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Old 09-05-2005, 03:39 PM   #1
Satyre
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Paradox: God cannot not believe

Mark, your post got me to thinking:

"For what it's worth, I heard that an atheist is someone that G-d does not believe in, not the other way around."


Rather than clutter the Aikido & Spirituality thread with my off topic inspirations I though it better to start a thread here instead.


A paradox that just popped into my mind, reading your post:

Theology defines the christian god as omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenificent. (and omnipresent)

Belief is defined as the "conviction of the truth of some statement or the reality of some being or phenomenon especially when based on examination of evidence."

However, omniscience effectively precludes belief as absolute knowledge eliminates the possibility of an opinion or conviction. This is part of the foundation for the absolute nature of the word of god.

On the other hand, being omnipotent, god cannot be incapable of belief.

Fascinating.


In addition belief in god is the short form for the belief in the existence of god. God however, cannot refuse to believe that I exist. God is omniscient and knows damn well whether or not I am. God is also definitely up to speed on whether or not we are on speaking terms at the moment.


Semantics. Which goes a long way towards supporting the position of negative theology (see Nikolaus von Kues / Cusanus) which asserts that language as used by finite beings is incapable of expressing the infinite. The limits of finite language are transcended by negating a specific characteristic:

God is good becomes god is not good. Not good does not mean bad but rather the removal of the finite limitation of the characteristic of goodness. Really interesting.
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Old 09-05-2005, 09:02 PM   #2
Mark Uttech
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Recall please, that when Adam and Eve hid themselves in the garden, God went looking for them, asking: "Where are you?"
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Old 09-07-2005, 06:57 PM   #3
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Now I know why it states in the Bible (can't recall exactly where....) why we should avoid the philosophy of man.....

I have no desire to get involved with word games (I avoid Scrabble like the plague), but here goes.....

As for "God is good becomes god is not good. Not good does not mean bad but rather the removal of the finite limitation of the characteristic of goodness", wouldn't that also mean removing all finite limitations of all the associated characteristics? The Bible is careful to warn us that God is beyond our comprehension, and our finite words (and brains) are just not up to the effort of trying to encompass Him.

As for God asking where Adam and Eve had gone, this is more of a statement of moral dilemma for Adam and Eve. God was fully aware of the actions of Adam and Eve, but He (IMVHO) was giving them an opportunity to step up and say 'we goofed - sorry!'. Even when given the opportunity to come clean, they started fingerpointing - something that has not changed over time (I'm guilty of fingerpointing too, as are most of us). This particular portion of Genesis need to be read very carefully and in context, is it is easy to understand confusion over God's supposed sudden lack of the omnis at tis point......

just my humble opinion.....
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Old 09-08-2005, 05:50 PM   #4
Satyre
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Robert,

that fact that god is beyond our comprehension what exactly what Causanus and his ilk were trying to address.

He suggested a form of intuitive knowledge going beyond rational comprehension.

Describing negative theology tends to backfire, as people often react badly to the attempt to use negation to create infinite terms.
Yes, negation would remove the finite elements of other such characteristics.
Interestingly enough, this method of description would only be applicable when discussing the nature of god, as everything else that is not-god is, by definition, finite.

(Just to keep us confused Cusa differentiated between two different types of infinity: One being the infinity of a string of numbers, the other being the infinity of the unbroken line, for example. Thinking about it makes my brain hurt.)

There's an article about Cusa in the catholic encyclopedia:
Nicolas of Cusa

Unfortunately most of the really informative information about him is in German.
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Old 09-08-2005, 11:45 PM   #5
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Isnt there some parable about god creating a mountain that he could not move.....i.e. god should be able to creat a mountain he could not move, but being god and therefore omnipotent, he could move any mountain created.

This is why christian theology tends to make my head hurt :-)

Brenda
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Old 10-04-2005, 10:44 PM   #6
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Quote:
Brenda Allen wrote:
i.e. god should be able to creat a mountain he could not move, but being god and therefore omnipotent, he could move any mountain created.
God could not move the mountain -- because -- he gave it free will?

