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Do you believe in god??

Forums New posts

Do you believe an intelligent agent was involved in the creation of the universe?

  • Yes

    Votes: 29 39.7%

  • No

    Votes: 26 35.6%

  • I don't believe, but I reason there is intelligence behind creation

    Votes: 15 20.5%

  • I don't believe but I reason it's a all a fluke (Or reason there is no intelligence behind it)

    Votes: 3 4.1%
  • Total voters
    73

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TClaeys said:
Even if it is untestable and unprovable, either there IS something behind the universe or there ISN't. The fact that we can't verify it with our limited knowledge (and perhaps it couldn't be verified anyway) is irrelevant to the existence of some agent of creation.
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I agree 100 percent! But that leads back to the basis of my whole view on the subject - if there is no way for us to know it, then why take a stance in one's life one way or the other?

If I said that our universe is nothing more than a dream of some higher being who exits on an alternate plane of existence in a larger universe that evolved naturally, there is no way to determine if it is true. It's just another of an infinite number of statements that have no answer one way or the other.
 
DamnDirtyApe said:
I agree 100 percent! But that leads back to the basis of my whole view on the subject - if there is no way for us to know it, then why take a stance in one's life one way or the other?

If I said that our universe is nothing more than a dream of some higher being who exits on an alternate plane of existence in a larger universe that evolved naturally, there is no way to determine if it is true. It's just another of an infinite number of statements that have no answer one way or the other.
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I see what you're saying and I guess it doesn't matter. Its not as if I live my life a certain way because of my tendency to accept this as truth or not. I even would admit it is perhaps even a bit silly to entertain, because it's unprovable either way. I suppose I may spend too much time thinking about something that really has no bearing on the reality of day to day life. But for whatever reason I thought it would be a good topic for discussion.

It's akin to the UFO question. It has no bearning whatsoever on humanity (unless you are being "abducted") and yet has a high interest level. I know there are some nuances that are different with UFO's, but the impact UFO's have on us is as irrelevant as god in our lives(unless you behave a certain way because of god or UFO's). I don't even know why I have such an interest in the subject. Maybe to escape the dull reality.
 
Well, I would pray about the matter, but you know what they say......

"When you talk to God, it's called prayer.
When God talks to you, ...it's called schizophrenia."
 
Experiencer7 said:
Creation is an ongoing process., of which we are a part.
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Yes, creation is ongoing. But the question is: how is it happening?? All the way back to human creation, animal creation, Earth creation, the galaxy, the universe. How did it happen??

"Yes, gee that was simple. Next question please." - kcfraser

Wow, how can it be that simple?? (thats the next question)
 
I do not believe in any concept of god or gods that humanity has come up with or ever will come up with.

Why? Human beings are working under a tremendous space and time resource restriction. We simply do not occupy a large enough slice of space and time to discuss the 'creation of the universe' or the 'existence of god'. It is as though we were in a large room with our noses stuck in one corner making speculations and proclamations about the contents of the rest of the room that we have never seen. We can talk about the nature of other corners that may or may not exist in the room and the name of the guy who painted the ceiling for that matter, but they would be equally meaningless. It is simply a ridiculous proposition to think that human beings, with our space/time data restrictions, brain resource restrictions, and perceptual restrictions, could deduce the origins of the universe or the presence of, let along the identity of, its creator should such a thing actually exist. All we have are the stories that we have made up to console ourselves or frighten others with.

Those who think that the resource restrictions that I mention aren't a big deal should try to describe the entire alphabet's character set using only the first five characters. The sub-set cannot comprehend the super-set.
 
TClaeys said:
A few things to sort of define god as best as I can. I'm not asking if you believe in Jesus and the Christian God, but I suppose that would be a yes in this poll. It doesn't even have to be any personal god that is somehow involved in your life, or anyones life for that matter. You don't have to believe in any type of afterlife either, although that would make it much more interesting. This could be some type of cosmic seeder, a personal god, or whatever. You may not even know what you believe, but your gut tells you something had to be involved.

We are told that the universe just happened. There was nothing, and then there was something. And this seems to be what we observe, or at least when we try to rewind things, this is how it appears. So we go from nothing (absolutely a void) to this circus act we call life.

We are told that this stuff just naturally happened. Although nature didn't even exist before it happened. Then apparently life formed from non-living matter. And it evolved, etc, etc. This was after all the known elements were formed from the one element Hydrogen. We happen to be caught in this perfect gravitational tug of war of being crunched back in and delicately expanding to resist the crunch.

What my question boils down to is this:
Do you believe in some intelligent agent that was somehow responsible for the creation of the universe??

I certainly don't base my views on any religion. In fact, I think the dogma is ridiculous. I base my views on the unknowns. This is perilously close to a "God of the Gaps" argument. And while we will surely discover more, I don't know that we will really understand how the universe came to be. And perhaps the more we discover, the more it might point towards a creator.

