could you convince

[fahrenheit 451]

could anybody convince me, of a god/gods, without using the Bible, Qu'ran, Torah, the book of Mormon, the Vegas. infact no scriptures, no holy books, just plain talk, you can use history, you can use geography, any subject except religious teaching. I am open minded.
I promise to follow a god if your successfull.

 

[water]

could anybody convince me, of a god/gods, without using the Bible, Qu'ran, Torah, the book of Mormon, the Vegas. infact no scriptures, no holy books, just plain talk, you can use history, you can use geography, any subject except religious teaching.

Why would you want to be convinced of that?

I am open minded.

No, you're not. If you set a restricting condition like "could anybody convince me, of a god/gods, without using the Bible, Qu'ran, Torah ...", then you are not open-minded.

I promise to follow a god if your successfull.

What is it that you really want?

 

[duendy]

could anybody convince me, of a god/gods, without using the Bible, Qu'ran, Torah, the book of Mormon, the Vegas. infact no scriptures, no holy books, just plain talk, you can use history, you can use geography, any subject except religious teaching. I am open minded.
I promise to follow a god if your successfull.

Study about Dionysos!.......
The god of many names. The effeminate god. The god who Is the sacrament that you drink and -he walks WITH you---ie., you become possessed by him. in ancient Greek, the term was 'enthusiasmos'/our 'enthused'

what this means is that you have been conned by the patriarchy. This con is not just propaganderized by the Abrahamic religions. It is also the case in Eastern religions, and in patriarchal paganism. where the 'god' is put a ABOVe and beyond the individual.

For example....here's yer history. The Grrek creation of Olympian gods cut off any links with Earth--they cut off their tails. This means that they are demonizing the old religion which understood Nature to be both matter and spirit. Alive

In the East, we get the idea of 'Maya'. that Nature is 'illusion' and thus the goal must be towars an idealized 'One'. that's the basis.

With Abrahamic religions it is that 'God' is transcendent, and the goal is the 'city of God' or some heaven. or Nature spiritualized in some future post apocalypse. And they too demonize any ecstatic interelation with Nature, especially when inspired with halluinogens

Science. well, science reduces Nature to a dead-thing. And disenfranchizes ANy spiritual experience. Demanding evidence for anything their dogma dictates isn't normal, or verified by their precious scientific method

so you have to look at all of that. and see the roots of where it's all coming from. I see it's coming from a patriarchal mindset which adopts itself to cultural circumstances--s for example, mechanistic-materialstic science has done

So back to Dionysos. so you eat/drink hir in Nature. And you suddelnly feel an ecstaic joy, and terror. and you dance and feel erotic, and feel Nature interfused withyourself. so this means that your ordinary egoic boundary is becoming much more flexible...
one of Dionysos' neames is 'god of Nature'....you ARe now Dionysos. yeah?....also known as 'Liber'--meaning god of Liberation, and The Loosener

so THAt is real spiritualty. Direct experience. not a load of old twots spouting dead guilt-inducing words at you

you dont have to accept the god Dionysos. iam attracted to that mythical character because i also am effeminate, so i feel it empowering
But the most important thing is bonding with Nature. And Nature religion is the most ancient and best way to do so

 

[ellion]

could anybody convince me, of a god/gods, without using the Bible, Qu'ran, Torah, the book of Mormon, the Vegas. infact no scriptures, no holy books, just plain talk, you can use history, you can use geography, any subject except religious teaching. I am open minded.
I promise to follow a god if your successfull.

what would you like your god to do? if you say you will follow him does that mean you want to be subordinate to him, have someone tell you what to do and how to live your life or does that mean you want someone to guide you lead you to a better understanding of yourself, your mind, your body, your soul and your relationship to the universe?

 

[audible]

Why would you want to be convinced of that?




No, you're not. If you set a restricting condition like "could anybody convince me, of a god/gods, without using the Bible, Qu'ran, Torah ...", then you are not open-minded.




