An Atheist still Waiting for an Answer

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.

Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.

Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?

Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

- Epicurus [341–270 B.C.]

What does it mean? It's very improbable that any God exists but if one does at best it is not all powerful, at worst it's malevolent.

Free thinking has been a thorn in religions side since the beginning and to this day the religious have yet to build a strong case against the onslaught of reason and logic.

Instead they bury their heads in the sands of fear and ignorance hoping that the questions will just go away and be forgotten but they won't. Secularism is already on the rise and the more people learn and think for themselves the more questions will be asked, the more questions asked the harder it will be to accept the ridiculous notions provided by religion.

So I figured I'd give our religious posters a chance to start over and take a stab at Epicurus' query.

 

God works in mysterious ways.



The idea of God being collective consciousness without singular creative powers (<- my view) is far less paradoxical than what is described by monotheistic beliefs.

 

The Greeks had no concept of god in the year 341-270 B.C. So what said Epicurus really?

http://youtu.be/9Cw3LkBEe7M

 

unfortunately, the concept of god has never made it past the 'idea' stage. someone thought him up, and then thousands of other people throughout the years have modified that idea, but nobody actually has any reason to believe that idea any more significant than the ideas of Bugs Bunny or Mighty Mutant Ninja Turtles.

debating about a hypothetical god gets you nowhere, because in order for god's abilities and intentions to matter, he has to be more than an idea. he hasn't gotten that far, and at the rate that religion demotivates people to discover the truth, i seriously doubt god will ever be proven to exist.

that, and you also have to realize that the concept of god is not being approached the way that actual facts are. the concept of god was created before there was any reason to believe in a specific concept of god or a creator. there were no actual facts presented. this is the way that fantasy novels are written.

the truth is normally only written about after certain events take place that provide details or facts that would indicate what exactly the truth is. the writers of the bible and other religions attempted to make it look like they were doing it the honest way, but in all reality, not a single word of the old testament was written by someone that actually saw or heard first hand any of the things they wrote about.

the koran was simply written by muhammad's corrupt friends while he meditated and pretended to hear god telling him what to tell his friends to write. dont you think that if god had a message, he'd give it to a guy that could write it down, instead of some illiterate fool?

no part of the creation of religion resembles the truth. it does, however, closely reflect fiction. god is an idea, an idea that took several thousand years and several thousand separate conceptualizations of god in order to get 2-3 versions that the masses would accept. they also happen to be quite similar plagiarisms of each other, and they also know down deep that they are wrong, why else would they be constantly trying to kill each other for thousands of years?

some ideas are bad ideas. any idea that discourages you from further pursuing the truth is an idea that is detrimental to the advancement of human intelligence.

 

Says who?

"For Epicurus, the purpose of philosophy was to attain the happy, tranquil life, characterized by ataraxia—peace and freedom from fear—and aponia—the absence of pain—and by living a self-sufficient life surrounded by friends. He taught that pleasure and pain are the measures of what is good and evil; death is the end of both body and soul and should therefore not be feared; the gods do not reward or punish humans; the universe is infinite and eternal; and events in the world are ultimately based on the motions and interactions of atoms moving in empty space."

Its seems for how little he knew most Christians today could stand to learn a lot from him.

 

Of course they did. Judaism, in one form or another, was around for at least 1000 years before Epicurus was born.

 

And they knew him well enough to honor him with his own euphemism.

"In Judaism, Epicursim are ones which do not have a share in Olam Haba -- the afterlife and the world to come."

Seems like atheists have been pissing off theists for some time now.

 

My only advice as a former Atheist, who does not think Atheism puts anyone in an inferior state...is that I'd hope you don't let some idiots, who happen to be religious, give the possibilty of higher existances a bad rap.

It's entirely possible to be spiritually healthy, while believing a God, if it exists, has likely never even read the bible.

I like to think of it in terms of a beetle, and us. If a beetle crawls within reach of the bottom of my shoe, and I'm right in front of it...it cannot comprehend me, and my power over it.

I tend to believe that any higher existences that may be interacting with us now...must surely be incomprehensible to humans, or we'd all be interacting with it.....instead of having to go to church, and hearing someone else define God's morality.

I've always hated falling back on compelling Jungian father figure archetypes to define the composition of a "God", because if it were that simple, and we looked just like God, we'd see him if he were here.

Having said that.....I see dead people......

jk.

 

Your assertion suggests there is no point in even wondering about God because he/she/it is incomprehensible to humans at the moment. However is the conversation about God not necessary especially in regards to the false Gods we are faced with today in order to clear the table for a better conversation? After all how will we ever be at a point where a higher existence is comprehensible to humans without first expanding our consciousness?

Spirituality is not compatible with the concept of God unless God is a thing and not a who because spirituality relies on existentialism which is fundamentally rejected by religions with deities.

 

While I'm astounded that this is the most relevant thing he had to say, Anobsitar brings up a point he might not have thought he brought up.

Greeks had an understanding of a monotheistic god, they just didn't have today's version of it. Nor did all of them believe it.

