Is the concept of "God" necessary, let alone real?

[Reflex]

No matter how enamored one is with an idealism that says everything is divine, sooner or later, reality will raise its ugly head.

The ugly head is God!

What ELSE do you think there is?

Do you think only beautiful and nice things are God/divine? How much sense does that make? There's your fantasy land.

This was already explained: God is indeed infinite and eternal, but to deny the possibility of his volitional self-limitation amounts to a denial of this very concept of his volitional absoluteness. Now, you may disagree, but it comports much better with the human condition than simply saying, “It’s all God.”

FYI, I played with the idea for years and even a have a book by that title. So do me the honor of respecting my beliefs and rejection of your beliefs.

[Lacewing]

...do me the honor of respecting my beliefs and rejection of your beliefs.

Like you do for others? (I didn't realize I wasn't.)

[Reflex]

...do me the honor of respecting my beliefs and rejection of your beliefs.

Like you do for others? (I didn't realize I wasn't.)

I know you didn’t. I forgive you. Having the logical inconsistencies of your idealism pointed out to you is very disturbing so you put your fingers in your ears and made noises to drown out the revelation.

Fear not. I won’t impose my beliefs on you.

[Mike Strand]

Hi, Nick_A, thanks for reading my last post.

Your question about "good" -- what a loaded word! I guess I was using it (as in, "God" as a metaphor for "goodness") in the sense of humans treating themselves and others with kindness and respect. This is one interpretation of the meaning of the Golden Rule.

In the Genesis story of creation, I think God declaring his creation "good" means it went according to his plan. It's probably difficult, however, for a human person to see earthquakes, volcanoes, flu viruses, and the like as "good", but many folks believe they follow a mysterious God's plan, and thus are "good". Good for testing our faith? Maybe.

Jesus claiming only God is good, not himself, can be interpreted as Jesus viewing God as an ideal for human behavior (i.e., the golden rule), which he himself felt he had not achieved. This notion speaks against the idea of Jesus as divine, at least when he walked the earth. Some Christian theologies, especially early ones, did not claim that Jesus was divine.

[Lacewing]

Having the logical inconsistencies of your idealism pointed out to you is very disturbing so you put your fingers in your ears and made noises to drown out the revelation.

Is this a projection of your own behavior? I don't do this. I read what you and Nick write... notice and acknowledge where we're in agreement (unless I decide not to respond because you're being an ass)... and I express if I see inconsistencies in your logic, as well as pointing out variations or broader possibilities. Both, you and Nick dismiss or ignore these examples, not reconciling/exploring how such alternative possibilities/realities "could be" despite your claims to the contrary.

I think it's valuable to acknowledge that we do not know ultimate truths that apply to everyone and everything. My comments about the divine being accessible to all was simply to make the point that to me it seems logical that it's all ONE already. Of course we experience limitations and restrictions in our human-bound ways, but why would we impose that on some grand scale and apply it to all? Clearly there are way too many possibilities and unknowns for us to make such absolute judgments and conclusions as we tend to do.

I think MANY PATHS WORK, perhaps exactly because I think everything is ALREADY ONE, and there is no ULTIMATE SEPARATE DESTINATION. I can understand that such a view may not be appreciated by those who think they've got it all locked down in a particular way/agenda that makes sense to them. It seems odd to me, however, that any theist-leaning types might be resistant to the concept of ALL being ONE. It's of a spiritual nature, after all. Perhaps such resistance reveals that there is a type of mindset more compelling than anyone's claimed theist values, in that it is very controlling and divisive in its own self-interest and self-preservation, to the point that such will be attributed to a god or ultimate truth/reality as an example of absolute authority.

And yes... in order to be "of god", many will feel the need to judge "what is not". So my "ALL IS ONE" view would fly in the face of that, I guess.

[Reflex]

Lacewing,

A reasonable person would confess that someone who understands your philosophy can also reject it as being confused and inconsistent and simply let it go.

I understand you see inconsistencies in my logic and believe you are pointing out broader possibilities that are dismissed or ignored -- an assertion I can also make about you. I agree nothing is certain, but I have no desire to share the burden of indecision with Buridan's Ass. I can always change my mind as evidence and experience warrants.

"Everything is one," IMV, is a logical certainty but also inconsistent with human experience. It is a paradox that we can either ignore or try to resolve. I choose to do the latter and see your philosophy as doing the former. I've resolved that paradox to my satisfaction, but it covers much more territory than we've covered here. The keys to understanding how the paradox is resolved, however, have already been mentioned; i.e., the chapter from the Tao Te Ching and to deny the possibility of the One's volitional self-limitation amounts to a denial of this very concept of his volitional absoluteness. To deny volition on the part of One is to brush the problem under the rug: out of sight, out of mind.

What I find most disturbing is your blatant hypocrisy, your scorn of human judgment followed by the very thing you scorn.

[Nick_A]

Hi Mike

You seem to be open to questions and not offended by them so I’d like to follow up a bit on your response if it’s OK with you.

