Searching for GOD...

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Alan:

All your points, or what you think of as points, have been answered by far better writers than I'll ever be. I recommend:

Richard Dawkins: The Blind Watchmaker/Climbing Mount Improbable/The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution

Jerry Coyne: Why Evolution Is True

Ernst Mayr: What Evolution Is

John Maynard Smith: The Theory of Evolution

Carl Zimmer: Evolution

Let us all know how you get on.

The Natural History Museum did an excellent basic text on Evolution at a fraction of the cost.

[Alan Burns]

God, being so much greater than humans, must surely be far more complex ... but you're perfectly happy to accept that he/she/it didn't have to be created or 'guided' by something even more complex!

Our human brains are not capable of understanding what God is.  The old testament gives a profound insight with God's answer to Moses's query about Him: "I am who am".
God is simpy existence, not just in our universe's dimensions of time an space, but in everything.  God is that which exists, in every moment of time, in every dimension, in every universe, totally beyond human understanding, which is why He had to become one of us to make Himself known.

[savillerow]

Msg 1651 AB And here comes the eternal question. . . . . . . . how do you know this?

[Shaker]

Our human brains are not capable of understanding what God is.  The old testament gives a profound insight with God's answer to Moses's query about Him: "I am who am".

Hm, very profound

God is simpy existence

We already have a word for existence, thanks.

[Leonard James]

Our human brains are not capable of understanding what God is.  The old testament gives a profound insight with God's answer to Moses's query about Him: "I am who am".
God is simpy existence, not just in our universe's dimensions of time an space, but in everything.  God is that which exists, in every moment of time, in every dimension, in every universe, totally beyond human understanding, which is why He had to become one of us to make Himself known.

Alan, you must be able to see that this is nonsense! Do you really believe he had to go through all the Jesus stuff because he couldn't make himself real to us any other way? After all, he revealed himself to Moses without any problem when he gave him the commandments. 

[torridon]

God, being so much greater than humans, must surely be far more complex ... but you're perfectly happy to accept that he/she/it didn't have to be created or 'guided' by something even more complex!

Our human brains are not capable of understanding what God is.  The old testament gives a profound insight with God's answer to Moses's query about Him: "I am who am".
God is simpy existence, not just in our universe's dimensions of time an space, but in everything.  God is that which exists, in every moment of time, in every dimension, in every universe, totally beyond human understanding, which is why He had to become one of us to make Himself known.

Ah, so you are actually a closet pantheist 

[torridon]

Faith doesn't win debates at all Alan. It doesn't save souls either, because souls don't exist as far as we know. If you want open people like me up to the possibility that there is a God then you are going to need reason and evidence.  Faith doesn't cut it with me, faith is immoral in my book, so I try to avoid it as far as possible. When you have some proper evidence for your beliefs, that is the time to sit up and take notice, all else is gratification or indulgence of some or other stripe.

I think we have agreed that there are aspects to our existence which at this time do not have an explanation, such as conscious self awareness.  Does it not require an act of faith to assume that conscious awareness can somehow arise out of the same sub atomic particles as we find in a lump of rock?  If you do have such faith in the ability of protons neutrons and electrons to generate awareness, then surely every bit of matter in the entire universe will have some form of locked up awareness trying to get out, pending some re arrangement of the atomic particles.  However the human concept of the soul makes much more sense, because the atomic particles then become the vehicle which is driven by the soul, and there is only one soul per vehicle.

When faced with something we do not understand it can spur our curiosity, or it can fund superstition. Enlightenment science embodies the first reaction, it is our determined curiosity to figure out how things work, and by investing in this approach and resisting superstition we gain deeper understanding which brings about improved conditions for life.  Photosynthesis for instance is a ubiquitous phenomenon of nature that we once did not understand, but because we have made the effort to figure out how nature does it, we can now build photovoltaic cells harvesting sunlight and reducing our dependence on burning ancient fossils.  Consciousness is another phenomenon of nature, considerably more challenging to understand than photosynthesis, but there is no doubt that it happens, it is ubiquitous, so we will set our minds to learning how nature has done it and eventually harvest that knowledge creating synthetic consciousness in machines in due course. Simply claiming it as magic is an abdication of curiosity and disciplined thinking and that approach will lead nowhere.

