Which one?
The god written in all capitals?
Allah?
FSM?

The one in all caps

What is that “GOD” anyway?

It depends on your point of view. This is my favorite tv quote about science vs God from Young Sheldon:

Did you know that if gravity was slightly more powerful, the universe would collapse into a ball? Also if gravity was slightly less powerful, the universe would fly apart and there’d be no stars or planets. Gravity is precisely as strong as it needs to be, and if the ratio of the electromagnetic force to the strong force wasn’t one percent, life wouldn’t exist. What are the odds that would happen all by itself?

Well, since there’s a high likelihood that, with there being billions of star systems, with possibly hundreds of millions of earth-like planets, there’s more life(s) in the universe (or maybe even in other universes), I would say more chances/higher odds.

@KNOWITALL For all we know, those settings for gravity do and have happened, but where and when they happened, we obviously aren’t there/then to observe it.

@blaine22 The one in all-caps is stupido-GOD, which exists as a mental condition. The evidence is in the (excessively-capitalized) words and behavior of its sufferers.

@KNOWITALL: That is beautiful and poetic (and I love Young Sheldon), but it’s an Earth-centric point of view that places our existence at the top of the universal (multiversal?) food chain.

There is no objectivity in that.

Earth can just as much be seen as “special” as a complete fluke.

If (non-stupido-)god is a metaphor for the universe, then the universe is god, and even if you think the universe is kind of a hallucination, or the material conception of the universe is an illusion, well, (non-stupido-)god is still the universe.

To answer your question directly, no. If there was I would have come across it many years ago. It is all fantasy and wishful thinking.

If one were to question how everything came to be without “God,” then one would also have to ask “Where did he come from?”

Not if god is everything, and everything is god.

Or not if you relate to time as a cycle, or as an illusion.

Or not if you think of god being whatever created the earth, and that there might be other earths.

You also don’t have to ask where god came from, if it’s not part of the story and doesn’t matter.

Nope.

And that sums up the bullshit that is this belief in “God.”

oh for pete sake, do we have to do this for a while again now?

@kneesox I’m starting to suspect that this question, and the question before it, has a purpose. And I don’t like it. at. all.

@Mimishu1995 me too. An agenda.

@kneesox or an attempt to get a “viral” thread and stir a reaction, given the OP’s age and previous comment on the previous question.

The concept of God lies outside of science. Science works with things that can be experimentally tested. It works like this. Formulate a hypothesis and design a test such that if the test fails then the hypothesis is rejected. Otherwise the hypothesis is provisionally accepted.

The problem with the God hypothesis is that there is no way of designing a test such that the failure of the test would cause us to reject the God hypothesis.

As for @KNOWITALL‘s example, it can be taken care of by the case of having multi-universes. For all we know, there may be infinitely many universes and we are just fortunate enough to be in one that supports life. We can’t at present test the multi-universe hypothesis, but it would provide an answer.

@Mimishu1995 Yeah, when I was a teenger, I’m sure I asked questions like this. I was new to the internet and it seemed “edgy” to immediately go for controversy every time. I think one of my most infamous questions back on AIROW was about parents creating a fetish in their child by spanking them. That caused a huge shitstorm. Lol. I think this kind of discussion can be interesting if the OP seems genuinely interested in this discussion and participates in it and isn’t just trying to “stir the pot”.

My own personal thoughts on this are that science and religion answer different questions about life. Looking for “scientific evidence” of God is often just going to be, for both the believer or skeptic, a frustrating dead end. It can be interesting to dwell on cosmological “first cause” questions and the origin of the universe, but there aren’t going to be any satisfactory empirical answers. Anything else is just speculative (order in the universe, consciousness) and there are many possible explanations and might or might not involve something divine or supernatural. That’s the problem with trying to apply the scientific method to something that’s a matter of faith.

@Zaku @cookieman Absolutely correct, we can’t know at this point in time.

I did think it was a lovely way to express the logic in Sheldon’s rationale though, even as the character is not a believer.

I don’t believe there is any actual proof of the existence of God.

It is simply a question of belief and faith.

