Title says it all.

I started this as an off-shoot from another thread that was starting to go off track. However, I think this topic can be and should be discussed in a civil manner. I certainly hope this does not turn into a "Bash [insert-religion here]" festival or "Bash Atheists"-athon. Religion is not the main topic - the existence of God is.

I think it would work well if everyone would just state how they feel WRT the existence of a creator and make that - not the "fallability" of faith, the "fallability" of a lack-of faith, or any such nonsense. State your opinion - if it happens to be faith based (for or against), the other side should let it be. This will avoid any needless "Faith is [indirect insult]..." or "Lack of faith is [indirect insult]...", when that is NOT condusive to understanding the other side. The topic is whether you think God exists, and why - not WHY another persons faith is wrong.

However, in the case that someone is willing to make a logical argument for the existence of God (believe me, they are there), that could surely be debated without the introduction of the faith topic as the driving force, or even the arguable induction of the Big Bang question (for Atheists, this may have a place in the beginning of our Universe). I may introduce a few theories on the existence of a creator in a few minutes just to give an idea of this concept.

So, now the question: Do you believe in the existence of a God? Do you believe God does not exist? Do you believe it can even be known (Agnosticism)? What has led you to believe this way?

Sub-questions to think about - If so, do you believe in a Personal God (Christianity, Judaism) or a Peripheral God (Deism, Pantheism)? Do you believe in the Big Bang Theory, or some other scientific set-of ideas that may explain the beginning of our Universe? What has led you to believe this way?

__________________
"The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom."
Isaac Asimov

hmmmmmm god is not a tangible thing and is a matter of faith. so in many respects cannot be proved is disproved.
then again what god would we be talking about? there's quite a few or is it god in a general sense?
those that have faith cannot be touched generally by those who disbelieve, only those who doubt can be touched by debate or talk to the contrary of their belief in a god or gods.
well i find M theory an interesting thing indeed in that some theorise that the big bang wasn't in fact the start,. the matter and such was pre-existing and this dimension was created by the clashing of two "branes"(membranes that seperate the dimensions) clashing. as i say i find it interesting and it's certainly speculation as quantum/string/M theory are in many ways untestable except in mathematical terms. again i am just fascinated by it and find that physics which used to bore the hell out me at school many moons ago now i find a fascinating thing indeed.
The elegant universe by Brian Greene is an excellent nova documentary which introduces this to the layman.
As far as do i believe in "god", well i don't know where to begin on that one really. i have a hard time believing in an interventionist god due to the nastyness in the world but the argument against that is free will.
i think though if there was indeed a god then he/she/it would be something indecribale and possibly beyond comprehension.
a bit like... how to put it......an ant , how does an ant coprehend us? it can't possibly really comprehend us at all. it may well be if there is a god then maybe that is how it is.
i like to look at as many religions as i can and try to see what common ground if any they have and things they share, in a comparative sense. to me it is fascinating.
in a way i don't know, you can't argue rationally( not saying you are irrational for believing) for a god due to the intangibility of god.
i suppose that i would be considered an agnostic.
i would indeed be interested to see rational argument for god. you are quite right emptypepsi you don't often see a rational debate on this topic.
i suppose what led me to be like this was being educated at a jesuit school, and that kinda put me off religion due to the way they teach, it's not very pleasant in my experiance, then seeing what i saw in the army put me off even more. i have always asked "why" of everything much to the annoyance of my teachers at school...lol
part of my doubt is this, "in the beginning was the word....", well that's can't be as a word implies language and language infers communication ad if god was first then with whom would he have need to communicate. also it could further be implied that the "word" could not possibly have been first as there is always a thought behind a word. i aksed this question in far simpler terms when at the jesuit school and the reply was corporal punishment.
anyway i will mull this over more. i hope i have not stepped outside the bounds stated by emptypepsi on this one.
Pax-RFS

__________________

There are 3 different reasons that I believe in God (a personal, rather than peripheral or pantheist God).

