Do you believe in God? Why or why not?

[I_Am_LebanoN]

Originally Posted by General my General!

Quite convincing.
Etc.

No disrespect to your "perspective" but I debate to learn not to win, and I have nothing to learn from you.

Originally Posted by Learned

This isn't accurate. If you'd like, I can write out a rigorous proof for you that demonstrates how any system of logic and rationality (such as arithmetic, algebra, calculus, etc) is ultimately incomplete in the sense that there will always be truths within that system of logic that cannot be demonstrated to be true, and falsehoods within that system of logic that cannot be demonstrated to be false. In other words, any rigidly logical system is incomplete. Furthermore, it is possible to prove that any logical system is also inconsistent, meaning that its consistency cannot be demonstrated within the system itself.

Thus you cannot demonstrate what you just stated since proving it would be dismissing it. I'd like to see you try though.

What this tell us is that, we can only be certain of what we can be certain of as long as we can demonstrate the consistency and viability of our methods exhaustively and rigorously within the system(s) of logic that we are utilizing, and that there will always be truths and falsehoods that we will never be able to identify as such. Essentially, the tools at our disposal (logic, rationality, mathematics, science, etc) will never be able to uncover all truths and expose all falsehoods, and in some cases, when it comes to some of the things we demonstrate to be true, the inconsistency of our methods will always cast doubt on the validity of our findings.

That is interesting as theory and I do agree with it but it is a useless reasoning as you'll never apply it to your life. Will you stop searching for answers and trying to uncover truths because of the belief that no proof of any theory is conclusive, ultimately ? Which would lead you to nihilism rather than agnosticism. And while the 1st is inapplicable, the latter is hypocritical.

[Frisbeetarian]

For those of you who don't believe in God, what do you think the purpose of life is? Is your life simply the product of an unlikely chain of events, on the cosmic scale, that eventually lead to your birth?

Does a purpose need to be?

Thus you cannot demonstrate what you just stated since proving it would be dismissing it. I'd like to see you try though.

Will prove that it is incomplete by reaching dead ends.

That is interesting as theory and I do agree with it but it is a useless reasoning as you'll never apply it to your life. Will you stop searching for answers and trying to uncover truths because of the belief that no proof of any theory is conclusive, ultimately ? Which would lead you to nihilism rather than agnosticism. And
while the 1st is inapplicable, the latter is hypocritical.

But when this notion applies to theory what you proposed is not valid. You cannot prove that god does not exist because of the shortcoming of our reasoning methods just like Learned implied. The argument that denies god's existence on the principle of not being able to prove his presence falls short from being logical as the later does not imply the other.

[I_Am_LebanoN]

Proving that something no longer exists would be impossible "because of the shortcoming of our reasoning methods just like Learned implied". But the existence of God has always been an assumption and these assumptions remained assumptions, we don't even have any kind of data to study to begin with.

Call it whatever you like, proof or not; God is exactly as likely to exist as the tooth fairy.

[Dalzi]

Yes I am certain that God exists. Have I questioned or do I question? Yes of course I do, part of being human and having a brain. There is Intelligent design with excellence and that design doesn't come about by blowing bubbles in water, it needs a methodology. I don't believe that perfection can come from imperfection.

I believe in God with no strings attached; no mortals and no gender. I don't believe in clergy unless they only exist to explain to me what I don't understand without getting paid for doing so. I don't believe in any man made doctrins that contradict the scripture. And I don't relate God or what I believe is the truth to what humans do and have been doing. Faith in God to me has nothing to do with religions and labels. It comes from the inside and grows with knowledge and questioning.

Cheers

[I_Am_LebanoN]

Originally Posted by Dalzi

I don't believe that perfection can come from imperfection.


Cheers

Yeah, perfection. You should maybe try googling Harlequin type ichthyosis for example. I advise you not to though.

[Ataraxia]

Originally Posted by TripolySunni

I Didn't take thier Evolution theory into Account and it turned out Wrong. And The Only Organized religion they knew was the Christianity Which is Very UnScientific and that is the truth. But They had some people fooled with this evolution theory You know with all the illustrations of monkeys turning slowly to humans.

You only object evolution because it contradicts your beliefs, which is a shame since you are still stuck in your religious circle.

Yes They were Athiests, You Making fun of it doesn't mean it's not a FACT. Trust me, check out Who came up with this Idea and U'll be surprized.

You are still being illogical. Can you answer me why would atheists come up with intelligent design if the very reason that pushed them to be non-believers or at least skeptical is the rejection of the God of gaps ?
Do you know that since the concept of intelligent design is wholly religious then the ones who created it are people like you, me ... thousands of years ago ( or even better ever since the "creation" of humanity ?) One of the reasons the concept of God was made was because of futile and unintellectual attempts to explain the universe which as I said only supports the God of gaps. Stop being illogical and spreading lies. I don't care about the background of those who termed it but it was logically present ever since humans appeared in Earth. What is even more ridiculous is that you believe that Atheists want to put a purpose for the universe when it contradicts with their atheistic identity. Talk about being blind.