What is it that you really want?

rosa :I'm sorry to cause arguement, But I'm under the impression that open-mindedness means :Having or showing receptiveness to new and different ideas or the opinions, ready to entertain new idea, an open-minded curiosity.
I cant say as I agree with you, as the bible etc is old hat.

 

[fahrenheit 451]

Why would you want to be convinced of that?




No, you're not. If you set a restricting condition like "could anybody convince me, of a god/gods, without using the Bible, Qu'ran, Torah ...", then you are not open-minded.




What is it that you really want?

water: I sorry, I surpose it does seem narrow- minded but how do you learn new things, if you keep dredging up the old stuff, that's all I'm asking.
duendy:I'm just wondering whether anybody can come up with a strong arguement for a god.
ellion:I would not want to be subordinate to any god, but if someone can convince me that there is a god, and thats what I have to do then so be it.

 

[Wilted_Lilac]

I think it would be interesting if someone could try using history or science to prove the existence of a god. Using scripture as proof is like reading out of a story book and saying that it is true because the author says it is. Can anyone offer an argument with straight facts?

 

[water]

fahrenheit 451,

You haven't answered my question:

Why would you want to be convinced of the existence of god(s)?

water: I sorry, I surpose it does seem narrow- minded but how do you learn new things, if you keep dredging up the old stuff, that's all I'm asking.

Well what god do you want? An actual one, or are we to make up some god for you, just for this particular case?

 

[§outh§tar]

Well what god do you want? An actual one, or are we to make up some god for you, just for this particular case?

The difference?

 

[Medicine*Woman]

Wilted_Lilac: I think it would be interesting if someone could try using history or science to prove the existence of a god. Using scripture as proof is like reading out of a story book and saying that it is true because the author says it is. Can anyone offer an argument with straight facts?
*************
M*W: Welcome to sciforums, Lilac. I've been here four years and this is brought up all the time, but no one has been able to prove the existence of a god or Jesus, yet, sadly, some people still believe in fairy tales.

 

[scorpius]

could anybody convince me, of a god/gods, without using the Bible, Qu'ran, Torah, the book of Mormon, the Vegas. infact no scriptures, no holy books, just plain talk, you can use history, you can use geography, any subject except religious teaching. I am open minded.
I promise to follow a god if your successfull.

sorry,
cant be done for the simple reason that gods are an invention of human mind.
they dont exist!

 

[Wilted_Lilac]

Well then, could someone justify the reason for their beliefs? Have they personally experienced "miracles" or do they simply feel better about themselves because they're no longer afraid of death?

How can someone believe in something merely because they're told it is true?

 

[Crunchy Cat]

could anybody convince me, of a god/gods, without using the Bible, Qu'ran, Torah, the book of Mormon, the Vegas. infact no scriptures, no holy books, just plain talk, you can use history, you can use geography, any subject except religious teaching. I am open minded.
I promise to follow a god if your successfull.

I'll give it a try.

ASSERTION #1: When humans 'create', the end result will likely be of
extraordinarily high quality if the creator really cares about the result.

ASSERTION #2: The quality of reality is flawless.

ASSERTION #3: Humans are a natural product of reality and their behavior
towards quality is a result of how reality made them.

ASSERTION #4: Cars are a product of humans. We know how they come to
be and we know many correct answers as to why they would exist in the
first place (the most fundamental answer being humans want them).

ASSERTION #5: In m-theory (formerly known as string theory), there are
lots of great models about how 'reality' came to be. No theory to date
postulates why any reality would exist.

If these assertions are accepted as true then the Universe is of flawless
quality, we have some ideas how it came to exist, and we don't know why it
would exist at all. If we consider a car then we can address the quality
component, the how component, and the why component. The biggest
difference between reality and the car is the why component (we know 'why'
for the car and don't know 'why' for reality). A natural answer concerning the
'why' component of reality is that 'something' wanted it. That something
would be 'God'.

