The Personality of God? [!OT]

This is another bit of a discussion thread, just as a heads up :-D.


Whether you're religious, non-religious, atheist, agnostic, whatever, there are people around you whether you are one yourself that believes in a "god" or whatever you want to call it. There is something interesting I've always found in the topic of it, because it is rather an oxymoron. You can't know if it/she/he is real until you're dead, but then you can't tell about it, because you're dead... or can you? It's possible that he is impossible, but theres the possibility that this impossibility could be an impossibility as well.

One thing that has always amused me about how "gods" are portrayed is that they all have an everchanging "personality" especially the mythological ones, but all of them yes, have some sort of personality in themselves.

Just for instance I'll take the Christian God (as I know a lot about it, Mexico is 99% catholic).

In the "modern" catholic God, he seems to out of being, out of place, just watching... it is too difficult for him to be a real being. It is shown in Adam and Eve that he was more human. He was curious, as if you had made yourself a little world, you'd tinker with it wouldnt you? Fool around, test it, expiriment it, see what works... and what doesn't. If a God exists, he must be laughing at everyone on Earth, yet then in the Catholic Bible you have this loving, caring, "personal", God. Which makes it a very tough thing to believe in, and demands quite a bit from you.

It's getting a bit later, and I need to get some MoN stuff done, so maybe I'll post a bit later. Just a bit of a brain jogger, out of a bit of boredom and some feeling of starting a discussion.... so I'll be back later.

<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ February 12, 2003 07:43 AM: Message edited by: Dragonrider ]</font>

Well... I believe there are different periods and such where the "god(s)/none" go through the phase. Like say it goes through a mad phase because something pissed him off. It kills off a few human for this/erupts a plague/makes them live in fear/causes a war. Then later on he is saddened by this. It lets one side come out winning and things are restored. That is if there are [any] god(s).

One big mistake that I think Humans make when deducting things about God is that they TRY to deduct things. If something is big enough to make the universe, a human could never confront it at this point. Thus, humans make god seem human, which if he/she/it were, then.... leave that for another day.

God's perosnality is what DR does everyight. A cruel sick twisted man, who likes to amke Cav get nekkid XD

*beats xel with a stick*

Nyoohohoho... Yuki-chan's vengeance will be slow and seet, God! XD

I myself believe that the Creator (of the universe) is not the same as God.

The funniest of all, is that God, as He is, is only a human creation! See. We have the concept of imperfection, right, which most of us may recognize it more or less easily. Then, if we negate the "Imperfection" you get the perfection, and that is what you can call God. A perfect being. The Omnipotency and other features we give God are also another illusion we have done of God. We, as limited beings, believe that if there is a perfect creature, then, it has to be able to do things we humans can't, such as be inmortal, or make miracles.

From an atheist standpoint, thats true, but for christians/any toher religion, it's not

^_^ God. Don't know what he is, and won't know until this pulse has stopped. There's tons of theories out there. It's hard to pick one.

I overheard a short few bits of a conversation today:

Somewhat cool guy: There's more to life than sex.
Shit head pikey ass who i hate: No there isn't.

When you think about it, and think of the basic instincts. There's only one, survival. That includes: eating, and sex. Interesting that a simple shit headed person can come up with the basis of the human mind. The only question now is who gave us our complex minds, which we can use to create and destroy or to love and hate? That could well be that God we're all so fond of.

(note, when I post here, I'm talking as if there was a God, I'm not sure whehter there is one or not, just leaving it as a note)

IRT OCB:
but for all we know (and this is most likely true) that there are many other "intelligent" forms of life, that could have much more than just our basic instincts.

IRT Melfice:
And about (if any of you remember this from the Q's of Doom) "can god create a rock that is too heavy for him to lift?" thing, there are quite a bit of solutions that sort of give a God some "personality".

1) He can't. He is imperfect, and quite human in that case.

2) He could.. if he is a God and can understand the universe and created things, then he most likely could understand the possibility in all impossibilities. Just because we cannot concieve or belive something doesn't make it not true. The human mind is made to adapt, and that is what keeps us from getting extinct. The human mind grows used to what is based around it.

For instance (I don't know if I've said this before or not):
If you take a typical family of 3, there is Mom, Dad, and 2 1/2 year old Robby. Let's say that while Mom is making breakfast, with her backed turned to the table, Dad begins to leviatate in the air. Imagine the reaction of Baby Robby. He would probably to the extent of his vocabulary say "Look Mommy! Daddy is Flying!", he probably doesn't find this strange or obscure because he doesn't yet know the limits of human beings. He hasn't adapted yet, but when Mommy turns around, she'll probably be in shock or scream until Dad stops floating around.

Ok, here's my rant of the day:

(Note: As usual, I don't intend on offending believers in my posts.)

