An Open Question

[Quantum Obscurity]

I'm a 17 year old, I'm a philosophy student, and I am an atheist.
I was raised in a christian family, but lost my faith around the age of 16. I am simply seeking A) An interesting debate, I love arguments. B) Any attempts to reconvert me, I'm not totally closed minded, in fact I remain entirely accepting of all other major religions, provided they tolerate my decision not to believe.

To make one final point, I am not here with aims to "troll" as it seems many other atheists are doing. All this does is lower opinions of atheists, and helps no one. I am here for proper arguement. For starters:
What makes you believe God exists?

Footnote: None of this is intended to be offensive, it is simply a question.

 

[Elioenai26]

I'm a 17 year old, I'm a philosophy student, and I am an atheist.
I was raised in a christian family, but lost my faith around the age of 16. I am simply seeking A) An interesting debate, I love arguments. B) Any attempts to reconvert me, I'm not totally closed minded, in fact I remain entirely accepting of all other major religions, provided they tolerate my decision not to believe.

To make one final point, I am not here with aims to "troll" as it seems many other atheists are doing. All this does is lower opinions of atheists, and helps no one. I am here for proper arguement. For starters:
What makes you believe God exists?

Footnote: None of this is intended to be offensive, it is simply a question.

Ever since I was able to understand how vast the world was and how beautiful it was, especially when looking up at the stars on a clear dark night, I knew instinctively, intuitively that God existed because I knew that it all had to have come together somehow. I was a young lad at the time and as I grew, I had the awesome privilege of having access to many books because I liked to read. One of those books was a Bible. I read parts of Genesis specifically the creation account and it spoke to me in a way that was meaningful and it made sense of what I perceived the world to be.

As I continued to grow, I found myself becoming engaged in making a living being at this point a young adult. I became more and more focused on myself and trying to establish myself in the world and had goals to live comfortably and luxuriously. In my attempt to do this, I became, over time, a cold hard hearted, self centered ,egotistical lover of pleasure and money. Shortly thereafter, all of this was taken from me and for the first time in my life I saw myself as completely helpless. Along the way I had hurt many people and done much wrong. It was during this period of clarity and contemplation that God began calling to my remembrance those things I had learned as a wee lad. I then remembered the story of Jesus and how it was recorded that He went about doing good and healing all of those who were sick and oppressed. I remembered how it was written that in spite of His great love and charity, He was betrayed by His own people and sentenced to be crucified. But that was not the end. I remembered how on the third day according to scripture He was raised to life for me. For me! I saw it all clearly in that rapturous moment, and I fell to my knees and prayed: "Lord! Have mercy on me, a sinner!"

At that moment the presence of Almighty God in the person of the Holy Spirit came down upon me and entered into me like a flood of warmth that I shall never forget. I had been born from above by the eternal life of God. It was in that moment that Christ fulfilled in me that which He had spoken: "He who comes to Me, I will in no wise cast out", and "...that they may all be one; even as You Father, are in Me, and I in You, that they may also be in Us; that the world may believe that You did send me. "

That belief grew into knowledge and is growing more and more as the end of my life draws to a close. I am 27 now, and I have written these things that you might know and believe in Him who is true.

 

[Quantum Obscurity]

I knew instinctively, intuitively that God existed

Before I read the rest, can I just ask how you know it was intuitive? You came up with the theory of a God entirely independantly, you had absolutely no knowledge or concept of God before this moment? Thats a fairly intellectual insight for one so young. One I can't, I'm afraid, believe.

 

[Going Merry]

i find it hard to doubt his existence
i just want to believe correcttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttty

i left the t's to show you i almost fell asleep typing this

 

[Elioenai26]

Before I read the rest, can I just ask how you know it was intuitive? You came up with the theory of a God entirely independantly, you had absolutely no knowledge or concept of God before this moment? Thats a fairly intellectual insight for one so young. One I can't, I'm afraid, believe.

