Fellow atheists - if a God existed...?

Hello Brethren, as a Pastafarian, do not get angry!

Compare our religion to those that are built on lies. I am not talking necessarily about mainstream religions (which themselves are often full of mysticism and ad-hoc reasoning), but think of cults, or churches where the leaders are scamming their followers out of money. These are groups where the followers fully believe. Are these churches legitimate since they have many True Believers?

Or can we agree that religion is as much about community as any shared faith. By any rational metric, Pastafarians are as legimate a religious group as any. Arguably more so, since we’re honest and rational.

Ramen

Maybe your perception of omnibenevolence is off. Maybe it it more benevolent for god to take those victims into heaven, or directly into reincarnation, or whatever. Really, how do you know that to a god that living to 80+ in good health is benevolence?

If a god exists, I wouldn't necessarily assume god created the universe or life. Couldn't a god be "Infinitely more powerful, infinitely more knowledgeable" and just have come across the universe already in existence and watched as life arose from non-life on Earth (or found it like that) and then decided to have fun with the primitive human race? (I'm totally channeling what I remember about the Q from Star Trek: Next Generation, but you get my drift: just because a god exists doesn't mean god created anything.) I guess for me, if god was proven to exist, I'd still like to see all the different qualities of god proven too. So even if a god exists, who knows?

I think the last paragraph there is the most noble and realistic (cold those actually correlate???) and if it`s so, metaphorically, in general it might be an improvement for all the self-pity and disillusionment and murderous revenges and conversions, as I`m sure I`d be most inept with a chemistry-set and no tuition,too.

And IF IF IF, repeat, IF there`s a being with the chemistry set, perhaps the Existence is the Sorcerer, an goddi `s the apprentice.

Personally I like the metaphor of a genius painter, with no form to copy..............as metaphors go, it makes more sense to me. Imagine, powder paints and a sphere.......hurricanes, the whole works. Will send my invoice to Disney later (fat chance)citing you as the inspiration.I just wish the apprentice would... and.... and.... and what can you expect of an untutored genius... WE KNOW.so its back to taking responsib-i-l-i-t-eeeeeeeeeeee. Pi sq x a paintbox. Here, have a paintbrush..

I would have a problem with the "omnibenevolent" trait. A deity that is omniscient and omnipotent would be self-sufficient. Therefore such a being would have no interest in anything, including the creation of a material universe. Even if this being did create, for reasons unknown, why would it have any interest in the fortunes of any developing lifeforms? (As an illustration, our own "God" has not seen fit to intervene in any bloody outrage, human or natural, throughout history, outside of the Bible.)

well the simple answer as written in the bible itself though many don't like to see it is that God is not very loving he strives on fear and anger when people don't listen he wipes them out with floods and plagues so worship him or else. and on that note he created the angels to do his will they do not have free will and must obey him so if they must obey him then lucifer must have been told to wage war and by falling and becoming satan he is and always has been doing Gods will so it is therefor Gods will. so by the bible itself God might have actually been happy to see the norwegian death toll rise. the God of the bible is not a nice person by any means he is an egotistical maniacal god. Jesus was the nice one teaching forgiveness and such but really if jesus was alive today he would be a Buddhist lol. because Christians are so far from the teachings of christianity that he would not even recognize them as his followers.

So if God exists then he would be a very evil being based on things he has done. not careless but actually EVIL so he would not care at all if we kill each other in his name and would do nothing to stop it.

but of course that's assuming god exists which is just silly to begin with the stories of fear and hate were created by men in order to attain followers through fear and gain political power as a result using it to shift followers views on when wars were god's will or not. so the rulers had to be on good terms with the clergy or the people wouldn't fight for them .

Many of the atheists and theists here cannot deal with hypothetical questions. But it seems to me that if there is a God, it must obey the laws of logic and it cannot be made of matter, energy or exist in space or time. That's all I can imagine deducing.

What I would deduce would be two possibilities or a mixture of those two.

He doesn't give a crap about humans

And/or

He likes seeing us suffer and get perverse pleasure from people appealing to him and worshipping him.

Ever hear "God's Song" by Randy Newman? It kind of combines those two possibilities

"Cain slew Abel Seth knew not why

For if the children of Israel were to multiply

Why must any of the children die?

So he asked the Lord

And the Lord said:

"Man means nothing he means less to me

than the lowiliest cactus flower

or the humblest yucca tree

he chases round this desert

cause he thinks that's where i'll be

that's why i love mankind

I recoil in horror from the foulness of thee

from the squalor and the filth and the misery

How we laugh up here in heaven at the prayers you offer me

That's why i love mankind"

The Christians and the Jews were having a jamboree

The Buddhists and the Hindus joined on satellite TV

They picked their four greatest priests

And they began to speak

They said "Lord the plague is on the world

Lord no man is free

The temples that we built to you

Have tumbled into the sea

Lord, if you won't take care of us

Won't you please please let us be?"

And the Lord said

And the Lord said

"I burn down your cities--how blind you must be

I take from you your children and you say how blessed are we

You must all be crazy to put your faith in me

That's why i love mankind

You really need me

That's why i love mankind"

Entirely plausible, metaphysically speaking.

However, I disagree that 99.999...% of the universe is uninhabitable. In fact, it better not be, because eventually we need a new home.

Since space-time is so vast, and apparently only part of a "larger multiverse", anything is possible. Maybe even if we can or can't travel the distance ourselves, we decide to seed life elsewhere in the vastness. We try to program it to survive, grow, change, build, and eventually, through chaos theory mathematics and the laws of entropy - a pre-programmed "consciousness" takes precedence in one life form, and it becomes dominant within it's reach.

...? Yeah, I went there.

If a god exists it is an impotent little fool. it is unable to do the slightest godly thing and won't even show itself for fear of being ridiculed

as for the shootings in Norway, I hate to say it, but it is long overdue for that exact reaction due to the constant eroding of human rights in favour of muslim, sharia laws and immigrant appeasement

EDIT: "Your pay-off line blows your argument out of the water. "What we see around us" are the effects of human activity. "

YOUR REPLY: I don't just mean human activity. I mean what we observe on the Earth, in the solar system, in the galaxy, in the universe, in all of existence. Existence as we know it makes no sense if we are being governed by a perfect being.

OK Angry Noo I think see what you're getting at. In that case, can I recommend you go to the BBC iPlayer and watch tonight's programme (9pm July 27) on BBC 2 called "The Code" ... unless you've already watched it 'live' of course. I think you'll find that the programme's content demonstrates the underlying order in everything terrestrial and cosmic. Quite the opposite from the juvenile assertion of "the kid with the chemistry set" in fact, and pointing instead to a creative perfectionist. As it says in Max Ehrmann's wonderful 1927 text "Desiderata" ... "be at peace with God, whatever you conceive God to be"