More - what is in my head stays in my head and dies when the body dies. All else is what I make of existence - given the gifts or lack of such I might have.No "mind is meat" in your philosophy .. hence you are free to do as you please.
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Do you believe in God?
- Thread starter firedragon
- Start date
YellowFeather
Member
The God I believe in is Jehovah God, The creator of the world and life. The unbeliever is blinded by the god of this age who hid's them from the gospel of Christ so they cannot see the truth. That is Satan. Satan is the god that rules the world till Jehovah God is ready to destroy him and those who do not believe in God. The end is very soon.
I Am Hugh
Researcher
This is me thinking just off the top of my head on the subject of atheism and gods, I am equally if not more critical of the traditional theist perception because it's more theological tradition than Biblical. So, the JW Bible, in my opinion is better than the more traditional "scholarly" translation. You have to ask yourself what school did Moses or Isaiah go to learn Hebrew, or Matthew and John go to learn Greek? Ironically believers alike seem to have their favored scholars, and while the skeptics have disdain for faith, they have an appeal to authority when it comes to credentials so long as the scholars agree with them. Words like credentials and credible come from the Latin word credit which means belief, trust. Faith.
The English word God was used by the pagans before the Christians. It means to pour/libate. Most people seem to think God is a name for a specific Biblical god, Jehovah. The result is most people don't understand the very simple concept of a god as being anything mighty/venerated. Sticks, stones, flags, statues, the supernatural, mortal men, idols.
Reverential capitalization can apply to various deities and rulers, so what is God to one person may only be a god to another person. Charles is a king, not my King, Jehovah is God, not an atheist's god. So, atheists tend to think that God or god means supernatural, creator, sky fairy when it just means anything perceived as particularly mighty and respected (venerated). They think they don't have any gods because they don't go to church or believe in the supernatural. Supernatural just means we don't understand it. Whales and giant squid once were thought to be supernatural like mermaids and leprechauns.
So, atheists tend to think belief and faith is ignorance when it is their own ignorance that may be an issue. For example, that a god or God has to literally exist. The Romans had a word like our god, but they didn't use it much unless in plural form because they used names for gods. So, they would have asked does Zues exist or Saturn exist rather than do gods exist, by definition an atheist is a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods. That is problematic in two ways, 1. Which God and 2. gods don't have to literally exist. You can argue that God, contextually in occidental culture is specific, the most commonly known Biblical God, but you can't argue that the Shinto Amaterasu was thought to literally exist. She was an admittedly invented deity for the training of Japanese youth.
The sacred pole (grove, Asherah, Judges 3:7) of the pagans is the same as a nation's flag, so, the JWs won't pledge allegiance to the flag. People don't understand that a god can be a natural or manmade object. They have that limited application of sky fairy. Who or what are the gods which don't allegedly exist in the definition of atheist? If there is no such thing as God is there such a thing as Lord? God means mighty/venerated. Lord means having authority, often granted. Godfather. Landlord.
The English word God was used by the pagans before the Christians. It means to pour/libate. Most people seem to think God is a name for a specific Biblical god, Jehovah. The result is most people don't understand the very simple concept of a god as being anything mighty/venerated. Sticks, stones, flags, statues, the supernatural, mortal men, idols.
Reverential capitalization can apply to various deities and rulers, so what is God to one person may only be a god to another person. Charles is a king, not my King, Jehovah is God, not an atheist's god. So, atheists tend to think that God or god means supernatural, creator, sky fairy when it just means anything perceived as particularly mighty and respected (venerated). They think they don't have any gods because they don't go to church or believe in the supernatural. Supernatural just means we don't understand it. Whales and giant squid once were thought to be supernatural like mermaids and leprechauns.
So, atheists tend to think belief and faith is ignorance when it is their own ignorance that may be an issue. For example, that a god or God has to literally exist. The Romans had a word like our god, but they didn't use it much unless in plural form because they used names for gods. So, they would have asked does Zues exist or Saturn exist rather than do gods exist, by definition an atheist is a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods. That is problematic in two ways, 1. Which God and 2. gods don't have to literally exist. You can argue that God, contextually in occidental culture is specific, the most commonly known Biblical God, but you can't argue that the Shinto Amaterasu was thought to literally exist. She was an admittedly invented deity for the training of Japanese youth.
The sacred pole (grove, Asherah, Judges 3:7) of the pagans is the same as a nation's flag, so, the JWs won't pledge allegiance to the flag. People don't understand that a god can be a natural or manmade object. They have that limited application of sky fairy. Who or what are the gods which don't allegedly exist in the definition of atheist? If there is no such thing as God is there such a thing as Lord? God means mighty/venerated. Lord means having authority, often granted. Godfather. Landlord.