Im glad you asked.

As a young lad I often used to think about how things worked. You know the kid who likes to take things apart like their Tonka toys and stuff and then put them back together. Well I just kinda looked around from toys to bigger things like cars and trucks and then airplanes and bigger things like that. I then looked at stuff adults take for granted like water in a glass, or dogs and cats and a cat's eyes how they look and why they have whiskers. I knew all of these things "worked" kinda like my little toys. As I got older, 10, 11 maybe I really became interested in how stars twinkled and how the sun was warm on my skin. All of these things I could not explain, but they "spoke to my mind, my heart " as if to say "we are here and we too work and have a purpose".

Of course as I mentioned earlier I was young and didn't know how planets or the sun worked, but I knew they were big and far away. and I knew that even though men could make cars and trucks and airplanes , they could not make those things.

So, in my mind I just kept going back and back as far as my little mind could carry me. I said to myself that there are many stars and space is big, but what came before space? and then I looked at my mommy and daddy and I said: they were once little like I am, but that means they had a mommy and a daddy, and if that was true, then their mommy and daddy had a mommy and a daddy and all the way back and then I remembered in Genesis how it said that God created Adam and Eve. So I understood that that was how we began. But it said God made Adam and Eve and then I said: "well who made God?" So I just kept reading and when I came to the part where God said: "From everlasting to everlasting I AM God" and again: "I AM The Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end", I just knew He was always there. I didn't know much about alpha and omega, but I knew what words like everlasting and eternal meant.

 

[dlamberth]

For starters:
What makes you believe God exists?

For me, God is Love and God is also Life. So when I see acts of Love with in life around me, I know God exist because when I look at that Love, I see the Divine there.

.

 

[EddyMabo]

I'm a 17 year old, I'm a philosophy student, and I am an atheist.
I was raised in a christian family, but lost my faith around the age of 16. I am simply seeking A) An interesting debate, I love arguments. B) Any attempts to reconvert me, I'm not totally closed minded, in fact I remain entirely accepting of all other major religions, provided they tolerate my decision not to believe.

To make one final point, I am not here with aims to "troll" as it seems many other atheists are doing. All this does is lower opinions of atheists, and helps no one. I am here for proper arguement. For starters:
What makes you believe God exists?

Footnote: None of this is intended to be offensive, it is simply a question.

The tens of thousands of children under five who die every day from easily preventable diseases. Proof that he is just as wicked as in the Bible.

 

[ranunculus]

The tens of thousands of children under five who die every day from easily preventable diseases. Proof that he is just as wicked as in the Bible.

That seems more consistent with a universe void of any caring deities.

 

[ranunculus]

But it said God made Adam and Eve and then I said: "well who made God?" So I just kept reading and when I came to the part where God said: "From everlasting to everlasting I AM God" and again: "I AM The Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end", I just knew He was always there. I didn't know much about alpha and omega, but I knew what words like everlasting and eternal meant.

I'm addressing this because this argument is my personal pet peeve. Everything needs a beginning, the universe exists, the universe had a beginning. God exists, god didn't have a beginning. This is special pleading and you've disproved your premise that everything needs a beginning.
You can't just define non causality as a property of your god and be done with it, thinking you've just explained something.

 

[Paradoxum]

These arguments all see to sounds like they are based on personal intuition and 'God of the gaps'.

I'm addressing this because this argument is my personal pet peeve. Everything needs a beginning, the universe exists, the universe had a beginning. God exists, god didn't have a beginning. This is special pleading and you've disproved your premise that everything needs a beginning.
You can't just define non causality as a property of your god and be done with it, thinking you've just explained something.

I think it is fair to say that some things don't have a beginning. Something has to be the fundamental existence of reality even if it is basic equations or logic. I also think it is fair (but not necessarily correct) to think that God is the sort of thing that might be able to be timelessly eternal. The problem is that it is hard to prove that God is a better candidate then any other possible first cause.

