Does everyone believe in God?

[Featherbop]

hmm...... this is gonna make the atheists have a whine attack. : :D

 

[Judy]

I wouldn't say that everyone believes in God, but God has revealed Himself to all of us through His creation.

Psalms 19:1. The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament shows His handiwork.

Rom. 1:18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,
19. because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them.
20. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, 21. because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
22. Professing to be wise, they became fools,
23. and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man and birds and four-footed beasts and creeping things.

 

[SyntaxVorlon]

Nope not at all. No reason to believe in any deity.

 

[Veritas]

No reason to believe in any deity

No reason huh? Fair enough. I'm glad you can use your reason to determine this.

Here is something interesting to think about my friend:

God is non-material, absolute, and real.

Is there anything else, that is non-material, absolute, and real?



Yes,

The laws of logic.


Everyone has a god of some kind, you simply cannot escape the conclusion.

Even atheists who rely soley on almighty reason, affirm a god in their proofs against God.

 

[Featherbop]

Nope not at all. No reason to believe in any deity.

that sounds like you just don't like the idea of believing in God.

____

I still hold the idea that everyone has a god of somekind. Whether they admit it or not. Someone, or something is their master in someway.

 

[reznwerks]

god

that sounds like you just don't like the idea of believing in God.

____
---------------------------------
Make believe was fun when I was a kid. Now that I'm an adult I put away childish things.

 

[Featherbop]

Make believe was fun when I was a kid. Now that I'm an adult I put away childish things.

No, now you're just trying to rationalize your little fairy tale.

 

[SyntaxVorlon]

Make believe was fun when I was a kid. Now that I'm an adult I put away childish things.

No, now you're just trying to rationalize your little fairy tale.

Bah, a unicorn could curbstomp your angels.

No reason huh? Fair enough. I'm glad you can use your reason to determine this.
Here is something interesting to think about my friend:
God is non-material, absolute, and real.

Is there anything else, that is non-material, absolute, and real?
Yes, The laws of logic.
Everyone has a god of some kind, you simply cannot escape the conclusion.
Even atheists who rely soley on almighty reason, affirm a god in their proofs against God.

I can show logic to work by predicting things with it and my knowledge of the world and watching what happens. But they aren't real, they are fabrications of human imagination used to explain causality and so many other things. No law actually exists in the universe, laws just show how phenomena work out and don't explain anything.
You also define God to be all powerful, all knowledgable, and all beneficent. You define your god as having a gender, a name, a chronology. These are all significantly different from how rationality is defined.
Reason is an ability humans develop, not a force of nature. It is quite obvious from nature that reason was not involved, at least from my standpoint. Our ability to reason has thus far allowed us to have a preliminary understanding of the universe, its scope, and the forces that act within it. It has provided us with the ability to explain how our universe works. I don't worship reason, it's a trait, a part of human nature that is part of the building blocks of civilization.

 

[Veritas]

But they aren't real, they are fabrications of human imagination used to explain causality and so many other things.

If that's the case. Why should I listen to you if you don't even believe what you know is real?

 

[Vic C.]

Re: god

Make believe was fun when I was a kid. Now that I'm an adult I put away childish things.

Exactly!

1 CORINTHIANS -- Chapter 13
10- But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away.
11- When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
12- For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.
NKJ

 

[SyntaxVorlon]

But they aren't real, they are fabrications of human imagination used to explain causality and so many other things.

If that's the case. Why should I listen to you if you don't even believe what you know is real?

I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at. The laws of logic we use are those which seem to follow from the way the universe works. They don't actually have any affect on the universe, they only exist in our minds to serve as a way of explaining the universe. The law of gravity, as an analog, doesn't do anything, it just describes the movement of objects in respect to eachother's masses.

 

[Featherbop]

So, the laws aren't really real, its just how people understand it?

So the laws of logic is just what the universe dictates?

So, that rationalizes believing no absolutes laws of anything.

 

[Veritas]

I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at.

I am speaking of the four fundamental laws of logic that the entire logical system is built on.

Law of Identity (A is A)
Law of Non-contradiction (A is not non-A)
Law of the Excluded Middle (either A or non-A)
Law of Rational Inference

They don't actually have any affect on the universe, they only exist in our minds to serve as a way of explaining the universe.

Do you see the problem you face if the four fundamental laws of logic are not real?

I think this is really beside the point of the thread. I'm sure it could lead us down a different debate.

My point is that you have to base your life on something. Whatever you base your life on, or live for, in essence, becomes your god. Albeit in some cases a very poor one. I assumed you based your life on reason. But you seem to have undercut your reason in your defense. That leaves you in an interesting position.

 

[Wertbag]

My point is that you have to base your life on something. Whatever you base your life on, or live for, in essence, becomes your god. Albeit in some cases a very poor one.

Aren't you simply redefining God? This is not the definition that most people think of when talking about God. Hes meant to be a thinking, feeling, knowledgable diety. Defining him as simply an ideal we base our lives on is quite a side step. Athiests do not believe in a diety of any description, they believe in logic/reason and those things are not a God in the traditional sense.

 

[SyntaxVorlon]

I am speaking of the four fundamental laws of logic that the entire logical system is built on.

