What is God to you?

MagicMarker

Biggins wrote: »

One more character in another book available at all good book sellers.
The end.

I prefer non-fiction myself.

Biggins

MagicMarker wrote: »

I prefer non-fiction myself.

Never said it wasn't

Kasabian

McChubbin wrote: »

I believe in Zombie Jesus.

My holy trinity is Chuck Norris (The Father), Bruce Campbell (The almighty Son of Chin) and Techno Viking (The Holy Mofo).

Then you have Space Pope and Space Ghost... *rambles*

Might explain your other thread , are you sure your were spiked or given a present.:pac:

Sam Vimes

kylith wrote: »

Exactly. In social animals morality is instinctive.

It's instinctive in us too. I know that when I hurt someone even unintentionally I feel bad, even if I tell myself that it wasn't my fault and there was nothing I could have done to stop it. And that's because the part of my brain that's "programmed" to release chemicals to make me feel bad when I hurt someone can't just be overruled by my conscious mind, any more than I can consciously choose to be sober after drinking ten pints. The sub conscious compulsions we feel to help others are the same ones animals feel. Animals don't have to "know" that any "good" behaviour will result in reward and if they did that would itself indicate some kind of higher reasoning ability because they would have to know what "good" behaviour is, that the recipient of the behaviour will remember it and that they will reciprocate.

All the animals "know" is that the suffering of other members of the pack makes them feel bad and vice versa. It's all just chemicals following the "programming" in their DNA, no higher reasoning required and no god either

Sam Vimes

Even the bible acknowledges that that people know right from wrong "by nature" independent of religion, that we feel involuntary subconscious compulsions to do good

book of Romans wrote:

13 For it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God's sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous. 14(Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law, 15 since they they do not have the law, since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them.)

So we all agree that we do good "by nature" because "the law is written on our hearts", we just disagree on how it got there because the writers of the bible didn't know about evolution, an excuse people today don't have

coffee_cake

Sanjuro wrote: »

So if you're a christian carrying a 36" television down four flights of stairs and an atheist (how you're supposed to know if someone's a christian or atheist by looking at them is beyond me) offers help do you say 'no thanks. God will help me'? The only thing that seems to serve is to point out the fundamental problem with most religions. That some invisible non-existant overseer will help you when you should really just interact with others, no matter what creed they may or may not have.

.

A man was trapped on his rooftop by the rising waters of a flood. A fellow came over in a rowboat and called to the man, “Hop into my boat!I’ll save you!”
The stranded man refused, saying, “No – God will save me!”
The water rose to the man’s knees, and along came a rescuer in a
motorboat.“Get in my boat!I’ll save you!” cried the boater.
“No!” the man on the roof replied.“God will save me!”
Soon after, the water was up to the man’s chest. Now came a helicopter
with a sling suspended from it.“Grab onto the sling!” called the pilot. “I’ll pull you up and save you!” As the man called, “No, God will save me!”a wave swept him off the roof and he drowned. As he entered into heaven, God greeted him, saying, “Welcome to
heaven! Glad to see you! Before I show you around and introduce you
to some of the angels, do you have any questions?”
“Well, yes Sir, as a matter of fact I do have one question.” the man
replied.“There I was, stranded on my roof, with flood waters rising all
around me!Why didn’t you save me?”
“Well!” replied God.“I sent you two boats and a helicopter!What more did you want?"

kylith

bluewolf wrote: »

flood story

apocryphal

vibe666

kylith wrote: »

apocryphal

bless you!

* sorry, it sounded like a sneeze.

Duggy747

God is like Brocolli to me...

I want nothing to do it and think people are sick in the head for liking it*

AskMyChocolate wrote:

Btw, if you're an atheist and you're struggling to carry a 36" television down four flights of stairs and a christian turns to you and says," Do you want a hand with that mate?" What do you say?

"NNNnnnnnnnnnnnrrrgh...........If...........if ya don't mind..............nnnnnnnrrrgh.......it's getting...........quite heavy!!"

Heh, what would you expect us to do? Hiss, turn into a bat and fly away?

It be like telling me ma to fùck off when she offer to cook me dinner when I come to visit! :pac:

*Duggy Disclaimer - This star represents that I joke, there is no hidden moral undertone against those who wish to practise Christianity. If you have a complaint please write a letter, put it in an envelope and post it into any bin.

geeky

Tom O'C.

philologos

Sam Vimes wrote: »

Even the bible acknowledges that that people know right from wrong "by nature" independent of religion, that we feel involuntary subconscious compulsions to do good

So we all agree that we do good "by nature" because "the law is written on our hearts", we just disagree on how it got there because the writers of the bible didn't know about evolution, an excuse people today don't have

Agreed, in the first respect in that the Bible does say that. Disagreed in the second.

