Is there a God, and if so, who is it?

[CharleyH]

This is what I believe:

There is no God, in any form.

Thanks Lew - see even Lew believes in the symbol!!!! Point made - sizzle.

 

[Guest]

Charleygurrl, I'm wasn't arguing, wouldn't pomolize in haste with you (unless it involved my tits). Are you gonna find anyone here who doesn't know they're self-aware? C'mon. I'm not being descartian or literary, just common sensical (though I try to avoid that if I want to have fun).

As for the 'can you tell' me's, of course not; not my point or inclination. Semio-Pomo, whatever, is only a tool for me, sometimes fun, sometimes serious, but never reality (whatever that is. My purple dildo is reality.)

I like 'proof of god by nipple'.

sexically and semiotickley, Perdita

 

[rgraham666]

Like Socrates, the only thing I am sure of is my own ignorance. About God or anything else.

And whether God exists or not and what the nature of that being is unanswerable… and not important.

The more important question is how should we as individuals act toward ourselves, each other and the universe we live in.

This question is also unanswerable. And has more bearing on our lives.

In fact I think pondering the first question distracts us from working on the second, which is not a good thing.

 

[CharleyH]

Charleygurrl, I'm wasn't arguing, wouldn't pomolize in haste with you (unless it involved my tits). Are you gonna find anyone here who doesn't know they're self-aware? C'mon. I'm not being descartian or literary, just common sensical (though I try to avoid that if I want to have fun).

As for the 'can you tell' me's, of course not; not my point or inclination. Semio-Pomo, whatever, is only a tool for me, sometimes fun, sometimes serious, but never reality (whatever that is. My purple dildo is reality.)

I like 'proof of god by nipple'.

sexically and semiotickley, Perdita

Do I ever really argue P? Humans are not self aware, are they? Did I mention I was . . . . a scientologist? laughing. The absurdists are my way - hmm - I see you cant answer your own mind, which is me, the devil on your shoulder - lol. Common sense like my last government? hmmm.

WHY does everyone think I'm pissed off tonight

 

[ABSTRUSE]

WHY does everyone think I'm pissed off tonight

I think you're too smart for my own good!

 

[Guest]

WHY does everyone think I'm pissed off tonight

That never entered my head. I thought we were having fun.

P.

 

[CharleyH]

That never entered my head. I thought we were having fun.

P.

LOL - I know WE are my Godess, hmm, which one would suit you?Athena? Demeter? Aphrodite?(sorry metric, Demetre) - my god (see! point! again - god damn me) still feel like I am pissing people when would rather be pissing ON people?

God, am I still going on about what Lou said about me?

Abs, abs and abs, because I love good abs . . .

I didn't break this thread did I? Was waiting for Dest and Renza to do their NY socialite interruption? Oops.

 

[Guest]

I didn't break this thread did I? Was waiting for Dest and Renza to do their NY socialite interruption? Oops.

Nah, we need comic relief when discussing Gawdallmighty. I just posted elsewhere: We must always have humour (or if lacking that, hysteria).

La Diosa Azteca, por favor. P.

 

[KarenAM]

Pure, let me see if I can make this argument make more sense.

Except for sociopaths, it is genetic that all humans have a moral code. Thus, much as the genetic programming to be left-handed will emerge naturally, so too will morality, unless conscious efforts are made to supress it (as was once done with left-handedness). Morality is there, and you can explain its presence by God putting it there or by natural selection causing it to come into being as a part of the adaptive advantage of being social.

Now, what is going to vary is this: Think of a circle, with yourself in the center. Everything inside this circle is treated one way (morally), but everything outside is considered abusable without violating one's inborn sense of morality. Inside the circle you have your kids, your spouse, other family members and friends. You probably have your tribe, your nation, etc.

What varies is not the existence of the moral code but who is in the circle. In wartime we are encouraged to think of "the enemy" as being outside the circle; therefore it is not immoral to shoot a Kraut, a Jap, a Towel-head, a Wop, a Spick, a Honkey, etc. Note how pejoratives like these are invented and spread, since by dehumanizing people it is easier to put them outside the circle. Note in this latest scandal in Iraq how the prisoners being humiliated were so often kept hooded, since the human face is where humanity is most clearly displayed. It's harder to be cruel when you are looking another human being in the eye, because your inborn moral code might just kick on and suck them inside your circle.

