Infinity.

[Voluntary]

Quote by: LadiesMan217 Let's put is this way, it is more intellectually honest to accept the possibility of a god rather than say there is no god when there is no evidence to prove either.

Which god? Thousands of gods have been created by humanity. Are you referring to a particular god such as Vishnu, Allah, Tuatha-de-Danaan, Mitra, Numakulla, etc. Here is a short list of gods you can choose from. YouTube - A SHORT LIST OF GODS.

Or are you just open to the possibility of an unknown, undefinable, and untestable god?

[another day]

These kind of discussions are inevitably nothing more then a bunch of meaningless and pointless word play and semantics

[LadiesMan217]

Which god? Thousands of gods have been created by humanity. Are you referring to a particular god such as Vishnu, Allah, Tuatha-de-Danaan, Mitra, Numakulla, etc. Here is a short list of gods you can choose from. YouTube - A SHORT LIST OF GODS. Or are you just open to the possibility of an unknown, undefinable, and untestable god?

I am saying that it would be the most logical to be open to the possibility of a "creator" being, which we will call a god, for lack of a better word, one that is not necessarily defined in the religions of the world, I am not trying to advocate any specific religion, or any religion at all for that matter, in this thread.

[LadiesMan217]

These kind of discussions are inevitably nothing more then a bunch of meaningless and pointless word play and semantics

I disagree, I think we are having a discussion with valid points, there has been no word play or semantics.

[another day]

You can make anything seem like a valid point if you are clever enough. The point is, this discussion is meaningless, and will never come to any sensible conclusions because it is removed from our realm of understanding, or even a practical need to understand.

[Voluntary]

Quote by: LadiesMan217 I am saying that it would be the most logical to be open to the possibility of a "creator" being, which we will call a god, for lack of a better word, one that is not necessarily defined in the religions of the world, I am not trying to advocate any specific religion, or any religion at all for that matter, in this thread.

I think we reached an understanding. I fell into strong atheism after being a deist due to a lack of a better word. I am a atheist via theological noncognitivism. The word god has lost all meaning to me. When someone says god, I hear "akjsdfy".

I am open to the possibility of a "creator", but this "creator" has yet to be observed, defined, and tested.

[LadiesMan217]

You can make anything seem like a valid point if you are clever enough. The point is, this discussion is meaningless, and will never come to any sensible conclusions because it is removed from our realm of understanding, or even a practical need to understand.

Fair enough, which is why I tend to stay away from the religion section because the god existence debates never get anywhere.

[LadiesMan217]

Quote by: Voluntary I think we reached an understanding. I fell into strong atheism after being a deist via a lack of a better word. I am a atheist via theological noncognitivism. The word god has lost all meaning. When someone says god, I hear "akjsdfy". I am open to the possibility, but this "creator" has yet to be observed, defined, and tested.

I am glad that we understand each other. I think this stance makes the most sense. It really would be impossible to 100% know for sure the existence of a "creator" unless the "creator" wanted to have its existence known, however most religious people cite that god has revealed his existence to them, which can make you wonder if the rest of us have overlooked something. That wasn't really a point for debate but simply an interesting sidenote. Anyway, here's to more fruitful debate in the future.

[WakeTFU]

Seems like a good spot to throw my view in:

Everything you see, hear, taste, touch, and smell IS god. So, perhaps those people really have had God revealed to them and perhaps you'll experience him now, too :)

[stevemckay]

Quote by: another day These kind of discussions are inevitably nothing more then a bunch of meaningless and pointless word play and semantics

Quote by: another day You can make anything seem like a valid point if you are clever enough. The point is, this discussion is meaningless....

If it is meaningless to you than why do you feel the need to partake? Twice even! Why not leave those of us who find this at least mildly stimulating to ourselves? Those who don’t like what is said here (no matter where here is within Volconvo) had to seek out this discussion... which makes me assume they want to be a part of the "debate" and are not just being a wannabe censor or something to be ignored like so much background noise.

I used to assume that if someone is here than they had an interest in being a participant in the discussion.. am I naive as to peoples motivation? I mean its not like folks just logged into their home account and had this discussion spammed into their email without any effort.... am I wrong?

