As in God cannot be comprehended in a material/physical sense.

As in God cannot be comprehended in a material/physical sense. — GreyScorpio

Yep, I see no problem with that assertion (and neither do the major tradition religions, including Christianity).

It is important to observe that God is far from being the only member of the set of "notions which cannot be comprehended in a material/physical sense". The Socratic problems alluded to earlier (virtue, knowledge, justice, piety) are all about this kind of notion.

you are more than free to disagree, and there are very logical arguments against, but in no way can you make a reasoned case that the ontological, cosmological, or arguments be design are illogical.

Would you care to explain to me how?

no -

Alright, So, If God can not be comprehended in a physical sense then that means that, logically, he can have no effect on human experience I believe? The non-physical cannot interact with the physical. If this is true then the truth of creation is not implying, suggesting or effecting anything about human experience. How can we truly understand things like this if we have no experience of such? Leading from this, if we have no empirical evidence, then does this not mean that it is not falsifiable? Ayer proposed the argument that religious language is not meaningful unless falsifiable, and according to the scripture itself, as we have just discovered, God himself is not falsifiable or fallible. Therefore, the meaning is completely lost, no?

In another attempt, if God cannot be comprehended in a physical sense, then what sense do we comprehend such a being to be able to parade his existence. "God is watching over us", "God is speaking to me" implying that he is interacting with the physical and this seems to be entirely impossible and God cannot do the impossible. So what are we to believe?

Then how am I to learn about your opinion?

God himself is not falsifiable or fallible. Therefore, the meaning is completely lost, no? — GreyScorpio

Fallible was the wrong word to use here. Couldn't think of the other one. Sorry :lol:

So, If God can not be comprehended in a physical sense then that means that, logically, he can have no effect on human experience I believe? — GreyScorpio

Would you apply this reasoning to "justice", "beauty", "knowledge", "virtue", etc? None of them can be comprehended in a material/physical sense, but they appear to have lots of effects on human experience.

The non-physical cannot interact with the physical. — GreyScorpio

This presupposes a meaning of "physical" that turns the sentence above into something tautologous. If we eschew this meaning and examine the issue more closely (see observation above), we see that the non-physical interacts with the physical all the time, non-stop.

In another attempt, if God cannot be comprehended in a physical sense, then what sense do we comprehend such a being to be able to parade his existence. "God is watching over us", "God is speaking to me" implying that he is interacting with the physical and this seems to be entirely impossible and God cannot do the impossible. So what are we to believe? — GreyScorpio

Quite simply, we should re-examine the dogma :D that the non-physical cannot interact with the physical. Let's do it by steps. What does "physical" mean?

This presupposes a meaning of "physical" that turns the sentence above into something tautologous. If we eschew this meaning and examine the issue more closely (see observation above), we see that the non-physical interacts with the physical all the time, non-stop. — Mariner

Ah, But are these concepts interacting with us, or are they just concepts that we posit to understand what we are talking about. Just like what we do with the word 'God'. I admit that these concepts show that they are able to have an impact on our experiences but are they correct to use in this sense? "Justice", "Beauty" and "Knowledge" are all concepts that don't necessarily effect us directly like the impact of a quickly moving train, or a hard hit on the head from a ball. The way in which these concepts and sensations are used are completely different. For someone to say "I feel beautiful" is not the same as feeling a piece of wood for the first time.

Quite simply, we should re-examine the dogma :D that the non-physical cannot interact with the physical. Let's do it by steps. What does "physical" mean? — Mariner

"Physical" is something relating directly to the senses. Something that we directly observe.

The way in which these concepts and sensations are used are completely different. — GreyScorpio

Precisely. They are different, which is not a reason to consider one of them more fundamental than the other, to try to reduce one to the other, or to disregard one of them.

Remember: A's and R's agree that God is not detectable through the senses. The question is where do we go from here. To claim that "since God is not detectable through the senses, he does not exist" is a problem of ontology and epistemology (not of theology); one must try to defend the principle "only what is detectable through the senses exist", which is the hidden major premise in that claim, before espousing it.

But the examples of beauty, justice, knowledge, etc., run counter to the premise -- and you agree with that. Beauty, justice, and knowledge exist -- though they exist in a different way than pieces of wood, trains and balls.

"Physical" is something relating directly to the senses. Something that we directly observe. — GreyScorpio

So, examples of notions which are not referring to physical objects, besides the aforementioned beauty, justice, virtue, knowledge, would be:

Triangularity
Britishness
The United States
Atoms

Right?