 

[Quantum Obscurity]

then I remembered in Genesis how it said that God created Adam and Eve.

I think you may have missed my point, I was suggesting, whether you meant it to or not, that your first statement pointed out that you arrived at the conclusion of God A Priori (Independant from experience), but in saying this you suggest that your idea of God, as with everyone else, stems from things you read or are told by the people you grow up with. There has never been a recorded situation where someone arrived at the conclusion of the existance of a deity without either the Bible or their communities pointing them towards that.

 

[Quantum Obscurity]

. I also think it is fair (but not necessarily correct) to think that God is the sort of thing that might be able to be timelessly eternal.

The problem I have with this is that, everything material ages. Time goes on. Nothing lasts for ever, not even the strongest materials we know of, eg. Diamond will last forever; thus everything has an end, and most therefore a beggining, because to suggest that an ending exists, one must have also started in order to reach that end.
The only way anything could be eternal is if something immaterial were to exist, which is a common suggestion of Substance Dualism. The problem with this theory is that if God were real, and were eternal, it must be immaterial. The laws of logic and science dictate that for anything to interact it must share similar properties. When a billiard ball strikes another, it transfers kenetic energy, because both balls have a mass, velocity (0 if stationary, but still a velocity) and other physical properties. If God were real and therefore immaterial, he would not be able to create or influence anything within the material world. The bible teaches that God is omnipotent, so would be able to interact with the world. The only ways out of this is to suggest one of 3 things. 1. God is material, yet real, and therefore is not eternal, and cannot be omnipotent. 2. God is real, yet immaterial, and therefore not omnipotent as he cannot influence anything in the universe that is material. 3.God is not real, because the concept of omnipotence and omniscience defy anything logical.

These is the primary reason I lost my faith.

 

[dysert]

I'm a 17 year old, I'm a philosophy student, and I am an atheist.

I was a philosophy student once. If you're not careful it can really mess you up. (For that matter, I was a 17-year-old once too ;-)

I was raised in a christian family, but lost my faith around the age of 16.

Please don't take offense (none is intended), but being raised in a Christian family does not make you a Christian. So it's quite possible that you didn't have any "faith" to lose.

I am simply seeking A) An interesting debate, I love arguments.

I like debates too, but I'm not interested in arguing.

What makes you believe God exists?

A few reasons:

1. The Bible. I think it extremely unlikely that such a document (e.g., without errors, without contradictions, with fulfilled prophecy) could have been generated and maintained without supernatural involvement.
2. The existence of the physical world. I can't imagine life coming from non-life or physical matter existing forever. Seems there had to be a beginning to the physical world, so in my mind there must have been Someone outside the physical world to get it all going.
3. The complexity of the physical world. It seems quite implausible to me that such complexity as the brain, the eye, etc., could have "just happened" even over billions of years.

Good luck in your quest.

 

[Quantum Obscurity]

Please don't take offense (none is intended), but being raised in a Christian family does not make you a Christian. So it's quite possible that you didn't have any "faith" to lose.

As a quick point, while this is true, I did believe. I was actually quite protective of my beliefs too, until I looked properly.

A few reasons:

1. The Bible. I think it extremely unlikely that such a document (e.g., without errors, without contradictions, with fulfilled prophecy) could have been generated and maintained without supernatural involvement.
2. The existence of the physical world. I can't imagine life coming from non-life or physical matter existing forever. Seems there had to be a beginning to the physical world, so in my mind there must have been Someone outside the physical world to get it all going.
3. The complexity of the physical world. It seems quite implausible to me that such complexity as the brain, the eye, etc., could have "just happened" even over billions of years.

Good luck in your quest.

The problems I have here, are that the bible DOES have some fairly significant contradictions. 1. It suggests that Satan is the route of all evil, yet god kills millions while Satan, through the entire book, kills a total of 10 people. 2. God spends the entire old testament being cruel and vengeful, yet in the new testament he becomes friendly and forgiving.