I consider myself a Christian and I believe in an ultimate being.

Of course each religion worship God in their own way and some believe in another God and some even in more than one.

Edgar Allan Poe wrote that man creates his own God and in a way I believe this to be true.

Some worship money, others power and there are many Gods that others worship.

I personally try to help others wherever I can and this is why I consider myself a Christian

Well there’s the god particle…

The only evidence is everything.

Whose god?

My favorite is thae ice floats.
Most things get smaller when they freeze. Not water.

Is there any scientific evidence that God is not

I am GOD.
Do not ask for proof.
You just need faith.

There is proof of DOG. Many, many DOGs.

@ragingloli What are you?
I have faith that there is no “God.”
Why do I need proof?

@BobM There is lots of proof that “God” isn’t. Just look around. See him anywhere?? If you can’t see him here you can’t and won’t see him anywhere.

The concept of “GOD” is ephemeral and hard to define. Humans may be creating a god-like intelligence as we speak. If we do succeed in creating an A.I. that can self improve, gain function without human assistance the whole singularity/superintelligence thing will probably happen. May as well call that “GOD” or “a GOD” as moments for us could be millennia of progress for something like that. Who is to say that such a thing did not create the universe we currently inhabit? The god of religion though… a different human creation with likely nefarious origins.

Here is the way I look at it.

1) I will only believe in God if there is empirical evidence of God.
2) If there is empirical evidence of God it means that God can be scientifically proven
3) If God is scientifically proven, then that means God is explainable
4) Therefore, God can not be a god.

Unless it is @ragingloli I totally believe in Rags.

The OP hasn’t replied to both questions yet…

No. There isn’t.

One of my favorite quotes:

~Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blind-folded fear.~ Thomas Jefferson

@Demosthenes it’s a bit.. hard for me to sympathize with that mentality, because I have never set out to intentionally cause chaos at any point in my life. That’s why I’m a bit hard on the OP right now.

But I can totally understand where you are coming from. And I’m willing to be proven wrong by the OP.

The all caps GOD lnflection threw us all. Like, is it time for a fight?

Kritiper. I don’t see you does that mean you do not exist.
You have no faith and believe in nothing others have faith and believe in something, does your nothing override there something

@BobM I respond to you. Isn’t that enough to prove my existence? Has “God” ever responded to you in the same way I have?

@Dutchess and he refused to clarify what he means by “GOD”, even after being asked.

That and the fact that he asked two questions about virtually the same topic in a row really set off my radar.

@KNOWITALL It’s an interesting argument, but a bit of a fallacy. The odds of hitting heads 10 times in a row is remote but 100% if you know how its done.

Same thing with the universe. The reason why we exist is that the laws of physics allow us to exist. If the laws of physics were different then we wouldn’t exist. That doesn’t mean that there haven’t been a multidude of other universes with different physics where life doesn’t exist, or it’s a radically different form. Also, evolution by natural selection selects for current environmental factors, so if the laws of physics were somehow different, then it’s possible life would have evolved in different ways.

@Caravanfan You believe in chance more so than I, and that’s okay. I just leave a little room for the possibility of a Creator. :)

“Chance” is something happening by accident. Given infinite time, those “chances” can create amazing things. Totally by accident.
I’ll probably never hit the lottery in my lifetime. But if I were to live forever and still play the lottery every day chances are I’d hit it.

@Dutchess_III We did, remember? It was only $30k but I prayed that God find a way for us to get married if that’s what He wanted and a week later my husband won. Maybe chance, maybe Divine intervention.
When you have accumulated ‘chances’ like that over a lifetime, it’s hard to believe it’s the ‘universe’ looking out for you.

My cousin hit 90 million. I don’t think she’s particularly religious. So what does that mean?

Clearly she made a deal with Rübezahl.

@Dutchess_III Sounds like she got lucky.
To me, there is no such thing as coincidence.

So she got lucky and you didn’t @KNOWITALL?

