Bigthink - Idea Comments Feed

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Wed, 07 May 2008 22:05:57 +0100

Hi Pokoj -- thanks for your input.

The aim in this thread has been to develop an all embracing MODEL of what the gods might be about. Your beliefs will be based on the model you have chosen -- and it is a choice, not an absolute [ a point missed by many in this forum ].

Don't go down the path of "parallel universes", a lesson well learned by Stephen Hawking. If you follow this stuff, you will know that he almost undid his lifetime's credibility in promoting this concept to the scientific community.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Wed, 07 May 2008 07:30:16 +0100

I answer my own question again...
What I believe of God does not leave room for separate entities... other dimensions and parallel universes would still exist within the realm of... existence... and all is a part of God...

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Sun, 04 May 2008 00:38:22 +0100

To try to alleviate some of the burden...

We only personify God because we have no true way of distinguishing His nature from what we know. This idea of "Father/Mother God" is inadequate as it instills human shortcomings, just as the meaning of the word "Son" is inadequate in describing Jesus in the relation of the Trinity. We are made in His image, not His nature.

I'm surprised the parallel universe idea hasn't come into this argument (as far as I could tell scanning through the comments.) One of the doubts I am struggling with is what if there are other universes alongside ours, as suggested by quantum/string theories... does this leave room for a separate "God" entity for each universe? If so, are they equal?

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 04:54:55 +0100

I'm just God. You'll have to discuss this with my Supervisor.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 19:45:06 +0100

In response to the comment you posted on Imagine God Evolving.
To whom is God answerable: it's creator, in name only, man?
Man's time? The history of God? God's/our needs in the present?
And the future, what will be demanded of God, how evolved will it become?
You could read my first post, "God is More Evolved Today than Yesterday".
I understand your idea that God is a human mind creation, but I do think it existed before man, and it will exist after man, when there is no trace of us ever existing. Our minds can only understand/preceive so much of God.
And just so you know, I don't think I have ever disagreed with anything I have read of yours.
Keep fighting the good fight dear sir.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 18:46:18 +0100

Thanks Djebe. There is quite a bit of work involved with this list, as you have implied. The danger is that I'm straying too far from my core-competence. I may not actually be able to deliver the quality analysis that this topic deserves, and certainly not quickly. It is important for me to get the facts right. You obviously know this subject well, and I am obligated to do more research if you are to take my thoughts seriously [grin].

Hope the concept has not been degraded by my inclusion of the Borg as a religious organization. I am planning to spin out a separate thread on this when I get my thoughts together. There do seem to be some interesting parallels, but I will not pursue them here.

And as a side note, I think this thread is exactly the type of thought-provoking discussion that BigThink had hoped to generate when they established the site.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 15:05:13 +0100

Sure, Djebe, sound good! :)
Looking forward to you further elaborations on the theoroid of monotheism!

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 14:24:55 +0100

cosmos: Waiting to get your list. When you're finished, will you condense it into an idea and post it? In that case, drop me a comment on one of my own ideas, so I get notified (with the usual 4-days delay).

QuickEye: Yes, the discussion is interesting. But I am definitely at the point where I have to continue with my own ideas to clarify what I mean with the theroroid of monotheism. Then you can decide how close together or far apart we are.

I will drop both of you a comment when I got on with that task. Hope that is ok with you. Right now I am working on something lighter: The question whether religion causes wars on outsiders.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 18:53:49 +0100

Partly in response to prompting from Djebe, and also because I will eventually need to 'put up' or 'shut up', I have been compiling a rough list of conforming religions.

Most interesting on this list was one that nearly didn't make the cut -- The Borg-Collective. Thinking hard about this has led me to revisit what I define as a religion. The B-C does seem to have the necessary qualifications. I will let this rattle around for a bit, and try to justify why the B-C should be included.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 15:02:39 +0100

Djebe,

I think the discussion about gravity as an analogy is making us drifting a bit off topic, but it is very interesting - more on that further down! :)

Your original point I replied to was your claim that god does not fall victim to infinite regress - why wouldn't it?
Why would we need to accept the monotheistic definition of the divine and exclude even higher powers? What causes you not to concur?
How is the definition of 1 of divine entity more realistic that the definition of x > 1 divine entities?
These questions are still awaiting answers.

And back to gravity as an analogy, since it started living it's own life when it became an analogy on a different level in the course of discussion... :P

I think we might be talking about the same thing, namely theories (gravity in your example), hypothesis ('theoroid' in your words, the existence of the divine being such) and explaining the world.

What I'm pointing out is that comparing a theory against a hypothesis on the merits of them explaining the world is not fair towards the hypothesis as it by definition is weaker than a theory and will always loose out.

