A Growing Pain for Atheists?

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  • Ahnimus
    Ahnimus Posts: 10,560
    God is a childish philosophy
    I necessarily have the passion for writing this, and you have the passion for condemning me; both of us are equally fools, equally the toys of destiny. Your nature is to do harm, mine is to love truth, and to make it public in spite of you. - Voltaire
  • RainDog
    RainDog Posts: 1,824
    cornnifer wrote:
    Or you could also have a situation where God exists outside of time, but we as humans still operate within its constraints. Where we are instilled with free will and allowed to write our own script.
    But if God already knows the outcome of that script, then the free will we are instilled with is only an illusion, as God is the ultimate reality.

    If, on the other hand, God doesn't know the outcome of that script, then free will is possible - i.e. you can "surprise" God by doing something other than what he scripted - only now God isn't the ultimate reality, as time is more powerful than he is.

    A possible third way is God is separate from the universe and has no ongoing contact with it. The universe began and ended in the blink of his eye. Here, free will is debatable.
  • gue_barium
    gue_barium Posts: 5,515
    Ahnimus wrote:
    God is a childish philosophy

    It is. It's psychology/philosphy mixed.

    Or, the absent parent.

    The bastard child.

    vanity.

    longing.

    news.

    what the?

    i'm not what?

    this could turn into

    a haiku, if i let it.
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  • onelongsong
    onelongsong Posts: 3,517
    RainDog wrote:
    It does pose a philosophical point. Basically, if God is timeless, i.e. outside of time, then from the ultimate perspective (God's), past, present and future are all the same. God already knows everything, including what we will do "years" before we are even conceived, and therefore has created a "predestined" universe where free-will is just an illusion.

    In other words, a man or woman can only repent if God created them to repent.

    In other other words, God created people with the specific purpose of populating Hell.


    what? people talk like God is the grand moderator of everything. God doesn't interfere with earthly events. he made this covenant with noah after the flood and gave us a rainbow as a sign. there have been signs of his extixtance since then but no real intervention. we are left to destroy ourselves and we're doing a good job of it.
  • Born2Jam
    Born2Jam Posts: 255
    onelongsong wrote:
    what? people talk like God is the grand moderator of everything. God doesn't interfere with earthly events. he made this covenant with noah after the flood and gave us a rainbow as a sign. there have been signs of his extixtance since then but no real intervention. we are left to destroy ourselves and we're doing a good job of it.

    Amen.
    "This band has provided many people a soundtrack to their lives.." ~ CitizenRick
  • gue_barium
    gue_barium Posts: 5,515
    onelongsong wrote:
    what? people talk like God is the grand moderator of everything. God doesn't interfere with earthly events. he made this covenant with noah after the flood and gave us a rainbow as a sign. there have been signs of his extixtance since then but no real intervention. we are left to destroy ourselves and we're doing a good job of it.

    God is the grand moderator of everything, here. If she doesn't like your style, you're banned.
    all posts by ©gue_barium are protected under US copyright law and are not to be reproduced, exchanged or sold
    except by express written permission of ©gue_barium, the author.
  • gue_barium
    gue_barium Posts: 5,515
    Born2Jam wrote:
    Amen.

    Quit that. Silliness isn't becoming of you.
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  • Ahnimus
    Ahnimus Posts: 10,560
    Why do they always ignore the brain?
    I necessarily have the passion for writing this, and you have the passion for condemning me; both of us are equally fools, equally the toys of destiny. Your nature is to do harm, mine is to love truth, and to make it public in spite of you. - Voltaire
  • Dustin51
    Dustin51 Posts: 222
    Anyone have a theory on what time zone God is in?
    Be excellent to each other
  • Ahnimus
    Ahnimus Posts: 10,560
    Dustin51 wrote:
    Anyone have a theory on what time zone God is in?

    The eternal time-zone apparently.

    Oh, and Hitler and Stalin were atheists... NOT!

    I swear Kirk and Ray got their 'facts' from conservapedia.com
    I necessarily have the passion for writing this, and you have the passion for condemning me; both of us are equally fools, equally the toys of destiny. Your nature is to do harm, mine is to love truth, and to make it public in spite of you. - Voltaire
  • Kann
    Kann Posts: 1,146
    RainDog wrote:
    But if God already knows the outcome of that script, then the free will we are instilled with is only an illusion, as God is the ultimate reality.

    If, on the other hand, God doesn't know the outcome of that script, then free will is possible - i.e. you can "surprise" God by doing something other than what he scripted - only now God isn't the ultimate reality, as time is more powerful than he is.

    A possible third way is God is separate from the universe and has no ongoing contact with it. The universe began and ended in the blink of his eye. Here, free will is debatable.

