What is a god?

[Norsefire]

I did create a similar thread to this a long time ago, but now again I feel that it is an important topic to discuss: what is a god?

We keep discussing whether or not deities exist, and what they do, and how they work, and all these similar sorts of concepts, without discussing the definition of a deity; and I don't mean the dictionary definition. I mean the core concepts behind the idea of a deity. The concepts.

I proposed, and still do propose, that a deity should simply be defined as any intelligent entity which possesses the ability to directly influence/bend/manipulate the physical laws of the universe; or an intelligent entity which is responsible for the creation of the universe, without necessarily being able or willing to influence it after the initial point of creation.

Religion is irrelevant in this discussion, because I do not care what people imagine that such a deity would look like or sound like, or where this entity would live, or what rituals this entity "wants", et cetera; I care only about the core concept, because the rest seems to be only a product of culture, and is based on absolutely nothing (while I believe the concept itself is based on inevitable observation: human beings, being intelligent and imaginative, can observe that they can directly influence their surroundings and thus may suppose that there may be more potential for influence that a "deity" would possess)



Now here's some food for thought:

Imagine that, at some point in the future, we are able to develop two significant technologies: simulated reality and artificial intelligence. Imagine that the simulated reality is set up such as to be indistinguishable from "real" reality, because we would possess the ability to directly interfere with, or entirely replace, sensory input; now imagine that we develop fully self-aware, conscious artificial intelligences.

Now imagine that we create a simulated reality wherein the artificial intelligences exist and experience the world according to the laws we would set and regulate outside of that reality; would we become gods, then?

 

[lightgigantic]

I proposed, and still do propose, that a deity should simply be defined as any intelligent entity which possesses the ability to directly influence/bend/manipulate the physical laws of the universe; or an intelligent entity which is responsible for the creation of the universe, without necessarily being able or willing to influence it after the initial point of creation.

why insist on the bit in bold?

Now here's some food for thought:

Imagine that, at some point in the future, we are able to develop two significant technologies: simulated reality and artificial intelligence. Imagine that the simulated reality is set up such as to be indistinguishable from "real" reality, because we would possess the ability to directly interfere with, or entirely replace, sensory input; now imagine that we develop fully self-aware, conscious artificial intelligences.

Now imagine that we create a simulated reality wherein the artificial intelligences exist and experience the world according to the laws we would set and regulate outside of that reality; would we become gods, then?

I guess so .... although given that we would be existing in a similar situation to what we devise for the AI, we wouldn't be significant ones.

 

[(Q)]

... would we become gods, then?

Only if we were jealous, hateful, mass murdering egomaniacs.

 

[Norsefire]

Only if we were jealous, hateful, mass murdering egomaniacs.

Come on, I'm serious!

 

[Emil]

I think much to this question.The result is that I do not know.
And I am curious what others say.
Especially those who believe in a God(Gods), in one form or another.

 

[baftan]

what is a god?

Although you mentioned "not a dictionary definition", at least we can start with one from Wikipedia in order to discover what do you mean by "concept behind deity":

A deity is a postulated preternatural or supernatural immortal being, who may be thought of as holy, divine, or sacred, held in high regard, and respected by believers, often called in some religions as a god.

Now let's go back to your definition:

I proposed, and still do propose, that a deity should simply be defined as any intelligent entity which possesses the ability to directly influence/bend/manipulate the physical laws of the universe; or an intelligent entity which is responsible for the creation of the universe, without necessarily being able or willing to influence it after the initial point of creation.

Your definition clearly trims/excludes the central ideas (or "concepts" if you like) behind the conventional God which is defined in Wikipedia definition. These are:

1- God that requires/demands an appreciation from its/his intelligent creatures (humans only).
2- Therefore a God that becomes the central figure for a deist religion.
3- God that can interfere the destiny or process of actual reality right now (because you said "without necessarily being able or willing to influence it after the initial point of creation).

Again, according to your definition, you only interested in the very "existence" of such an "intelligent" power who is able "to directly influence/bend/manipulate the physical laws of the universe". This "intelligent entity" could or could not be (because you said "or") responsible for the "creation" of the universe.

All in all, I can deduce that you problematize these three central concepts behind deity:

1- Creation
2- Intelligence
3- Above physical Universe

You don't question whether or not this deity is interfering actual ongoing of the current universe as we (humans) define as "reality", and you don't question whether or not current religions exactly defines this "intelligent entity". These are out of topic.

