How can God not exist?

[KilljoyKlown]

No thanks, I think I'll leave you with that ground breaking, brilliant, and individual thought.

jan.

I have to say your answer (or non answer) was expected. Not to original but very typical of those born into a religious family.

 

[wynn]

You said there would be no atheists if the concept of God merely came from negating finite material things. Where do you get this idea that an atheist who can conceive of "God" by the standard definition must also believe in such a concept?

The common atheist reasoning is that belief in God is a person's own doing - this is my starting point.

But if all those people who claim to believe in God would have come to that belief all on their own, then how come that so many other people who try to come to belief in God on their own, fail?

Further, if belief in God would be a person's own doing, that means that anyone who has any conception of God would also believe in God.
Because if belief in God would be a person's own doing, then no external authority from other people or from God Himself would be necessary in order to come to belief in God.
If a belief in something is considered a person's own doing, we are in the realm of solipsism, and there, there is no distinction between mere conception and belief, the two are the same.

I think that in order for someone to actually believe in God, there has to be input from God as well.

Well you can think whatever you like, but can you find a logical justification to support your line of thinking?

In order to be able to meanigfully discuss topics from field X, we also need to accept the definitions of terms as they are provided in field X.
If we are talking about theistic topics, this means we need to work with standard theistic definitions.

God is usually defined as the Supreme Being, the Creator, Controller and Maintainer of the Universe and everything and everyone in it.
As it is said, not even a blade of grass moves without God's will.
As such, God also plays a part in what people think of God.

Secondly, God is usually defined as the Supreme Being, the Creator, Controller and Maintainer of the Universe and everything and everyone in it.
As such God's consciousness is greater than that of other beings. If other beings are to come to knowledge of God, God needs to accede to that. (Similarly as one cannot visit the President without the President's approval.)

This is the point where many discussions on belief in God go amiss, and instead there is the assumption that belief in God is a person's own doing (or at least the doing of a society).

Can you provide conclusive proof that this assumption is false?

God is not a rock or a bacterium that a human's own effort would be sufficient to gain satisfactory knowledge of it.


Again: We are working here merely with implications and conclusions from standard theistic definitions.
If you refuse to accept those, then I'm afraid there isn't much to say.

 

[wynn]

Can I imagine it, as in truly visualize it and fully understand all the resulting implications? No I cannot, and I contend that no one else on this Earth can or ever has. But can I contemplate the idea that such a contact might one day happen? Sure. Nothing divine about it, it's all derived by extrapolating on the world around us and anything else we can ever expect to see.

Sure. It is said sometimes that a mere philosophical understanding of God doesn't bring much.

 

[wynn]

Does Signal's point then mean that, because someone can believe in vampires, vampires must therefore exist??

No, this is not what I mean.

We've talked about the problems with the meaning of "exist" and naive realism before.

 

[Dywyddyr]

Let's get something straight.
You're the liar, not me.

Wrong.

You said the dictionary definition I used to show the religiosity of
some (if not all explicit) atheists, was a colloquial term.
Prove it?

Prove it? You accepted it as a colloquial term.

More dishonest diversion.
Reported.

 

[wynn]

If the human conception of God wouldn't necessarily require any divinity in order to be conceived, then there would be no atheists.

So you are saying that the existence of atheists is logically conclusive evidence of God's existence?

That would be a stretch, but a bit in line with Bobin's "Tiny bits of proof of the existence of God" (not sure what the English translation is)...

You actually believe that? (If so, what becomes of your non-theist posting-persona?)

Like I said, I think it takes a lot more to be a theist than just being able to come up with some more or less philosophical arguments that seem to support theism.
By the criteria of some atheists, I certainly appear to be a theist; but by the criteria of some theists, I am not a theist.

Most people can and do conceive of God on the grounds of negating ordinary terms, but only some take to worship of God.

Not "negating". That's apophatic theology, which is an alien concept to most conventional theists, although it's very big in the Western mystical traditions.

The comment you're replying to goes back to Cpt Bork's idea that "Every definition I have ever heard for an infinite creator is merely based on negating anything finite" and he even seems to see terms like "Supreme Being" to actually be a negation (but not in an apophatic sense).

Rather, it seems to be a matter of expanding a selected set of human-derived qualities until they are supposedly "infinite".