Seriously, Nicolas Cusanus is the forerunner of the modern philosophical school of phenomenology, modernly begun by Edmund Husserl, a Jewish convert to Catholicism, in the early twentieth century. Phenomenology is a philosophical school concerned with the limits of language, as is the better known school of semiotics. Semiotics, which likmited its inquiry to language, however, nearly ended up in a logic trap by denying (as did Roland Barthes and Jacques Derrida) that language was capable of any inherently meaningful content, i.e.- content that was not arbitrary.

Phenomenology acknowledges the useful but limited role of language, and rather than discarding it, simply places it context as a subset of the universe of human action, in which meaning takes on a far broader scope.

Interestingly, one of the foremost exponents of phenomenology, in the latter part of the century, both in purely secular philosophy, and in theological application was none other than Pope John Paul the Great. For five years from 1979 to 1984 his Wednesday audience addresses on the Theology of the Body illustrate the method beautifully. He thoroughly dissects and shows the practical and spiritual significance of scriptural teaching on human sexuality in a careful and well reasoned way. They are collected at
http://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/JP2TBIND.HTM for any who may be interested.

Each address in the series is relatively short, as they were read aloud, and the themes are developed consistently throughout the series. they are topicaally captioned and one can skip aroond wihtout losing too much. Even if any of you may theologically disagree with his conclusions, the observation of his phenomenological method is very helpful.

It has greatly assisted be in thinking about Aikido, the "Theology of Battle" if you will.

Cordially,
Erick Mead
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Old 10-05-2005, 03:05 AM   #7
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Quote:
Brenda Allen wrote:
Isnt there some parable about god creating a mountain that he could not move.....i.e. god should be able to creat a mountain he could not move, but being god and therefore omnipotent, he could move any mountain created.

This is why christian theology tends to make my head hurt :-)

Brenda
The saying goes as follows......

Can God make a rock so big he can't lift it? If he can't lift it, then he's not omnipotent. But if he can't make such a rock, then he's also not omnipotent. Therefore, an omnipotent God can't exist.

Most christians that are asked this question (that I have personally asked, so don't go all freaky haywire on me) either refuse to answer it, or are too dumbfounded to approach it with logic, and usually mumble on about faith or some such thing. Please once again this is from my own experience and is not meant as an insult to any "christians".
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Old 10-05-2005, 03:58 AM   #8
Mark Uttech
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Parents create their children but cannot control them. A potter can form a bowl of clay, but the life of the bowl is another matter. In Aikido, nage thows uke with no clear guarantee. Likewise, uke attacks nage with no clear guarantee. This is the life we are given. In gassho.
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Old 10-05-2005, 01:05 PM   #9
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

The problem with the logic of the parable is that you assume God and the rock are two separate and distinct things. If God is omnipotent, then why can't be also "BE" the rock?

Duality can get you into trouble if you ask me! If you strip it out of the equation, it no longer matters anyway since God would be in everything and everywhere all at once.

However, many religions also have an issue with this logic as many believe in a separate, living, and distinct God of which humans are literally the Children of God and while "God-like" not in and of God, but a creation.

To each, his own!
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Old 10-05-2005, 01:07 PM   #10
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

BTW...I tend to like the book "Your God is Too Small" by J.B. Phillips

Good simple book that addresses just this issue from a non-passionate, non-critical, yet sensitive view towards both believers and non-believers.
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Old 10-05-2005, 06:56 PM   #11
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Now that I have some more time, I will try to express my feelings on the original statement to the best of my ability.

First, I must respond to a previous post.

Quote:
Kevin Leavitt wrote:
The problem with the logic of the parable is that you assume God and the rock are two separate and distinct things. If God is omnipotent, then why can't be also "BE" the rock?

Duality can get you into trouble if you ask me! If you strip it out of the equation, it no longer matters anyway since God would be in everything and everywhere all at once.

However, many religions also have an issue with this logic as many believe in a separate, living, and distinct God of which humans are literally the Children of God and while "God-like" not in and of God, but a creation.

To each, his own!
I absolutely agree that duality although having it's place, can be very dangerous, and I also agree that "god" and the 'rock' can be considered the same thing. However I feel the rock can be proven to exist which makes it's explaining easier, but from a "christian" stand point (as I know it) this is not possible, and I will elaborate on this later in the post.