According to this view, then, we cannot teach people to be moral. What we can do is teach those who are not sociopaths to cast their circles widely, and to be aware of how some try to get their circles to shrink.

God is one way to do this, but there are plenty of others too.

 

[Guest]

LOL - I know WE are my Godess, hmm, which one would suit you?Athena? Demeter? Aphrodite?(sorry metric, Demetre) - my god (see! point! again - god damn me) still feel like I am pissing people when would rather be pissing ON people?

God, am I still going on about what Lou said about me?

Abs, abs and abs, because I love good abs . . .

I didn't break this thread did I? Was waiting for Dest and Renza to do their NY socialite interruption? Oops.

Huh?

What did I say? When? To whom?



Whatever it was, I'm sure it was in jest! Love ya, Charley!

Lou

 

[lewdandlicentious]

According to this view, then, we cannot teach people to be moral. What we can do is teach those who are not sociopaths to cast their circles widely, and to be aware of how some try to get their circles to shrink.

God is one way to do this, but there are plenty of others too.

Good post Karen, a very good way of explaining it.

Well done!

 

[CharleyH]

Huh?

What did I say? When? To whom?



Whatever it was, I'm sure it was in jest! Love ya, Charley!

Lou

Ahhh -oh yes baby - oops - didn't mean to orgasm so publically almost.

LOL - why does everyone think I am pissing on them?

Hm - ok 'going' with it.

Yum

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Opposing this are the ideas of secular humanism, which say that if there is no God then we are all in this together and all responsible for each other’s well-being. It’s absolutely essential that we help each other because God’s not going to help anyone.

There's no reason to suppose "if there is no God, then we are all in this together."

There's no reason to suppose we are 'all responsible for each other's well being.'

We're responsible if we choose to be. That's why it's called humanism. Humanism puts the welfare of humans as the highest goal.


====

But it's true that there's an evolutionary value in a person's saving his/her brother (sister) [and other close relatives]. Those genes are similar to one's own; it's the next best thing to passing one's own along

As to the last statement,
Natural selection favors those societies that love and care for their members and who have an ethical sense.

It seems NOT universally true. The 'society' of cockroaches does not 'love and care for' each other. Indeed, if one dies, he's eaten by the others.

Sociobiology does say that evolution focuses on the gene rather the individual, but during the most critical periods of human evolution, mankind lived and functioned only as a group, and as groups they survived or died. An individual human alone is no match for nature and has zero survival probability. It's only by banding together in groups that humans were able to survive and take over the world. Evolution therefore selected those groups which had the most cohesion.

As for the cockroach argument, cockroaches aren't social insects like bees or ants. In any case, the analogy doesn't hold between humans and insects. Insect societies are not composed of volitional, sexual individuals. If you want to look for analogies, you'd do better looking at cetaceans, apes or wolves.

The size of one's 'tribe' is open to debate, but humanitiy's progress can be seen to parallel the size of the group we associate ourselves with. In the earliest days we identified only with our immediate tribe. People who weren't part of our tribe were not even considered human. We've shifted our thinking so as to increase the size of our 'tribe' since then and include more people into what we think of as human, moving through city-states, ethic groups, cultures, and at present seem to be stuck in thinking of our groups as nations, though there are already some encouraging signs that the idea of national identity is finally fading, to be be replaced by something even more inclusive.

---dr.M.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

One thing we should keep in mind when discussing religion is that 'religion' means different things to different people. Theology is the study and philosophy of God, but religion is also concerned with ethics, which is the study of proper behavior. Already in this thread you can trace two separate discussions, one on the existence of God (theology) and one on morals (ethics).

While all the world's religions seem to share pretty much the same ethical codes--no murder, the golden rule, etc.--their theologies are quite different.

---dr.M.

 

[fifty5]

I'm surprised none of the agnostics and atheists have talked about the problem Dostoevsky put in the mouth of a character:

If there is no God, everything is permitted.