[Shaker]

A brilliant post as ever, torridon.

[SusanDoris]

A brilliant post as ever, torridon.

Seconded.

[jjohnjil]

God, being so much greater than humans, must surely be far more complex ... but you're perfectly happy to accept that he/she/it didn't have to be created or 'guided' by something even more complex!

Our human brains are not capable of understanding what God is.  The old testament gives a profound insight with God's answer to Moses's query about Him: "I am who am".
God is simpy existence, not just in our universe's dimensions of time an space, but in everything.  God is that which exists, in every moment of time, in every dimension, in every universe, totally beyond human understanding, which is why He had to become one of us to make Himself known.

What you're saying, Alan, is that God and Nature are one and the same.  True, nature is beyond our understanding but most people accept that evolution has gradually developed life from a very simple form right up to the complexity of the human brain.  To add an already existing, out of nowhere, entity to have a hand in it all, simply complicates the whole explanation IMV.

To say that God is all of existence, but then make him out to be some great magician in the sky who has to impregnate a young girl in order to produce a special human being/god that would do a few magic tricks (and think that will convince the whole of humanity of the existence of himself) is such a child-like explanation that it explains nothing!

I agree with you that it is all far beyond our understanding, but how is it then that we have Christians telling us what he wants us to do; that he  looks down on everyone; that he brought on a flood and wiped out whole populations and a thousand other things about him? 

Do you not see that we get all these stories from antiquity because the people who wrote the tales that compile the Bible had just as little an understanding as we have but tried to explain the forces of nature to their primitive followers in a way that would satisfy them?

If you really think that God is just everything their is (Nature) then why don't you agree with Rhiannion's views on it all?

[Alan Burns]

Msg 1651 AB And here comes the eternal question. . . . . . . . how do you know this?

There of course is no way of discerning the nature of God ourselves, so I am going on what is revealed from the inspired words of the bible.

[Alan Burns]

God, being so much greater than humans, must surely be far more complex ... but you're perfectly happy to accept that he/she/it didn't have to be created or 'guided' by something even more complex!

Our human brains are not capable of understanding what God is.  The old testament gives a profound insight with God's answer to Moses's query about Him: "I am who am".
God is simpy existence, not just in our universe's dimensions of time an space, but in everything.  God is that which exists, in every moment of time, in every dimension, in every universe, totally beyond human understanding, which is why He had to become one of us to make Himself known.

Ah, so you are actually a closet pantheist 

I think I was getting a bit carried away and missed out the important bit.  God is the original existence which brought other things into existence, such as our visible universe.  This universe was brought into existence by God, but the material universe we see is not God, it is His creation.

[Alan Burns]

Our human brains are not capable of understanding what God is.  The old testament gives a profound insight with God's answer to Moses's query about Him: "I am who am".
God is simpy existence, not just in our universe's dimensions of time an space, but in everything.  God is that which exists, in every moment of time, in every dimension, in every universe, totally beyond human understanding, which is why He had to become one of us to make Himself known.

Alan, you must be able to see that this is nonsense! Do you really believe he had to go through all the Jesus stuff because he couldn't make himself real to us any other way? After all, he revealed himself to Moses without any problem when he gave him the commandments. 

There are many thing in the bible which do not seem logical to us humans, but I trust that God knows best. 

[Shaker]

Do you always abdicate the hard yards of thinking for yourself in this way, Alan?

[jjohnjil]

God, being so much greater than humans, must surely be far more complex ... but you're perfectly happy to accept that he/she/it didn't have to be created or 'guided' by something even more complex!

Our human brains are not capable of understanding what God is.  The old testament gives a profound insight with God's answer to Moses's query about Him: "I am who am".
God is simpy existence, not just in our universe's dimensions of time an space, but in everything.  God is that which exists, in every moment of time, in every dimension, in every universe, totally beyond human understanding, which is why He had to become one of us to make Himself known.

Ah, so you are actually a closet pantheist 

I think I was getting a bit carried away and missed out the important bit.  God is the original existence which brought other things into existence, such as our visible universe.  This universe was brought into existence by God, but the material universe we see is not God, it is His creation.

So why do find it incredible for our human brain to have developed from natural evolution but don't find it at all incredible that this entity you call God - that you say created that brain - should come from absolute zilch!