And this is what Bork seems to consider to be the negation.

Take supposedly desirable human qualities X, Y and Z, then imagine God as the ultimate being that embodies infinite-X, infinite-Y and infinite-Z.

That expansion isn't a tremendously difficult psychological process to imagine and it certainly doesn't suggest or require any divine intervention.

I am also not sure whether the concept of infinite-X, infinite-Y and infinite-Z are adequate to describe God.

In some Hindu traditions, for example, they would formulate it as "perfect measure of X, perfect measure of Y and perfect measure of Z". How much or how little that "perfect measure" might be, that is another question.

That's the doctrine, but I'd be more inclined to attribute religious adherence largely to accidents of birth, and in the case of conversion, to psychological factors.

I wouldn't, because there is so much variety between people. Some are born into very religious families, but are not religious themselves. Some are born into scarcely religious families, but themselves are very religious. Some try for years to get themselves to believe in God, and still fail. Some turn around over night. Some are happy in their spiritual path, some are sad.
There are so many factors, so much variety, that I don't really see any firm patterns.

But whatever it is, it's an entirely different idea than the ontological argument.

Whatever what is? Apophatic theology, Bork's idea of negation, religious adherence, ...?

 

[wynn]

Prove it? You accepted it as a colloquial term.

I, too, accept "atheist religion" as a colloquial term!

 

[Dywyddyr]

I, too, accept "atheist religion" as a colloquial term!

That wasn't what was under discussion.

Jan's "definition", the one he used to "prove" atheism is a religion was a colloquialism, not a working definition.
He accepted that it was in fact a colloquialism and the discussion moved on. However now that his further points have been refuted he's reverted to the earlier (and already discredited) "argument" in order to sustain his idiocy.
This is a typical Jan tactic.

 

[Jan Ardena]

Dywyddyr,

Prove it? You accepted it as a colloquial term.

I accepted that it can be a colloquial term, but not necessarily in the
context I used it.

But come to think of it; it is a dictionary definition which didn't state
that it was a colloquial term. And it fits perfectly with the primary definition of
religion.

So once again, as you claimed it was purely a colloquial term, I'm asking
you to back it up with an explanation.

Please, don't weasel out of this challenge.
In fact, if you don't provide an explanation, I won't see the
point of continuing discussion in this thread.

jan.

 

[Jan Ardena]

I, too, accept "atheist religion" as a colloquial term!

Did you see my dictionary definition?

jan.

 

[wynn]

Did you see my dictionary definition?

Yes, I have. I don't quite see the point of the fuss around it.
I suppose you've just stepped on some toes ... which their owners had all over the place ...

 

[Enmos]

It is simply idiotic to say that atheists have a religion of their own.

 

[wynn]

It is simply idiotic to say that atheists have a religion of their own.

What an ideologically loaded statement!

 

[Dywyddyr]

I accepted that it can be a colloquial term, but not necessarily in the context I used it.

And you were informed by Glaucon that it remains a purely colloquial term.

In fact, if you don't provide an explanation, I won't see the point of continuing discussion in this thread.

There is no point.
You have displayed your evasiveness and dishonesty once again. Reverting to a previously-discredited argument does nothing for your credibility, and neither does failure to answer later posts.
I don't know whether Glaucon was planning to ban you temporarily or just issue an infraction., but either way I have nothing more to say to you.

 

[Enmos]

What an ideologically loaded statement!

It's factual. Perhaps you can take over from Jan defending his 'atheist religion'. Lets see if you do better.

 

[Dywyddyr]

What an ideologically loaded statement!

:spank:

 

[wynn]

It's factual. Perhaps you can take over from Jan defending his 'atheist religion'. Lets see if you do better.

I already did earlier.

 

[wynn]

:spank:

This nasty Universe, innit, it keeps doing these ugly things to you, like saying "atheist religion."

 

[Enmos]

I already did earlier.

Ah yes, that was equally nonsensical.
Did you put those quotes there for a reason?

 

[Dywyddyr]

This nasty Universe, innit, it keeps doing these ugly things to you, like saying "atheist religion."

Pfft, the spanking was for echoing one of LG's more specious pieces of nonsense. I thought you'd done it deliberately.