In the Genesis story of creation, I think God declaring his creation "good" means it went according to his plan. It's probably difficult, however, for a human person to see earthquakes, volcanoes, flu viruses, and the like as "good", but many folks believe they follow a mysterious God's plan, and thus are "good". Good for testing our faith? Maybe.

You wrote that creation is considered good because it went according to plan. Would it be reasonable to conclude that the universe serves a purpose according to plan?

Your question about "good" -- what a loaded word! I guess I was using it (as in, "God" as a metaphor for "goodness") in the sense of humans treating themselves and others with kindness and respect. This is one interpretation of the meaning of the Golden Rule.

Must the Good refer to human behavior? What if the earth were destroyed as well as Man living on it; would the good as universal purpose still exist? Do you believe the universe is here to serve Man or is man here to serve a universal purpose defined as “good?”?

Genesis 1 refers to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Do you think it refers to Man’s behavior or an aspect of universal purpose in which Man plays a part?

[Lacewing]

"Everything is one," IMV, is a logical certainty but also inconsistent with human experience. It is a paradox that we can either ignore or try to resolve.

Why do we need to ignore it, and what is to resolve? To bring it down to a small scale example, it's like looking at the planet Earth from space as compared to staring at ants busily building in the dirt. You can see both views, and they exist simultaneously -- one being of vastness (without any visible intention), and the other being of a much smaller and limited focus with lots of visible intention. Do we need to ignore or resolve that? It's just different scopes, that contain different characteristics. The "rules" and "needs" of one scope don't necessarily exist in another.

...to deny the possibility of the One's volitional self-limitation amounts to a denial of this very concept of his volitional absoluteness.

I don't imagine that it's volitional (by human standards)... so your statement doesn't ring true to me.

To deny volition on the part of One is to brush the problem under the rug: out of sight, out of mind.

I don't see the problem that you do.

What I find most disturbing is your blatant hypocrisy, your scorn of human judgment followed by the very thing you scorn.

What I find disturbing is the way you put words in my mouth, and assign things to me that are not mine. I do NOT scorn human judgment. I simply point it out for how it is used and what it causes and how it can distort things. It can be very valuable and it can be very limiting. Humans are divine while they are very limited too. Do I have to pick one or the other, and define myself by that limited view? Am I too "flighty" because I won't settle on one particular notion? How would that be accurate?

You don't really understand what I'm seeing. Some parts may be familiar to you, but your responses show that it's not resonating more fully for you, and that's fine. No, I have not read ACIM... although I have heard of it over the years. There are so many ways that awareness and perspectives can arise for any of us... and there are so many facets and degrees of that in everyone. I can appreciate the obvious value of human patterns, but I've always been compelled to look beyond them... and I've been rewarded for doing so, which is naturally very affirming.

[Reflex]

Lacewing:

I’m going to take my own advice and let it go.

[Mike Strand]

Hello again, Nick_A, and thanks for your ideas regarding "good" and your apparent interest in what it means to me.

I tend to believe "good" and the associated word "God" are human (or anthropocentric) concepts or ideas or ideals which refer to actions or objects (or a supposed Being) which human beings hope will promote human happiness, welfare, survival, and the like. Maybe apes and porpoises also have such an idea, centered upon themselves. I tend to doubt that without life that is aware of itself and its own feelings of despair or pain or joy, "good" is an empty word or a missing concept.

The idea that the universe serves a purpose according to a plan, and thus is good, accordingly (if my thinking is consistent) supports the idea that the universe is set up for the benefit to humanity. "God" is the wonderful "parent" in our imagination that planned the universe this way for us "children".

As an application of my definition or concept of "good": To say that a human activity is "good" or "bad" for the environment really means that humans believe that the human activity affects the environment in such a way as to either be beneficial to human beings (good) or harmful to human beings (bad), at least in the long run.

What is beneficial to human beings? We may often disagree with each other on this: We debate systems of government, types of food, types of technology, belief systems (such as religions), and the like. So I may well be ambivalent or mistaken in labeling particular actions or objects as "good", because I lack understanding or knowledge about how such actions or objects may affect me or other people.

Are human survival, happiness, and welfare "good"? If we could hear from a whale or an ape, we might get a "No". But mice, rats, cockroaches, and squirrels may say, "Yes!"

[Immanuel Can]

I tend to believe "good" and the associated word "God" are human (or anthropocentric) concepts or ideas...

That's a possible explanation, especially if we don't consider any of the explanatory problems it entails. It's even a plausible one, especially if we take for granted that there is no actual God. The question, of course, is is it the true or right explanation? And that's a different question.

The idea that the universe serves a purpose according to a plan, and thus is good, accordingly (if my thinking is consistent) supports the idea that the universe is set up for the benefit to humanity.

Not necessarily. If there were a God (and let's just take that for the moment as a hypothetical), then it would be quite rational to suppose He created the universe for a purpose of His own, a purpose within which human beings fit, and maybe even that they importantly fit; but not necessarily that His whole purpose was to do what they would expect of Him, or to "benefit" them on the particular terms they might anticipate.