Correct me if I am wrong and/or missing any point from your formulation. Now let's come to your future fantasy. Actually I am pretty convinced the possibility of such a futuristic scenario when I look at the current developments in technology and human demand for "immortality". Yet, it would be utter future-telling psychic attempt to pinpoint exactly how this system will work and how the relation between real and simulated as well as artificial and natural will be developed.

But your main question is a clear one:

would we become gods, then?

You are asking this question because:

We created this simulated/artificial, out of current reality, environment. Is that so? But who are "we" and where will we be? More precisely, where will the members of this future generation be relative to this environment? Inside of it, outside of it, or in between? If they would be inside they are part of it, therefore they can not be Gods; at least not more than their own Gods. They will become the occupants of this environment. If they would be outside of it and has total control inside of this environment, they are still no God to anything, because the characteristics of this environment and occupants (artificial creatures) are more or less same to our actual computer software environment, only bit more sophisticated.

If they are in between, forget about being God, they are simply fucked up, simple as that. Just like now we are living in between our imagined universe and the reality of nature. Our identity (I'm talking about general humanity, not individuals) is mixed up, our position is fragile -because we depend on both sides-, and we are still we; that is to say, have to deal with other fucked up creatures in a sort of society. That wouldn't be an ideal God, would it?

We can test the concept of God from the main three points that I have deduced from your initial definition: For instance, did we actually "created" this environment. This is a double edge sword question: "Creation" and "We". Because our current understanding forbids a type of creation which makes things out of nowhere, suddenly, or from nothing. Everything, bar none, everything has an history, connectivity, former processes or steps, and everything is temporal. This is true for nature and its phenomenons as much as human civilization, ideas or technology. Therefore, anything will come up from this type of rule will necessarily have a connection to this reality; either in terms of infrastructure (such as depending upon physical elements, energy, etc.) or in terms of history of intelligence. Just as our abstract, weird, distinctive-branded (by us of course) minds still have deep connections to natural structures and environment, this future system will also have some position in actual reality. All in all, there is no separate, isolated creation; neither "sudden"...

And this "We" is also problematic: As we know from our current unnatural human universe, as long as it's "we", no single entity will single handedly possess the knowledge and/or power to manipulate the entire system. "We" will depend on each other. Moreover, if we give share to these artificial conscious beings in terms of running the system, "they" will also have power to manipulate the system, they will part of decision making. Directly (as you said) or indirectly. What if we start to engage our own beings with these artificial elements? I strongly suspect whatever we invent in the future, we will first try them on our own bodies, minds and environment, just as we are doing today. That is to say, we will not allow to create a clear border between artificial vs natural; and or real vs simulated. We will most likely mix them.

Finally, if we go back to the thread title, What is God?, it's simply a product of human imagination, a fairytale, a dream...

 

[Emil]

....Finally, if we go back to the thread title, What is God?, it's simply a product of human imagination, a fairytale, a dream...

Oopssss ..... and I got a lesson how little I know.
I need time now, to translate so I can understand better.

 

[Kernl Sandrs]

Well for me benevolent entity wouldn't care whether or not I ate poultry on one day of the week for a period of the year...


And how do we know we're not an artificial intelligence in a virtual reality? :bugeye:


If we created their environment, and their consciousness, then we are their creators, but I don't know if you can call that godly. We didn't use any divine power or knowledge to bring them into existence. Just science. Now if we had them worship us, that would be another story...

 

[baftan]

And how do we know we're not an artificial intelligence in a virtual reality? :bugeye:

"Finger to the bumhole" test: never fails...

 

[Kernl Sandrs]

"Finger to the bumhole" test: never fails...

:bugeye:

 

[Enmos]

I did create a similar thread to this a long time ago, but now again I feel that it is an important topic to discuss: what is a god?

We keep discussing whether or not deities exist, and what they do, and how they work, and all these similar sorts of concepts, without discussing the definition of a deity; and I don't mean the dictionary definition. I mean the core concepts behind the idea of a deity. The concepts.

I proposed, and still do propose, that a deity should simply be defined as any intelligent entity which possesses the ability to directly influence/bend/manipulate the physical laws of the universe; or an intelligent entity which is responsible for the creation of the universe, without necessarily being able or willing to influence it after the initial point of creation.

Religion is irrelevant in this discussion, because I do not care what people imagine that such a deity would look like or sound like, or where this entity would live, or what rituals this entity "wants", et cetera; I care only about the core concept, because the rest seems to be only a product of culture, and is based on absolutely nothing (while I believe the concept itself is based on inevitable observation: human beings, being intelligent and imaginative, can observe that they can directly influence their surroundings and thus may suppose that there may be more potential for influence that a "deity" would possess)



Now here's some food for thought:

Imagine that, at some point in the future, we are able to develop two significant technologies: simulated reality and artificial intelligence. Imagine that the simulated reality is set up such as to be indistinguishable from "real" reality, because we would possess the ability to directly interfere with, or entirely replace, sensory input; now imagine that we develop fully self-aware, conscious artificial intelligences.

