Albert Cipriani

Dear Win,
You ask,
No thing in this universe is equal to any other thing in this universe. Equality, like the “number” zero, is just another of our useful lies.

No matter how you define the good, some act must necessarily be somewhat better or worse at achieving that good. No two actions can equally achieve what is good. One must necessarily do a better job of it than the other. – Sincerely, Albert the Traditional Catholic 3/23/03

the_cave

But they can't create themselves, and the parent amoeba can. God can't create his parent because...he doesn't have one! He's the eternally existent being! Hence, nothing can be his equal. It's the theist trump card, I'm afraid...but now you might have some very good questions about what an eternally existent being could be...without one, however, it seems to me that the materialist will need to hypothesize an infinite chain of causes for the universe itself, which I don't often see them doing these days.

Sorry, here's what I mean; think Flatland. Imagine a 2D creature living on the surface of a ball. It can move along that surface, but can't conceive of leaving the surface--moving towards the center of the ball, or outwards from it. But the ball itself is curved in 3D. It's true that some say a truly 2D surface (infinitely thin) couldn't interact with a 3D world. But if it's true that everything that there is, is ultimately made out of one-dimensional strings (as String Theory claims), it seems that there must be some way to get different dimensions to interact with one another! I don't know how, you'll have to ask the physicists. My example is more of an analogy than a good model.

Arbitrary free will--which I think must mean that some events are just random, and don't have a cause (but that's my opinion.) There are I am afraid plenty of threads about this, so I won't get started here. The other option is complete determinism, which I don't subscribe to, and which does pose problems for the theist.



Well, I myself say they could come from society's interaction with "god", which changes over time. Even without god, some say that they come from society's interaction with our "moral sense" (which can stand in for god, in this argument.) If there is a moral sense, then some things could still be absolutely moral (for humans, as Fiach noted above), while other things could differ from one society to another. I admit not all Christians/theists think in these evolutionary terms. But some do.

Wiploc

If Albert could really do this, make people go to Hell by explaining his unattractive religion to them, that would make him the moral equivalent of Satan, wouldn't it, the cause of people's fall?
crc

Wiploc

crc:
I think you are confusing sexual reproduction with asexual. If I created a clone of myself, I would still me me. It is the same when amoebas split: the parent is the child.

In any case, your analogy is not apt. God is not an amoeba. If god were to split to make two gods, you cannot point to anything about the results (call her the "new" god) that would have to be inferior to the "old" god. You have no reason for your assertion that god could not make another god just like him. Therefore, it is reasonable for us to suspect that you deny that possiblity only because you don't like the results.


Ah, logic. Well, if we were going to let that stop us, we couldn't have the doctrine of the Trinity, could we?





Are you saying it would take a miracle? Are you saying he can't do miracles?






So if believers in timeless eternity and an uncaused first cause contradict themselves, that doesn't count. But if materialists contradict themselves, that somehow puts them at a disadvantage?

crc

Cipher Girl

Hi the_cave
So a 2D creature lives on a 2D surface. He can only conjecture a 3 dimensional space (volume). Well I can extrapolate that to a 3D creature (me) thinking of 4D objects and a 4 dimensional space. Are you trying to say that god exists in 4-space? Oh my 4D God, I'm so unworthy! Forgive me for the evil of worshipping Ameoba God! :notworthy That when I model a hypercube or hypersphere in my computer, I'm seeing a part of 4D God? And what about fractional dimensions, how do they fit in to this 4D God, are they minor deities? Oh, Sierpenski Gasket, save me!
Okay, Okay, I'm just a funnin with ya. Well I'm certainly off topic here, but it's a lota fun.
Well for the almighty Ameoba God, why can't he split? You say he can't, and I say he can.
I didn't say Ameoba God created his parent. As wiploc stated, there is no parent-child, only clones replicating themselves endlessly. Hey, I've got an idea. Perhaps the expansion of the universe is caused by Ameoba Gods replicating themselves. There, you now have evidence that the Ameoba Gods
exist and interact with 3D space. As you can see, I'm in a pretty good mood today.
I couldn't agree with you more. It is a random universe after all.
Back to the topic at hand.
Are you saying that the OT god has been portrayed unfairly by the bible? That the people who did all of the horrible acts, were just rationalizing their actions, and using god as an excuse?