 

[alain]

the universe, when compressed into two dimensions is represented by the surface of a balloon. in 3d, its alot harder to imagine, but, using the balloon, you can see that light will eventually travel all the way round

so, if the universe was infinately old, the night sky would be literally full of stars, not a single gap. (if that makes no sense, then its cos i suck at explaining things)

so the universe cant be infinately old, so there has to be a date when it was created. and you cant create something from nothing, unless you are God. (and God can have existed forever without making the night sky lit up, he does not emit light)

 

[water]

“ Well what god do you want? An actual one, or are we to make up some god for you, just for this particular case? ”


The difference?

You have lost yourself in constructivism, and you have completely deconstructed. You are now in the post-modernistic phase of "everything is equally true", the new-age nihilsim.
Right now, you can't be sensibly talked to; ie. whatever anyone says will be yet another truth that is to you equally true as all other truths, and thus none of them is the truth.
I think you need a spanking.

 

[kenworth]

the single best arguement i can think of for a god is the question,what happened to create our universe?where did the matter come from?even if you believe in multiple universes,tears in space time,whatever,the question still stands.

 

[Yorda]

the single best arguement i can think of for a god is the question,what happened to create our universe?where did the matter come from?even if you believe in multiple universes,tears in space time,whatever,the question still stands.

Maybe matter didn't come from anywhere, maybe it has been there forever... That's what I think at least...

 

[ellion]

the single best arguement i can think of for a god is the question,what happened to create our universe?where did the matter come from?even if you believe in multiple universes,tears in space time,whatever,the question still stands.

matter is only energy in motion. the dilemma could be more easily resolved by answering the question; what was the first cause of movement?

 

[Silas]

If these assertions are accepted as true then the Universe is of flawless
quality, we have some ideas how it came to exist, and we don't know why it
would exist at all. If we consider a car then we can address the quality
component, the how component, and the why component. The biggest
difference between reality and the car is the why component (we know 'why'
for the car and don't know 'why' for reality). A natural answer concerning the
'why' component of reality is that 'something' wanted it. That something
would be 'God'.

Ooooh, so close! Your assertions were questionable, but well formulated. Then you stated without evidence or proof that "a natural answer to Why is 'something' wanted it" and then merely defined the word "God" to stand in for that 'something'.

The Creation (Big Bang, for example) is the creation of everything, the entire Universe and everything in it. If there is no Universe "prior" to the Creation, then there is nothing to "want" a Universe to create.

However, if we accept the process of the necessity of a Creation anthromophorsised into "wanting" the Universe to exist, then let us say that the Universe exists because the immutable and absolute laws of mathematics force the creation of the Universe - and that this is the equivalent of "something" (ie the laws of Mathematics) "wanting" the Universe to exist. Mathematical laws (unlike physical laws) really are immutable, eternal and changeless, just like God is supposed to be. But despite having the same characteristics as the common conception of God, and having the same effect as the common conception of God (ie the creation of all the laws of Physics and the Universe for them to play in), the Laws of Mathematics are not really equivalent to the kind of God I believe fahrenheit451 is asking for proof of.

 

[Itseemstome]

I think, given the time and inclination, that I could convince you of the probability of a higher form of intelligence than that of which we are normally aware. Lets leave out God/Gods, that's too emotive.

My arguments would revolve around Near Death Experiences and the fact that those who have experienced them are completely unafraid of death, totally changed people and couldn't care less whether you believe them or not. They are content to an extent way beyond the norm. Whether these experiences are due to some independent intelligence or some 'higher' aspect of their own minds is something we could philosophise about. If you were then inclined to look for further evidence I would suggest you look at some of the results of hypnosis.

On the other hand I think I could show a fairly convincing argument that the three monotheistic religions all originated from the ancient astronomical beliefs of the Egyptians and others. I think I'll wait and see where these remarks take us, if anywhere, before adding to that.