It's Complex for you as a human with Limited mind and understanding as for God it may not be complex, and it's Complexity and beauty and Perfection of all phenomenon Reflects the Glory of its creator.

Lol, so it's not complex anymore ? ( since you said it may be complex for human only) LOL. So It isn't perfect anymore? Ok, then it is no where near complex and anyone could have done it since it's complexity means nothing.

If this isn't the most ridiculous argument I've read I don't know what is it then ! Try to be objective than just defending your point.

As for me Debating you a thousand yrs ago, well That remains to be seen. Anyway
Can you tell me that Thunder is explainable that you have mentionned it? Why does the Electron react the way it does In Relation to the Neutrone and Protons? You Realise that scientists Still havn't dived deep enough to know why the small bodies act the way they do and the more the microscopes and the science evolves The More they discover Other Smaller bodies which they cannot See But they can feel.

Would we be talking about this had adaptation and evolution not happened ? Our world the way it is and your existence required and entailed evolution and adaptation as I said before. The reason you are here is because it happened. If it didn't you wouldn't be here to talk about. Once you try to think with a pure mind, only then you would break out of your religious circle.

They are pretty famous people and BTW I told you they didn't believe in Organized religion then you reply to me by repeating what i said, Brilliant. I told you that these guys Only Had access to certain religions which they found Conflicting with thier discoveries so they Left them and Created thier Own Concept of God. As for Gallileo He was trying to correctify the teachings of the Church for thier own good.and I thought i already explained God to you but you seem not to understand. I told you GOD means an Object of Worship which people put thier hopes, Faith and aspirations in, Like Money or Science or Physical Strength or Communism. Let me give you an example: The Army generals most of them have a very famous God Called Sun Tzu, They believe that if you follow his teachings you will succeed in battle and if you Go against it you will lose and they even Belive that he Foretld the defeat of the Nazis and the defeat of the confederates in America, So this is a Man which they put all thier hopes and faith and aspirations in In order to get Victory in Return THUS A GOD.

They don't believe in organized religion because they don't agree with putting purpose for everything. Einstein for example said that even if it turned out that some God exists he surely doesn't watch you and judge you and all that. His idea of God was very abstract and thus he gave no importance to such creator. Therefore, if you come with Islam and say well now we have more common sense, he would care less because he believes God is not in the form you like to label him. Again, ridiculous.

and i already told you that most humans have more than one God...So the simple message of Islam is just worship One God and be thankful to him without associating anyone. For example: If you Succeed in an Exam Thank God then Thank the teacher who taught you, or If you Win a War Thank God Then thank the Generals and the Whether conditions and the Weapons... So Just Put all your Hopes and ur aspirations and Faith in one God and not hundreds.

And all that even if made any sense, has no importance.

The Universe existed before the Humans did and there are other creations before Humanity and that is common knowlege in islam and the universe will continue after Humanity until the day of Judgement, so I really don't know what ur on about. In Fact this Whole thing Started by a being which is Not Human, a Being who is not an angel But of the Jinn called "3azazil", After this being Used the power alloted to him to Act as an Arrogant Racist Then he was Cursed and called "Iblis" or Satan as they say in english and he caused Adam to commit Sin so Adam and his progency were Placed on earth were they are to prove that they are worthy of God's Mercy.
Allah Created everything, and he is an all knowing and almighty God. For him this is not a problem but it is one for his creation so he offered a solution and he is an expert on his creations.

So the world doesn't center on us anymore ? What purpose did God create the universe then ?

If Allah Knows ur Future that Shouldn't affect you in anyway, If the teacher Knows The answers and has setup the questions and Has a solid Idea of who will Fail and who will pass, That does not affect The students taking the test Because they don't know. So Nothing is really Controling you, you can either Go to heaven or Hell based on what you do ragrdless of all else.

A solid idea here is a a logical assumption. In God's case, he is all-knowing. He won't guess, he knows. Very wrong comparison.

Each Prophet is responsible for his own people and not the ones before him, it is written in ur Bible that the father shall not bare the eniquity of the son nor shall the sone bare that of the father, So in Islam you do not go to heaven and Tell god to Charge ur Sins to jesus(PBUH). Prophet Elias(PBUH) was responsible for his people, Prophet Yusuf(PBUH) orJoseph Was responsible for his people and so on and there are litterally Thousands of them Both messengers and prophets. For anyone on the face of the planet which did not receive clear guidance the judgement Criteria will be different from those who did depending on how they lived and what they believed.

