God

[reception]

what is God??

[naomi24]

Oakleaf, the point is he wasn't talking to Christians, as Theland claims. Yet another little twist in the story to suit.

[Theland]

Hello Naomi - I think I might not have expressed myself properly, not unusual for me. What I meant was that Jesus said that His followers would be hated because He is hated. Followers meaning whoever follows His teachings, whatever their former religiosity or ethnicity.

[chakka35]

Theland, you're way off-beam, as usual. I don't actually deal in venom, merely fact, reason and logic, ingredients which I know are a mystery to you. Not to worry: your role in life is to preach, not to think, a role you fulfil admirably.

naomi, if you don't like the term "deist" I withdraw it unreservedly and apologise. You seem to believe in some sort of 'being' but one that does not interfere in everyday matters by answering prayers, performing miracles and so on, and that's what I understand a deist to be.
I have to say that since you adhere to some of the trappings of religion (souls, life-after-death and so on) it is hard not to seek some sort of label for you. But I will desist from trying in future.
The word "atheist" (an "-ist" that I am very proud to be) has the saving grace that the prefix "a-" clearly indicates that I reject all aspects of religious belief unreservedly and without exception.

On your second point I simply cannot agree that we must keep an open mind about absurd things, purely because we cannot disprove them. I thought that Russell had put paid to that idea years ago with his famous (and funny) "teapot-in-orbit" analogy.
I believe that the onus is on those who moot weird things - things which make no sense and which break all natural laws - to prove them, or at least to offer some tiny bit of evidence that a rational person can seize and start working on. If they can't then that rational person is perfectly entitled dismiss the idea with a shrug and get on with other things. He has no obligation to clutter up his mind with every daft thing that people invent, purely in the cause of "keeping an open mind".

I still can't remember who it was who said that keeping an open mind can be a good thing, but not so open that your brain falls out.

[Lonnie]

Hi naomi,
Yes, I was talking about the Biblical God, the Biblical God was the creator, but having said that, the two can be split.

To go into it deeper, God said, 'Thou shalt worship no other Gods Before me'.
#So God wasn't deying the existance of other Gods, just saying he's top God,

So maybe the question should have been, what are Gods, or something similar.

[naomi24]

Theland You won't like to admit it, but you follow the teachings of the church you belong to - and they are far removed from the teachings of Jesus.

Chakka Thank you. My problem is that I have witnessed what you would consider to be absurd - and, although I wish it was otherwise, I have no explanation to offer. It may seem quite bright to say 'keep an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out', but sadly, if people have a mind to, that sentiment can be applied along with the blinkers.

Lonnie What arrogance this God displayed - and where the biblical God is concerned, par for the course, in my opinion.

Incidentally, has anyone noticed the person who posed the original question hasn't returned with any input? Do you think he/she was seriously interested in getting an answer - or was he/she just thinking up something to write? Whichever way, a good debate.

[chakka35]

I agree with your last point, naomi, but there are no blinkers in my case, as witness the shelffuls of books I have covering investigations into these things. Just three examples, in ascending order of unlikeliness:
I am not against the idea of Telepathy (ESP) on principle: I see nothing inherently outlandish in the idea that transmissions can take place, by a means yet unknown to science, from one brain to another. But when objective investigators go along to those institutions that claim to be able to demonstrate ESP, their �tests� are found to be flawed and a lot of cheating goes on. Some of the cheating is deliberate (there is one method which is so very clever and so very simple that, given a collaborator, I could fool anyone tomorrow into thinking I was telepathic) and some of it an unconscious slewing of results in a desperate attempt to get the �right� answer.
The only people who claim evidence for Life after Death are mediums, operating in front of gullible spectators in Victorian-style parlours or assembly halls. Here the cheating is always deliberate, and so obvious that you wonder why anyone is fooled. What no-one seems to ask the medium is why these people speaking � from the other side� never tell us anything remotely interesting about the afterlife but confine themselves to banalities like �Tell Aunty May I�m very happy here.�
As for The Soul, no-one offers any evidence that can be examined, so all we can do is speculate as to how the idea came about in the first place. I think it�s the old longing for an afterlife, the snag being that everything that comprises us on earth is destroyed on death, either by burning or by corruption. (Cont�d)

[chakka35]

(Cont�d) So let�s invent something which we can claim does not get destroyed and that gives us life after death. We�ll call it The Soul and we won�t bother with trying to describe it or justify it; we�ll just believe it.

My question is: if I were blinkered what would I be failing to see in these cases and a hundred like them?