Now imagine that we create a simulated reality wherein the artificial intelligences exist and experience the world according to the laws we would set and regulate outside of that reality; would we become gods, then?

I think that if your definition allows for people to become gods, your definition must be flawed.

 

[Randwolf]

I think that if your definition allows for people to become gods, your definition must be flawed.

I don't know, Enmos. I realize this whole debate (if you can call it that) rests on semantics, but are you familiar with the works of Nick Bostrom? He presents an intriguing argument that one of three possibilities must be true. It is a logical gedanken, but kind of paradoxical. It allows for humans (depending on how you define 'humans' of course) to be Gods....


ARE YOU LIVING IN A COMPUTER SIMULATION?

ABSTRACT​

This paper argues that at least one of the following propositions is true: (1) the human species is very likely to go extinct before reaching a “posthuman” stage; (2) any posthuman civilization is extremely unlikely to run a significant number of simulations of their evolutionary history (or variations thereof); (3) we are almost certainly living in a computer simulation. It follows that the belief that there is a significant chance that we will one day become posthumans who run ancestor-simulations is false, unless we are currently living in a simulation. A number of other consequences of this result are also discussed.

Bolded emphasis mine. Anyway - food for thought, kind of like the liars' paradox.

Which one would you pick?

 

[Enmos]

I don't know, Enmos. I realize this whole debate (if you can call it that) rests on semantics, but are you familiar with the works of Nick Bostrom? He presents an intriguing argument that one of three possibilities must be true. It is a logical gedanken, but kind of paradoxical. It allows for humans (depending on how you define 'humans' of course) to be Gods....

Well, first off, I don't think it is possible to break the laws of nature.
And, secondly, isn't a god supposed to be superhuman by definition?

ARE YOU LIVING IN A COMPUTER SIMULATION?

Bolded emphasis mine. Anyway - food for thought, kind of like the liars' paradox.

Which one would you pick?

Well, option (1) naturally

 

[Randwolf]

Well, first off, I don't think it is possible to break the laws of nature.

I missed this part - I assume it is a reference to an earlier post. I do not recall anything "breaking the laws of physics or nature", but I admit I only read the abstract today, just to make sure I had the right citation. I have read the paper in full a couple of years ago though. If your comment does refer to the "Simulation" post, please expound.

And, secondly, isn't a god supposed to be superhuman by definition?

Isn't that the OP question here? "What is a God?" I interpreted that to sort of leave things kind of open ended...

Well, option (1) naturally

I probably would have guessed that for you, Enmos. Knowing you, it surpasses speculation and enters the realm of "wishful thinking"...

I do have a couple questions:

• Did you read the full paper?
• If so, what do you make of the logic? (Almost aside from the content)
• Had you read it before?

Personally, I'm going with option three - but hey, that's just me...

 

[Enmos]

I missed this part - I assume it is a reference to an earlier post. I do not recall anything "breaking the laws of physics or nature", but I admit I only read the abstract today, just to make sure I had the right citation. I have read the paper in full a couple of years ago though. If your comment does refer to the "Simulation" post, please expound.

Isn't that the OP question here? "What is a God?" I interpreted that to sort of leave things kind of open ended...

I do have a couple questions:

• Did you read the full paper?
• If so, what do you make of the logic? (Almost aside from the content)
• Had you read it before?

Personally, I'm going with option three - but hey, that's just me...

Heh, sorry.. my answers were basically disagreements with what is in the OP. I didn't read the paper. Perhaps later

I probably would have guessed that for you, Enmos. Knowing you, it surpasses speculation and enters the realm of "wishful thinking"...

:shy:

 

[baftan]

[*]Did you read the full paper?
[*]If so, what do you make of the logic? (Almost aside from the content)
[*]Had you read it before?

