God's Existence: Beyond Existing and Nonexisting?

[mosassam]

In that case are you actually saying that having theories is wrong since not yet proved?

Hi mubashirmansoor, I'm not sure if this is a response to my post or something earlier. Just in case it is to mine - I'm not saying anything is wrong.

 

[mubashirmansoor]

Hello mosassam, It was actually a response to your post, sorry for not indicating...

In that case, the presence of god can called a theory... Not yet proved...

 

[mosassam]

A theory can be simply an opinion or something that is testable, something that can incorporate facts and make predictions. I'm not sure what you mean by theory but I find it hard to concieve how you can realistically test for god

 

[mubashirmansoor]

By somehow trying to capture the light emited from the Earth about 3000-5000 years back and to check out if mosses, jesus or Muhammad ever talk with their gods... :)

 

[mosassam]

I did write the word 'realistically' in bold type, and I'm not sure that your suggestion fits into that category.

 

[ray b]

is god dead?
could a god be mortal?

if you think there was a creator
why does such a being need to continue to exist
after the creation is done?

how would a dead creator be different from
one who got bored and no longer cares
or one who is busy on new different projects elsewhere
and has no time for finished work

BTW I don't believe in fairytales
but why must a god live forever

and or could a ''god'' be a random act
by a passing alien that creates life
without intent
like a bit of trash tossed out

 

[mubashirmansoor]

Lets not forget that the whole topic of god is man made and that we really can't prove its existence using any experiment... It's the logic which can prove if its yes or no...

So... yes you are right it was wrong to say theory, but hypothesis will go :)

 

[mosassam]

Wow Ray, that's so totally deep! Untold bro.

 

[mosassam]

It's the logic which can prove if its yes or no...

Logic can't actually prove anything, it's just a mechanism. Give it a premise, wind it up and let it go. And hypothesis is pretty much the same as wild guess. Here's a hypothesis for you - about 99.99% of people who believe in god do so because their parents do. If correct, what can this hypothesis tell us about programming/conditioning?

 

[mubashirmansoor]

is god dead?
could a god be mortal?

if you think there was a creator
why does such a being need to continue to exist
after the creation is done?

how would a dead creator be different from
one who got bored and no longer cares
or one who is busy on new different projects elsewhere
and has no time for finished work

BTW I don't believe in fairytales
but why must a god live forever

and or could a ''god'' be a random act
by a passing alien that creates life
without intent
like a bit of trash tossed out

I don't really believe in what you say about fairy tales...
As a reply I would like to qoute a sentence from Avvaiyar:

What we have learned is like handfull of earth;
What we have yet to learn is like the whole world

As a result from my point of view its too early to say what you said...

 

[DaveC426913]

By somehow trying to capture the light emited from the Earth about 3000-5000 years back and to check out if mosses, jesus or Muhammad ever talk with their gods... :)

You might be able to with Jesus or Muhammed, but to be able to tell if mosses ever talk with their gods would be much harder. You'd need a botanist and some time lapse technology...

 

[mosassam]

You'd also need a top class lip reader (or moss reader). As for the existence of god, look to the work of Ilya Prigogine on Dissipative Structures

 

[fedorfan]

In short we know nothing for sure, though nonexistence seems like the most reasonable thing after death and nothing is reasonable as far as entities or higher presences, we know nothing at all about them.

 

[mubashirmansoor]

Lets hope that someday we would be able to see a light in this infinite darkness...

 

[fedorfan]

Lets hope that someday we would be able to see a light in this infinite darkness...

Yeah, hopefully.

 

[moe darklight]

In that case are you actually saying that having theories is wrong since not yet proved?