I don't know that this has been asked before or not and thought it would be a good question. Thanks for comments and participation. There is no MAYBE as an option. You may teeter from believing or not like I do, but MAYBE doesn't answer the question. Don't worry, you won't go to hell. ...... I don't think.
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Hi TClaeys,

This was my reply to an ancient mysteries question:
Religion might end but the spiritual is coming on strong and hard. Religion is man's interpretation of the spiritual mixed in with some actual spiritual information. The spiritual is the truth which cannot be denied and is currently being found by the quantum mechanics scientists. No matter how you slice it, something had to create existence. I have heard some say that since time folds back, maybe something from another place in time created the matter which was involved in "The Big Bang", which supposedly started everything, but what created time? I don't care how many times it folds or in which direction, something had to start everything including time. Matter, energy, time, consciousness, existence (which is its own proof). Tell me what created it? So, whether extraterrestrial beings or interdimensional beings created or messed with man's dna, created man in a test tube or whatever else, something still had to create the other beings. Something still had to create existence. Can anyone tell me what created existence? So, religion might end, but the spiritual is just beginning.

What I would say in reply to you, TClaeys, is that there has to be a God. Some people just choose not to believe and that is their prerogative.

Diana
 
Any 'believer' that actually wants to be honest would have to examine each god humanity has worshiped. What actually happens is that religious individuals usually adopt the religion of their families, region, or nation without any thought (except for contempt for) other religions. Those who don't usually haven't made any real investigation or studied comparative religion, they just hear something and 'believe it' and then have the intellectual dishonesty to look down on others who find such a practice ridiculous, dangerous, and well quite frankly dishonest.

I suggest a good starting point is http://www.godchecker.com which has cataloged over 3700 different gods. Or ... you could just pick one at virtual random as most do.

To even use the word "God" in a sentence is an absurd proposition as its definition is so nebulous and obscure that attempts to get believers to define it are often met with disbelief that anyone would even need to have the word defined for them, yet when they do attempt it you get wacky nonsensical mumbo jumbo that doesn't have a leg to stand on.

Religion is the original hoax.
 
trainedobserver said:
Any 'believer' that actually wants to be honest would have to examine each god humanity has worshiped. What actually happens is that religious individuals usually adopt the religion of their families, region, or nation without any thought (except for contempt for) other religions. Those who don't usually haven't made any real investigation or studied comparative religion, they just hear something and 'believe it' and then have the intellectual dishonesty to look down on others who find such a practice ridiculous, dangerous, and well quite frankly dishonest.

I suggest a good starting point is http://www.godchecker.com which has cataloged over 3700 different gods. Or ... you could just pick one at virtual random as most do.

To even use the word "God" in a sentence is an absurd proposition as its definition is so nebulous and obscure that attempts to get believers to define it are often met with disbelief that anyone would even need to have the word defined for them, yet when they do attempt it you get wacky nonsensical mumbo jumbo that doesn't have a leg to stand on.

Religion is the original hoax.
Click to expand...

The question I asked in this thread was :
Do you believe in some intelligent agent that was somehow responsible for the creation of the universe??

And from that people immediately went into religious slants. I agree that a definition of god is all but impossible to define. Some quickly think of some presonal god that is involved somehow with everyone's life. I don't mean that. I just wonder who thought that some kind of agent was involved. My best guess is that ALL religions are wrong and feeble attempts to explain their existence.

That said, I still feel there may be a bit more than just a deterministic unfolding of the universe that happened to construct human beings in a way that they discuss this very idea. But I couldn't tell you anything about whatever may be the cause, .. .. and there may be no intelligent agent in the first place.
 
Do i believe in God? Well firstly it very unlikely God created man in his own image. If there is a vast number of civilizations out there in the universe or even civilizations somewhere that reside on a different plane of existence. If there is a God and he created everything that we see and experience. As a Human being myself and one of the many species who live on the planet. We far from perfect and we certainly are a flawed species. This would suggest God himself is imperfect.
. I've a believe that some of the answers to the burning question those God Exist. That the UFO phenomenon has some somewhat influenced this belief system with sightings and appearing to our ancestors of old, and again they might just be as puzzled about their own existence and they too, could be experiencing phenomenon from were they come from that is equally as puzzling to them as the UFO phenomenon is to us. Who knows for sure, but i rather look at a subject that has some evidence of existence/ the UFO phenomenon than looking for God that is less than convincing. Maybe the UFO phenomenon; is just God showing us he exists without revealing too much. I Guess this would be considered a lunatic idea.
 
Belief and Ignorance are close cousins.

If someone else hasn't said that...they should have.
I apologize if I'm ripping off a quote.
 
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