Firstly, to me it seems logical that there is some original force, to start off everything, and looking at the complexity of the systems created, it seems logical that this force would be intelligent, and extremely powerful (not necessarily all-powerful, but powerful enough to create the universe). Now, Science explains a lot, but not everything. I was talking to some Physicists the other day, and they said that there are a huge number of things about the universe that don't make sense. Why, for example, does the universe move so slowly? There isn't nearly enough matter to explain the speed that the universe is explaining. Also, why is there so much matter, and so little anti-matter? There ought to be the same amount, which would then cancel each other out. There are too many things that, to me, smell of some directing force, the "Prime Mover" of ancient Graeco-Roman philosophy.

Secondly, the Bible. As a historical document, and looking at the actions of the authors, it actually seems quite reliable to me. From my training as a historian, it seems to me that it does not contain many of the factors that would make it as unreliable as one might think, when cross-referenced with other historical documents of the time. So, if it is reliable, then surely it must be true, and for it to be true, then God must exist.

Thirdly, and most importantly, is my experiences with God himself (or rather itself... God doesn't seem to me to have any gender, it's too alien for such concepts). Of course, it's possible that these are the products of some sort of delusional complex, ie I'm crazy and interpret perfectly normal happenstance and mass hysteria as some sort of supernatural force, but hey, if I'm crazy then I'm crazy, I'm pretty happy so I might as well continue acting as I do.

__________________
... I am surprised at your insolence in writing to me at all. You know, as I know, that I bought this constituency... may God's curse light upon you and may it make your women as open and as free to the excise officers as your wives and daughters have always been to me while I have represented your scoundrel corporation.
I have the honour to be... your obliged humble servant, Anthony Henley
- MPs reply to constituent, mid 1700s

Do you believe in the existence of a God? Do you believe God does not exist? Do you believe it can even be known (Agnosticism)? What has led you to believe this way?

I don't believe in God or gods or anything similar. I am convinced that God or gods or anything similar do not exist. However, I know that it can not be known for absolute sure (i.e. just because I say it is so and am convinced it is so does not make it so).

Many things have led me to think this way. Most of it has been just from a lot of thinking, a lot of watching, and a lot of listening to people (those who believe in higher powers and those who do not). Religion and the existence of God, gods or other similar things make perfect sense to me as a means of explaining what is around us when we can not immediately come up with an actual answer. It appears to be something that humans are good at doing and I only very slightly envy those who can believe in God, gods or <fill in the blank> (only slightly).

If so, do you believe in a Personal God (Christianity, Judaism) or a Peripheral God (Deism, Pantheism)? Do you believe in the Big Bang Theory, or some other scientific set-of ideas that may explain the beginning of our Universe? What has led you to believe this way?

I don't believe in personal gods or peripheral gods. I'm not sure that I would say that I "believe" in a Big Bang Theory or any other scientific set of ideas that may or may not explain the beginning of our universe. However, I do think that they are a step in the right direction. Whether or not I think that the universe can be explained is a different story. We are always looking for a "why" and something inside tells me that there isn't always a "why" and there may not even always be a specific "how" and we, as human beings, may have to just come to terms with that. But, that being said, I'm pretty much certain that we never will.

What has led me to my semi-beliefs is.... again... I guess just looking around, listening, seeing.. trying to understand and really being fairly convinced that gods make as much sense as the tooth fairy and so the question of their existence falls into the same category. For myself. I am interested in the hows and whys of religion but they do nothing for me personally.

__________________

So, if something does nothing FOR you personally, you have no use or need of it ?

I see.

Hedonisms lowest common denominator. That's what I see :-)

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Anyways, my "beleif" is that I'll know about God IF and when there is a time for me to KNOW God or know ABOUT God.

