my friend
what would be the purpose to logically prove God's existance?
No matter what we do to try to have God enclosed in the little box of human logics, we won't be able.
Now as a matter of debate different points of view, well I have to say it's a very interesting topic, just to see with what people can come out.

Ok, I think for me then, there is no God. And this is because I don't believe that a deity exists by this description you gave.

Or, to put this another way, I simply don't view the world from this point of view an longer. That is to say that your definition appears to be a bit Newtonian to me.

Your definition state - "consisting of every possible attribute and/or affection thereof"

This presumes that attributes and/or affections are preexisting. Much like Newtonian physics used to think of the world of atoms preexisting.

I've moved on to a quantum view of nature. Nothing actually exists as an "attribute". What exists is a substrate that has the potentiality to exhibit attributes and therefore sense them.

Like Artgurl often says, God is like an ocean. God makes waves, and it’s the waves that bump up against each other that give rise to attributes and sensations. Without having something to bump up against there can be no sensational existence. (i.e. no attribute or affection thereof).

God is this undefined substrate. A substrate that has no attributes outside of it’s ability to produce attribute. God is “potentiality” as they say in physics.

Most views of God are indeed Newtonian in nature. We are trying to imagine a being somewhat like us. And we still even think of ourselves as being Newtonian in nature. But the universe doesn’t work like that. The universe can “walk through walls”.

So if this is the definition that we must use, then I would say that God is not only unprovable by that definition, but probably not even like that at all.

This is not my idea of what God is like, so by my own ‘personal’ meaning of the word, this wouldn’t even be a discussion of ‘God’, it would be a discussion of some hypothetical idealization of God that I don’t even agree with.

In other words, I have nothing to say about the topic based on that definition. It’s beyond my idea of what God is like.

No “personal’ involvement or emotions invested here. I just have nothing to offer a discuss based on that definition. I’m totally useless!

Miguel:



One cannot prove or disprove God's existance, that is a futile discussion. It is why I have chosen this description. I believe that no matter how one looks at God, one cannot deny the known truth in that definition...



The parameters for the concept of God must be set... as Voile and Abra have pointed out. That is what the premise is intended to do.

James:



No it does not presuppose affections' and/or attributions' prior existance. It does however, presuppose that all possiblities of extension exist within the original substance(God). It presumes one original source.



My definition, James does not conflict with this notion. Your mistaken perception concerning prior existing affections has led to this conclusion. I already explained that this was not the case.




I hope you reconsider your perception of the definition, based upon this response, James.

That’s exactly what CreativeSoul is trying to do here. He’s not trying to prove or disprove God. What he’s trying to establish from a philosophical point of view is what God can or cannot be like (given certain premises or postulates which he’s currently working on trying to get accepted )

His intentions are nothing but pure and with intention of working in harmony with others for the good and advancement of all.



I would argue that while the concept of God, in general, cannot be proven or disproved, (depending on how the very concept is defined), certain religious doctrines and pictures of God can be discredited based on their own inconsistencies or failure to properly describe the actual universe in which we live.

So while it may or may not be possible to prove or disprove the existence of a God, it may very well be possible to disprove specific religious doctrines. Or at least show that in order to believe them we must reject our experience of reality itself as well as accept self-inconsistencies within the doctrine. But that is not the topic of this thread.

I think, (although I'm not sure) that CreativeSoul's purpose here is to address the problem of trying to decide whether God is or is not provable. And the conclusions of those discussions will lead us to specific properties that God must even possess or not possess.

In other words, by asking why god can't be proven we are forced to address the specifics of what attributes God must possess to have gotten himself into such an unprovable state.

Or something like that.

CreativeSoul is not seeking religion. He's a philosopher gone haywire.

Ok, I can buy that.



Ok, I’ll suspiciously stay tuned.



I’ll stand passively by for a while and see what develops.

I’m taking NOTES!

Thanks James... for your kind words in an earlier post.

I do need to make an adjustment though... It is below... minor, but necessary... distinguishing the two 'types' of existance...and took out the unnecessary 'as we know it'...


The a priori substance of all material and ethereal existance, completely independent from initial cause and consisting of every possible attribute and/or affection thereof.

God – (def)The a priori substance of all material and ethereal existence, completely independent from initial cause and consisting of the potentiality to create every possible attribute and/or affection thereof.