@KNOWITALL And I have no problem with that. My best friend is a rigorous doctor and accept science as rigorously as I do. He also is a very religious Christian and goes to church every Sunday. Like you he has room for belief God in his life. I do not. Actually, I come from a long line of atheists. My grandfather was an orthodox Jew and an atheist. He was Bar Mitzvahed at the age of 99. He said, “I don’t want to believe in a God who allowed millions of people to be killed in World War 2, but I believe in being Jewish.”

@Dutchess_III I could go into several instances you may call luck, but I know is God’s work. There’s no doubt in my mind.

@Caravanfan Ah yes, that’s a very common non-believer question. How any God could allow such brutality, especially for His chosen people.
The thing is, He didn’t remove choice from us or Hitler.
I won’t indulge myself with a lengthy post but I do hear that often.

I used to have room in my life for God too, which in no way affected my acceptance of evolution or the actual age of the Earth. However I shocked my fellow Christians with that. I was going to hell don’t ya know!
As @Caravanfan once told me, it wasn’t millions of regular people who were slaughtered. It was God’s chosen people. How could he allow that?
(PS it’s all Caravan’s fault that I’ve accepted atheisim. Send HIM to hell God. Not me!)

@KNOWITALL I agree with you in that. My grandfather was “angry” at God and rejected God because of that. For me, I’m not angry at God because I don’t believe in God to begin with. I agree with you that it’s humanity’s choice to kill humanity.

As I’ve mentioned before, my daughter went to Catholic school for thirteen years (K-12). We are not religious. My daughter and I are agnostic and my wife is a very lapsed Catholic). We loved the curriculum and really enjoyed the community and their general goal of helping your children to become good, caring people. They were very light on dogma, science focused, and were open to other religions.

I think it’s okay to cherry pick your involvement in religion sometimes and adjust your faith or lack of along the way. I don’t see it as a fixed, binary situation.

My daughter liked it so much, she chose a Catholic college this year.

@Dutchess_III @caravanfan Thank you both for respectful discourse. Hugs.

There is no scientific evidence that a god exists from what I have read or observed. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t.

If someone chooses to believe in a god, I’m okay with that. When they tell me that they know that there is a god (only one has done so), then I ask for their proof or story. (No explanation was offered.). It’s unfortunate…I would like to hear it.

@Pied_Pfeffer We had a fabulous thread several yeats ago I posted. ‘How has God proved His existence in your life.’
We had a lot more members then and a more diverse group of jellies, check it out.

There’s no proof that God exists but also no proof that God doesn’t exist. Believers choose to believe in God. I choose to believe.

@jca2 I choose not to believe, but I really respect and like what you wrote.

@KNOWITALL Can you provide a link to that post? I would like to read it.

@Dutchess_III which in no way affected my acceptance of evolution or the actual age of the Earth.

I always find it strange when people open up God’s existence to being disproven by placing limits and conditions on it. In the Renaissance, there was such hostility to heliocentrism because it was thought that the sun had to revolve around the earth in order for God to exist. The same thing goes for a “young earth”. If the earth isn’t 6000 years old, then God doesn’t exist. If evolution is real, then God doesn’t exist. It seems to me that if God does exist, then science can’t disprove God. Science would just be a way of understanding the God-created world. But that’s just my perspective…

Oh I know @Demo. I always found it odd that they’d put God in a box. Aren’t his powers limitless?

@jca2 I think you’re right on one issue, it’s all a matter of beliefe. Not possible to KNOW these things.

@Demosthenes
The issue with that is really simple.
The bible makes certain literal claims. The earth being immovable. It having 4 corners and the sky being a dome. Humans formed from dirt and ribs. Someone once counted up the time that passes in the stories, and came to 6000 years.
If you believe that the bible is the literal word of god, and claims within it are exposed as false, it calls into question everything else in the book, including its claims about god itself.

@ragingloli Oh I understand the logic, it’s just never been the way I view religion and God. When I was being brought up as a Catholic, I never took a “literalist” view of the Bible. It was always about the bigger picture. A literalist reading is going to run into problems no matter what.

@ragingloli “I am not ashamed to be called an agnostic. I do not pretend to know that, which other men say they are sure of ”. Clarence Darrow. I think that goes both ways.