Fiach

Are you saying that the OT god has been portrayed unfairly by the bible? That the people who did all of the horrible acts, were just rationalizing their actions, and using god as an excuse?

There are only three choices:

1. The Bible is all a pack of lies.

2. The Old Testament recorded true atrocities but the Israelite storm troopers excused their guilt by blaming a God who can't defend himself, because he is imaginary.

3. The Old Testament recorded true atrocities, and God is really a horribly evil cosmic monstrosity, and the Israelites were just his evil minions.

Fiach

HRG

Sorry, physics contradicts you. An electron is exactly equal to any other electron. This shows up in statistical physics (Fermi-Dirac statistics), in the scattering of two electrons etc.

Regards,
HRG.

Albert Cipriani

Dear HRG,
Have you considered the age of the two “equal” electrons? Matter is decaying into sub-atomic particles. I’ve heard that the estimated life of highly stable atoms, such as gold atoms, is about 40 billion years. Do you think your two “equal” electrons were created and will decay at precisely the same nanosecond? – Albert the Traditional Catholic 3/24/03

the_cave

Fiach, cut it out with the straw men.

You left out the part where I said it was an analogy, and not a model

(But for the record, if god were somehow some sort of 4 dimensional being, we certainly wouldn't respect him just because he had 4 dimensions; we'd respect him b/c he's the greatest good. Which happened to have 4 dimensions )

Well, after thinking about it, one way to put it is, I think that god is kind of defined in a way that makes this logically impossible--god is more or less the greatest, most powerful being that there is--but that means there's no space for god to split "into". Besides the created universe, there's nothing besides god, so there's no place where there could be more than one god. Difficult to think about, but I think this is correct. It's an interesting question, though.

If that's the case, then there's still an original. Or, if you argue that there's no "original", all the clones are the same being as the first one...it seems we're going to run into some trouble with our metaphysical language here. Let's say you have two amoebas that split at some point. Are they both the same amoeba as the first? If so, how can we say there are two of them? If not, then the first one no longer exists. Or, if you want to say that now there are two of them, but they're still the same as the first, then does that mean the first one was more than one amoeba even before it split? Solving this problem is not really a religious problem; it's a philosophical one. I myself don't know the solution, other than to say that the original one stops existing after it splits. But I don't know enough to say whether most philosophers would agree with me. Another interesting question.

I'm saying that the OT god is in part a human interpretation of the divine. Sure, I'd even say there was some rationalization going on--but remember it would have been based on very different ideas about ethics and morality than we have--we have advanced in our understanding, and hence we understand god better.

Mageth

Well, after thinking about it, one way to put it is, I think that god is kind of defined in a way that makes this logically impossible--god is more or less the greatest, most powerful being that there is--but that means there's no space for god to split "into".

I fail to see how that makes the split "logically impossible". Couldn't the two beings just split the space? Can you elaborate?

Besides the created universe, there's nothing besides god,

And how would you know this?

so there's no place where there could be more than one god.

I fail to see why what god is or isn't logically necessitates that there's no "place" for another god. If god is the greatest, most powerful being you say he is, could he not find a way (e.g. a "place") if he so wished?

A side note: If your "no place" hypothesis is true, is that why the trinity is all smushed into "one" god?

Maybe initially there were three gods, but the lack of space forced them to merge into one.

Another side note: god is described as a spiritual being. The bible describes other spiritual beings (angels, satan, demons). So are these other spiritual beings occupying spiritual space that god would otherwise occupy? Did god give up some of his space for these other spirits? If so, why could god not give up space for another god if he split?