Before I continue, I would like to say that I respect each individuals right to believe whatever it is they choose to, and that no other person, or group of people, has the right to say to another that they are correct or not. Just as a group has no more right to silence one person, as one person has a right to slience a whole group. I also believe that duality is an essential part of our existence, i.e. there can be no good without evil, no love without hate etc. .... Labels if you will.

When speaking from a christian standpoint, we must first observe and respect; without observation we cannot truly see where our christian neighbors are coming from, and without respect we cannot comprehend their arguments. What we must not do however is forget the bad that comes with the good of these arguements, (I am reminded of the saying, "those who forget history are doomed to repeat it") and with fear of getting to far off topic, I will try to make my point as clearly as possible in the shortest amount of time that is needed.

When talking about an "Omnipotent" or "Omni-anything" diety we must first assume that if such being or entity exists there is absolutely no way that the human mind would be able to comprehend or understand it's actions or thoughts. There could be no way that the eternal source of all things could fit into our minds.
"the Tao that can be told, it not the Eternal Tao" further "the Way the can be weighed is not the Eternal Way" etc.


Quote:
Benjamin Pooley wrote:
Belief is defined as the "conviction of the truth of some statement or the reality of some being or phenomenon especially when based on examination of evidence."
I think to fully understand we must go to the root,
the conviction of "truth".This argument as to what defines truth especially when it comes to religion has been one that has been done many times, by many people and for fear of "beating a dead horse" I will simply state my opinions and move on, I believe truth to be a fact that has been verified, "5 + 2 = 7" is a true statement, as is "the sun rises in the east". These are examples of how I see truth.

"For what it's worth, I heard that an atheist is someone that G-d does not believe in, not the other way around."

Speaking from an athiest standpoint, "How can something that does not exist not believe in me?"

An atheist is defined by the Australian Atheist Foundation as...
"A person who does not believe in the existence of gods, goddesses, fairies, spirits, angels, ghosts, trolls, leprechauns, bunyips, nymphs, etc.

One can take a nominal figure and say that humans have conceived of at least 10,000 gods. Christians say that 9,999 of these are false -- atheists reject the whole 10,000.

When talking about Athiest we must look at the fact that everyone is born an athiest. It is an accident of birth which determines the indoctrination of becoming a Hindu, a Moslem, a Jew or any of a multitude of Christian denominations and to induce a child to believe in basically anything one chooses, i.e. santa claus, faries, god(s), heaven, hell, etc. is fairly easy. Religion is primarily a matter of infant brainwashing continued endlessly generation after generation with no one thinking to check the basic claims. The environmental culture and peer pressure reinforces the home indoctrination."

To further understand an athiest viewpoint.....

"Common sense dismisses the story of Noah's Ark as a primitive myth and the idea of sacrificial offerings and atonement are unworthy of a good god. It is possible to be punished for another person's wrongdoing but guilt cannot be transferred. When the immoral story of Adam and Eve is seen as a folk tale then the idea of 'original sin' disappears together with the need for a saviour."

The idea that love can be commanded is diametrically opposite to the nature of love and must be rejected.

If we were all to approach this with a neutral mind (which including myself, is impossible due to enviormental conditioning) it may become clear, but alas no such event has been done in human history. We can all say what is fact but the truth of the matter is simple.... There are three sides to every story, Your side, My side, and what really happened (is, etc.).

From a chrisitan standpoint...
(I am not going into denominational preferance, just basic tenents)

There is a heaven, a hell, along with a god, a satan, angels, demons, purgatory, a good, an evil etc.

A common misconception is that cristianity is a monotheistic religion, when in fact it is really duotheistic. Satan acting on 'his' own volition making 'his' own choices, seperate from "god's will"
seperating 'him' as an individual entity forces us to recognize the duotheistic quality of christianity (not including the three-is-one trinity, which under scrutiny shows us christianity is really quadrotheistic, as the three seperate beings from one stem represent) When we observe this not including the bible we can see that the main structure and foundation of this religion is based on this duality complex, and as such, is so the universe.

