Atheists, define 'God'

[mark kennedy]

I guess the first order of business would be to determine the singular meaning. I'm not talking about a plurality of beliefs, names or conventions just a literal meaning for the core term. I suppose things like attributes, etymology and phenomenal manifestations would be important but I'm curious how atheists handle the transcendence. To put it in layman's terms, what is the unifying theme of atheism and the theistic a priori of God's eternal nature?

Whenever I get into these philosophical issues the first thing that comes up is something like, 'what do you mean by...?'. Ok, let's start with that one this time, what do you mean by 'God'? The alternative as far as I can tell is that atheism is simply contrary and contentious skepticism, existing solely in the negation of a philosophical system with not definitive epistemology of it's own.

Please feel free to respond as you see fit, I only mean to stimulate conversation, nothing more. I'm just throwing out some random thoughts on an epistemology I find ambiguous. BTW, if the subject interests you and I don't return in a timely fashion your invited to drop me a PM as a reminder at your discretion.

You thoughts...
Mark

 

[Davian]

When has "God" ever been properly defined?

 

[EddyMabo]

Fictional character?

 

[Skavau]

That's up to you guys, but broadly:

A supernatural entity responsible for the creation of the entire universe.

That's the broadest theistic definition I can give. Any changes on that are initiated by theists themselves.

 

[Eudaimonist]

This is my working definition, and is subject to refinement.

A god: Any sentient entity responsible for creating, shaping, and/or ordering the natural universe, and which provides an explanation for otherwise potentially mysterious facets of human experience.

(I'm not impressed when people refer to unconscious forces as gods. The word god seems superfluous at that point.)

Theists, of course, will have their own more detailed definitions.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Dave Ellis]

There's so many possible definitions out there, I take the position that it's just simply not our place to define what a God is. I leave that up to the Theist making the claim.

That being said, if they define something as God that is clearly outside of the generally accepted view of God (being a powerful supernatural being of some kind), I will reject their claims on that merit.

An example is the pantheistic view, where they define everything as God. It makes the concept redundant.

 

[quatona]

Whenever I get into these philosophical issues the first thing that comes up is something like, 'what do you mean by...?'. Ok, let's start with that one this time, what do you mean by 'God'?

I have no god concept of my own. That´s why my first question to a theist who wants to talk to me about their god concept is "God? What do you mean??". I am depending on their indidividual concepts in order to have a meaningful conversation about them. Weren´t it for theists, "God" wouldn´t be in my vocabulary.

 

[KCfromNC]

Oh god, not another "you're not an atheist because you don't not believe in the correct god(s)" thread. Most of the other responses have been good, though - why is a Christian relying on non-believers to define his god for him? Doesn't he know what he believes in?

Anyway, gods are just something someone else believes in. It doesn't really matter how they're defined if they don't refer to real existing objects. Or at least is doesn't matter to me not believing in them. No real difference in lack of belief between I had a concrete definition of them and the object defined conclusively doesn't exist and the alternative of I have no idea what the object is even supposed to be, much less know it exists or not. It's all just stuff other people believe in, for whatever reason, that I remain to be convinced of.

It's sad that modern apologetics always reduces to word games like this. You'd think that people would put energy into doing good deeds and showing that their religion is a positive force for good to sell it rather than trying to trick people into believing.

 

[Lord Emsworth]

I simply copy and paste what I posted before:

God must

(1) be necessary being.
==> There is no problem with that in and of itself, at all.

(2a) be a conscious/intelligent/sentient entity, or something along those lines.
==> This is largely meaningless. While it does make sense to refer to humans as thinking, knowing, caring (etc) entities, it is not clear at all what some such means when it refers to an entity as per (1).
(2b) have libertarian free will.
==> As a quick reminder, libertarian free will is the ability to chose from actual alternate possibilities, without it being random/arbitrary. This criterion is necessary because God would need to be capable of creating this world or another world. The problem is that libertarian free will is contradictory.​

The context of the thread I originally posted this too was slightly different, but I think it is good enough.

 

[mark kennedy]

I have found it puzzling that atheists not only don't define 'god' as a dialectical entity, they never demand a definition. That's really what I was wondering about when I started the thread. One of you recognized that God being creator is central but in the pagan religions the elementals came before the gods, they in fact, gave rise to the gods.