__________________
You cannot control your emotions and be self-seeking and ambitious at the same time.

I believe in God for many reasons:

1 - matter nor energy cannot be created or destroyed, yet we are sarrounded by both. Somebody set off the big bang. If you read Stephen Hawkins interviews before he realized scientist didn't like this point of view and that it effected his pay check he asserted that the Universe had to the result of a conscious decision. That which has design and purpose has to have a designer, accidents rarely look ordered. So much that supposedly happens by accident in our universe has purpose and order. Along the same lines, the theory of ideas/forms...concepts of justice, freedom and all that's good could not be born of human minds in my opinion. We got these from God.

2 - Which leads into....Peoples reactions in such discussions. We fight not with the tangible but with pricipalities and powers which leads so often to raging and incoherant rantings and violence. Rare is the debate between athiest and believer calm.

3 - God saved me. Man does not break true principles, but breaks himself against them. Man needs God and Religion (Jung and his followers). Man is born with concious and a will to strive towards right (recent studies reveal according to NPR, just as the Bible says the non-believer is given conscious to know what's right when he sees it.) Sin is not sin for his sake, but for ours.

Anyway - so much philosophy and knowledge ends with the basic truth that something created this, it would be foolish to turn away, I think.

__________________
On a Mission from God

Ahhh, this should be a forum in itself!

After reading only part of post #1, I did a <Ctl End> to the bottom. I didn't want to be influenced by any other post. So, here's my position.

My opinion is that there are no gods, nor is there any need for them, much less to explain the physical universe. They are creations of man for a variety of purposes.

Moses created Yahweh for the purpose of acquiring political power. Mohammed created Allah for the same purpose after seeing the commercial successes of Jews and Christians in the Middle East in the seventh century. Eastern deities are more of the philosophical sort, but also help to explain the physical universe.

The Jahweh of the Jews became the Jehovah of the Christians. The moon-god al-Ilah of the pagan Arabs became the Allah of the Islamists. If judging a god by it's worshipers, all three are different deities. The three have different identities and characteristics, but they are not the same no matter what the claim might be.

This example, together with all the other deities worshipped over the centuries is, to me at least, clear evidence that the gods are no more than inventions of man. To the extent that they bring peace and comfort to the individual, and cause no harm to others, the worship of deities is a good thing.

A.E.Hayden, in the last chapter of his book, The Biography of the Gods, poignantly wrote, "For too long, man has put off unto the gods those things he should be doing for himself.

As to the Big Bang, it's just a cosmologist's explanation for the begining of the universe. For some strange reason man needs to have beginings and ends to things he can't completely understand, and explanations for everything in between.

My 2¢....

__________________

Well, ok. That's fine. You stated that that is your opinion at least :-)

So, your answer to the question:

"Why is it (the universe) HERE ?"

Is:

"It just IS."

And that is FINE.

IF you choose to stop there and ignore the obvious questions that come of these statements.

Which is a choice MANY of us make.

__________________
You cannot control your emotions and be self-seeking and ambitious at the same time.

At this period, the Jews already venerated Yahweh.

__________________
... I am surprised at your insolence in writing to me at all. You know, as I know, that I bought this constituency... may God's curse light upon you and may it make your women as open and as free to the excise officers as your wives and daughters have always been to me while I have represented your scoundrel corporation.
I have the honour to be... your obliged humble servant, Anthony Henley
- MPs reply to constituent, mid 1700s

Haha, dude... what are you even talking about?

The beliefs in gods or supernatural powers is not something that I am a part of. I don't need it to give me pleasure or whatever it is you are apparently reading into that question (although I think that belief in gods and others DOES give people pleasure and that is why they do it.... hence... by your theory if I were really hedonistic I would believe in gods or whatever.. right? :P). I have come to a conclusion in my own mind that there aren't such things and although I am interested in the hows and the whys, I simply do not follow the same path as others. I don't even know what you were trying to infer here but.... yeah, you definitely read way too much into what I said.

__________________