As an application of my definition or concept of "good": To say that a human activity is "good" or "bad" for the environment really means that humans believe that the human activity affects the environment in such a way as to either be beneficial to human beings (good) or harmful to human beings (bad), at least in the long run.

There are several questions here, of course. We might wonder what is "good" or "beneficial" for human beings. Surely whatever it is would be something that would help them to actualize whatever purpose for which the Supreme Being would have created them, no? I mean, assuming such exists, of course. But would it be something that they necessarily had to understand automatically, or at first? Could it not be that the Supreme Being had a larger understanding of the situation than any of his creatures?

But you know this problem, I sense, for you say...

What is beneficial to human beings? We may often disagree with each other on this: We debate systems of government, types of food, types of technology, belief systems (such as religions), and the like. So I may well be ambivalent or mistaken in labeling particular actions or objects as "good", because I lack understanding or knowledge about how such actions or objects may affect me or other people.

Well put. We might be quite clueless about how it all comes together, no?

Are human survival, happiness, and welfare "good"? If we could hear from a whale or an ape, we might get a "No". But mice, rats, cockroaches, and squirrels may say, "Yes!"

Or, as we think, they might actually have no such conceptions of "good," and the question thus may be thrown back on us.

[Nick_A]

Hi Mike

The idea that the universe serves a purpose according to a plan, and thus is good, accordingly (if my thinking is consistent) supports the idea that the universe is set up for the benefit to humanity. "God" is the wonderful "parent" in our imagination that planned the universe this way for us "children".

What about the functioning universe gives you the impression that its purpose is to serve Man? It seems far more evident that Man on earth serves the universe by the results of its bodily processes. Why does this appear odd to you?

As an application of my definition or concept of "good": To say that a human activity is "good" or "bad" for the environment really means that humans believe that the human activity affects the environment in such a way as to either be beneficial to human beings (good) or harmful to human beings (bad), at least in the long run.

Can we agree that good and evil for us living on earth are purely subjective decisions. Objective good and evil doesn’t exist for us. Life may be meaningless below Plato’s divided line as expressed in Ecclesiastes but that isn’t to say that the objective good as a conscious expression of the necessity of the universe cannot be the objective good.

[Belinda]

Hi, Nick_A, thanks for reading my last post.

Your question about "good" -- what a loaded word! I guess I was using it (as in, "God" as a metaphor for "goodness") in the sense of humans treating themselves and others with kindness and respect. This is one interpretation of the meaning of the Golden Rule.

In the Genesis story of creation, I think God declaring his creation "good" means it went according to his plan. It's probably difficult, however, for a human person to see earthquakes, volcanoes, flu viruses, and the like as "good", but many folks believe they follow a mysterious God's plan, and thus are "good". Good for testing our faith? Maybe.

Jesus claiming only God is good, not himself, can be interpreted as Jesus viewing God as an ideal for human behavior (i.e., the golden rule), which he himself felt he had not achieved. This notion speaks against the idea of Jesus as divine, at least when he walked the earth. Some Christian theologies, especially early ones, did not claim that Jesus was divine.

Science has so far been unable to tell us whether what exists is ordered or chaotic. The cosmic god is defined as that which orders what exists. It's a matter of faith whether or not I believe in that order. As it happens I do.

The various gods which command the several ethical systems follow from the sort of order which is believed in . The sort of order which is believed in is the theory of existence , that is to say the ontology, which is believed in.

Jesus declaring that only God is good means that Jesus equated God and absolute , Platonic good i.e. the Platonic Form of the Good.

[Mike Strand]

Thank you, Immanuel Can, Nick_A, and Belinda, for your stimulating thoughts on my July 1 post!

It’s difficult for me to think of “good” and “God” other than as human ideas that express deep human hopes of happiness and well-being for ourselves. I admit, however, that I'm often tempted to conceive of a concept of universal order (perhaps in the mind and actions of a Superior Being) that is for the ultimate fulfillment of some purpose for all self-aware life. (I hope it doesn't just refer to the fulfillment/well-being of a superior race of aliens who are experimenting with us "lower life-forms").

Such a larger concept may well be beyond human capability to understand or explain, or maybe we’ll discover the explanation some day, or a species will evolve that is able to do so.

Regarding the search for a larger (e.g., Platonic) definition of “good” or “God”, I can’t help but think of the saying attributed to Confucius: “The hardest thing of all is to find a black cat in a dark room, especially if there is no cat”.

Well, there could still be something in the dark room to be found, but not a cat. This moves me to prefer a practical, anthropocentric, even subjective definition, simpler for me to grasp and discuss.

[Immanuel Can]

This moves me to prefer a practical, anthropocentric, even subjective definition, simpler for me to grasp and discuss.

Well, as I said earlier, such an explanation could be considered possible, maybe even plausible, and yes, probably simpler. None of those adjectives, however, are associated with making the explanation more right or true, are they? The truth could quite easily be an alternate possibility, perhaps more plausible given different facts, and also more complex than easy for us to think about.

Either way, the acid test will be whether or not it conforms to the facts of how things actually are, no?