Proof God is real

[JECE]

Could you imagine a square circle?

Now that there is just a language game.

[Fluminator]

Fluminator, Origenism was condemned by the ecumenical synods (he was not excommunicated though because he had died before the synod), and Augustine's opinion was treated as such until very later when Catholic Church found it useful to sell forgiveness for a price. East Orthodox Church, while holding Augustine as a saint, denies this theological view. Most dogmas do.

Augustine's opinion on universalism/exclusivism/inclusivism? Sorry I missed which one specifically you're talking about.
I know universalism is denied by most Christians nowadays.

[PRINCE WILLIAM]

Yes, the notion that everyone we'll be saved in the end because God is merciful and won't let his creation forever in hell.

[Jamiet99uk]

God couldn't create a limited perfect being.

So, God is flawed. God creates imperfect beings. God demands we obey a certain code. Adam and Eve act outside of God's code, as God knew they would. God condemns the whole of humanity as sinful, on the basis of his creations acting as predicted, and some humans start to die painful, unexpected deaths. Babies die in their thousands within hours of being born, because God determined it thus.

Someone (not Fluminator because he believes in his own unspecified magic cloud wizard) tell me again how God loves everyone.

[Jamiet99uk]

Let's be clear, as before:

I find it impossible to imagine God.

But, more importantly, I find it impossible to imagine an omnipotent, loving God, on the basis of the above. If an omnipotent God exists, he is the most evil being ever to have existed, since all pain and suffering is his plan.

[Fluminator]

I feel like I've specified what I believe the nature of God is many times.

[Octavious]

Let's be clear, as before:

I find it impossible to imagine God.

But, more importantly, I find it impossible to imagine an omnipotent, loving God, on the basis of the above. If an omnipotent God exists, he is the most evil being ever to have existed, since all pain and suffering is his plan.

Let's go back to something I think was mentioned briefly in another thread relating to the fairness of it all.

Consider the possibility that we live in a multiverse. Your soul could be inhabiting your body and experiencing the highs and lows of this universe, and also a universe in which you are a high born elite with the body of Heracles, and also a universe in which you are a slave, and also a universe in which you live for about a week before passing on, and countless others.

Now, I'm not going to pretend for a moment that I actually believe this to be true, but what we can say is that in a matter of a few lines we have conceived of a workable explanation of existence that both creates the full range of life experiences and is completely fair to everyone, whilst at the same time creating apparent injustices for us to be appalled by and fight against. And if we can imagine such a system so easily, then for a god to create a system that works as well or better would be trivial.

Again, I'm not trying to convince you that any of this is true, but I think it is worth acknowledging that it is possible.

[Jamiet99uk]

I feel like I've specified what I believe the nature of God is many times.

Sigh.

I'm sorry but I don't think you have. Or, you have repeatedly specified something utterly meaningless and unintelligible to me.

[JECE]

Let's be clear, as before:

I find it impossible to imagine God.

But, more importantly, I find it impossible to imagine an omnipotent, loving God, on the basis of the above. If an omnipotent God exists, he is the most evil being ever to have existed, since all pain and suffering is his plan.

Let's go back to something I think was mentioned briefly in another thread relating to the fairness of it all.

Consider the possibility that we live in a multiverse. Your soul could be inhabiting your body and experiencing the highs and lows of this universe, and also a universe in which you are a high born elite with the body of Heracles, and also a universe in which you are a slave, and also a universe in which you live for about a week before passing on, and countless others.

Now, I'm not going to pretend for a moment that I actually believe this to be true, but what we can say is that in a matter of a few lines we have conceived of a workable explanation of existence that both creates the full range of life experiences and is completely fair to everyone, whilst at the same time creating apparent injustices for us to be appalled by and fight against. And if we can imagine such a system so easily, then for a god to create a system that works as well or better would be trivial.

Again, I'm not trying to convince you that any of this is true, but I think it is worth acknowledging that it is possible.