I know you asked these questions to Enmos, but I kind of accepted these questions as if they were asked to me and come up with this:


Problem with replication: This simulation will replicate the past or any other reality, but for what? And how? We are not talking about the replication of a statue or building a model of a city; not only we are talking about not less than this:

“Simulating the entire universe down to the quantum level… What you see through an electron microscope needs to look unsuspicious…”

(The extract is from Bostrom’s article)

But we are also talking about a “dynamic” system where everything has a constant interaction to everything else, “down to the quantum level”. My claim is simple: We can not call this as a “simulation” anymore; at least not in the conventional sense of the word. These post-humans must give at least a degree of autonomy to their so-called replicated simulation. In other way of saying this, below scenario presented by Bostrom is ridiculous:

Moreover, a posthuman simulator would have enough computing power to keep track of the detailed belief-states in all human brains at all times. Therefore, when it saw that a human was about to make an observation of the microscopic world, it could fill in sufficient detail in the simulation in the appropriate domain on an as-needed basis. Should any error occur, the director could easily edit the states of any brains that have become aware of an anomaly before it spoils the simulation. Alternatively, the director could skip back a few seconds and rerun the simulation in a way that avoids the problem.

This would be very cumbersome, let alone impossible: Because implication is there: Creating a set of endless possibilities in order to compensate every single happening within the simulated environment against any type of “mistake”. Moreover, the entire simulation process will aim for deceiving simulated humans: What a useless and stupid engagement! Why did I create the simulation in the first place: This reminds me the good old idea of "God created the entire universe for humans only". But why? Do human brain and its understanding present more valuable knowledge than the entire universe? Why shouldn’t I create more complicated systems if I had an opportunity? Why should I dedicate all my technology and effort in order to deceive my creation, a.k.a. simulated humans looking at simulated electron microscope in order to see my simulated atoms? What will I get out of this?

At this point, I would prefer to buy what Norsefire offered in OP:

…without necessarily being able or willing to influence it after the initial point of creation.

This strategy is clearly more exciting, informative, open to new possibilities, worth to observe and adventurous. For that, the future post-humans might have started a universe with simple rules and watch its development a.k.a. “evolution” without knowing beforehand what’s going to happen. They will also perfectly know that any interference to this simulation will practically “end of the experiment”.

Other than this, simulated consciousness can still be created and artificial agents would be let know about their conditions. They can be cooperated. Yet this is one option among many; every project, especially the big ones require an aim; at the end of the day we will use the precious resources of this universe. Creating conscious beings, fooling them every second about their reality, and getting some sort of enjoyment out of this can only be dreamt by an agricultural puppet master, a.k.a. an ego-centred God. What will happen later on? Will this God (this is “future us”) reveal his existence and “grand plan” to his simulations when the right time arrives and demand for an obedience? What if his simulations evaluate the situation and call him a “wanker”?

One more point for the propositions listed by Bostrom, about the first one:

(1) the human species is very likely to go extinct before reaching a “posthuman” stage;

In any case, if we become “posthuman” we as current form and level of human species become literally “extinct” anyway. Does he think that there will be humans, posthumans and simulations living happily ever after? We can easily call ourselves as “post-prehomosapiens” instead of what we actually call known as “humans”. How do we imagine that these post humans will refer themselves using humans as a reference point? Where does this assumption come from? Why don’t we call ourselves as “post-chimps”?

 

[(Q)]

Come on, I'm serious!

So was I. Read any scripture.

 

[Michael]

I proposed, and still do propose, that a deity should simply be defined as any intelligent entity which possesses the ability to directly influence/bend/manipulate the physical laws of the universe; or an intelligent entity which is responsible for the creation of the universe, without necessarily being able or willing to influence it after the initial point of creation.

I'm not sure, but, do Greeks Gods actually manipulate the "Physical Laws" of the Universe? I mean, you pray for rain, it rains. How do we know these Ancient Gods didn't seed some clouds with silver nitrate? Or use some other new fangeled technology?

Now, as for creating a Universe. OK, yeah, that probably takes a God or two. But, suppose in THIS universe only exists YOU. All else is just some medical techs monitoring your brain and manipulating what information it's fed. I mean, maybe you and your kind evolved normally but reached a point where your own technology allowed you to isolate your own brain in a virtual reality AND remove all knowledge you had done as much.

You may be your own God?

These other people are just the technicians you hired to keep the V world you created running smoothly so you can enjoy this vacation before you wake up and go back to doing your normal job ... which is running a Socialistic Society where you have outlawed Capitalism

OK maybe I hacked that off something?

 

[Dywyddyr]

I'm not sure, but, do Greeks Gods actually manipulate the "Physical Laws" of the Universe?

Well they can interbreed with humans.
And don't conserve mass when they shape change (Zeus -> swan, etc).

 

[Enmos]

God is one, in the world Who is running the natural system of the world, like River, Rain, Weather changing, men and women creation, died and alive etc.
See detail in the Sikh Stories which is positively pointing the presence of God.

God is not needed for any of that.