This whole thread makes me think of a movie I once saw (Kevin Smith's Dogma) Where in it, the character playing god (Alanis Morissette) could not directly speak to people and needed her angel to translate her point, this was due to the fact that if ever a 'mortal' or 'underling' to god were to ever hear it/her/him speak the listeners head would explode because it could not handle such a powerful and direct transmission(?) from such an entity.

Anyway, as a taoist of sorts (can one truly be a toaist?), I can apply this line of thinking to my everyday life, and integrate it in how I approach the world and existence or lack thereof, and when it really comes down to it.... I guess "What is truth?" is only something you can answer.

Anyway just my bits with no real structure. Thank you for reading.
Eddie
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Old 10-17-2005, 02:55 AM   #12
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Have my ramblings killed this topic?
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Old 10-17-2005, 01:09 PM   #13
Abasan
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

"God is good becomes god is not good. Not good does not mean bad but rather the removal of the finite limitation of the characteristic of goodness. Really interesting."

It is interesting when one comes out and think about this. Especially when playing with the words of infinity and finite.

Personally I believe that good and evil are only representations made by human beings to better understand their relative position in the world therein. We however are incapable of comparing our notions with that of God. First of all, don't even bother thinking in dichotomy. Such as man/woman, good/evil, large/small. God exists and is. Thats all. Oh that God vs Satan just cracks me up too.

When you think more about the universe, then you'll see why our sense of relativity is so skewed and miniscule. Our sense of big are mountains. Our sense of infinity can be the drops of water in the world's oceans. Our sense of speed is limited by the speed of light. Yet, what is earth compared to our solar system. What is our solar system compared to the galaxy, and what is galaxy compared to the universe? How big is the universe? In the seconds that it took to create the universe and its rapid expansion to its present (currently enlarging) size, do we even have a relative measurement of that?

Yet here we are, trying to measure up God.

Last edited by Abasan : 10-17-2005 at 01:12 PM.

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Old 10-17-2005, 07:57 PM   #14
Nathan Gusdorf
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

With regards to the relative size of the universe I think Monty Python and the Meaning of Life said it best:

Quote:
Whenever life gets you down, Mrs. Brown,
And things seem hard or tough,
And people are stupid, obnoxious or daft,
<sung>
And you feel that you've had quite eno-o-o-o-o-ough,

Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving
And reolving at nine thousand miles an hour.
It's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned,
'Round the sun that is the source of all our power.
Now the sun, and you and me, and all the stars that we can see,
Are moving at a million miles a day,
In the outer spiral arm, at fourteen thousand miles an hour,
Of a galaxy we call the Milky Way.

Our galaxy itself contains a hundred million stars;
It's a hundred thousand light-years side to side;
It bulges in the middle sixteen thousand light-years thick,
But out by us it's just three thousand light-years wide.
We're thirty thousand light-years from Galactic Central Point,
We go 'round every two hundred million years;
And our galaxy itself is one of millions of billions
In this amazing and expanding universe.

<waltz>

Our universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding,
In all of the directions it can whiz;
As fast as it can go, that's the speed of light, you know,
Twelve million miles a minute and that's the fastest speed there is.
So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,
How amazingly unlikely is your birth;
And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere out in space,
'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth!
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Old 11-21-2005, 09:46 AM   #15
Steve Mullen
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

once again monty python is the answer to the really serious questions in life.

on a more serious note id like to start by saying, i feel that everyone has a right to any kind of religion they want (so im not picking on anyone!!)

This is kinda off topic but in the scope of religion et al. I think that there is a popular misconception (or is it?) that true faith excludes the possibility of questions, it has to be a blind faith. the answer to all the paradoxies (paradoxes??....... the more than one paradox) about god given by many religions is that our failure to come to any conclusion is both the cause of and caused by our lack of faith. they argue that they have no such questions, since they are sure of what they believe then it seems to them that they have got it right. our failure to come to any deffinite answer proves that he is something beyond human conception and therefore something to be revered and worshiped (lest we feel his rath).

