Do you believe in a personal God?
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Well, think of the suffering, think of the poverty, think of earthquakes, think of other natural disasters, think of tsunamis. Why does God give us SH't? IF you are pissed, and if you throw the guy who didn't appreciate your work in hell, then you're not perfect and need anger management classes.
Maybe suffering on Earth IS hell. Oh damn, I just applied a personal interpretation to the Qur'an that makes me a hypocrite. brickwall
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Maybe suffering on Earth IS hell. Oh damn, I just applied a personal interpretation to the Qur'an that makes me a hypocrite. brickwall
The Quran is not straightforward language to us, and to the present generation of people who know Arabic. But during Mohamed's time it was pretty straightforward (to them). Classical Arabic is the language the quran was written in. So I guess personal interpretations won't harm you.
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The Quran is not straightforward language to us, and to the present generation of people who know Arabic. But during Mohamed's time it was pretty straightforward (to them). Classical Arabic is the language the quran was written in. So I guess personal interpretations won't harm you.
Magic Mushrooms may help give a clear understanding.. hypno
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Magic Mushrooms may help give a clear understanding.. hypno
Do you know Old English?
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Do you know Old English?
I don't know English at all. O0
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I don't know English at all. O0
I take that as a form of retreat.
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I take that as a form of retreat. P
giveup
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Salam,
God maybe a substitute for the marvels of the universe.
Why? Most normal believers do not conflate the marvels of the universe with the One whom they believe created the universe.
If God was intelligent and with emotions that would be a problem wouldn't it? For an intelligent being to create us, it should have to be far more complex to create an organism like a human, let alone the universe. For something to exist as an entity, something else should trigger it to exist. So who created God? ;D
Interesting that you believe it is necessary to start putting conditions on an 'enity' that by your own admission must exist outside any reality you could experience. Is it then logical to start using the theory of mechanical determinism on the concept of God?
If human logic can't grasp that, then there is no point in science and reason at all.
I pondered on this a long time and I still can't grasp how you made the leap from the first statement to the next.
People believe in Personal God because "I believe it because I believe that because I know from somewhere...."
The key word here is "believe". As is the case with some atheists I've spoken to, you're using this word in autopilot and plugging it in where it sounds right, without actually paying attention to what it means. People 'believe' in God for various reasons. If you're pointing out that this is not logic, then allow me to congratulate you for pointing out that belief logic. But perhaps you've failed to see that people have good reasons for believing in God, many of which have a foundation from logical reasoning.
There is no evidence of the existence of an intelligent creator scientifically at all.
What exactly would evidence of an intelligent creator look like, scientifically? Because as it stands, anything that breaks scientific axioms is always put into the "haven't figured it out yet" drawer, to be revisited later. And all things that conform to the established scientific facts are deemed 'normal' and thus do not provide evidence for an intelligent creator.
We don't know where the matter came from.
Interesting, because earlier you were attempting to use determinism to falsify the existence of God, who exists in a realm you know nothing of. Yet you seem happy to leave your determinism equation unresolved by stopping at the BB.
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The thing is to see things like this
NOTHING CAME BEFORE THE BIG BANG, NOTHING EXISTED. >D
What came before the big bang?" or "where did the energy for the big bang come from?" Both innocent enough questions, but they both imply as if there was a time "before" the big bang. Think about it, The big bang was the event that created the fabric of reality, time included (space-time) Explained beautifully by Einstein's theory relativity. There can be no "before"!
The main reason, this question pops up, is because we as humans have always lived in an environment where an effect is preceded by a cause. We find it really difficult to grasp such concepts as Nothingness, Black holes, Infinity and things popping in an out of existence. In fact, we find it so difficult that we tend to assign an intelligent agent to these things. Someone all powerful and all mighty who created these things for us. It makes everything simpler and less stressful.
peace
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NOTHING CAME BEFORE THE BIG BANG, NOTHING EXISTED. >D
So I take it you changed your position from yesterday?
All the matter that the entire universe is made of was already present (albeit in a different form) at the Big Bang.