Also, while science doesn't explain everything yet, that is because we are a tiny, insiginificant species within a nigh on infinite universe, and we can only observe 0.3% of the known universe, and beyond that it could be bigger than we even know! We cannot possibly expect to know everything, but we don't need to turn to supernatural theories just because we don't know everything yet.

 

[EddyMabo]

A few reasons:

1. The Bible. I think it extremely unlikely that such a document (e.g., without errors, without contradictions

So, you haven't read the bible...

The complexity of the physical world. It seems quite implausible to me that such complexity as the brain, the eye, etc., could have "just happened" even over billions of years.Good luck in your quest.

..or science text books?

 

[Paradoxum]

The problem I have with this is that, everything material ages. Time goes on. Nothing lasts for ever, not even the strongest materials we know of, eg. Diamond will last forever; thus everything has an end, and most therefore a beggining, because to suggest that an ending exists, one must have also started in order to reach that end.

I'm not sure if it is true that one needs a beginning to have an end (maybe it one does), but since I believe the Universe had a beginning this is an ok assumption of most physical things.

The only way anything could be eternal is if something immaterial were to exist, which is a common suggestion of Substance Dualism. The problem with this theory is that if God were real, and were eternal, it must be immaterial.

What does immaterial mean? Later on in the post you seem to assume 'immaterial' is a type of substance that can only interact with other immaterial substances.

If you mean to say God is a substance than I would disagree. God can be conceived of as simply the basic foundational existence of reality. God isn't any 'thing' but rather the foundation of everything. This is not pantheism but panentheism.

(This is my understanding of God before my loss of faith).

The laws of logic and science dictate that for anything to interact it must share similar properties.

I agree that that is true in science, but what law of logic dictates this?

I think the important thing to note here is the definition of 'interact'. I am pretty sure the common understanding of that word doesn't apply to God.

Also note that I am not a theist, I am simply arguing against you because I think your argument is incorrect.

When a billiard ball strikes another, it transfers kenetic energy, because both balls have a mass, velocity (0 if stationary, but still a velocity) and other physical properties. If God were real and therefore immaterial, he would not be able to create or influence anything within the material world.

The problem with this is that it assumes God is a substance separate from the material. If God holds all things in existence at all times then God is connected to all things at all times. In some sense all things are part of God.

The bible teaches that God is omnipotent, so would be able to interact with the world. The only ways out of this is to suggest one of 3 things. 1. God is material, yet real, and therefore is not eternal, and cannot be omnipotent. 2. God is real, yet immaterial, and therefore not omnipotent as he cannot influence anything in the universe that is material. 3.God is not real, because the concept of omnipotence and omniscience defy anything logical.

4. Everything is in God, but God is also more than merely the universe. God can influence the universe in that He can influence Himself/ the basic existence of all things.

These is the primary reason I lost my faith.

Well in my opinion it isn't a good reason, but there are good reasons to doubt. I hope you don't mind my criticism.

Please don't take offense (none is intended), but being raised in a Christian family does not make you a Christian. So it's quite possible that you didn't have any "faith" to lose.

True, but that doesn't mean that every teenager who loses faith never was a Christian to begin with. Not to sound big headed, but if I was never a Christian in my teenage years then no teenager is a Christian.

 

[Elioenai26]

I'm addressing this because this argument is my personal pet peeve. Everything needs a beginning, the universe exists, the universe had a beginning. God exists, god didn't have a beginning. This is special pleading and you've disproved your premise that everything needs a beginning.
You can't just define non causality as a property of your god and be done with it, thinking you've just explained something.

You state that everything needs a beginning. This is incorrect. Logicians maintain that everything that begins to exist must have a cause. God never began to exist but has always existed, therefore He needs no cause.