Robert Pirsig offered one insight I found helpful, he said that the literal meaning of god is good just as the root meaning of buddah is quality. Obviously a Christians definition of God is going to be developed differently then a rending of the literal meaning of the words used to to describe God. Generally in Christian theism there are four requisite elements of God's divine nature but we can get into that a little later.

There can only be a couple of reasons that the core term in a world philosophy is never defined. Either the term is already clearly understood and intuitively obvious or irrelevant to the essential epistemology. That would render the word 'atheism' meaningless unless there is a clear meaning attached to 'theism' or it's just another fallacious skepticism having no substantive argument of it's own.

Perhaps a better question would have been, how has it been defined philosophically? It's just a little odd that there are no clear meaning attached and certainly puzzling that there are no definitions demanded at the outset.

Very curious, very curious indeed.

 

[Skavau]

I have found it puzzling that atheists not only don't define 'god' as a dialectical entity, they never demand a definition.

Why would we? Curious why you think we should or expect us to do so. Atheism, pragmatically is built upon suspicion and skepticism of other people's claims of God. It is not the intrinsic denial or dismissal of all concepts of God.

At any rate, in many discussions atheists do ask for theists to provide detailed definitions.

That's really what I was wondering about when I started the thread. One of you recognized that God being creator is central but in the pagan religions the elementals came before the gods, they in fact, gave rise to the gods.

Yes, we know - but you asked us to give definitions. I am sure we all could list off all different types of Gods from deism, theism, polytheism, pantheism, panentheism to dystheism - but what would that demonstrate? That we know about a lot of different concepts of Gods?

There can only be a couple of reasons that the core term in a world philosophy is never defined. Either the term is already clearly understood and intuitively obvious or irrelevant to the essential epistemology. That would render the word 'atheism' meaningless unless there is a clear meaning attached to 'theism' or it's just another fallacious skepticism having no substantive argument of it's own.

Pragmatically on a Christian forum the majority concept of God is going to broadly be the theistic stereotype. The omniscient, omnipotent and omnibenevolent (a trinity of sorts) entity. There is no need to keep referring specifically to this when it is accepted by most Christians on here.

There is a vague meaning attached to theism. You come under it, being a Christian and anyone trying to pin down your concept of God would need to understand that and probably more so by asking you as a person how you view God.

Perhaps a better question would have been, how has it been defined philosophically? It's just a little odd that there are no clear meaning attached and certainly puzzling that there are no definitions demanded at the outset.

Very curious, very curious indeed.

There is no clear meaning attached because to so many theists, it varies. Some only slightly but some more so. Theism has in its umbrella Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Zoroastrianism, Baha'i and Sikhism as well as subsects contained within those religions and even different philosophical definitions.

 

[Illuminaughty]

Whenever I get into these philosophical issues the first thing that comes up is something like, 'what do you mean by...?'. Ok, let's start with that one this time, what do you mean by 'God'? The alternative as far as I can tell is that atheism is simply contrary and contentious skepticism, existing solely in the negation of a philosophical system with not definitive epistemology of it's own.

Atheist is a phrase used to describe a person who lacks belief in god/s. It, in and of itself, isn't a philosophy and thus doesn't need a special epistemology of it's own. Do you not believe in unicorns? Does you aunicornism constitute a philosophy on your part? Atheists, like all people, usually have a philosophy on life and an epistemology but atheism itself isn't one any more than aunicornist would be.

 

[quatona]

I have found it puzzling that atheists not only don't define 'god' as a dialectical entity, they never demand a definition. That's really what I was wondering about when I started the thread. One of you recognized that God being creator is central but in the pagan religions the elementals came before the gods, they in fact, gave rise to the gods.

Robert Pirsig offered one insight I found helpful, he said that the literal meaning of god is good just as the root meaning of buddah is quality. Obviously a Christians definition of God is going to be developed differently then a rending of the literal meaning of the words used to to describe God. Generally in Christian theism there are four requisite elements of God's divine nature but we can get into that a little later.

There can only be a couple of reasons that the core term in a world philosophy is never defined. Either the term is already clearly understood and intuitively obvious or irrelevant to the essential epistemology. That would render the word 'atheism' meaningless unless there is a clear meaning attached to 'theism' or it's just another fallacious skepticism having no substantive argument of it's own.

Perhaps a better question would have been, how has it been defined philosophically? It's just a little odd that there are no clear meaning attached and certainly puzzling that there are no definitions demanded at the outset.

Very curious, very curious indeed.