It is still perfectly possible that we could have evolved biologically, while still having our concept of morality given to us by God. Even before we get to the position of biological evolution, there are still a lot of questions surrounding whether or not the circumstances required for such evolution could have come about by their own accord.

I.E - The God question is as open as ever, and we don't really need an "excuse".

raah!

Sam Vimes wrote: »

Good=helping other members of the pack
Bad=hurting other members of the pack

What's the problem? Why does that have to be any more than instinct?

All these points have already been thoroughly discussed.

The kernel is "helping other members of hte pack = good" would be described as morality, but that's probably not how evolution brings about "moral action" in things. It is more likely to be "helping other members of the pack = dopamine release (or whichever chemical it is that has the desired effect". And I have also said, it's fine to say you l ike dopamine releases, but this puts you on a similar level to heroin addicts.

But all that has been discussed.

Ruu_Old

A fairy.

raah!

Sam Vimes wrote: »

can't just be overruled by my conscious mind

Here's an interesting example, sayingn you run somone over... and you feel bad. But then, through a set of reasoning, you convince yourself that it wasn't your fault, but that someone else killed him (for example), does htis not count as consciously overriding chemical releases?

Another example is most people say that once you do something band, it becomes easier to do it again.

A reverse example is that someone might feel bad for copying someone's essay. In both senses it's reason controling the chemical releases. While this isn't that related, I do think that one's conscious mind can overcome emotional or chemical impulses.

All the animals "know" is that the suffering of other members of the pack makes them feel bad and vice versa. It's all just chemicals following the "programming" in their DNA, no higher reasoning required and no god either

This is not contradictory to anything I've been saying either. It's much exactly what I've been saying.

Voodu Child

Something I stopped believing in when I was about 9.

I think I actually believed in Santa Claus slightly later than god, at least there was some physical evidence of Santa :pac: (presents). The evidence was planted as it turns out, leading to my life-long distrust of authority figures.

Killer Pigeon

Geez people,

Morality is subjective in the sense that, lots of different people have lots of different ideas about what is moral and what is not, but it is objective in the sense that, there is objective truth that shows what is moral and what is not.

So morality doesn't come from some giant moral spaghetti monster.

Evolution is true and there is evidence, creationism is false and there is no evidence (i.e., Genesis is a load of BS).

There is no afterlife, you don't go anywhere after you die because technically you're still here but all your bodily functions have failed and your consciousness has flicked off. Proving that there is no afterlife or continuation of the consciousness after death can prove that all world religions are false.

Nobody can prove whether or not there is a supreme being or prime mover who initiated motion and energy exists but believing or not believing in a supreme being will not effect you in any way because after all there is no afterlife so you can't go to hell or limbo for not believing. However, someday I think physicists will figure out how in fact energy and motion came into being and then we can all live happily ever after. The End.

Sam Vimes

Jakkass wrote: »

Agreed, in the first respect in that the Bible does say that. Disagreed in the second.

It is still perfectly possible that we could have evolved biologically, while still having our concept of morality given to us by God. Even before we get to the position of biological evolution, there are still a lot of questions surrounding whether or not the circumstances required for such evolution could have come about by their own accord.

I.E - The God question is as open as ever, and we don't really need an "excuse".

Yes Jakkass, the concept of the christian god remains, as always, unfalsifiable. You can claim that god was involved somewhere at some unspecified point along the line and that he did something that there is no requirement for him to have done because it could have happened quite easily without him but the position has moved from "this can't have happened without god" to "you can't prove god wasn't involved even though there is no reason to think he was other than I like to think so" and that's a much weaker position to hold. Once we have established that something can happen quite easily without god, why still insist that he must have been involved?

Sam Vimes

raah! wrote: »

All these points have already been thoroughly discussed.

The kernel is "helping other members of hte pack = good" would be described as morality, but that's probably not how evolution brings about "moral action" in things. It is more likely to be "helping other members of the pack = dopamine release (or whichever chemical it is that has the desired effect".

That's what I said, I just said chemical release instead of specifying that the chemical was dopamine.

raah! wrote: »

And I have also said, it's fine to say you l ike dopamine releases, but this puts you on a similar level to heroin addicts.