So those people before where do they go ? Why couldn't God find a solution for them ? They all go to heaven( unfair). They all go to hell ( also unfair). They don't go anywhere ? ( hell even this might be unfair, if you take into account how nice heaven may be :p)

Listen i try to answer as best as i could and sometimes I can't even express properly and that is simply because I'm not a Scholar nor english Nor do I have a Conversation about religion with Athiests usually anyway... So If a Person Didn't Die he could have repented? well It seems he died without repenting, seems he didn't take this seriously when he had the chance and It seems that he is Gonna take Responsibility for what He does Just Like Ariel Sharon or George bush will be responsible for what they did. Don't Sound too unfair to me.

That's not the point.I'm sure you are more educated than me. I am just 17, and I can't express properly either.I also don't go into debates with religious people. My parents even just know I'm careless of religion and a bit skeptical but they don't know I'm an atheist. If you watch my replies carefully I don't go into the religious and evolutionary debates simply because I haven't read Darwin's books or any evolutionary book yet. I am simply a non-believer because well it made no sense to me. To me the story of religion does not add up. At first I was kind of afraid because of the consequences I MIGHT face if God existed in the end. But now I feel it gives me strength actually. I know that if I could have reached with my logic that God exists I would have believed in him. I have no other reason not to. That is why I don't fear this possibility anymore.

As for the Heaven and Hell equation ( as I like to put it),

when he had the chance

Maybe he couldn't take it seriously. This reply brings us back to the first post I made about this subject. So, after all it's about time ?! So it gives "unfair advantage". What's the point of me repenting and then dying in the following two case:

One guy has the chance, repents and die although he has done the same faults the second guy did, whereas this second guy couldn't live to a time where he could repent. Ofcourse this is one example. You could refer back to kids and babies. Where do they go ? ( the concept of conscience ( which religion depended on) is a sword with two sharp ends eh ?) Or any other person who could have done what other bad people did but had the "luck" of dying before them. All these matters that would be referred to as "unfair advantage".

[Ataraxia]

Originally Posted by Dalzi

Yes I am certain that God exists. Have I questioned or do I question? Yes of course I do, part of being human and having a brain. There is Intelligent design with excellence and that design doesn't come about by blowing bubbles in water, it needs a methodology. I don't believe that perfection can come from imperfection.

I believe in God with no strings attached; no mortals and no gender. I don't believe in clergy unless they only exist to explain to me what I don't understand without getting paid for doing so. I don't believe in any man made doctrins that contradict the scripture. And I don't relate God or what I believe is the truth to what humans do and have been doing. Faith in God to me has nothing to do with religions and labels. It comes from the inside and grows with knowledge and questioning.

Cheers

Do you think God is important ? Given your description of God ( with no religious strings attached to him) then I doubt he should be any important as he did not present himself to you.

[Frisbeetarian]

Proving that something no longer exists would be impossible "because of the shortcoming of our reasoning methods just like Learned implied". But the existence of God has always been an assumption and these assumptions remained assumptions, we don't even have any kind of data to study to begin with.

Call it whatever you like, proof or not; God is exactly as likely to exist as the tooth fairy.

Why are NP-complete problems interesting? First, although no efficient algorithm
for an NP-complete problem has ever been found, nobody has ever proven
that an efficient algorithm for one cannot exist. In other words, it is unknown
whether or not efficient algorithms exist for NP-complete problems. Second, the
set of NP-complete problems has the remarkable property that if an efficient algorithm
exists for any one of them, then efficient algorithms exist for all of them.
This relationship among the NP-complete problems makes the lack of efficient solutions
all the more tantalizing. Third, several NP-complete problems are similar,
but not identical, to problems for which we do know of efficient algorithms. A
small change to the problem statement can cause a big change to the efficiency of
the best known algorithm.

[False Morel]

God is a final idea in the form of a suggestion subject only to belief.
Man has the freedom of choice to believe in that suggestion.

However, the "why" question is out-of-bounds in this particular case!
The question ought to be posed on a believer is the "how" question:

How do you believe in God?

No reasoning could be discussed regarding faith.

[Dalzi]

Originally Posted by I_Am_LebanoN

Yeah, perfection. You should maybe try googling Harlequin type ichthyosis for example. I advise you not to though.

This is irrelevant. The creation of world is perfect, and that means it's not random, but rather intelligently designed. Do you look like that? A deformality doesn't rule out the perfection of creation from which ever angle you examine it. Abnormalities only show what happens when the intricate and precise design is disrupted. If you fail to see perfection even in the fingernail that you clip off, then that's your own opinion.

Originally Posted by Ataraxia

Do you think God is important ? Given your description of God ( with no religious strings attached to him) then I doubt he should be any important as he did not present himself to you.

No man made strings attached to Him. Those strings render him imperfect. The way he presented himself has nothing to do with the retarted clergy and their inventions.