(I know this was not directed at me but) no, a (true) scientist with a theory does not believe the theory he/she is researching until enough evidence exists to make a solid argument for it (and even then, since future evidence might prove that theory wrong again) ...

the difference between religious thinking and scientific (or actual) thinking, is this:

the scientific thinker, when he encounters a theory that sounds interesting or probable, thinks "hm, this sounds interesting. perhaps i should explore it further and see where it leads me." he simply follows a theory to explore its possibilities (sometimes it turns out to work out).

a religious thinker, on the other hand, thinks "hm, this sounds interesting... IT MUST BE TRUE!" ... and any further research (if any) is made based on the assumption that the theory is true to begin with.

---

as for not being able to prove that god doesn't exist... I can't believe people still use that argument! my blood boils when i hear someone say that.

can any of you prove the following statement wrong:
there is an invisible, massless unicorn sitting on your lap at this very moment.

because, according to religious thinking, if you can't ... THEN IT MUST BE UNDENIABLY TRUE! ... I guess we're lucky the unicorn doesn't promise to send you to a better place if you strap a bomb to yourself and kill all those who don't believe in it.

 

[fedorfan]

(I know this was not directed at me but) no, a (true) scientist with a theory does not believe the theory he/she is researching until enough evidence exists to make a solid argument for it (and even then, since future evidence might prove that theory wrong again) ...

the difference between religious thinking and scientific (or actual) thinking, is this:

the scientific thinker, when he encounters a theory that sounds interesting or probable, thinks "hm, this sounds interesting. perhaps i should explore it further and see where it leads me." he simply follows a theory to explore its possibilities (sometimes it turns out to work out).

a religious thinker, on the other hand, thinks "hm, this sounds interesting... IT MUST BE TRUE!" ... and any further research (if any) is made based on the assumption that the theory is true to begin with.

---

as for not being able to prove that god doesn't exist... I can't believe people still use that argument! my blood boils when i hear someone say that.

can any of you prove the following statement wrong:
there is an invisible, massless unicorn sitting on your lap at this very moment.

because, according to religious thinking, if you can't ... THEN IT MUST BE UNDENIABLY TRUE! ... I guess we're lucky the unicorn doesn't promise to send you to a better place if you strap a bomb to yourself and kill all those who don't believe in it.

Yeah man, exactly, my beliefs are agnostic but come on, I think religion really is just a joke, we know nothing about god or anything like that.

 

[mubashirmansoor]

God & Religion !

(I know this was not directed at me but) no, a (true) scientist with a theory does not believe the theory he/she is researching until enough evidence exists to make a solid argument for it (and even then, since future evidence might prove that theory wrong again) ...

The god that we are talking about are different from each other, The god which I'm talking about is simply the most primary particle which has existed & will exist...

Now you can take this god as a quark or conciousness or whatever...

Even if we look at the history of god, we can simply see that god was never introduced by a religion or belief it was an outcome of the primary science available to the ancient civilizations... As they couldn't explain different things or in general the existence... the concept of god was introduced.

 

[heusdens]

What if to say that God exists or does not exist is meaningless? That's the way we think of things; either it's real or it's not. But God's the creator of existence. Why must we limit an omnipotent being to existence or nonexistance? What if there's more than what exists and what does not, like a grey area in between, or a completely new category that I or nobody else could really define? Just an idea.

If you define God as the creator of existence, then this implies God created itself. Something of a hurdle, because how can something that does not exist create itself?

Therefore, such a creation is rather meaningless and utterly nonsensical.

It simply doesn't work, no matter how hard you bend your concepts.

Rather, you are mistaken or misconceived in a very elementary sense, since you want to grasp something INCOMPREHENSIBLE, namely how Something can come from Nothing.

It is however, not a mystery how something can become, where that something did not exist before. You do that everyday, when you for instance cook your meal. This meal suddenly comes into existence where it did not exist before. Just by the process of cooking, putting the ingredients into your cooking equipment, etc.

So, the becoming of something, is rather comprehensible, since this is what we observe everyday, and contains no mystery or incomprehensibility. That is because we see the Being of the meal and the Non being of the meal, in their unity, which is becoming - or in this case better stated as the process of cooking a meal.
It is clear from that that this becoming is what unites Being and Nonbeing.