As I said, I demand it all the time.

 

[Eudaimonist]

One of you recognized that God being creator is central but in the pagan religions the elementals came before the gods, they in fact, gave rise to the gods.

That's why I had written: "creating, shaping, and/or ordering." Any one of those could count.

And I demand definitions all of the time.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[mark kennedy]

That's why I had written: "creating, shaping, and/or ordering." Any one of those could count.

And I demand definitions all of the time.


eudaimonia,

Mark

I noticed that, just sounds more like a description. It might interest you to know that 'God' has often been redefined in atheistic terms. I'm kind of an old school Calvinist so naturally I'm going to believe God to be self-existing as well as self-evident. You just don't have this in other philosophical pursuits, determining the meaning of the core terminology is invariably the first order of business.

 

[jayem]

To me, a sine qua non for a god is supernaturalism. A god exists outside the realm of matter and energy, yet it has the power to affect matter and energy. That's important to me because I am primarily a naturalist, who rejects the existence of anything supernatural. I'm an atheist only secondarily as regards any supernatural god.

 

[Eudaimonist]

I noticed that, just sounds more like a description.

I suppose, but why does that matter? What is the need for a formal definition? A set of criteria seems sufficient.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Paradoxum]

When I think atheist I would understand it to mean that that person doesn't believe in a 'Supreme Mind' or 'Supreme Force'.

The 'Supreme Mind' could probably mean a number of things and still reasonably be called God or god. I would say that 'god' without a capital 'g' refers to a god that seems to be finite/limited in some way. God with a capital 'g' refers to an infinite/unlimited/perfect Mind. In either case this means a Mind that is necessary/timesless /eternal. 'Mind' here means a function that understands facts and might have values.

'Supreme Force' refers to things like karma or any unconscious force that seems to act for a purpose or in aid of morality.

Bear in mind that I just made all this up, but it does seem that God/god can mean many things. After writing all this it seems that the common attribute is that of acting for a purpose/goal and/or acting to promote morality.

So very basically God could mean a necessary Force or Mind that acts for a purpose. Atheism is the rejection of this.

 

[Eudaimonist]

I noticed that, just sounds more like a description.

As I understand it, a formal definition has a genus and a differentia.

For example, Aristotle defined a human being as a rational animal.

Animal is the genus. Human beings are a type of animal.

Rational is the differentia. Human beings are a rational type of animal.

So, my definition of gods is a type of sentient being that creates, shapes, and/or orders the natural universe.

Genus: sentient being
Differentia: creates, shapes, and/or orders

Granted, I'm being somewhat loose with the differentia. Still, I think I'm not doing all that bad with a definition.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Davian]

I have found it puzzling that atheists not only don't define 'god' as a dialectical entity, they never demand a definition.

You titled this thread "define God"... "God"-with-a-capital-G. Are we now talking about deities in general?

I have pretty much given up asking for robust definitions for one's personal deity(s), having gotten nowhere with that. As a working definition, I would define "God" as a character in a book (movies too).

That's really what I was wondering about when I started the thread. One of you recognized that God being creator is central but in the pagan religions the elementals came before the gods, they in fact, gave rise to the gods.

All human-created concepts.

Robert Pirsig offered one insight I found helpful, he said that the literal meaning of god is good just as the root meaning of buddah is quality.

I don't care if he claimed that god literally means cake and ice cream.

Obviously a Christians definition of God is going to be developed differently then a rending of the literal meaning of the words used to to describe God. Generally in Christian theism there are four requisite elements of God's divine nature but we can get into that a little later.

Anything testable? No?

There can only be a couple of reasons that the core term in a world philosophy is never defined. Either the term is already clearly understood and intuitively obvious or irrelevant to the essential epistemology.

False dichotomy. "God" is not clearly understood, and I don't think you consider it irrelevant.

That would render the word 'atheism' meaningless unless there is a clear meaning attached to 'theism' or it's just another fallacious skepticism having no substantive argument of it's own.

Or it is justified scepticism, given the inability of theists to provide a robust, testable definition for their core term.

Atheism does not make a positive claim, and requires no arguments of its own.

Perhaps a better question would have been, how has it been defined philosophically? It's just a little odd that there are no clear meaning attached and certainly puzzling that there are no definitions demanded at the outset.

There were, you just missed that part.

Very curious, very curious indeed.

Do you wonder why theists cannot provide clear meaning to their core term?