The fact that it means morality isn't magical and it doesn't make you feel special doesn't mean it's not true.

raah! wrote: »

Here's an interesting example, sayingn you run somone over... and you feel bad. But then, through a set of reasoning, you convince yourself that it wasn't your fault, but that someone else killed him (for example), does htis not count as consciously overriding chemical releases?

Another example is most people say that once you do something band, it becomes easier to do it again.

A reverse example is that someone might feel bad for copying someone's essay. In both senses it's reason controling the chemical releases. While this isn't that related, I do think that one's conscious mind can overcome emotional or chemical impulses.

This is not contradictory to anything I've been saying either. It's much exactly what I've been saying.

Yes someone who runs someone over can keep telling themselves that someone else killed them, our capacity for reason allows us to choose to ignore these feelings but the feelings are there nonetheless. Over time the feelings can sometimes but not always reduce but they're still there to begin with. The point I was making was that the source of our compulsion to do good and to feel bad about hurting others is these chemical releases. Reason does not control these releases, we do not choose to release these chemicals that cause us to feel bad, we can only choose with great strength of will to ignore them. So it's actually our capacity for reason that allows us to hurt others and convince ourselves it's ok; our reason allows us to be immoral despite the chemicals that are released by our evolved brains doing their best to stop us by making us feel bad

philologos

Sam Vimes wrote: »

Yes Jakkass, the concept of the christian god remains, as always, unfalsifiable. You can claim that god was involved somewhere at some unspecified point along the line and that he did something that there is no requirement for him to have done because it could have happened quite easily without him but the position has moved from "this can't have happened without god" to "you can't prove god wasn't involved even though there is no reason to think he was other than I like to think so" and that's a much weaker position to hold. Once we have established that something can happen quite easily without god, why still insist that he must have been involved?

I would disagree, given that I would regard morality on a real and tangible level as being universal, rather than subjective. In the day to day implications of acting, it lends itself more to a universal morality which our consicence can grasp, rather than subjective morality which really is merely intellectual than pragmatic.

It hasn't moved at all. We need a tangible standard on which to base human action. Good and evil must be universal concepts if they are to be really workable.

This is why in the passage you quoted in Romans, Paul is referring to the divine law, and how people who are ignorant of it can still follow it by nature. However, ultimately, there is only one law irrespective of how people wish to attempt to weedle out of it.

It's pretty much an exaggeration and a leap to suggest that this could happen "easily" without God. Ultimately, morality makes little real sense without God.

take everything

I'm just amazed that Jakkass and Sam Vimes still have stuff left to say to each other.

Sam Vimes

Jakkass wrote: »

I would disagree, given that I would regard morality on a real and tangible level as being universal, rather than subjective. In the day to day implications of acting, it lends itself more to a universal morality which our consicence can grasp, rather than subjective morality which really is merely intellectual than pragmatic.

It hasn't moved at all. We need a tangible standard on which to base human action. Good and evil must be universal concepts if they are to be really workable.

The fact that you would like there to be a universal standard doesn't mean there is one. The closest we get in the real world is something like "no sane human beings want themselves or their loved ones to die". That could be said to be a universal standard across all of humanity. From this we can derive that killing is wrong. No god required.

Jakkass wrote: »

.
It's pretty much an exaggeration and a leap to suggest that this could happen "easily" without God. Ultimately, morality makes little real sense without God.

Saying that something is so complex and wondrous that it must have been created by something even more complex and wondrous makes little real sense. It just shifts the buck.

Sam Vimes

take everything wrote: »

I'm just amazed that Jakkass and Sam Vimes still have stuff left to say to each other.

We don't. It's just the same circles over and over again. He makes a point, I respond to it, he ignores my response or misses the point completely and then makes the same point again a few days later. Fun times

I have written exactly the same post to him pretty much word for word probably a dozen of times at this stage. He doesn't listen but maybe others will

raah!

Sam Vimes wrote: »

That's what I said, I just said chemical release instead of specifying that the chemical was dopamine.

I know it's what you said, It's also what I've been saying for the last ten pages.

The fact that it means morality isn't magical and it doesn't make you feel special doesn't mean it's not true.

I never made any arguments of this kind. I simply used the word morality correctly. You seem to be conflating it with empathy. Arguments for their separateness can be found in the thread.