I was also afraid that, comparing the hypothesis of the divine to the theory of gravity might cause some to unjustifiably think that both ideas are of the same weight, which they aren't.
No hypothesis can take shortcuts into becoming an accepted theory: it needs evidence.
No analogy to a successfully verified hypothesis that became theory (gravity) makes a mere hypothesis (existence of the divine) more substantiated. Simply postulating the divine in the same sentence as a scientific theory does not make them of the same weight and power. That is the point I'm trying to make through being such a hairsplitting bastard that I am. :P

I completely agree with you on events that have profound impact on our lives. I stand in awe and wonder myself when confronted with such. It seems that our views might be the same, but with different names.
Having said that, I interpret you statement about the "questionble value of faith" when it goes against proven facts as removing all traditionally held attributes of the divine from the concept of a deity and leaving god as a synonym for awe and wonder, as opposed to being a creator and lawmaker. Please correct me if I'm misinterpreting you!

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 12:36:05 +0100

Djebe -- now that you're posing these curly questions, I might end up having posts as long as those in our companion thread [g].

Firstly, I see monotheism as a simplified version of the tiered-model, where the one entity is responsible for everything. If you stand back from my theory, where the details are less distinct, it really looks monotheistic [ I really must give this a name, and stop referring to it as "My Theory" [grin] -- if I did a thorough search, I'm sure I'd find someone has already classified it ].

The ONLY function not available to the god's in the Tiered Theory is Creation. There are a few important pieces in my model, to do with the Creator, that I have not yet detailed here. If I still have your interest, I will address that at a later time.

I might decline the temptation to identify religions suitable for inclusion in my model, partly because of my limited knowledge on religions at large. As you suggest, this could well deserve a thread of its own. However, I think I could find some common-ground in religions as diverse as Buddhism and Ra-ism. Parishioners of all persuasions must at some stage question 'The Beginning', even if there is no controlling authority [ i.e. God figure ] sanctioned by their religion.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 11:10:44 +0100

QuickEye, I am probably overworking the analogy between a scientific theory and a religious "theoroid". But sometimes you have to do that. My main problem is that I cannot state monotheism here in a few sentences. But the difference is not between gravity being there and god not being there.

Apples always fell to the ground. But what did people see when they looked at it? What educated europeans saw after Aristotle for way over a thousand years was the apple trying to return to his natural place in the middle of the earth at a speed proportional to his weight. What they saw after Newton was "gravity", i.e.an apple being attracted by the mass of the earth at a speed which was, for all practical reasons, the same for all objects once the resistance of air was removed.

The theoroid of god is about what you see when you see an apple falling to the ground, when you see a child being born, when you see a plane crashing into a skyscraper. If there is no difference in all of this between an atheist and a believer, when there only is the question about whether evolution should be scrapped and whether you got to heaven or to hell, wherever that is, THEN I agree that this faith is superfluous and of extremely questionable value.

cosmos, IMO monotheism is about ommnipotence. Creation, however understood, would only be a part of this. But I am curious about which religions you want to lead together. Perhaps that could be an idea of its own.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 01:13:34 +0100

Gents,

Interesting discussion, I'm glad to be part of it!

Djebe, I think that the hypothesis of god is not good, it indeed falls prey to Ockahm's razor.
I'm not sure though I follow you argument about the the quality of an existential theory?

For the sake of clarity I would like to introduce the difference between "scientific theory" and "hypothesis", as similar concepts seem to emerge in the discussion.
A scientific theory has powers of explaining a wide range of natural phenomena, it makes predictions and it can be falsified. A scientific theory is in fact a scientific fact until falsified. Gravity for example, or evolution are such theories. They describe the world with empirical evidence that can be reproduced, checked. It devises experiments to verify (or falsify) it's power of explaining occuring phenomena.
Hypthesis is a suggested explanation of a pehomenon, that needs to be verified against observable evidence.

In this sense any god is a hypothesis (a suggested explanation with no evidence for it), and which seems to fall off reality when Ockham's razor passes by.

Coming back to gravity: it exists in the observable world even if we cannot formulate the principles of gravity. Apple fell towards the centre of the Earth even before Newton started thinking about why it happens. And everybody at any time in the history of the world could drop a stone and it will inevitably fall. Regardless whether they had an expressed word for it. The word "to fall" is in this respect synonimous and I would argue that it exists in any culture, the same way as the word "stone". So gravity is not man made. Deities are.

In what sense do you mean that any god is not within our heads? It does not give any verifiable clues to its existence, has no explanatory power of experiences and observations (Ockham's razor again). Thus it does not leave any trace in the real world and thus exists only in people's heads. As gravity was not "developed" but existed since the beginning of times everywhere in the universe, I don't really see how the concept of god (monotheistic or otherwise) can hardly be likened to it.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 00:33:46 +0100

TeddyBear -- the reason I think your argument may be circular probably relates to the constrained context. If I read correctly, you base the final word on what's written in the Bible. But the Bible was written by man to explain what he thought God should be about. Perhaps you can understand my confusion. Any valid argument must have independent start and end points, or it becomes circular [ sometimes I enjoy arguing about arguing, more than arguing theologically [grin] ].

