Starting today August 7th, 2024, in order to post in the Married Couples, Courting Couples, or Singles forums, you will not be allowed to post if you have your Marital status designated as private. Announcements will be made in the respective forums as well but please note that if yours is currently listed as Private, you will need to submit a ticket in the Support Area to have yours changed.
Are you saying that there is no proof or evidence of God's existence?
Which harkens back to the OP: if God exists, he knows what evidence he could bring forth that would be sufficient to demonstrate his existence. If no such evidence is possible, then there's nothing God could do to demonstrate his existence. If this is indeed the case, then there a priori will never be any evidence for God, and there therefore is no good reason to believe he exists (even if, as in this hypothetical, he does indeed exist, we could never tell this case apart from the alternative)."In the most general sense possible, [and beyond that it is not proven,] the concept is too insubstantial for one to even know what a proof of it would look like, to definitively contradict it, to find evidence which is specifically in support, tangibly, comparing the likelihood of all alternatives."
"In the most general sense possible, [and beyond that it is not proven,] the concept is too insubstantial for one to even know what a proof of it would look like, to definitively contradict it, to find evidence which is specifically in support, tangibly, comparing the likelihood of all alternatives."
Which harkens back to the OP: if God exists, he knows what evidence he could bring forth that would be sufficient to demonstrate his existence.
If no such evidence is possible, then there's nothing God could do to demonstrate his existence. If this is indeed the case, then there a priori will never be any evidence for God, and there therefore is no good reason to believe he exists (even if, as in this hypothetical, he does indeed exist, we could never tell this case apart from the alternative).
Yet, the OP somehow believes that the a priori impossibility of evidence for God is somehow a detriment to non-believers' position - yet such a case would clearly be detrimental to the theists' position. Most perplexing.
You say that the concept of God is too insubstantial for one to even know what evidence for its existence would look like.
How did you arrive at that conclusion?
Because there is no operational definition of god. We don't simply not know what to look for, we haven't decided what we're looking for evidence of.
"In the most general sense possible, [and beyond that it is not proven,] the concept is too insubstantial for one to even know what a proof of it would look like, to definitively contradict it, to find evidence which is specifically in support, tangibly, comparing the likelihood of all alternatives."
Are you saying that there is no proof or evidence of God's existence?
No. To anyone. If God is omniscient he would know exactly what each individual would require to believe in him. That it might be unwelcome to many is irrelevant to what would convince them.To who? To the one willing to believe in and obey and worship Him and love Him as God their Father, Sustainer, and Provider? Yes i agree.
We've been through this. This is a different thing you're talking about. The question of belief in God is different to the question of serving God. That many are unwilling to serve God, obey God does not mean that they could not be convinced of God.To who? To the one not willing to believe in and obey and worship Him as God their Father, Sustainer, and Provider? No, I disagree. I disagree because God cannot force anyone to trust, love and hope in Him.
How bizarre. How can anyone make a free choice if they do not have access to all the facts? I mean from your perspective people like me are ignorant of what is. We don't have all the information, or understanding of that information. This means that we cannot make a free choice.God's primary aim is to receive unto Himself a people who love Him and want to live with and for Him freely by an exercise of their own will. God is obligated to give only that evidence which is sufficient for men to be able to make a choice between accepting Him and rejecting Him freely.
Perhaps not, but this is not only (a) irrelevant to what convinces people of God's existence but also (b) irrelevant to him granting people a free choice by providing concrete evidence they would accept.God is not obligated, nor is He even able to force an obstinate, unwilling man to freely repent from his wicked self dependence and worship Him as the One True God.
I think you mean unwilling to serve. No-one is truly unwilling to believe or not believe in anything. We are our beliefs. We are our convictions. They shape us. Again, my anti-theism and the anti-theism of others are distinct from what we consider to be true. I am certainly willing to believe in God.For the one who is unwilling to believe, no amount of evidence will convince them.
To who? To the one willing to believe in and obey and worship Him and love Him as God their Father, Sustainer, and Provider? Yes i agree.
