God?

[The Motor Court Company]

If you are interested in this debate, you can try renting the movie, God's Not Dead
It is produced by a Christian film company.

A lot of arguments for and against are discussed in the movie.

 

[lowlyirvinerenter]

Arguments for a "God":

• This earth works too well to be created by chance. When we find the Egyptian pyramids, do we think they were created by chance?
• Life (including insects) is so incredible that science has not come even close to duplicating it.

Both these arguments can be rebuffed.

• Earth is approximately 4.54 billion years old. Universe about 13.8 billion years old. Life has evolved over millions of years. Egyptians and other ancient civilizations studied the cosmos and built the pyramids through a lot of hard work and observation. This can be explained about a lot of other such buildings that were built to align with cosmological bodies.
  
  
  
• Again, life forms on earth are primitive and have evolved over billions of years. The 1st known life form existed 3.6 billion years ago and the 1st human is known to have evolved about 2.5 million years ago. You might want to look at the cosmic calendar of Carl Sagan that shows how young humans are on a cosmic scale. Link to cosmic calendar http://www.cybermaze.com/astro/cosmiccal.html.
  
  So to counter the point, even for a simple life form to exist, it took over 2 billion years on earth, us humans have been only around for 2.5 million years which is why our science is not advanced enough to duplicate complex life forms yet. Although we can "clone" complex cells, "grow" things from scratch, but we are far far away from creating complex life. But this will come eventually as our science progresses.
  

Effectively as qwerty pointed out anything unknown / unexplainable to science is explained using God and religion. This is to answer questions to more complex questions (life, death, purpose, etc.) that us humans try to answer. Believing in God / religion for most people is to explain the unexplainable. No one has said this more effectively than Einstein, who did not believe in a personal God, but a pantheistic one. He has been quoted as saying the following in relation to his beliefs of a God, "an attitude of humility corresponding to the weakness of our intellectual understanding of nature and of our own being."

 

[irvinehomeowner]

Effectively as qwerty pointed out anything unknown / unexplainable to science is explained using God and religion. This is to answer questions to more complex questions (life, death, purpose, etc.) that us humans try to answer. Believing in God / religion for most people is to explain the unexplainable. No one has said this more effectively than Einstein, who did not believe in a personal God, but a pantheistic one. He has been quoted as saying the following in relation to his beliefs of a God, "an attitude of humility corresponding to the weakness of our intellectual understanding of nature and of our own being."

But even a pantheistic one is still a "God".

One more wrench:

I don't believe any of the main religions discuss life on other planets (except maybe Scientology).

However, many "intellectuals" do believe there is life out there (which is understandable considering the odds). How can they believe that because like God, they have no concrete  evidence?

 

[irvinehomeowner]

I forgot who said this, but I think I saw it on a TV show or something and someone said it's better to believe in God than to not believe.

If you believe in God and there is none, oh well... but if you don't believe in God, and there is one, oh hell.

 

[lowlyirvinerenter]

I forgot who said this, but I think I saw it on a TV show or something and someone said it's better to believe in God than to not believe.

If you believe in God and there is none, oh well... but if you don't believe in God, and there is one, oh hell.

Didn't mean to thank, but quote.

You are referring to Pascal's wager. It in itself does not prove God or it's existence, but the stacks it against the probability of finding heaven or hell against a finite loss (giving up certain things for eternity in heaven of hell shall God exist). This argument is based on thinking that there is only 1 God of a certain religion and that you picked the correct God to believe in. The flaw is that the concept of heaven or hell is based on religions and not associated with the thinking of God. If merely going to heaven is a motive you have to "choose" the right God to believe in. What if you believe in the Christian God and only a Muslim God exists or one of the Norse Gods (Odin or Thor) or pick any other religion? Just because one wants to go to a supposed heaven believing in a God is not the best thing to do. In fact, scriptures for most religions forbid believing in any God but theirs and banishes the others or non-believers of their God to hell.

 

 

[Irvinecommuter]

I forgot who said this, but I think I saw it on a TV show or something and someone said it's better to believe in God than to not believe.

If you believe in God and there is none, oh well... but if you don't believe in God, and there is one, oh hell.

Didn't mean to thank, but quote.