The scripture teaches us that God is uncaused, and timelessly eternal, meaning He has the attribute of aseity, meaning that He is uncaused. This of course is not empirically verifiable or falsifiable. It is understood by faith. J.I. Packer explains it by saying: God's self existence is basic truth. At the outset of his presentation of the unknown God to the Athenian idolaters, Paul explained that this God, the world's Creator, is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because He Himself gives all men life and breath and everything else (Acts 17:23-25). Sacrifices offered to idols, in today's tribal religions as in ancient Athens, are thought of as somehow keeping the god going, but the Creator (the I AM) needs no such support system. The word aseity, meaning that he has life in himself and draws his unending energy from Himself (a se in Latin means from himself), was coined by theologians to express this truth, which the Bible makes clear. (Packer, J.I., 26-27).

 

[Elioenai26]

The tens of thousands of children under five who die every day from easily preventable diseases. Proof that he is just as wicked as in the Bible.

I have an honest question and it is not only for you, but for everyone who uses this as an argument.

How many children have you ministered to and tried to help become better who have preventable diseases? How much time, effort, and money have you put into the care and service of these little ones?

It seems to me that humans should be held responsible for this tragic occurance which amounts to turning a blind eye away from the misery and heartbreak of so many people. Hunger, many preventable diseases etc. etc. could all be cured if selfish people would stop thinking of themselves and help their fellow neighbor, something that Christ commands us to do.

America can send men to the moon and do all kinds of other things that take billions of dollars to see come to pass, but they can't help children with common ailments, which when not treated, can be life threatning. Other countries are to blame as well. It is a testimony to the moral bankruptcy of people that this happens, not God.

 

[Quantum Obscurity]

How many children have you ministered to and tried to help become better who have preventable diseases? How much time, effort, and money have you put into the care and service of these little ones?

The point here is that, if God is A) Omniscient, B) Omnipotent and C) Loves all his creatures
Why did he create pain and suffering for them in the first place? He either A) Doesn't know, therefore is not omniscient, B) Can't do anything about it, therefore not omnipotent or C) Doesn't care enough to do anything about it.
Or there is the simple D) He doesn't exist to do anything about it.

 

[Elioenai26]

I think you may have missed my point, I was suggesting, whether you meant it to or not, that your first statement pointed out that you arrived at the conclusion of God A Priori (Independant from experience), but in saying this you suggest that your idea of God, as with everyone else, stems from things you read or are told by the people you grow up with. There has never been a recorded situation where someone arrived at the conclusion of the existance of a deity without either the Bible or their communities pointing them towards that.

I arrived at the conclusion that something or someone had to make all the things that I was seeing when I was a little kid. I did'nt sit down and try to label everything and give it a name or definition. I just knew that it came from somewhere. That is all im saying. I knew that this was the case, because to me, to think that it just popped into existence one day on its own was not in keeping with the reality that i was experiencing. I knew Tonka toys were made by people in a factory just like cars and trucks were. I knew that my mommy and daddy came from somewhere. They didnt just appear into thin air one day. The mind of a child is able to receive and understand things that an enlightened intellectual mind oftentimes overlooks. What an intellectual adult dismisses as illusory or fantasy, a child can accept. A child who has not been corrupted by the teachings of so called "intellectuals" can receive deeper insight into the mysteries of the universe because he has not been trained to think a certain way, or to reject certain thoughts as untrue. A child simply observes what is going on around them and understands them simply. They may express their thoughts crudely, but their knowledge is not crude. They have no preconceived opinions or ideas that their perceptions must be filtered through, and therefore plainly see reality as it is.

When I read the Genesis account, it was in agreement with what I already perceived reality to be like. I understood that something or someone had to make the first humans. Thats all im saying. The Genesis account gave names and labels to those things I knew to exist intuitively. When I say intuitively, im speaking of all the powers of reasoning when combined together, that form a picture or understanding of reality.

I hope this clears things up a wee bit.