But where does this idea of omnibenevolence come from? I can understand that if an ancient Greek philosopher ponders a monotheistic god, he might be inclined to think of it as omnipotent, omniscient or even omnipresent in order to just get the idea into his head. However, surely, a monotheistic god (which is not yet influenced by Christian thought) can be evil or at least a bit of a dick?

 

oic, so you're a part of god?

 

We all are. "God" is not a singular being.

 

It seems I poorly worded my opinion if that's what you took away. I beleive we will be able to comprehend God some day when beetles learn to speak English, and we should all keep looking for that moment.

If you can't prove the existence of God, you can't prove a false one is false.

Expansion of the consciousness isn't neccessary for faith, and that is all humans have right now, faith. I have an unshakable faith, and have never needed to discover the fabric of which God is made. Faith too often means you simply believe what your religious leader says about morality and reality, and you never quesiton it.

Both things and people exisit, I don't follow.

 

See...now your talkin'......and unfortuantly, most of America's evangelical religions believe God is a singular being that you can have a personal relationshiip with

 

Very unfortunate indeed.

Such attitudes place God out there instead of within.

 

sweet!

 

Dude....if you would have said that to me back inthe 90's.....back when I used to, ya know...I'd still be sitting here with my jaw wide open staring into space, saying "woah...man...."

 

I have a few things on my agenda.

 

First let me say I don't necessarily disagree with what you said in your original post. In this case more information was needed before I could even make such a decision and in such discussions to agree or disagree is not very beneficial. Answers are not the answer, questions are.

Beetles will never learn to speak English for it would serve them no purpose. And your use of the term higher existence is subjective. If a beetle could be given the power of intelligence and allowed to speak it might pause for a moment to tell us how spectacularly over complicated we make our lives before returning to being a beetle.

Faith is not all we humans have right now and its only purpose is to shield us from accepting that we are at the whim of things we cannot yet comprehend and even from things that we can comprehend like nature.

Because we use our intelligence to survive it brings us to a place where we falsely believe we deserve better treatment than say a cockroach. A hurricane then becomes an act of God punishing us for something we’ve done because this scenario allows us to believe we can prevent it upping our chances of survival when in fact it is simply a part of the natural world that will not discriminate for the sake of our own perceived self worth.

In the scenario of a God or higher existence as you put it you must assume that the higher existence relies on or utilizes or even considers our consciousness on some level. If not we are completely incompatible and what serves to give ones existence meaning could be disastrous to the other.

Existentialism is directly linked to spirituality and absent in the eyes of religion specifically one with a deity. Using Christianity as an example we do not give our lives meaning, Jesus does.

Therefore understanding a higher existence or God would not be beneficial to us especially in regards to spirituality because unless that God our higher existence directly relates to us its knowledge or wisdom would put us at a disadvantage.

 

Beetles don't have vocal chords, but if they evolved so, and evolved to have a modern humanoid type of brain, it is concievable that they could speak English, if they found English books lying around still.....but in the time that might take, humans would probably have probably evolved beyond the point where they'd be speaking English.

At any rate...I think I'd be willing to table the aspects of this dialog that deal with evolution, because it's kind of arbitrary to "faith". I was trying to use the analogy to make a case for the lack of comprehension on a fundamental physical level between life forms that we can see today.

I agree with every word in the above quote except the one thats bolded

Agreed.

Not neccessarilly...I'm not projecting for the Beetle nearly as much as I would for my Min Pin dog. I guess my playfull notion that Beetles could some day speak English might give off that appearance. And you're right, my sister's need to not have Beetles around is often disasterous for the insects that make thier way into her house, and she does not take into acoount the Beetle's possible perception of her.

That's the real trick there huh?....because making sure the morality of the deity you worship is "correct" is simply seeking moral relativism, is it not.

Should we not embrace the simpler idea that if it feels good, do it?....and if it stops feeling good, don't do it?

 

there were a plethora of others.

 

Let's think about your question in a practical example. People always ask: "Why doesn't God tell us when people we love are going to die?" It sounds like a good idea at first. But... then when people start to be spontaneously nice to me, I start to wonder. Is it my time? Am I going to die? General global panic ensues, and everyone eventually agrees to try not to be nice to anyone out of respect.

So the answer to your question is unfortunately that we are humans, and in general we are a bunch of idiots. God is just doing his best with what he has to work with down here.

 

Hey, even if he wasn't "all powerful", he'd still be far more powerful than you or I - so that's reason enough to call him God.

Actually the existence of evil allows people to be good by free will rather than force, maybe that's a higher virtue to God than just "forcing" everyone to do good - even those who'd do evil if they were given the choice, and therefore would only be doing good insincerely. Maybe God values sincerity over zombie-like obedience - hence why he allows evil.

Plus if he was so oppressive, why wouldn't he just smite all you atheists, rather than give you the free will to slander Christianity if you so wish to - name one atheistic dictator like Stalin, Mao, etc who'd afford dissenters the same grace.

 

How did they have no concept of god?

 

But what evidence exists for your god? What do you believe it does or has done in the universe? Is there any need, any reason, to believe in it? Just curious.