[Leonard James]

There are many thing in the bible which do not seem logical to us humans, but I trust that God knows best. 

In other words, blind belief! Fortunately for you, Alan, you will never get to know how wrong you are! 

[Nearly Sane]

If you give up on something being logical then there isn't really any point in trying to have a logical discussion on this. The only thing a private chat with Dawkins would achieve would be Dawkins crying at this sort of inanity from Alan.

[SusanDoris]

I find it really hard to believe that AB (and others here and on GH), in the face of such a wealth of amazingly interessting, practical, useful, and life-enhancing, information can keep believving in a  not-even-ephemeral, non-existing thing.  The fact that any god/spirit/etc is an idea generated by human minds is a million times more fascinating and worthy of wonder than anysuch unreal idea.

Ah, well!

[Alan Burns]

What you're saying, Alan, is that God and Nature are one and the same. 

Sorry I did not express this very well.  God brought nature into being and set it in motion, and is no doubt responsible for the laws of nature, but nature is not God, it is His creation.

[Alan Burns]

So why do find it incredible for our human brain to have developed from natural evolution but don't find it at all incredible that this entity you call God - that you say created that brain - should come from absolute zilch!

God did not come from anywhere, God simply exists.  I know our brains find this difficult, but we have to come to terms with the fact that something has to exist and that something is God.

[Shaker]

So why do find it incredible for our human brain to have developed from natural evolution but don't find it at all incredible that this entity you call God - that you say created that brain - should come from absolute zilch!

God did not come from anywhere, God simply exists.  I know our brains find this difficult, but we have to come to terms with the fact that something has to exist and that something is God.

The assertion treadmill is up and running as smoothly as ever.

[jjohnjil]

So why do find it incredible for our human brain to have developed from natural evolution but don't find it at all incredible that this entity you call God - that you say created that brain - should come from absolute zilch!

God did not come from anywhere, God simply exists.  I know our brains find this difficult, but we have to come to terms with the fact that something has to exist and that something is God.

But if you're happy with such an explanation for God, how on earth do you find the natural explanation so incredible!  If God need not come from anywhere, why cannot the Universe have come from the same place?

[Andy]

God, being so much greater than humans, must surely be far more complex ... but you're perfectly happy to accept that he/she/it didn't have to be created or 'guided' by something even more complex!

Our human brains are not capable of understanding what God is.  The old testament gives a profound insight with God's answer to Moses's query about Him: "I am who am".
God is simpy existence, not just in our universe's dimensions of time an space, but in everything.  God is that which exists, in every moment of time, in every dimension, in every universe, totally beyond human understanding, which is why He had to become one of us to make Himself known.

Ah, so you are actually a closet pantheist 

I think I was getting a bit carried away and missed out the important bit.  God is the original existence which brought other things into existence, such as our visible universe.  This universe was brought into existence by God, but the material universe we see is not God, it is His creation.

See, this is some of the compartmentalised bullshit that needs pointing out to you and dealing with. You can't make an argument for ID from complexity while you simultaneously believe that god brought the universe into existence. By believing the latter, you remove all contrast between complex and simple things, leaving your complexity argument redundant and reduced to a case of special pleading. You're having your cake and eating it. Pick one or the other - either god created all or only the complex.

[Nearly Sane]

Some things about human beings is not logical.

What matters to me, is that people are able to live rich and full lives and enjoy themselves.

If that takes a certain amount of irationality and being illogical, so be it! 😉


We don't all want to be "Mr Spock"  but it takes all sorts to " live long, and prosper"

A little bit of barminess is good for you 😉😀

I'm sure if I met RD he'd have his own little bit of barminess, just not involving God 😃

No one is asking people to be Spock or logical all the time, but if you are trying to present a logical case as to an extent Alan has been doing, suddenly saying in the middle of it that logic does not apply means you have removed the point from everything you have been saying

[ippy]

Msg 1651 AB And here comes the eternal question. . . . . . . . how do you know this?

I go along with you entirely Savil, you do know that you wont be getting an answer, they're too busy fingers in their ears La la la la la, you know the rest.

If you'd been into their nonsense for a number of years, even if the penny had dropped as I'm sure it has with a lot of them, there would be a tremendous loss of face involved if they were to admit.

ippy