However, outside of this unity of becoming, all of a sudden turning Nonbeing into Being becomes totally INCOMPREHENSIBLE, because Being and Nonbeing are assumed to be absolutely SEPERATE and outside of their unity, which is Becoming, with the effect that one already annuls the possibility of that becoming, and yet on the other hand, is admitted at the same time, which makes there solution an impossibility.

 

[fedorfan]

Noone does or ever will know in this world.

 

[heusdens]

Noone does or ever will know in this world.

Your statements reads that any knowledge is impossible.

That is untrue, since we DO have knowledge (in this world, although it is an unnecessary precisation since only *this* world exists).

 

[mubashirmansoor]

Well heusdens, your previous reply is sure logical but how will you define something which has always existed in other words as many of the religious schools say; god has always existed and will always exist, to me this means he was never created... but I do like to know how this sentence sounds to you

Regards
Mubashir

 

[brent704]

There's the "physical" world which we discuss, think, and feel 99% of our lives. A non-physical (or spiritual) world exist- although it's our nature as human beings to not understand or even take much interest in what we cannot see or touch. Possibly, this is a handicap passed down from our ancient ancestors? Nevertheless, The mind is powerful even beyond it's OWN beleif (think about how the mind's neurological pathways are developed from birth, which explains why the non-physical world is so difficult to understand) so there are many ways for us to "connect" with the spiritual world-- this is exactly why we MUST be very careful in what we believe in our hearts & minds--because we will carry that into the next life (or afterlife etc, depending on what you beleive) and it will manifest itself in one way or another. For example, we manifest and become whatever we put into our bodies. If it's healthy (all natural), we will be healthy and exemplify what it means to be LIVING. On the other hand, if we consume "junk" food, don't exercise etc we are literally, slowly killing ourselves. We must be very careful with what we feed the heart, mind (body), and spirit (or soul). God gave us the will to live and believe whatever we wish... and he makes every one of our wishes come true (in this life or the next). So, at the end of the day, it's not about what we "know" or "beleive" to be true or not-- its about what we desire (or wish). We tend to wonder "what in the world would cause one person to kill another??" If we live our entire lives beleiving we are "weak & wounded" then evil (satan, etc) will prevail in the end (in this life or the next). We tend to doubt our faith "why do bad things happen to good people and good things to bad people??" We dare to wonder things like this without even considering consequences and rewards in the next life. We must try to look at the BIG picture in order to get a better understanding of God's will...we're on the this Earth for only 80-90 yrs or so. Compare that to eternity! Does eternity really exist? The choice is yours...

 

[moe darklight]

\A non-physical (or spiritual) world exist-

on what basis do you make this claim?

 

[heusdens]

Well heusdens, your previous reply is sure logical but how will you define something which has always existed in other words as many of the religious schools say; god has always existed and will always exist, to me this means he was never created... but I do like to know how this sentence sounds to you

Regards
Mubashir

It sounds like a good english sentence.

But perhaps you want me to reflect on this?

From what and/or how do you infer there to be something like a deity existing from all eternity? How did you conclude that? There must have been some reasoning for you, to assume such a being to exist.

In most versions of deities, this particular being shows up as a "logical conclusion" from a reasoning that assumes the material world must have come from somewhere.

Of course, if one assumes that to be the case, it takes a deity for the world to exist.

But what reason is there to assume the world was not always existent in the first place?

The point is: one assumes something contradictionary about the world, like assuming that the world was not always there, this leads to irrational thinking and irrational conclusions.

All forms (or perhaps almost all, since I can't make this a too general case) of religions and religious thinking drops down to this: they assume something rather illogical and then pose their "resolution", which in their case is that we somehow must assume the existence of such higher being (which come in different flavours, acc. to local traditions).

But what we should do is of course correct our illogical assumptions, instead of assuming something out of the ordinary.

