Is there evidence your god beliefs are true while other god beliefs are false?

[Skeptic Ginger]

Thought:

Why did you choose that shirt to wear this morning?

It was available.

It fits (works for) you.

DR

So whichever god beliefs are available, then, is the reason they are chosen?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Actually, that wouldn't answer the OP at all. She wants "scientific evidence" on why what I believe is true and someone elses beliefs are false.

Straw man question dodging.

 

[Mobyseven]

The problem with philosophy is often anybody feels they can discuss it without ever having a damn clue what it is they're talking about.

Quoted for truth. Sadly, this comment will pass right over the egos of those it is most applicable to.

 

[arthwollipot]

So whichever god beliefs are available, then, is the reason they are chosen?

I find it hard to believe that DR simply browsed among the available religions and picked one out like a shirt off a rack. Of course I could be wrong and DR is one of the very few people who has done exactly that, but religion doesn't seem to me to be something that one just shops around for.

 

[Henners]

By this criteria, weapons development, such as nuclear bombs, is faith-based while our democratic system of government is not.

Look up "theorem" and "converse" and tell me why they didn't teach those things in Maths when you were at school.


I say "All potty bores are ree". You say, "NO. For, by that criteria(!) this ree bore that I have should be potty, yet it is not."

But I didn't ever describe a characteristic of ree bores. I described a characteristic of potty bores.

Get it?

Oh well...

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Skeptigirl, I think that one problem with getting answers to this question is that the theists who have been posting here don't believe that all other god beliefs are false. While your statement may be true for many, perhaps even most believers, it does not appear to be a true statement for the theists who post in this forum. Thus, the assumption behind your question - that they recognize other god beliefs as false while claiming theirs is true - is not accurate. Theists who have posted here reject the simplistic "invisible sky daddy" charactorization of ALL gods, so they are equally disbelieving of that charactorization of their god (or goddess) as they are of all the other gods, be they Allah, Zeus or Pele.

If you want an answer to that question, I think you will have to start by trying to understand what it is they do believe in. (Hint: It isn't an invisible sky daddy that requires blind unthinking faith.) Then you may be able to discern where and how they draw the line between credible god beliefs and silly ones. .....

Theists seem to be dancing around the question like it was a hot potato. A lot of discussion about spirituality and the rest, but not one theist yet has even had the courage to say, "I don't believe Zeus ever existed." Why is that?

 

[Henners]

The Buddha would have agreed with the comparison of religion to aeronautics; religion in Buddhism being likened to a vehicle.

Speaking for The Buddha now.

What can I say.

Box of frogs, anyone?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

You might as well say "You are all stupid for believing in something that I don't. Now tell me why you believe that other stupid guy is wrong."

and then when no one answers ask "Why is no one answering my question?"

Do you believe Zeus does or ever did exist?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

This isn't meant to be a smart aleck response back but:

If you care God is there then go look for him. If you don't care he's there then what's it matter ultimately what evidence any of us has? As for Christianity - I'm not sure what Christian dogma has to do with anything. I think I'd first start with Jesus and go on from there. But that's just my opinion and I have no scientific evidence it's more true than some other approach to Christianity.

I don't want your evidence why you believe in a god. I want to know why you believe in one god and not another god. Why are you avoiding that specific question? You seem willing to tell us why you believe in a god.

I'm actually surprised there is this much avoidance of this question. I expected a lot of answers that included the usual faith and inner feelings intangibles. I didn't expect it would be that hard for a theist to say Zeus is a myth but my god belief is true.

 

[plumjam]

This is not my experience with religion. OK, my experience is limited to a couple of years in a Pentacostal Christian church, but while I was there I was bombarded with warnings about "false religions" and "The One True God". I was very much given the impression that Pentacostal Christianity was the right religion and all the others were wrong.
I admit, this is limited experience, but it certainly coloured my opinions, and was one of the reasons I rejected Christianity.

Yes, I agree. This is a problem with some strands of Christianity IMO. You know, it's just the religious version of bigotry. Religions, even when divinely inspired, inevitably accrue some less than divine elements, due to the imperfections of those involved in their development over time.
I wouldn't want to argue, either, that all religious organisations are of equal merit. I would prefer, say, Eastern Orthodoxy over Jim Jones any day. In other words there are some 'false' religions But I would argue that the great majority of mankind are not following religions like those.

