I am god

You are god

Bah

I am curious what Manifold's bias looks like. Most people believe God exists, but most Manifold users seem not to.

"Bah" is the correct answer because both religion and atheism provide a logical consistent version of the world and as such the only reason to choose one over the other is through belief.

@AlexCao I think it is possible to have a logically consistent understanding of the world that includes god, but it's rare

@Tumbles I mean, if we don't confine ourselves to any particular religion it's pretty easy to insert a "God" into one's worldview

joke answer: "which one hee hoo"

real answer is i don't know and don't care. for me practising religion offers some extra depth to my life that other things do not provide, and probably counter to what others would think, it makes me feel grounded and helps me connect with the world around me more (being someone who practices a somewhat nature-honouring tradition). i will for all intents and purposes act as though my gods (and others, too) are 100% and for certain real when in religious spaces because acting within that framework of belief is where the value is, but in the end, i have no real way of knowing and it doesn't matter to me either

i should also add: i think us believing that they're real, and acting as if they are, makes them real to an extent

@ngoomie thanks for sharing your thoughts. I like the depth of self awareness you have towards your own believes

@ngoomie This resonated with me, thanks. I think of God as a shorthand for the limit of my own imagination. I practice and worship in the faith tradition of my father’s family and my education because it’s comforting to me and gives me a framework for reflection. And because the Anglican liturgical and musical traditions fill me with awe and joy. But I love the Buddhist saying, if I point at the moon I hope you look at the moon. Not my finger! Christian nationalism is all about looking at their own finger and getting mad if they can’t make everyone else look at it too.

What would a godless world look like? Like ours.

Children get raped and killed, sometimes in front of their parents, starve to death, get lifelong traumas, every single day, inflicted even by those who should protect them – family, clergy, teachers.

No karma, no justice outside ours.

No need for divine powers to explain human desires, flaws, perversions, or miracles and curses.

If there are gods they are unnoticeable, sadistic or don't care about us.

@RatUziCat

@RatUziCat what's wrong with having a sadistic, morally corrupted god? how does that have any effect on its existence?

@AlexCao
1. A world with a sadistic god would likely be even worse. Most people aren't even being tortured half the time!
2. Most people who believe in god believe in a god that isn't evil and sadistic. So even if the problem of evil doesn't technically defeat the concept of a god, it does defeat each popular conception of god individually, which is pretty close

@RatUziCat That is what a world without an interventionist god looks like.

@ClubmasterTransparent down here, a non interventionist but omnipotent god is sadistic. "God works in mysterious ways" can only go so far. Many people on this Earth would like this little nightmarish experiment to be wrapped up, thank you

@RatUziCat You’re not wrong — but given there’s not an understanding of an Eternal or a divine that’s useful to you, what is engaging you in this discussion?

@ClubmasterTransparent this world would do better without the belief in gods, since associated behaviors would disappear: superstition, wishful thinking, passivity, expectation of karma, divine retribution, paradise and hell and so on.

Redefining stuff as gods is just a bit less toxic. The Big Bang, Cosmos, Universe, Nature, ... have no purpose and don't care about us. Let's focus on our fellow humans' well-being. Human-based spirituality is great, belief in the supernatural is not.

Besides, American culture's obsession with religion is tiring.

Would "Bah" include belief in some sort of non-abrahamic God (possibly polytheism or aristotelian prime mover), or does that go to yes?

@Isaac228c I would count it as a Yes, but then again, you can vote however you prefer or feel most appropriate

Philpapers (https://philpapers.org/surveys/results.pl) goes 73/15/13 (rounded) to atheism/theism/other

If the intention was to collect some kind of data - poll would be better.

Bah -->

Neither the arguments to whether God exists or doesn't exist make sense to me. The universe must have a creator and yet the creator must also have been created somehow.

If I think about the history of the universe, from the emergence of life, to human beings, first civilizations, the scientific method, the creation of intelligent machines, and the various physical revolutions (from Ptolomy to Copernicus to Einstein), I also think that:

• Our capability to understand the universe is now immensely greater than few thousand years ago (and incomparable to what other beings could do millions of years above)

• The potential to have a better understanding than we have now throughout the billions of years of history in front of us is even greater

• We probably have no clue of what all this means, we are ants that try to find a meaning to of the universe