Muffled
Jesus in me
Probablity which is a logic subject. Numbers do not prove anything as you know in logic that is a fallacy but they sometimes predict what can be. For instance Sheffield has won six golf tournaments this year. That means it is probable he may win another. The thing is you are not willing to accept the testimony of witnesses as fact but the fact that the witnesses agree tends to lend to their credibility.
Muffled
Jesus in me
I believe most of the time it is a materialistic view. That was the case with my wife until she encountered a demon through a Ouija board.
My main (though rarely used) argument for a spiritual dimension underlying the material-causal reality is the repeatability of transcendent and immanent experiences through mind-harnessing techniques like meditation or absorptive prayers and the life changing effects thereof (in a positive way). As an instrumentalist of James's bent, I find that to be sufficient to assert these to have truth values associated with them...as James himself did.
Clizby Wampuscat
Well-Known Member
Good evidence is whatever evidence convinces you of a proposition or claim is true. Good evidence is different for different people because people have different ideas of what good evidence is. I don't think there is good evidence for the existence of god and others do.
That second sentence is an ad populum fallacy and is unrelated to the first one.
Have you seen Monty Python and The Holy Grail. It has a scene lampooning reasoning like this like this:
So, logically speaking ...
VILLAGER #1: If... she.. weighs the same as a duck, she's made of wood.
BEDEMIR: And therefore--?
VILLAGER #1: A witch!
CROWD: A witch!
And this is also an ad populum fallacy.
No, I am not willing to accept such claims from faith-based thinkers. A consensus of experts is meaningful, but a consensus of people willing to believe by faith just means that they're imbibing similar messages uncritically.
Maybe-probably is redundant there. This should say "Sheffield has won six golf tournaments this year. He may win another and probably will." You don't need to express uncertainty twice in the same clause. Here, I've put them into two different independent clauses.
That's not truth. That's a faith-based, unfalsifiable ("not even wrong") belief, and doesn't qualify to be called correct, knowledge, fact, or truth. You're guessing. The atheist is the person who chooses not to do that.
What responsibility do you think we have to guess about gods? I would consider that irresponsible, and a logical error - this time, non sequitur: your claim does not follow from any sound argument. There is no sound argument that ends, "therefore God."
You know. Anything better explained by positing a god than the naturalistic alternative. The evidence I've seen offered is the world itself and its complexity, scriptural prophecy, and medieval scholastic arguments for gods. None of those make gods more likely. The prophecies are weak and the arguments all successfully refuted. And naturalistic explanations are preferred to supernaturalism (principle of parsimony in hypothesis making) for which there is no evidence, either.
You don't know that. It's very possible that souls are a fiction and that we only have the illusion of free will.
Is this the latest creationist apologetics meme, like "I just can believe in goo to zoo to you." (abiogenesis and evolution)? Very pithy, like "I don't have enough faith to be an atheist"
Mind appears to be an epiphenomenon of brain.
But you reject that because you need mind to survive death just like you need free will to be compatible with omniscience, because you've chosen to believe such things without sufficient evidentiary support, and now you have to defend indefensible positions. You probably also claim that scriptural prophecy is good evidence for a god, and that scripture contains no error or contradiction. Most zealous believers say as much.
Here's the thing about being correct: your position cannot be successfully contradicted by evidence or pure reason. Also, correct ideas can be used to predict future outcomes. That's how we know they are correct. They are induced from experienced and used to make successful deduction, like directions for how to a given location. Correct directions get you there, and if you followed the directions and you don't get there, then they were incorrect.
Here's the power of empiricism and the relative weakness of faith-based belief. You know that in your daily life. It's how you learned where to eat to find a meal you will like. If your belief gets you to a good meal, we can say that because it allowed you to anticipate how the evening would go correctly, the idea can becalled knowledge and that it has practical value.
Compare that with your religious beliefs, which do none of that.
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firedragon
Veteran Member
Are you saying this so called "good evidence" is subjective? It's relative?
Anyway, when you say you don't think there is good evidence for the existence of God, what evidence are you talking about? What has been presented to you? What's your epistemology? If you don't that, there is no point speaking about evidence. First you should have your epistemology in place to ask that question. Otherwise it's not a responsible question. That lacks epistemic responsibility.
firedragon
Veteran Member
What is a "naturalistic explanation" in your paradigm?
muhammad_isa
Veteran Member
Of course I do .. so do you.
Now, you might not think that there is "a ghost in the machine", but that is neither here nor there.
When we speak to somebody, we are addressing the person, and not a piece of meat.
Impossible .. it is a contradiction to suggest that you or I are not responsible for what we post on
this site. It is no illusion.
Irrelevant how "the machine" operates .. we are all unique individuals.
I don't need it to .. in fact I would be more than happy to be 'obliterated' forever .. and
I'm sure that goes for many people who find their suffering intolerable.
..but I cannot believe that .. it makes no sense to me .. and I have learnt otherwise.