As for god cannot believe, i think that most (if not all) organised religions (im so gonna take some flack for this next comment, but from the bottom of my heart i mean no offence) show that if god does exist and can believe, he/she/it certianly doesn't believe in us. I'll explain what i mean by that

Aside from all the bad in the world which can be described as being god's will, we have a very vein person as a point of worship. i once read a quote from someone which summs up my feelings exactly and has stuck with me ever since, but alas in the passing of time i have forgotten the guy's name

"what kind of egotistical god would create a race, give them a utopia once they die, and only let them in if they praise HIS name every day"

I think this is so true, most religions (with the possible exception of buddism, i think?!) will tell you to pray every day or you can't get to heaven/nirvana etc. to me this shows that god doesn't trust us at all, and he only wants the ones that are on 'his side' to live in his utopia.

Anyway, like i said i mean no offence by any of what i said and i fully believe and strongly uphold everyone's right to believe in whatever they want, it's part of what makes up this world.

Peace out y'all
Steve

"No matter your pretence, you are what you are and nothing more." - Kenshiro Abbe Shihan
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Old 11-21-2005, 12:15 PM   #16
Kevin Leavitt
 
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

IMHO, we personify that what we cannot wrap our brains around or imagine. Bringing the image of God down to our level allows us to understand God in a way that makes sense to us. The paradox in doing that, IMHO, is that we impose the rules and limitations that we see within ourselves in God as a concept.

Even Buddhist are guilty of doing this to a degree.

Just as Aikido practice, we impose our beliefs and paradigms into our relationship with uke, it distorts and clouds the true nature of that relationship. It is only when we can "let go" of those notions that we can experience the Completeness of "God". Maybe that can occur in our lifetime, maybe not. Maybe we can only experience that through Jesus. Maybe we can only experience it after we die.
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Old 11-22-2005, 06:38 AM   #17
Steve Mullen
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

i read somewhere that the milky way is 12,500,000,000,000,000,000 (that is twelve and a half thousand million billion) miles across,

"No matter your pretence, you are what you are and nothing more." - Kenshiro Abbe Shihan
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Old 11-22-2005, 07:06 AM   #18
Nick Simpson
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Wow. Thats big.

They're all screaming about the rock n roll, but I would say that it's getting old. - REFUSED.
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Old 11-22-2005, 07:20 AM   #19
Steve Mullen
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

woah, i just had a flashback of saturday night there.....sorry, i had to

"No matter your pretence, you are what you are and nothing more." - Kenshiro Abbe Shihan
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Old 11-22-2005, 07:25 AM   #20
Nick Simpson
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Lolz.

They're all screaming about the rock n roll, but I would say that it's getting old. - REFUSED.
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Old 02-26-2006, 04:57 AM   #21
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Interesting thread covering some of the ground my private speculation has followed, However when Ian states
Quote:
When talking about Atheist we must look at the fact that everyone is born an atheist. It is an accident of birth which determines the indoctrination of becoming a Hindu, a Moslem, a Jew or any of a multitude of Christian denominations and to induce a child to believe in basically anything one chooses, i.e. santa claus, faries, god(s), heaven, hell, etc. is fairly easy. Religion is primarily a matter of infant brainwashing continued endlessly generation after generation with no one thinking to check the basic claims. The environmental culture and peer pressure reinforces the home indoctrination.
I must disagree. My own experiences as a child and observation of the current crop show me that we are all born as profound believer's in magic, especially of the sympathetic and ritualistic kind which can be seen as religion.

Lucky coins, rocks or whatever, turning round ten times or holding your breath to get good luck, or even a footballers lucky sock are all evidence of that root belief. Various religions and philosophy's either codify a natural response into its own system or attempt to challenge it to death. Intellectually many of us know that cannot luck cannot be coerced, but emotionally we still like to have our "lucky pulling pants" on at a party.

BTW, I don't have OCD despite how it sounds!
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Old 02-26-2006, 08:17 AM   #22
Mark Freeman
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

So Ian thinks that everyone is born an atheist, that is to say we are born 'not believing anything' Which, I must say is pretty hard to disagree with.

Nathan thinks we are all born, profound believers in magic.

I personally have to go with Ian, to believe in magic you have to have a profound sense of what is possible so as to be 'amazed' when you are presented with what is 'not possible' (magic). We are not born with a sense of what is possible, that has to be learned.

We learn just about all we learn as small children from our immediate environment, parents/siblings being the primary source in the early years. I remember my grandmother telling me no end of 'old wives tales' and superstitions. Most of them easily discounted as soon as reason starts to kick in.