I had a partner who would go in and out of consciousness every few minutes for an hour or more every time that she ingested gluten. After each episode, when she came to, she wouldn't remember how she got to where she was, with the last thing that she remembered a specific, shifting point in time in the last few hours. Every few minutes I repeatedly and patiently explained to her what happened and where she currently was and where we had gone, even though I knew that she would never remember any of those conversations. Eventually, she would fall asleep and recuperate her memory up to the point that she ingested gluten, but never remember getting back to a safe space and all of the episodes that happened after she got there. Nevertheless, even though she would never remember it, I can't imagine refusing to explain what was going on, or leaving her confused and worried. If I could sit by her bedside and explain her situation over and over again, why couldn't your god in this hypothetical scenario explain that our pain and suffering were transient and balanced by parallel lives, or just give us the ability to know about these parallel lives? Refusing to explain is just plain cruel.

[Octavious]

If I could sit by her bedside and explain her situation over and over again, why couldn't your god in this hypothetical scenario explain that our pain and suffering were transient and balanced by parallel lives, or just give us the ability to know about these parallel lives? Refusing to explain is just plain cruel.

Seriously? Isn't it obvious?

[JECE]

If I could sit by her bedside and explain her situation over and over again, why couldn't your god in this hypothetical scenario explain that our pain and suffering were transient and balanced by parallel lives, or just give us the ability to know about these parallel lives? Refusing to explain is just plain cruel.

Seriously? Isn't it obvious?

I guess so. Your god is cruel and heartless.

[Octavious]

If I could sit by her bedside and explain her situation over and over again, why couldn't your god in this hypothetical scenario explain that our pain and suffering were transient and balanced by parallel lives, or just give us the ability to know about these parallel lives? Refusing to explain is just plain cruel.

Seriously? Isn't it obvious?

I guess so. Your god is cruel and heartless.

Clearly it isn't obvious to some people . But to illustrate it in admittedly crude terms, if you knew you lived multiple lives and the particular life you were in was a bit shit, you'd just blow your head off with a shotgun and move on to the next one. You need to experience apparent injustice in order to develop a desire to fight it. You need to believe life is finite in order to value it and make the most of it. For deeper explanation read and understand some of the many other comments on suffering you've clearly just skimmed in the various other posts.

But my post is not designed to address the suffering issue. It is designed to illustrate the fact that the life we experience may well be perfectly fair and just whilst at the same time appearing not to be

[JECE]

Seriously? Isn't it obvious?

I guess so. Your god is cruel and heartless.

Clearly it isn't obvious to some people . But to illustrate it in admittedly crude terms, if you knew you lived multiple lives and the particular life you were in was a bit shit, you'd just blow your head off with a shotgun and move on to the next one. You need to experience apparent injustice in order to develop a desire to fight it. You need to believe life is finite in order to value it and make the most of it. For deeper explanation read and understand some of the many other comments on suffering you've clearly just skimmed in the various other posts.

But my post is not designed to address the suffering issue. It is designed to illustrate the fact that the life we experience may well be perfectly fair and just whilst at the same time appearing not to be

You need to experience apparent genocide in order to develop a desire to fight apparent genocide? I don't. I'm perfectly motivated to fight poverty, genocide, rape, etc. without thinking that I experienced these injustices.

My post was not designed to address the suffering issue directly, either. My ex basically experienced many finite lives within a few minutes of each other. Yet at the same time I knew that she had a much grander life to make the most out of. Knowing that she would recuperate a standard human life did not make me devalue her comfort when she was going through her episodes, even though I knew that they would be short-lived and that she would probably never recuperate her memory of them. How could your merciful god, in his or her infinite wisdom, not show that he or she loves you in each of your hypothetical parallel, finite lives?

[Octavious]

You need to experience apparent genocide in order to develop a desire to fight apparent genocide? I don't. I'm perfectly motivated to fight poverty, genocide, rape, etc. without thinking that I experienced these injustices.

I assure you, JECE, that you would have a hard time fighting poverty if poverty didn't exist. I'm frankly baffled that you're even making this argument.

My ex basically experienced many finite lives within a few minutes of each other.

No, she didn't. It doesn’t resemble anything I have said. Frankly I think trolling using the story of the ill health of a loved one is in pretty poor taste

[Doom427]

You need to experience apparent genocide in order to develop a desire to fight apparent genocide? I don't. I'm perfectly motivated to fight poverty, genocide, rape, etc. without thinking that I experienced these injustices.