@Desmosthenes In my area, Fundamental and Southern Baptists are completely literal. That’s one of the reasons I converted to Catholicism when I was 17.
People use the bible to keep women subordinate and in dresses (not pant!), LGBTQ’s in hiding or conversion therapy, etc… It’s extremely closed to change in dogma.
In my opinion many of the alpha white males stick with it to abuse women and children, and to stoke the great white male ego. I grew up with these values and only realized it was wrong in my late teens.

I truly believe using the bible as a tool to divide is part of the disconnect on many levels. It’s very sad what some people do and say in God’s name.

Which version of the bible are you all referring to? It’s so far mistranslated from the original documents and missing sections that it is almost laughable.

I don’t take the Bible literally. To me, it’s someone’s interpretation of things.

My daughter came to me recently, crying, because her Catholic friends told her she’s going to go to hell because she was never baptized. I explained to her that some people are leaving religions, specifically the Catholic religion, because a lot of it is based on fear and guilt, for example, if you don’t do certain things (like get baptized), you’re going to burn in hell.

Catholic services make me feel like I’ve gone back in time, a thousand years, to some dark, ancient, magic ceremony. Kinda spooky, honestly.
Mom was raised Catholic. She gave them the boot when they sent her a letter telling her she was excommunicated because she’d married a man who had been married before. They didn’t recognize us 3 kids either.
She was livid!!
Assholes.
But I have to wonder who told the church? One of her family members?

@Dutchess_III And then, some people don’t understand why so many people turn atheist. Gosh, I have to wonder…churches turn away their own flocks.

@Nomore_lockout Boy isn’t that the truth. I go every once in awhile if someone invites me. I like the fellowship and music, etc….but generally I dislike almost everything about organized religion.

I’d rather meditate or read the bible or other literature on my own at this point. Churches have lost a lot of credibility with my generation because they don’t accept LGBTQ’s, who are just people trying to be happy.

Sorry I get worked up about this particular subject as I have people I love very hurt by church folks. To the point many have outright rejected God, just as they were rejected by the church. That doesn’t work for me.

@KNOWITALL That was always a big issue for me as well. They like to preach, too bad they don’t put their preaching into practice. “Judge not, lest ye be judged”, And, “What ye do for the least of these, ye do for me”.

@Nomore_lockout Yes, the hypocrisy is what burns (actually hurts my heart) me, too.

I should be able to ask any of my friends of any color or lifestyle to church so until I can, I just won’t go or contribute any money.

It’s just so odd to me, because I grew up with preachers, was at Christian pre-K- the church was my home away from home. I absolutely loved the people, mom taught bible school and changed the sign each week, and volunteered to clean the church. I mean we were all in. She went to a religious college here so we hung out with a wide variety of people, missionaries and I even went to the SW Mo Baptist Convention a few times.

I can’t even imagine any of that at this point in my life and in history. I feel betrayed by my religious family. But luckily my faith in God is not affected as man will always let you down, but He never will.

Well, I will say, it wouldn’t hurt them any to blow the dust off of that Bible, and maybe try actually reading it. There are some useful things in it, regardless of where you stand on the God issue.

I always love questions like this. Is there scientific evidence of God? Well, science follows very specific laws. There are laws concerning energy, mass, time, etc. But laws imply order. They imply consistency. And that flies in the face of the belief that every thing is random. Because if you say there is no God, no being that set order to things, then you truly believe that just through random chance, order was created throughout the universe.

Yes, it was through eternal random chances. Some worked some didn’t. Just like evolution.

Yet evolution requires vast amounts of energy which goes against the ideas of the laws of entropy.

Not really. It’s small changes, over time, at the molecular level.

Vast amounts of energy? What do you think evolution is or how it works @seawulf575?

“Yet evolution requires vast amounts of energy which goes against the ideas of the laws of entropy.” sources please ! ! !

@Demosthenes I’m of the opinion that people can be good religious folk and even theistic (Christians, Jews, whatever) without taking a literal view of the Bible. Even when I was a theistic Jew I never doubted evolution or anything scientific.