IOW, in the 'no god' scenario, other than getting grabbed by the cops, why not capture, kill, and eat your next door neighbor?

OK, there's the bad publicity on the evening news, and possible revenge from his/her family members, but what else is there to worry about?

“Enlightened self interest!”

If it's OK for me to do you, then it's OK for you to do me.

If, on the other hand, we pass human laws that protect you from me, then I'm also protected from you.

It's in my interest - for every "me" around!

f5

 

[fifty5]

It all depends on how you define magic. Christianity is by far more 'superstisious' and 'supernatural' than say, Wicca or Paganism. Most pagans think that magick isn't about breaking the laws of nature, but about understanding them, and being able to manipulate or use them to your advantage. If you think of Magic as supernatural, or something that can't be scientifically explained- then by definition, science *can't* discover magic- because once something's scientifically explained, it's not magic anymore (by that definition)

I also read something once that claimed that magic was a *social* interaction. IN otherwords, some people say if it doesn't 'work' everytime it's not real. They compared the rules of magic to the rules of social interaction- they don't work everytime, but understanding them helps you to achieve your aims. Example- if you smile and say hi to someone, you expect that most likely they will be friendly back. But sometimes that's not what happens. Usually that doesn't mean that we give up on polite greatings and say they 'don't work'- although repeated rebuffs would make us look to see what we are doing wrong, in order to improve our 'charm spell'

To me, that's exactly what magic is, it's making things happen using unseen (not 'supernatural') forces. Like creating worlds -people places and plots- out of dark lines on light papers. The words don't supernaturally jump up and dance around the room, or form into characters- but something is created that is bigger than the sum of it's parts.

Thanks for that, SnP. I don't think we really disagree. My take on the difference is that it's only one of emphasis - I'm giving priority to the rationality underneath situations we don't understand fully, while you seem to me to be emphasisng the fact of not understanding - in your word, "unseen".

It isn't your 'Magick' that I was dismissing, but the kind of 'magic' that you also seem to dismiss.

Love and respect,

f5

 

[shereads]

Now, what is going to vary is this: Think of a circle, with yourself in the center. Everything inside this circle is treated one way (morally), but everything outside is considered abusable without violating one's inborn sense of morality. Inside the circle you have your kids, your spouse, other family members and friends. You probably have your tribe, your nation, etc.

What varies is not the existence of the moral code but who is in the circle. In wartime we are encouraged to think of "the enemy" as being outside the circle; therefore it is not immoral to shoot a Kraut, a Jap, a Towel-head, a Wop, a Spick, a Honkey, etc. Note how pejoratives like these are invented and spread, since by dehumanizing people it is easier to put them outside the circle. Note in this latest scandal in Iraq how the prisoners being humiliated were so often kept hooded, since the human face is where humanity is most clearly displayed. It's harder to be cruel when you are looking another human being in the eye, because your inborn moral code might just kick on and suck them inside your circle.

I've heard the idea of family or tribe expressed as concentric circles or "ripples." Those most like us are in the circle of people with whom we empathize too much to harm them deliberately. In widening outward circles are people we perceive as "other" than ourselves. The greater the difference in appearance, culture and geography, the farther they are from our inner circle - and the less likely we are to feel empathy. For nearly every culture, those who are farthest away geographically fall into the outermost circles, and if they don't resemble us culturally or in appearnce, we may have so little empathy for them that we barely consider their suffering.

The life of one person in your immediate family is worth a dozen lives in your town; a thousand lives in a country whose people look like you and share a similar culture; tens of thousands of lives in Bangladesh.

It's sad that we don't recognize all human beings as worthy of empathy, but maybe a certain amount of denial is necessary. If we grieved for every tragedy the way we grieve for our own, we couldn't function. I'm not sure I believe that morality is genetic, but maybe the ability to turn it off is an inherited trait. Not an attractive one, but a necessary one.

We're all in denial about the state of the world during most of our waking hours, aren't we? If we allowed ourselves to focus on the awful things that are happening right now, and that will happen an hour from now, to children in Rwanda, women in Afghanistan, the calf that's going to be next week's veal dinner, we'd just curl up in a little ball of grief and never get back up.

