• You are currently viewing our forum as a guest, which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our free community, you will have access to additional post topics, communicate privately with other members (PM), view blogs, respond to polls, upload content, and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free, so please join our community today! Just click here to register. You should turn your Ad Blocker off for this site or certain features may not work properly. If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us by clicking here.

is God sadistic??? Or is it just me?

R

RDF

Guest
My point was never to bad mouth athiesm, but to show how poor the Carl Sagan analogy is.

Fair enough. I agree that the scope of Sagan's analogy was rather restricted. I think he just wanted to show the utter frustration of the scientist trying to cope with something considered a truth by most of the world but which somehow has never left a scientifically verifiable trace of evidence in its wake.

Your response that atheists simply have faulty senses or choose not to perceive God seemed too facile to me. Part of the purpose of Sagan's analogy is to make the exact opposite point--that atheists have often put in a lot of thought and effort trying to investigate this momentous claim of "a dragon in the garage." It's not our fault that the dragon doesn't leave any evidence behind.

Lack of evidence is lack of evidence. It shouldn't be turned into an accusation that the atheist is at fault or is colorblind or isn't looking hard enough. And that's why I jumped in: To make the point that the atheist's consternation over lack of scientific evidence is genuine and that the believers have to carry some of the burden here instead of writing off the problem and blaming it on the obstinacy of atheists.

But beyond that, I'm not looking for a win or even an argument. I'm happy to let believers continue believing. I agree that Sagan's analogy is restricted in scope and isn't very useful when it comes to disproving the existence of God. I don't think it's really about proof or disproof. I think Sagan's analogy mainly just illustrates the scientist's frustrating predicament: He is perfectly willing to keep an open mind and research the claims of believers, but the end result is always the same--he never finds a shred of hard evidence no matter how closely he investigates this claim of "a dragon in the garage."

I appreciate the in-depth responses. All the best! :nice:
 

JAVO

.
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
9,178
MBTI Type
eNTP
JAVO said:
How could he have recorded it infallibly? Any media would eventually become unreadable or deprecated. Also, keep in perspective the mindset and culture at the time. It was different than ours is now.

He’s the fucking Lord God ALMIGHTY isn’t he? He could poof a temple into existence, write his will in plates of gold in every language humans ever have or will speak then place his divine protection over the whole kit so it suffers nary a scratch for all eternity.

So your argument then is this:
1. If God exists, he would do what I expect him to do.
2. What I expect God to do is not happening.
3. Therefore, God does not exist.


Better yet, why doesn’t he come down here in person and talk to us? Can he do that? Why does he have to make us jump through hoops?
Have you ever read a historical account of him doing this?
 

sassafrassquatch

New member
Joined
Jul 20, 2007
Messages
961
So your argument then is this:
1. If God exists, he would do what I expect him to do.
2. What I expect God to do is not happening.
3. Therefore, God does not exist.

No, I’m saying that IF god exists he is horribly inept at whatever he is trying to do. Unless his intent is to spread confusion and divide humanity. In which case I’d say he’s done a fine job.

Have you ever read a historical account of him doing this?

I meant come down and stay here.

godfailednv8.jpg
 

JAVO

.
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
9,178
MBTI Type
eNTP
No, I’m saying that IF god exists he is horribly inept at whatever he is trying to do. Unless his intent is to spread confusion and divide humanity. In which case I’d say he’s done a fine job.

So your argument then is this:
1. God may exist.
2. Evil, suffering, and confusion about God exist.
2. Therefore, if God does exists, God is either not omnipotent or is malevolent.

Edit: In the photo, take the blinder of religion off of the cat, and you'll resolve the fail condition. ;)
 

Alfa Prime

New member
Joined
Nov 6, 2007
Messages
13
So I have been lost to say the least. Lost in life at the moment, there was a time when I thought that I knew where I was going and what the path before me held. A time when my faith was strong and my belief cemented. But over the course of the last year I have had some questions and some doubts and there is so much that I don't understand that I feel I should understand.

I mean is God sadistic? I'm serious.


I look at various quotes in the Bible.

You did not chose me I have chosen you

I will not give you more than you can handle

I knew you before you were born, planned you and i know your life.