@Dutchess_III @seawulf575 is correct. Life does take vast amounts of energy. That energy source is called “Sun” Perhaps @seawulf575 has heard of it.

:D

@Caravanfan I’m of that view as well, no matter how loudly the literalists try and say that those people are not “true” Christians/Jews/Muslims.

“Yet evolution requires vast amounts of energy”
Which the SUN supplies in ample amounts.

You forgot the _”...laws of entropy” link @seawulf575.

So let me sum up what you are saying. There is no God and that everything is just random, but there is specific direction in things like evolution. But it is just random. And the laws of nature and the natural universe just randomly assign structure to things that are, by your definition, random. So how does that work exactly? What are your sources for these beliefs?

Is this about soup?

@rebbel ha, good one!! (Slaps knee in glee.)

@seawulf575 I never said there was a specific direction in evolution. Some stuff shows up and it works, and those genes are passed on.
Some things don’t work and those mutations fall out of the gene pool.
I know it’s hard to comprehend the vast amount of time that it took took to get from 3.5 billion years ago to now.

@Caravanfan I wanted to congratulate you! You recognized the sun as an energy source! Good boy! And @ragingloli is right up there with you! But maybe you two smarmy geniuses could explain how the sun would make a fish want to leave the water? Or maybe how it could create entire species? And not just one or two cases, which is what your randomness would dictate, but entire species! Come on…you can do it….

Because god told the fish to walk, dummy!

@Dutchess_III You can jump in on the question I just asked @Caravanfan and @ragingloli. What you are all trying to do is say that structure exists but it is only random. Yet it isn’t. To believe exactly what you just said…that genes could be altered and produce something that works and is passed on…indicates structure. It is the definition of structure. So to say it is random makes no sense. Let’s think about it. You are trying to say that mass quantities of one type of creature was altered to become something else. Because one would not do it. It COULD NOT do it. If a fish, suddenly gets lungs and can exist outside the water, that isn’t a mutation that has any chance of success. It is a fish. It lives in the water. There is no reason for it to leave the water. If it suddenly got lungs, it would drown before it would figure out that leaving the water was the best course of action.
Not to mention that there would be any number of missing links out there for us to find. Yet we haven’t found them.

Magic!

That’s not how evolution works.
A fish doesn’t suddenly has offspring with lungs and hindlegs.
I’m sure I’m telling you no news.

I think he actually thinks exactly that. One day a primate gave birth to a Homosapien baby. And here we are.

Did you know @seawulf575, that all blue eyed people go back to one common ancestor, a woman, who lived 10,000 years ago? Apparently that mutation worked because we’re all over the place today.
Which also means I’m related to Val Kilmer! Yay!

@seawulf575 , The answer is natural selection. Most random mutations are harmful to an organism, but random mutations that give a slight advantage will be selected for. These beneficial mutations mount up over the course of hundreds of millions of years to give evolution.

And yet none of you are actually answering the questions. You are all trying to still claim structure as a justification for you claim of randomness. Every time you claim structure, you are pointing to intelligent design. Try justifying your beliefs without claiming structure. Show me the scientific evidence that all is randomness and that there is no God.

There is no structure. You are the one trying to claim there is structure.

Aren’t you one of the ones talking about evolution? Of things changing in a given direction? Survival of the fittest and all that? That is structure. Face it, evolution points to structure. Every aspect of it shows that. You mentioned blue eyes. That is a genetic aberration that serves no specific means. So it is easy for that to occur with no negative side effects. When you talk about fish walking out of the water (and yes, I know it didn’t happen all at once…which is my point), you are talking about a genetic aberration that DOES serve a specific end. But not all fish had that genetic aberration would survive. As they grew legs, even vestigial legs, it would change their chances of survival in water. Not to mention the question of WHY would they grow legs? WHY would that even occur? It wouldn’t serve them any purpose in their environment.
You are talking about structure and plan every time and yet you don’t even see it. So try digging a little deeper than a scratch-the-surface answer that doesn’t really answer anything.