After all we do not directly observe any of those. To see a triangle is not the same as seeing triangularity; to see a british city (or a british person) is not the same as seeing britishness; and no one has ever seen "the United States" with the naked eye. At most one has seen some lines in a drawing that purport to represent the United States. But one can play that game with gods, angels and demons too.

Atoms is a cute one too.

Right, I finally understand. So what is your main standpoint then? That God exists or he doesn't exist?

Mostly, it is that the answer to this question (sorry to sound so Clintonian) hinges on the meaning of the word "exists". God certainly exists if this word is taken to mean, let us say, the "big sense" of exist -- the one which encompasses transcendent and imaginary beings (not to distinguish between these right now to make a clearer point). And God certainly does not exist in the "restricted sense", the one which encompasses objects of sense perception, but which excludes abstractions, concepts, and other notions which are not objects of sense perception.

The subjacent reason for so much vitriol in God-debates is that the participants are not addressing God's existence per se, but what follows from it. A God-debate in the format "Does God exist?", in principle, is no different from a hobbit-debate. Do hobbits exist? In some senses, yes, in other senses, no. But we don't see people disagreeing vehemently over the issue. That is because the existence or non-existence of hobbits does not impinge on, say, other people's freedoms, or on the organization of society, or on the meaning of life, or on the destiny of souls.

God (for people on both sides of the debate) is a powerful little word. It addresses much more than dogma and history.

One observation (quite empirical) that sheds some light on what is going on in God debates is that we don't have to explain to toddlers what God is. They appear to have an innate notion of, let's say, "external and universal authority"; and this is the crux :D of the God debates. The discussion is much more about authority vs. liberty than about the definition and properties of God. (In other words, we don't have to have a clear notion of God to use the notion in an instrumental fashion -- as toddlers do).

I think in large measure, people talk past each other when they are not clear on the basis of what they believe to be true. You can believe things to be true by either, fact, reason or faith.

Often in "God exists" discussions one party is arguing from a basis of reason against another party arguing from a basis of fact. Or one is arguing a point based on faith.

it is not a matter of fact that God is,
it is reasonable to believe that some definitions of "God" is, or at least was
it is a matter of faith that the God of the Bible, or the Torah or the Koran, or the fill in the blank - exists.

You can believe things to be true by either, fact, reason or faith. — Rank Amateur

At the basis of all three there is experience.

(This is not a disagreement. It is just an observation that explains how one can transition from one mode to the other without discontinuity. They have a common root).

- agree

God (for people on both sides of the debate) is a powerful little word. It addresses much more than dogma and history. — Mariner

I completely agree with this. The stigma around the word God is the main problem with 'Does God exist?' debates.

At the basis of all three there is experience. — Mariner

What is experience? (not saying I disagree with you, but this term itself must be clarified)

At some point we will have to point at something and say, "This is the fundamental block. It cannot be explained by recourse to something else. If you are asking what it is, you already know it". Experience is my candidate for that fundamental block. If we try to explain it, we will always be going around in circles.

We can describe it, of course. (Which is not the same thing as explaining it). "Have you experienced X?" means, "did you, as a conscious subject, become aware of the presence of X?" But this description is already mixing the concepts of consciousness and awareness -- and we know (by experience!) that experience does not require, absolutely, either acessory notion. (We can experience a kick in our face while asleep. And we will wake up with a big pain in our face, perhaps missing teeth, etc. All of them aftereffects of the kick: but they are not the kick itself).

In some sense, our consciousness can retrieve unconscious experiences, going back (at least) to early childhood. What is the nature of that which is being retrieved? The fundamental blocks of our lives (not merely mental lives). I can't go further than that.

Okay, so then you're saying that facts, faith and reason are directly emergent from this fundamental block. I would call this "life" or "being" perhaps.

Here's a question (playing devil's advocate now).

If God exists in a similar sense that justice, truth, beauty, etc. exist, then why is it that some cultures and religions have no notion of God (in a transcendent sense, I'm not talking about the immanent Devas) - for example, Buddhism? How could they have missed it?

Right, I finally understand. So what is your main standpoint then? That God exists or he doesn't exist? — GreyScorpio

That is a questions that requires an understanding of what is the basis for the truth claim, for either answer. If, as per the discussion above, the only valid truth claim you would accept is fact, that God could be proven as some being that occupies space at some point in time, can be measured and weighed. Or a predictable force or wave that the effects are subject to repeatable experiments where there is sufficient evidence to be explanatory as scientific theory. Than the answer would be there is no proof that God, per that definition, either exists or does not exist. The only scientific acceptable answer to that proposition is there is no answer. Science only confirms existences that are proved or disproved, science makes no claim on the unproven.