Examples of this reasoning are for example to reason that the world somehow needed a begin, and since the world can not pop out from nowhere, the higher being is proposed to fix the situation, to give a "first cause". But since the deity itself is an infinite cause, this makes the situation the same as assuming the world did not start at all. The only difference is then that this eternal cause of the world, takes on some human like proportions and attributes.

But a more logical approach would be to see that this assumption of ours, that the world would have needed to have a begin, is simply wrong.

Some other form of reasoning is for example the question: Why is there something instead of nothing? Also this question is then answered in some cases and argued that we would need to have a higher being, which could have "created" the world from nothing.
That reasoning is of course incorrect, since also for this deity, that supposedly created the world, the same question does apply, rather the question then reads: why does this higher being exist, rather then nothing? In conclusion, the "invention" of this higher being does not bring us one millionth of a milimeter further in answering the question.

The question itself is however simply wrong. If we restate this as why is there Being instead of Nonbeing, we are already assuming something out of the ordinary, namely we assume that Being and Nonbeing are only and absolutely seperate and in that manner, we don't reflect on them in their unity, which is Becoming. Being and Nonbeing necessarily belong to each others, they are opposing notions which are bound to each other (that is: they don't exist separate of each other).
Being and Nonbeing are in other words just different (opposing) moments of becoming, and in becoming it is revealed the truth of the both.

 

[heusdens]

There's the "physical" world which we discuss, think, and feel 99% of our lives. A non-physical (or spiritual) world exist- although it's our nature as human beings to not understand or even take much interest in what we cannot see or touch. Possibly, this is a handicap passed down from our ancient ancestors? Nevertheless, The mind is powerful even beyond it's OWN beleif (think about how the mind's neurological pathways are developed from birth, which explains why the non-physical world is so difficult to understand) so there are many ways for us to "connect" with the spiritual world-- this is exactly why we MUST be very careful in what we believe in our hearts & minds--because we will carry that into the next life (or afterlife etc, depending on what you beleive) and it will manifest itself in one way or another. For example, we manifest and become whatever we put into our bodies. If it's healthy (all natural), we will be healthy and exemplify what it means to be LIVING. On the other hand, if we consume "junk" food, don't exercise etc we are literally, slowly killing ourselves. We must be very careful with what we feed the heart, mind (body), and spirit (or soul). God gave us the will to live and believe whatever we wish... and he makes every one of our wishes come true (in this life or the next). So, at the end of the day, it's not about what we "know" or "beleive" to be true or not-- its about what we desire (or wish). We tend to wonder "what in the world would cause one person to kill another??" If we live our entire lives beleiving we are "weak & wounded" then evil (satan, etc) will prevail in the end (in this life or the next). We tend to doubt our faith "why do bad things happen to good people and good things to bad people??" We dare to wonder things like this without even considering consequences and rewards in the next life. We must try to look at the BIG picture in order to get a better understanding of God's will...we're on the this Earth for only 80-90 yrs or so. Compare that to eternity! Does eternity really exist? The choice is yours...

The universe is best described as an eternal process unfolding endlesly in space and time.

 

[Anttech]

All forms (or perhaps almost all, since I can't make this a too general case) of religions and religious thinking drops down to this: they assume something rather illogical and then pose their "resolution", which in their case is that we somehow must assume the existence of such higher being (which come in different flavours, acc. to local traditions).

An Assumption is an assumption. Nothing more, to assume there is or isn't something is still just an assumption.
When you don't know all the fact, or rather can't understand all the facts about something, that something being our universe IMHO it is completely illogical to conclude anything without proper testing of your conclusion. So how do you test your hypothesis, since you don't believe there is a god, you must be able to test your believe.. right?

But what we should do is of course correct our illogical assumptions, instead of assuming something out of the ordinary.