    Or you can always take the easy way out and say that since our knowledge and understanding is extremely limited next to god's infinite knowledge we cannot conceptualize his point of view. It's coherent with a complex god, it's a simple answer. But it's not really mind stimulating.
  • RainDog
    RainDog Posts: 1,824
    onelongsong wrote:
    what? people talk like God is the grand moderator of everything. God doesn't interfere with earthly events. he made this covenant with noah after the flood and gave us a rainbow as a sign. there have been signs of his extixtance since then but no real intervention. we are left to destroy ourselves and we're doing a good job of it.
    Didn't Jesus come after Noah? Maybe I'm nitpicking, but I'd call creating yourself in the form of a man so that you can die, be resurrected, and thereby forgive all earthly transgressions to be an example of intervention. If you're a Christian, that is.

    But you are touching on a point I've been kicking around lately. Personally, I don't believe in Noah or the Biblical flood; but I do agree that God (if he exists - I'm still kicking that one around, too) not only doesn't interfere, but can't. Divine Intervention - either God stopping something or causing something - implies an ignorance of future events, which is impossible for an all knowing and all powerful God.
  • RainDog
    RainDog Posts: 1,824
    Kann wrote:
    Or you can always take the easy way out and say that since our knowledge and understanding is extremely limited next to god's infinite knowledge we cannot conceptualize his point of view. It's coherent with a complex god, it's a simple answer. But it's not really mind stimulating.
    True. But I could also say that volcanic eruptions are caused by dragons. ;)
  • Ahnimus
    Ahnimus Posts: 10,560
    All that shit was lies man, all lies.

    Both sides fudging facts. Like "Hitler and Stalin were athiests" or "90% of Sweden are Atheists" lies, lies and more lies. Hitler was a Roman Catholic and Stalin was Orthodox Christian and only 80% of sweden are atheists.
    I necessarily have the passion for writing this, and you have the passion for condemning me; both of us are equally fools, equally the toys of destiny. Your nature is to do harm, mine is to love truth, and to make it public in spite of you. - Voltaire
  • Kann
    Kann Posts: 1,146
    RainDog wrote:
    True. But I could also say that volcanic eruptions are caused by dragons. ;)

    I'm all for dragons as a means to explain stuff.
    (I still think it makes sense to consider that since we are infinitely less complex than god we should have a hard time understanding what he is all about)
    Both sides fudging facts. Like "Hitler and Stalin were athiests" or "90% of Sweden are Atheists" lies, lies and more lies. Hitler was a Roman Catholic and Stalin was Orthodox Christian and only 80% of sweden are atheists.
    Well if Stalin was orthodox he should have sent himself to the goulag according to his laws... damn hypocrite!
  • RainDog
    RainDog Posts: 1,824
    Kann wrote:
    I'm all for dragons as a means to explain stuff.
    (I still think it makes sense to consider that since we are infinitely less complex than god we should have a hard time understanding what he is all about)
    I've no problem with that, provided the idea isn't used as an excuse to turn a blind eye to reality (young earthers, I'm looking at you!! :D )

    But, I mostly joined this thread to say that the question "what created God" doesn't necessarily stem from "kindergarden philosophy."
  • Kann
    Kann Posts: 1,146
    The question is legitimate, as are all questions. I guess providing an answer and holding it for sure is what may seem kindergarten like (and that goes both ways).
    I had a teacher who taught us that believing in God is a nice idea as long as it doesn't keep you from asking questions and trying to answer, on everything.
  • Ahnimus
    Ahnimus Posts: 10,560
    Something that does not exist is not infintely more complex than me.
    I necessarily have the passion for writing this, and you have the passion for condemning me; both of us are equally fools, equally the toys of destiny. Your nature is to do harm, mine is to love truth, and to make it public in spite of you. - Voltaire
  • Cosmo
    Cosmo Posts: 12,225
    prism wrote:
    I love how they got completely dumb-founded when they were asked "if God created everything who created God?"
    ...
    1. In the beginning, Man created God; and in the image of Man, created he Him.

    2. And Man gave unto God a multitude of names, that he might be Lord of all the Earth when it was suited to Man.

    3. And on the seven millionth day Man rested and did lean heavily on his God and saw that it was good.

    4. And Man formed Evenflow of the dust of the ground, and a host of others likened unto his kind.

    5. And these lesser men were cast into the void; And some were burned, and some were put apart from their kind.

    6. And Man became the God that he had created and with his miracles did rule over all the earth.

    7. But, as all these things came to pass, the Spirit that did cause man to create his God lived on within all men: even within Evenflow.

    8. And man saw it not.

    9. But, for Christ's sake he'd better start looking.
    Allen Fieldhouse, home of the 2008 NCAA men's Basketball Champions! Go Jayhawks!
    Hail, Hail!!!
  • Ahnimus
    Ahnimus Posts: 10,560
    I'm going to puke if I have to listen to anymore new-age rehtoric and verbal sewage today.
    I necessarily have the passion for writing this, and you have the passion for condemning me; both of us are equally fools, equally the toys of destiny. Your nature is to do harm, mine is to love truth, and to make it public in spite of you. - Voltaire

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