----

Gods' personalities are those printed by the ones who wrote books about them. It is impossible for a mute, invisible, intangible (not to say inexistent) being to show any personality.

----

Alright, there's something want to comment on. I wanted to talk about this from long ago but I didn't feel like it. AFAIK, the bible was supposed to be a fable kind of thing, god being one's inner self, hence the human-like personality. Man created God in his own image. The bible was supposed to teach the people of that age morality and other ideas, which had to be encoded in tales because nobody had any kind of education nor were interested in any. That's the reason why the sacred books of different religions have many things in common.

The bible, however, was very, very bad written, in a very, very bad fashion; it used very, very dangerous words subject to misinterpretation, and it was very, very wrong in countless subjects. Then, to make matters worse, the church business started, it interpreted the bible literally (thus spreading LOADS of nonsense like the world being created in 7 days and all that ridiculous bull pretending to explain everything when they know nothing), and used it as a tool to control people better than any government or enterprise would ever do in History. Men also used god as a wildcard to explain everything and thus feel wise and comforted when going to sleep (duh). Anyways, I don't give a damn about those teachings, neither the literal ones nor the supposedly original ones. No offense to believers. But I just think for myself, and morality is something I forged out of my personal experience and observation, if it wasn't already encoded in my DNA as instinct.

Mythologies were created for the same purposes as religions. They, however, were much more fun, and they used different gods to represent different things and personalities. It's a fable, after all. They have similarities with religions as well, like Hebe being the Greek Mythology equivalent of Eve (christian) and Hawwa (jewish).

----

IRT Melfice: I agree with you

Quoting Melfice:
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#E0E0E0"><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">The Omnipotency and other features we give God are also another illusion we have done of God.</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>
The ultimate proof of god's omnipotence is that he does not need to exist to save us [img]biggrin.gif[/img] .

Quoting OCB:
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#E0E0E0"><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">^_^ God. Don't know what he is, and won't know until this pulse has stopped. There's tons of theories out there. It's hard to pick one.</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>
Why you should pick one? Why god must exist? Why god, to begin with? Is it any logical to you?

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#E0E0E0"><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">who gave us our complex minds, which we can use to create and destroy or to love and hate?</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>
Natural evolution. It's far easier to think that, than some god playing Black and White and creating us. Besides, if such intelligent god existed, where did he come from?

----

WRT Xellos' question about if an omnipotent being would be able to create a rock too heavy for him to lift:

*** Prove that no such omnipotent being could ever exist by reduction to the absurd: ***

(Reducing to the absurd is a mathematic/logic way to prove things that is considered valid under all circumstances and in all applicable cases.)

An omnipotent being (I will call it "god") is, by definition, capable of doing _everything_.

Could god create a rock too heavy for him to lift?

Case 1. He should be able to create it sattisfying all requirements. But then he would not be able to lift it, so there would be one thing he cannot do; therefore he is not able to do everything; consequently he is not omnipotent.

Case 2. He always should be able to lift rocks, no matter what. In that case he will not be able to sattisfy the requeriments of Xellos' question, so there is one thing he cannot do; therefore he is not able to do everything; consequently he is not omnipotent.

In all possible cases, we obtained that an omnipotent being is not omnipotent (absurd).

***

I can hereby affirm that omnipotent beings DO NOT exist. This is NOT an opinion, I have proven it.
No bad feelings! [img]wink.gif[/img]

Didn't some supergenius do a math problemt hat was 800 pages logn that ended up proving God existed? Therefore, he proved God existed [img]tongue.gif[/img]

NOTE TO MIKE:

See my post. You proved it but in human terms, it is very possible for a omnipotent being to exist that can do anything, but if such a bieng existed, then our minds could obviously not concieve how it could do such a thing, just like a caveman could never concieve how a space shuttle works.

I agree Mike. That proves a very good point. There is this book called "The universe in a nutshell" it is supposed to explain everything I believe. I might check into it.

My dad owns the book, I don't really want to get into it right now (I'm too stupid still, maybe next year).. Stephen Hawkings stuff is usually REALLY complex. (I'm 99% sure it's his book)

There is a shortcoming in the entire conception of "being able to do anything". One cannot acknowledge that God can do anything, for, in order for this be taken literally, all given scenarios where God is in question of performing any duty must be satisfied.

No question can be answered to the extent that it is terminally defined. If I ask you why you answered "Yes" when I asked you if you lived in the world, how would you respond? Because you do live in the world? Because I am aware of the fact that at this present moment you exist in this world? Then I ask you "How do you know that?"... There is no definite answer, there is only an understanding of set variables that are assumed for. With this question, there often exists even no such grant due to person based opinion of the wording.