With that said do you have anything of value to add besides this thread being "meaningless"? IMHO this whole damn existence is meaningless... should we discuss that in a new thread?

[gela]

Its humans that feel a need to put a begining and an end on time.
Because everything we experience in our lives has a begining and an end.

However, I think the universe is forever ongoing. I don't think that this supports the creator theory at all. I just think that the universe.. or some strange form of the universe - always was, and always will be.

After all, time itself might not be linear.
How are we suppose to put a begining and an end onto something we can't fully comprehend?

[gallo]

Quote by: tommy5x Quote by: Anmon Quote by: gallo A philosopher once instructed me: Half a loaf is better than nothing. Nothing is better than heaven. ergo -------------------------------------- Half a loaf is better than heaven. You and Tommy seem to be making the same logical error as the above syllogism. By the way, the syllogism is valid. the logic here is truly astounding, I hope when I die now, instead of going to heaven and paradise, I go to half a loaf instead. It's valid only by pedantic grammatical interpretation.

You guys are correct. I messed it up. That is not a valid sylogism. I should have said:

Nothing is better than heaven.
Half a loaf is better than nothing.
ergo--------------------------------
Half a loaf is better than heaven.

There! Now the sylogism is valid. Notice that I make no claim that it is rational or true, only that it is a valid syllogism. It has the form:

B=A
C=B
ergo
C=A

Why don't one of you point out where the error is. Can either of you point out the logical error? Which is, by the way, the error I was pointing out in a previous post.

[tommy5x]

It's valid only by pedantic grammatical interpretation.

[gallo]

Quote by: tommy5x It's valid only by pedantic grammatical interpretation.

Why not just say you don't know?

[WakeTFU]

Quote by: gallo Why don't one of you point out where the error is. Can either of you point out the logical error? Which is, by the way, the error I was pointing out in a previous post.

The logical error is where you use 'nothing' twice but with different meanings. In the first instance you should've logically said 'no thing' (nothing that we can concieve of) which is much different than the nothing (lack of everything) that half a loaf of bread is better than.

[gallo]

Quote by: WakeTFU The logical error is where you use 'nothing' twice but with different meanings.

EXACTLY!!!!

In the first instance you should've logically said 'no thing' (nothing that we can concieve of) which is much different than the nothing (lack of everything) that half a loaf of bread is better than.

Quite nice, but you aren't one of the two who were telling me how my logic was wrong.

Embarrassing to have stated the syllogism wrong in the first place. It's been a lot of years since I took logic.

[Kuldeep]

Points, which interested me in this thread are:

1. Nothing is never a possibility. See, within the domain of our senses, God may be nothing but, within the domain of different type of senses (unknown to us currently) God could be something (may or may not be responsible for our creation, existence or so to say governing us)

2. Analogy of Net world, Programmer to Universe and God was nicely put forth by stevemckay, which may or may not be a reality.

3. falasy of No - thing and Nothing explained by WakeTFU

4. My view tallies with that of Gila and WakeTFU as far as God and our universe are concerned

To elaborate, to my mind God ( which may be given any arbitary name) is something existing as universal consciousness (the basic life force) but, becomes individual consciousness due to individual body and mind. Anything which is within our conception scientifically or otherwise and even beyond are just properties of that God,.which is beyond conception.God and its properties are eternally existant and therefore to me, there is no creator and creation sort of truth existing. ???

[tommy5x]

Quote by: WakeTFU The logical error is where you use 'nothing' twice but with different meanings. In the first instance you should've logically said 'no thing' (nothing that we can concieve of) which is much different than the nothing (lack of everything) that half a loaf of bread is better than.

=

It's valid only by pedantic grammatical interpretation.

[gallo]

Quote by: tommy5x = It's valid only by pedantic grammatical interpretation.

Sorry. You are wrong. It isn't an interpretation, pedantic, grammatical or otherwise. It is an error of logic.

[tommy5x]

Nothing is better than heaven.
Half a loaf is better than nothing.
ergo--------------------------------
Half a loaf is better than heaven.


Your average person would read that and think "Sounds about right," and that's they way it was intended to be read, unless somebody deliberately wanted to dick with people.

It's pedancy on behalf of the use of nothing that creates the logical flaw.