If the basis of the truth claim is reason, than the question would be better framed as is it a reasonable belief that God exists. And this is not a dichotomous condition. There a reasonable arguments that God does and does not exist. This is the realm of Philosophy, not science.

If the basis of the truth claim is faith, than there is no argument with the claim. People can belief by faith what they wish. Or chose not to believe what they wish by faith. This is in the realm of Theology.

If God exists in a similar sense that justice, truth, beauty, etc. exist, then why is it that some cultures and religions have no notion of God (in a transcendent sense, I'm not talking about the immanent Devas) - for example, Buddhism? How could they have missed it? — Agustino

I don't think that God exists in a similar sense that justice, truth, beauty etc. exist. Those are merely examples to underline the point that "X exists" is equivocal, that X may exist in many different modes.

The apophatic theology has it right. God is not a proper subject of any sentence; we cannot speak of Him without falling into equivocation. The best that one can hope for is fruitful analogies (and these depend on experiences, of both speaker and listener).

The teachings of Pythagoras about the Monad and the Dyad are probably the best non-Christian attempt to refer to God as He is (as opposed to God as He reveals Himself to us). Are you familiar with them?

As for the point about Buddhism, I would have to have some evidence that they have truly "missed" the Pythagorean Monad. As far as I know (which is not a lot), the Buddha-nature shares some traits with the Monad. If that is correct, then there is nothing being missed.

Are you familiar with them? — Mariner

Not very, do you have a reference?

Unfortunately the best works that I know of are in Portuguese. "Pitágoras e o Tema do Número" and "Platão: o Um e o Múltiplo". Fantastic works.

Perhaps the SEP entries on Pythagoreanism and associated notions can shed some light.

Using a symbolic language to summarize the point:

Being comes from Nothing, i.e., 1 comes from 0.

The begetting of Being (1) begets polarity (2), automatically, as a result of the coexistence of Being and Nothing, and later as Being becomes individualized in a variety of modes (all of them dependent on polarities for existing).

When someone understands being and nothing as "partners in existence", this understanding, by conjoining both partners, supersedes them (and is symbolized by 3).

Pythagorean tradition goes on in this fashion up to 10. The set of insights (one associated to each integer up to 10) is called the Pythagorean tetractys.

To lead the discussion back to your question in the thread, God is not 1, he is 0. The creative abyss our of which all Creation sprang forth. 1 would be something like the Platonic Demiurge, rather than the Christian God.

Buddhism was an outgrowth of Hinduism which describes God in terms of aspects, one of which is MahaVishnu which is the absolute transcendent aspect of God as they think about it. They clearly do have a notion of a transcendent God.
Whether they acknowledge it within their own doctrine is no indication that they have no notion of the concept.

The question "does a god exist" typically presumes that there are only two possible answers, yes or no. It presumes that things either exist, or they don't. Let's observe reality to test this presumption.

The overwhelming vast majority of reality from the smallest to largest scales is space. Now let's apply the presumption. Does space exist or not, yes or no?

There is "something" between Earth and Moon or they would be one. But this "something" has none of the properties we would normally associate with existence. It's invisible, has no weight or mass, color or shape etc. Not being a physicist I'm making no claims here other than to suggest the question of existence would seem to be rather more complicated than the simplistic dualistic "yes or no" nature of the question at the heart of the God debate.

We might continue from there to observe that while the paragraph above is basically just common sense available to any thoughtful person, high profile experts on both sides of the God question have been earnestly debating the God question based on the "yes or no" presumption for centuries, a process which continues to this day. Such an observation might cause us to deepen our skepticism of authority, leaving us little other option than to think such things through for ourselves.

Ah, but upon what basis would we do that? If order to think this through for ourselves we would need to reference some methodology which we judge qualified to evaluate the question. So before we do anything else we must first prove that whatever methodology we have chosen is qualified for the task at hand.

If we choose holy books as our methodology, before we dive in to quoting scripture we must first prove that holy books are qualified to deliver credible answers on the very largest of questions. If we choose reason as our methodology, before we dive in to doing logic calculations we must first prove that the poorly developed ability of a single half insane species on one little planet in one of billions of galaxies is capable of developing credible answers regarding the most fundamental nature of everything everywhere (scope of god claims) an arena which that species can not begin to define in even the most basic manner such as size, shape etc.

If one follows this trail in an intellectually honest manner one will likely arrive at the understanding that there is no methodology which can be proven qualified for questions of such enormous scale as god claims. At this point the God debate collapses in on itself and we arrive at the truth, we are ignorant.

And then the useful question becomes, what is our relationship with this asset which we have in such abundance, our ignorance?

@Jake
:clap: Well said!

@BrianW, thank you.