I personally believe that a belief in 'god' is not hardwired into a child's brain. It is part of the software / ideas installed after birth. An impossible but nevertheless conclusive experiment would be for three sets of parents ( 1 atheist, 1 religion A , 1 religion B ) to swap children at birth, and check what beliefs the chidren had at around their 8th birthday. pretty obvoius I would think.

I do believe however, that a 'propensity to believe in some kind of religion' 'is' hardwired into the brain. There are many many advantages to this. We as humans function as group animals, we work best collectively, religious beliefs ( whether logical or illogical, true or false is immaterial ) afford us 'membership of our 'group', social cohesion, culture, hope, faith, trust, etc all positive traits, and I'm sure there are many more than the few I have listed here.

Unfortunately this very close knit 'group think' which can be so beneficial leads to conflict with others of a different close knit 'group think'.
An obvious example is the current problem in Iraq with Shia and Sunni Muslims, they both 'believe' in the same 'god' but have a 'different coloured' hat on, so are able to see the others as 'wrong'. I'm sure others may jump in here and start informing me of the many other non religious factors that have brought the population to the brink of civil war, I do realise there is more to it than what is baldly being stated here. My point is that it's the beliefs themselves that are the root of the conflict.

I am of the opinion that trying to approach religion with logic is like trying to unpick a birds nest wearing boxing gloves.
But human beings are more than their 'current beliefs', flat earthers will tell you that.
Most of us are of the agreement that the beliefs and culture of the Taliban are 'medieval' :- witness the recent beheading of a school head-teacher for the crime of 'educating girls'. Beliefs change over time, even strongly held ones.
Many christians believe in the literal word of the bible, which means that they believe the world was created around the same time that the agrarian revolution was taking place.
There are plenty of christians who accept that the world is part of a 13-15 billion year old universe, and chose to believe that the bible is not to be taken literally but to be interpreted, which they do. It doesn't diminish their belief in god ( for some it reinforces it ).

'If' god does exist and is the omni everything that others say he is, I am part of 'him/her' and 'he/she will understand that a non-belief in him/her is part of life's rich trapestry and 'just as valid' as a belief in him/her.

'If' god does not exist, then I as a 'current non beliver' am right and the 'believers' are wrong.

I will barricade myself behind many sandbags to avoid the missiles I can feel coming my way.

Peace,
Mark
p.s. I am open minded and if anyone can offer up any proof of the existence of a god not based on 'faith' I will be interested in considering it and possibly changing my mind on the issue.

Success is having what you want. Happiness is wanting what you have.
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Old 03-11-2006, 01:34 PM   #23
aikidodragon
Dojo: North West Arkansas Aikido
Location: Arkansas
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

If God is all knowing, then why do some christians insist that we have free will.
If God is all powerful, then why does he not stop disasters amungst humanity.
If God is all loving, then why does he allow bad things to happen to his followers.
On the whole adom and eve thing. If God is all knowing, he would have known that they woudn't answer or show themselves. He also would have allready know where they were. If he was all loving why did he kick them out of the garden. I don't remember the bible saying exactly why they weren't allowed to eat from the tree.
Also the 66 books we know as the bible are only what the early church decided should be allowed. What about the dead sea scrolls or the gosble of thomas or marry ect.
Christans tend to look at the bible as solid undeniable fact, but say stories from other faiths are just miths. However; the stories in the bible are just based off miths or maybe fact that accured earlier in history. The ten plagues that fell on egipt attacked a particular egiption god or goddess every time.
The accounts we get in the bible are who knows how many hand accounts of the stories. There was know writin language when the world began, so how could the story be free of missinterpritation or misunderstanding from the stories past down by mouth.