Yes someone who runs someone over can keep telling themselves that someone else killed them, our capacity for reason allows us to choose to ignore these feelings but the feelings are there nonetheless. Over time the feelings can sometimes but not always reduce but they're still there to begin with. The point I was making was that the source of our compulsion to do good and to feel bad about hurting others is these chemical releases. Reason does not control these releases, we do not choose to release these chemicals that cause us to feel bad, we can only choose with great strength of will to ignore them. So it's actually our capacity for reason that allows us to hurt others and convince ourselves it's ok; our reason allows us to be immoral despite the chemicals that are released by our evolved brains doing their best to stop us by making us feel bad

I disagree, and think using words like "good" and "bad" casually like that in an argument about morality will only confuse matters.

Yes it is our capacity for reason that allows us to do things that aren't evolutionarily advantageous. It is also our capacity of reason that allows us to use words like good and bad. These are concepts, and without reason, or words even (maybe without words as pictures or something, but that is a massively different area of study. They need signifiers, semiotics yada ydadadada).

So saying "reason causes us do do immoral things despite our dopamines definition of good and bad" is ridiculous. Because dopamine doesn't define things. What's more, I've said all this already.

Sam Vimes

raah! wrote: »

I never made any arguments of this kind. I simply used the word morality correctly. You seem to be conflating it with empathy. Arguments for their separateness can be found in the thread.

I think I missed them, could you summarise?

raah! wrote: »

I disagree, and think using words like "good" and "bad" casually like that in an argument about morality will only confuse matters.

Good and bad are what we call these things. There need to be no confusion except where people like to think that there's something transcendent or other worldly about it. For the purpose of this thread let's define them as "helping others and avoiding harming them". Is that an acceptable definition to you?

raah! wrote: »

Yes it is our capacity for reason that allows us to do things that aren't evolutionarily advantageous. It is also our capacity of reason that allows us to use words like good and bad. These are concepts, and without reason, or words even (maybe without words as pictures or something, but that is a massively different area of study. They need signifiers, semiotics yada ydadadada).

Do you think that doing good, ie helping other members of your community and avoiding harming them, is not evolutionarily advantageous?

I would argue that going around harming others whenever you feel like it is not evolutionarily advantageous.

raah! wrote: »

So saying "reason causes us do do immoral things despite our dopamines definition of good and bad" is ridiculous. Because dopamine doesn't define things. What's more, I've said all this already.

No dopamine doesn't define what's good and bad. What defines these things is whether or not they harm others, our brains are wired to release dopamine (or whatever) when we cause suffering. We know what causes suffering because because we know what causes ourselves to suffer.

If someone scratches me it hurts. That defines in my brain and the brain of an animal that scratching causes suffering and so they don't do it to others. That's all that's required. We don't have to come into the world with a pre-defined list of things that are good and bad, I don't have to be born with the knowledge that scratching hurts, we learn that as we go along by finding out what causes suffering.

philologos

"I don't listen" meaning that I simply just disagree with your view, and I find that it doesn't make very much sense at all?

Sam Vimes

Jakkass wrote: »

"I don't listen" meaning that I simply just disagree with your view, and I find that it doesn't make very much sense at all?

No Jakkass, you don't listen as in whenever our paths cross (and many others mind you) you miss the point completely until you disappear without responding to most of the points put to you and then pop up a few days later saying the same things that have already been responded to as if nothing happened.

caseyann

What amazes me is people trying to belittle something others have faith in and try to force their opinion on the people who do have such a faith,When the people who have faith leave the ones who dont alone :rolleyes:

philologos

Sam Vimes wrote: »

No Jakkass, you don't listen as in whenever our paths cross (and many others mind you) you miss the point completely until you disappear without responding to most of the points put to you and then pop up a few days later saying the same things that have already been responded to as if nothing happened.

Again, "I don't listen" effectively means, that you say something that I just don't agree with and I explain why, and then you get frustrated at my mere disagreement. "Miss the point completely" effectively means the same thing!

It seems you expect your views not to receive any scrutiny.

Sam Vimes

caseyann wrote: »

What amazes me is people trying to belittle something others have faith in and try to force their opinion on the people who do have such a faith,When the people who have faith leave the ones who dont alone :rolleyes:

So the people without faith giving their opinion on this thread are forcing their opinion on others and the people with faith giving their opinion on this thread are leaving others alone

Sam Vimes

Jakkass wrote: »

Again, "I don't listen" effectively means, that you say something that I just don't agree with, and then you get frustrated at my mere disagreement. "Miss the point completely" effectively means the same thing!

You've just repeated the point I already responded to as if that makes you right. "Miss the point completely" means that you have responded in such a way that shows that you have misunderstood the point being made. If you want to think that I just don't agree with you and it has nothing to do with the fact that you disappear whenever you're asked a question you can't answer you go right ahead