Again, I don't "need it to be" .. if you cannot comprehend, then so be it.
All you have is your intuition that you are right .. no more. Human intuition is no match
for logical proof.
Mumble, mumble .. and nothing more than unenlightened boasting.
McBell
Unbound
also God; Old English god "supreme being, deity; the Christian God; image of a god; godlike person," from Proto-Germanic *guthan (source also of Old Saxon, Old Frisian, Dutch god, Old High German got, German Gott, Old Norse guð, Gothic guþ), which is of uncertain origin; perhaps from PIE *ghut- "that which is invoked" (source also of Old Church Slavonic zovo "to call," Sanskrit huta- "invoked," an epithet of Indra), from root *gheu(e)- "to call, invoke." The notion could be "divine entity summoned to a sacrifice."
But some trace it to PIE *ghu-to- "poured," from root *gheu- "to pour, pour a libation" (source of Greek khein "to pour," also in the phrase khute gaia "poured earth," referring to a burial mound; see found (v.2)). "Given the Greek facts, the Germanic form may have referred in the first instance to the spirit immanent in a burial mound" [Watkins]. See also Zeus. In either case, not related to good.
You do know this is the year 2024, right?
Clizby Wampuscat
Well-Known Member
Yes. I explained why too.
I cannot list off of the arguments and evidence I have considered. It has been many. If you have evidence to present please present it and I will evaluate it. Epistemology is a big subject. What do you want to know?
moahmd sare
New Member
Yes, this is correct. I am from a mostly Muslim country. I find some Muslims or Muslims from the other Tawaf. I highly doubt they are Muslims because they practice pagan rituals and do strange things that are not found in the Quran or anything related to it. There are also some Christians in this situation, and in the two cases you mentioned, my friend, they do not do what their religion dictates to them. Rather, they do what their beliefs dictate to them, which sometimes contradicts religion, but they claim that it is from the origin of religion, and this exists in many cases, so people are confused as to which of them is right, such as suicide, for example. , For example. In suicide operations, for example, it is forbidden to kill oneself in this or any other way. According to the Qur’an. Even if he killed himself in defense of himself or his country. Whoever kills himself, God will punish him as if he killed someone else. But what the Qur’an does not forbid is death in battle only at the hands of aggressing enemies or those who have committed high treason. Or a person. He wants to kill you or rob you, or he wants to attack your family or someone else. If he is killed in this case, he is a martyr, but he must defend himself, and it is not permissible for him to kill himself for fear of falling into their hands or blowing himself up among them, for example. This is not permissible as stated in the Qur’an, and if they kill him, this is his fate, and he does not have to kill himself. But there are Muslims who do not prohibit killing oneself, even though it is forbidden in Islam. You also find some people exploiting religion just to get money or fame.
firedragon
Veteran Member
Do you think someone could develop a scientific test to test the existence of God?
We don't have key witnesses such as the Roman soldiers who most probably buried what was left of Jesus in a mass grave in my view, we only have second hand stories by those who disagreed on the details.
Additionally I believe we don't have any writers writing as it happened, at best all we have is there memories and our memories from even 10-20 years ago are not much better than chance as our minds alter our memories each time they are accessed (if you have Netflix I recommend "the mind explained" for the scientific details of this.
It also doesn't help that the writers were salesmen in my view.
It's the issue at hand regarding souls and disembodied minds.
That person is that, too - a fleshy individual with a mind.
You don't understand the argument against the existence of libertarian free will, but that's deliberate. You can't make a man understand what he has a stake in not understanding.
That was a response to, "Mind appears to be an epiphenomenon of brain. But you reject that because you need mind to survive death"
Whatever your reason for believing a god exists, you've chosen to believe in the god of Abraham over the alternatives for a reason. For most people, it would be a combination of being acculturated into such beliefs as well as a desire to avoid extinction with death and be protected and get wishes granted while still alive.
I don't buy the arguments that claim that someone had no choice but to hold such beliefs after trying so hard to disprove them.
Intuition is all you have in support of your religious beliefs.
That was in response to, "Here's the power of empiricism and the relative weakness of faith-based belief. You know that in your daily life. It's how you learned where to eat to find a meal you will like. If your belief gets you to a good meal, we can say that because it allowed you to anticipate how the evening would go correctly, the idea can becalled knowledge and that it has practical value."
That's all you got from that - mumble, mumble?
Attachments
Clizby Wampuscat
Well-Known Member
Maybe, It makes sense to me that if a god interacts with our universe it would be possible to develop a scientific test to detect that god.
firedragon
Veteran Member
No. Science's axiom is methodological naturalism. So you are making a category error.
The atheist's usual position is that there is not sufficient evidence for believing that God or gods exist apart from social or personal constructs of human mind and civilization.
I do not see how your reply is relevant in such a case.
The Cambridge Companion to Atheism