I assure you, JECE, that you would have a hard time fighting poverty if poverty didn't exist. I'm frankly baffled that you're even making this argument.

I'm trying to stay out of this but what is this argument Octavious? God has to make poverty so we could experience the joy of fighting it? It's like the quote about the British empire establishing slavery just to abolish it, except unironically applied to all human suffering?

This feels like a purely post-hoc conclusion - you know the current world has bad stuff, and you believe in God, so you somehow have to make an argument to explain this. But honestly I would treat the defeatism of Pangloss saying this is the best world we could possibly have, or the conservativism of simply saying if you suffer it's because you're bad, over this belief that we need to have bad things in our life purely to make us feel better. gag.

[Octavious]

The point I was making to Jamie was perfectly clear, Doom, and somewhat different to the suffering stuff you and JECE like to keep bringing up. I have absolutely no interest in continuing a discussion where you invent some nonsense you want to pretend is my belief and try to argue against it. The exercise is utterly pointless.

[Jamiet99uk]

The point I was making to Jamie was perfectly clear, Doom, and somewhat different to the suffering stuff you and JECE like to keep bringing up. I have absolutely no interest in continuing a discussion where you invent some nonsense you want to pretend is my belief and try to argue against it. The exercise is utterly pointless.

No offence, but engaging with your multiverse idea, which you stated you did not even believe in, is surely a waste of time for everyone involved, no?

[JECE]

My ex basically experienced many finite lives within a few minutes of each other. Yet at the same time I knew that she had a much grander life to make the most out of. Knowing that she would recuperate a standard human life did not make me devalue her comfort when she was going through her episodes, even though I knew that they would be short-lived and that she would probably never recuperate her memory of them. How could your merciful god, in his or her infinite wisdom, not show that he or she loves you in each of your hypothetical parallel, finite lives?

No, she didn't. It doesn’t resemble anything I have said. Frankly I think trolling using the story of the ill health of a loved one is in pretty poor taste

A gluten intolerance has nothing to do with ill health. If you don't want to engage, that's fine. But my point was relevant to your silly multiverse idea. Presumably in such a system there is an end to the multiverse when your soul reaches heaven, right? That may be all you care about, but if I were a multidimensional observer I would care about the wellbeing of each individual life in each dimension, as would a kind creator god.

[Octavious]

The point I was making to Jamie was perfectly clear, Doom, and somewhat different to the suffering stuff you and JECE like to keep bringing up. I have absolutely no interest in continuing a discussion where you invent some nonsense you want to pretend is my belief and try to argue against it. The exercise is utterly pointless.

No offence, but engaging with your multiverse idea, which you stated you did not even believe in, is surely a waste of time for everyone involved, no?

You don't believe that such a system would be fair? That's as far as your engagement has to go. None of us can claim to understand how the universe works, but you seem to be enthusiastically clinging to a narrative that is fundamentally unfair

[Octavious]

My ex basically experienced many finite lives within a few minutes of each other. Yet at the same time I knew that she had a much grander life to make the most out of. Knowing that she would recuperate a standard human life did not make me devalue her comfort when she was going through her episodes, even though I knew that they would be short-lived and that she would probably never recuperate her memory of them. How could your merciful god, in his or her infinite wisdom, not show that he or she loves you in each of your hypothetical parallel, finite lives?

No, she didn't. It doesn’t resemble anything I have said. Frankly I think trolling using the story of the ill health of a loved one is in pretty poor taste

A gluten intolerance has nothing to do with ill health. If you don't want to engage, that's fine. But my point was relevant to your silly multiverse idea. Presumably in such a system there is an end to the multiverse when your soul reaches heaven, right? That may be all you care about, but if I were a multidimensional observer I would care about the wellbeing of each individual life in each dimension, as would a kind creator god.

That you have failed to understand the idea doesn't make it silly. There is one individual soul over which God cares deeply that lives many lives. It is a simple illustration that the universe can exist in a system that is fundamentally fair to all human souls. And if one such possible system exists there are almost certainly others that you may find more pleasing.

As for engaging, as you just argue against literally everything, including something as basic as saying someone having a major reaction to eating gluten is a health issue, it does seem to be something of a waste of time.