Why not? Does a Christian not reject the Hindu gods? If not, why does the Christian not worship the Hindu gods?

Yeah, the issue of a supreme God, and lesser 'deities' can cause confusion. In Hinduism there is God without form, and God with form. Formless God, being infinite, and omnipotent, is free to manifest him/her/itself in any particular form so desired. Thus God can appear to his devotees in the form of Vishnu, Siva, Kali.. and any one of myriad other forms. It is the same 'One True God' behind all of these manifestations. You might ask what is the need for the various manifestations. It's a kind of adaptation to the varied psychologies of each individual person. Due to an individual's particular psychological make-up they may be more naturally attracted to a manifestation of God that exhibits certain qualities.. such as femininity, compassion, power, forgiveness, playfulness...etc..
In a sense, it's a kind of reaching out to the individual... meeting them where they are now.
God in Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, for example, tends to be God without form (although God did become manifest in a human form in Christianity). There are bound to be people brought up in a Muslim, or Judaic background who would be more suited to God with form as they have in Hinduism, but their options are a bit limited.
So, to answer your question, a Christian is free to reject the Hindu Gods, with no harm done. If he were to reject the formless God that lies behind the Hindu Gods, then he would be simultaneously rejecting the same formless God of his Christianity.

It's right there at the top of the Commandments: "Thou shalt have no gods before me". The first commandment (of the common set) is telling Christians explicitly to reject other Gods! Or so it seems to me.

As I understand it, at the time, there were all kinds of Gods being worshiped, some of which, presumably, were not of genuine divine origin. So this pronouncement, I would imagine, was to get people to focus back onto the centre. Meher Baba says that divine communications are tailored to the specific cultures they are given, during that specific era. So, for example, it wasn't communicated in the Koran that a man should have only one wife. This was due to the fact that in the culture it was presented to this would have been such a radical shift in lifestyle that the communication would not have 'taken'. Instead a 'happy medium' of a limitation to 4 wives was communicated.

Hypothetical:

Say there is a pagan god whose worshippers claim will seek out and kill all those who don't believe in him. As a Christian, you reject that god, because you don't believe that he will seek you out and kill you.

But if you stick to the claim that Christians don't reject other gods, why aren't you terrified that you will be sought out and killed?

Yeah, as I said above, there are some false Gods. Like if I were to sit in my bedroom and dream up a cruel God like that, it wouldn't make that God real.

So here it is. It appears to me that Christians do reject other gods, plumjam and DR notwithstanding. Automatic exclusivity is built into religion, especially Christianity with its First Commandment. Apparently I have it wrong. Can anyone enlighten me?

Christians reject particular manifestations of God (some of which will be genuine, some not). If they reject the formless God behind the genuine manifestations they're rejecting their own formless God.

 

[plumjam]

What can I say.

Nothing of much substance, apparently.

 

[arthwollipot]

...Thus God can appear to his devotees in the form of Vishnu, Siva, Kali.. and any one of myriad other forms. It is the same 'One True God' behind all of these manifestations.

I'm not all that familiar with Hinduism. Is this the Hindu doctrine or the Christian interpretation of Hindu doctrine? I was under the impression that Hinduism was genuinely polythestic. You seem to be saying that it's actually monotheistic, but with a veneer of polytheism.

As I understand it, at the time, there were all kinds of Gods being worshiped, some of which, presumably, were not of genuine divine origin.

But some were?

Christians reject particular manifestations of God (some of which will be genuine, some not). If they reject the formless God behind the genuine manifestations they're rejecting their own formless God.

How does a Christian determine whether a particular manifestation of God is genuine?

Again, this is not what I was brainwashed with. One God. All others are Satan in disguise. All of them. As I said, limited experience.

 

[Mobyseven]

A summary of the thread so far, for those not inclined to read the whole thing:

In the beginning, Skeptigirl asked a question. This made a lot of people very angry, and a smaller number of people very curious. Primarily they were curious as to exactly what the answers to the question Skeptigirl asked would be. But as time wore on, the curious people began to wonder exactly what it was about Skeptigirl's question that made a lot of people very angry.