Try telling that to a QM expert

The question itself is however simply wrong. If we restate this as why is there Being instead of Nonbeing, we are already assuming something out of the ordinary, namely we assume that Being and Nonbeing are only and absolutely separate and in that manner, we don't reflect on them in their unity, which is Becoming. Being and Nonbeing necessarily belong to each others, they are opposing notions which are bound to each other (that is: they don't exist separate of each other).
Being and Nonbeing are in other words just different (opposing) moments of becoming, and in becoming it is revealed the truth of the both.

ermm so let me get this straight, you are saying that no god exists and god exists are the same thing? Each have to exist as one because they are the opposite of one another? Like The computer I am typing on now, and the no computer I am typing on now?

 

[heusdens]

An Assumption is an assumption. Nothing more, to assume there is or isn't something is still just an assumption.
When you don't know all the fact, or rather can't understand all the facts about something, that something being our universe IMHO it is completely illogical to conclude anything without proper testing of your conclusion. So how do you test your hypothesis, since you don't believe there is a god, you must be able to test your believe.. right?

What is there to test?

The issue is rather reversed, those people claiming the theory of the existence of a deity should make their case clear, and since they can't we must conclude that their theory doesn't hold water.

Try telling that to a QM expert

QM only shows that some of our daily logical assumptions don't hold true in the quantum world.

ermm so let me get this straight, you are saying that no god exists and god exists are the same thing? Each have to exist as one because they are the opposite of one another? Like The computer I am typing on now, and the no computer I am typing on now?

You didn't get it.

Let us say: your computer (the being of it) is something that became a computer, which involved the process of manufacuring the components of the computer and assemble it, right?

Now this proces of 'becoming a computer' is the simultanious being and annulling of it's non-being of that computer. In that way (by the way of making a computer) the being of the computer and the non-being of that computer belong together, as they are two moments of the becoming of that computer.

Hope you get that?

 

[setAI]

I think the consequence of the Church-Turing thesis and computation in general is that any classical or quantum computer capable of performing [at most] a number of operations in it's lifetime equivalent to the amount of information in the observed universe- would be functionally equivalent to God in every conceivable way-

Seth Lloyd says that the universe contains about 10^90 bits of information and has performed 10^120 operational steps since the big bang- this means that even without considering the Beckenstein Bound or the locality of an observer and the severe limitations on information they impose- any computer in the Cosmos that can in it's lifetime perform 10^120 operations [regardless of 'how long' this takes relative to the computer's 'hardware'] is capable of computing the states/history of any possible intelligence including YOU and also including any form of super intelligence up to and including the entire Hubble Volume configured as a single 'supermind'- and universal computation on this scale means that such forms of super intelligence could simulate/manipulate/emulate/access information from any other conceivable universe/mind/being [with similar causality/locality]-

if the Universe is spatially infinite and/or exists as part of a multiverse- then there must exist an infinitude of such intelligent minds/computers both natural and artificial- each equivalent to God- in that they can simulate worlds as complex as ours- and thus can control create worlds/people/ histories equivalent to ours- they would intimately know any possible being intimately- know any possible thought or memory- compute all possible histories of any possible world or life- manipulate and create physical laws by simply applying the desired rule-system as a program- and each of these infinite number of intelligent computers would by definition be identical and INCLUSIVE of the others- as they could compute/access the precise states and histories of any possible equal or lesser intelligence as easily as their own [Principle of Computational Equivalence]- in essence this infinite pantheon would really be One- and would include all possible universes/gods/worlds/people in it's computation space

so God probably exists- as a sysop of sorts

 

[Anttech]

Let us say: your computer (the being of it) is something that became a computer, which involved the process of manufacuring the components of the computer and assemble it, right?

Now this proces of 'becoming a computer' is the simultanious being and annulling of it's non-being of that computer. In that way (by the way of making a computer) the being of the computer and the non-being of that computer belong together, as they are two moments of the becoming of that computer.

Hope you get that?

Yes I got it (I think); but it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. It seems you are saying that the process of *becoming* a computer means that the *no computer* annuls and the *computer* starts to exist. I don't see how you can annul something that doesn't exist, unless perhaps in retrospect, after knowing of the existence of that said something...

Seems to me to be a circular argument...