(adlibed I know)


As I apply these to my life I feel betrayed by God. Seriously hurt and bitter and I don't trust him. Because while I have the right to choose and I chose, I chose wrong and I failed and um God knew it too yet he still allowed for me to fail. And apparently his reasoning in this is to bring us closer to him.

Wait back um I think in my mind, you want me closer to you so you set me up for failure and you know what I am gonna do and it's not working. This baffles me, he is supposedly my heavenly father who loves me more than anything and more than I love my children, but I wouldn't set them up to fail just so they would need me more.

Do I set a candy bar on the coffee table and tell them not to eat it and then condemn them when they eat it, No I don't set them up to fail.

To me this theory isn't simple it's sadistic

Am I missing something here? Apparently my life was to set me up to need God more and it's done the opposite b/c I don't trust him at all..... yet he knew this and still he allowed it......


I believe this is immature thinking. We do not live in paradise, where everything is ideal.

Treasure your failures, for they are the greatest gifts from which we can learn and grow. Treat them as such, and they will not cause you pain.
 

findthejake

New member
Joined
Sep 30, 2007
Messages
258
MBTI Type
ENFP
A God who could make good children as easily a bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave is angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice, and invented hell -- mouths mercy, and invented hell -- mouths Golden Rules and foregiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people, and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites his poor abused slave to worship him!
-- Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger
Twain was the shiat!
 

Roger Mexico

New member
Joined
Nov 2, 2007
Messages
131
MBTI Type
INTP
OK, my two cents for shits and giggles:

I'm too lazy to go back and quote whoever said this, but it's grossly inaccurate to characterize atheism as "just another belief" or "just another way of dealing with [whatever]." Atheism is the proposition that God is the answer to a question that doesn't need to be asked in the first place.

Why am I here? Because at some point my parents fucked. Not pleasant to imagine, but true. Why do they exist? Because at some point their parents fucked. Problem solved.

Why does food taste good? Why does sex feel good? Because no one would eat if food tasted like battery acid, and there wouldn't be very many people if we weren't physically wired to seek out food and sex. So a planet populated by creatures that hate eating and fucking wouldn't make very much sense. Problem solved.

What happens when I die? "I" ceases to be a meaningful concept. The materials that currently make up the physical gestalt indicated for convenience' sake by the shorthand "Roger Mexico" will be reclaimed by the larger physical gestalt out of which they were originally combined into such. I won't be around to see it, so I can't say as I'm too invested in the particulars. (Although if I had a say I would decidedly prefer an Irish wake to the noncommittal, atonal warbling of Scandinavian Protestants that has been the preferred method of getting me closer to God thus far in my life.) Problem solved.

Why are some things in my life difficult? Because I suck at those things. If they're important to me, I'll work on not sucking at them. Problem solved, at least in theory.

Why is there evil in the world? Because people invented "good,' which required an opposite adjective in order to be useful as a means of conveying information, and it turns out lots of things that happen all the time fall into the "other" category. (See Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals for more on this. Fascinating book.) "Problem of evil" solved. Actual problems involving evil? More difficult, although one should note that since "good" and "evil" are human inventions, evil will cease to exist as soon as humans do.

How do I find peace and contentment and warm fuzzies and special unique specialness in my life?

You know, I'm starting to think having more sex might be an important component of this process for me. Ironically, God in pretty much all of his incarnations seems to want me to hate and fear my own sexual impulses, so I can either spend a lot of money on new-agey self-help books and spend a lot of time and energy on trying to reconcile the demands of my "spiritual self" with my physical body, or I can remember that the same people who told me about God when I was little also told me about Santa Claus. It's not "problem solved," but it's definitely "problem simplified."

I'm tired, so I'll just bow out with some Slayer lyrics:

Drones since the dawn of time
Compelled to live your sheltered lives
Not once has anyone ever seen
Such a rise of pure hypocrisy
I will instigate, I will free your mind
I will show you what I've known all this time

God Hates Us All, God Hates Us All
You know it's true, God hates this place
You know it's true, he hates this race

Homicide-Suicide
Hate heals, you should try it sometime
Strive for Peace with acts of war
The beauty of death we all adore
I have no faith distracting me
I know why your prayers will never be answered

God Hates Us All; God Hates Us All
Yeah, He Fuckin' hates me

Pessimist, Terrorist targeting the next mark
Global chaos feeding on hysteria
Cut throat, slit your wrist, shoot you in the back fair game
Drug abuse, self abuse searching for the next high
Sounds a lot like hell is spreading all the time
I'm waiting for the day the whole world fucking dies