Some of the angry people yelled loudly about the question, "It's a trap! The atheist is lying in wait to pounce on you the moment you answer!" Some of the angry people said that they didn't care, and said so repeatedly using a lot of words so that you wouldn't get confused about just how much they didn't care. Some of the people said that they didn't see the point in discussing their beliefs with anyone of a different faith, and especially not with all those evil atheists watching. None of the angry people answered the question.

Drawn by the bickering, a troll approached the thread and started talking, though his lips never moved and his larynx never vocalised. He talked of 'philosophy' and very deep and meaningful things, but he was sadly talking nonsense. Some of the curious people drew into battle with the troll, but alas to no avail - the troll was invulnerable to logic and reasoning.

And so it is that we stand now on the worn battleground of a thread, remnants of strawmen hewn around the field. And still the curious people have nary an answer, and wait for the day when the theist who will partake in the discussion without dodging the question or creating strawmen or resorting to logical fallacies and childing behavious shall arise, as was foretold in the prophecies.

 

[plumjam]

Belief in gods also depends on the proximity of the religions you are then exposed to because of where you were born or live or the culture surrounding you. That seems to me to be evidence the god belief components of that religious experience are arbitrary. Maybe the religion needs certain elements in order for you to fall in love with it and maintain the relationship, but the god beliefs themselves do not come from real gods existing in the Universe. If they did, then where you were born would not matter. When you had that inner experience, it shouldn't depend on the religion you are exposed to, yet it is.

Wow. So a religion can only be genuine if it has never been communicated to any human beings anywhere, ever.
Scientists only exist because they have been exposed, through their culture - the people around them - to modes of thought which advocate investigating things using the scientific method.
Does that mean that science is invalid?

 

[plumjam]

I'm not all that familiar with Hinduism. Is this the Hindu doctrine or the Christian interpretation of Hindu doctrine? I was under the impression that Hinduism was genuinely polythestic. You seem to be saying that it's actually monotheistic, but with a veneer of polytheism.

I think in the west we tend to view religion in a more static way, and thus want to be able to apply hard and fast labels to their components. In Hinduism it is seen more as an experiential journey from A to B. The polytheism is a helpful element of the journey for some people, as they constitutionally find it easier to concentrate on God presented in a particular form. It's recognised though, that these manifestations of God are not competing discrete identities, rather they're emanations from the same supreme being. So, monotheistic, yes, polytheistic, yes. The two are not mutually exclusive, in this context.

How does a Christian determine whether a particular manifestation of God is genuine?

No easy answer, but you can use your moral intuition.. examine the people associated with that God, the teachings associated with it, the traditions, the behaviour of followers, whether that God has made people less selfish, more compassionate..etc
And if it doesn't appeal to you personally, you can pass.

 

[ma1ic3]

I am not interested in debating my world view. Who I am is not an abstraction, nor is it your play toy. Put another way, I don't care to be talked at.

You don't care to be talked at and you don't want to debate your world view... And you're in the Religion and Philosophy forum on a skeptic website talking to a bunch of atheists in a debate thread... Ok. You've probably had to repeat yourself, haven't you? Haha.

I am still awaiting a response to why I should care about another religionist's beliefs. That is directly related to the OP. Given that this is page seven, I guess I'll accept I won't get an answer.

There is no reason. There you go. So now that we got that out of the way we can actually focus on the ACTUAL topic of the thread now, which is what makes your religion (or someone else's) right and the others wrong, rather than why Darth Rotor should "care". But since you don't want to debate, you can go ahead and mosey on to another debate thread and tell everyone there about how you don't want to be "talked at" or debate your world view.

 

[Mashuna]

You took an intersubjectively investigable phenomenon like homeopathy and tried to equate it with an intersubjectively non-investigable phenomenon, namely internal spiritual experience.
That was the silly part.
Can't you see the difference?

Ok, your Education, Medicine and Aeronautics.
All based on beliefs.
Education on the belief in the value of knowledge.
Medicine on the belief that it is good to alleviate suffering.
Aeronautics couldn't have got off the ground (geddit?) if the Wright Bros hadn't had faith that powered flight was possible.. in the face of widespread ridicule too. The first aeroplane was a faith-based product.

So are you now happy to use the word faith to apply to everything, intersubjective or not?

 

[plumjam]

So are you now happy to use the word faith to apply to everything, intersubjective or not?

