Why is god so hard to believe?

[Cris]

Vitalone,

God can exists in a higher dimension controlling what happens in our dimension...

That is just an imaginative fantasy.

The gods depicted by humans could've been aliens that created us......

Another imaginative fantasy.

God(s) could be standing right in front us right now. The human eye sees less than 10 million colors, what if we could see 1 trillion?

Another imaginative fantasy.

The reality precieved by our brain does not exist. We do not see true reality. Everything we see, hear, touch, smell, and taste are interpretations of our brain. Thus, only our brain is real. We can't even imagine true reality.

You will tie yourself in knots with thinking like that. But using that reasoning you cannot claim that your brain is real either since we only know about the human brain through our senses. Taking that further you cannot then claim that you exist.

To exit that cycle we can start by stating ‘I think therefore I am’. From there we can reason that what we perceive in terms of the universe, the question of a god, etc, are all within our frame of reference that we can consider a reality. For example if the Matrix was real then that life within that virtual reality would effectively be their reality. Unless you can show an alternative reality we are forced to argue based on what we all commonly perceive as reality.

Prove that gods are Fictional characters.

That is easy. There are no proofs or evidence for the existence of gods. Without factual, observational, or detectable evidence then the only way that the concept of a god exists is due to human imagination. Hence gods are fictional characters.

Perhaps your view of god is some imaginary guy controlling everything, but my view of god is not.

How we each view gods is irrelevant. If you have no facts to support your view then your view is of something fictional.

Why do you believe what you see?

I believe at least one of the outer planets was detected mathematically before it was directly observed. Vision is not the only mechanism that constitutes observation and detection and proof.

Why do you believe what you hear, touch, taste, and smell, it is only a sense created by your brain....

Then are you claiming you have other senses, and if so how do you know what they sense is real?

 

[Cris]

Vitalone,

Hmmm.....did you read my post? I listed several possibilities...

No you didn't. You only listed items from your imagination. Proving them to be possible is entirely another issue.

 

[Cris]

Vitalone,

You cannot prove God to be true/false so its a possiblity.
Cris, I listed several possibilities of a god, so there's a chance now.

Read my examples described for Philosopher using dice so you better understand the differences between posibilities, chance and imagination.

Describing something you imagined doesn't immediately qualify it as a possibility.

 

[VitalOne]

That is just an imaginative fantasy.

How do you know its an imaginative fantasy? Wait..you don't know, you just assumed, very scientific. You cannot prove the possiblities wrong, you know that it is very possible. Explain how its a fantasy? We do only see 10 million colors, aliens could've created us, and a force from another dimension could be controlling this one.

You will tie yourself in knots with thinking like that. But using that reasoning you cannot claim that your brain is real either since we only know about the human brain through our senses. Taking that further you cannot then claim that you exist.

You can claim that your brain or whatever is driving to recieve these senses is real or else you wouldn't recieve the senses. Quantum Physics tells us that this reality isn't real. But you can go on believing what your brain interprets and ignore the true reality.

I believe at least one of the outer planets was detected mathematically before it was directly observed. Vision is not the only mechanism that constitutes observation and detection and proof.

Ok...so you will believe something you see, hear, smell, touch, taste, or can mathamatically reason?

Then are you claiming you have other senses, and if so how do you know what they sense is real?

I was trying to say that what you think is real isn't real...

That is easy. There are no proofs or evidence for the existence of gods. Without factual, observational, or detectable evidence then the only way that the concept of a god exists is due to human imagination. Hence gods are fictional characters.

By that logic the perfect criminal did not commit a crime since there is no evidence that he did. And by your logic things not recorded in history never existed. If I showed you what I thought was god, you would say no thats not god.

There is no concrete evidence that aliens exists, so by your logic aliens will never exists and theres a 0 chance of them existing.

 

[VitalOne]

Ok, how can I prove it to be a possiblity then?

 

[DefSkeptic]

Quantum Physics tells us that this reality isn't real. But you can go on believing what your brain interprets and ignore the true reality.

And you know the true reality? Using what tools, I mean you have made the brain an obsolete tool, so what special tool do you possess?

 

[fadingCaptain]

My stance is slightly different than cris' on this.

I will whole heartedly admit there is a possibility of the existance of a god(s). And I am not 100% certain that a god does not exist.

This means very little in the end however. I still do not think it probable that god exists therefore I do not believe god exists. I think the chances are so extremely remote that in the minimum a weak atheist position is warranted.

Keep in mind that this is all reactionary to the theist claim. It isn't a question of certainty but probability.

PS.
For the purposes of this post god = supernatural force or being responsible for our existance.

 

[VitalOne]

And you know the true reality? Using what tools, I mean you have made the brain an obsolete tool, so what special tool do you possess?

True reality is beyond what your 5 senses are interpreting. The Brain isn't obselete, it is what interprets the 5 senses. It or whatever drives the brain is what is real or else we would not be interpreting anything. However this is very hard to imagine, like a colorblind person imagining color. My special tool is the brain beyond the 5 senses...

 

[DefSkeptic]

My special tool is the brain beyond the 5 senses...

How do you exercise your brain beyond the 5 senses? What is beyond our 5 senses?