I never said I wanted to be God's disciple
I'll never be the one to blindly follow

Man made virus infecting the world
Self-destruct human time bomb
What if there is no God would you think the fuckin' same
Wasting your life in a leap of blind faith
Wake the fuck up can't ignore what I say
I got my own philosophy

I hate everyone equally
You can't tear that out of me
No segregation -separation
Just me in my world of enemies

I never said I wanted to be God's disciple
I'll never be the one to blindly follow
I'll never be the one to bear the cross-disciple

I reject this fuckin' race
I despise this fuckin' place
 

The_Liquid_Laser

Glowy Goopy Goodness
Joined
Jul 11, 2007
Messages
3,376
MBTI Type
ENTP
OK, my two cents for shits and giggles:

I'm too lazy to go back and quote whoever said this, but it's grossly inaccurate to characterize atheism as "just another belief" or "just another way of dealing with [whatever]."

Lol, that is what every belief system says about itself.
 

The_Liquid_Laser

Glowy Goopy Goodness
Joined
Jul 11, 2007
Messages
3,376
MBTI Type
ENTP
And he throws the point straight over the middle of the plate. Liquid Laser goes into his stance and... swing and a miss!

And Roger Mexico doesn't even realize that we're not playing baseball.:harhar:

More importantly saying that you're beliefs are superior to everyone else's does not make it so. I had to spell that out in case you missed the point. ;)
 

Roger Mexico

New member
Joined
Nov 2, 2007
Messages
131
MBTI Type
INTP
And Roger Mexico doesn't even realize that we're not playing baseball.:harhar:

More importantly saying that you're beliefs are superior to everyone else's does not make it so. I had to spell that out in case you missed the point. ;)

Dude, read my post. Atheism isn't a belief; it's the lack of a belief coupled with the lack of any sense of the absence of that belief.

Religious people ask me "but how can you think that life just spontaneously arose from inert chemicals? Isn't life just so amazing that there has to be some greater meaning to it?"

And I say, "uh, no. What are you, high? If we didn't exist we wouldn't be having this conversation to begin with, so really I'm not that amazed that I exist. You might want to think about getting out more."

OT: and furthermore, "you're" is a contraction for "you are." "Your" is an adjective meaning "possessed by you."
 

The_Liquid_Laser

Glowy Goopy Goodness
Joined
Jul 11, 2007
Messages
3,376
MBTI Type
ENTP
Dude, read my post. Atheism isn't a belief; it's the lack of a belief coupled with the lack of any sense of the absence of that belief.

The choice to not have a belief is still a belief. The very fact that one calls themself an athiest shows that they've made a conscious decision about the existence of divine being(s). When you consider the wide range of theistic beliefs that exist, athiesm really doesn't seem that different from any other belief systems. Like all belief systems athiesm has viewpoints about the existence of divine being(s) even if the viewpoint simply consists of "I don't care" or "My default is nothing until further evidence is uncovered".

Actually if you look deeper you will find that athiesm covers a fairly wide range of beliefs. There are quite a few flavors of athiesm out there. (Just like there are quite a few flavors of Islam, Christianity, Hinduism, etc....) Athiesm isn't really that different from the other belief systems. Some athiests even belong to athiestic organizations.

OT: and furthermore, "you're" is a contraction for "you are." "Your" is an adjective meaning "possessed by you."

Now I know your weakness: grammar. Muhuhahahah!!! :D
 

sassafrassquatch

New member
Joined
Jul 20, 2007
Messages
961
The choice to not have a belief is still a belief. The very fact that one calls themself an athiest shows that they've made a conscious decision about the existence of divine being(s). When you consider the wide range of theistic beliefs that exist, athiesm really doesn't seem that different from any other belief systems. Like all belief systems athiesm has viewpoints about the existence of divine being(s) even if the viewpoint simply consists of "I don't care" or "My default is nothing until further evidence is uncovered".

Actually if you look deeper you will find that athiesm covers a fairly wide range of beliefs. There are quite a few flavors of athiesm out there. (Just like there are quite a few flavors of Islam, Christianity, Hinduism, etc....) Athiesm isn't really that different from the other belief systems. Some athiests even belong to athiestic organizations.

kolinahrxw4.jpg

Also, it's athEIst NOT athIEst.
 
