Is God's existence necessary?

[Rick O'Shez]

I didn't ask you to prove gods, false or otherwise I was only asking for clarification why you think everyone has a few of them. It just doesn't make sense in my opinion.

The only God I have is Ice-cream.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

However, the need for God's existence is apparent for many people's emotional well-being.

It seems that a lot of people prioritise comfort over truth.

 

[McBell]

People aren't ''atheists''. /Ie they do worsdhip things //''gods'' //that;s what 'god' means, like 'false god', in the Bible.
When I meet an atheist, /a real one, I will question the necessary existence of a God.

This is nothing more than you trying in vain to foist your insecurities onto everyone.
It has no more meaning than claiming everyone is an atheist because no one believes in every single god ever thought up.

 

[McBell]

Giving ''examples'', is no more of an argument than my previous statements.

Spoken like someone making bold empty claims....
Giving examples is not an "argument".
However, it does reveal how much merit, if any, your "argument" has...

If the belief is that my statement is wrong, then it is simply your position, no point in trying to 'prove' my position. Ie the position is over-arching beyond the examples.

Sounds like nothing more than a sad attempt at drawing attention away from the fact that you have not even one example to support your claim...
So why should your claim not be dismissed as wishful thinking?

 

[prometheus11]

There are plenty of atheists out there. They are people who, for whatever reasons, lack a belief in any gods that have been described to them by other people.

 

[Willamena]

I see that in English form includes content? I was thinking the word meant only the shape. If your formless God has absolutely no content then why would it be necessary?

Shape is a type of form, the outward appearance; just as essence is internal form, and structure is physical form.

The formless (or nameless, or transcendent) God refers to something that precedes our capacity to assign form (or name, or existence) to things. That is raw consciousness. It is beyond all attempts to think of it as a thing.

It's not my God.

 

[Jumi]

The formless (or nameless, or transcendent) God refers to something that precedes our capacity to assign form (or name, or existence) to things. That is raw consciousness. It is beyond all attempts to think of it as a thing.

Consciousness also has form in this case. Wouldn't the formless God rather be unconscious since it would also lack that type of structure required to have consciousness?

 

[Willamena]

Consciousness also has form in this case. Wouldn't the formless God rather be unconscious since it would also lack that type of structure required to have consciousness?

Consciousness is the framework in which form gets assigned, so it's not itself got a form (just as truth has no truth-value). It's just a word "in this case," as useful in the sentence as "God."

Unconscious isn't really about consciousness, it's about awareness. (Stupid Freud.)

 

[Jumi]

Consciousness is the framework in which form gets assigned, so it's not itself got a form (just as truth has no truth-value). It's just a word "in this case," as useful in the sentence as "God."

Consciousness itself has form because it has content. Even if we empty our minds of thought, it's still not formless but like water adapts to the shape of the container. There is our baseline, it's not without form.

Unconscious isn't really about consciousness, it's about awareness. (Stupid Freud.)

I wasn't thinking about Freud here. Even Freud's unconscious would have form and content. What comes out is something not easy to guess and it would not be what we chose.

 

[Willamena]

Consciousness itself has form because it has content. Even if we empty our minds of thought, it's still not formless but like water adapts to the shape of the container. There is our baseline, it's not without form.

I wasn't thinking about Freud here. Even Freud's unconscious would have form and content. What comes out is something not easy to guess and it would not be what we chose.

It has no other form but the form of its contents, but that is not its form but the form of its contents--the machine's product declaring itself the machine.

Dogen gives an image of a "bright pearl." All the world is one bright pearl. Imagine the three-dimensional world flattened into such a two-dimensional surface--with no depth, because depth is sitting there on the surface of the pearl, and no breadth, because breadth is there too, sitting on the surface. Everything that can be rests on a surface that is itself. The perfect reflection.

 

[Gambit]

Consciousness itself has form because it has content. Even if we empty our minds of thought, it's still not formless but like water adapts to the shape of the container. There is our baseline, it's not without form.

If you ever had the experience of pure consciousness, you would realize that it is nonspatial and nontemporal and therefore formless.

 

[prometheus11]

Gambit, are you claiming to have experienced pure consciousness? Is there any measurement whereby someone can definitively tell whether or not another person has experienced pure consciousness?

 

[Rick O'Shez]

If you ever had the experience of pure consciousness, you would realize that it is nonspatial and nontemporal and therefore formless.

No, it's just a different state of mind with a sense of great spaciousness and timelessness and such. "Pure consciousness" is a fiction, more akin to a religious belief than an experience.

 

[Desert Snake]

This is nothing more than you trying in vain to foist your insecurities onto everyone.

Actually, it's insecurity that makes you not realize the truth in the supposition.

It has no more meaning than claiming everyone is an atheist because no one believes in every single god ever thought up.

Actually, it does.

 

[Gambit]

No, it's just a different state of mind with a sense of great spaciousness and timelessness and such. "Pure consciousness" is a fiction, more akin to a religious belief than an experience.

If it is spaceless and timeless (transcends the spacetime continuum), then it is nonphysical and formless.

 

[prometheus11]

And nonexistent?

 

[Gambit]

Gambit, are you claiming to have experienced pure consciousness? Is there any measurement whereby someone can definitively tell whether or not another person has experienced pure consciousness?

I believe we can make the inference based on a measurement of brain waves (more specifically, delta waves).

 

[prometheus11]

Not good enough. Schizos would show the same pattern when describing their. Communication with alien overlords.

 

[YmirGF]

If you ever had the experience of pure consciousness, you would realize that it is nonspatial and nontemporal and therefore formless.

Would that be pure consciousness as opposed to impure consciousness?

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Is there any measurement whereby someone can definitively tell whether or not another person has experienced pure consciousness?

Yes.....but only by another who has experienced pure consciousness....