Chance. Mutations happen by chance. There is no outside guiding hand or overall structure. It all happens from the bottom up at random. At each stage there are mutations that provide an advantage, a very small advantage, but even a small advantage over time will cause the changed organism to predominate. Then the changed organism will get mutations, a small fraction of which provide a further advantage. Over time the mutations will eventually add up to evolution.

Look at what happened with the covid virus. Mutations occurred leading to the delta variant. With organisms that have short lifetimes and that exist in very large numbers, we can see evolution at a much quicker pace.

I know it’s hard to grasp. That’s why so many Christians try to shove God into a small box and give him motives and attributes they can understand within their limited human scope.
I guess I don’t understand how humans are willing to accept magic over physics and biology.

I really don’t want to insult you, @seawulf575, but you come off as not very bright.
Although you are pretty good at stringing words together, I must admit (way better than I), them combined make not much sense.
Also, I get the idea that you portray the person that the teacher told to be anti whatever, in the class debate club; no matter if you personally agree or disagree with the issue at hand.
I’m very tempted to start a new question about the earth being a sphere…

@seawulf575 is terrified to give up on the idea that there is a god who controls every little thing.

How about the atheists on this thread stop insulting those who believe in God?

@jca2 It can work both ways. Not so much here, but I’ve been other places where the people of faith trash atheists mercilessly. How about we all live and let live? Since none of us can prove jack diddly anyway?

@Nomore_lockout: I totally agree!

Well when someone posts a question like this you can expect it to turn into an argument.

Seems like seawulf is intent on having an argument, so, yeah…people are going to respond in kind. But you can disagree with each other without implying that anyone who believes differently than you is stupid. I happen to think it’s an interesting debate, but it’s so likely to devolve into insults.

@Dutchess_III: An argument or debate is ok, but implying that others who believe what you don’t believe are morons or stupid is not ok.

I never said he was stupid. I don’t think he is. I know I’m not stupid and I still believed (more or less) for most of my life.
The boy just needs to get him some NOVA.

@rebbel Actually, in formal debates, I can take either side. The way I do that is to understand what my opponents are going to present. I may not really believe in a side, but can argue it fairly effectively. However in this case, I’m really sick to death of hearing people get all arrogant and dismissive to anyone that believes in God. They always give smarmy answers and basically get personally offensive. Yet their own arguments do not defend their point. So far all I have heard is basically “God doesn’t exist because we have faith he doesn’t exist”. Not a shred of proof in the bunch. So how is that really any different than the view they despise in Christians? I have asked for proof that God does NOT exist and I have not gotten it. Meanwhile, I have pointed to numerous examples of things that show structure in our universe. Structure does not exist where things are totally random. So the view point that things are totally random is already suspect. And for those that have touted it to claim structured facts as proof of randomness shows me they either don’t understand what they are saying or are just to scared to admit they might be wrong.

@LostInParadise The covid virus is interesting. The normal way viruses mutate is that they become less infectious and less damaging. Yet the Covid virus seems to defy that. Huh. Wonder why?

BTW, @Caravanfan and @ragingloli, I’m still waiting for you to explain how the sun results in movement of one species into another.

The sun creates the energy to grow the foods that we, and animals, can eat to stay alive long enough to produce mutations. It is not directly resonsible for evolution. The mutations over millions and billions of years are responsible for evolution.

Plants are the first step in the food chain.

A rabbit comes along and eats plants.
Then a fox eats the rabbit.

A deer eats the plants.
Then a lion eats the deer. Or we eat the deer.

The sun is responsible for that.

@Dutchess_III But if the sun produces the energy for food growth in a system, why would a creature have to mutate to move away from that system?

@Dutchess_III I guess another way to ask that is why, if a system is sustaining life adequately, would a mutation to move away from that system be beneficial to the creatures that are living just fine? And if the system is not capable of sustaining life, doesn’t death to thin the demands seem a more likely outcome than long term mutations?

@seawulf575 Ok, you can take either side? Let’s see an argument for evolution.

Not all mutations are beneficial. Some are harmful. The good ones are retained.

You just have to let go of the idea that mutations have a “plan.” They don’t. It’s just shit happens.

