Safehands wrote: » You know, I visited the Museum of Modern art last year. I saw a pint of water on a glass shelf. It was an exhibit. The artist declared that it was actually a tree, not a glass of water, and he presented an articulate argument explaining his reasoning. I'm sure some people looked at it and wondered. No matter how well his explanation was presented, it was still a glass of water, not a tree. The facts revealed that no matter what the artist wanted it to be it was always going to be what the evidence declared it to be, a glass with water in it. Always look at the evidence, then decide!
Roquentin wrote: » is the glass half empty or half full, it depends on ones interpretation
Safehands wrote: » Ah! now that is a different argument, optimism v pessimism. Nothing to do with the discussion on this thread.
Roquentin wrote: » thats your interpretation
Thisname wrote: » No one here can prove that there is a God (or that there isn't) I could mention things like the origins of the universe, life, intelligent design etc etc But the only way you'll know for sure is if you give Him the benefit of the doubt. Why not since you're not 100% convinced either way anyway? Take a step of faith and talk to Him, ask Him to reveal Himself. (Don't expect the clouds to part and God to reach down and take you by the hand!) But if you seek Him with an honest heart you'll find He's true to His word. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. Jeremiah 29:13
Brian Shanahan wrote: » We may not be able to disprove the existence of a god (mainly because it is impossible to disprove an undefined entity) but we can disprove specific gods, given enough effort. For example, a thorough reading of the torah & tanakh will disprove yhwh. First of all the description of his "creation" (there area ctually two, which contradict each other) bear no relation to reality, and if he created everything, shouldn't he have gotten it right in the retelling?
Brian Shanahan wrote: » Second comes the large number of logical impossibilities attributed to him, such as the omnipotence omniscience problem, or the omniscience existence of free will problem. And third is the fact that he breaks physics so often that we either have to throw out yhwh or throw out reality. I know what I'd rather keep.
Brian Shanahan wrote: » It is obvious from reading the bible (which contains translations of jewish scripture) that yhwh was a concept invented by a people trying to explain natural phenomena they didn't understand, and to gain control over others while creating a divide between jews and their neighbours (the many rules and taboos). It is clear that he is a group imaginary figment.
An omnipotent God is also omniscient
physics is broken in many situations
that a good God did it
RikuoAmero wrote: » The two attributes are diametrically opposed and cannot co-exist in the same entity. I love how you just say essentially "He's both" all without any sort of explanation, reasoning or logic to back up your assertion. Omnipotence is the ability to do anything. Omniscience is having all knowledge. If an entity is omniscient, he knows what he will do for every moment throughout all of time. He thus becomes trapped by it (for a great example, read Frank Herbert's "Dune Messiah", where the protagonist, Paul Muad'Dib, loses his physical eye-sight, having to rely on his ability to predict the future in order to 'see'...only for him to become trapped by it, as he loses any ability to change the future). A being who is trapped by his own omniscience is thus by definition NOT omnipotent, as he does not then have the ability to do anything.
RikuoAmero wrote: » You really don't know how stupid this is? We rely on predicting the future in order to survive, which essentially means mathematics/physics. If you throw the reliable nature of physics out of the window, then for all you know, you could be eating poison when you thought you were eating bangers and mash.
RikuoAmero wrote: » Insert standard retort of "A good god wouldn't drown an entire planet full of innocent people" and let's move on.
RikuoAmero wrote: » Don't bother with saying "They were all evil" or anything of that nature, because that only reveals you to be the sickest, most depraved individual imaginable, a person who is okay with the thought of outright genocide of an entire planet.
On a Human level, it is something like me knowing that I will exercise my free-will to drive to work tomorrow. Me knowing what I will do, in a particular situation, doesn't affect my ability to decide what I will do, in the first place.
RikuoAmero wrote: » This is what you have decided to, chose to do, intend to do (choose your favourite phrase there). However, you don't know 100% for a fact, that this is what you will do. You've chosen to drive tomorrow, great...except that once you go to do it, you find out, to your surprise, that you forgot to buy petrol the previous day, or it's broken down or something. In other words, you didn't have omniscience. Something outside of your knowledge acted contrary to your will. This is not the case with your god, who is described as having omniscience. He supposedly knows, 100%, what he will do tomorrow. Nothing can change that (otherwise it wouldn't be omniscience), thus he cannot be omnipotent.
J C wrote: » Like I have said, unlike me, where many things may conspire to prevent me driving tomorrow, God's omnipotence means that He can choose to do exactly what He wants to do ... whereas my lack of both omnipotence and omniscience, means that my intentions are always subject to change. God knows 100% what He and everybody else will do ... and He can choose to do whatever He decides to do, as His sovereign will decides - so He is both omniscient and omnipotent.:)
RikuoAmero wrote: » He can choose what to do tomorrow, but once he makes that choice, it's locked. Part of omniscience is awareness of what happens in the future. I as a human can choose right now to drive to work, but because I don't have knowledge of the future, I am free to change my mind. Your god cannot. In fact, I'm skeptical that your god (if he exists) even has the ability to choose. Choosing implies time, moving from a state of non-choice to having made a choice. It implies options, of deciding between several exclusionary choices. Do I go to work tomorrow by car, or by bus? I can't take both at the same time. Can your god? Can your god take several choices that are mutually exclusive? Omnipotence suggests yes, but this goes in violation of the law of non-contradiction.
mister gullible wrote: » Does it get any more ridiculous?
