This would indicate that they in fact only exist as a result of their religions. — Maureen
In that case, let's assume for instance that the object that we know of today as the Rosetta Stone was not defined as such until the 7th century, even if it existed and was known about prior to the 7th century. The stone could have existed and humans could have been aware of it prior to it being defined as the Rosetta Stone, but it cannot be assumed that the stone does not exist or it was simply made up as a story regardless of whether humans had witnessed or were aware of it prior to its defining, because the stone is tangible and can and has been witnessed by multiple humans since its defining, and therefore it does clearly exist in spite of anything. But the same argument cannot be made for any God. Unlike the Rosetta Stone, it can indeed be assumed that any God does not exist or was made up in conjunction with their respective religions, and the reason why is because Gods are not tangible and cannot be physically witnessed, and for this reason we also don't know if humans were aware of or considered the presence of any given God before the God was defined in conjunction with its religion. On the other hand we have to assume that this was not the case, because I don't know how anyone could be aware of something that cannot be seen or witnessed physically unless this thing (God) is defined. How else would any human have been aware of its presence?The particular God definition, as a Christian-type God, didn't exist before it was defined, but that type of God might well exist before anyone defines Him.
How else would any human have been aware of its presence? — Maureen
In other words, before Christianity came about, there may as well have been no Christian God. I will not argue that there could have been a Christian God even before Christianity came about, but unless humans were aware of His presence before the onset of Christianity (which is impossible to determine, but again very unlikely), then no one among us can argue that He existed before then. — Maureen
So therefore how would you know they existed in the absence of religion? — Maureen
Also, I think you’re 1) conflating atheism and agnosticism and b) presupposing that atheism is an argument for God’s nonexistence. The latter would be limited to “hard” atheism; atheism (a-theism) per se is simply (defined as) an absence of theistic belief (theism), not an affirmative belief that God doesn’t exist.
That is, everyone is born an atheist.
Because unlike Gods, the existence of the sun or mount Olympus can be established by their physical presence since they can be seen. There is no disputing their existence in spite of them being defined by someone at some point, because they can be said to have existed by pure nature of the fact that they can be seen, and therefore whoever identified them knew of their presence by seeing them. Meanwhile, because Gods cannot (and could never) be physically seen, this poses a challenge as to what their existence is contingent upon, or how their existence was conceptualized by those who initially defined them.Why wouldn't your argument work for something like the sun, or Mount Olympus?
Before the Bible or any other religious text was written, or more specifically before its respective religion came about, did that religion have a God as far as humans knew? — Maureen
But there might still have existed a God, — S
Your question actually makes no sense. — S
To me it makes sense. — god must be atheist
A god which has been in existence forever, must have had some traces of himself or herself before a religion adopted it as its own. — god must be atheist
Because unlike Gods, the existence of the sun or mount Olympus can be established by their physical presence since they can be seen. There is no disputing their existence in spite of them being defined by someone at some point, because they can be said to have existed by pure nature of the fact that they can be seen, and therefore whoever identified them knew of their presence by seeing them. — Maureen
Truly, the Christian god is not the same as the Jewish god, and the Muslim god is just yet different from the two. — god must be atheist
That’s what the Christians, Jews, and Muslims believe, — T Clark
i.e.. Nothing 'exists' before it is conceptualized/languaged/ thinged by humans within their socially evolving language. Even the 'thing' we call 'time' only 'exists' relative to human planning purposes, such that 'things existing before human observers' is a useful process we operate NOW, in which we picture a primative world in our mind eye.....This relativistic principle can be applied to any 'thing' conceptualised, from 'rocks' to 'gods', — fresco
I wouldn't be so quick to generalize there. I'd bet plenty believe that the god of different religions isn't any different. They'd think that the differences are relics of the "translations" basically. — Terrapin Station
This could very easily be the case, but to argue that is to say that those who wrote the religious texts had themselves only had ideas or witnessed things that would cause them to believe they had experienced God sensorily. This still does not change anything about my initial argument, though, which was that Gods are not tangible things whose presence has ever been physically seen.If experiencing the thing in question sensorily is all that's required, surely some religious folks--and often the ones who wrote religious texts, claim to have sensorily experienced god
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