@Caravanfan So now you want me to do your side of the debate too? You just failed debate 101. You are the one that made a smarmy comment to me about the sun in your typical arrogant fashion. I have challenged you to support your views. You have just failed. Thanks for playing.

@Dutchess_III I have not said nor even implied that all mutations are beneficial. What I have asked of you is to defend that randomness in mutations can lead into a situation that leads to new species. You have claimed genetics as an answer, but that is structure. It is not random. You keep trying to use structure as your answer, yet randomness (which is your claim) is the antithesis of structure.

I give up.

Someone does not understand “mutation” ! ! ! ! ! !

Plus he doesn’t “believe” in it!

Someone does not understand “Randomness”! ! ! ! !

Here is my biggest issue with the God thing. Or with Christianity at least. Hypothetical situation here folks, so don’t twist my meaning, or say that I’m trying to justify adultery, ok? Now mainstream Christians would have you believe, that all you do is accept “Jesus as Savior” and all is forgiven. I give you Joe Schmuck here. A good husband to his wife, good dad to his kids, pats his dog on the ass three times a day. Fairly decent man. So Mr. Shmuck goes jogging one morning, has a coronary, bites the burrito. But unknown to his wife and kids, he had a twyst with another woman, years ago. And he was never religious. He gets to the pearly gates, St
Peter kicks his ass and sends him to hell for adultery. You follow me so far? Ten minutes later, a peace of human excrement like Hitler or Joseph Stalin shows up. Murdered untold millions and brought misery and greif on the world. But for the sake of argument, let’s say Adolph or Josef had accepted Jesus on their death bed, so despite their many crimes, Saint Pete gives them a pass. Do you really, honestly, expect people to buy this scenario? Go suck an egg. Let the punishment fit the crime. We humans seem to understand this and try to put it to work in our imperfect justice system. But Big Sky Daddy in all his omnipotence,.can’t wrap Cosmic skull around this concept? Sorry friends, “Does not compute”.

@Nomore_lockout I get it. That is why I specifically have not brought a religious aspect into it. When you mention a specific religion or belief, it muddles the conversation concerning the existence of God.

@Nomore_lockout Have you read the Quran? Or Mormon bible with the golden plates? Or the Native belief they came from underground?

I just try to educate myself and ask questions, rather than judge.

Here is another way of looking at this question. What difference would it make if God exists? What would you do differently? I don’t see saying prayers and going to church as doing a whole lot. We can therefore say that belief in God has no significant consequences, which by definition makes it inconsequential and therefore not worth bothering with.

@Nomore_lockout That’s one of my biggest issues with religion as well, the “exclusivity” idea. Even using a more extreme example: the pious Buddhist monk who lives an ascetic life in a monastery, who spends his whole life helping the poor, praying for peace, is going to be eternally punished (according to certain interpretations of Christianity and Islam) because he happened to choose the wrong religion. That’s something that I have never accepted. And I don’t think you have to accept it to believe in God. But I know plenty of people who do accept that and try to convert me with it and it doesn’t work for me at all. I’ve always believed that if there is a higher power, then different religions are just different paths to that higher power.

Not to mention the millions of people who never even heard of Jesus. All the people born 300,000 before Jesus or Abraham or Allah. Are they going to hell?

@Dutchess_III Great point. I often wondered about that myself. Just one more issue I have with Christian belief. @Demosthenes ditto that

No. Science by definition requires the phenomena it studies to be falsifiable and testable. God is neither falsifiable nor testable by definition. They are incompatible epistemologically. Note that doesn’t men that it’s impossible for God(s) to exist as well as science to be true.

If anything, science is the closet thing one can have to understanding the “mind of God.” Just like studying an artist’s works of art can teach you much of their nature, studying science reveals the mind of the creator (if there is a creator). It’s certainly a more reliable source of insight into the creator than reading books written centuries ago by people several generations removed from the events that allegedly transpired and then compiled and translated by yet other people all with their own perspectives, cultures and agendas.

@seawulf575 You know what? You’re right. I made a smarmy comment and I apologize. I would like to see you post your opinion of the other side of the debate.