Law of Identity (A is A)
Law of Non-contradiction (A is not non-A)
Law of the Excluded Middle (either A or non-A)
Law of Rational Inference

They certainly do make the macro-universe far easier to understand. This is why Quantum Physics is hard to understand because A and non-A are both probable states and not definite when you get down to that fundamental a level when studying the universe.

[quote:52181]They don't actually have any affect on the universe, they only exist in our minds to serve as a way of explaining the universe.

Do you see the problem you face if the four fundamental laws of logic are not real?
[/quote:52181]No you haven't pointed one out.

I think this is really beside the point of the thread. I'm sure it could lead us down a different debate.

Make one if you like

My point is that you have to base your life on something. Whatever you base your life on, or live for, in essence, becomes your god. Albeit in some cases a very poor one. I assumed you based your life on reason. But you seem to have undercut your reason in your defense. That leaves you in an interesting position.

Now you're using your life to try to define the default. You're saying that because you live your life by "god" then that simply what everyone lives by, a god. But humans don't live lives in respect to gods, they live their lives in respect to ideologies and thought patterns. Your ideology is a belief in an allpowerful deity, who just happens to be omnibenevolent and all knowing and looks surprisingly like yourself. One of subcategories of ideology is belief in a god, but this is separate and distinct from a life that follows the ethics and sciences that stem from rational thought.

 

[Veritas]

Aren't you simply redefining God? This is not the definition that most people think of when talking about God. Hes meant to be a thinking, feeling, knowledgable diety. Defining him as simply an ideal we base our lives on is quite a side step.

Thats a good point. But remember, God is extremely difficult to define in the first place. It's like defining self. For example: Are we thinking, feeling, and knowledgable? If you take the materialistic view you would ultimately deny we are thinking, feeling, and knowledgable.

Athiests do not believe in a diety of any description, they believe in logic/reason and those things are not a God in the traditional sense.

Atheism is, in fact, illogical.

The word atheism means - negative god, or, no god.
That affirms a negative, which is a logical contradiction

How can you confirm a negative in the absolute? The only one way you can confirm this is with infinite knowledge.

Now agnosticism is a different matter, all you have to do is prove that you don't know.

 

[SyntaxVorlon]

Atheism is, in fact, illogical.

The word atheism means - negative god, or, no god.
That affirms a negative, which is a logical contradiction

How can you confirm a negative in the absolute? The only one way you can confirm this is with infinite knowledge.

I'm happy you know your etymology and I commend you for it. However the modern version to which mainstream atheists subscribe is a position of nonbelief that requires some form of objective proof to change.

 

[Vic C.]

Now agnosticism is a different matter, all you have to do is prove that you don't know.

Tell me about it! I've been down that road. I had to backtrack. Came to a roadsign that said...Dead End. :wink:

 

[Veritas]

- I introduced the four fundamental laws of logic -

Syntax said:

They certainly do make the macro-universe far easier to understand. This is why Quantum Physics is hard to understand because A and non-A are both probable states and not definite when you get down to that fundamental a level when studying the universe.

So do you throw out the four fundamental laws of logic? No, of course not. We still use the same reasoning to try to figure out quantum physics. In fact, just last month a 50-year-old mystery in quantum structure was solved using classical thinking.

I said:
Do you see the problem you face if the four fundamental laws of logic are not real?

You said:
No you haven't pointed one out.

Well, use the four fundamental laws to figure out what I mean.

You're saying that because you live your life by "god" then that simply what everyone lives by, a god. But humans don't live lives in respect to gods, they live their lives in respect to ideologies and thought patterns.

Which are non-material, absolute, and real.

If you assert they are not real, you disprove them.

If you assert they are relative, they refute themselves.

It's as simple as that.

Think about what you are saying when you claim reason is not real.

Your ideology is a belief in an allpowerful deity, who just happens to be omnibenevolent and all knowing and looks surprisingly like yourself.

I believe it is I that take on the characteristics of my Creator. Even my reason.

One of subcategories of ideology is belief in a god, but this is separate and distinct from a life that follows the ethics and sciences that stem from rational thought.

I think you've got that backwards. :wink:

 

[SyntaxVorlon]

So do you throw out the four fundamental laws of logic? No, of course not. We still use the same reasoning to try to figure out quantum physics. In fact, just last month a 50-year-old mystery in quantum structure was solved using classical thinking.

No, but it makes it impossible to simply assume them. Try applying these laws of logic to schõedinger's cat.
It's not that they are thrown aside, they are just not absolute.

Well, use the four fundamental laws to figure out what I mean.

Don't be obtuse.

It would help if we could have a reasonable discussion.

Is it so unreasonable to ask that you post your own thread topics?

Which are non-material, absolute, and real.
If you assert they are not real, you disprove them.
If you assert they are relative, they refute themselves.
It's as simple as that.
Think about what you are saying when you claim reason is not real.

I am asserting they are not real in the sense that the Law of Universal Gravitation is not consulted by oceans when the tide goes out. Just because they don't have any bearing on the way the universe acts doesn't mean they are wrong.
I must make reference to Schrõedinger's cat again, they apply absolutely (as far as I can tell) in the macroscopic world save for various cases such as the cat.
Reason is an ability used to understand how the universe works, it isn't claimed to be the fundament cause for why the universe works. Thus it is not a deity.

Quote:
One of subcategories of ideology is belief in a god, but this is separate and distinct from a life that follows the ethics and sciences that stem from rational thought.

I think you've got that backwards.

Please support give support for this rebuke.