You are referring to Pascal's wager. It in itself does not prove God or it's existence, but the stacks it against the probability of finding heaven or hell against a finite loss (giving up certain things for eternity in heaven of hell shall God exist). This argument is based on thinking that there is only 1 God of a certain religion and that you picked the correct God to believe in. The flaw is that the concept of heaven or hell is based on religions and not associated with the thinking of God. If merely going to heaven is a motive you have to "choose" the right God to believe in. What if you believe in the Christian God and only a Muslim God exists or one of the Norse Gods (Odin or Thor) or pick any other religion? Just because one wants to go to a supposed heaven believing in a God is not the best thing to do. In fact, scriptures for most religions forbid believing in any God but theirs and banishes the others or non-believers of their God to hell.

If you make the decision that there is a god, then it is up to you decide which one is "right". 

 

[lowlyirvinerenter]

But even a pantheistic one is still a "God".

One more wrench:

I don't believe any of the main religions discuss life on other planets (except maybe Scientology).

However, many "intellectuals" do believe there is life out there (which is understandable considering the odds). How can they believe that because like God, they have no concrete  evidence?

Most intellectuals argue about the possibility given the probabilistic chance. If one thinks that life is special to earth and cannot exist anywhere else given the vastness of the unexplored universe or in fact our own solar system, one has to be an egoist. Some interesting links below about life in the universe -

Stephen Hawkings take - http://www.hawking.org.uk/life-in-the-universe.html
Drake Equation - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_equation
Ferni Paradox (against Drake Equation) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox

Interesting debate for SETI (Search for Extra-terrestrial Intelligence)
A Critique of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence - http://home.honolulu.hawaii.edu/~pine/mayr.htm
In Defense of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence - http://home.honolulu.hawaii.edu/~pine/sagan.html

 

[lowlyirvinerenter]

I forgot who said this, but I think I saw it on a TV show or something and someone said it's better to believe in God than to not believe.

If you believe in God and there is none, oh well... but if you don't believe in God, and there is one, oh hell.

Didn't mean to thank, but quote.

You are referring to Pascal's wager. It in itself does not prove God or it's existence, but the stacks it against the probability of finding heaven or hell against a finite loss (giving up certain things for eternity in heaven of hell shall God exist). This argument is based on thinking that there is only 1 God of a certain religion and that you picked the correct God to believe in. The flaw is that the concept of heaven or hell is based on religions and not associated with the thinking of God. If merely going to heaven is a motive you have to "choose" the right God to believe in. What if you believe in the Christian God and only a Muslim God exists or one of the Norse Gods (Odin or Thor) or pick any other religion? Just because one wants to go to a supposed heaven believing in a God is not the best thing to do. In fact, scriptures for most religions forbid believing in any God but theirs and banishes the others or non-believers of their God to hell.

If you make the decision that there is a god, then it is up to you decide which one is "right".

But then it would defeat the purpose if you pick the wrong one, i.e. end up in hell.

 

[irvinehomeowner]

I forgot who said this, but I think I saw it on a TV show or something and someone said it's better to believe in God than to not believe.

If you believe in God and there is none, oh well... but if you don't believe in God, and there is one, oh hell.

Didn't mean to thank, but quote.

You are referring to Pascal's wager. It in itself does not prove God or it's existence, but the stacks it against the probability of finding heaven or hell against a finite loss (giving up certain things for eternity in heaven of hell shall God exist). This argument is based on thinking that there is only 1 God of a certain religion and that you picked the correct God to believe in. The flaw is that the concept of heaven or hell is based on religions and not associated with the thinking of God. If merely going to heaven is a motive you have to "choose" the right God to believe in. What if you believe in the Christian God and only a Muslim God exists or one of the Norse Gods (Odin or Thor) or pick any other religion? Just because one wants to go to a supposed heaven believing in a God is not the best thing to do. In fact, scriptures for most religions forbid believing in any God but theirs and banishes the others or non-believers of their God to hell.

 

Ahh, so that's what it's called.

And yes, I posted that question earlier... what if you chose the "wrong" deity?

Or what if you choose no deity but still live a moral and giving life?

 

[Irvinecommuter]

I forgot who said this, but I think I saw it on a TV show or something and someone said it's better to believe in God than to not believe.

If you believe in God and there is none, oh well... but if you don't believe in God, and there is one, oh hell.