To who? To the one not willing to believe in and obey and worship Him as God their Father, Sustainer, and Provider? No, I disagree. I disagree because God cannot force anyone to trust, love and hope in Him. God's primary aim is to receive unto Himself a people who love Him and want to live with and for Him freely by an exercise of their own will. God is obligated to give only that evidence which is sufficient for men to be able to make a choice between accepting Him and rejecting Him freely. God is not obligated, nor is He even able to force an obstinate, unwilling man to freely repent from his wicked self dependence and worship Him as the One True God.
For the one who is unwilling to believe, no amount of evidence will convince them. This is what Jesus meant when He said only those who were willing to do His will would know whether or not the words that He spoke were true. Elsewhere Jesus also spoke saying that if they would not believe Moses and the prophets, then neither would they believe even though one be raised from the dead.
It is not a detriment to you because you ultimately get what it is that you want from God...Nothing... You see no divine acts or miracles. You see no evidence of God. And you are happy and content with this.
Because there is no operational definition of god. We don't simply not know what to look for, we haven't decided what we're looking for evidence of.
This, more or less.
Richard Swinburne, a prominent Christian philosopher, treats God as a proper name of the person referred to by the following description: a person without a body (i.e., a spirit) who necessarily is eternal, perfectly free, omnipotent, omniscient, perfectly good, and the creator of all things. This description expresses the traditional concept of God in Western Philosophy and theology.
Richard Swinburne, a prominent Christian philosopher, treats God as a proper name of the person referred to by the following description: a person without a body (i.e., a spirit) who necessarily is eternal, perfectly free, omnipotent, omniscient
Typically, we only look for one of these attributes at a time. Which one would you like us to investigate scientifically? How would we actually do that?
We're looking for a person without a body. How do we find that? How do we operationalize a bodiless person? What if we are able to insert somebody's mind into a computer? Would they not be bodiless? Would they then be God?
Next, we're looking for something eternal. How do we know what is eternal, or determine that it will be eternal? How do we then connect that to our bodiless person?
I was told that God was neither omnipotent nor omniscient, but whatever. How do we determine that our bodiless person is these things? And how do we operationalize perfectly good? What is good?
Weird you'd tell us god is omniscient and omnipotent after assuring us that your god doesn't know how to provide convincing evidence to non-believers. Both can't be true, so which is it?
The questions that you have asked are good questions however before I endeavor to begin answering them I would like to go back to the question I posed in my last post. The question kind of ties into what you are asking.
The question that I posed to you and the other gentleman was: What gives you the reason to think that there is no operational definition of God? It is clear that this idea of yours had to have come from somewhere some source or reference or person or teaching so I was curious as to know where the idea comes from; that is, the idea or view that there is no operational definition of God.
If you can expound on this train of thought then I will be better able to answer your questions.
An operational definition is meant to put limits on what we are studying, so we can validate or invalidate it through measurement. How do we measure a bodiless person? How do we determine omnipotence, or omniscience, concepts which are unlimited, when we do not possess it? How do we determine a perfect good, when our concept is clearly imperfect? How do we determine what is supernatural when we are limited to a natural existence? How do we limit an eternal being?
An operational definition of God is impossible because God is defined in terms of things that we cannot test.
Now, how do you intend to test for God?
Ultimately, our working definition of God according to Anselmian Perfect Being Theology is full of content. So much so that God still finds place in one way or the other in metaphysical and philosophical discourse today.
We investigate God's existence the same way we investigate any other person's existence. We do this by keeping in mind God's superlative attributes. If God exists then we expect for there to be evidence of this. Philosophers of religion, natural theologians, metaphysicians, historians, astronomers, cosmologists, physicists, biologists, archaeologists, etc. have a wealth of data at their disposal for investigating this matter. This is one area in which science has been and can be very useful.
Why arbitrarily use Anselm's definition of god (which imparts no actual information by the way) rather than any other definition of god?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?