I would like to add these boldface alteration to the definition based on your clarifications. This may seem subtle, but to me it’s huge. Think of it this way,… you have the ability to play tennis. Does that mean that you are innately tennis? Or that tennis is property that you possess? No, of course, not. What you possess it the ability to play tennis.

In this same way, God does not possess or consist of attributes but rather God has the ability to play them. And by playing them God creates them. In this way the attributes themselves have no true existence just like tennis has no true existence. It’s a fleeting dance.

This is the nature of God’s creation. It’s a dance of God. Or the music of God if you like. But this doesn’t imply that the music preexists within God, anymore than tennis preexists in you. It’s just something that God can do.

Please not here that this brings us to a need for further clarification of words. What does it mean to create something?

By my description above nothing is created separate from God. It’s not like God is a sculpture working in clay and creates objects (or beings) that are separate from God. Instead, God becomes whatever is created. Just as you become a game of tennis when you play it. In this way everything that “exists” is a manifestation of God.

This is probably jumping the gun and going in a totally differnet direction that you may have intended But at this point it seems to me that this falls out of the original definition. Of course, many others may disagree with this view. They may prefer to think of God as having the ability to create entities that can be external to God stand on their own. Personally I don’t buy into that view.

This is why the topic of God ultimately depends on how a person views God. These definitions aren’t going to work for someone who views God as being person-like and having the ability to ‘create’ things external to itself. They would need to deal with a totally differnet definition. In fact, it seems to me that anyone who views God as being person-like would not be able to begin with such a primitive definition that we are starting with here.

They would need to begin with a fully functional person-like deity that has no mother or father and who possesses magic to do things that have absolute no rational explanation. To them a God is indeed the personification of a magician. You can’t expect those people to consider anything less. To them God is a magician, period. Asking to define him is redundant.

In short, I don’t believe that most people are even interested in addressing the concept of God beginning at the level you are talking about here. Most people are more interested in ‘religion’ than ‘philosophy’. They just want a God to pray to and then they’ll go out and watch a movie or something.

James, I cannot accept this addition, I am sorry to say.

I understand your intention as you have explained, however consisting of every possible affection and/or attribute thereof covers what you have described, as well as what you have described as reasons against leaving it out.

The phrase 'potentiality to create' presupposes forethought... which in and of itself presupposes reason before experience... which presupposes an entity or being before creation that uses reason, which is anthropomorphism.

Leaving out that phrase is necessary as we do not want to open a ball of anthropomorphical worms... it allows way too much personification of 'God'...

Well, as a physicist I would disagree with your presumption here.

Quantum fields do have the 'potentiality to create' and they do it often and randomly.

Does that mean that they possess forethought?

I don't see where the phrase 'potentiality to create' implies or presupposes forethought. That would only be true if the thing being created was 'predetermined'. But there's no suggestion in the definition that this is the case.

Philosophical constructions such as these can indeed be painstakingly slow.

You see a problem with ‘potentiality to create’ as presupposing forethought.

I see a problem with ‘consisting of every possible attribute’ as suggesting that attributes preexist and are called up from a preexisting library or source of attributes.

So we both have our own discomforts with these subtleties. But at least we both have an understanding of where the discomforts stem from.

I fear that on this dating forum we aren’t going to get a whole lot of input from serious philosophers who will have even additional concerns and suggestions.

This seemingly simple definition could be examined, scrutinized and modified for months if left with a group of philosophers. And even after all that time it would probably be hopeless to reach a consensus.

This is why I avoid philosophy and prefer science. Although in truth, modern physics has reach the point of becoming pure philosophy as well, unfortunately. We’ve out-thought our ability to perform experiments to test our theories, and now we need to wait for technologies to catch up with our brains. So at the current time even physics is crippled. Hopefully that won’t last forever.

Understood...

How about this then...


The indivisible a priori substance wholly comprised of all possibilities of ethereal and material existence.

Sounds good to me.

Perfect...

sounds like energy huh?

Painted this thread right into a corner...lol...


Oh well, it happens...


I now stand with my nose in the corner for defining 'God'...

"I understand it better if it is put in the form of energy." But back to the topic: I have been reading through and I thought the original post was for discussion of the doctrines of religion without the argument of an existance of god or non-existance. I was waiting with bated breath for the discussion. I too had the note pad out. Philosophical discussion of the doctrines of religion without the proof of the god of the religion.