Next what happened to the place of women in christan beliefs. Before christianity, women were sacrid. Look at thbe greeks, the egeptions ect all had women goddesses. Christianity and some other fiaths place high stress on male dominence. Why is god fother. He can not have children only the mother can. Males may participate in the making of life, but they can't give it.
Christians claim to have the one and only correct belief. If this was true why were there so many other gods and goddesses. Also why did he wate so long to show his face. If he was the correct one why isn't god and christ from the begining of writin history. If christianity is the only correct faith, why do all the other religions also claim to be the correct faith.
Thoughs who posted abuve are right.
I was born in America to a christian family. Therefore I was rased christian and am expected to believe the christian teachings. But what if I had been born in Japan I might be Shento or budest.
bacdk to free will and god being all knowing. If god knows everything i will do or choose then do I realy have free will. If he knows that I am going to put a question mark at the end of this, do I have the choise to put a period? That was a very bad example i know but it proves a point. If he knows I am going to do something then some how it is manditory that i do that thing. For if we had free will there might be to many options for god to be all knowing how would he know wich option we will choose. If he knows wich option we will choose it is no longer free will.
This post seems circular i know. But I am a philosophy major and these issues and questions entrest me.
Also I am sorry about any misspellings in this post.
I did not intend to offend anyone and I appoligize if i did.

:kiAikido is just origami with people.
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Old 03-12-2006, 08:21 AM   #24
Mark Freeman
Dojo: Dartington
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

Quote:
I did not intend to offend anyone and I appoligize if i did
There's a whole other thread just there!

Offence can be easily taken, or not, depending on the individual seeing/hearing what you say. If you ask challenging questions of someone, because you would genuinely like to explore the oddities, conundrums, paradoxes that are seen in a set of beliefs, then offense shouldn't be taken, but sometimes it is.
Recently in the UK, the BBC were to show a performance of "Jerry Springer the Opera" on tv, they had over 50,000 complaints from Christians claiming to be 'offended' by this and it should be banned on the basis of blasphemy, and that it depicted Jesus in a nappy ( daiper ) one of their main points of 'offence'. No more than a few of the 50k complainers had seen the Opera, so how theu could be 'offended' is beyond me.
I went to see the show, and had a great time is was funny, with great music and ultimately uplifting giving a message of love and compassion for your fellow humans. Jesus was depicted in a loin cloth, which as far as I'm aware is how he appears on the cross in most christian churches. He was not shown in a nappy at all!!! The character playing Jesus in the second half of the play was the same one who appeared in the first half in the JS show who 'did' appear in a nappy due to his own warped
sexual fetish, not uncommonly seen on the JS show. A minor but obvious error if you haven't seen the show or are not interested in examining the facts.
I personally could be just as offended by people who believe I should not have the right to freedom of expression/thought, and that somehow they have some moral superiority that their particular 'faith' affords them. To them I say, stay out of my theater, stay out of my home, stay out of my hospital, stay out of my schools, and stay out of my government. They have their own places of worship and I will certainly not impose myself in there. Freedom of thought/speech is at the core of modern civilisation, repression belongs in the past. We are at a fork in the road, there is a polarisation going on, secular free thinkers on one side, and religious fundamentalists on the other, the majority of religious folk are non fundamentalists, but as this important time in history unfolds and is accessible to all via global communications, the drift towards the extremes is giong to provide an historical turning point. We live in interesting times!

an interesting sight that I recently came across:

http://www.faithfreedom.org/index.htm.

The main author is under death threats for daring to write what he see's as the truth about a particular religion ( originally his own ). He has challenged the scholars of that religion to provide proof that what he writes is not true, and offered a $50,000 payment as an extra incentive. Some are so offended by the fact that their beliefs are called into question that they are prepared to murder him to 'prove' their side of the argument. Scary

Just my humble opinion.

regards,
Mark

Success is having what you want. Happiness is wanting what you have.
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Old 03-12-2006, 11:24 AM   #25
gertninja
Location: Burnley
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Re: Paradox: God cannot not believe

an interesting sight that I recently came across:

http://www.faithfreedom.org/index.htm.

That blew away my afternoon, a well researched, coherent and scholarly site from a complete loon! I wonder what happened to turn the author into a fanatic. Reminds me of the attitude that some ex catholics have adopted.
Anyway, I think Sara was asking the questions (from a christian perspective) that all religions are susceptible to. Issues of Omniscience, omnipotentency and the very idea of divinity itself. I Always get a 'better' response from the door to door religious sales-people with the questions about the bigger picture than I do from issues of holy scripture. With the bible they can say its either 'literal truth' or 'an allegory' depending on which brand they are pushing.
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