Didn't mean to thank, but quote.

You are referring to Pascal's wager. It in itself does not prove God or it's existence, but the stacks it against the probability of finding heaven or hell against a finite loss (giving up certain things for eternity in heaven of hell shall God exist). This argument is based on thinking that there is only 1 God of a certain religion and that you picked the correct God to believe in. The flaw is that the concept of heaven or hell is based on religions and not associated with the thinking of God. If merely going to heaven is a motive you have to "choose" the right God to believe in. What if you believe in the Christian God and only a Muslim God exists or one of the Norse Gods (Odin or Thor) or pick any other religion? Just because one wants to go to a supposed heaven believing in a God is not the best thing to do. In fact, scriptures for most religions forbid believing in any God but theirs and banishes the others or non-believers of their God to hell.

If you make the decision that there is a god, then it is up to you decide which one is "right".

But then it would defeat the purpose if you pick the wrong one, i.e. end up in hell.

Your purpose shouldn't be to hedge your bets.  If you believe there is a god and you want a relationship of some sort with him/her, you should focus on that.  My personal inclination and belief that Christianity is unique in both philosophy and experience.

 

[Irvinecommuter]

I forgot who said this, but I think I saw it on a TV show or something and someone said it's better to believe in God than to not believe.

If you believe in God and there is none, oh well... but if you don't believe in God, and there is one, oh hell.

Didn't mean to thank, but quote.

You are referring to Pascal's wager. It in itself does not prove God or it's existence, but the stacks it against the probability of finding heaven or hell against a finite loss (giving up certain things for eternity in heaven of hell shall God exist). This argument is based on thinking that there is only 1 God of a certain religion and that you picked the correct God to believe in. The flaw is that the concept of heaven or hell is based on religions and not associated with the thinking of God. If merely going to heaven is a motive you have to "choose" the right God to believe in. What if you believe in the Christian God and only a Muslim God exists or one of the Norse Gods (Odin or Thor) or pick any other religion? Just because one wants to go to a supposed heaven believing in a God is not the best thing to do. In fact, scriptures for most religions forbid believing in any God but theirs and banishes the others or non-believers of their God to hell.

 

Ahh, so that's what it's called.

And yes, I posted that question earlier... what if you chose the "wrong" deity?

Or what if you choose no deity but still live a moral and giving life?

Well...each religion has its own answer to the first question.  As to the second question, morality is pretty subjective.

 

[yaliu07]

This topic started to turn into heated discussion.  Please state your reason why you believe or not believe in god. 

 

[Irvinecommuter]

This topic started to turn into heated discussion.  Please state your reason why you believe or not believe in god.

Heated?  It's been pretty calm so far.  I already stated my reasons.

 

[yaliu07]

is god same as religion? or are they separate subject?

Does all these terrorist using the name of "religion" or use the name of "god"?

 

[sgip]

"Although in Christianity, the belief is only through Jesus can a man be saved, it's hard for me to fathom that anyone who leads a moral, charitable life will end up in "the hot house".

The question put is reasonable however in defining a "moral life" you have to ask "by who's standard?" Since man's standards are ever changing you can't rely on that measuring stick as a ticket to heaven.  I'm sure plenty of people believe they are moral, people who by any rational perspective are hardly paragons of virtue. What was acceptable by some in the 1900's is now taboo in the 21st century.

Since God is pure truth and pure love, that is the standard we are judged by. As a Christian, I know that God's standards are an impossible measure that I cannot meet, no matter how much I try. Only through the substitutionary sacrifice of Christ am I considered blameless and acceptable to a holy God. It is if as at a capital trial, God is to sentence me for my crimes, but Christ stands up and accepts my just deserved punishment in my place instead of me.

God hasn't sent anyone to the hot house. Never has, never will. After a lifetime of rejection on earth, a God of love wouldn't force someone to spend eternity living with him. Instead of bending one's life to the will of God as Christians are supposed to saying "Thy will be done", he answers the sinners request - "my will be done", in heaven as it was on earth.