Of course. Faith can be present in all areas of life.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Really? So at least 30,000 people, including many skeptics, witness something unexplainable that had been predicted to happen beforehand by a vision of Mary, passed on by 3 peasant children. And that isn't verifiable evidence?
How is it not?
If thousands of people seeing the Sun jump about in the sky, approaching the Earth in a zigzag fashion, and dry their soaking clothes and the ground within an inexplicably short time... and for those people all to have gathered in a field to witness it at a particular predicted day and time ... isn't enough evidence for you, what conceivably would be?
Answer: nothing.

Well this post has probably been replied to but I'll give my 2 cents as well. Your cynical post here contains gross misinformation and includes the big lie, if someone looks at evidence and isn't convinced it proves a miracle, that person will NEVER believe anything represents a miracle. You are simply rationalizing why you believe in some frauds and false claims and other people don't. It must be that we are incapable, it can't be that you've been fooled.

Your facts about Medjugorje are not even accurate. There was no proclamation the Sun was going to move ahead of time. In fact, Mary supposedly told the girls to tell people they were supposed to believe without seeing anything. A bunch of people believed they saw the Sun "jump around" after a crowd of people in a field had gathered. So there are two possibilities. The Sun moved around which if it did one wouldn't need to have been in the field (or wherever) to have seen it, or it appeared to move in people's minds. No one saw the Sun move except those staring at it expecting it to move when someone in the crowd claimed it moved. So then you can ask to how did the mass hallucination occur, not 30,000 people saw the Sun jump around because it actually did move around. And such mass hallucinations are documented as having occurred when no god beliefs were involved.

Find me one credible video of the moving Sun from these You Tube videos. None show anything other than a shaky camera and obviously faked images like the strobe light version where you can't see anything or the big black dot over the Sun that no one around the camera person seems to even notice.

http://www.youtube.com/results?sear...medjugorje apparitions miracles&v=mJFrhTntJBQ

Either people couldn't video tape the phenomena at all, or there should be thousands of very good images, not this handful of fuzzy strobe lights and obvious fakes.

Perhaps you've heard the question asked, where are the artificial legs hanging up with the crutches in Medjugorje?

Is that the best miracle God can produce? It doesn't make any sense at all.

Really? How about the incorrupted bodies of saints? St Bernadette for example.
http://www.catholicpilgrims.com/lourdes/bb_bernadette_body.htm
http://www.ichrusa.com/saintsalive/bernad.htm

...

St Bernadette's face and hands are waxed, and there are detailed reports of the "mold" and other signs of deterioration when the corpse was taken out for exam. So is God imperfect then?

Lenin's body is well preserved.

Rosalia Lombardo's corpse is well preserved.

There are physical conditions which on rare occasions keep corpses well preserved. Bernadette didn't become a saint until the preserved corpse was found. Wiki lists a bunch of supposed Catholic saints that have incorruptible bodies. Where are they? I only found a couple pictures and Bernadette was the only Saint.




The problem with your dismissal of people who have an alternative explanation for the events you describe is that you make up a lie about those people who draw an alternate conclusion from the evidence. You make up the lie that "no evidence" would be sufficient.

Because I interpret the evidence differently than you, instead of recognizing maybe there is an explanation other than "gods did it", you prefer to discount those other interpretations as people who would deny evidence rather than believe in gods. It isn't denying evidence to look for rational explanations for things rather than to stop looking and pronounce, God did it.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

...
The event was witnessed by some people up to a radius of 30 miles away from the field in question. Some that hadn't heard of the prediction.
What really happened to the Sun that day, is anyone's guess... but that's why it's a miracle.

Last I heard you could see the Sun from just about anywhere on Earth.

...Straw man alert. Bernadette, for example, was not given prior mummification treatment, as were your examples. How can a body not decompose for 30 years?
Why does this only happen (without mummification treatment) to people recognised as holy in their societies?
If it's just a physical quirk, why doesn't it happen to animals?

No one washes stray animals and seals them in coffins with melted lead. You need to read a bit more about Bernadette.

And I supposed you are going to tell us Rosalia was also recognized as a saint? How come Bernadette wasn't recognized as a saint until after her body was found in good condition? There are 3 or 4 similar cases around the world. It is rare, but not unheard of and you've been fed a lie it only happened to Catholic saints.