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 00:20:26 +0100

Djebe -- I think I now understand your analogy between Gravity and God. They are both theories to explain certain things in our experience and observation. Let's run with Gravity for a bit...

The hunt is on at the moment among theoretical-physicists to determine a unified theory of 'everything', be it String-Theory or something else. Eventually, I expect Gravity will form part of a bigger picture. And this is exactly how I see the theory of God. There will come a time when he will need redefinition as well. But I would NEVER believe there could be a higher authority than the Creator. I do not expect you to subscribe to my religion, but I would hope that it does make some sense.

Agree about god not participating in all religions -- it was always going to be a big ask to have ALL religions conform to my model [grin].

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 16:33:53 +0100

cosmos: This is a subject I find very fascinating. A theoretical term is, in a certain sense, "in your head", but also denotes something in the world. Take gravity again. This is not a natural kind, as stone is - every language has a word for stone. But gravity was not thought of before Newton formulated his theory, put it in our heads, and yet, "gravity" refers to something outside our heads.

I see the god of monotheism in the same way. Monotheism was developed at a certain time and place in history, and since then, "god" is in the head of people, but it isn't about the interior of their heads.

Just a memo: Not all religions are about god. Buddhism and Confucianism definitely aren't.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 15:14:59 +0100

Cosmos,

My reasoning doesn't go around in circles, they simply have to be within their context - which I'm trying to do in my own response to this idea. [God is morally responsible, but we understand God through his revelation in the Bible - thus, we understand that he is good and holy, the ultimate standard of such things so he cannot be held accountable by any higher standard than himself. To the Christian, this is a good thing. See the other thread for an explanation.]

To the other gentlemen I was addressing, you will find a more thorough explanation of my beliefs and arguments in my response thread. That is where I shall continue to discuss these issues as this thread is primarily devoted to a more abstract argument and concept of God.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 12:41:04 +0100

Djebe -- Taking a practical approach, I would happily settle for a couple of levels [grin].

Even though I take a tongue-in-cheek approach to this topic in general, there is an underlying desire where I try to seriously rationalize, reconcile and accommodate all forms of religion in a common-model, rather than assuming they're all rubbish, except for the one I believe in. For the record, I believe in a Creator, something more magnificent than I will ever be able to wrap my mind around. I see the postulation of God in the various religions as a stepping-stone to reach the Creator. In some religious models, God is elevated to supreme-creator as well. Since all this modeling is fictional, it hardly seems appropriate to take a serious stand on which model has the most credibility.

Incidentally, I do agree with you that God is really in our heads, as much as we might try to believe otherwise [ at least that is what I think you said, or am I twisting your words beyond their meaning? ].

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 11:46:00 +0100

Umm, re-reading my comment after your answers I have to admit I was a bit too short. Sorry about that. Second try:

"God" is, of course, not a theory in itself, but the central concept of a kind of theory, just as "gravitiy" is the central concept of the laws of gravity. The theoroid (nice word) would start something like this: "There exists one, and exactly one being that causes everything in the world to happen ..." etc. That was what I meant with my "gravity" analogy.

cosmos, for this reason, I would re-formulate your idea like this: If anybody accepts a theory with one god, there is no reason why he shouldn't accept another with two or a hundred gods stacked upon each other. I would not concur with that because the existential, spiritual or whatever point of monotheism is the stance of the individual human in face of this one god. You cannot just copy this one level higher and postulate the same relationship between god and supergod, exactly for the reason that "god" only makes sense as a term of the monotheistic theoroid.

QuickEye: God can be declared a "figment of our imagination" if the theory is no good and falls prey to Ockhams razor together with all its theoretical terms. The problem is to decide whether a EXISTENTIAL theory is good or not.

Comment on: To Whom is God Answerable?

Bigthink — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 09:27:51 +0100

Djebe,

Your definition that god is an "existential theory about us and our place in the world" places god firmly in people's heads (where theories exist) instead of being something independent from us. I believe you are right: god is but a figment of our imagination.
Defining god like that strips it of being the creator of the objective universe, as a theory in somebody's head cannot create a universe independet of that head (mind). Having a lab-coat is the same as being able to create anything independent from us.

It seems to me that your analogy is not really spot on. Gravity is the attraction of matter to matter. But gravity (a phenomenon) itself is not matter, thus is not attracted to matter.

So the question still stands: who created an alleged creator?