There are plenty of proofs for the existence of a creator. Even at 4x billion years, there isn't enough time or the right conditions to create life out of non-life. Does that disprove evolution? Not really. Micro-evolution is evident today with dogs, cats, birds, all living things changing within their species. Macro-evolution with dinosaurs becoming birds, men evolving from lower species, nope. Was the world created in 6,000 years (Young Earth'ers) or 6 epochs (the "Gap Theory") or 6 literal days? Yes. A creator God could have spoke the universe into existance any or all of these ways. It takes far more faith than I have to believe that as a result of random happenstance over time we have complex and spontaneous life.

Don't know it TI's server space will have enough room for this thread. We'll see. It's been a while since one was locked down.

 

[lowlyirvinerenter]

I think most people believe in a God / religion because of teachings at a young age, done mostly to teach morality. Unfortunately more times than not, teaching morality is done through fear (going to hell, etc.). This fear and the discouragement of questioning keeps most people religious. In fact, a lot of religions tend to fight people questioning their beliefs, but don't mind questioning people who have different beliefs.

A lot of Christian denominations believe in "spreading" their God's word, through any means and bring non-believers (could be Christians of other denomination) in their fold. Such proselytizing is more prevalent in Africa and other developing nations where Christian missionaries go in and provide food, shelter, education to people after they convert to their religion and accept their God's word. Most of these people convert so that they get access to basic amenities rather than for believing in the new God or new religion.

Some of the bloodiest wars in our history have been fought due to spread word of one's God. Be it the crusades in the middle ages, or the fights between Christians (Catholics and Protestants) or in more recent times fanatics of a certain religion killing other non-believers in the name of their God. God is one concept / word that has been abused by people time and again to control the masses for power.

Once you give thought to how most religions in the past spread because of the religion of the ruler of the region (be it Catholicism in South America, and Islam in Middle East being prime examples) it becomes clear that most people were left no choice except death but to convert to that religion.

Sorry for the long post, might be a little incoherent at times, but just wanted to highlight how people abuse and misuse God and religion for their benefit.

I think yaliu rightly points out, most people mix God and religion and cannot separate one from the other, other than the "new age" believers and "spiritual" who believe in a higher power regardless of religion.

 

[Irvinecommuter]

I think most people believe in a God / religion because of teachings at a young age, done mostly to teach morality. Unfortunately more times than not, teaching morality is done through fear (going to hell, etc.). This fear and the discouragement of questioning keeps most people religious. In fact, a lot of religions tend to fight people questioning their beliefs, but don't mind questioning people who have different beliefs.

A lot of Christian denominations believe in "spreading" their God's word, through any means and bring non-believers (could be Christians of other denomination) in their fold. Such proselytizing is more prevalent in Africa and other developing nations where Christian missionaries go in and provide food, shelter, education to people after they convert to their religion and accept their God's word. Most of these people convert so that they get access to basic amenities rather than for believing in the new God or new religion.

Some of the bloodiest wars in our history have been fought due to spread word of one's God. Be it the crusades in the middle ages, or the fights between Christians (Catholics and Protestants) or in more recent times fanatics of a certain religion killing other non-believers in the name of their God. God is one concept / word that has been abused by people time and again to control the masses for power.

Once you give thought to how most religions in the past spread because of the religion of the ruler of the region (be it Catholicism in South America, and Islam in Middle East being prime examples) it becomes clear that most people were left no choice except death but to convert to that religion.

Sorry for the long post, might be a little incoherent at times, but just wanted to highlight how people abuse and misuse God and religion for their benefit.

I think yaliu rightly points out, most people mix God and religion and cannot separate one from the other, other than the "new age" believers and "spiritual" who believe in a higher power regardless of religion.

Religion is often used as an excuse to create war/chaos but it's the covering, not the cause.  Most of the popes in history were political in nature and used the crusades as a way to filter out enemies from allies.  But that's no different than most things.  Mass murder was committed by Hitler, Stalin, and Mao for reasons unrelated to religion.  Chinese history is filled with war and death and religion played next to no role in that history.

Religion is different from God.

 

[Irvinecommuter]

"Although in Christianity, the belief is only through Jesus can a man be saved, it's hard for me to fathom that anyone who leads a moral, charitable life will end up in "the hot house".

The question put is reasonable however in defining a "moral life" you have to ask "by who's standard?" Since man's standards are ever changing you can't rely on that measuring stick as a ticket to heaven.  I'm sure plenty of people believe they are moral, people who by any rational perspective are hardly paragons of virtue. What was acceptable by some in the 1900's is now taboo in the 21st century.