Defining god in a non-feeling way is difficult I see.

dragoness...

To James' next 'question'...



This cannot be 'known' , or can it?

It stands to reason that some form of 'intelligence' in the 'substance' had to exist.

Ok - whole new perspective here.

Were we 'created'? Well, based on scientific information we developed / evolved. The evolution required specific materials and events to bring them together. Somewhere in all this there had to be either an 'original' genetic code or 'something' currently unidentified that would allow for the development of genetic diveristies.

Some believe that only a super-being could have cause all these simultaneous activities to occur AND some believe that the original DNA could not be a matter of coincidence, and therefor can only be attributed to an intelligent 'being' who 'created' it through thought alone.

But that is just the path that has been followed for many thousands of years and so it has become a mindset. But what of other scenarios?

Other 'beings' not super anything, just other beings. Perhaps other dimensional, perhaps travelers from another universe, who accidently started a chain reaction that began a new universe (ours). What if part of that reaction, was destroying their own universe? Science fiction can create a multitude of various stories. But for whatever reason, these beings, felt the need or desire to seed the Earth with something of themselves or something they created. Perhaps evolution was part of that which was seeded so that the creations would evolve in accordance with the natural world that surrounded them.

It may or may not have been their goal that any of the creatures that developed would attain self-awareness. It could be they were merely attempting to pass on some part of themselves or their dying universe rather than to fade into oblivian. Or it could have been some grand scientific experiment, that has long since lost any captivating qualities. Or perhaps the experiment was deemed a failure.

Of couse such theories have as much proof as any other belief system. Consider all those who have had 'visitations' by E.T.. And all those who claim to have seen, touched, heard other worldly ships. Even our own high tech instruments have had strange encounters. We have pictures, testimony and we have these things far beyond any claims of other religious proof.

Now, of course, there are those who would say BUT WHO CREATED THEM?. How redundant!

The point being that one belief system is about as logical as any. And if one is acceptible than they all are because there is no proof. But as far proof goes, my 'possible' theory has as much proof as any other.

therefore - there are no god/s/esses only possibilities.

Ok Di....

You ready to play 9-ball yet?

I wouldn’t say that’s redundant at all. There still remains the question of what started it all.

Just imagine for a minute that a meteor hit the earth. We managed to get a few people sent off to Mars before the earth (having been knocked out of orbit) slowly falls into the sun carrying with it any and all traces of human existence (the moon naturally goes with it)

So now the few humans who escape to Mars succeed in terraforming the planet into a suitable place, but just as civilizations rose and fell on Earth, so it also happens on Mars. Now generations millennia down the road only have their own experience to try to decide how they got there. They would not have fossil records of evolution! From their point of view they just started out with man already in existence!

They have no record of the earth-moon, and no way of even determining that it had ever existed.

Now they really would be in a situation that appears that they were “put there!”. And of course they were!

But clearly not by a God. They were put there by ancestors that had evolved on a planet in their own solar system that no longer exists!

They would be stuck with absolutely no way to determine their true origins.

I think we are lucky to be able to know that we did indeed begin on earth and evolve out of it. That’s a clear record of what happened, and we should really be grateful that we have been blessed with that information! Things could be a LOT worse! We could have no clue how we got here!

We can also see that we are made out of the same stuff as the rest of the universe. But even my hypothetical Martians would be able to discern that much. But they would have no record of their evolution.



I would argue that this is not true. The current most popular belief system on the planet is about the least logical. The idea that a Santa Claus God exists and keeps track of who’s naughty and nice? The idea that he (being all powerful) had no choice but to send his only begotten son to be nailed on a pole? The fact that the book that is supposedly his word claims that man is responsible for the imperfections of the world when the actual evidence from universe says otherwise?

Please Di. Tell me in what way that belief system is logical?

Ok Creative, race to 7, must call early 9 (no luck) - then turn about , race to 7 8-ball - call your pocket (not your shot) I drink shots, so calling the pocket has to be enough. Bank or kick the 8-ball.

What are we playing on 9' simonas drop leather pockets or 7' Valley (no mud ball)hurts my shoulder (surgery you, know!)

Any other rules?

Any one for a 9-ball ring game - payout on the 1,6 and 9 ??

I wanna shoot BEFORE Creative though.