God does (omnipotent) as He sees fit and knows (omniscient) what He will do for the rest of eternity ... as well as what we all will do, as well.
RikuoAmero wrote: » A being that is omniscient who makes all of its choices throughout all of eternity, those choices become locked in. He knows 100% that two days from now, he will do X. That becomes a fact to him, something that is without question. If you bring in omnipotence, (in other words, give him the ability to change his mind) this then renders his knowledge that two days from now, he will do X, false. He does Y instead. This negates omniscience. It's one or the other, J C. Remember, this isn't from the human point of view, where the future is forever unknown to us (I can intend to do something two days from now, but I don't know perfectly whether I actually will do it). The christian god claim I've heard plenty of times says that God knows the future perfectly. He is supposed to know it as perfectly as I know my own name. If he knows the future, he knows what actions he will take. He cannot then have the ability to change his mind, otherwise that negates his knowledge of the future.
Nick Park wrote: » You are probably posting this in the wrong forum as the concept of omnipotence you are talking about is not the Christian one. Omnipotence, as understood in Christian theology, does not mean the ability to do anything at all. For example, omnipotence does not include the power to create a square circle, the power to make something that simultaneously exists and yet does not exist, or to do anything that would be contrary to one's nature (such as sinning).
RikuoAmero wrote: » In other words, what one is logically able to do, and in their nature. That definition defeats your god claim, since I can do only those things that I am logically able to do (for example, I cannot flap my arms and expect to defy gravity). My nature restricts my actions yet again - it is not in my nature to go around commanding others to dash infants heads against rocks (yes, that is from the OT, what God is claimed to have commanded his followers to do). Under that mode of thinking, the label of omnipotent applies to me and applies to you.
As for the outside time nonsense, that is an assumption that theists make, without any evidence whatsoever. It is a game of moving the goalposts. First, God was depicted as a powerful being who walked bodily around the earth. Then our knowledge advanced, and he was said to live in the clouds. Our knowledge advanced, we invented air-travel and found there were no gods in the clouds. So God was moved yet again, this time to...outside time? We currently define something that exists as something that is within space and time. If you put your god outside of time, you might as well say he doesn't exist at all. This is also a situation of you wanting to eat your cake and have it too - God is outside time, but also interacts with the universe (in other words, is inside space and time)...which is it?
RikuoAmero wrote: » Also, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle defeats the notion of God (at least in terms of his supposed omniscience: you can't know both the position and the momentum of a given particle simultaneously)
Nick Park wrote: » It would if you're interested in playing smart-aleck games rather than discussing what Christians believe.
I was, of course, referring to God's moral nature rather than to physical attributes or capabilities.
Unhistorical waffle.
Christians have believed in God as an eternal Being long before we invented air travel. Why not try to engage with what Christians actually believe (which is the purpose of this thread) rather than making stuff up?
There is no contradiction with a God who exists outside of time and is able to interact with time and space. In everyday life we often speak of someone being outside of something yet having the ability to interact with that same thing.
And as for your claim that "We currently define something that exists as something that is within space and time" - that is purely your arbitrary claim based on a prior assumption that an Eternal God outside of time and space does not exist. You are, therefore, committing the logical fallacy of begging the question.
RikuoAmero wrote: » I am discussing what christians (generally) believe. There is one problem here: that of the many different denominations. Who are you to say what is and is not a christian belief?
How so? This is historically accurate: the view of what and where a god is has changed over time. The Greeks believed they lived in bodily form atop Mt. Olympus for example; Jews believed God walked around in Eden (so to do literal christians) Check medieval art: how often are God, the angels, etc, depicted as coming from the sky? Now that we have airplanes and space-craft, does any modern christian theologian depict God as coming from the sky?
Now fast forward to modern times, where we have reached that realm, and suddenly he is said to be outside time instead (according to you). Well now you have just reached the problem of never being able to substantiate your argument: how can we reach outside time to verify this claim?
A necessary assumption, unless you want to falsify it and give me evidence of something that exists outside of space and time...instead of just saying there is this one thing?
What you're doing there is the cosmological argument
Your goal here is to prove God through logic.
RikuoAmero wrote: » Nick, if you're just going to make claims about God, but are not interested at all in proving them...what are you doing here?
Nick Park wrote: » I'm pointing out the inadequacy of your arguments against God. I'm also correcting your misrepresentations and misunderstandings concerning Christian belief. I don't see that there is any onus on me to prove those beliefs at all - certainly not in the Christianity Forum. Now, if I was posting in the Atheism and Agnosticism Forum and telling the people there. "You've got it all wrong - there is a God!" then there would be an onus upon me to prove such claims.
marienbad wrote: » So what is the point of the thread title then ?
Nick Park wrote: » Now, if I was posting in the Atheism and Agnosticism Forum and telling the people there. "You've got it all wrong - there is a God!" then there would be an onus upon me to prove such claims.