When I state that "God can do anything," how would you know how to define anything? By all that which God can do? If that were the case, it would be impossible for God NOT to do anything, for one cannot do that which he cannot do. It is impossible to reason that anything is what it is taken to be (idiom), when "things" is in terms of that being all that applies to what does and does not exist, for then it would also be nothing (which is something of anything), in which case, it cannot be anything more than just that (which is less than anything in terms of what we take it to be, thus, impossible).

Thus, any methodology using it in this context is false. God cannot do anything - meaning any single or multiple thing(s) - in these terms, for he cannot do something which he cannot do, which is something of that which the word anything applies to.

Let's see...

IRT Xellos: I didn't know about that, but I would like to read about that guy's axioms - god is something you have to set by axiom, as there is no way to deduct it from Nature's currently accepted models. I think he did a good service to the church, making it sound, with his 800 page conjecture, that a serious scientist has proven god exists. I wonder how much did he get paid for that. Probably nothing, because if the church got him to believe, he'll consider himself paid by having won a few square meters in their heaven (too bad he has to die to see if it's true or not).

IRT DR: Under the arbitrary definitions of the words I have used - particularly, anything meaning *everything*, my demonstration is absolutely valid. It's not that I do not understand something, like the way some machine works, or strange physical phenomena; I have used a set of natural life axioms (language definitions) on which I constructed my demonstration, therefore proving it in an absolute way for our world. If you want to talk about omnipotence, you'll have to use a different word than "anything"... It's as if I say 1 = 1. (Assuming normal math axioms) this is absolutely true, there is no way for anything, even omnipotent, to make it not so.

IRT Grandas: I agree.

IRT Mike:

First of all, the book xel is referring to I dont THINK is the universe in a nutshell. If I remember properly, Stephen Hawkings is agnostic, an his book had little to do with god at all (not sure, never read it, just looked over my dad's shoulder every once in a while, stuff about black holes and orbits, etc.). Anyways, I don't feel ready to read stuff from that guy yet, who most people are currently regarding as the smartest man on the Earth today.

Second off, yes, your demonstration is quite valid, but it is easily deniable. Anything can be denied by anyone, as (imo) there is no absolute answer to any question. If you could answer everything in axioms and such, then the world would be quite a bore, and philosophy would have little place in the world. Socrates said (or is credited with saying): "The only thing I know is that I know nothing."
For really, what is a natural life axiom, if we can little understand where we even came from? For all I could possibly know, the world WAS created in 7 days (although it is little likely, and the olden catholic church was quite stupid then, and quite a bit today). You can relate to an axiom, but how do you know it is correct? All you have to prove it is yet another natural term or definition, which will leave you empty again. Of course this is all in my opinion, I could be wrong, and chances are we are all wrong in some aspect of this...

As a final note-
I created this thread with the attempt to talk about a "god" in a different way then proving that it does exist or it doesnt exist, or that we dont quite know. But I guess we always lead back to this topic in the same way don't we?

IRT DR:

Nor do I. I would be seriously disappointed at the one who I consider one of the smartest persons in the world, if not the smartest, if I found out that he's an avid believer, because religion is opposite to Science. As for reading his books, I would think twice before I read something from him, he's probably way smarter than me, and what it is obvious for him might not be so for me.

There are absolute answers to questions. If, for example, I tell you B = 5, then ask which number is B equivalent to, there's only one, absolute answer to that question. All non-ambiguous, unique answers to questions in a non-ambiguous context with non-ambiguous axioms are absolute.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#E0E0E0"><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">If you could answer everything in axioms and such, then the world would be quite a bore, and philosophy would have little place in the world.</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>
Nope, that's EXACTLY what makes philosophy fun. The use of reason to discuss things.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#E0E0E0"><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">"The only thing I know is that I know nothing."</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>
Which is an obvious contradiction, a joke from him. He meant there's so much to discover and learn that all he learnt and philosophed about is insignificant.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#E0E0E0"><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">For really, what is a natural life axiom, if we can little understand where we even came from?</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>
Definitions of words we arbitrarily chose are a good example of what I meant by natural life axiom. We don't have to know where did we came from (it's likely that we'll never have an absoute answer to that question). But we don't need that to do math, physics and philosophy. By natural life axioms I also meant the mathematical system supporting our best proved and/or verified physical models (for example, the math behind movement, gravity, etc.).

