. God is defined in terms of infinites, such as infinite power and infinite knowledge. So whatever evidence presents itself, you can always say that it is evidence not of an infinite being but of a slightly less than infinite being. Making the Statue of Liberty disappear might seem like evidence that a god exists, but didn’t David Copperfield already do that.

There is also the problem of faith. If sufficient evidence of God’s existence is presented, then what is the importance of faith?

For me, it would help a lot simply if theism made sense.

theophilus

Well, there's good news and there's bad news.

You're right that if God has ordained that you will come to faith, then that will happen.
However, if he has not, you are still responsible for your unbelief because it is willful unbelief on your part, i.e., no one ever "wanted" to believe but was unable to do so.

Jet Grind

So God picks and chooses certain individuals to come to faith? Sounds like a real arsehole to me.

RevDahlia

I have heard many atheists answer this question, but don't think I've ever heard a theist have a crack at it.

To reiterate s5o8's original question for the theists: What would it take for you to disbelieve? Just curious.

long winded fool

It would seem that for a true theist (someone who actually believes and doesn't just wish to believe) absolutely nothing could shake their belief, and vice versa for true atheists. I can't think of anything occuring that would make me abandon critical analysis and assume that it's just God and that's all. If I woke up in a fiery pit surrounded by demons tomorrow, I'd assume that there was some physical explanation for my being there. Failure to scientifically explain a "miraculous" phenomenon for a true atheist doesn't equate to God any more than failure to reconcile a scientific phenomena with the idea of God equates to no-God for a true theist. We always just assume that it somehow must fit and that we'll probably be able to figure it out later, and that, in the mean time, there's still no reason to automatically assume God/no-God.

Spenser

Perhaps the absence of suffering would be a start. Maybe an actual miracle caught on tape or personally witnessed by myself when my state of mind was coherent. Furthermore a book that isn't so confusing to all its followers as to put them at odds my help me along my way. The total disappearance of cancer and / or deadly diseases might give rise to the notion of divinity. Some sort of evidence or proof that the laws of nature could be defied, say two minutes from now.

I doubt any theist could offer up anything that would change their mind but I am curious to see...

bocajeff

Miracles and all that jazz wouldn't change my finite mind. It, being finite, could never know for fact that those miracles were being done by an ominpotent, omnicient "god" instead of just a super-potent and super-nicient being.

For me to know for fact I would have to be omniscient as well.

Spenser

Honestly I'm not sure much of what I said would change my mind either, but it would at least make theistic accounts for the nature of their God more plausible.

However, if God made me his gift to women then I'd entertain the idea of his existence a lot more favorably. And now to play the violin... :boohoo:

Keith Russell

Darth, A is A.

Life is life. For life to be 'God', too, violates the Law of Identity.

Does we really need two words for one concept: life? Does 'God' truly not have 'His' own Identity, that he needs to sponge off an already existing concept: life?

Really?

K