My point- if I had one - is that we rely on the ability of some members of the community to turn off empathy - or morality - to do the ugly jobs that we don't want to think about. The people for whom the only lives worth saving are those of their own inner circle...We also rely on those with exceptional empathy/morality to organize charities, join the Red Cross, and do the good things that need doing, in the outer circles that we prefer not to think too much about. The rest of us, those with average morality, fall somewhere in between.

 

[sweetnpetite]

According to this view, then, we cannot teach people to be moral. What we can do is teach those who are not sociopaths to cast their circles widely, and to be aware of how some try to get their circles to shrink.

God is one way to do this, but there are plenty of others too.

This is one of the deepest most amazing things I have read in a long time. I am in awe.

 

[sweetnpetite]

Wildly inapropriate hijack/flirtation

Ahhh -oh yes baby - oops - didn't mean to orgasm so publically almost.

LOL - why does everyone think I am pissing on them?

Hm - ok 'going' with it.

Yum

Your not pissing on me! And it's pissing me off!!!

 

[sweetnpetite]

I'm glad you liked it

I guess I tend to also think of 'god' in the same terms as I do 'magic' -unseen, but not necesarily supernatural.

Even with science, not all things can or will be understood or seen. I do believe that god can intervien, and spells can work, and karma as a general principal. But as *God* said on Futurama- "When you do things right, people won't know you did anything at all." (I think that's right)

Love and respect right back,

Sweet.

Thanks for that, SnP. I don't think we really disagree. My take on the difference is that it's only one of emphasis - I'm giving priority to the rationality underneath situations we don't understand fully, while you seem to me to be emphasisng the fact of not understanding - in your word, "unseen".

It isn't your 'Magick' that I was dismissing, but the kind of 'magic' that you also seem to dismiss.

Love and respect,

f5

 

[The_old_man]

QUOTE
While all the world's religions seem to share pretty much the same ethical codes--no murder, the golden rule, etc.--their theologies are quite different.

---dr.M.

As I have said before ... Religion is good, until the priests get hold of it.

GOD set up the parameters by which this universe came into existence. Included in those parameters were the chemical reactions permitting life to exist. Also included were the various laws of probability.

HE/SHE/IT then relaxed/rested and watched curiously as this universe was Born, expands, and ?

Yes, as the creating entity, GOD exists.

As the "Loving, Guiding, Omnipotent, giver of grace and forgiveness." NO.

 

[fifty5]

Thanks Lew - see even Lew believes in the symbol!!!! Point made - sizzle.

I believe in the symbol too, but, despite subsequent musings, I'll go back to the way I formulated it in my teens:

a) Either there is a God or there isn't.
b) If there isn't, then there's no point in worshipping an empty symbol.
c) If there is, then look around at the world. If there is a God, then all the evidence proves that he/she/it is an evil bastard - and infinitesimal as I am, I've more self respect than to give in to the threat of eternal damnation. I'l deny and fight against such a being! (But I won't, let it be noted - other than in intellectual argument - attack other humans who don't share my belief.)
d) I could be wrong. Maybe there is a perfect god and there is some ineffable reason behind war, famine, poverty, religious oppression and all that shit. Well in that case - if god is that perfect - then he/she/it will respect my atheism, since that's the only conclusion that seems rational to this effable being. ... Or else option c was right!

 

[fifty5]

The more important question is how should we as individuals act toward ourselves, each other and the universe we live in.

This question is also unanswerable. And has more bearing on our lives.

In fact I think pondering the first question distracts us from working on the second, which is not a good thing.

It can do, RG, without any doubt, but I don't think it has to.

My credo is that since I can't believe in God, then what's left is me and my self respect - and I can't respect myself, if myself doesn't respect others...

f5 (evolutionarily programmed)

 

[shereads]

Pat Robertson just called. He told God about this thread, and God is going to hack the site and crash the server.

Just fyi

 

[fifty5]

According to this view, then, we cannot teach people to be moral. What we can do is teach those who are not sociopaths to cast their circles widely, and to be aware of how some try to get their circles to shrink.

God is one way to do this, but there are plenty of others too.

Right on Karen! I'm sure that your self respect quotient is high!

f5