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#E0E0E0"><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">For all I could possibly know, the world WAS created in 7 days (although it is little likely, and the olden catholic church was quite stupid then, and quite a bit today).</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>
That is one of the church's stupidest claims. The events that gave birth to the Earth probably started with a Big-Bang (most probable/best working theory so far), and thousands of years had to happen before the Earth was somewhat similar to what it is today. Will you believe in what a bunch of greedy puritans say about the creation of the Earth for their own good (that a guy wrote all by himself one day, two thousand years ago) that uses "god" as a cheap wildcard for explaining everything, or what a group of the smartest people in the world can predict out of observation, getting more complete and precise everyday, and works pretty well with explaining all the phenomena we can observe anyday?
Besides, read my first post in this thread. That tale about the 7-day creation of the Earth is not supposed to be interpreted literally, but the church isn't smart enough to realize that. Wait, it is... it is even smarter. Come to think of it, even if some pope realized all this, why would he want to stop teaching the bible literally to the lambs? It's a perfect way to control them. Only the smartest escape it.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#E0E0E0"><font size=2 face="Verdana,Tahoma">All you have to prove it is yet another natural term or definition, which will leave you empty again.</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>
The closer axioms get to reality, and the further we work with them, the more we will know and understand about the universe. If you set a system of axioms for, say, low-speed movement, and you can verify your deductions based on these axioms are all correct, then I don't care about the universe being exactly like that, or very similar. It's the same - we have rules for it, we can deduct, predict, explain, and therefore, work on it.

I would be glad if you read this document - it pretty much explains my thoughts and atheism in general: link

Finally, I must apologize for taking your thread offtopic like this. But what exactly was the original purpose of this thread? I don't quite get what you mean by god's personality; you mean mythological gods' personality as described by myths?

The only thing humans/creatures really need to exist are memories. Without them, they are nothing. Of course, thanks to these memories, we have our personalities. So our personalities are just made up of past memories. But, where do those memories go when we are dead? People decided on this Afterlife idea from there, and it makes sense to have a ruler of the Afterlife AKA God. While i don't believe the God theory, i do believe in an afterlife. There has to be somewhere for our memories to go.

Our memories are links between neurons in our brain. They are chemical. It's likely that they will be lost; however, I'm agnostic on the afterlife subject.

Unfortunately, I can't post very long right now, I have to get to track, but a few things:

1) This isnt exactly off-topic mike (its pretty close to what I wanted actually, just didnt want to try to prove/disprove a god existing, more aobut HOW a god could exist, how it would work, how it wouldnt, so its pretty on-topic)

2) About Socrates, in Plato's writings (as Socrates had none, so everything that socrates is said to have said was passed on through plato) he said that Socrates realized he could assume nor prove anything, and that he was troubled by it, in notes about that famous quote from Socrates (the only thing I know is that I know nothing).

P.S. Mike:

I'm a lot more with you than I am against you in real life, but in these threads if no one contradicted it wouldnt be any fun would it? (:-P)

IRT to DR and Wiseman:
The book I am talking about was written by Hawking. He uses "god" as a metaphor in there. I saw an interview with him on TV talking about his book. I don't believe he knows everything. But it is pretty intersting to read.

I don't believe anyone knows everything, but I do think he is a very smart guy.

<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ February 12, 2003 11:01 PM: Message edited by: Dragonrider ]</font>

If you don't believe that no one knows everything, then you must believe that someone knows everything, yes?

there, I fixed my gramatical double negative mistake, I've been talking in spanish all day, so I get that stuff mixed sometimes :-P

hate when it happens.

Yeah, In spanish sometimes, a double negative just enhances the negation. like:

No hay nadie aqui
"There isn't nobody here..."

When it means
"There is Nobody here..."

I alwyas peak double negatives, lol

I know four words in Spanish; uno(1), dos(2), trece(3), and mucho(I think it means much).

there's no trece, thats Frenchi I think, its tres [img]tongue.gif[/img]

btw, whats cayate mean? My friend said he'd give me 2 tins of altoids if I tol my Spanish teahcer Cayate, por favor, bt I didn't as I knew it had ta be somethign that'd get me in trouble [img]tongue.gif[/img]

<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ February 13, 2003 08:06 PM: Message edited by: Xellos ]</font>

IRT N:
3 = "Tres"
"Mucho" means "much", "many", "a lot of", or "greatly".

IRT Xellos:
"Trece" = 13
"C?llate" ("Callate" in some parts of America) = "Shut up". You definitely not want to say that to your teacher [img]smile.gif[/img] .

Oh yeah, trece is 13! sounds french when its written down like that

though in Spanish it doesn't sound french at all! (or at least i don't think it sounds like that....)

It is "TRE-THE" (the -th- sound is like the one in THING )

Same for "Catorce" and "Quince".

in Spain it is, but in latin america its like

TRE-SE

:-P

We learn Mexican spanish, and it's pronounchd like DR says

Treh-theh? lol, sounds like what some street doofus might tell you upon imploring one for spare change.

in Spain, (I think, I've never been there, but I'm 99% sure) its not EXACTLY like in "thing" but its like "thsing" like they're talking in a lisp.

Well, it depends on the part of Spain you are.

- In the Carary Islands, they say "treh-seh".
- Some people say "treh-thseh"
- Most people in most parts of Spain say "treh-theh"