What came before the big bang?" or "where did the energy for the big bang come from?" Both innocent enough questions,
Which are also questions I didn't ask.
The main reason, this question pops up,
Can't see who popped this question to you. Wasn't me.
In fact, we find it so difficult that we tend to assign an intelligent agent to these things.
To be fair, you should really speak for yourself and not project your difficulties in comprehension onto others. The belief of an intelligent God can come from various different reasons.
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NOTHING CAME BEFORE THE BIG BANG, NOTHING EXISTED. >
The red highlighting above is from me.
That is a materialistic opinion/explanation of the creation. There is also a monotheistic opinion/explanation, like the following. It is all according to The Qur'aan with all Qur'aanic verse references. Just click on the link below.
http//free-minds.org/forum/index.php?topic=9600440.msg247806#msg247806
Peace,
Khalil -
You said it yourself, there was no such thing as time prior to the big bang. It doesn't even make sense to say "nothing came before the big bang, nothing existed" because "nothing" has never ever existed. Prior to the big bang there was actually something!
The quranic creator is simultaneously as personal as it gets and utterly detached from creation. The judgement is based on numbers. That's the whole point of perfect justice, you can't mess with the raw data. Numbers can be harsh or merciful but they're just numbers and they simply do not lie. Reality is crude and harsh in that sense but look again, it's so easy to kill life yet it absolutely thrives on this planet.
If you end up in hell, you clearly were an ass, just as if the scales read 600lbs you are assuredly obese beyond measure. I have never quite understood the point of God creating a creature only to throw it into torment myself but the concept of perfect justice isn't hard to understand. Isn't it funny that 8312 states that people who think this cannot be have themselves exceeded its limits?
I am not eternal, I came from my mothers' womb as a result of the interaction between sperm and egg.
Might want to double check as to who you really are. I am currently 13.75 billion years old myself. But then again, 13.75 billion years ago I put a brand new battery in my cosmic watch, so my real age is "whatever". Boy did installing that battery cause quite the stellar ruckus. My reasoning being, if I am to identify with my physical body, there isn't really such a thing as age except the age of time itself. After all, this body is just a chemical reaction caused by a long series of chemical reactions. It's just one long chemical reaction when you think about it from an emotionally detached perspective.
Why stop at the egg and sperm, that's an arbitrary standard that just appeals to our sense of "it popped out of that hole so it began there". If anything one's birth was destined to be from the beginning of the universe. On the flipside of it, "you" could only exist in a universe capable of containing "you". Given that you're here as opposed to not here, it seems to me that you've chosen to make this section of eternity your abode by virtue of being yourself. And that's where all relevance of there being a personal God or not goes out of the window.
Eternity is a fairly accomodative thing. Any scenario can be, it's just a matter of where it "is" or "isn't" in this abstract infinite space that contains all things and things that are beyond the concept of "things" and non-things and other things. Stuff and things really.
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If you end up in hell, you clearly were an ass, just as if the scales read 600lbs you are assuredly obese beyond measure. I have never quite understood the point of God creating a creature only to throw it into torment myself but the concept of perfect justice isn't hard to understand. Isn't it funny that 8312 states that people who think this cannot be have themselves exceeded its limits?
You know what's the greatest discovery is? When you realize that you are free to do whatever you want, without judgement, without any threats overshadowing all the decisions you make in your life regardless of what you have done, what you are doing and what you are going to do--and yet still you choose to create that loving compassionate whole peace on earth because you have found that it is what you are, isn't that the greatest discovery that humanity can ever have?
There is a perfect justice beyond what a human is capable to conceive in just one finite lifetime on earth (which is nothing but just a 'passing of an afternoon', isn't it?). And yet there is a choice for those who would go for more than just everlasting "fires" and "rivers"--that is to go beyond the duality itself. If you know you can go beyond it, wouldn't you choose it? Will you not want to end the cycles of "fires" and "rivers" (referring to all the metaphors of what get singularly defined as "torments" and "paradise" aka "hell" and "heaven" that occurs throughout our lives as humanity, to create what we are always here for?