Since God is pure truth and pure love, that is the standard we are judged by. As a Christian, I know that God's standards are an impossible measure that I cannot meet, no matter how much I try. Only through the substitutionary sacrifice of Christ am I considered blameless and acceptable to a holy God. It is if as at a capital trial, God is to sentence me for my crimes, but Christ stands up and accepts my just deserved punishment in my place instead of me.

God hasn't sent anyone to the hot house. Never has, never will. After a lifetime of rejection on earth, a God of love wouldn't force someone to spend eternity living with him. Instead of bending one's life to the will of God as Christians are supposed to saying "Thy will be done", he answers the sinners request - "my will be done", in heaven as it was on earth.

There are plenty of proofs for the existence of a creator. Even at 4x billion years, there isn't enough time or the right conditions to create life out of non-life. Does that disprove evolution? Not really. Micro-evolution is evident today with dogs, cats, birds, all living things changing within their species. Macro-evolution with dinosaurs becoming birds, men evolving from lower species, nope. Was the world created in 6,000 years (Young Earth'ers) or 6 epochs (the "Gap Theory") or 6 literal days? Yes. A creator God could have spoke the universe into existance any or all of these ways. It takes far more faith than I have to believe that as a result of random happenstance over time we have complex and spontaneous life.

Don't know it TI's server space will have enough room for this thread. We'll see. It's been a while since one was locked down.

I agree with everything you said about this except for the macro-evolution part...not reason why God can't employ macro-evolution as a way to create human beings as we know it.  I do not believe Genesis 1-3 is meant to be literal in anyway.

 

[sgip]

From the theological argument: Macro-Evolution is not compatible with Judeo-Christianity. Man was created in the image of God and has a soul. Non-human life does not have a soul (with regrets I say this as I am an animal lover). Because of this, man cannot evolve from lesser animals who do not have souls. Man was uniquely created, set apart.

From the scientific argument - there hasn't been enough time when you lay out how long it would take to see an evolutionary leap, zero transitionary evidence, no "hopeful monsters" as some of the older theory's used to rely on. The bones we dig up show there are other versions of ape like creatures. That's a given. In 10,000 years there will be fossil evidence of the Black Rhino's, Passenger Pigeons, Dolphins and other exitinct animals, but that doesn't mean unique species lines sprung from them. To a Creationist, the "Lucy's" and other fossil records are simply additional versions of species we have around today that just didn't make it.

Out of order comes chaos, not the other way around as far as I can tell. 

 

[Irvinecommuter]

From the theological argument: Macro-Evolution is not compatible with Judeo-Christianity. Man was created in the image of God and has a soul. Non-human life does not have a soul (with regrets I say this as I am an animal lover). Because of this, man cannot evolve from lesser animals who do not have souls. Man was uniquely created, set apart.

From the scientific argument - there hasn't been enough time when you lay out how long it would take to see an evolutionary leap, zero transitionary evidence, no "hopeful monsters" as some of the older theory's used to rely on. The bones we dig up show there are other versions of ape like creatures. That's a given. In 10,000 years there will be fossil evidence of the Black Rhino's, Passenger Pigeons, Dolphins and other exitinct animals, but that doesn't mean unique species lines sprung from them. To a Creationist, the "Lucy's" and other fossil records are simply additional versions of species we have around today that just didn't make it.

Out of order comes chaos, not the other way around as far as I can tell.

Only if you read Genesis literally.  There are clear fossil records of Neanderthal and Homo erectus....yet they no longer exist today.  If you believe homo sapiens are what is meant as "man" in the Bible...what happened to those others?  Scientific evidence is also pretty clear that Neanderthals and Homo Sapien split off from a common ancestor about 500,000 years ago...you can see the transition from apes to homo sapiens physiologically...not so much mentally/psychologically.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_evolution

I'm not a natural historian but if 95 percent of the scientific community is in agreement, I'm going with that until there is reason to consider the alternative.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creation–evolution_controversy

Again...the mechanism in which the modern day homo sapien developed can be evolutionary.  Once the development occurred, homo sapiens are very different from all other species for some unknown reason...that is the God factor.