 

[Raithere]

Originally posted by VitalOne
Quantum Physics tells us that this reality isn't real.

Not really. Quantum physics tells us that events on a quantum level do not obey the laws of classical physics, not that the classical world is somehow unreal. The classical world is emergent in the probabilistic nature of quantum reality.

~Raithere

 

[VitalOne]

You can exercise your brain beyond your 5 senses by completely ignoring them, turning them off, and then think. Beyond our 5 senses there is nothingness, well I can't really explain it, you must experience it.

 

[Cris]

Vitalone,

There is no proof that god doesn't exist. So it remains very possible.

There is no proof that humans do not spontaneously transform themselves into plants. So it remains very possible that you are about to spontaneously turn into a plant.

Do you want me to spell out the errors in your attempt at logic or can you manage yourself? But really an absence of evidence for something in no way supports the case that it might or could exist, or is any way a possibility. The reverse is true though, i.e. an absence of evidence for a claim is strong evidence that the claim is likely to be false, especially over a significant amount of time. E.g. claims have been made for gods over several thousand years yet there remains a total absence of proof for their existence.

As advanced as we are, we don't why things happen, just how, we don't know what drives things to happen, we don't why things react the way they do, we don't know how ideas are created. Why do chemicals exist? Why does life have order? We know so little.

These are all true, but none of that point to a conclusion that a god must exist.

Reality doesn't exist the way we believe it to.

How would you know that since you are using the same perceived reality to reach your conclusion?

The greatest scientific minds believed in god.

Can you quote some names? I can also state that most scientists are atheist by a large margin.

According to Nature 394:313, a recent survey of members of the National Academy of Sciences showed that 72% are outright atheists, 21% are agnostic and only 7% admit to belief in a personal God.

For more statistics - http://www.objectivethought.com/atheism/iqstats.html

God is probably more a force, the force where everything began.

How do you calculate your probability, or is that just wishful thinking?

1,000 years ago flight was impossible, no one knew how to do it so it was impossible.......

OK, but that still adds no weight to a god ever becoming possible.

 

[DJSupreme23]

It is wrong to think that quantim theory says that our reality "isnt real".

Instead of assuming certainties (liek newtonian physics), quantum theory replaces them with probabilities.

And our reality with have a very, very high probability, say:

.99999999999999999999 for a given event that we percieve.

 

[Cris]

Vitalone,

Ok, how can I prove it to be a possiblity then?

I don’t know. But that is your problem since you made the claim. Until then the conclusion is that it is not possible to show that gods could exist.

 

[Philosopher]

ok Cris, you continually point out everyones "fantasies", then prove to us there is no god. Tell us where we came from. You can't, and since you cannot there is no way to prove god does or does not exist. Until we know the reason for our being, we DO NOT KNOW JACK. And you claim you know just as theists claim they know. So this makes you no different than those who believe. You both think you're right, when really neither of you are. Cause nobody knows the answers. Thats all I'm trying to say. Every idea from thiests and athiests point of view can be disproven. So just take it as a grain of salt and move on. There is no point in arguing over something that has no answers.

The same arguments you are using against theism can be used against atheism. Step back and try and look at it from someone from the outside.

 

[DefSkeptic]

Tell us where we came from. You can't, and since you cannot there is no way to prove god does or does not exist.

The God explanation does not win credibility due to our inability to give a conclusive answer to our origins. We can look at the God explanation and conclude whether or not it makes sense with reality, in my opinion it is a outdated and primitive explanation.

Until we know the reason for our being, we DO NOT KNOW JACK.

Not true. We know a good deal about life and the universe. Now, it is true that we have a lot to learn and gather, but to say we do not know jack is a little too much.

There is no point in arguing over something that has no answers.

It is a quest to find answers, do not give up merely because we might not seem close to a definite answer, keep on keeping on. There is an answer. Stop looking and you will not find it, keep looking and eventually it will reveal itself.

The same arguments you are using against theism can be used against atheism. Step back and try and look at it from someone from the outside.

Personally, I think Cris does very well in argumentation. He speaks with a clear and concise voice.

 

[Cris]

Vitalone,

How do you know its an imaginative fantasy?

You stated God can exists in a higher dimension controlling what happens in our dimension...

There are no proofs to show that God exists, it is invalid to then proceed to assert where he exists. Without facts you can only resort to your imagination.

Wait..you don't know, you just assumed, very scientific.

Just simple logic.

You cannot prove the possiblities wrong,

You haven’t shown these are possibilities, only imaginative assertions. And I have no interest in attempting to research your fantasies for you.

you know that it is very possible.

Why?

Explain how its a fantasy?

Done already.

… aliens could've created us,

It’s a possibility if you can show that aliens exist and that they have those capabilities. Otherwise it is just a fantasy.

and a force from another dimension could be controlling this one.

Only if you can show that other dimensions exist and that such a force can have such an ability. Otherwise it is just fantasy.

You can claim that your brain or whatever is driving to recieve these senses is real or else you wouldn't recieve the senses.

Unless of course you have something that many call a soul and it is that that is controlling you and the brain is just a gateway? Another nonsense fantasy BTW.

