thenexttodie
New Member
It's a question I wanted to ask HWIN in another thread but I felt it was to off topic. So I'm starting a new topic and leaving it open to anyone (hopefully atheists) who would like to respond.
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Dragan Glas said:The only way to know - one way or the other - is if there's life-after-death.
If there isn't. we'll never know.
Belief n life-after-death is independent of a belief in a deity - more people believe in it than in a deity - though one's still stuck with the soul, and it's de facto non-existence.WarK said:Dragan Glas said:The only way to know - one way or the other - is if there's life-after-death.
If there isn't. we'll never know.
Most theists define their god as all-powerful, all-knowing and all-good. As those are logically impossible a being defined using those terms can't exist. God is impossible by definition.
There could(?) be life after death and no god.
Steelmage99 said:Depending on how the god is defined I do believe that we can know if a god exists in any practical and relevant sense.
thenexttodie said:Steelmage99 said:Depending on how the god is defined I do believe that we can know if a god exists in any practical and relevant sense.
I am surprised by most of the answers in this thread, including yours. What, do you think is one good way or maybe several ways one could know that God or a god, actually exists?
tuxbox said:There is not any empirical evidence that a Creator/God/s exist, and I'm a Deist that believes in a Creator. So, you can't really blame anyone here for not believing.
thenexttodie said:tuxbox said:There is not any empirical evidence that a Creator/God/s exist, and I'm a Deist that believes in a Creator. So, you can't really blame anyone here for not believing.
Well "empirical evidence" depends on our ability to gather, correctly interpret and apply data. Historically, this seems to be something most of us are not very good at. So, it's not like God would say "I will depend on what people call empirical evidence, to make myself know to them" or something like that.
thenexttodie said:Steelmage99 said:Depending on how the god is defined I do believe that we can know if a god exists in any practical and relevant sense.
I am surprised by most of the answers in this thread, including yours. What, do you think is one good way or maybe several ways one could know that God or a god, actually exists?
thenexttodie said:Well "empirical evidence" depends on our ability to gather, correctly interpret and apply data.
Historically, this seems to be something most of us are not very good at.
So, it's not like God would say "I will depend on what people call empirical evidence, to make myself know to them" or something like that.
So, suppose I'm the ruler of the universe, and I want to convey to my creation - specifically to my chosen species, the most important aspect of the entire enterprise, and for which the universe was created - my message, telling them all of the important things they need to know - how I want them to behave, what it's all about, where they can put their penises and what position I wish them to adopt while engaging in this practice, how they're to treat each other - the rules of the game. What, given all of the above, and given that I'm supposed to have perfect, infallible knowledge of the entirety of the universe including all of space and time and the thoughts of every entity within it, is the best plan I can come up with?
I know, I'll use a book, ambiguous, open to interpretation, riddled with vague metaphor and straight up factual errors that are demonstrably not in accord with experience. Let my infallible knowledge result in a failure to correctly count the legs on an insect, or assert that the genomes of organisms can be changed wholesale by having their parents bump uglies alongside coloured sticks. Let's give it a nice, simple title, like The Holy Teaching (Torah) or The Holy Recitation (Qu'ran) or maybe simply The Holy Book (Bible).
Let's overlook all of the issues arising in the foregoing discussion, knowing about all of them. Let's ignore the fact that some people will use these books as weapons to beat, figuratively and literally, others who don't accept it. Let's make it so that no group of believers can agree with any other group about what I was trying to say. Let's ignore the fact that people will literally kill and die over the nonsensical contents of this book, that it will be the cause of millions upon millions of deaths and depredations, denial of basic rights, justification for slavery and subjugation, and treating followers of other iterations of the same book as second-class, or subhuman, all allegedly representing what I, author and inspiration for all of these books, and architect of the universe, purportedly want to see.
Nope, I can't think of a better plan than that. What do you think?
thenexttodie said:Well "empirical evidence" depends on our ability to gather, correctly interpret and apply data.
hackenslash said:Ah, the 'interpretations' canard. Never far away.
There's only one interpretation that matters, namely the one that is consistently in accord with observations and survives tests that could potentially falsify it.
So, suppose I'm the ruler of the universe, and I want to convey to my creation - specifically to my chosen species, the most important aspect of the entire enterprise, and for which the universe was created - my message, telling them all of the important things they need to know - how I want them to behave, what it's all about, where they can put their penises and what position I wish them to adopt while engaging in this practice, how they're to treat each other - the rules of the game. What, given all of the above, and given that I'm supposed to have perfect, infallible knowledge of the entirety of the universe including all of space and time and the thoughts of every entity within it, is the best plan I can come up with?
I know, I'll use a book, ambiguous...
Laurens said:What kind of God?
A God who answers prayers? We can test that. Thus we can know whether or not such a God exists.
thenexttodie said:I disagree that the bible is ambiguous.
thenexttodie said:In fact, it is so clear and redundant that even atheists (even I think some on this forum) argue that the account Jesus could not have been factual because it fits to well with the old testament.