R

RDF

Guest
The choice to not have a belief is still a belief. The very fact that one calls themself an athiest shows that they've made a conscious decision about the existence of divine being(s). When you consider the wide range of theistic beliefs that exist, athiesm really doesn't seem that different from any other belief systems. Like all belief systems athiesm has viewpoints about the existence of divine being(s) even if the viewpoint simply consists of "I don't care" or "My default is nothing until further evidence is uncovered".

Actually if you look deeper you will find that athiesm covers a fairly wide range of beliefs. There are quite a few flavors of athiesm out there. (Just like there are quite a few flavors of Islam, Christianity, Hinduism, etc....) Athiesm isn't really that different from the other belief systems. Some athiests even belong to athiestic organizations.

If lack of belief is the same as a belief system, then that means I have hundreds or thousands of belief systems. I don't believe in God, I don't believe in the tooth fairy, I don't believe in the Easter Bunny, I don't believe in elves, etc.

So according to you, each of those disbeliefs equals a belief system, equivalent to your own belief system in God? That doesn't say much for your own belief system.

To me they are just lack of belief. I don't tack any particular philosophy or qualifier onto my disbelief in God or any of my other disbeliefs. I simply don't believe in God and an afterlife the same way that I don't believe in the tooth fairy.

I'll grant that there are other atheists who do build some kind of philosophical superstructure on top of their atheism or qualify their atheism any number of ways.

But as it pertains to me, "atheism" isn't a school of thought or even a collection of people. It's just a label. Here's my thinking about that label:

"I don't believe in God the same way that I don't believe in the tooth fairy. According to the usual definition of these things, I guess that makes me an "atheist" Fine, whatever. If that's the appropriate label, then that's what I'll call myself so that people understand my position."

But it seems strange to hear that since I'm an "atheist," I must have a "belief system." I never understand why religious people claim that simple lack of belief in something is a "belief system." If I don't believe in ogres living in caves, is that a "belief system" too? And is non-belief in ogres on a par with your system of belief in God and in whatever religion you profess?
 

JAVO

.
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
9,178
MBTI Type
eNTP
Anything thought to be true but not proven as a truth is a belief. If I say, "God does not exist," is that a belief or truth?

Every belief has a belief system attached to it, whether consciously acknowledged or not. Even our nonconscious cognitive and perceptual biases are belief systems.
 

JAVO

.
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
9,178
MBTI Type
eNTP
sassafrassquatch said:
No, I’m saying that IF god exists he is horribly inept at whatever he is trying to do. Unless his intent is to spread confusion and divide humanity. In which case I’d say he’s done a fine job.

So your argument then is this:
1. God may exist.
2. Evil, suffering, and confusion about God exist.
2. Therefore, if God does exists, God is either not omnipotent or is malevolent.

If this is an accurate summary of your argument, then I agree with it. In fact, the conclusion that God is not omnipotent is necessary to allow for human free will.
 
R

RDF

Guest
Anything thought to be true but not proven as a truth is a belief. If I say, "God does not exist," is that a belief or truth?

It's the exact same thing as saying "The tooth fairy does not exist." I tend to think of it as a truth. I tend to find it as knowable as anything else in the world. But if you want to define "The tooth fairy does not exist" as a belief, that's fine with me.

Every belief has a belief system attached to it, whether consciously acknowledged or not. Even our nonconscious cognitive and perceptual biases are belief systems.

So you're saying that "The tooth fairy does not exist" is potentially a belief, and hence that "The tooth fairy does not exist" is potentially a belief system. And thus "God does not exist" is potentially a belief system.

Fine. Whatever. It's all just labels.

But you may want to distinguish between the belief system "The tooth fairy does not exist" and the belief system of Christianity. It seems absurd to equate the two. At a minimum, it makes the label of "belief system" meaningless, since pretty much anything becomes a "belief system."
 

JAVO

.
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
9,178
MBTI Type
eNTP
But you may want to distinguish between the belief system "The tooth fairy does not exist" and the belief system of Christianity. It seems absurd to equate the two. At a minimum, it makes the label of "belief system" meaningless, since pretty much anything becomes a "belief system."

Are you pushing the "hyperbolic =" button on your philosophical calculator again? :D
 
Top