Quantum Physics tells us that this reality isn't real. But you can go on believing what your brain interprets and ignore the true reality.

I think Raithere has addressed this.

I was trying to say that what you think is real isn't real...

OK but I don’t see how you can prove that or define it in such a way that it makes more sense.

By that logic the perfect criminal did not commit a crime since there is no evidence that he did.

You’ll have to think a bit harder on this. A crime requires that someone has been harmed, either through loss of assets, life, or by physical injury. If no one has been harmed then no crime has been committed. If a crime has been committed then evidence of the crime will exist. What would be missing in your case would be any link to who committed the crime. But the fact would remain that a criminal exists.

Extending that idea to a god you would have to show that something about the universe cannot have arisen except through the existence of a god. At the current time I will assert that I can provide alternative, simpler and more credible explanations to anything you suggest where a god is proffered as the cause.

And by your logic things not recorded in history never existed.

If they aren’t recorded and leave no indication of their impact then how would you know they occurred? If you then claim that something occurred but could not quote any evidence then you are back to fantasizing again.

If I showed you what I thought was god, you would say no thats not god.

Not quite. Unless you could show that your thought mapped to a proof for a god then you’d just be fantasizing again.

There is no concrete evidence that aliens exists, so by your logic aliens will never exists and theres a 0 chance of them existing.

No you are missing the point a little. Lack of evidence now doesn’t mean that evidence will not become available in the future.

 

[Cris]

Philosopher,

ok Cris, you continually point out everyones "fantasies", then prove to us there is no god.

Why? The concept of god(s) are someone else’s fantasies. If they want someone to believe them then aren’t they responsible for showing some proof?

Tell us where we came from.

The most promising scientific theory to date and the most likely answer to your question is abiogenesis.

You can't, and since you cannot there is no way to prove god does or does not exist.

Since God is only a fictional concept then the issue of whether such a thing exists or not seems largely irrelevant. As to our origins; isn’t that a matter for science to resolve?

Until we know the reason for our being, we DO NOT KNOW JACK.

Do you mean reason or origin? Science will satisfy the origin issue in due time, as for a reason then that raises the issue of why there needs to be a reason for our existence.

And you claim you know just as theists claim they know.

Not quite. Theists claim they know that gods exist. I’m saying that what theists have offered are baseless fictional concepts and that there is no reason to take their fantasies seriously.

So this makes you no different than those who believe.

But there is nothing worth believing. There is a massive difference.

You both think you're right, when really neither of you are.

Aren’t you now including yourself in that since how do you know that gods definitely do or don’t exist. Isn’t it going to be one way or the other?

Cause nobody knows the answers.

So tell the theists that.

Every idea from thiests and athiests point of view can be disproven.

My claim is that theists offer nothing but fictional fantasies because they have no evidence and no credible reason for their claims, how do you propose to disprove my claim.

So just take it as a grain of salt and move on. There is no point in arguing over something that has no answers.

All the time theists continue to push their dangerous ideas then it is important to continue to oppose them.

The same arguments you are using against theism can be used against atheism.

But I’m not making any claims about fictional concepts. How does my argument operate against atheism?

Step back and try and look at it from someone from the outside.

Are you truly on the outside? You are not a theist since you state that no one can know whether a god exists, doesn’t that make you an atheist since you disbelieve theist claims?

 

[36_precent_normal]

Originally posted by VitalOne
I don't understand why athiests say that god existing is impossible or that there is no god

Athiests find the existence of a higher entity hard to belive for a number of reasons.
prolific among the scientific community they tend to disbelief in a god because their grasp of the world falls into the realm of the tangible and the measurable. they are driven by logical deduction. God does not always follow logical patterns of operation. The belief in god requires faith. faith in what cannot be seen or measured or deduced by human reason.

others find it hard to believe in a higher power because they fear being controlled they refuse to answer to a someone other than themselves. others still posses a psycological insecurity that prohibits them from believing something they havent seen or directly phiscally felt.

By today's standards, Jesus, Moses, and Mohammed were Atheists, for they believed in something other than was practiced on those days, they denounced the old gods and for that they were viewed as Atheists.

they were not viewed as atiests. they merly extened upon the teachings of their predecessors and proposed changes to the current school of thought. They did not claim that god did not exist nor did they even claim that the god of the culture they came from didnt exist they merly cliamed to come bringing a certian set of new principals of worship and behavior the key idea here being principals that not theological dogma.
muhammad for example claimed to be a prophet sent from god which clearly defies the defithion of athism --"the belief that theres no god" -Mr. Webster.
1.) it would be wise of you to Mr./Ms. Flores to be familiar with the terminalogy you are using (i.e. athiest) and
2.)it would be even wiser of you to be familiar with your own faith, i am a catholic and and more familiar with your faith than you are with your own. i would recommend research as a cure.

Clearly i believe there is a god, and i believe that the one true faith is the one that the believer finds brings him/herself closer to his god.

athiem is (in my oppinion) merely uncertianty, uncertianty of the unknown

 

[doom]

Well i stay agnostic cos i believe in parallel universes,if i said i was an atheist id look stupid(or more stupid put it that way).